we had a wonderful thanksgiving weekend, relaxing, lots of food, family and friends. just the way i wanted it. have to say that amy's gingerbread recipe was a smash hit! so delicious, make it tonight if you can. there is a link to it a few posts back. on friday david and i took the kids to union station to see the model trains and snap some pictures for our christmas card. we managed to get some really good ones, but plenty of outtakes as well. thank goodness for digital cameras, there is no way i would have snapped 50 plus real film pictures, much less afford to have them processed. not that i dont like film cameras, i do, but not for squirming toddlers. thought i would share some of the more humorous ones. why did we go right before naptime? because we are crazy? enjoy a challenge? wanted a headache? i dont know. we did have a good time, eliot loved the trains. the building itself is beautiful. which is why we ended up with a bunch of pictures like this (instead of in front of the big tree with lights). now that the pictures are taken, i can get out the gocco and get busy on the actual cards. this years theme is "simple", win win for everyone, right? for more funny outtakes, check out amanda's blog. she had the same idea this weekend, but was brave enough to attempt it with three kids!!! thumbs up amanda!
I took Beth to see the trains before naptime too and she was so unruly. She refused to let me take pictures and just ended up hitting and pushing over all the children she saw. I can safely say it was a "new low".
The funny outtakes sometimes end up being the faves imo! Though I TOTALLY understand the frustration when you're trying to snap a good one for cards and such!!!
I am in love with Collette's ponytails btw! Very big girlish!
can words express how freaking cute this is? by far my favorite outfit for collette! it doesn't seem that long ago that eliot wore that sweet shirt. i love the sneakers too! too much. i can't take it.
Curse words are what I would have to use for describing this. This is a post-sanity level of adorability. And the pigtails in the next post? As the AIM-Tech kids are wont to say: Boog! Sash!
why, snips and snails and puppy dog tails of course. as with every rule there are exceptions, one being little ethan. we havent had the chance to meet ethan in person yet, but i managed to whip up a little welcome gift and send it off with the ever helpful jeffers who is going to visit for thanksgiving. since the gift will be arriving later today i can go ahead and post pictures without ruining the surprise.
a cozy fleece elephant to cuddle with on those cold d.c. nights.
and a cute matching knit hat to keep his little head warm. cant wait to see you guys at christmas! man, it was really hard to keep those photos to myself for so long! i am not good at secrets at all. ok, now i can get to my thanksgiving baking. pumpkin pie for david and for me i am going to try amys yummy gingerbread recipe. david and i are not actually eating these all by ourselves, we will share with my family tomorrow, a little bit anyway. on friday i am going to try kerry's recipe for heaven... i love to bake, but i dont do it very often. maybe i just love eating baked goods. that sounds more like it.
hope everyone has a safe and happy thanksgiving weekend!!
Thank you Hannah! This is by far one of the cutest gifts we have recieved. I was hoping you would knit something for him, I'll post a pic of his cute head soon.
so i have been pouring over the denyse schmidt book, in awe of her wonderful ideas. i know i have blogged about this in the past, but i am going to do it again. waaay back, almost five years ago, i ordered some fabric to make a quilt or something for soon to be born eliot. some awesome outerspace, rockety stuff from reprodepot. and still it sits and moves all over the house. sometimes it is in the closet, sometimes it is in the basement, sometimes i cant find it for a few months. last spring i dug the rocket fabric back out in a fit of productivity and went to the fabric store to buy some accent fabrics. by golly, i was going to get crackin. i was feeling especially guilty since i had recently purchased fabric for a quilt for collette, thats right, another kid and another pile of fabric for all these quilts i am going to make. sometimes i think i am delusional. anyway, so eliot has informed me that he wants his birthday party to be all about outerspace (it is at the end of january). perfect time to make the quilt for him as a present at his outerspace party. i had always envisioned a pretty simple block quilt, but now that i am armed with this new book, things are changing. the "big zig" quilt has caught my eye, and seems to be something a beginner could tackle. ok, here are the photos, and bring on the advice and opinions.
here is dsq quilt. so lovely... i think that i could use my rocket fabric for the large brown expanses and the two solids i already have for the zigs.
the rockets (photos are sucky because i took them in my basement last night). and the accent fabric i bought a while back, which now i think might not be 100% cotton, but i still like the colors.
let me be clear, i have never made a quilt before. one "quilted" baby blanket and that is it. i am i crazy? can this be done? should i flip the fabrics and just have rockets in the zigs? the dsq quilts look so nice with their solid colors, but maybe too simple for a kids room? i dont know. thoughts please!
get yourself a walking foot & you'll be in business! i like the idea of the bigger portion to be the rockety stuff. hard to know if you could recognize what it is if it was just the zigs. but then again simplicity is great... i guess i'm not much help. it will be awesome though.
are you machine quilting this? that can be a challenge if you don't have a quilting machine (the sheer size of the piece can be a challenge with a regular machine). that said, i think your idea for using the rockets fabric for the majority of it and the two others for the zig zags is excellent. BTW-i don't have a quilting machine, so i only make small stuff. i can't wait to see your progress!!
What a perfect opportunity to make this quilt! I bet Eliot will appreciate it a lot more now than he would have as a baby. I love your fabrics and think the rocket would look great as the "field" for the zig-zigs; you might just want to check that the horizontal seam below the zig-zag bands is not too obvious (it might be if the rocket is a large scale print). I love to hear about works in progress--can't wait to see this quilt!
Go for it! I like the idea of the rocket fabric for the majority of the quilt too. And the rocket fabric would be more forgiving than a solid fabric for the quilting as the print would distract from any mistakes.
I know it will be amazing!
PS Have you ever looked into having a pieced top long arm quilted? I just heard about this and I have no idea how much it costs but I'm really intrigued by the idea.
I love the rocket fabric! Like everyone else is saying, I think it would make a great choice for the large expanses. But Anamaria is right about the horizontal seam below the zigzags, I suspect it might be too obvious. If it is, what about applique-ing the zigzags onto the top of the solid rectangle?
If you decide to quilt it yourself, you might try just straight quilting lines rather than the zigzags. You could make them perpendicular to each other (like graph paper), or at angles. At least you wouldn't have to keep stopping in the middles of lines and changing directions.
Or you might want to check into how much it would cost to have someone else machine quilt something for you. In my area, it would be about the same or less than the cost of a walking foot (so $60-100), and would be much less aggravating than constantly rolling and unrolling the extra fabric, trying to stuff it through your machine.
sure! i got it a long time ago, like six and a half years ago. obviously i havent been too motivated since then, but i got it online at www.reprodepot.com they have great fabrics, and while they might not have that fabric, you should still check them out.
it was one of those weekends where nothing spectacular happened, but it was just great. the eddys came into town on friday, which of course makes any weekend great, and had dinner with us. so fun to spend time with good friends enjoying good food and conversation. hot out of the oven apple crisp with a scoop of ice cream doesnt hurt either. im thinking apple desserts are the new chocolate? it sure did taste good. i practically forced kerry to look at my new denyse schmidt book that i was so excited to finally have. i think i am the last person in crafty blog land to have it in her possession. i already have plans on a quilt, more to follow this week. saturday the kids went to my parents house to spend the night so that david and i could get some "financial issues" figured out. not fun, but good to have a better picture of our budget through the end of the year. that night we went to a house warming party for some friends. kind of short notice, but i didnt want to go empty handed so i threw together this quick pillow for them.
i had burned this screen on my gocco to test out on a tshirt for collette, so i just reinked and printed it on some canvas, cut it out, distressed it a bit and then sewed it on. here is a close up of the patch.
turns out that they had turned one room of their house into their "family tree" room, so this fit the bill perfectly. after the party david and i took advantage of our no kids status and went to see a late showing of pride and prejudice. oh my goodness. i am a lover of the book and the bbc version (who doesnt love colin firth????) so i was a little bit worried about this new version. i am here to tell you that you should run, not walk to see the movie. it was excellent in so many ways. the writer did a wonderful job at abridging the story, the acting was amazing and the cinematography was beautiful. i cried twice, which i never do. i think i must love reserved, distant men. both colin firth and matthew macfadyen were wonderful darcy's in their own ways. so romantic. oh goodness i could go on and on. i liked it so much that i joined my friends sarah and beth this afternoon to see it again! less than 24 hours later. cried again. it could be the pregnancy hormones talking, but it really was that good. thank you sarah and beth for my date with you. they made me dinner as well. what a great weekend! friends, crafting, parties and movies. so satisfying.
taco dinner with david's favorite dessert, it doesn't get much better. the pillow turned out great! i love how you stitched so it looks more haphazard. awesome. i bet they loved it. i love the gocco look. and i must have the new denise schmidt book. images have been filling my mind since i read it 3 times at your place.
I am going to agree with Hannah...run to the theatre to see Pride and Prejudice. Mr. Darcy is the ideal man. I like David even more for being willing to attend it.
man, i don't know if i could handle watching pnp, i cried when i read the book, boohooed a sorry little puddle around my bed. fantastic pillow! cannot wait to see your quilting progress
i couldnt sleep last night because my mind was racing. one of the things it kept coming back to was christmas card designs and gift ideas. i very much want to hand make most of my gifts this year. is this going to be harder? i dont know. i will let you know. today a friend gave me a wonderful vintage baby memory book from 1955. in great shape (still in the box!) and full of wonderful vintage illustrations. i am delighted with the whole thing, but the best part about the book is that all the way through it is sprinkled with these wonderful softies that remind me quite a bit of mama duck from little birds. so many great ideas!! i had to scan my favorites to share.
i think i am seriously in love with this giraffe... is that weird? i just love it...
the red elephant is killing me...
too sweet for words perhaps? i think so.
have i ever mentioned that i was obsessed with scotties when i was 12? i was. we are talking scottie notepads, stationary, pins to go with my scottie sweaters. about the only thing scottie i didnt have was a live dog. much too expensive. i feel the obsession kicking back in when i look at this picture. must be careful...
but maybe i wll begin a new obsession with doxies? maybe? ok, i might be just a little too excited about these pictures, but i have a lot of babies/toddlers on my christmas list this year!! im envisioning lots of wool felt and most definitely the little collars with bells. any advice on actually making softies is more than welcome, since i have only tried once or twice and i dont really know what im doing. also, who was it that had a good source for inexpensive wool roving/stuffing? i think its time to get a little organized on this whole gift making thing, to get my softies in a row so to speak. hee, hee...
i was just looking on your blog & then this beautiful post appeared! i LOVE it! who gave you that baby album? i must see it. those pictures are too much!!! i, too, would like to make a softie, but feel way too scared. i think they would make excellent toddler gifts! i can see you as a scottie kind of girl. i'm thinking red & black plaid...
Did you have the black and white scottie dog magnets? I absolutely loved those and still managed to lose them within five minutes of leaving the Stuckey's regardless.
i love these illustrations! the lamb looks very, very similar to one i made last year. hand-sewing little felt animals like this is not difficult, but it is time consuming. you can, however, take your work with you or sit in front of a dvd to do it. vintage softie books often have great patterns like these. let me know if you need some help getting started.
mama and me - i exported the video, from my editing software, as a quicktime file (.mov) optimized for broadband viewing, uploaded it to a different website with a lot of hosting capacity and linked to it.
i feel like my constant response to huffman goods is "too much". once again. how is that a kid in the leaves is so freaking cool? if the kid is elliot huffman - that'd be one reason. if the filmmaker is david huffman - that'd be two. kudos huffs.
came across your blog... this clip is fantastic! i want to show my husband. i'll bet it will motivate him to play with our editing software!!! i love it!
i was thinking about this months theme for stp, exploration of identity, and having a hard time. mostly due to the fact that i still am doing some exploring. not that identity is static, but my is certainly all over the place right now. currently in the number one slot is "mom", just like amanda over at soulemama. mom is a pretty good thing to be, especially since it also lets you slide into kid quite a bit. this weekend we spent quite a bit of time doing one of eliot and collettes favorite things, playing under the covers on mom and dads bed. they love it! as i was anchoring the covers and snapping pics i remembered how much i used to love doing the same thing. so my identity for this weekend was most definitely kid, and so much fun. check out the slideshow on flickr. i took a bunch...
i am excited for when i get to be a mom, so there can be an excuse for doing things like carving a pumpkin & playing in the snow. maybe even playing under the covers! you are a great mom & kid, hannah!
now that the pictures are taken, i can get out the gocco and get busy on the actual cards. this years theme is "simple", win win for everyone, right? for more funny outtakes, check out amanda's blog. she had the same idea this weekend, but was brave enough to attempt it with three kids!!! thumbs up amanda!
now that the pictures are taken, i can get out the gocco and get busy on the actual cards. this years theme is "simple", win win for everyone, right? for more funny outtakes, check out amanda's blog. she had the same idea this weekend, but was brave enough to attempt it with three kids!!! thumbs up amanda!
5 Comments:
I took Beth to see the trains before naptime too and she was so unruly. She refused to let me take pictures and just ended up hitting and pushing over all the children she saw. I can safely say it was a "new low".
oh my gosh! I love the one with his hand covering her mouth! Priceless!
Cute pictures!
The funny outtakes sometimes end up being the faves imo! Though I TOTALLY understand the frustration when you're trying to snap a good one for cards and such!!!
I am in love with Collette's ponytails btw! Very big girlish!
they are adorable. i can't wait to see the final picture and your christmas cards.
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