I'm still here...

We moved into our house last Friday and are trying to get settled in. Things have been busy--the boys are going to new schools *again* (sigh) and they each had a sick day this week and I've been a bit under the weather myself. And I'm working on getting things somewhat organized in our new space.

I do have a cool new sewing area; I'm setting up in the dining area on the main floor:

The black hutch was in the kitchen at our old house and it doesn't fit in the kitchen here. I am going to use the main cabinet area for my small fat quarter bins. I have 5 of them, sorted by color. And somehow they all got packed into different random boxes. I've found four of them but am still missing the red/purple bin. I hope it shows up soon.

The door on the right is a little closet under the stairs, which is perfect for storing my big fabric bins. I will probably get a new, bigger, sewing table eventually, but this little gray table will work fine for now.

So, this past week I've spent a lot of time quilting. I finished quilting the baby quilt that's folded up on the floor in this picture (above), but can't show the whole thing yet. And I also quilted this old UFO:

This little quilt is from a few years ago when I was trying to decide if I wanted to make and sell quilts for a business. It's been pin-basted and waiting, for a long time. I don't want to sell quilts for a business. But I decided to finish this up and send it in to the Bumble Beans Basics quilt drive. A while ago I looked at my goals for the year and I had said I wanted to make two quilts to donate to charity this year. Victoria from Bumble Beans is asking for quilts that will be given to families in NYC who need them. More information here, if you're interested!

I am not sure how my time will be organized here yet. Things are good here, but a lot different. My boys each had about 6 more hours of school each week in Kansas, and their schedules are quite staggered here (one leaves at 7:10 and one leaves at 8:50) so that means I have more time with them one-on-one, and a bit less time for my own personal stuff. Which is fine, just different. I am going to have to get more organized and settle in a bit more before I will be able get into a good routine for blogging.

I did want to share one cool thing before I go--750 Words. Melissa, who is Living a Creative Life, shared this site a few days ago and I signed up that day. If you are familiar with the book The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron or morning pages, which are a part of the Artist's Way program, it is a website for doing morning pages-type writing online. It's not really the same as writing them out long hand with a pen and notebook, but it is a good substitute and takes less time. Which is good. I've written my 750 words for the last 10 days and it helps me dump my brain out, figure out what I need to be doing, what I want to do, and what is important to me. So go check it out!

I finished up this quilt top yesterday afternoon and made it outside with my oldest to take a couple pics in better light:

 

Overall I really like it. I bought this fabric because it reminded me of my Grandma Taylor, and these colors still make me think of her. (I think this is about a 2-year-old UFO.) That outer border was frustrating to make, and it has some mistakes, in part due to seam allowance consistency problems caused by the pinked edges of the precut fabric. I think if I make something with little fiddly squares again, I will trim the pinked edge off first.

If you want to make a quilt like this (or if I ever want to do it again), here are some of the specifications: 

*Hourglass blocks started as 6" squares and I'm not sure what they finished at.

*First border is 2" (cut measurement) strips of the more solid fabrics I had left over.

*2nd border is 1.5" strips cut, finished at 1" wide.

*Outer border started as 2" squares. Actually I did a little bit of strip piecing, just to get the fabrics for that border into pairs, then I sewed 4-patches and then added another pair to make 3x2 units. And then I didn't have enough squares so I cut a few more strips and added a few 1x3 segments in as I was piecing together the 2 long borders. Also, I didn't do the math to make the squares in this border fit on the quilt exactly right.

*The solid is a quilter's only solid from JA, can't remember the name right now.

*Finished measurements of the top are about 43"x47".

my big boy :)

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In other news, we are ready for the next big step in our relocating adventure. Tomorrow morning, the moving truck is bringing all our things (that we said goodbye to on September 15) to the home we are renting. We are looking forward to having more light, more space, and a shorter walk from parking to the front door. And of course we are excited to have all our things back too. I am looking forward to seeing my colorful dishes, my kitchenaid, and my fabric/sewing machines. I'm most looking forward to settling down and hopefully feeling like we are home after all these months of the upheaval that comes with moving.

Halloween 2011

We had a fun Halloween this year. Here are the kids in their costumes before we headed out to the trunk-or-treat:

 

This is the only picture I have of #2 wearing his ski mask. He was a robber; I convinced him he needed the getaway bag with a dollar sign so people would know what he was up to. 

  

 

Another shot of all three of them. Kid #1 is "a guy with a mustache" and he made that mustache out of duct tape. And #3 is Rapunzel, of course. Here's another picture of me and her; this time she has her Rapunzel hair on too:

 

I love how the dress turned out, it was a lot of work but I'm happy with it in the end. (A lot of work like my sewing machine doesn't have a zipper foot and I was going to just sew it in without one but then there was the extra layer of the overskirt and well... I just handsewed the thing. The lace didn't stay in place either so it's all handsewn --tacked really-- down.) Anyway, my little girl loves it, and that helps. I'm glad it fit her right, because I didn't check out the pattern on patternreview.com or measure it beforehand. 

I'm happy that Halloween is over and looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas and moving out of our apartment, next week!

Blogger's Quilt Festival--Matching Quilt

Hi everyone! I wish I had been able to finish a new quilt for this fall's Blogger's Quilt Festival, but with our recent move and the fact that we are living in temporary housing (just for 2 more weeks!), that just hasn't been possible.

So for my entry, I ended up deciding on a quilt I made for my oldest son back in 2004. I had just had my second baby and wanted to make him a baby quilt, and I also decided my then 4-year-old needed a bigger quilt as well. There weren't really sewing blogs back then, but I found an online quilting message board where I participated in a 4.5" I-spy charm swap. The fabrics were swapped in pairs, and I made my boys each a "matching quilt." So each square has a match and it's kind of fun to try to find the matching pairs of kitty, or cow, or ghost, or whatever fabric.

 

I decided to sash this one with 1" strips of black fabric, and I love how it turned out. It's quilted with variegated brightly colored thread, but I don't have any other pictures of this quilt at the moment.

Don't miss out on the rest of Blogger's Quilt Festival! Check out all the great quilts at Amy's Creative Side.

Three years old

Today I have a 3-year-old girl for the first time! I'm so happy that she's been a part of our family.
She was born over 6 weeks premature--it was quite the dramatic fall season that year. I love this picture of her; she was 2 days old.

 

Here she is around her first birthday:

(If you want to make a charm pack dress like this one, I have a free tutorial here.)

And age 2:

And last night, while she was opening presents:

And just to keep this a little bit sewing related, here's the progress on this year's Halloween costume, so far:

Happy Birthday Lauren!!

Progress (& my take on copyright)

I fixed my daughter's skirt, what do you think?

 

A couple of people suggested that I just add to the length or let her wear leggings underneath...and that could have worked, but it was so short it didn't really cover her tushie very well anyway, (it did but it flipped up very easily) and also when I was putting the elastic in the first time it was clear how short that yoke section was going to be and I stitched really close to the edge of the casing fabric when I was putting the elastic in (I sew the elastic into a circle first and then sew the fabric down around it. No threading the elastic through here!) Anyway I was worried that it might not last through being washed. So. I cut the new yoke 6" wide and made sure I sewed a good 1/4" from the edge when I put the casing in this time. The skirt looks really good on my girl and will be less likely to flip up and show her bum (which will be wearing tights or leggings, but still). 

I've also made good progress on my hexagon project this week.

 

I am pretty much copying the layout from Alex's solids hexagon pillow. It won't take too much time to finish sewing this together, and then I'll need to decide if I need to make some partial flowers to go on the ends of the shorter rows. 

On a different note, this week Angela wrote a couple of blog posts about copyright as it pertains to quilt/craft designers. Very interesting. What she's saying, and I agree, is that pattern/tutorial writers don't have any legal right to dictate what can be done with finished products made from their patterns or tutorials. This is something that has been covered a lot on Sewing Mamas (where I used to spend a lot of my sewing-related internet time :) ) over the years, and the general consensus there (admittedly referring mainly to clothing designs) is that selling a pattern tracing or copy of a pattern is illegal, and selling items made from someone else's pattern is not against copyright law in the U.S.

Anyway, it's a big topic that can be expanded into the shady practice of cottage licensing, digitizing licensed characters, the use of licensed fabrics, and more. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Skirt for my girl

 

I made this little skirt for my girl over the weekend. Sadly, I think it's a little too short and I'm going to need to unpick the yoke, cut out the elastic, and add length by making the yoke a couple inches longer. The worst part? Well, besides black thread + black fabric? I topstitched the yoke. Oh well, I will be much happier with the project if I redo it, even though it won't be the most fun.

It has been a little chilly here lately and from what the locals say, it's going to be this way until March (at least). So I decided to make a scarf and found some cute patterns over on ravelry. I am trying to hold myself back from going and buying yarn to make this or this, at least until I make a little more progress on my hexagons or finish up the skirt re-do.

We are coming really close to making a decision on where we will live for the next year. (We're going to rent for a year while we get to know the area better, and then buy a house.) Looking forward to hopefully having a place with more light! Here's a picture of the view out our living room window:

 

It's pretty, but also makes things quite dark inside. Even when it's sunny out. We have a similar view from all of the windows here, by the way. (Also, they have been replacing/repairing the wooden deck railing out there and it's not painted yet, if you were wondering.)

So this week my project goals are to work some more on my hexagons, redo the skirt, and finish a quilt back. What are you going to make?

Sewing Pretty

My new little backup sewing machine arrived on Friday. I decided to get the Janome Hello Kitty machine, and so far it's working great. It's a very basic machine, and I can't use my quarter inch foot from my other Janome on it, but I think I'll be able to figure out a solution to that.

I also wanted to share a little sneak peek of what I've been working on. I'm probably not going to share the whole thing until it's been given to its owner.

In moving news, we are working on getting adjusted to our new place and climate. My little girl keeps asking if various friends from back in Kansas are moving, too. It is a little sad to have to keep telling her that no, they are not moving too. We are working on adjusting everyone's wardrobes to fit the wet and cool climate--I am still looking for a rain jacket for myself; it needs to be cute. We are looking for a home to rent for a year and hoping our Kansas house will sell soon. I don't have a great internet connection or as much time to sew...I can't wait until I can sew more and share about it here on the old blogge. :) 

Easing back in (with hexagons!)

Well, we are in our temporary digs here in Seattle—the boys are in school and happily riding their respective buses, my husband has figured out the park and ride and our cars arrived yesterday so I don’t have to drive anyone to their destinations any more. I'm happy to have my very own car back too; it was so weird driving a different (rental) one. We moved here with what we were able to pack into suitcases and bring on the airplane, so that means no sewing machine. For a little while. (Hopefully there will be an update on that very soon!) I brought some bits of my favorite fabrics and have been working on some hexagons.

We are in a dark-ish, halfway underground apartment for these first two months, and taking photos is going to be challenging.

Back in July I went to a blogger meetup that I then failed to blog about. One of the cool people there was Leigh, who blogs at leedle deedle quilts. I LOVE this project of hers (she brought it for sew-n-tell that night), and thought I might maybe start a hexagon quilt. I'm not all the way decided on that, but I am thinking making a pillow, or maybe two, might be more realistic for me.

I wanted to share a couple of things quickly (we have kind of crummy internet here, sigh)--Amy from the cute life started making some Dear Jane blocks; I love them. Some of them are the same ones I made for my Kona challenge No Prints Allowed/Jane Stickle 9-Patch.


And I heard from Jessica at Favequilts.com, and my crooked pumpkin quilt block tutorial was included in a round up of twelve pumpkin quilt block patterns. Check it out if you need some fall sewing inspiration!



Hopefully I'll be able to start posting here more regularly--I've missed sewing, and sharing about it here too. I have some other sewing projects I'm planning on working on in the next few weeks too. I hope you have all been doing well!

All packed up

Today's the big day, well one of them. Yesterday everything got packed up. Our suitcases are packed for the next 2 months in corporate housing, everything else is going on a truck today and then into storage. The house goes on the market tomorrow, fingers crossed that it'll sell quickly!

Big News

Hi everyone! Sorry I haven't been blogging very much lately; we just found out we will be moving to Seattle in about 3 weeks from now! My husband had several job interviews (for one job) and we were hoping he would be offered the job but weren't sure until earlier this week. So now we are hurrying to get our house ready to sell and get our stuff ready to move. I started on the organizing/decluttering a few weeks ago and it has felt good to donate and trash a lot of the extra clutter around here. I did find out that neither Savers nor Goodwill will accept a fake Christmas tree in August, though. I still have a lot to do but I am trying to do some of the deep cleaning each day now along with continuing to go through all our stuff. It is going to be really hard for our family to leave our friends and neighbors here, and I know being in a new place will be challenging too, but we are excited to start a new adventure!

I don't have a lot of sewing of my own to show off but I did get my quilt from DQS11 in yesterday's mail.

The quilt was made by Karen, who goes by Fun & Comfort Quilts on flickr. She was so generous and included workbooks for each of my kids and a quilting book for me, along with vintage zippers, trims, thread, and chocolate. Amazing. I really like the gorgeous color gradation in the quilt and the triangle blocks are so cute.

Also, I mailed my quilt for this swap on the last day which was Tuesday, and Marilyn got it yesterday. I had a lot of fun making a quilt for someone that I actually know this time. She sent a really sweet thank-you email yesterday... as much as I love getting my quilt in these swaps, I have really enjoyed making quilts for someone else, especially when they really love it. :)

I also have a little toddler dress to show you:

 

This was made with the peasant top pattern from Little Girls, Big Style, with a few changes. I folded out some of the ease in the bodice front and back pieces, and the skirt tiers aren't as full as the pattern suggests in the book. I had to cut the whole thing out of this remnant of shirting fabric I had that was just under a yard. I shortened the sleeves, too. I like it, and I think my girl will be able to wear it into the fall and winter with long sleeves underneath and leggings or tights.

So... I will probably not be posting here very much for the next little while. I am still not sure if I will be able to have my sewing machine while we're in temporary housing so I am thinking I need to put myself together a little hexagon hand sewing kit to keep myself busy.

Farmer's Wife Blocks 7-10

Top left--block 7, Birds in the Air. The lesson I learned is that even if things look contrasty, they might not be so much on a really small scale. Also, I got a Parisville fat quarter stack and am excited to use some of the Parisville purples in my purple-focused Farmer's Wife quilt. :)

Top right--block 8, Bouquet. Done is better than perfect!

Bottom left--block 9, Box. Adding in some darks.

Bottom right--block 10, Bow Tie. Kind of monochromatic.

Finished Doll Quilt--DQS11

I finished this up the other day and decided to share the final product.

I did mostly machine quilting, but the houses are hand quilted with 2 strands of embroidery floss.

So glad to have this one done!

DQS Quilted

I did the quilting on this today. It was fun, and I like it! I will be sending it off to my partner soon...just needs binding and a label, and it will be done!

This was going to be a "quilt blocks" post

But I kept going and got all of my Punctuation blocks finished and sewn together.

This is pretty much what a whole jelly roll makes. I have about 6 blocks left over to sew into a strip for the back. Each strip of the jelly roll made 2 complete blocks with about 2.5" left over at the end. Right now this is 48" x 54", and I'm going to get some yardage from my LQS to add solid borders just to the top and bottom. These blocks were really easy to make, with only two trips to the ironing board needed. I love the bright colors and the letters. My favorites were the strips that had 4 prints on one strip (like the yellow one on the bottom row.)

And here are some quilt blocks I've finished recently:

Blocks 3-6 of the Farmer's Wife quilt sampler. I am having fun using purple in each block, and some new fabric arrived today that is greatly increasing my purple stash. I'll show you later.


And, some more blocks for my DQS project. I'm going to make a little row sampler, with these stars and squares, and some of the houses I made earlier. (Oh yeah, and one more row that isn't done yet.) I hope my partner likes it!

Finally, I have an idea for a fun little quilt using these:

It's going to be a baby quilt for my niece who's scheduled to arrive anytime now. I got the solids from Tammy at Marmalade Fabrics. Turns out she's pretty much my neighbor. It was super sweet to be able to drive just a few minutes and see her cool little fabric shop last night. Thanks for letting me stop by, Tammy!

Summer Fair Quilt Show!

I finished up the binding on this quilt the other day, and this morning I saw a post about the Summer Fair Quilt Show, hosted by Gen X Quilts, so I decided to join in the show!

I made this quilt top last year, I think in March, just for fun. Did the quilting over a few days during the last couple weeks, and finished it yesterday. It's 36" x 48", and it's just going to hang around at our house for now.

Go visit the fair, and see all the cool quilts! There are recipes, too!

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I've been working on some more Farmer's Wife quiltalong blocks, and blocks for my doll quilt swap too. I guess I'll do a quilt block post soon here.

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It has been super hot here for days, no, weeks. (I don't watch the weather, but other people in this house do, and they are saying we've had something like over 30 days with a heat index over 100 so far this summer). My 11 year old just got out his 5th grade solar cooker and I think he's making hot dogs for dinner tonight.

Go! Baby Winner

Thanks so much to everyone who stopped by to enter the Go! Baby fabric cutter giveaway. I really wish I had more than one to give away, but I don't.

Anyway, I'm happy to announce that the winner was commenter #37, Sharon, who said, "I would use the strip cutter to make a jelly roll race quilt." Congratulations, Sharon!

Here are some burp cloths I made after I got my Go! Baby; the pic is a bit dark but I think they turned out pretty cute! The circles are just raw edge appliqued on, and the tumbler strip has the edges all turned under, with a couple ribbon loops for added cuteness. The burp cloths are double thickness of prewashed white flannel, 10" x 15", and they are turned and topstitched.

Machine Quilting Sampler

I finished up the quilting on this quilt today. I decided to have it be kind of a machine quilting sampler. There are 12 blocks, and within each block, each strip of fabric is quilted with a different design. I did repeat designs in different quilt blocks, though. I still need to bind it but wanted to show you some of the quilting:

I really like how that feather turned out. I quilted it after watching some Karen McTavish videos.
The loopy zigzag (right below the feather) is repeated in probably every block in this quilt.

Echo quilting around a bird. It isn't perfect, but that's ok.

I am in love with this sort of fan quilting thing I did in the purple/pink strip above. I tried some loopy hearts up there too, should have done that one more than once.

I did a kind of carnation filler in the center square of this block.

This photo is a little more close up than the others, and you can see some less attractive quilting here too. That's ok... it's all part of the process. I learned a lot while quilting this quilt, my skills improved (you get better with every quilt you quilt, you know) and it was fun, too! I will probably do a sampler like this sometime again. 

Now I need to figure out what to do next. I will probably get going on some Farmer's Wife quilt blocks, and make the binding for this quilt. I have a baby quilt that I really ought to make soon as well. :) (My sister T is having her 2nd baby girl within the next month!)

p.s.... Don't forget to enter my giveaway for an Accuquilt Go, Baby! :)

Go! Baby Giveaway!

Hey there friends, I'm excited to let you all know that Accuquilt is going to give away a Go! Baby fabric cutter along with three dies and a cutting mat, to one of my readers.

To enter, leave one comment on this blog post (one entry per person, please). Let me know something you'd like to make using the Go! Baby, if you win, ok? I will choose the winner on Monday, May 25 (oops, I meant July 25! The summer has gone by so fast!). Make sure I have a way to contact you; if you're a no-reply blogger, include your email address in your comment. I will email the winner

Here's a link to my zigzag mug rug tutorial, made with my Go! baby triangle die, and if you're new here, I wanted to let you know I have lots of other free tutorials as well, for quilting as well as clothing sewing projects and techniques.

Have a great day, and good luck!

Zigzag Mug Rug Tutorial!

Today I have a fun little project to share, but first I want to tell you about my new toy.... I got an Accuquilt Go! baby fabric cutter a few weeks ago (right before my vacation). I picked three dies, and I decided to go with ones that aren't necessarily very easy to do with a regular ruler and rotary cutter. I got a circle die that has three sizes of circles, an equilateral triangle die that also has three sizes, and the 3 1/2" tumbler die. The Go! baby is really easy to use, and my kids were pretty much fighting for turns at cranking the handle.

I opened my Go! baby as soon as it arrived and started cutting triangles. I've been wanting to make a zigzag quilt for a while and that was what I had in mind as I cut pink, green, yellow, and white triangles from my scrap bags. (I am pretty sure that the idea of making zigzags from these kind of triangles came from my friend Lorilee, and I think it turned out pretty well!) I used the medium triangles and they finish really small (about 1" on each side) but that's ok because this is a small project.

Step 1: Use the Go! baby to cut 14 medium triangles in each of 3 colors. Also, cut 45 white triangles. Sew the triangles into rows of 7 colored triangles alternating with white triangles, and make sure a white triangle is at each end of each row.

Step 2: Sew the rows together. I started by sewing the pairs of pink, green, and yellow rows together, making sure the triangles were offset to create the zigzag. Then I sewed the three sections together, this time making sure the white triangles were offset.

Step 3: Trim the sides of the mug rug top. Trim the longer edges too, if needed.

Step 4: Layer the top with batting and backing, and secure with a few pins. Choose thread for quilting.

Step 5: Quilt. I used my walking foot and matching thread to quilt down the middle of each zigzag row. Then I trimmed the excess batting and backing fabric.

Step 6: Bind. I found this single binding tutorial and changed it up a bit by machine sewing the binding first to the back and then machine sewing it down in the front. I think next time I use this technique I will go with a 1.5" binding strip instead of 1.25".

All done! (It finished up at 6 1/2" x 8" in case you were wondering.) Now I have a place to keep my big sweaty glass of ice water all summer long. You could use the larger triangle on this die to maybe make a mug rug with one zigzag stripe, or you could make a placemat or larger quilt easily with that larger triangle. If you make a project with this tutorial, please let me know--I'd love to see it! (Somebody needs to make a Charlie Brown placemat or mug rug...)

I will be giving away an Accuquilt Go! Baby along with the winner's choice of three dies to one of my readers very soon, stay tuned!

Featured at Amy's Creative Side

Hi everyone, how's your Friday going? It is super hot here. I spent a few minutes on the porch with my toddler earlier, painting on the concrete with water and paintbrushes. Other than that, I'm planning on staying in the rest of the day.

I wanted to let you know that today I'm featured over at Amy's Creative Side. Thanks so much for letting me share a bit about myself and my quilts, Amy!

Also, this was a couple weeks ago, but Penny at Sew Take a Hike posted about the cute chicken potholder she made using my pattern from 101 Patchwork Projects. I love it. I think I need to make some more of them.

And finally, you should know that I'm almost done with a new project and tutorial... using my new Accuquilt Go! Baby! fabric cutter. I will have a tutorial soon, and then I will get to give a Go! Baby away to one of my readers. Check back next week for that, but for now, here's a little sneak peek of my project:

Something a little zigzaggy....

peer pressure... I caved

Here are my first two blocks from the Farmer's Wife Sampler book.

For now I am planning on trying to include purple in as many blocks as possible.

I couldn't get my printer to work yesterday, so I used my brain and math to make these blocks. Block 1 on the left isn't exactly perfect... but I did my best and got tired of re-sewing. 

Back from vacation

Last night we got back from a week in Utah... back to the heat and humidity. We are under a heat advisory for the next couple of days at least, gotta keep the kids inside as much as possible and hydrated, too. We might need to go to the movies in the next couple days, and the library, and the pool too....

Here are some of the trip highlights--
*My flight out of KCI getting delayed and then being stuck in the Denver airport for over 6 hours, unsure if I would make it to my high school reunion. Living this day on 3 hours of sleep and with a 2-year-old, and her car seat, in tow.
*Flying standby for the first time, and making it to Utah in time (barely) to see my friends at the reunion. It was so much fun. And weird, but fun.
*Oh yeah, I would have had the privilege of flying into Provo if the standby thing hadn't worked out. Crazy, huh. (depends on how much you know about Provo, I guess.)
*Lots of family bonding.
*Reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows for the second time. I had forgotten most of it. Ready to watch movie #7 (I think I'll buy the DVD) and maybe #8, soon.
*Meeting new friends from the quilt blog world. (This will be its own future blog post... but we had fun, and delicious cupcakes.)
*Getting into Doll Quilt Swap #11, yay! I am excited about whoooo I am sewing for, this time. I have a couple of ideas for this person, maybe I'll make a sample block or two in the next couple days. I made a mosaic of quilts/ideas I like, in case the person sewing for me is curious:

The missing photo up there is a zigzag quilt. I was feeling too lazy to go back and edit my mosaic. And yes, some of these have been in previous DQS mosaics I've made.

Last week I did some machine quilting for my mom (it's super secret, well one person can't know about it, but it is really cool, and I used disposable cleaning gloves for my quilting gloves), and this morning I took in the elastic in my skirt waistband, but other than that, I haven't sewn for like a week and a half! I've missed it and have a bunch of things I want to work on this summer.

what I've been working on (and a quilting dilemma)

I finished something cute the other day:

 This is the knotted top from Little Girls, Big Style in size 2. (affiliate link)  I used a couple of the DS Quilts fabrics from JoAnn, and the dot fabrics were others I had on hand. (The big red/white polka dot is from JA too, and I love it. The light blue is a mystery. I bought it in Utah a couple years ago but I don't have any other information on it.) I like this pattern; it turned out really cute, and if I make it again I will definitely make the shoulder straps significantly more narrow, or else make a pleat in them where they are attached to the bodice back. With the straps this wide, the back of the top doesn't lay really smoothly when my girl is wearing it, and making the straps narrower will look better in terms of scale on the smaller sizes.

And, my friend Ceresa made the adorable bow this afternoon. She makes fabulous bows and sells them at her etsy shop, Bowreesa. The bow she made matches the top perfectly!

I got some new quilting thread yesterday and decided to start quilting my vintage sheet quilt.

I am just going to do a little at a time (we have some busy weeks coming up here) and take a kind of sampler approach to the free motion quilting.

I am kind of bummed out... because for a long time I really wanted an extension table for quilting on my Janome, and I quilted with the extension table attached for the first time last night and this morning... and it's not working for me. The fabric seems to be sticking to the extension table (or at least not sliding very freely), and I know that can be corrected if I buy one of those slider things I've heard about, but the problem is that the extension table I got extends in front of the needle area of my machine and I have to hold my hands, arms, and shoulders higher in order to manipulate the quilt. And it hurts. So I need to figure out a solution to this somehow. Maybe see if there is an extension table that doesn't go in front of the machine, or at least not as far. Or find out about getting a higher chair (a lower table isn't really going to happen any time soon I'm afraid.)

I will probably do some more quilting tomorrow; we'll see if I can make any changes in my approach that will solve my problem!