elephant baby quilt and OCD-ness towards bobbins...

I have been having the urge to make a quilt so I finally gave in ---

It's baby quilt size 35"x24" 

And it's now in my shop.

Here's Micah modeling 

When Heather posted about needing bobbin storage it reminded me how unhappy I am with the mess of thread currently in my sewing box so I did some goggling and found this idea and decided to try it out

It's fantastic!

 I actually bought 3/8 tubing because they were out of 1/2 and to me the 5/8 looked too large. It was only $.38 per foot and out of the 1 foot I cut about 40 rings... super cheap and awesome... it's sad how happy this makes me!

Book of Numbers Tutorial

For tutorial go here.

Book of Numbers

So one project kept me busy the ENTIRE time that I was gone... it might have been slightly ridiculous... I wanted to make a number book to match the color book.  It was fun to make but I didn't expect it to be quite so time consuming.

I went from 1-10 and showed each number 5 ways. The 1, one and roman numeral are all painted

The hands are embroidered (my own patterns) and the dots are felt appliquéd on

Here's a shot of all of the pages

I am in LOVE with it though I am completely done with making books and long term projects in general and I am happy to say as of this last weekend I finished all of my long term/ongoing projects so I am really happy to have some 'relaxing' time. We'll see how long it lasts!
I am also excited to tell you that there will be a tutorial out for this in April so if you want to make one for yourself and can wait that long I will show you how!

Color Book and Smelly fish

I finished Micah's Color Book. Which has been on my long term to do list forever -- it really wasn't in my plans to make it now but I had time to raid Mums scrap bags so it moved itself to the top of the list! Mum tried to show me paper piecing which is really cool... but I ended up trying to use too many different pieces and being new to the process I ended up being lazy and gave up.

Here's all of the pages before I put the book together

And here it is put together. It's turned out pretty large I think it's about 7x8" and somewhere between 2-3" thick.
I embroidered the front page for texture and hand stitched each page to the cover.
I LOVE the way the spine turned out!
The color names are freezer paper stenciled
And I tried to do something different and funky with each patchwork page
I also tried to have some sort of texture fabric on each page.

I am really happy with how it turned out... especially since I didn't start this with any sort of plan I just let it evolve as I worked on it.
So I realized yesterday that I hadn't shown you all this awesome hat Sherie knit. Micah has the coolest aunt!
I mean who doesn't need a fish eating their head?
I think the one above will go in his photo album!
And this one is Ubers favorite. He's not super steady in his bumbo seat yet his daddy's been working on it with him... don't worry he is heavily supervised when we put him in it - Micah not uber... though I do tend to supervise his dad too!

Nursery Reveal

I am so happy to finally show you Micah's completed nursery!

My goal was to create a fun space that he wasn't going to out grow quickly. I really wanted to stay away from any specific theme's but have a lot of nature inspired items. It was amusing to realize later that the first item I had for the nursery was a calendar print of James Christensen's Flight of the Fable Maker that I'd had my Mum frame a few years ago. I had it hanging else where in the house and had totally forgotten about it until half way through finishing the nursery. It fits in perfectly and ties the whole room together. So somewhere I managed to keep that in the back of my mind as I made all of my design choices!

I can't say by any stretch of the imagination that this nursery really ended up being budget friendly, well at least by our standards. But I did pick items that could be used for all future children and then could transition into our house in other areas easily. And everything that I could possible do myself I did.



Matt and I have always thought it would be fun to have a giant map in the house so I decided to incorporate one into the nursery. I just love the array of muted colors it brings into the room and I made a bunch of flags out of Japanese masking tape and straight pens to mark all of the place we've been separate, together, and soon as a family.

It's hard to pick a favorite item in the room but the Tree Stump Ottoman is definitely near the top. And to make it even sweeter it's full of a schleich animal collection my dad has steadily been adding to.

The Mobile and Quilt are my other favorites for the room. And are hopefully items that will be with him for many years to come.

Most of the toys in the room are hand-me-downs from various family members. With a few additions like his own Steiff elephant, SIGG bottle and various Melissa & Doug items.
Well there it all is finally! I hope you guys enjoy the pictures as much as we are enjoying the room! Oh and sorry there is not Micah shoot for you this post has taken a few days to get together and I simply forgot to load one in at the bottom when I started... I'll try to get some up in the next few days! : P

Resource list:

Crib - Walmart.com

Dresser- 'vintage' piece my parents picked up second hand for me in Germany

Chair - Babiesrus

Side table - Pottery Barn Kids

Rug - Pottery Barn

Wall sconce - Restoration Hardware outlet

Curtains - Pottery Barn pinstriped sheers discontinued

Floating shelves - Ikea

Closet shelves/hanging system- Lowes

Baskets - Michaels Craft Store

Wooden clothing hangers- amazon.com

Book baskets & wall hooks - from Ballard Designs but have since been discontinued

Map - McMaps.com

Toy Chest- has been in the family since my mum was a child

The elephant puppet is from this etsy shop

Puky Bike - a gift from my parents

The stuff I made: Tree Stump Storage Ottoman, Bunting, clothing organizer, Mobile, Quilt, bumpers, Deer head, Spoon Shadow box, growth chart

Stuff others made: elephant stuffed animals, hamper, diaper bag, back pack, elephant garland,