Hot Pads

One of my friends lent me a magazine with 50 quilt blocks and I suppose it was inevitable that I would get inspired and decide I just had to make a couple of them. I decided to make some hot pads for Christmas presents. The best part is that I would be able to practice my quilting AND have a gift when I was done! Originally I was just going to make 4 for Michael's Grammy. I spent hours figuring out how big the pieces were going to be and how much material I would need, but after returning from the fabric store and cutting out my pieces I realized I had enough for 10. I have no idea how that happened. Apparently I really really suck at math.

I had a very difficult time picking fabric. I'm not sure why, but in the end this is what I chose. The patterned for the main fabric, the dark for the rest and the lime for the accents.

All the pieces cut out ...

... pieced ...

... and sewn. With a LOT of ironing involved! The quilt block I chose is called Card Basket. In the magazine it's rated intermediate so may have been wiser to do it after a little practice but hey, why not just jump right in??

I think the back looks almost as cool as the front!

All done! Another friend has a link on how to make your own quilt binding so I checked it out and found it was actually quite easy! I think it adds a nice touch to have binding that matches your project exactly.

Since I had so much extra material and the first two turned out so great, I decided to make more. This block is called Water Wheel or Whirlwind. It was definitely a lot easier and therefore turned out a bit better as well :)

This one is Aidan's favourite

I still need to practice corners with binding, but overall I'm really happy with them and also the way the fabric matched!

More Christmas Projects

I am really having fun thinking of things and then making them for Christmas presents this year! I've gotten into sewing a lot more this past year and am really enjoying making new things such as these things I made for some Christmas presents:

I found this pattern for a coloring tote bag, but when I made it, it was super tiny! The bag with the bugs is the original size, the polka dot bag is 9" square.

I love having leftover material that I can use for these little projects! I made Aidan a blanket when he was 8 months old and the bug bag is made from that material. It's the perfect size to hold his Leapster!

I enlarged the pattern to 10" wide by 12" tall which I think is the perfect size. Just big enough to hold a regular coloring book! This material is from Aidan's blanket as well and I think it looks SO great!

I think I like the lining on the left better with all the letters and stuff

The front has seams 1" apart which is perfect for markers! Now that the bag is enlarged, there are 10 little pockets for markers, pencils, pencil crayons - I'm really happy with how they turned out! Once Aidan saw the larger ones he decided that he didn't like his little bag anymore and wanted a bigger one. Thankfully I had enough material that I could make him one as well! The great thing about sewing stuff for your kids is that they have no idea what you're making - until you're almost done, and that can always wait until bedtime :)

Back in the early Fall Michael and I went to a fundraiser for a little girl out in Sexsmith who has a lot of medical issues due to vaccines. One of the items at the fundraiser was a tutu that was super cute! I took a look at it and figured I could probably make it and then when I Googled it, I found a whole bunch of tutorials (even some tutu-orials!) online!

It turned out so cute that I had to go back to get more tulle to make 2 more than I was planning to! And now that I know how easy they are to make - no sewing required! - I think every little girl should have a little tutu to dance around in!

Keira's Blanket

Since I finished Aidan's blanket a couple days ago I've been working on Keira's blanket - it was soooo close to being done, all I had left was sewing on the binding and doing the quilting.

Here's the finished product! You might notice at the top by Muno's block there's a part with no binding - Fabricland ran out of the binding I was using so I'll have to wait for them to get some more stock in before I can finish it completely. I decided to just echo the squares for the quilting and it turned out really nicely. Not too much and not too little - just right!

This is the back. I used Keira's old receiving blankets and it works out pretty well because she's really into purple lately! I wish there were more colors involved, but I only had so many blankets to work with!

Christmas presents ready to go! And now that these are done, I can move on to other projects like housecoats, pajamas and tote bags!!

One Down, One to go!

I stayed up way too late tonight just so I could finish sewing all the figures onto Aidan's blanket, but now it's DONE! Very exciting - so of course, I had to post pictures! :)

The whole thing - it is long and skinny, but it matches his Ikea bed

Closeup of the bottom 2 rows

Closeup of the top 3 rows

... AND HAT!

I had some flame material left ... and since the mittens were a hit, thought I'd try a hat. However, I didn't have a pattern and it turned out to be a little more difficult than I thought. That's why it looks kind of like a mushroom. *sigh* It's kind of funny, actually, but Aidan likes it :)

Halloween

Here are the kids all dressed up for Halloween! Keira is using Aidan's old Pooh Bear costume and Aidan is, of course, Spiderman. I should have looked at the picture and taken a better one with Keira smiling ...

First we went over to the neighbours on either side of us and then came back to the house to wait for Michael. The kids took this opportunity to dive right into their candy! We had been invited to go along with some friends on their bus (yes, a school bus) and trick or treat. It was awesome! The kids had a blast with the other kids and it was definitely warmer than wandering the streets on our own!

Michael and Keira coming back from a house. Keira's getting sick and was really tired by this point (hence the soother) but she definitely wanted to go get candy from the houses. She was just as sure that she did not want to eat any of the candy!! It was pretty funny, she got upset when I tried to offer her some ... I guess that's not a bad thing though!

Aidan and Emaly, who matched quite well as Spiderman and Spidergirl.

The kids with their loot! We did more driving than trick or treating, so we didn't end up with a lot of candy but that's really not a bad thing!!!