Gaudy Kitty Quilt

  
Oh, gaudy kitty quilt.  I love you so so much.  I am 99.9% sure that this is my favorite quilt that I've ever made, beating this quilt by only 1/10 of a percentage.



Background - We moved Phoebe into a twin size at the beginning of summer;  hence, she needed a new big girl quilt for her big girl bed.


 
If you learned anything about Phoebe from her Rainbow Kitty Party, you know that this girl has a *bit* of an obsession with kitty cats.  So I decided to take all of my kitty fabric - including the super gaudy novelty prints that had been in my stash for forever - and combine them all in a quilt that any 4 year old, cat-lovin girl would go nuts over.  In turn, the Gaudy Kitty Quilt was born.


 
It took me quite awhile to figure out what kind of layout would be best for this crazy quilt.  I didn't want to cut the fabric pieces too small since a lot of these novelty prints have a larger scale.  Plus, I got into quilting because of all the amazing textile design, and I like to really showcase the prints in my quilts.

   

My good friend Rossie is the one who recommended this layout of equilateral triangles with the prints laid out in rows.  I had just finished working on this poor quilt that was never blogged about, which was also made up entirely of triangles, and the last thing that I wanted to look at was MORE TRIANGLES, but I knew that it would be the way to go.



This was my original fabric pull.  I have some other great cat prints in the stash, but once I started putting the majority of the fabrics together, the quilt's own color palette started developing, so I decided to remove the blues and most of the other darker toned prints.  Yes it was being made with novelty cat fabric - but I wanted to at least try and make the final product pretty!



I didn't have enough kitty fabric to complete the entire top, so I started mixing in other things Phoebe likes - butterflies, bugs, birds, bunnies (apparently anything that starts with B), and some blender floral prints that I thought made the color scheme a bit more interesting.  I'm proud of myself for even cutting into some of my preciously hoarded japanese fairytale prints.



After getting the top pieced, I made the decision to send out the quilt top to a professional long-armer to be quilted.  I've always quilted my own quilts on my machine at home - even some much larger than this, but my friend Brenda put the idea into my head to have a design of cats quilted all over the top - which was pretty much the best idea I'd ever heard in my life.

Luckily I know Kathy though our Modern Quilt Guild who owns Thread Bear Quilting.  Not only is she an amazing quilter, but she was able to quilt this design all over the gaudy kitty quilt.

I wish I would have remembered to get a detail picture of the quilting itself, but take my word that it's amazing.  If you look closely in the third picture in this post, you can make out the quilting the clearest. 

And that brings us to the end of this quilty journey.  Phoebe loves, and I mean LOVES her quilt, which makes this momma so darn happy.  But even if she didn't, that would still be okay - because then I'd get to keep it for myself!

Meow! 

**This quilt is part of the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Click here to be inspired by hundreds of beautiful quilts!

Maternity top to girl's maxi dress

Phoebe has been growing like a weed this summer, and has somehow completely skipped over 3T and now fits comfortably into a 4T.  It's definitely time for me to sew her up a new batch of clothes since preschool is right around the corner - eeeks!

As I've stated in previous posts, I really love working with re-purposed clothing when sewing for children, since you can usually get more than enough fabric out of an adult garment, plus you get to take advantage of already finished seams, hems, cuffs.  Yay for being lazy!

So pardon the terrible photo, but here's a before picture of a maternity top that I definitely never plan to wear again....

I didn't have a particular pattern in mind - just measured around Phoebe's chest and waist (21") and determined how long I wanted the dress to be (22" with an already finished hem!) and cut a rectangle to that size (I think I only ended up using the front panel from the original top, lol) and sewed the long ends together to form a tube.  

Then I cut a band that was about 5" wide by 20" long (you want the band a little shorter so it will stay tight around her chest and not fall down).  I sewed the bands short sides together, then folded it in half to a double thickness and basted the ends so it would stay put while attaching the skirt.

Then it was as simple as sewing the skirt to the chest band.  Just be sure to stretch the band a little bit while sewing to fit it to the skirt.  I also hand sewed on an extra strap that ties around her neck to make sure it stays up while she's running around.

I'll be back soon with lots more Phoebe clothes (I've got to round up some photoshoot bribes first) and some other back to school sewing projects! 

Costume sewing

Sorry for the week long absence - thanks for sticking around!  Let's just say that I have never been a happy pregnant person, to put it mildly, and I've been in some sort of pregnancy funk lately.  It doesn't help that I always end up getting a ridiculously huge and larger than normal pregnant belly (I didn't even leave the house my entire last month pregnant with Phoebe because people would seriously gawk at me), and I have been super uncomfortable, tired, and short tempered lately.  But I doubt you came to listen to me bitch about that - so onto more fun stuff!

So one thing that I churned out during this last week was Phoebe's Halloween costume.  Nothing like waiting until the last minute, huh?  When I was little, my grandma always made costumes for my sister and I, and when we got older, my parents kind of left it up to us to create something for ourselves.  Aside from some wigs and makeup, we never bought prepackaged costumes and I'm pretty sure that is what instilled my anti-manufactured Halloween costume beliefs.  

Halloween is such a great time for kids to be creative and help make something truly unique to wear on a day where anything goes.  I vowed before I even had kids that they would never wear one of those cheap, plastic, out of the bag costumes that promotes no imaginative thinking.  

*After rereading this I realized how harsh it sounds, and by no means am I trying to belittle parents who do purchase costumes from stores.  Not everyone knows how to sew, nor has the time - and who knows where I'll be next year when I've got two kiddos to sew costumes for.  Just my own personal thoughts regarding Halloween - and it's my blog and I can say whatever I want :)  Stepping off my soapbox now....* 

So initially, I had wanted to dress Phoebe up as Rainbow Brite for Halloween.  However, Phoebe has made it well known to everyone that she has her own opinions and ideas now, and hence I was informed that I would be making a bunny costume this year.

I bought a yard and a half of ultra cozy, micro-fleece at Joann's, and used two patterns that I already had in my stash.  The pants were made using the quick-change trousers pattern from Anna Maria Horner's Handmade Beginnings, and the hoodie was made using Heidi and Finn's Urban Unisex Hoodie pattern - previously blogged about here.

I free-handed the ears, whip-stitching them into place, and used a knit shirt from Target's clearance rack to line the hoodie and make the pink for the ears.

The only part that I'm super bummed about is that I should have gone up a size when making the hoodie, because it's a little short in the arm and waist length.  This kid is just growing way too fast!  

But Phoebe absolutely adores her costume, and hops to her little hearts content when she has it on.

Now we're working on the "trick or treat" part.  Phoebe absolutely refuses to say it, for some unknown reason, but would instead prefer to say "Booooooo!" followed by announcing "Phoebe's kinda scary!".

Some other fall going-ons...

Other stuff that's been keeping us busy around here but isn't really worth an entire blog post....

A trip to the pumpkin patch

Followed by pumpkin carving (Phoebe requested that her pumpkin "have a happy face with oval eyes, a circle nose and a tiny mouth"

Making button magnets (we spent a good deal of time washing them first - kept her busy for a solid 20 minutes!)

Multiple trips to the apple orchard

Making baby shower cupcakes.  Designed to coordinate with the invitation.

3rd trimester already - eeeks!

Balloons, confetti, giveaways! Happy blogiversary to me!

*The giveaway is now closed!  Winners will be announced soon.  Thanks for playing!*

One never needs an occasion to get balloons - but I am pretty darn excited that my tiny little corner of the internet has been around for ONE year today!

I had put off starting a blog for forever because I absolutely hate to write.  However, it turns out that I actually enjoy writing as long as I'm talking about things that I'm passionate about.

And adding lots of cute Phoebe pictures make the process a lot easier.

So to celebrate, I'm hosting a giveaway x 3!  Just leave a comment telling me what keeps you coming back to my blog...  Quilts, kid clothes, baked goods, home projects, fabric porn, my adorable daughter......etc.  Or what kind of things you'd like to see more of in this little space.  

I won't make you follow, tweet, or pass out fliers for extra entries, because I freaking hate that.  I'll leave the comments open until Wednesday the 28th (at whatever time I get around to closing them), and I'll pick 3 winners who will have their pick of 3 prize packages (first winner gets first pick, etc.)

So what are these amazing prizes do you ask?

Prize package one has been generously donated by Brenda, owner of the wonderful Pink Castle Fabrics and is a fat quarter pack of all eight Pastry Lines in voile from Anna Maria Horner's little folks line.  I really can't express how much I love these fabrics.  I've got one yard cuts of them just waiting to be made into something fabulous for myself.  And if you don't think a fat quarter pack will be enough to make a quilt large enough to completely envelop yourself in voile (which is what I plan on doing), Brenda has all of them in her shop right now at a pretty fantastic price!

Prize package two contains three large vintage pillowcases and eight vintage sheet fat quarters.  If you've read this blog for even a short amount of time, you have to know how much I love using these in both my crafting and sewing projects alike.  For past vintage sheet projects, check out some of my posts here, here, here, and for my most pinned vintage sheet project on Pinterest, click here.

Finally, prize package three includes a fat quarter from the always popular Flea Market Fancy line by Denyse Schmidt, and other large assorted scraps (some of those strips in the upper right corner are about 5" x 44") from FMF and Heather Ross - my all time favorite fabric designer :)

Whew!  Got your favorite picked?  

Enjoy your weekend and I look forward to coming back next week with more sewing, crafting, and other lovely things (like giveaway winners!) to kick off my second year of blogging!

The start of fall craft season

Why is it that people don't really decorate the house for summer?  I guess we're all too busy doing fun things outdoors to really want to stay inside anyways.

Well now that the temperatures are getting colder and we're spending more time indoors, we're doing a lot more crafting and getting the house ready for fall.  This project I found via Pinterest - the greatest place on the internet, in my opinion :)

After painting coffee filters with watercolors and markers, I cut out little leaf shapes, backed them in double stick tape, and let Phoebe go wild sticking them onto a large kraft paper tree I taped on the window.

Phoebe liked to stick most of hers onto the trunk (I guess that's what you get when you tell a toddler, "put the leaves on the tree"), and I took liberty in finishing the branches.

That extra branch turned out a little bit crazier than I had planned.

Other going-ons

I haven't been the most consistent blogger lately, but now with summer coming to a close I'm hoping for things to slow down a bit so I'll be able to devote more time to this space.  Especially since my one year blogiversary is coming up later this month and I've got a great giveaway planned!   Well, I don't know exactly what it will be yet, but I promise you it will be great :)

So even though the blogging has been lacking, I've still been keeping pretty busy.  Here's a couple of things we've been up to that didn't fully necessitate their own blog post....

I finally made Phoebe her own Sweet Pea Pilot Cap

I've been in bloomer production once again as I have been hit with a slew of baby showers.  I also had another batch of three more that were shipped out before being photographed.

Phoebe's summer onesies had gotten way too filthy and stained for my liking, so a quick trip in a dye bath of fall colors made them good as new.

We took some time to visit the area's county fairs and mingle with the animal life.

I've spent many an evening sewing late into the night with my kitty quilting companion.

 

And finally we've just been enjoying these cooler temperatures and late summer rainstorms.

 

Is everyone else's summer finally winding down?  Do you love fall as much as I do?  I had my first pumpkin spice latte of the season the other day and it was heaven!