Mother's Day Pillow

What better gift could I have given my Mom on Mother's Day besides her king-sized quilt that I ran out of thread for while quilting it? (more is on the way)

Well, a pillow to match of course!

I started making the hexagons for these once the quilt top was complete. I wanted to be sure that the scraps were really scraps and not needed for the quilt. I sewed them together by hand, then machine quilted them onto a 17inch square.

It was hard to give this to her, I wanted to keep it for my house! The back may be my favorite part oddly enough. It's just strips left over that I made into an envelope back. Oh I love it.

A Parade & A Blessing

This past weekend was Dover Days, and every year that includes a parade on Saturday. Personally, I love parades!

There is nothing quite like seeing fellow citizens who have served or are preparing to serve our country marching with the sounds of either our nations anthem or other patriotic music being played. Brings a tear to my eye every time, or maybe a few more. I wasn't able to get a picture of any of them, but here's the fire engine from the Air Force Base. My father in law tells me this is the one they send in to take care of plane fires.

And, who could forget the awesomeness of the Weiner Mobile.

On Sunday we blessed our little Mr. J. This was the only good photo I got of him in his blessing gown, all the others had serious double and triple chins.

On a side note, if you have ever wondered why I usually don't post any pictures of my husband and I this is why:

This Week

I know I usually do my 'This Week' posts over the weekend to kind of sum up the week before, but this weekend we were a little busy (imagine that with a family of 7).

This week:

My little man turned one month old, still can't believe it's been a whole month.

I pinned this little cutie quilt, hoping to get it quilted up quick and make a little tutorial for it (it was super easy, and used some precuts).

My Mom's Pink and Green King got some love, I got about 60 blocks quilted in just 2 days. I'm hoping to finish it up this week! By the way, I think my husband and I will have to buy a new bed because I'm not sure if I ever want to make another king sized quilt again, unless of course I'm getting it long-armed or a big new sewing room with more space.

We started T-ball season with the boys first game on the 21st. It was so nice to see them playing.

Tomatoes were also planted as well as some brussel sprouts (those are a first for us, and they were a hybrid for slightly warmer temps). The kids helped do the weeding and watering, it's so nice to have helpers.

Helping Hands Mystery Quilt - Part 1

I actually finished the first part for this quilt the week before Mr. J was born, but haven't really had blogging on the front burner since then. Can you tell?

Either way, here are my blocks for the first part of the Mystery Quilt:

There's 18 total of the altered 9 patch blocks, 10 of the 4 patch blocks, and 12 of the long rectangular ones, for a whopping total of 40 blocks so far.

I think the blocks without the main fabric (the pink print) look kinda mint chocolate chip-y, don't you? It didn't even come into mind when I was picking the fabrics, but now that it reminds me of ice cream I think I like it even more (though I'm not really fond of that flavor unless it's the Thin Mint one).

The organizer of this mystery was nice enough to email me the second part because I missed March's guild meeting (I was still in the hospital with the baby). I have yet to get started on it, maybe I'll blame my slacking on just having a baby because it's a TON of small blocks with diagonals and HSTs (by a ton, I mean around 50 or so if I remember reading it correctly). Yikes.

I did really want to keep on top of this one so I didn't ruin the surprise of the mystery. I could just keep the last part in an envelope until I finish all the other parts. We'll see.

And, here's a cute baby picture for good measure:

Packages, Who Doesn't Love Getting Mail?

As I mentioned in my last post, there was another delivery that I received the week our youngest was born. That sounds kind of funny, like it was forever ago when in reality it was only a week and a half ago. Oh he's so cute, more pictures soon of him.

This was what I found in my mailbox on the 22nd:

Well, it was actually in an envelope, but I'm sure you assumed that. It's my loot from the Rainbow Swap I did. I was sooo excited to get it! And, I will definitely be doing this one again next spring.

There are tons of ideas flowing about what to use it for. Here's a little collage of what I've been goggly-eyed over:

1. I Think I Love You, 2. tutti frutti lieblingsdecke krabbeldecke quilt frankfurt, 3. Nine Patch Quilt Along Progress, 4. full view, 5. 3x6 block, 6. For Sew Chaos Kristin 4th qtr beehive 12, 7. petals mini quilt, 8. demo mdp top for class, 9. values quilt top, 10. Fat Quarterly Quilt Along!, 11. Not available, 12. Not available, 13. Not available, 14. Glamour shot, 15. 3x6 Bee 3rd Quarter Beehive 8 rsislandcrafts

Credit for:
#11: http://bolohead.blogspot.com/2012/03/packages-are-in-mail-and-on-their-way.html
#12: http://gemini-stitches.blogspot.com/2011/12/fresh-sewing-day.html
#13: http://www.fromthebluechair.com/2012/02/color-quilt-top.html

I know that most of these projects aren't really do-able with 4 1/2 inch squares, but they're so pretty.

I'm really leaning towards doing a sampler and using most of these to get inspiration for my blocks. Clearly I'm not fully committed yet, but thankfully I'm not planning on making this for a gift - it will be all for me! Ok, maybe I'll share with the kids... if I have to.

Introducing Boy #3

This past week there have been a few deliveries that I/my family have received.

Some of them are quite life-changing, where others were just plain awesome.

The biggest (and most amazing) delivery of the week was this little guy:

He came in a whirlwind, that aside from a few key moments, was mostly a blur to me. Lets just say that I am so so so thankful that it is over, and only took about 3 hours.

This boy was a whopping 9 pounds 2 ounces, a pound and a half bigger than my biggest thus far.

We are so happy that all went 'well' and that the baby & I are healthy.

I didn't take any photos in the hospital (except the few when the kids came to visit), I was way too sleepy and was in vacation aka brain dead mode. Can you blame me? I only had one little person to take care of! Just about every moment he slept so did I.

Welcoming Warmer Weather

Ahh, this wonderful weather has been pulling everyone outside, and away from their bogs.

We have been weeding and preparing our gardens for planting. My youngest daughter (who is 2 1/2) just loves to help in the dirt, and I am ever thankful for it. I'm hoping to get some peas, beets, and sugar snap peas planted tomorrow. The tomatoes need to get started inside this week too.

My brother came to visit three weeks ago and we planted some herb seeds while he was here. They are sprouting up quite nicely! I haven't had an herb 'garden' before (we planted about 3 or 4 together in one large pot) and am very excited to have my very own fresh herbs on hand! I had been thinking about making a cute shelf to hold mason jars with herbs in them, but had been pushing to project off. When I told my brother this he said something like - just put one together now, if you haven't done the other one yet you're not going to. Thanks for the push bro.

In other news, I'm a ripe 38 weeks pregnant. As of today it's only 10 days till my due date. I am getting so impatient. My first 2 kids were born at 36 weeks and because of that I think sometimes that the last month of pregnancy should be optional... I am happy to be healthily pregnant though!

A wonderful package also came this week, which has been making it much much easier to wait for this little baby. A wonderful package with the word Amazon on the side of box (I love those ones... and the ones with fabric.com on the side).

I've wanted an iPad forever, but just couldn't spend that much money on something just for me. A new sewing machine sure, but a 'toy', not so much. I absolutely LOVE my Kindle Fire.

I also got some new books, because of course you need new books when you get a Kindle right??

I've had my eye on these 3 books for quite some time now. I entered just about every website/blog giveaway to try to win the two quilting books when they were 'blog-touring'. Looking forward to making stuff from all these books!

What are you doing with the warmer weather lately?