Picture Perfect Polaroid Blocks

Back in July, we had a great demo at our quilt guild meeting. Pam showed us how to make the Picture Perfect Polaroid Blocks. These little guys are fast, easy, and addictive!

We followed the demo with a swap and a challenge. Everyone who wanted to participate in the swap made blocks to swap at the August meeting and then were challenged to complete a project using the Polaroid Blocks.

I used several of the blocks that I received in the swap and added a few from my stash to make this little kids quilt.

I really like the look of the blue and the white together. To continue the "clean" look of this quilt, I did simple straight line quilting along the sashing.

A couple of my favorite blocks:

This happy cat reclining in his inner tube with an umbrella drink just cracks me up!

And I love this little mouse who found his way to the bottom corner of the quilt. He kind of looks like he's trying to scurry off.

Fifth Grade!

Phew! We made it through the first week of Fifth Grade!
I still find it hard to believe that my baby is this big now.
Where does the time go?

First day of Fifth Grade

Nathan's favorite new shirt

So, five days down....175 to go!

A Finish!

Late last year, I found out that my Uncle wanted me to make a quilt for my Aunt. Of course I said I would do it!
 I didn't have much help in deciding which colors to use, or what size to make it. I hoped that whatever I chose, she would like it.
 So, I pulled all my quilting books off the shelf and started thumbing through them. I finally decided on Modern Maze from Amy Ellis's book Modern Basics.  I chose fabrics similar to those that Amy used in the original. I used the cream colored fabric with the green Dogwoods for the backing. The finished size is approximately 60"x84".
I finished this quilt and gave it to my Aunt last month. She loved it! And I really enjoyed making it for her. It was truly a labor of love.

Wow!

Where has the time gone? I haven't posted for three months.

I started working again last winter, after being a stay at home mom for 9 1/2 years. When things got busy, something had to give and apparently it was my blog. (Also, I haven't quite figured out how to post to blogger from my iPad.)

And now I can't figure out how to navigate the new Blogger page. Hmmm......

A Scrappy Finish

A while ago, actually several years ago, I made this scrappy quilt top. It was one of those sewing days where the scrap basket was overflowing and I had to do something with all those little pieces! So, I did a little improv sewing, making wonky, scrappy, log cabin blocks.


I finally finished it last week. It is the first thing I've completed from my 2012 Goal Board. I gifted this little lap quilt to my MIL on Mothering Sunday (Mother's Day in England), while she was here visiting. I hope she will enjoy it!

Bragging. Again.

Back in December, Nathan participated in his school Science Fair. He decided on an engineering type project using Legos. We built a small shake table and he tested to see if a tower's stability would be affected by it's height and displacement. It was really a fun project.

Oh, and he won First Place in his class!

And then, the school selected his project to go on to the County Science Fair, which took place last week.


His project was included in the Fourth Grade Engineering, Mathematics and Gaming category. And I'm very proud to say that he took First Place!!

Congratulations Nathan!

Pokemon + Quilt Block = PokeBlock

In case you didn't know, my son is obsessed with Pokemon.

The kid has well over 1,000 Pokemon trading cards.

Seriously.

This is Torchic. He's one of the cuter Pokemon and one of my son's favorites. (Or at least he was a favorite last week.)

Of all the quilts I've made, I have never made one for my own dear son. Yes, that means my 9 year old is still using his Thomas the Tank Engine blanket. Which has definitely been well loved and is in need of replacement. I knew I wanted to make him a Pokemon quilt, but couldn't quite figure out how to do it. Some of those characters are very detailed and way beyond my ability for applique. And my embroidery skills don't even rank as deplorable.

Inspiration struck at our last quilt guild meeting when we learned about making Crayon Quilts. I printed out a Torchic coloring page, grabbed my fine line black Sharpie, some Crayons, and my fabric and got to work. The photo was taken after doing two layers of crayon. It looked good in real life, but I can see a few light spots in the photo. Easy enough to fix. And best of all, Nathan loved it! Now I just have to decide how many different Pokemon I want to color.

This is the other thing I made tonight.

Mug Brownie Sundae......mmmmmm! I wanted to try microwave brownies and found a recipe on Instructables for Mug Brownies. It was super, super easy. I added a scoop of Vanilla Bean ice cream and some chocolate sauce while the brownie was still warm. It was delicious.
(And it was prettier right after I made it. It melted a bit while I was searching for the camera.)