One down....

I finished a WIP! Yay for me :)
This has been in the pile of what-am-I-going-to-do with-this? projects for a while, and all I needed to finish it was really to decide to give it away!

 

I have had too much to do, and too much on my mind lately to focus on sewing - so I am very happy to have finished this.

 

I am happy with how it turned out! The circles are a pain to cut, but they really do come together pretty easily - I would definately make another one of these.

 

Since this is going to a good friends' son, I tried to find some boyish prints to go on the back. There just are not many guy-prints to be found!!

Anyway, I hope he will like it. I had fun making it :)

Wedding Quilt for friends!

We went to a wedding last weekend.
And....eventhough I am far too busy as it is, I had to make a quilt for our friends for their wedding. It's not their fault my schedule is isane!

 

Obviously I waited until the last possible minute to start this, and ended up spending an entire weekend working on it :)

But I am happy with how it came out.

 

And the happy couple liked it too!

HST pillow

The couch at my house is a rather sad-looking thing. I made a pillow last year to brighten it up a little, I meant to make more - but that didn't happen.
Miss V started complaining about us only having the one pillow - and could I please make another one? So I found a Kona charm pack and some scraps and made this

 

I am pretty happy with how it turned out.

I used some of my FMF for the back

 

 - sorry about the blurry picture - 

I put it on the couch and I do like it....

 

Maybe I should make one more? And preferably before 2012 ;)

Love

Miss V: This is for you
Little A: Oh, is that for me? Did you really make this for me?
Miss V: Yes I did. Because you are my little brother and I love you :)

Mother's Day

On Mother's Day I had some sewing time - yay!
I am still working on the star quilt

 

I really like this pattern!

I think Miss V and her friend must have caught me at a time when I was feeling particularly guilty about not spending enough time with my kids....or maybe I had just said no too many times already that day?! Somehow, they managed to make me promise that I would sew them matching bags. So I did. These are made from KeykaLou's Curvy Clutch pattern.

 

I quilted their names so they can tell them apart - and because I want (and need) the practise :)

They love their new little clutches, so it was worth the work - the girls picked the fabrics, and they are very proud of how well they did.

My kids woke me up with kisses on Mother's Day :) And some pretty awesome gifts.
I have not been very good at saving hand- and footprints as they are growing up, but they gave me this fabric

 

All the blue hands are Asks and the red ones are Violas :) I have no idea how I am going to use this, but I am sure I'll think of something.

They also gave me this Moomin mug - because they love bubbles

 

Cute, huh?!

I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day as well. Whether you are a mom, friend, aunt or something else!

Kindle Cover How-to

This is so super-fast! I made this in less than an hour, and so can you :)

 

What you need is one piece of focus fabric, one piece of fabric for lining and one piece of batting - I used a piece of a fleece blanket from IKEA, because that is what I had on hand.

Each piece should be cut to measure 6 1/8'' by 16'' -if you have a Kindle 3G like I do.

The fabric in the photo is folded in half.

The first thing you do is to lay out all your fabric pieces. You place your focuse fabric right side up, and put your lining fabric on top of it wrong side facing  up. And then you place your batting on top of the lining fabric.
Should look like this:

 

Now you sew each short end with 1/4'' seam allowance.

I cut the batting close to the seam, to avoid bulk.

 

Do this at both ends of your fabric-pile. This is also the step where you can measure once more, to be sure your cover will have the right size at the end - just lay your Kindle on the fabric, line ot up to the first seam, fold the fabric over your Kindle, and see how much fabric is left for your second seam. I am a lazy measurer, so I need to do this....

Then you turn your fabric right side out, so you have the seams and the batting in the middle, and you lining fabric and focus fabric facing out.

Now you fold the cover in half, with the lining side facing out, and sew down each side, using 1/2'' seam allowance - like so

I have cut the fabric close to the seams, maybe 1/8'', to avoid bulk.

Now you turn the cover right side out. make sure you turn the corners out as good as you can. I use a crochet hook or a knitting needle.

The you sew at 1/4'' from the side seam, on the front. This will make a french seam, and cover those fraying edges on the inside, so you don't get lint in you Kindle :)

 

Once you have done this on both sides, your cover is all done!!

It is supposed to be a tight fit, you don't want your Kindle to slide out of the cover.

 

If you have questions or if you make a cover using this how-to, please let me know :)
This style will also work for your phone or an iPad. You just measure your phone/iPad and add 1/2'' seam allowance to the length and 1'' to the width (remember you need to cover both the height, front and back).
I would love to see your creations!

Spring :)

Spring seems to finally have found its way to Denmark!

We have had picnics, and not only in the living room - real outside picnics. Needless to say Miss V is excited about that :)

 

It is nice to spend more time outside, without having to put on 50 layers of clothes first.

I have finished my BeeFF block for Lu - she asked for a garden, so I made her some strawberries

 

Also...I finally cut into my Hope Valley jelly roll. I am pretty happy with how this is turning out - more pictures to follow - there are some rookie mistakes, but that's ok. It's my first time.

 

I hope to get this finished soon. 

Somehow I only seem to sew things that I have not planned. So far I haven't really made any progress on my list for 2011. So either I'll have a very productive fall, or I just won't get everything done :)

BeeFF for Tia

I finally finished my BeeFF blocks for Tia!! Tias month was February, so I am still behind :/
This is the first block

This is machine sewn. I am just not patient enough to hand sew!

The other block is hand sewn, and so took me almost 2 months to finish :/

I am still fiddling with the Christmas ornaments, I have some ideas. That'll be the next post...

The kids and I have been visiting my parents all week, we'll be going back to Copenhagen today. We have visited the artmuseum, aRos.

I really want to see the installation on the roof "Your Rainbow Panorama" by Olafur Eliasson, but it doesn't open untiln the end of May.

So....we'll just have to come back soon :)

We also found time to visit a fabric store - obviously!

Happy Easter

I am trying to catch up on some sewing. I made these pillows for my Dad. They are his birthday present. And to give you and idea of how late I really am, I can tell you that his birthday is in January *ahem*

I made these to match the Morris Workshop quilt I made for my parents for Christmas. Atleast that was done in time ;)

I used up every little bit of the prints to finish these, as you can see on the back

I have almost finished one bee block for Tia, and I have one more to do. Lets just say, that applique is not my favourite kind of sewing....

This block I am handsewing, and the next one will be sewn on my machine. If not Tia will not get these babies back until sometime in 2012 - and that would not be fair!
I have also almost finished a block for Lu, but I'll have to show you that when I am back in Copenhagen, I didn't take a picture of it yet.

On a different note....
Mmmmm....spring! You have to love it!

The kids and I are spending Easter in Aarhus with my parents, and we are having a wonderful time.

I had some good news at work, and what better way to celebrate it than buying a new pair of shoes?!

These will be for work too....perfect for spring if you ask me :)

Catching up...

I am having a very strange 2011 so far. There are some personal issues I need to sort out - so be patient with me!
I have hardly touched my sewing machine all year, so I am already behind in getting bee blocks made and sent to my friends. This weekend I made a start, and I will catch up!
This is the first block I made for LauraJay for the BeeFF bee on Flickr:

 

LauraJay requested faded colors. Working on these made me realize that I have almost no faded colors in my stash. I knew I like bright, but still....

This is the second block I made for her:

 

Sorry about the blurry picture and the awful colors in this picture :(

I also had some catching up to do for the Row10 bee from 2010 (ACK!)
This is the row I made:

It was sent out a little more than a week ago, so it should arrive at its new home soon!

Also....I have finally decided on an e-book reader. I have had such a hard time deciding, but now it is here, and I LOVE it!!

 

Now my biggest problem is, that I still have to finish the paperback I am reading. I sooo want to read on my Kindle instead!

Positive Wednesday :)

Having a busy life, being lucky enough to have kids and also to have a job that enables me to provide for them, that makes me thankful!

My daugther gave me these this morning, right before I went out the door at 6:30AM to go to work.
As I am sure you have guessed MOR is Danish for Mom :)

That makes me feel blessed and thankful - getting letters and drawings from my daugther!

And it makes me feel like that every time I look at them during the day. I have them at the office with me, as a reminder of the blessings I have.
It even makes it more bearable that I don't have time to sew!

Ice

We still have a lot of snow here.
So yesterday when Miss V and I walked home from the pool (yes, it is an indoor pool!), this is what we were walking on:

 

I could have worn more sensible shoes, sneakers are not the best for walking on ice!
There was a lot of laughing, a lot of sliding and no falls!! I did have to catch her a few times, but we didn't fall :)

State of the WIPs...

...most of them anyway!

I laid out the rows for my Row10 quilt to take pictures this evening, and Little A just couldn't stay off it!!

I have all the rows now, and I absolutely love every one of them! A huge thank you to my friends who made these rows for me. This quilt will definately be a favourite!

I have also looked at my WIPs to see how much I still have to do to have a finished quilttop.
This first one is my scrappy circle WIP. I think I need to make quite a few more of these to have a quilt in a good size.

Not too bad, though, I have more blocks than I though I did :)

This next one is going to take me forever to finish. I am not enjoying making these stars as much as I enjoy looking at them! I am sure I will love this once it is done - but I am not sure it will be done in 2011....

This week has been hard work. Getting up at 5:30AM is not easy for me, and especially not during winter when it is so dark in the morning! I'll stop whining, I really enjoy my job - it's just the getting up early in the mornings I don't like so much!

A year of living positively

This year I am going to do a post every week about something positive that happened to me, big or small.

 

Starting work again after New Years has been both rewarding and exhausting. I really like my job, and the kids have been so happy going back to their friends, so everything is going really well.

However, I am a person who likes to stay up late in the evenings and sleep in a little - and Charles has let me do that during the holidays - so getting up at 5:30AM and being at the office by 7AM is a little challenging right now. I have managed, and I will manage to do it, though.

Anyway, Charles sees that I am tired, and since I don't drink coffee, he got me a big cherry coke. Mmmmm...just what I need after a long day at the office! Cherry coke and reruns of "Bones" and my sweetie. That makes me thankful :D

Quilty goals for 2011

I am not sure if I am going to be able to finish all of this in 2011, but here's the list and then we'll see how much I get done :)

I have finally made curtains for our living room, and I would love to have an extra set! Maybe even a set of Christmas curtains before December 2011! How fun would it be to have Christmas curtains?!

I am in the Bee FF quilting bee on Flickr, so I want to be on time with the blocks for that. That may sound as an easy goal to achieve, but it hasn't been so in the past! Here's hoping I'll do better in 2011!

My growing list of UFOs should be reduced.
These are the ones I want to finish:

My SC2 quilt. I have all the blocks, and I am using this mustard solid to make sashing.

This has been waiting for a while because I couldn't decide what to use for sashing. But I need to finish it!

I also want to finish the quilt for our bed

 

Right now we use to regular sized quilts to make our bed, not a very good solution!

Also, I have my Row10 quilt. I still have to make my row for this

I am looking forward to this one being finished! I love these rows so much!!

I want to reduce my stash in 2011. It is not too big, but I can definately make quite a few quilts with what I have, so my goal is to work from stash. I can buy fabrics for binding and I will need to buy batting. And I know I will buy fabric, but it shouldn't be as much as it has been in 2010.

Oh...I also want to make a quilt for Charles' dad and his girlfriend, they are getting married sometime this spring. And my SIL is turning 50....and one of my friends is having a baby.

I'll be busy!!

Happy New Year!!

Miss V set the table..

She helped me make our favourite food for the first course

 

The boys don't care for sushi, so they pretty much waited for the main course :) Which also means that Miss V and I will be having sushi for lunch tomorrow!

We went for a walk and looked at the fireworks, we turned our couch around so we sat facing the windows looking out at the fireworks and we ate way too much candy.

A perfect New Years Eve!

I wish you and your loved ones a happy and blessed New Year and thank you for all your kind words, your support and friendship in 2010 - I am looking forward to seeing what 2011 will bring!