October 2012

October has been so busy over here. First Sewing Summit, and then it took a few days to recover and catch up on my sleep. The next weekend we took a long trip together that was much needed. It was so good to just spend time together as a family. And after we came back it was back to the grind and I sewed a few miles on my sewing machine in just two days. More on that later. I’m nearly done with all my Christmas sewing already and it feels so good. I’ve never been this ahead of the game before, I can hardly believe it.

I’ll hopefully get finished going through the Halloween pictures on my camera today. I’ll just tell you it was freaking awesome. And although I do have a little bit of “this-costume-isn’t-handmade” guilt, she picked her costume a few months ago and it was the one where I magically found the perfect pieces I could order online and then it was done. It was nice, but I don’t think I’ll do that next year. I love making Halloween costumes.

Be back soon. I’ve got a lot to share! (And a lot of that Christmas sewing which I can’t share for months!)

Sewing Summit

Last night I got home from spending four days in the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City with a group of fantastic and amazing women. I made some wonderful new friends, ate a lot of brownies, didn’t get any sleep, and didn’t sew a stitch. But working on the Sewing Summit staff with Erin, Ali and Megan was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever been a part of.

Last Wednesday, the day before Sewing Summit began was one of the worst days in a long long time… it started with the mechanic telling me I needed four new tires, somewhere in the middle I got pulled over and got a ticket, while on the freeway driving to SLC to start work on Sewing Summit organization stuff a semi kicked up a rock and chipped my windshield. And then I realized I had left a very important bag of stuff at home by the couch and had to drive all the way home to pick it up. Sigh. Awesome, right? But after that things got much better. (Except the next day we had to buy 2 new tires for our other car. Lame. Did I mention I had to buy a new phone last week too? And we have to replace a broken window this week as well? Seriously. I think there’s a saying about raining and pouring that should go here…)

But starting Thursday morning I threw myself into work and didn’t stop until yesterday afternoon. It was happy and rewarding work. But I am exhausted. I feel like I could sleep for 24 hours before I am really caught up. But instead I am off to buy new tires, mail 29 boxes full of fabric and goodies home for those people who ran out of space in their luggage and snuggle and play with Creamie. And something about grocery shopping and laundry will need to work it’s way in there too.

See you soon.

Morning Makeover

Late last night I was at the grocery store trying to get everything ready so I can be gone for four and a half days. I shouldn’t ever go to the grocery store alone. I have all this “time” to browse every aisle and look at stuff I’d never take the time to look at when I have a small person with me.

But last night I was at Walmart and saw these black mocs for $12. And they were almost cute, but not quite. So this morning I cut the black bow off, trimmed the fringe a bit and tacked it down on the edges so it didn’t stick up quite so much. Then I tied a scrap of pink ribbon in a bow and I’ve got myself a much cuter pair of mocs for all my late night making stuff sessions. Not bad for $12. Next on my list is painting my toes and buying jellybeans. Important stuff right there.

Down to the Wire

Well friends, Sewing Summit starts in just two short days. I am plugging away at my to do list. I am ridiculously thankful that Scott had a paid holiday today so I could get a lot of things done without parking Creamie in front of the TV all day. She had a great time playing with him all day. And I successfully threaded my serger without crying and then hemmed 20 tablecloths.

Today I made a pretty vintage sheet bunting that is going to be given away in a bunting swap at Sewing Summit. It felt good to cut into a few of the pretty sheets I’ve been saving and hoarding for so long. One of my goals on my 30 before 30 list was to sell pieces of my sheet collection. And as soon as Sewing Summit is over I am going to start slicing and dicing them into kits. I’ll do some bunting kits, some fat quarter bundles, and probably some larger 1/4 yard strip kits. I’ll get myself together here as soon as I recover from the next week.

So, I don’t embroider. Like at all. But I want to learn, so on Saturday while I was working at my quilt shop job I asked the lady I was working with to give me a lesson. She is amazing. And before I left I had a good start on a small simple project. On Sunday I was sitting on the couch working on it some more and Creamie got all excited about doing her own stitching. And after lunch we tried it. You guys. She did amazingly well. I mean, she got distracted easily, and had to stop for snacks, but before she went to bed she had stitched her own little flower. All by herself. I helped her get the needle up from the bottom in the right spot, but everything else was all on her own. I am ridiculously proud. And I am framing this little flower. Today she started another project, her name in rainbow letters. And this time she is doing the whole thing herself. Her tiny little three year old fingers are coordinated enough to push her needle back up from the underside with only 1 thread between the end of her last stitch and the beginning of the next. She amazes me.

This is my small project. It’s my first successful embroidered anything. (This pic was taken before I added the satin stitches on the beaks, and a worm in the mamas mouth.) The pattern is from Aimee Rae‘s book Doodle Stitches. Which is lovely, I’ve spent a happy few days browsing through it. Ok, back to the todo list. And I’m gonna work a little ice cream and warm cookies in there somewhere.

September

A few days late, but this September was kind of awesome. I finished a lot of projects, we went camping two weekends in a row, Creamie rediscovered her love of painting, I picked a million raspberries and it finally started to cool off at night so I can open the windows and turn off the AC. And we celebrated two birthday’s which meant homemade chocolate cake two weeks in a row.

October is already shaping up to be super beyond busy. Like seriously. Have you heard of Sewing Summit? Yes? No? Well it’s an awesome sewing conference here in Utah, SLC to be specific. And I’m on the staff. I don’t expect to come up for air until the 15th at least. And then it will be Halloween costume time. And I’ll need to do something about all those school clothes I was going to make, got distracted and they are still in piles of fabric + pattern + thread/notions on my dresser. Scott loves that. HA!