WIP Wednesday

So what have I been up to lately?  Oh, you know...just growing a human! 

We had our second ultrasound and it's a girl!!  A squirmy, wiggly little girl who already appears to be talking with her hands.  (I'm sure I don't know where she gets that!)

So of course we immediately went shopping and spent a paycheck at Carter's. We got everything from pjs to a party dress...(yeah...I know...but they're so cute and tiny!)  And then I spent waaaaay too much time putting together potential color palettes. (I mean, what could be more important than picking a color palette and displaying it in mosaic form, I ask you?!?)  For the moment, I'm thinking of this one (it looks better with the actual fabric swatches):

Light gray walls, white furniture, aqua, turquoise, yellow, and just about every, single shade of pink.  Although if you ask me again in 5 minutes, it could be totally different!

So here's where I stand with the WIPs:
~ Growing a human: in progress
~ Filling a closet for said human-in-progress with clothes that will probably be outgrown before we can cut the tags off: in progress
~ Picking a color palette: in progress
~ Approximately 1 bazillion sewing projects: in progress, 1 itsy bitsy finish (stay tuned)

Lost: 1 Mojo

So over the course of the last few months, I seem to have misplaced my sewing mojo.  I mean, there have been times that I wanted to work on something fun and quilty, I just haven't had the energy to actually make it happen.  But I have a pretty good excuse.....

Now that my energy is back on the rise, I'm hoping to be able to bang out a couple of WIPs.  (I need to get all of my basting done before the bump turns into a prohibitive beast!  I also need to get everything checked off my list before we find out the sex...because I'm going to be a baby-quilt-makin' machine once I have my color scheme!  Mwwaaaahahahaha!!)

Oh, and you're probably wondering about our super-awesome announcement cards.  If you're within driving distance of Granby, MA, you NEED to check out April Eve Images!!!  She is SO freakin' amazing and fun to work with...we already have plans for birth announcements, Christmas cards, and 1st birthday photo shoots...and a photo album...and some prints...  I'm not kidding.  I loooooove April and her style...and let's face it, if I don't plan that stuff out now, I'll be throwing my baby into a photo booth at the mall trying to get last minute pics to send out to the grandparents.  Either that or our Christmas cards would be made with sad, poorly lit phone pics in which our baby has the demon eyes...  All my planning doesn't seem to crazy now, does it?  Anyway, April is awesome.  Check her out.  Right now.  And I'm going to spend some time being crafty for a change!

They started it!...

Happy New Year, Everyone!!!  Christmas just flew by again this year and somehow I find myself having to go back to work tomorrow.  Boooo!  I managed to get a lot of sewing done over the past week or so, which is good since I have about 5,000 projects I need to finish!  However, thanks to the pop-up Instagram quilt along started by Megan, Brenda, Katy, Rita, and Lindsey, (and egged on by nearly everyone else) I have neglected ALL of those 5,000 projects over the past few days and started a new one. 

It's super addictive and the blocks only take about 30 minutes each! 

Come on...just try it...everyone else is doing it!.... (#scrappytripalong on Instagram and Flickr group here...just sayin'!)

26 Acts

With Christmas just around the corner, we've been rushing to finish our shopping and paying way too much for shipping to ensure everyone's presents arrive on time.  (Seriously, I just paid equal parts for presents and shipping...awesome.)  And to be honest, we are a very lucky family.  We aren't the kind of people who don't know what to do with all of their money, but we aren't struggling either.  We don't really NEED all that much.  And so aside from shopping for the kids (super fun!), buying stuff for each other isn't quite enough to get the Christmas spirit pumping through my veins. 

As you may have heard, Ann Curry started the newest fad of doing good with a simple tweet: "Imagine if we all committed 20 acts of kindness to honor the lost children of Newtown."  She wrote more about it here.  There are a number of variations on that theme (i.e. 26, 27, and 28 Acts) all making their way through social media and around the globe.  When I went to bed last night I thought "that's such a nice idea." But shortly after my morning coffee (sometimes a girl needs a little caffeine to get her going), I decided that I needed less thinking and more doing.  I was in.  I picked #26Acts simply because I had heard that number the most.  (I know...my complicated decision-making process is astounding!)   I try to do nice things for people on a regular basis: hold the door, smile and say hello, help carry things for people with strollers...once in a while I pay for the person behind me at Starbucks.  The thing I don't do very often is talk about it.  I like to be a quiet do-gooder.  (Those of you who know me in real life are laughing at the idea of me being quiet!  But you know what I mean!)  I'm not usually one for the spotlight when it comes to stuff like that.  But today I put on my big girl panties and documented my 26 Acts on Instagram and Facebook.  I was hoping that if I could get over the weird feeling that comes with bragging about kindness, I could maybe inspire a few of my friends and family to pay it forward for someone else.  So with that, my husband and I kicked off our mission....

Numbers 1-3: Christmas turkeys for the food bank

Numbers 4 and 5: munchkins and coffee for the fire and police departments

Number 6: bought a Christmas tree for a stranger (that's the firehouse...forgot to take a pic when I was getting the tree!)

Number 7: 125% tip for our server at lunch

Number 8: let people cut into traffic about 50 million times (too easy!)

Number 9: told someone I was thinking about them

Number 10: dropped a couple of bags off at Goodwill

Number 11-31: paid off 21 toys (3 layaway accounts) for families in our town

Number 32: donation to Salvation Army

So there you have it..our 26 Acts morphed into 32 Acts and it was amazing - Christmas is just oozing out of me now!!!  This was easily one of my favorite days ever!! When you start to do good things for others, even if you don't let them in on the secret, other people start doing good things for you.  Or maybe you're just in the right frame of mind and you start looking for the good instead of the bad.  People carried packages for me, they were patient and smiled, cars stopped to let us cross the street...it was a chain reaction! 

As a side note, we actually had some trouble finding stores that do layaway (some places only have Christmas programs that were already over and done with)...so in case you're interested, Sears and Kmart look like good places to start since they have year round programs!  AND as a reminder, since many people have made payments on their accounts, you don't have to sell an organ to pay one off...you know, just in case you're thinking about it!

Anyway, I hope my weird, selfish bragging makes you want to do something good in the world!!  Now I'm off to start working on number 33: do.Good Stitches blocks for December. (That one REALLY feels like cheating!)

Oh yeah, and Merry Christmas everyone!!! 

Celebrate Good Stitches, Come on!

(If you were not singing that title a la Kool and the Gang, well...I just can't help you...)

So it's been quite some time since I've checked in.  (FYI, I was going for the world record for consecutive days without posting.  Keeping my fingers crossed that 38 days is enough to clinch it.)

Y'all know I'm part of the {Rad} Empower Circle for the do. Good Stitches charity quilting bee, right?  Well, Rachel has organized a big year-end celebration with prizes galore!  Each circle submitted their favorite quilt for the Best of 2012 contest and voting is open to the public.  Our entry is Heather's Square Pants quilt. 

Awesome, right?

Now here's the thing...each member of the winning circle gets a sweet-ass prize from Marmalade Fabrics: a bottled rainbow fat quarter set. BOTTLED RAINBOW!!  So this is the part where I beg and plead for your vote.  (You should know that I don't see anything wrong with bribery.  I'll be your best friend.  I'll make you cookies.  I'll do your laundry.)  So here's what you have to do.   

1. Go here and vote.  
2. Change computers and vote again. 
3. Repeat until you run out of computers or until the clock strikes midnight.  (Voting ends tonight at 11:59 pm...)  
4. Bask in the knowledge that you have my undying love (and maybe some clean laundry).

Now, "what if you're not in the bee but you've made a quilt for charity," you ask?  Well, you can add your quilt to the pool and be in the running for another sweet-ass prize: a Winterkist bundle from Mad About Patchwork!!  WHAT!?!  Quilts must be added to the pool by tonight at midnight. 

Ok, so quick!  Start voting (thank you, thank you, thank you!) and good luck with the Winterkist drawing!!!! 

Sewing, sewing, and more sewing

While we rode out the hurricane last weekend, I did a lot of sewing.  A LOT!  (We never lost power and didn't have any issues or clean-up from the storm...we were really, really lucky.  So I got to sew for 4 days.  Really, really, really lucky!)

I got my do. Good Stitches blocks done (October was my month...I picked Ashley's Converging Corners block...)

I worked on an improv project (sorry, no pics)...I got a million blocks done. (Ok, maybe it was only 10...but it seemed like a million.)

After all the improv, I needed a structured project.  So I whipped up a little patchwork number with one of my Bella FQ bundles.  (more pics to come)

I machine stitched the binding again....I'm starting to see improvement in my skills...baby steps to getting it right.

And today I picked up some nice fall colors to make Thanksgiving napkins for my brother-in-law. (He's hosting this year!)  I haven't started on them yet, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to want to keep them for myself!

Well, I'd love to stay and chat but I really have to get back to my sewing...(you didn't think I'd had enough yet, did you?)

Blogger's Quilt Festival

I'm adding my Single Girl to the Blogger's Quilt Festival!  I wanted to make this quilt for quite some time before I actually started on it.  And I'm so glad I went for it! 

If you're a regular visitor, you might remember it from this post.  And if this is your first time stopping by, then welcome!  Here's a quick recap for ya.

I made this quilt for a dear friend as a wedding gift.  She had been a self-proclaimed "single girl for life"...right up until she got engaged.  I started with the dark purpley-red wine color of the bridesmaids' dresses and expanded into bright reds, orange, and one or two pinks and purples.  

The piecing was a challenge, but the quilting is where I spent most of my energy! (It's also my favorite thing about this quilt!)

Since my single girl was getting hitched, I used the quilting to transform it into a wedding ring pattern.  It wouldn't have been so bad if I had left myself enough time to pebble an entire quilt.  (But why would I make life easy for myself?)  I spent every spare second working on it and by some miracle, it was finished with a whole 24 hours to spare!

(wow - this is not a great picture...but you can kinda see the quilting?...)

This is one of my greatest achievements to date, second only to the time I single-handedly bathed two dogs and lived to tell the tale.  And in all honesty, if it had been for anyone else I may have kept it for myself, whipped up a quick whole-cloth quilt for the happy couple, and called it fair. But I really love my friend and she really loved the quilt!  Success!!

So here are the final stats:

Size: ~85"x92"

Pattern: Single Girl by Denyse Schmidt

Techniques: patience, free-motion quilting

Quilted by: me

Best Categories:  home machine quilted, bed quilt

Thanks again for stopping by and super-extra thanks to Amy for hosting the festival!