More on kids…

Since I have been in my sewing room a total of 15 minutes to check my email in the last week, I thought I’d write about kids….. again.  (Sorry, they seem to occupy every minute of my time.) Yesterday was especially crazy.  My two oldest girls were packing for girls camp.  I’m afraid I got a little (lot) impatient with them.  It took three hours to pack for four days.  Every time we went over our check list, something else had been forgotten.  But, now that my husband is on a business trip, my girls are gone and I’m left with my three youngest, things have calmed down.  I can actually think straight and this is what I have been thinking:

I love how my adorable (Well maybe not.  He just let out a not so adorable burp right as I was typing this sentence.) little boy is sitting next to me drawing sea monster pictures and talking nonstop.  He tells me how good he is at memorizing because he can close his eyes while he recites. 

I love how my twelve year old sneaked out of bed last night at 11pm to unload the dishwasher for me. 

I love how my three year old has messy choppy hair (a result from last months self hair cut) and a messy cookie face right now and is as happy as can be, because her other mommy (daughter 3) is playing so sweetly with her.

I love how daughter 3 takes such good care of her little sister.

I love how my oldest daughter shares my love of all things mystery.  She adores Sherlock Holmes, Nancy Drew, and old detective radio shows.

What more could a mom ask for?  I’ll happily forgo sewing for awhile, so we can create some awesome summer memories with each other.

Stormy

Kiddo Photo Shoot

Summer is here.  School is out and we are busy!  Between awards assemblies, class parties, and kids underfoot, sewing has come to a dead stop.  But, I did get the kids dressed up and outside to do a photo shoot today.  It’s been on my to do list for months.  I thought it’d be fun to show some of the funny photos instead of the perfect ones.  They show so much more personality!

You might not think this is funny, but this is my oldest trying to look all serious.  It makes her look mad instead. 

My second is quite a nut.  We have a bunch of photos that look just like this.

There was a little girl who had a little curl right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good she was very very good and when she was bad she was horrid!  (I’ve teased my only curly top with this poem since she was little.  This is the look I always get.)

This is the “your crazy mom” look that I get when I’m making funny faces and noises trying to get just the right smile.  Love the eyebrow!

Do I even need to say anything?  I love it!

Stormy

Short-Attention-Span Syndrome

For the last two days, I’ve been planning out another quilt sampler.  I’ve been browsing patterns, magazines, my fabric stash, etc…  for block/fabric ideas.   Then, something bad happened.  I sat down in my sewing room and looked at all the quilts in progress within arms reach.  Hmmmm.  Isn’t the first stage of dealing with a problem recognizing the problem?  I know this can’t be the scientific name, but I think Short-Attention-Span Disorder pretty much covers it.  I need to focus!!  And finish this:

Or this:

Or this:

Maybe this:

And definitely this one:

I’m thinkin’ I should hold off on the sampler quilt.  Just for awhile. 

Stormy

Quilting with Red White and Blue

If your anything like me, you quilt according to the season.  In the Fall and Winter I make cozy warmer colored quilts.  In the Spring, all the soft flowery fabrics get pulled out. And, for summer it’s usually reds and creams.  But this year, I must be feeling extra patriotic.  I pulled out a red, white (well, cream), and blue quilt kit I bought years ago called  “Chippewa Nine Patch”.  The quilt and the fabric, Prairie Paisley, was designed by Minick and Simpson, who always have the greatest fabrics in these colors.  Unfortunately, my quilt doesn’t quite look like this:

It looks more like this:

Holy guacamole!  There are 25 – 81 patch squares.  No wonder I love it.  I’m hoping to get it done in the next month.  Ha ha ha!  I’ll have so much time to quilt when all the kids are home from school.  ROFLOL!  No seriously,  I really want this one done.  But, until I can show you the finished pictures, I found some other awesome red, white and blue quilts to get you in the patriotic mood.

This gorgeous Irish Chain quilt is from Suzy's Sewing Basket.  She sent it to a soldier in Iraq which resulted in a volunteer effort which delivered more than 6,000 quilts to wounded military personnel and their families.

I am totally in LOVE with this patriotic quilt from Cluck Cluck Sew.  She did a block tutorial for this quilt last year.  I going to have to give this one a try.

This beauty was in American Patchwork and Quilting seven years ago!  It is also another one of my UFO’s.  I bought it when I was a few days away from delivering child number four.  No wonder I never finished it.  One day….

Now I need to go sew, so I can enjoy my own patriotic quilt.

Stormy

My newly painted dining room

I’ve had two red dining rooms in the last six years.  I like red and I seem to be a little more daring in my choice of colors for the dining room.  But recently,  I’ve really wanted my house to be more calming.  (Five kids all home from school for the summer. Go figure….)  So, the upstairs bathroom got redecorated in blues and greens.  All the red came out of my bedroom and was replaced with creams.  And, the biggest change was my red dining room.  I liked it, but never really loved it.  It was just too much.   I had a big room and felt like I needed to fill it up with knick knacks.  Not anymore!  I found a gorgeous blue, painted the walls, and took out all the stuff.  Much better.  You be the judge.

BEFORE

 

AFTER

Now, I find my kids drifting towards the dining room to do homework.  I walk through it just cuz it makes me smile and to get a whiff of my Lemon and Lavender Scentsy I turn on almost every day.

  Now, if I could just convince my oldest daughter to let me repaint the red bathroom!

Stormy

Daisy Buttons

I finished another UFO this morning.  Hooray!  Hooray!  I believe this was the oldest UFO I had.  I’m not even sure when I bought it.  I just remember pushing around one of my daughters (not sure which one) in her stroller through Joann’s (before I knew about the difference in fabric quality) and cringing at the price of all that fabric.  Yes, this was my very first quilting project!!  I saw the free pattern in a flyer, loved it and went to the store to buy everything I needed to make the adorable quilt in the picture.  Little did I know how long it would take me!  Originally, I thought I bought it to make for daughter  three, but yesterday I pulled out the project sheet and the date on it was 2001!  Ahem…. before she was born.  Oh well, if it weren’t for my snooping daughters poking around in my sewing room asking for things these UFO’s would never get done.  So daughter three, here’s to you (and for you) for bugging and nagging me long enough to finish this long time in coming quilt!  Daisy Buttons…….

One of my favorite things about this quilt is the pink backing.  I love how it stands out against the mostly yellow top.

I’m also a big big BIG fan of striped binding.

I think this may be the happiest quilt I’ve ever made.  What could be more cheery than buttons, flowers, pink and yellow?

Stormy

Little Cars and Trucks

There is nothing as little boy as cars and trucks.  Whenever I’m in the grocery store and I walk past the toy aisle with the matchbox cars, I get a little twinge.  There are four years in age between my only boy and his little sister.  We had lots of good quality time together.  I can’t think of a time we went to the grocery store when we didn’t come home with a matchbox car.  Picking out a car was the highlight of the trip.  Now, my little buddy just turned 7, is soon to be a second grader and isn’t as excited about a matchbox cars as he used to be.  But, I still think of him whenever I sew little boy blankets and quilts, and how fun it was to play trucks and cars.

My little guy………..

He’s growing up too fast!

Stormy