Drop Dead Cute

Local Crafting Goodness

Thank you everyone for all the kind words, love and prayers over the last few weeks!! We've all been enjoying Baby Asa and just laying low having some family time. I hope to start blogging again this week but we'll see how that goes - time seems to evaporate with a newborn and 2 year old. I've been wanting to make a sling for the last week and it blows my mind everyday when I realize it's dinner time already. I figure between breastfeeding and an afternoon nap my productive hours have been reduced to um, well, about an hour a day. Thank goodness my mom is here to help or nothing would be getting done. Anyway, I wanted to let you know about some local craftiness going on over the next month. With some help from grandma I hope to be able to attend some of these events myself.

First up is the Original Sewing and Quilt Expo at the Dulles Expo and Conference Center in Chantilly, VA, September 30 - October 2. I've gone for several years and even though it may not fully be my cup of tea, I've bought hard to find items, taken half a dozen good classes and bought my serger there (most machines are sold at a discount at a show).

On Saturday, October 2, from 10am-5pm is the Crafty Bastards Arts and Crafts Fair in Adams Morgan (a neighborhood in DC). I look forward to this show all year! Lots of great hip crafty goodness. Definitely worth checking out if you haven't before. It's a fun day for the whole family but I'll warn you, there are a ton of people so if you can get away with not bringing a stroller, I would.

Here's a new craft show I hope to check out. One of my friends will be a vendor there with her fabulous earrings and necklaces.

So this isn't really a local event but more of a nationwide event. I recently joined the NOVA branch of the Modern Quilt Guild and found out about this project (basically a challenge/contest). The Modern Quilt Guild is fairly new - started a year ago and has spread like wildfire accross America. The NOVA branch began merely a few months ago. Project Modern has four challenges over the next year and the first challenge is making a quilt based on an inspiration of your choice and it closes November 30th. There are a bunch of prizes including a sewing machine. Find more info here. I would love to do this but have very low expectations of myself right now so I might have to skip this one and catch the second challenge.

Welcome Baby Asa

Baby Asa joined us September 9th at 6:10pm. All 6lbs 9oz, 19.5" of him are just pure sweet joy. So far (keep in mind I'm writing this only on day 5), he has been a fairly mellow baby. His brother was a handful to say the least (colic, reflux, breastfeeding issues, etc.), so to experience what most people consider a "normal" baby is a welcomed relief.

In the early morning hours on the 3rd I had strong contractions 10 minutes apart for several hours and I thought for sure we were on our way to the hospital when they suddenly stopped. As I laid there in bed I realized I didn't get any family photos with the baby belly. So morning came and I called my neighbor friend and asked if she'd be willing to take a few photos. I'm so grateful she was available and willing! Thank you Katrina for blessing us this way!

I woke up on the 9th suspecting my water had broken because I had a little leaking going on. So hubby and I with hospital bag in hand went to the doctors at 9am to confirm. Sure enough I was right and we headed on over to labor and delivery. We were settled in my room about 10:30am. I had been having strong contrations for about 2 weeks, sometimes 10 minutes apart, sometimes an hour apart and they were still up their inconsistent ways. I walked the halls, squatted, tried to get them going and nothing was happening. Thankfully I was 5cm dialated already so I knew once the contractions decided to kick in it should be fast. The doctor came in at 3pm to see how things were going and discovered that even though I was leaking my water bag wasn't fully ruptured so he popped it and I prayed. I want as little intervention as possible in my births and at this point I was getting nervous that things might not go how I would like. I was able to have a natural, no drugs birth with jack (not even an IV) and my desire was to do the same with Asa. However, I also had to trust that everything was in God's hands. So no matter what happened I had to trust in His perfect will and timing.

Well, the Lord was fast to answer because with in 5 minutes I had a contraction, then another and another. They came fast from that point forward. My regular doula wasn't able to be there so I had  backup doula Julia. She was great. She arrived just in time, around 4:30pm. I had never met her before but she dived right in and worked with me through the hardest part of labor to push this little guy out. At 6pm I measured 10cm and got the green light to push. 10 minutes later Asa was in my arms. Once his head and arms were out my doctor told me to reach down and pull him up to me. That was fabulous! I am so blessed and grateful for the wonderful people that were there to help me welcome this little guy into the world. And so thankful to the Lord for His abundant faithfulness and the many many answered prayers.

My doula took some beautiful photos that I wish I could post here but if you want to check them out click here.

 

Kid's Activity Case

This is my little man's present for when he visits the hospital when baby arrives. Currently we're using one of my prototype diaper clutches to keep a small coloring book, crayons and stickers in. It works well and he knows I keep it in my purse so whenever he's in the mood whether at home, at a restaurant, in an airplane or car, etc., he pulls it out and has fun. I've been wanting to make something a little more functional for him and this is what I came up with. I've been making sketches for weeks, changing the design numerous times and then landed on this. I'm so happy with the way it turned out and I hope it works well for him.

It has a velcro closure and this is what it looks like when you first open it. On the right is a pocket for smaller booklets, wikki stix and flash cards. On the left is a bigger pocket that fits Step Into Reading books that I pick up at Target. I designed the pockets so in the event that sides of the case fall to the side of his lap things don't go falling out...hopefully. That's the idea anyway.

The mini sticker/coloring books I find at Target, as well as the flashcards. The Dover books (Little Construction Site) I find at local toy stores and stock up on them whenever I can.

This is what it looks like fully open. The middle section fits a notepad for coloring or the Kumon Workbooks. On the right is an empty watercolor case used to hold crayons. I put a lot of thought into this part. Initially I was going to sew little individual spaces for crayons like you would for crayon or pencil rolls but we end up with a million broken crayons and it just didn't seem practical. Then I thought about making a pocket to keep them in but my little guy likes to see all his crayon options at once and I know that would just end up with him taking them all out at the same time and that would end in a mess. So a see through case it was. It fits the larger triangular shaped crayons as well and eventually he could put pencils in there.

Next to the crayon case is a pocket for stickers and foam stickers. Again, I designed this so he could easily get into it but if it falls to the side of his lap that the pocket is facing up and things won't fall out.

Here you can see that I made a pocket for the notepad or Kumon Workbooks back flap to fit into to keep it from moving around.

I attached the crayon case with two kinds of velcro. The kind on the plastic case has serious adhesive not meant for sewing and the kind on the fabric is meant for sewing and has no adhesive.

Here it is without anything in it. As much as I love this Echino Car fabric, if you decide to make one of these I would advise not using a fabric with a pattern like this. Half the time I spent on this project was just trying to match everything up. Don't get me wrong I love how it turned out and I didn't mind at all because it's for my little guy but having a directional fabric with a very specific pattern made it more time consuming.

A few last specifics:

The Echino fabirc is mid-weight which works really well for this kind of project.

I inserted seperate pieces of extra thick template plastic in-between the fabric layers that form the three different panels to make the case more sturdy and less floppy. I topstitched between the panels so they stay in place and the case folds properly.

Folded, the finished measurements are approximately 7.25"x10.5"h

Fully opened, the finished measurements are approximately 21.5"x10.5"h

Don't think I'll be doing a tutorial on this guy. The amount of steps kinda makes my head dizzy. Maybe one day I'll write up a PDF pattern though. Hmmm. Always coming up with more projects for myself :)

Can't wait to give this to him. Any day now!

Lemonade and Watermelon Quilt

I started this quilt (my first one by the way), about a year and a half ago. I did everything except the binding in about a day and a half. Then something kept me from finishing it and it got thrown on my half-finished-projects-pile and there it has remained. I've been trying to finish all those projects over the last month and I'm happy to say I've been fairly successful! I finished up the binding the other day and TA-DA - here it is! YAY!

My mom is the quilter in the family and has made some amazing quilts. Her specialty is applique. I think I'd go crazy with all that hand work but she makes it look effortless. This little quilt was easy and unintimidating for my first quilt project. Just enough to get the feel for it without being overwhelmed and leaving me excited for the next one. I like that it doesn't really have a pattern, it's fun and I enjoyed placing colors and patterns where I thought they'd look best. Very freeflowing - no rules, yet I learned all the basics to making a quilt. It's 44"X34", nice size for a lap or crib quilt and I got the instructions from Amy Karol's book, Bend-the-Rules Sewing. I fell in love with the colors on her quilt (they reminded me of summer lemonade and watermelon - hence why I named mine that) and inspired me to make one of my own.

The diamond star looking fabric is from a summer top that I haven't worn in years but kept just for the fabric, which I'm glad I did because it works perfectly here. I machine stitched straight lines at varying widths down the quilt to hold everything in place. I made my own binding with three of the fabrics and I love it! Another little touch of something fun.

Please note if you happen to have or buy Amy's book you can find corrections to her patterns here. This one did have a typo.