Golden Valley, AZ

We made it to my aunts. I blogged about it in the family blog. I think i'll mostly blog over there about the "adventure"...but post some of my favorite pictures and crafty finds here...we will be visiting quilt shops and antique stores along the way. So if you read both, it wont be the same thing in two spots. This is a small cactus at my aunts. I really love it. We brought home some starts of it a few years ago, but it is to wet for this one at home. So I always enjoy it while visiting here.

I sat around outside in my PJ's all day (they live on land in the desert...aka: few neighbors) - drinking my caffeine free Coke. I love the little droplets on this. I'm thinking about another 30 Day Macro Photography Challenge. I think i'm going to do one the month of October - 30 Days of Fall Macro...

This is a neat little chime on my aunts back patio. I might have to make one like it with some of my fabric scraps to put outside next summer. A great way to enjoy my favorite prints while outside on our deck. See this set on Flickr for more photos.

And it begins...

Yes, on long drives, i've gotten into the habit of propping my foot up on the dash ledge of my Element. My foot was hot.

I feel bad for Brice, he was stuck in his car seat most of yesterday. But he was such a good boy. I left his dealy-bob that entertains him in his car seat at home, so we had to pick up another one at Target on the way. The little frog plays songs and ribbits. He loves it! I'll post pictures along the way on Flickr here and post my favorite pictures each day.

We went from Vancouver, WA down to my dads in Livermore, CA for a short visit yesterday and then on to a hotel along 99...I think it was in Ripton. We finally drifted off to sleep at 1:30a. That was a long day for me. I'd been up since 5:30a and only had 4 hours sleep the night before. I'm beat!

Blogging Without Obligation

I agree with everything she has to say and I hope you will all take something away from this. I sometimes forget that blogging isn't an obligation, but something fun. I truly enjoy posting and keeping myself busy to have something to blog about...but I need not feel like I HAVE to blog either. Take a minute and click on the picture to read this blogger's thoughts.

New Goodies

Antique vase. Found at a garage sale last weekend for $0.50! I think i'll put it on my desk and have it hold pens.
Some new fabric. I love the kitchen print...an apron, maybe? The print below it is a Kokka. It has blue and green leaves. I love the muted colors. And then Joel Dewberry. I have wanted this fabric since it came out, but have never been able to find the yardage.
And a whole slew of fat quarters! I have a quilt in mind for these. Squares from the FQ with white sashing. Simple, but lovely.

Working On My List

1. Finish Diaper Bag Pattern and make another using the pattern (and email to testers). *I have been working on this, but can't cross it off yet...
2. Finish decorating/putting together my sewing room. *add "clean" to this one... (see below)
3. Make header for my Grandma's blog. (Image above.)
4. Get the rest of my stuff unpacked from boxes (it's been a year, it's really time to get everything unpacked).
5. Finish my Hour Glass quilt (I'm almost done!).
6. Design & make stuffed animals - giraffe & elephant! ...with pattern...?

Just checking in and showing that I am busy. Actually, I took a bit of time for myself today and I jumped into a little papercutting. My finger hurts from the x-acto knife, but it's actually kind of fun. I probably wont get anything else on my list done for a few weeks. We leave this Friday for our two week road trip, so there will be little crafting while in the car. BUT - I will be posting the whole time, lots of great landscape photography. So stay tuned...

Mama's Little Boy

WANTED!

I can't find this fabric ANYWHERE! It's Chez Moi by Sentimental Stuidos for Moda. Anyone know where I can find it? Anyone have some they want to trade me? I just love the color and print and would really like to have some in the stash for scrappy projects. I'm so sad I can't find it!

Enter to Win!

Be sure to visit The Vintage Pearl to enter to win a camera strap cover (like above) created by Shealynn (that's her's in the picture), a photographer who found the need for a comfier strap. I like this idea because it is just a cover for your existing strap, so if you share your camera with, say, your husband...and he doesn't like flora prints...just slide it off and his reputation as a macho man wont be ruined! Shealynn also has another blog here.

Speaking of photography blogs, I do have one here...but I haven't posted in awhile. I didn't do any photography later in my pregnancy because I was on bedrest. But i'm going to be starting up again. I have a photo shoot over the next couple weeks at my old place of employment (where some of my prints were purchased and hang). I'm taking "working" pictures for them to use in flyer's. I'm not really an "indoor" photographer, so this will give me a chance to practice with a flash. I will also be taking some photos of a friend and her daughter this fall. If I was brave, i'd shoot weddings...but that is just too much responsibility. Maybe I'll be a second camera for someone one day. But I really love taking pictures of kids.

A Sad Day

I did what I thought was best. She just wasn't getting the attention she needed now that the baby is here. Golden Bond Rescue will now try to find her a home where she will get the attention she so badly wants. We've had a full 8 years together and i'm not sure how i'm going to do the following years without here panting while I sew, getting dog hair all over my quilts and tangling herself under foot. I'm sure going to miss her.

Feeling Overwhelmed

There is so much going on in life these next few months, and so much I want to do around the house, with just no time to do any of it. So, I am making a list of things to get done, and I am making it a personal goal to get this list done before moving on to new projects.

1. Finish Diaper Bag Pattern and make another using the pattern (and email to testers).

2. Finish decorating/putting together my sewing room.

3. Make header for my Grandma's blog.

4. Get the rest of my stuff unpacked from boxes (it's been a year, it's really time to get everything unpacked.

5. Finish my Hour Glass quilt (I'm almost done!).

6. Design & make stuffed animals - giraffe & elephant! ...with pattern...?

I'm keeping it simple and attainable. None of these are a drag to do, everything is quite enjoyable, I just need to set the goals to get them done. As I finish each, I will blog about it to keep myself accountable to someone out there. That is after all why I started this bloggy thing. But this will take some time, i'm sure. Baby is only entertained and sleeping for about an hour at a time, and we are traveling a lot these next few months. I did get some help this weekend. I spent time at my moms on Friday and Sunday and she entertained Brice while I worked on my hour glass quilt and quilted Brice's quilt from her. Turns out the HQ only needed a new needle - thank goodness! We were worried the machine needed to be taken in.

On a sadder note, my computer decided to reformat my CF card from my camera the other day. It had new pictures of Brice and Colin on there...amoung other photos...like photos from Brice turning 3 months. A big milestone to me. Husband, and his infinate knowledge of all things computer related, is rescuing the photos for me. But it's taking time. I hope to post those soon.

Doodles

Trying to squeeze in a little craftyness on a hot (104 degrees) and humid day.

All Sorts of Adobe!

I am slowly teaching myself Illustrator, just by doing tutorials I find online. I'm giong to look at books today at Barnes & Nobel to see what I can find. I love learning a new tool. Today I utilized my Lightroom, Photoshop and Illustrator to create the picture above. I edited this picture in Lightroom to have that aged effect, then I created the rough edges in Illustrator and made it all come together in Photoshop. I've always wanted to know how to create borders like these for my photos. I used this tutorial. Have you noticed my other photos and their border with dropped shadow recently? I also taught myself how to create a command for that in Photoshop. It's about a dozen steps to create the effect, but all I have to do now is press F4! So nice!

An Award!

I've been given an award! Katie of And Sometimes I Quilt was kind enough to include me in her 7 choices - I feel very honored. Thanks Katie!

The rules are as follows:
1. The winner can put the logo on his/her blog
2. Link to the person you received your award from
3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs for an award
4. Put links to those blogs on yours
5. Leave a message on the blogs of the people you have nominated.

My winners are: Oh, Fransson!, Chickpea Sewing Studio, Cornflower Blue Studio, UK Lass, Greeting Arts, Giddy 4 Paisley and Mama Sarah Bear. As always, it's hard to choose just 7 - I have so many I would love to give this to!

New Hair!

This is my husbands idea of taking a picture of my hair. A little distracted, maybe... My hair is getting to be a very dark blond, so I had some lighter color added in and got some bangs, as well as shortened some of my layers. There's more pictures here.

I started a new blog for my family to keep up to date on Brice, but you're welcome to view it, too! I have a link in the side bar as well. That way this can be more about crafting and I can go on and on about my adorable little boy in a blog of his own. Of course, i'll still do updates here. Like this: He's 11 weeks old now and so darn cute! He smiles all the time and is laughing, too. I just love seeing his dimples as he smiles. He definatly recognizes dad and gives him the biggest smiles.

Fabric Finds in Bandon

This is a lovely stack of 30's prints that I picked up while "camping" last week. I went to Forget-Me-Knots Quilt Shop in Bandon, OR. Bandon is such a cute little town and the shop was full of fabrics. Not many designer fabrics, though. And, as with Coo's Bay's shop, I noticed the prices were slightly higher than I would find here in the city. I've wanted some of the older prints for awhile now to add to the stash, and this was the first time i've seen them available in fat quarters. Perhaps I just haven't been paying much attention else where.

That Dog!

Oh yes she did! Thankfully, it was "craft" size and originally bought at 40% 0ff. It's not entirely her fault. I was dumb enough to leave my craft room door open and this is what seizures do to her. Oh well. She's okay and that's what matters.

We had our first spill over of tears. The poor guy was very upset about something. We couldn't figure out what, but it was so sad to see the tears on his face. 11 weeks tomorrow! Can you believe he's already 2 1/2 months old! So big!

"Cheep-Cheep"

Some more Illustrator. Kind of cute. Needs some work. But what do you expect for 10 minutes of fiddling with a program I don't know. I have some fabric to show you - my favorite thing, a stack of new fabric. I'm too tired to go downstairs and off-load the pictures from the camera. You'll just have to stay tuned. A Brice photo is long overdue, too.

Illustrator Doodles

Look what I made in Illustrator. I'm slowly getting it. Now, if I could just draw a bird...i'll get there. I bought some cute fabric yesterday - and even got 5% off since I bought my Bernina at that shop a few years ago. Bonus! I had no idea. Pictures, you ask...maybe tomorrow. I still have my new shelves sitting empty. I need to get some fabric unloaded onto them.