Parent Teacher Conference

 We had Parent Teacher Conferences for Nathan a little bit ago...it's so nice to have him doing well! With everything else that he struggles with I am glad that he is able to concentrate at school and learn well! That is one blessing I am VERY grateful for! And the best of it is, he has friends! He makes friends very easily! Brandon has always struggled so I have never really experienced a child of mine playing with and having friends!

 The school had a book fair during the Conferences, so I bought Nathan a book, he did some chores at home to earn it. He loves this book because of the name...and insists that he wants his name changed to Big Nate. He goes by Nate at school since there is another Nathan in his class.

 Kimball was there with us and got a pencil (as did everyone else). He sure does love his big brother!

 Then I remembered that I was suppose to be trying to take more pictures of the boys so I can send them to my Sister who is on an LDS Mission in California right now...

 Bubble showing me the pictures on my ipad....my twin brother and his boy.

 Then he started getting mad at me and didn't want me to take his picture...

 of course Mom's don't listen well when it comes to taking pictures.....

 I tried to distract him.....

But in the end....I ended up putting my camera away...but look at that face! Worth a thousand words!

My Sweet Boys

 My Nay Nay

 My Bubble

My Oldest

In Progress

 

Here is my pile of quilts that are waiting to be quilted! 

I finished one quilt already and will share pictures of that later....but now if I had a good working sewing machine would make quilting these babies a lot easier! 

10 Years

Last week Travis and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary! I can't believe we have been together for that long! At times it feels like the full 10 years, but then at others it feels as if it has FLOWN by!

One of our engagement pictures.....

Us today....a little larger but a LOT wiser!

We had a kind of a week long celebration, on Valentine's Day we went to a Lady Antebellum concert. It was fun, Trav enjoyed himself TONS but I am not a concert type of person.

Before we left Kimball "had" to have a picture with Mommy before we left...

 Then here we are at the concert....

 

Darius Rucker was there and performed before hand....

Sorry Bad picture

 

 He was very good, and if you don't know who he is....he used to be the "Hoodie" in Hoodie and the Flow Fish (did I spell that right?)

Then here is Lady Antebellum....they were very good and I enjoyed their songs.

We were able to celebrate our anniversary all week long. One perk we have for marrying on the 16th! I am looking forward to another 10 more years.....and then some!

Doll Quilt Swap 12 (DQS12) Updates

I have been hard at work (okay so 1 night) creating the DQS12 quilt. I have been looking for different patterns and trying to find the one that I like the best and after looking I found what I wanted....so the majority of the quilt is done...

 Here is what the design is as a reminder.....

 Here is the grass...I had to end up cutting the log cabin blocks down because I had made them too big! Darn 20"x20" measurements!

 The sun! I really like how the sun turned out! I am pretty excited about the little patchwork, I just did a random jumble! Although I must say that these curves are NOT easy....I will definitely have to practice more to make this feel any easier!!

I ended up buying the Dresden ruler and I was pretty impressed with how easy it was to use and how easy it was to sew the pieces together! I think I will DEFINITELY make more of these little guys in the future. But I just mostly winged turning it into a square. I used this site to help me with it. But overall for my first time making a Dresden block I am pleased with my work!

I have actually made two of all of these! So that 1)I can use the best blocks for my partner's quilt and 2)I can have my very own of this quilt! It won't be too much longer to finish it, although I do need to decide what I want to do the for the tulips, piece them like how I usually do or if I want to do a sort of paper piece.

Another Doll Swap

Before I knew that I was going to do the DSQ12 I signed up for the Quilting Gallery Doll Quilt Swap. So I now have two doll swaps I am participating in! But it's all good because I get 2 new doll quilts to hang up in my room so I am excited!

So this past weekend I designed the doll quilt that my secret partner wants. She asked for any type of holiday type quilt that she can hang up. I wish I could do one for all the seasons for her, but alas...I have settled on an Easter quilt so that she can use it right away!

I probably won't use these exact colors because I don't know what I have on hand, and will use something that I already have, but you get the idea. I found the bunny block online and someone had made a paper pieced one, well she didn't leave a copy of it, so I had to create my own. I will sew on buttons for the eyes and then a little pink felt nose.
I like this quilt so much I might actually make one for me! But who knows! Here is the doll quilt that I will be making for the DSQ12...

 

I am really liking this quilt, and might make me a copy of it too...

My partner really likes curves, which is something that I have avoided since starting to quilt. They look really hard and I just haven't had a desire to do them yet, so this quilt will be challenging me to 2 learn 2 new types of blocks, the New York Beauty block (sun) and a Dresden block (tree). I think I have found a good tutorial on the tree, and maybe on the sun as well...but I am having a hard time figuring out what size they will be. I mean this is a doll quilt so I can't make them too big, but we will see. 

If you have any suggestions on a good place to look at that has a Dresden tutorial and pattern as well as the New York Beauty block, I would LOVE to see it!

Now let the games quilts begin.....

Siggy Swap 2 - Finished!!

So sometime last year I just checked and it was 18 months ago! I joined the Siggy Swap2. We made a siggy block and signed them, then mailed them to one person and she divided them up between us all....want to know how many of us there was? 100!! It was fun to see where everyone was from, well the quilters in the blogger world. I have had it on my WIP list for a long time, and finally FINALLY finished it!

 I decided to do a simple block pattern, and since there was so many different colors from all the siggy blocks, I thought black would make them pop....so I took out my black straps and viola!

 I had 3 extra blocks that didn't fit, so I thought I would add them to the back...hopefully these three ladies don't mind.

 I also did a very simple lines for the quilting, and since it's not one that will be used as a blanket and just a wall quilt, I didn't think it needed tons of quilting. (Plus I was being lazy that day and just wanted it done!)

 It is hanging in my room over the wall by my treadmill....I moved the treadmill so that I could take the original picture of it finished. Now I can look at it while I exercise!

It ended up being 65.5"x50.5". I was going to make it longer, but I'm glad I decided on this! Oh it's beautiful! I am VERY pleased with my work!

9 Patch I-Spy Quilt

Yeah I have another quilt finished! Don't you get so excited when you finish a quilt? I am always amazed one how fast some quilts go together and then then others take you YEARS to finish! This was one that took me about 3 days total!

 I really like how this quilt turned out! I wasn't sure about the border and just added it to make my quilt a little bigger, but I am LOVING it!

 I think after you stare at the quilt for awhile the 9 Patch design pops out....a LONG time staring....

 When I was at the store grabbing some fabric for the back, I forgot how much I needed, and of course I didn't have enough! So I improvised the rest!

I never plan out what I do for the back patchworks, but just go with what I have, until it becomes the right length...I actually had to cut quite a bit off the "patched" area side because I made it too large and didn't have enough room to lay it out properly in my small living room.

 I love how bright this quilt is! Now do you think I can call this a "boy quilt"? I only have a few blocks that have pink in it, but the rest are more "boyish" colors.

I couldn't resist, I LOVE this binding job with the sewing machine, I usually do a zig zag for the binding, because I like the reinforcement it gives, but on my Juki only has straight stitch, so I worked with it, and I just LOVE how it turned out! I think that I MIGHT ACTUALLY be getting better at this quilting/sewing thing!

Remember...

Remember last year when I made a quilt for the Moda Bakeshop called Bird Love? Well I was going through my scraps at the end of last year and I stumbled across some left over blocks, so I decided to make myself a Mini quilt....

 Just a simple little mini quilt that I have added to my room wall! I will have to take a picture of all of my mini quilts some day.

I had originally made the Bird Love quilt for my Mother in Law, which she still loves! Now I have something to remember my creation by too....I think I need to do this with all of my MBS quilts!

Finished in time!

Well I will be the first one to admit, but I did manage to finish Jared's wife's quilt a day early! It came together really fast and even though quilting it was a bugger, it went faster because it was a smaller quilt! 

I had Trav help me take pictures right before Jared came to get the quilt, so unfortunately the lighting is bad.

 The "special" spot that was needed.

 The back is fleece, which made it very hard to quilt.

 I didn't quilt on the jean stars because I thought it would be too thick.

I am told that Jared's wife loved it! Another job well done.

Doll Quilt Swap 12 (DQS12)

Well I was able to make it this time around! I am apart of the Doll Quilt Swap 12 over on flicker! I am so excited! I haven't been apart of one since DQS9! I loved it so much so I am thrilled to be apart of it again! 

So for my swap partner, I have created this little mosaic to show my interests and thinks that I LOVE! One thing, I LOVE the map mini quilt! I have been admiring it on pinterest and fell in love! So just a hint! 

1. DQS11 Package Received, 2. DQS11 received!, 3. "Love to Sew", 4. My DQS 11 Treasure!, 5. The matching angel pillows, 6. dream doll quilt, 7. fabric map in progress, 8. "Love the Beach", 9. You can call me Owl., 10. Charisma Quilt, 11. Hushabye Stars, 12. DQS9 Angel Quilt #2, 13. Sparklers 2, 14. Persian Garden, 15. X Rated Schnibbles Quilt, 16. Renaissance Garden 2, 17. IMG_548317, 18. Prairie Paisley quilst, 19. Basket Case Quilt, 20. DQS7 Finished 1, 21. Quilted, 22. Rainbow Half Square Triangles, 23. Pretty Little Wonky House WIP, 24. All Around the Town Quilt, 25. Tanner's Treeline

I can't wait to share my quilt that I will make for my future swap partner, I haven't found out who it is yet, but I can't wait to find out who it is and discover her/his likes and dislikes! 

Another Top Done

Well I was able to finish another quilt top! Remember when I was making some i spy 9 patch blocks? Well I had a 5 left over, so I decided to make another 7 so I could make a twin size quilt for the craft show in May. I ended up adding a strip for a border and I 'm rather pleased with the look.

 Now my stash of i spy blocks have been reduced severely, so I will be needing to host another i spy swap so I can gather more! So far Nathan and Kimball have an ispy quilt, so now I need to make one for Brandon and Nathan!

 After looking at the blocks, I decided it is kinda hard to see the different colored 9 patch blocks, so I labeled a few.

This shows the different blocks better, although I think in the future I will add some sort of border/sashing to the blocks in the future so you can tell a lot more. That is if I decided to make this type again, although I rather like it. Now I need to quilt and bind it!