Happy Memorial Day

 
Chase had a great time today...
- we went to the park
- jumped on a trampoline
- had M&M fans
- played with water balloons
- had wild fun with friends

I hope everyone else enjoyed the long weekend too!

The Great Outdoors...I Think Not!

 
Do you want to know what I spent all day doing today?

This...



You are probably wondering why it took all day to plant a few flowers. Well, if you are like me and you hate being outside in general, it probably means that you devote about one day a year to gardening. One day a year that involves trimming all the bushes, raking all the pine needles and leaves from last winter, spraying the weed infested yard with chemicals, and oh yes, the best part, digging up the ENTIRE flower bed that has been taken over with weeds, redoing the lining and mulch and spending a small fortune on pots with flowers so that your neighbors don't hate you.

I admit it, we are probably the reason HOAs were invented...thank goodness we don't have one...



 

Summer Time

Life is Good

 
Today I am feeling inspired. One of my coworkers was recently diagnosed with Colon Cancer and her positive outlook on life has been amazing. She is almost done with her first round of treatment and based on her blog entry it sounds like the side effects are starting to get pretty bad and yet she is hanging in there amazingly. Talk about inner strength, it is humbling to watch. I just hope that I can handle the obstacles that life throws at me with that much grace. So for today, I am just going to try to be grateful for how lucky I am and for all the good things in life.
 

Craft Fair Prototypes

 
Time to start getting ready for the craft fair next week. In addition to a bunch of swaddlers I made these prototypes.

Here is a little gathered clutch. The only thing that I don't love about it is that it has interior pockets and it may be a bit small for that. I think I will do the next one without pockets.



Here is a hooded towel. The hood is fairly small so it really is toddler sized, I think I may make a few with bigger hoods.




Here is my second attempt at a hooded towel. I was happy with the hood size on this one but I tried to cover all of the seams, and while it looks nice, it isn't very sewing machine friendly because of how thick the seams are. I broke a needle, jammed my machine, and I think I am going to have to finish it by hand.



Lastly here is a fun summery ruffled scarf. I love it but I am not sure if other people will....undecided on if I should make more.


 

Happy Mother's Day!

 
Happy Mother's day to all the fabulous moms out there! I hope you all enjoyed your weekend as much as I did. I honestly didn't have many expectations for this weekend (because I feel spoiled by my husband and family numerous times during the year not just on one day) but it ended up turning out perfectly - I love when that happens.

My Mother's Day Weekend looked like:
- An entire day of babysitting from my mom and dad (who happen to be the best parents ever)
- Hanging with one of my friends that I haven't seen in ages (outside in perfect weather)
- Sewing my hexagon quilt with Capricious while stuffing myself full of Hot Tamales candy
- Flowers, Godiva Chocolate, Soft Pretzels, and a Pandora charm
- A nice new hair cut and eye brow wax
- Finishing the first season of Bones
- Sleeping in
- My dad's yummy blueberry waffles and sausage
- A doting husband who let me do everything I wanted to this weekend without any complaints
- Lots of hugs and kisses and sweetness from Chase (he was amazingly well behaved this weekend)
- Chase blurting out what my "surprise" present was first thing this morning

Everything was perfect, it will be a hard weekend to top next year...I feel lucky to be a mom.

Here is the tattoo I got on my first mother's day.



Also, here is a picture of the pottery pieces Chase made as gifts for people, cute don't you think...


 

Hexagon Quilt Fabric

 


Here is the fabric I plan to use for my hexagon quilt. I am going to do about an 18 inch wide vertical strip of hexagons with solid fabric on both sides. My fabric has all been cut up into 2.5 inch squares and now I am just waiting for my paper pieces to arrive in the mail.
 

Another Pentagon Ball

 
Boris liked Chase's pentagon ball so much he wanted one too. This one is a little smaller but still cute I think. One thing that I have noticed is that when you use a whip stitch and then stuff the ball you can see the stitches, I am wondering if I should switch to a ladder stitch which is what I have been using the close the ball once it is stuffed.



 

Quilted Pentagon Ball

 
I was recently inspired by this ball. I decided that I want to make a hexagon quilt but I thought that it would be a good idea to try a starter project first so I made a pentagon ball. I actually didn't mind the hand piecing at all so I bought some one inch paper hexagons and hopefully I will be able to get stated on a hexagon quilt soon!