Girls' Dresses and a Doll Dress

It is time to update my blog since I have been doing so poorly at it lately, just a little busy and have not gotten all the pictures to add with the updates. So I am updating with the few pictures that I do currently have and will worry about the rest later. 

So lets start with an what got me to make these dresses. Which is all thanks to a visit from a friend from California at the end of August. Her daughter found out that she was coming to see me and wanted to know if I would make her a new dress, since she can no longer fit in the one we gave her two years ago that my youngest daughter had grown out of. I thought it was cute that she called herself to ask me to make her a dress. A few days later my youngest daughter and I where wasting time before going somewhere so we stopped by the local fabric store and picked out some fabric and a pattern. My friend and her daughter liked  what we picked out. Although I had everything cut out before my friend's visit it did not get sewn until after she had left. The first dress is the one sent to my friend's daughter. The last picture is my youngest daughter in her new dress. In the middle is a picture of a doll in a cute little dress. This is the matching doll dress to the dress that my daughter passed on to my friend's daughter. The doll dress had been cut out when I originally made the dress for my daughter but it only just got made, it only took me about four or five years to get around to it after finding the bag it was all put away in years ago. It was my purse project as I call it, a small project that I can keep in my purse or bag and hand sew when I have to sit and wait somewhere. So it was only fitting that the picture of the finished doll dress went with the new dresses for the girls that had the original dress and both loved it so much that they wore it every chance they could until they could not fit in the dress any more. It is also fitting that their girls' new dresses kind of match even though they each got their own version of the dress.

Cross Stitch For My Husband

 

I think it was last year I came across a cross stitch kit that reminded me of our Golden Retriever. When I told my husband about it he wanted it so I went ahead and bought it. I do not know how long it sat waiting to be worked on but I finally got around to making it for him. Now to just get it framed so he can put it up somewhere.

Though I am a bit behind with posting it. Considering I finished it before I made the recent doll clothes for my daughter's doll and my boys' bears. At least I have gotten it up now though. I still have a few other things that I am behind with putting up but they will have to wait a little longer since I can not seem to locate the card reader to load the pictures. I will work on finding it and hopefully get the other stuff posted tomorrow or at least as soon as I can get to it. 

Doll Sleeping Bag & Pillow by My Daughter

My youngest daughter enjoys to sew with me from time to time. One night my husband was watching some reality television show while I was looking at something, I think I was reading am email. Anyways some how the two things made me think that she might want to try a new sewing project. I asked if you would like to make a sleeping bag and pillow for her doll. She loved the idea, but was disappointed that I was not planning on doing it with her right then and there. She did get to pick out her fabric that night but I did not let her sew it until the next day. Now I just need to find another simple project for her to make, I might even try something a little more challenging since she has been doing so good the simple ones.

Doll and Teddy Bear Clothes

With all the rain we have been getting lately, my kids where stuff in the house playing with their toys. One of them asked if I would make a new shirt for their teddy bear. I had some patterns for doll clothes that I had not tried yet so I pulled them out and had my kids help find fabric for them.

 

 

Each of my two youngest boys got pants for their bears and on got a vest. 

 

 

My daughter wanted something that looked a little like a nurses top.

 

Either way they each have a list of things that they still want me to make for the dolls and teddy bears. I just need to get to work sewing more to get them all done.

Kids Hats

Having been busy with kids activities and school, I had not been doing a lot of sewing. A few days ago I was getting bogged down with my school work and decided to take a break to do something more enjoyable for me. While going through my patterns I came across a hat pattern and decided to make it. I started out planning on just making one hat but of course my kids four youngest all liked the hat and wanted me to make them each one. So far I have only made three of the hats, I need to finish the last hat or I will have an upset kid.

The pink hat was the first hat that I made. It was the only hat I had planned on making. I think it is cute and that I might make a flower pin to put on the hat to hold up the brim in the front for when my daughter wants to have it up. 

Below my son shows off his dinosaur hat. The third hat that I made is a stripped hat that we call the dizzy hat because it makes everyone get dizzy when they look at the pattern of the fabric for more than a second. It has two panels on the inside from a piece of Harry Potter fabric to make it fun for him. The last hat I need to make may end up being made out of a sports fabric. 

Husband's Wall of Accomplishments

To start things off I must admit that I have been getting behind on my posts but for good reason. I have been in school, my kids finished school and I have been making sure that they are busy and staying active. So I have a few posts that will be getting posted today to get caught up.

 

This post is to show off my husband. At the beginning of June my husband was medically retired from the Air Force after fifteen years of service. He was hoping to make it to his twenty but that did not happen. His new job starts in a week and he will be working as a civilian in the same area as he just left.  

On the wall in the center are the certificates that he got at his retirement and the shadow box of his flag, ribbon rack, dog tags, etc. On the outside of that are the degrees that he has completed during his time in the military. He is still working on his doctoral degree, so that might be joining the wall before we know it too. Our family is very proud of him and all that he has accomplished.

 

Update on Friends Quilt and Two Baby Blankets

It has been a while since I last was able to post. The last thing that I had posted was the progress of a quilt top for a friend from a design that she made up. That was back during my spring break since I had started back to school. I little while after that post I was able to do a little more work on the quilt top before having to put it aside so that I could focus on my school work. The picture below is the picture of the point at which I stopped working on it with a print of the design that it comes from. My classes are finishing up the last week this week, then I will have a week or so off that I hope to be able to finish off the top of the quilt and get started on quilting it. Though I do not think that I will get it finished before my summer term for school starts up, but I am hoping to get a good amount done on it in the time that I have free from school. 

 During one of my rare free days from school work and errands, I went to spend some time with my friend that I do crafts with. The day before as we planned our get together my friend reminded me that a lady from church was due to have her baby and the ladies at church were giving her a baby shower. I was not able to go due to having to make it to one of my classes. So I found some fabric to make a baby blanket for my friend and I to tie when we got together so she could take it to the baby shower as a gift from both of us.

As I looked for the fabric for the baby blanket for the lady from church reminded me that I needed to still make a blanket for one of my husbands co-workers who is due soon. I had forgotten how far along his co-worker was but figured that I better get her baby blanket done too. It was a good thing that I did too, because the day I got back from my friend's house my husband brought home a baby shower announcement for his co-worker. Her baby shower I would be able to make it to since it was on a Saturday. Since I had a few extra days and had extra fabric from the blanket I decided to make a matching puppy dog toy.  

To bad for me that Saturday was not my day. I ended up having my jaw and ear hurt by one of my dogs trying to jump over me. To twisting my ankle and falling hitting my back and head on concrete tiles. Which I am still in pain from but doing a lot better.

Stacey's quilt

Well this is the picture that I picked for my friend's quilt.

I was able to get the stuff I need for if right away and get the fabric cut into the general size needed for each section. Due to my school work and still getting use to all the work it requires after all these years, I was not able to get much of anything done on it until my spring break. Once my spring break started, I set to work on the quilt. What you see in the picture below is what I managed to get done in three days. It is mostly machined pieced to this point, with just the little bit of green in the center area being hand appliqued. What is left will be hand appliqued, which might take me a while to get done now that my spring break is over. I am hoping that I find enough time to fit in some work on it so that at least the top of the quilt get finished before summer. If I manage to get the entire quilt done before then would be even better, just have to wait and see.  

 

My friend Stacey and Me

 

My husband and I have a long time friend named Stacey that is an artist. She has recently begun teaching at a high school in El Paso, Texas. She recently designed a couple of drawings through her lesson planning for her classes. My husband suggested that I should make one or both into a quilt. To which Stacey has offered to make more designs for me to turn into quilts. So although I have a few more things on my list of projects to complete I will be starting to quilt one of these for Stacey as a sample. Wonder where this will take us with this collaboration between her drawing designs and me quilting them.

 

 

Time to pick a picture and figure out how much fabric I will need. I get to go get the fabric tomorrow and get started.

Apron

Last summer when my mom came out to visit she brought aprons that she made for each of the kids. They love them and have used them plenty since she was here. Though since then I have had to redo two of them. The first one was last year around Thanksgiving I think. My son had worn his while helping bake, then left it on the floor instead of in the hamper to be washed. The dogs loved chewing it but it was saved and had to just get made a little smaller. The latest victim of the dogs chewing was not as lucky. It had to have a complete reconstruction done, but the little guy who it belongs to still likes it and is happy we could at least save it. The apron is just not a big one that goes up over the chest and ties behind the neck anymore. Although in reconstructing it for him I learned that the guys who work at one of my family's favorite restaurant wear this kind of apron, guess. Guess I never noticed but do you blame me, I am always busy trying to help the little kids pick what they want to eat or something.  We are always a large group after all.

Dream Catchers

Well I have finished yet another one of my projects from my list of unfinished stuff.

With it being a rainy day and being sore from a back injury last week thanks to one of my dogs, I figured it was a good day to work on some of my unfinished stuff. Yesterday I managed to weave the centers while taking breaks between homework assignments that I had to get done. Not feeling like doing much because of the rain, what better activity then to do something simple.

The top dream catcher is for my daughter's friend and the bottom one is for my oldest daughter. They were the two who started the chicken crazy at my house. Since my puppy did not take to kindly to the chickens and killed all but one. We saved some of the feathers from the two that started the craze. The dream catchers are a way for them to still keep something from the chickens since they are not going to have any more for a while. Yes I said they, it is funny but the chickens belonged to both my oldest daughter and her friend, can you tell why we call her one of my other daughters.

I hope that they like them. I have my daughter's hung up in the family room not far from her bedroom door. I decided that I am going to wait and see how long it takes for her to notice that it is there.   

Plaid Skirt

After I made the dress form of my daughter I started playing around with some fabric to make a skirt. I was kind of thinking it could be more of a pattern than anything. Until now the skirt has been half finished on the dress form, so I am pleased to say that it is now finished. Now I just have to see wants it. My daughter who it is actually sized to does not like it and from the moment I started playing with the fabric has said she will not wear it. I am thinking it will go to one of her friends, who has said that they liked the skirt and would wear it. Luckily for me she fits my daughters clothes so I should not have to worry much about altering it to fit her. 

Initial Pillows

Another one of my projects can be checked off my list of things that I need to complete before starting anything new. About four years ago I start making initial pillows to go with my bird pillows in my formal living room. One pillow for everyone in the family. Well something happened to my computer so I was not able to get the embroidery pattern for the letters W and Z for my name and my youngest sons name. So the other pillows got put away and never finished. I have decided it is high time that they got finished. I will just have to wait to get the last two letters done until my hubby can either find a fix for the box to write my pattern on my disk for my machine to read or he buys me a new box. At least these ones are done though so no more sitting in the unfinished pile of things.

These pillows are mirror images of the initial. I used two colors, a blue for the boys in the family and kind of greener color for the girls. They are done on a creamy yellow colored fabric which was used as the backing for the bird pillows that I did. Making them match enough to go in my formal living room together very nicely.  

New QR Code Pillow - Sarah

I finished a new QR code pillow, this one is for one of my oldest daughters close friends. (aka one of my other daughters) To be honest I had cut out the parts for it last year but never got them put together. From the time that I picked the fabric to use the pillow changed from going to one friend then another, to my daughter and then back to the first friend. This one says 'Sarah' and I think is fitting for her since the fabric is tie-dyed and she wears a lot of tie-dyed shirts. To me this picture does not due it justice because how bright the colors really are.

That is one project off my list of unfinished projects from 2012. Should be about seven more before I start any more new projects. I am hoping that I will be able to go get the missing items that I need so that I can finish my daughter's dream catcher and a quilt. I have not decided if I want to machine or hand quilt my quilt piece yet though. At least right now I have a cross stitch to work on when I am not working on homework.

Final project of 2012 and the start of my new year

To finish off 2012 I finished this cross stitch that I was working on. My family let my relax in the living room for the most part by myself while I finished off the project. It felt good to end the last day of the year by finishing off a project. It was just in time for me to start a new cross stitch as we watched all the celebrations of ringing in the new year on television. The new cross stitch is a kit that my husband asked me to make for him of a golden retriever sleeping on a quilt. 

With it being the being of the year I decided to took a moment to pull out all my unfinished projects to see how much I have to complete. Then made a list of all of the projects and what all I need to get or do to finish each of them. To my amazement I only have about ten unfinished projects currently and that includes the new cross stitch that I started on New Year's Eve/Day. Though it does seem that the projects I need to complete are large or have a lot to them. There are two quilts, one king size top is complete the other is a partially pieced full size top. Then there is a QR code pillow that is cut and ready to sew, a set of six pillows that just need filled (counted as one item on my list), a dream catcher using the feathers from my daughter's chickens, and a skirt that needs a zipper and hemmed. Plus my new cross stitch and of course the cross stitch of my mother-in-law and her dad. Even getting a few projects framed and so they can be hung and not ruined by my kids or animals. 

So I plan on finishing off all those projects as soon as I can and hopefully before starting any new projects, unless hired for something. They will have to be worked into my schedule of kids activities and my school work because I start back to school on Monday. Not to mention the house projects that must get finished because they are already started but have been sitting half done, driving me crazy. So basically I am going to have a busy start to the year but it should be a great year. Just take me a little time to get myself a schedule figured out to be able to get a little of everything done each week or how ever I manage to work it out. Wish me luck as I get it all started and work out my schedule.