A Quilt For Yelena

Two of my dearest friends are getting married later this month, so of course I made a quilt. This isn't a wedding quilt -- they've yet to decide on what they want -- but a quilt for her. He has a quilt which she had me make for his birthday several years ago. She steals the quilt to lay under for cosy naps, because according to her, the quilt makes naps that much better. 

I love seeing my quilts being loved and used, but that quilt represents him, not her. So in honour of her special day, I thought she should have a quilt of her own to lay under. 

It wouldn't stop sliding off the stool, so I had a cookbook weigh it down. She likes to cook so I thought it was quite fitting hehe 

It's a super scrappy quilt with many pops of colour and lots of low volume. Both of us enjoy that in a quilt :) She has no idea what I've made her, and I told her if she doesn't like it, don't tell me or I'll steal it back. Not sure if I want her to like it anymore lol!

I saw this quilt on Pinterest and thought it was something she'd like (the woman is a great fan of HSTs), so I sized it down to a smaller lap and started pulling fabrics from my scrap pile and my stash. There are sooo many favourites in there... Denyse Schmidt, Carolyn Friedlander, Jen Kingwell, Kate Spain, Lizzy House, Tula Pink, Cotton + Steel... the list goes on.

The quilt's fairly simple, but I took my time going block by block to try and get a nice balance of colour. Plus my little baby boss doesn't allow me to stay in my sewing room for too long hehe It might be the Stockholm Syndrome talking, but I don't mind it one bit. (By the way, she's already 5 months old. How'd that happen?!)

But I digress.

I quilted it in a crosshatch in white thread, used Lizzy House's pearl bracelets on the back (one of Y's faves) and the binding is a teeeeny little dot by Jen Kingwell. Those tiny dots were too good not to be used!!

[I didn't use the pattern but it's Braque by Melinda Lin.]

Fingers crossed she likes it! Can't wait to see them walk down that aisle in a couple of weeks! :)

Back At It

Oh how I've missed sewing. I've done a little sewing since I had Alexa, but it's been sporadic at best. But we've sort of gotten into a good enough rhythm that I manage to steal away for a few hours each day (an hour here and there, but still better than nothing!) to work on something.

The something I'm working on right now is a gift for a friend who's getting married next month. Yup, next month as in I'm totally insane to start this so close to the wedding but whatever. I'm going to do it and if not then well, I tried.

The quilt pattern is based on Melinda Lin's Braque... I saw the version done in Jennifer Sampou's Studio Stash yarn dyes, and it caught my eye. But I didn't think my friend's very much into woven fabrics, so I dug into my stash instead.

Honestly, I didn't quite fancy it when I started because I thought it was too all over the place for her. Me, I love scrappy, so the crazier the better. But I think she'll like it... I've sort of found the colour scheme I need to stick to and that's made it easier. If you're wondering, this is how I function 80% of the time. No plan, just throw stuff on the wall that I think might work and then hope for the best hehe!

Okay, back to work I go :)

What's everyone working on these days?

New Old Photos

I was poking around my photographs on one of my memory cards and found a bunch of photographs I'd totally forgotten about. I don't think I've ever saved or processed them, so tada! They're from about two and a half years ago when we stopped by Brattleboro, VT on our way home from NH.

The photos make me miss autumn... my favouritest season of all. But spring is on its way with all the daffodils, crocuses and hyacinths popping up in our front yard :)

I realise it got a bit silent around here again... Looking after an infant doesn't give me too much time to do much of anything, let alone anything quilty or blogworthy. I have plans... but definitely am not in a hurry to get to them. I'm soaking up every minute of her and her meatball head (seriously, her cute head is like a delicious meatball lol), because soon this will all be a distant memory. She'll be four months old in a week... How'd that happen??

Giant Triangles

Many moons ago, a lovely client bought a triangle baby quilt from me (I believe I neglected to blog about it... oops) that looked very much like this one, just with slightly larger triangles. She had no grandkids to buy it for but bought it anyway! I thought that was insanely sweet and very flattering :)

Soon after, she contacted me to see if I'd make her daughter and son-in-law a bed-sized version. Of course, this was all while I was pregnant, and quite heavily so. And I still said yes. Haaaaa...

I started cutting and sewing the triangles together before Alexa arrived, but I never quite got round to putting the quilt together. Thankfully my client is beyond patient, and told me to take my time since there wasn't any rush. Bless her heart. I was so relieved to hear this because I'd had a cesarean so all quilting had come to a crashing halt... and basting a queen-sized quilt was just incredibly impossible.

Fast forward to present times! I've finished the quilt... FINALLY! Well, a few weeks ago, but you get the picture. I hated making my client wait, but I've had to accept that I can't work as quickly as I once did. And it turned out really great, even though quilting a queen wasn't the most fun I've had hehe! But I did it! And that's what's important!!! :)

I tried to keep it from being too colourful and girly since it's for a couple, and I'm given to understand he's not particularly fond of pink. But I realised that the quilt I was basing it on had lots of those awesome pops of colours, and that's what made it fun. So apologies to the son-in-law, but he just has to deal with the pink. Some men are funny that way... thankfully my hubs doesn't care.

I gave the client a few choices of backs and bindings... She wanted something funky on the back so she went with this Amy Butler print, and the Denyse Schmidt voltage dots for the binding. She asked if I'd put their names and wedding date on a label, and seeing as her daughter's favourite colour is red, I framed it in a DS dot.

They received the quilt a tiny while ago and I'm told they love it! Phew! Monica and Antoine, I hope you have a beautiful and colourful marriage :)

Alexa's Room... A WIP

Three months in, and I've finally made a crack at decorating my child's room. Go me. But in all fairness, she's pretty damn cute, so cuddling with her is top priority these days! 

But there's something to be said for baby monitors because there's only so much sitting around you can do while mentally writing your to-do list. Bless whoever made them as awesome as they are today, with the video and sound, and being able to talk to the baby without having to walk down the hall or up the stairs. And we didn't get one that hooks up to Wi-Fi because the stories of idiots hacking into baby monitors and talking to the babies freaks me the hell out. No. Thank. You. 

Yikes, did you enjoy that little trip we took on my tangent... Anyway...

My sister, Averil, brought the ribbon bunting thing over from Singapore, and amazingly enough, it matches the quilt I'd made Alexa almost perfectly. And it's not as if we coordinated our efforts either. She'd gotten that for a friend's wedding, and brought it over since her friend didn't want to hang on to it. I love when things work out like that :)

Plus I didn't want to hang anything too heavy over her crib because I'm paranoid about things falling. Not that anything ever has fallen... Just paranoid because why the hell not :)

And yes, of course there's kitties on the quilt. Kitties all over the place. This kid of mine is going to love cats whether she wants to or not :)

I'll do a separate post on the quilt... I need to take photos when it's nice and sunny. Somehow when it's sunny, I've got my arms wrapped around the baby. 

Aside from the ribbon bunting thing (seriously, what is it called?!) I made her this banner. This is my third go at a banner... The hubs just hung his head and laughed when I told him how many times I attempted it lol! The first one, I'd used skinny lettering and absolutely hated it. The second one's lettering was super wonky and it made me want to stab it a lot. Third time's a charm, right?

While it still isn't perfect (I'm looking at it now and thinking that's still super wonky... dammit! I drew a line and everything!), I'm quite happy with it. And if I try again, the hubs might have me committed. The banner is pretty much a copy of Secret Holiday & Co's lovely banners, but I'm not about to pay $90 when I can make them myself. I say them because you know my house is going to be filled with banners that say silly things... and I'm going to make a couple for my sisters too.

Of course being a quilter, I had to stick some fabric in there. I used a tiny floral print for the back just for something special. No idea what it's called or where I even got it from... I just found a FQ of it in one of my drawers. Yeah yeah, fabric hoarder, yada yada yada.

Isn't that little doll peeking out just so cute??? My bestie Margie sent that to Alexa and I love it so hard. It's keeping the crib warm while the baby still sleeps in the bassinet in our room.

Also, the more I look at the YAY banner, the more it seems a bit sarcastic to me. YAY. No exclamation point. Just YAY. Hehehe! Suits the doll's face!

The neon pink string on the banner makes me all kinds of giddy :) Alexa has a onesie that's got tiny neon pink flowers and it's the one clothing item I can't wait to get out of the wash and slap back on hehe

There'll be more to come... I hope? There are pictures to hang (that reminds me... Self, go buy frames) and a couple of other things I'd like to get for the room... hopefully it'll be done soon. If not, well, what's she going to do about it? Haha!