Saturday, August 09, 2014

Baby Sunnies Hack

I sewed!!  It was hand sewing, but sewing, nonetheless!

I purchased a pair of sunglasses for Maggie (almost 4 months old!) at Mountain Equipment Co-op yesterday.  They were these ones:


MEC Adele Sunglasses (Kids)


When I put them on her with the red strap, they were a bit too big, even on the tightest that the Velcro fastens.  But, I bought them anyway because I thought that I might be able to tweak them when I got home.

Into my supplies I jumped, and came out with 1" black ribbon, 1" black elastic, some black thread and a needle.



I didn't even measure...I just cut off a length of ribbon that I thought was long enough, and then cut another using the first piece as a guide.  After I took off the red strap that came with the glasses, I threaded one piece of ribbon into the slot on each side of the sunglasses until the ribbon was at the halfway point.

On each side of the sunglasses, I folded the cut ends of the ribbon over to the wrong side and pressed them with my finger nail.  I put the end of the elastic between the two folded over ribbon ends and hand sewed the elastic to the ribbon.  I did not cut the elastic to length before I sewed.

Next, I put the sunglasses around Maggie's face and decided how much elastic would be needed to fit her.  I held the length, and cut it.

On the unsewed side, I folded the cut ends of the ribbon over to the wrong side, and just like the first side, pressed them down with my finger nail.  Again, I put the end of the elastic between the folded ribbon ends and hand sewed it in place.

The result...




















On my beautiful model...





And while we were on vacation in Kelowna, BC



More to come,





















Tuesday, July 08, 2014

Scooter

L-R: Scooter, Jeff, Lucas

See that dog in the picture, up there?  He looks really sweet, doesn't he?  Well, looks can be deceiving, that dog, right there, is a maniac!

This dog is going to kill me...or I am going to kill this dog!  

While my brother, Jeff, and his lovely little family (wife, Nikola and son, Lucas) are in the Czech Republic for 3 weeks, I am house sitting.  Basically, the house looks after itself, but it is air conditioned, and my house is not.  Score!  

So, really, I am devil dog sitting.  Scooter is a 1.5 years old and still behaves like a puppy.  The ad on Petfinder.com said he is a Labrador/Golden Retriever mix, but I have seen pretty good photographic evidence that suggests that he is, in actual fact, a Labrador/Pit Bull mix.

Really, he means well.  Really, he does.  Right?

For example, when people are in the pool, he feels that it is his duty to make sure that they are safe by dragging them back to the stairs.  Or if he can't get to the pool (because maybe someone lashed him to the wrought iron patio table), then he will bark incessantly to alert the entire neighbourhood of the impending danger of being in the water.  Charming...

Or when he dug his nose into the very closed diaper bag, did not disturb a thing, but was able to pluck my black leather Coach wristlet out and take it to the couch to give it a good chew.  Why?  Because I'm pretty sure that he thought the cow wasn't dead yet.


I guess I'm done using it!

The bad news:  this is not the first item that has been damaged.  
The good news:  Maggie's face has never been cleaner!  :)

And just for a little Maggie update, here is a photo collage from when my sister, Kari was playing with her last week.  She is now 3 months old!


That's my girl!


More to come,



Monday, June 30, 2014

Book Review 1

by Jonas Jonasson


Image from Chapters.Indigo.ca


This book is my book club selection for September.  We do not meet during the summer, so this is the next book we will discuss.  I am the "host", so that means I have to find the discussion question and choose the meeting place.

Sometimes we meet at a restaurant that matches the book we have read, but unless we eat at IKEA, that will not be happening in September.  :)

Book Review

This was a fairly easy read and early on, it was also pretty humourous.  As the chapters passed, and the historical coincidences keep piling up, it got a little tedious.  By the end it was clear that the events of Allan's life helped with getting him and his merry band of nitwits out of trouble, but it really wasn't worth it.  

I would rate it 3 out of 5 stars. ***



More to come,


Monday, June 23, 2014

#NewBloggerFail




So I have been blogging, on and off, for a few months now.  My blog overview has been telling me that people have been viewing my blog posts, but so far, no one has been commenting.

I think I solved that mystery today...

As I was getting caught up on my Bloglovin' feed, I have been hopping through new quilter blogs care of Plum and June.  It is a great hop!  I have been finding all kinds of people who are new to blogging and/or quilting...like me!! So I'm reading, and reading, and reading...and <<POW!!>>...there it was...a blog post about another blogger who wasn't getting any comments either!  Thank you, Cozy Capatiller, for helping me solve the mystery I didn't even know that I had to solve!  :)

Still working on my sewing room...maybe finished by the end of this week??

More to come,


Thursday, June 19, 2014

State of Affairs

The Escape of Chaos by Nicholas Vitale


In my last post, I mentioned that my sewing space was a mess.  Here is the proof:


View from the laundry room

View from the stairs


Carpet is draped over my sewing table due to the flooding that happened during the first thaw.  We had a lot of snow this past winter and when it melted in such great quantity, it came through the seam of the window on the right.  My mom and I got as much off the floor as possible (thank god for plastic bins!), and placed the carpet on my sewing table to dry out.  Not long after that, I moved to her place until I had Maggie, so I haven't had a chance to put my sewing space back together again.  That is my goal this week.  I'll post pictures when I get it done.


More to come,


Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Maggie is Growing!

So, it has been another month since I posted.  I am learning that I do not have has much time as a new mother as I thought I would, but I love every minute of it!

I have done absolutely ZERO sewing, so I have nothing to report on there.  I have moved back to my own house, though, after staying with my parents for 2 months after Maggie was born, so hopefully I can find some time to get some stuff worked on, and maybe even done!  First, I have to get my sewing space back together, as the initial thaw decided to make its way into my basement and I had to lift the carpet up from the floor, which moved everything out of place.  I am hoping to get that done this week.

Maggie is growing like a weed!  She was 2 months old on June 1.  Here is a comparison:




As you can see, she has definitely gotten chunkier!  She is a little longer, too.  Inspired by Young House Love, I am planning on taking Maggie's picture every month on a different piece of fabric, then using the fabric to make a quilt.  Sherry and John took a picture every week, but I am just not that organized!  Click here to see the quilt that Sherry made.


More to come,



Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Maggie Monday...er...Tuesday!

This past weekend, I got to celebrate my first Mother's Day.  Maggie and I did our usual morning routine, then when we came downstairs, I found a little surprise waiting for me.  It turns out that Maggie had been conspiring with my grandmother, her great grandmother, to get me little present.




Then my brother and sister-in-law came over with my nephew, Lucas, and we went for a walk at the waterfront.


Maggie and Mommy


Lucas and his dad, Jeff


My life has changed A LOT since becoming a mom on April 1.  Maggie is the sunshine of my life, to steal a phrase from Stevie Wonder.  It is still a little unbelievable that she came from me.  Of course, there are times that she drives me crazy, but I haven't wanted to hide under the covers...yet. :)


More to come,

Wednesday, May 07, 2014

My First Quilt - Part 3

On the Design Wall...

I finally got all the blocks pieced for the quilt I am making my sister.  Here is what it looks like on the design wall.

Blocks, not joined & sashing strips

Don't mind the shelves in the background...I'm a teacher who has been out of the classroom for 2 years, and those are boxes of books for my classroom library!  :)

Blocks pieced together

I had previously decided to make the quilt smaller than the pattern calls for, by making only 25 blocks.  As this quilt was (is?) a gift to my sister for her 25th birthday, 24 blocks will make up the quilt top and there will be one block pieced into the back.

So far, so good!  Now to join the rows to the sashing and I will have my first official quilt top!

More to come,


Monday, May 05, 2014

Maggie Monday!

Welcome to Maggie Mondays!!

This will be a returning series, since part of what I do now is be a mom to Maggie.

Maggie was born on April 1, 2014.  Here she is minutes after being born via c-section (not my first choice, but you deal).


Love at first site!

Maggie was 7 lbs, 12 oz and 19.5 inches of pure joy!

Here she is at 1 month old, 8 lbs, 9 oz.




More to come,


Saturday, May 03, 2014

My First Quilt - Part 2

Before my abrupt departure from the blogosphere, I started sharing the very first quilt I started.  It is called the Blonde Redhead and I found it in Quilty (a magazine for beginner quilters). {P.S., I LOVE Quilty!! <3}

It is made up of the Sister's Choice block.  Here are some pics of the first blocks I pieced...





As you can see, I chose the same colour combination that the pattern calls for.  At this point in my quilting journey I'm not very confident in putting together my own colour combinations.

I am making this quilt for my sister...and I'm still not done!

More to come,



Monday, April 14, 2014

Where Have I Been???


HAVING A BABY!!

Shortly after my last post...too long ago, I know...my parents moved me over to their house so we could await the arrival of Butternut.  We didn't have much time to get settled in, though, as the arrival came sooner than expected; 4 days before the estimated due date.  So on Tuesday, April 1st, I found myself in the hospital, labouring, pushing, eventually being c-sectioned, and becoming a mother to a beautiful baby girl.

Miss Maggie weighed 7 pounds, 12 ounces and was 19.5 inches long.
Her face was a little bruised up from the pushing, but other than that, she is perfect.

More to come,


Thursday, March 27, 2014

My First Quilt - Part 1

All through my childhood, my mom sewed all kinds of clothing and costumes, for herself, and my brother and me.  In high school, I took a course called Clothing.  It taught me the basics of using a sewing machine and we completed several little projects over the course of the semester.

Fast forward (*cough*) 20 years (*cough*), and I found "Quilty", a quilting magazine.  The orange and white quilt caught my eye on the cover of the Winter 2012 issue, so I scooped it up.  I figured that I could probably sew a straight line, and be good to go.

After flipping my way through that issue, I wandered around the Quilty website and found this awesome quilt:  the Blonde Redhead, made with the Sister's Choice block.  It looked like the perfect choice for my first quilt.  I could make it for my sister.  She had a birthday coming up, so it would be perfect!
Blonde Redhead

I downloaded and printed the instructions, found the local quilt shop, purchased a cutting mat, rotary cutter, ALL kinds of fabric and matching thread.  Yay!

More to come,








Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Claiming My Blog

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/12010447/?claim=75d7sjst3ez">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

Are You Happy?

I think I am generally happy.  Of course, we all have off days, but on the whole, I am happy.  There are many things in our lives to be happy about, but often we don't acknowledge them on a daily basis.  Acknowledging what makes us happy is the premise behind 100 Happy Days.


100 Happy Days
According to this HLN post, #100HappyDays: Who is behind the challenge?, this project was initiated by Dmitry Golubnichy who started recording what makes him happy in November 2013.

I started the challenge after my sister posted the link on Facebook, and here is what I have been happy about since last Wednesday.

#happyday1


#happyday2


#happyday3
Hahaha!  I went looking for #happyday3, and it turns out I missed it!  Oops! :)  I did post this picture on what would have been day 3, though, and I am pretty happy with it, so I am going to count it.

#happyday4


#happyday5


#happyday6

So, that is my 100 Happy Days Challenge progress so far.  I hope you find something to be happy about every day, and that you take a moment to acknowledge it.

More to come,