30/30 - Goulashes, Swaps, Sewing & More!

My dirty goulashes that live at my moms. It gets so muddy out there, that I had to have some to wear around the yard. I just don't have use for them now that i'm back living in town - so there they will stay. And this is the last of the Macro Challenge photos. I don't know what i'll blog about each day...but i'm sure i'll think of something!

Look what I got in the mail today! My lunch bag! I just love it! I actually have this fabric, but with yellow flowers and i'm going to make a nursing cover-up out of it - so it's perfect that I have a bag to match. I will get tons of use out of this bag! It's perfect for trips to the store. Stephanie at Creative Reveries was my swap partner and she used Elizabeth's pattern for Little Shopping Bags.

But that wasn't all I received - she included some ribbon, rickrack and lots of fabric that she thought would be good to use for my little baby-to-be. The fabric is a perfect addition to the stash i've been accumulating to create a scrappy quilt for him. I'm especially excited to have some rickrack in my stash - everyone seems to be using it lately and i'd like to give it a try.

Look at this cute little bag I made the other day. I went down stairs about 11pm and didn't come up until 3am! I had no idea it was so late. But I started and completed this bag. Can you believe how much it looks like the picture? (See next picture.) It's from the book Quilted Bags in a Weekend by Ellen Kharade - my aunt got it for me for my birthday this year.

I love it when things turn out like they should. The only thing i'm not happy with is I used a heavier interfacing and it's really too stiff. So I have fabric to do one in black and white prints, and i'll use a lighter weight interfacing this time around. I'm hoping to work on that one tomorrow.

Today I made burp cloths! My friend has one this size, and I really liked it. So got some fabric at Joann's for cheap and each burp cloth cost about $1.50 to make. Pretty good, considering a 3 pack of burp cloths at Target is $10. That's $3.50/burp cloth. These are so much cuter and no one will have any like it. Hopefully this is enough to get us through a few days...

Our crib came in the other day. Aaron put it together with his stepdad's help while his mom and I watched. It's so very cute. I really wanted a white crib, but didn't want it to look girly. I think this fits the bill nicely. And, of course, it's a convertible crib (what ones aren't these days?). It will make a very nice toddler bed and later a great headboard for a full-sized bed. As you can probably see, the room is still far from done. But the walls are painted, the floors are in and we have a crib! We still have at least 3 weeks....

Check out that belly! 36 weeks. He's sticking his butt out on the right side there. He just loves to do that to me. I had the first of my weekly appointments today. Blood pressure was up slightly. I'm 1 cm dilated and 50% effaced. More than I expected to be. But despite what my husband and best friend think, i'm not going to deliver early. (I hope!) Because of my blood pressure issues I get to have another ultrasound! So tomorrow morning I get to see how he's doing, how big he is, make sure he's growing (because I haven't gained weight in 2 months). But, unfortunately, I have to have non-stress tests every week at my office visits. Hopefully that goes better than it did at the hospital last Friday. That was too many hours trying to get him to do what they wanted.

Wow - that's a lot of blogging! What am I going to blog about the rest of this week? I'm sure i'll think of something... there is a crochet project in the works...but i'll tell you about that tomorrow!

29/30 - Buttons!

I covet these buttons. They are my moms...and I think they were my step-dads mother's before that. I especially love this red button in the center. I might have to go steal a couple from her sometime soon.

28/30 - My Favorite Things

Rocks! I love rocks! That's probably why i'm a geology major. It will be nice to say one day soon that I have my BS in Geology. 5 more classes. Maybe when this baby is a year old i'll be able to finish up the last few classes. But, honestly, I probably wont use the degree for sometime. At least not until this baby is grown. But I do love my geology.

Wonder if i'll make it down to my sewing machine today? I did get the binding sewn on my mini quilt last night. So I am accomplishing little bits of crafty projects.

27/30 - Pagoda

Well, the Macro Challenge is almost over. I got a lot of great shots today while out at my moms house. Here is a little concrete pagoda she has sitting on her bedroom patio. I like the close up of the moss with the little window blurred out in the background.

While I was there I used her sewing machine, with the stitch regulator (Bernina 430, I believe). I sewed my quilt for the mini quilt swap...and then decided it needed a little more embellishing to make it not so simple and plain. So I sewed on some beads. It's really cute. I can't wait to show it to you, but that will have to wait until after Kate receives it. I hope I can get it mailed this week. Wonder how long it will take to get to Australia? (And how much it's going to cost!) I'm going to have a hard time parting with this...I might have to make myself one.

We had us some country fun at moms this afternoon! That's right, David is home and he's been pulling out my dads guns. Military boy that he is, he had to clean them and make sure they were being used. He was excited to have my step-son come out and play around with him. Not only did they shoot the BB guns, but they also pulled out the 22. That was loud. Of course my mom and I had to get in on the action. Is that wrong to see a pregnant woman shooting a gun? Seems slightly off to me. What's even sadder, my step-son is a better shot that I am!

I can't believe how much weight i've put on in my face this last week. I know that is normal for pregnant woman, but I really don't like to see it on myself. It's especially hard to see these photos of myself today and then see my big wedding canvas when I was nice and skinny - not 9 months ago - every time I walk into the living room! Yes, just one month before I got pregnant. So sad. Here's a before and after...I can't wait to get back to before! (I can't believe i'm sharing this horrid picture from today!)

26/30 - Glutton for Punishment

Looks like another picture I posted recently - but it's orange this time! It's another knit cap for my little boy. I'm going for no mistakes/ripping out this time around.

So I was late in posting yesterdays photo. Yesterday was a long day. I was in the hospital for the whole of the afternoon. We were checking to make sure I wasn't leaking amniotic fluid. As of yesterday, I wasn't. But I wasn't exhibiting any of the "signs" like I had been of the possibility of leaking. So i'll just watch it. I'm not too concerned - Brice seems to be moving around lots. Although, the reason we had to stay so long a the hospital was because he wouldn't move around for them. He had a good heart rate, but wasn't showing any "spiking" of activity. So I had to change sides while laying down, and then drink orange juice (which gave him hiccups for 30 minutes) and we had to "buzz" my stomach... Finally, towards the end of our visit, he decided to give them what they wanted. He was just sleepy. He's active in the morning and evening, but quite in the middle of the day. We were discharged, that's the good news. I was contracting every few minutes while we were there. It was fun to see them on the monitor. Last night I started to have MUCH stronger contractions. They were very painful. I can't even imagine what it will feel like once they are for real, and not just Braxton Hicks. I'm not looking forward to that. They are already making me nauseous. I haven't been worried about pre-term labor, but i read today about my being so anemic during this pregnancy, and that can cause pre-term labor. I'm still not really concerned. Even if I did go into labor soon, i'm 36 weeks today and 37 weeks is considered full term. What i'm worried about is not having what I need! There is still so much to go buy. I think I need to get started on that buying this week!

Almost forgot! My Lunch Bag Swap partner (Michelle at Greeting Arts) got her package! She blogged about it here. She seemed to really like it! Which makes me happy. I always am so self-conscious when crafting for others. I'm afraid it wont be good enough, or something they like. But I have so much fun making and giving!

25/30 - Orange Yarn

Catching up! Some really nice orange yarn to be made into a cute little hat for my little boy.

24/30 - Rubber Bands

Kind of a cool shot. These are all the rubber bands from just one of my diaper cakes I got at my shower on Sunday. There were a LOT of rubber bands around a LOT of diapers! I forgot to ask my girlfriends how many were in their cake. My mother-in-law said there were 90 in her cake, and she didn't have near as many as the cake from my friends. I'm not going to count - i'm satisfied knowing it was a lot of diapers. We are basically covered on newborn sized diapers. My MIL has another 210 at her house on top of the probably 200+ I now have in a big bag in the closet. That should get us through the first 2 (maybe 3) months. Hopefully....

And here is the pile of diapers! Not only did I pull off all the rubber bands, but I unrolled them all, too. In the process of taking the cakes apart, I got to see everything else that was mixed in with them. Tons of onesies, socks, hats and bibs. Liz, you went crazy on the Calvin Klein bibs. I have a HUGE pile of clothes, blankets, burp clothes, towels, wash cloths, etc... to wash.

There is still so much I need to get. Some i'll get now, some i'll wait on. To the moms out there: what would be your "must haves" for those first few weeks at home...?

23/30 - Sewing Adventures

Yesterday found me over at my friend Sarah's fixing her sewing machine and teaching her some basic sewing (she blogged about it here and darn, do I look pregnant!). It was as much a learning adventure for me as for her. With some adorable spring fabric (above) she bought, we decided to try and make a skirt for her almost-6-year-old, Stella. She grabbed one of her daughter's skirts and brought it down to the kitchen table. We laid it out on the fabric and cut a wide path around it. (This worked for me in the past when helping my mom sew scrub tops for work.) I've never attempted a skirt before. So it was part way through the process that I realized the skirt was cut as a rectangle to begin with, and then as it was gathered at the top, it went into that A-line skirt look. Long story short, I taught her what I could and she ended up coming up with a VERY cute skirt. I got a picture message on my phone this morning showing me the final product.

I was reading Rachel's blog (Cornflower Blue Studio) this morning (she has a great macro shot today!) and followed a link over to another American-blogger-living-in-Germany - Baby Anne Quilts. She is doing a week of blogging about Earth Week. Take a minute to go read this post. I found it really interesting that in Germany they don't use paper/plastic bags when shopping. Everyone brings their own bags to bring home their groceries. I've been reading about this on a lot of blogger's blogs lately and thinking that I need to be better about doing that myself. I'm not normally a "tree hugger" kind of person, but this is something that makes sense to me. So maybe after baby is here, I will work on making some simple bags for shopping. At the very least, i'll take one with me on my retail-therapy shopping trips.

In my defense, when I do get paper bags with the little handles on them at stores, I save them. I either give them to my mom to use as lunch bags (which she uses over and over again until they are un-usable), if there aren't any kind of store logos on them then I reuse them for gift bags, and even if their is some identifying logo on them I just cover them with scrapbook paper. Heck, I even use them for transporting things from point A to point B. So at least I do reuse what I can. It's a start.

And what's next on the crafty agenda you ask? I'm working on another basket, and thinking about what I can do with that Yummy Yarn. Wonder how it would look as a knit cap for myself? I'm off to find a pattern!

22/30 - Accomplishment

Finally! It's done! With some help from Karin (Orange Flower) I closed off the top and sewed up the seam tonight. She sent me a great link on how to seam it up - found here. Thank you, Karin! Now, time to make the orange one! :) But first, for those of you that knit, I have some questions.

What in the world did I do to get this hole? I know I hadn't dropped a stitch when this happened. But I obviously did something and that makes the most sense.

Next question: why is it that when I "decrease" and knit the two loops together I get these bumpies? It looks fine on the knit side, but on the purl side I get these little bumps. Is that normal?

Anyhow, here's the completed hat! I'm excited to try it on him. It's tiny, so he wont be able to wear it for long, but it's still fun to make something likes this for him to wear.

My girlfriend Sarah took this picture on Sunday at my shower. It's so sweet. It's my moms hand on my belly - Brice was moving around. I don't think he likes being head down, because he frequently moves out of that position. I'd say daily he moves to a lateral position and then back to head down again. Pretty soon he wont have enough room to do that anymore. Let's just hope he's head down the last time he's able to move like this.

Tutorials to Check Out

Have you been checking out Sew, Mama, Sew!'s tutorial contest entries? My Nursing Cover-Up tutorial was on yesterdays post! They posted some last week, yesterday and again today. Check them out - there is some great stuff in there!

Last week Sew, Mama, Sew! (who by the way is a local online fabric retailer) featured a few of their new Board Members, and one of my favorite bloggers was featured. Oh, Fransson! After you've read Elizabeth's bio, you should check out her blog. She has been hosting the lunch bag swap that I participated in and has posted weekly with bag inspiration. Some very cute stuff!

21/30 - Vintage Quilt

My favorite fabric in a vintage Double Wedding Ring quilt I have . I just love the red with the blue, pink and orange in the little white dots. Since I can never seem to keep the quilts I make, it's nice to have this one all to myself.

A better look at it. This belonged to my step-dad's mother. I'm not sure if she made it or not, but I like it anyhow. I spend most days on the couch curled up under this. Especially with the cold weather we've been having lately.

My little knitted cap is almost done! I should post a photo of it tomorrow... Stay tuned.

Baby Shower

Isn't this so cute! My girlfriends made it for me for my shower yesterday. I can't bring myself to pull it apart yet. I just love the little Elephant on the top. He is so sweet. Another favorite - the pictures my mom painted me for the boys room. It's the giraffe, alligator, hippo and elephant like Pottery Barn Kids has right now. Only much better price to have them painted by mom, than bought from PB Kids. More pictures on my Flickr.

20/30 - Yummy Yarn

I'm so tired. I didn't go to bed until 5:30am this morning, woke up at 8...went back to sleep. Woke up at 9...went back to sleep. Got up and ready at 10am, out the door at 11:30 to get some last minute stuff and was gone at my grandma's for my baby shower all day. I can't believe it's 10pm and i'm still awake. So here's my macro for now and i'll blog more tomorrow.

19/30 - Beaded Trim

I'm running out of things to take macro photos of. It's hard when you are confined to the house, and more specifically to upstairs away from the craft space. Tomorrow is my baby shower...maybe i'll find some interesting things to photograph at my grandma's house. Anyhow, this is the detail around the top of a bag I made a few years ago. I pulled it out and have been using it to transport my knitting/crocheting with me on the rare occation I do leave the house.

Here's the whole bag. I had some left over home decore weight toile that i recovered a chair in...I thought it would make a cute bag. This was a Simplicity pattern (if you want to know which one i'll have to go look in my patterns downstairs). It is such a cute purse, but the bottom was a pain. I don't know if that's how all round oval/round bottoms are...or if it was just this pattern. Since this one I haven't attempted another round bottom.

So as i'm sure you can see, i'm messing around with the look of my blog. This is not the end of it. Just the end for tonight. See, it's 2am and I REALLY need to get to bed. I love what pregnancy does to ones sleep patterns. Just preparing me for the baby, I guess.

OH! Almost forgot - we did get snow today! It was coming down quite hard, especially since we are almost at sea level here at the house (120ft). There are more pictures in my Flickr, but here's a quick look at our April "showers".

Is it really almost May?

Just a lovely anomaly to share. Yes, that says snow. Tonight through Sunday down to 500 ft. We're about 120 ft. here at our house, but we'll see snow anyways. Apparently it's coming down at the beaches and in Seattle (about 3 hours north of us). Crazy! Could the weather here in the PNW get any crazier? Tornado's, snow through April, rain, rain, rain.... I just hope this means we will get an exceptional summer. But we all know that it always rains until after the 4th of July here.

18/30 - A Few Of My Favorite Things

There is nothing better than a stack of colorful fabric. I went through some of my fat quarters yesterday and pulled out fabrics I thought would work for the mini quilt swap i'm part of. The good news is I wont need much from each of these prints for what i've got planned, because I really wanted to use some of these in a quilt for my little boy...well, not the pink one, obviously.

Yesterday, while blog-hoping, I came across A Country Mouse in the City. In one of her posts she had a list of things that she was thankful for. Her 4th entry in this list says this:

4. I have the ability to create and share my quilts with those I hold dear in my life. So what if someone else creates the same thing. When it comes down to it every work is an original creation by the quilter's own hands. I am not doing this to win awards or pay the bills. I do this as a labor of love, and my biggest hope for my quilts is that the recipient will cherish them.

I don't think I could have said it better. I often feel bad these days when I see something another crafty blogger has made and I think to myself, I could make that! I don't think of making it for a profit, I think of how I enjoy the project and the challenge of figuring it out myself. What creativity is there in it for me if I just buy it? I always think to myself "imitation is the greatest form of flattery". So I hope if others seem me create something they have created that they will remember this. Then, there has always been the part of me that thinks - i'm not going to pay $100 for that when I can make it myself for $10! :)

In a fit of frustration last night I ripped out all my knitting work on the cap and started over again. My husband was sitting by me when this happened...I think he found it quite amusing. This is just how it goes...good thing I have at least 5 more weeks. The big issue was not knowing that when it says "stockinette 16 rows" it means to do 8 rows knit and 8 rows purl (not 16 rows of knit and purl). So then after ripping out all the unnecessary rows and putting back the needle...my stitches were twisted and it made it impossible to knit/purl. Oh well. This is what you get when you teach yourself something. Trial and error.

17/30 - Where the Magic Happens

Hmmm, looks a bit dusty from fabric fibers. I sure miss sewing. I thought about giving it a shot again today. But I spent most of the day resting upstairs. Maybe tomorrow. This is my Bernina Activa 220. I got it on sale after Christmas. My birthday is just a week and a half after Christmas, so I saved up all my birthday/Christmas cash and bought this. I think i've had it about 3 years now.

I have seen some really cute sewing machine covers lately. I don't have one. I'm wondering if I should. But I feel like if I had my machine covered up under something I would be less enclined to use it. It would just be one more step in getting myself to the sewing machine. Why do you need a cover anyways? Do they really get dusty? Other than the fiber dust I get in the bobbin case and on the foot... I don't think i've ever had to dust off a sewing machine. But i'm assuming this is why people have them...

How do you like the new layout? Too busy? Should I go back to the old layout? I just thought my right side bar was getting too long/full. What do you think?

16/30 - Cravings

I couldn't resist the box of donuts at the grocery store tonight. I ate the one with sprinkles...I don't even like chocolate, but it was soooo good! I'm just about done with the knitted cap, i'm on the decreases now. Maybe i'll get it done tonight and the seams sewn tomorrow.

And because I have been slack in my craftiness on the blog...here's a good tutorial on French seams.

Oh, and good news, my blood pressure was normal today! The medication is working. Maybe that means I can get back at my sewing machine... I have a mini quilt to get done! My lunch bag for the lunch bag swap was mailed today. Some lucky recipient will be getting a box in the mail in 2-3 days. I hope they like it!

15/30 - Kitchen Cactus

My approach to this plant is similar to my sedums...ignore it. But it really doesn't like being ignored for quite so long. It's not looking so good these days. I think we need a "rain storm" in the kitchen to revive it.

Spent the day at the hospital - visiting my friend and her baby (who gets to go home from NICU tomorrow!)...and then waiting for my mom to come out of surgery and go home. She's doing great! her gallbladder sure looked better than mine when it was removed.

My knitting is coming along quite nicely...hopefully i'll have a hat to show you tomorrow!

34 weeks, 4 days

14/30 - Need More Be Said...?

Really...i'm sure you can guess what this is. My first attempts at crocheting resulted in this...but I always get right back on the "horse" so to speak.

Today we put together baby Brices' stroller. It's a Chicco car seat/stroller system. It was the only one that I could easily disengage and lift from the base and stroller. I have weak hand strength and this one was so nice on my hands. I just love the green, too! This is a shower gift from my mom and grandma...we got it a little early. We'll be taking it to the shower on Sunday so grandma can see what she helped to buy us. :)

13/30 - Knit...Purl....

Look at that lovely knitting. And such a beautiful grey-blue. But, wait!

That looks like my yarn basket! And it looks like that lovely blue knitting is in MY yarn basket! Could it be, did I actually do something with the knitting I taught myself a few weeks ago? Oh, but it gets better...

I learned to PURL! Yes, me! And I didn't just learn, I taught myself...with the help of Knitting Help's website and videos. They are fabulous if you're wanting to learn to knit and are a do-it-yourselfer like myself. So i'm sure most knitters start with a scarf...yeah, not me. I dive right in to whatever it is I really want to make with a new craft. So of course i'm making a knit cap for my little boy (due to arrive in just 6 more weeks!). Watch for the finished project found in this book - thanks Karin!

12/30 - Sedums

My sedums on the front porch. I'm surprised they look this good. They survived our very wacky weather, including a tornado in my neighborhood. And odd thing for our area. It was a long night last night (seizing dog), and a very long day today. We had gorgeous 85 degree weather, but, of course, I hear snow is in the forecast for next week. We need days like this every so often to remind us just why it is we live in the Pacific Northwest. I can't wait for summer!

11/30 - A Walk in the Park

After a little bit of shopping today, my mom and I stopped at the Starbucks in downtown Vancouver by Ester Short Park to have a little snack. I got to pet some of the cutest dogs - I can't remember what they are called. They are apparently a rare breed. They have a big head on a little body with short, stubby legs. I wish I had taken a picture - but I always feel awkward asking people to take their picture. Anyways, we went over to the park and took a [very] slow walk around the paths and looked at all the tulips blooming and the fountains. It was such a warm, lovely afternoon here. And tomorrow is even better - 76 degrees! I am so looking forward to it.

Some of the beautiful tulips spotted in the park. Check out my Flickr set - Vancouver, WA USA to see more. I'll hopefully be able to add more to this set as Spring and Summer go on. I have hopes of taking lots of walks in the park with baby Brice and all of my girlfriends that are having babies right now. Yes, there are about 8 of us...it must have been in the water.

Here's a quick peek at my hand quilting on my drunkard's path mini-quilt. I have been working on this for a few years (mostly stashed away during that time). I finished the quilting last night and just need to iron it and put on the binding. Then it's ready to hang on my wall! I'm quite proud of it - I can't wait to show you the completed quilt!