My first quilt

I know I have quilted many quilts, but this is the first one I've done with my own pattern and materials. The layout of the quilt using dark/ light squares quilted in triangles. The greatest thing about this quilt is that every single bit, down to the thread is all thrifted, vintage and secondhand. It was all headed for a landfill and it has been rescued. I think I could get addicted to this. Most of the flowered patterns are vintage sheets that I got from a vintage sheet square swap.

Here is the almost finished quilt hanging on the line. I couldn't wait until the binding was finished to take pictures of it.

Here is the back of the quilt. It is a little bit off at the bottom. I"ll have to work on that. I think the bottom fabric pulled away a bit from the top 2 layers as I was quilting it. Otherwise I am really happy with this quilt.

#22

We got 2 1/2 quilt backs out of this large king sized sheet. For those of you who are bored with this pattern, I am mainly recording the quilts for our records, not because I think they are really all that interesting to look at now that we are into our 20th quilt with pretty much the same pattern.

#20 and 21

Refuge House #18 &19

More quilts and more vintage sheets. The exciting thing about this batch of quilts is that we completed them in 1 month, 2 nights of quilting and putting them together and a few extra days of me sewing the bindings and washing them. We are getting really good at this. Manna and Amy sewed a few of the bindings on these quilts and Shelley, Lidia and Manna put most of the tops together.

Little forager

I made this bag for Jacob's 2nd birthday so that he could collect his own treasures when we go out, or bring along a toy that he wants to carry. The other day he grabbed his bag and wanted to go out for a walk. He has also knows where my shoes are, so he got me my shoes and wanted me to have my own bag. I have a bag that looks similar to his, so I grabbed it and we went off on our walk. We ended up walking all the way around our block. It is a walk that takes normal humans 10 minutes, but it took us about an hour. We met some neighbors and explored every single thing on the block with great detail. His favorite question is, "What's that?"
He also collected some things to put in his bag--a stick, a few rocks, some seeds and dried blossoms. He also found 2 different places to slide. It's so great to experience things through his eyes and also watch him learn more about his little world.

crayon rolls

I've been wanting to try crayon rolls for a while. These were a fun, fast project--made for some special girls. The notebooks were fun to make too. I used recycled paper and extra cards for the top and bottom pages. The one thing I might do next time is create a flap for the top of the roll so that the notebooks don't slip out. Otherwise, I'm pretty happy with the project. I have also seen these rolls with rick rack trim, but I'll have to save that for next time. I'm still not expert enough to sew that in without error.

Hot summer days

Well, here is my hair cut. I don't really do well with close ups. So, this is the best shot we could manage. I like the length. It's a lot lighter now and not so hot. I can also still pull it back if I want to get it out of the way.

More Jacob shots with our succulent pots.

Meet our friendly garden gnome whose hat got broken when Nate tried to lift it with one arm. Luckily it was only the hat and not the head or something else. It still hasn't been repaired. Hopefully it will grow back someday.

This is Jacob's favorite place to play. What boy wouldn't want to have all of this gravel for a bulldozer to shovel around?