This room has been our office, then our guest room, and now a room for the new baby. This set up is by far my favorite!

Here’s a view from the doorway -

And this shows one side of the room, with the glider and closet door. As I mentioned previously, we opted for gray for the walls, and I totally love it. (Benjamin Moore Gray Horse.)

You may have seen the pillow I made for the glider in this post. The mirror and table are finds from a local antique shop.

This shows the opposite side of the room, standing at the closet -

The large pear is a wall hanging we made forever ago using a Marimekko panel, and I was so pleased to find that it nearly perfectly matches the bookcase (which I finally broke down and bought, despite the high shipping cost!) I posted about the crib here, including the crib skirt and sheets I made. The smaller art pieces are also fabric covered canvases, using some of my favorite fabrics from Hitomi’s shop.

The bookcase currently holds a variety of fun items – a few vintage toys I’ve found online, and a few that were mine as a child. The cute little turtle (we’re calling him Timbo) on the top shelf was made by my sweet friend Phiona, using a Wee Wonderfuls pattern. We also received a wonderful gift from Heather – a copy of Where the Sidewalk Ends, which was one of my favorites as a child. After doing a little digging, I discovered I owned another Shel Silverstein book, so now we’ve got the start of a collection!

The lower shelf holds the stack of quilts.

A couple stuffed animals, and that wonderful sweater made by Kate.

Above the crib is this fun Flensted mobile (love that little worm on a hook!). Currently it’s been keeping Morgan entertained, and I hope it will do the same for the baby!

The opposite corner holds the changing table and a smaller vintage table holding those fabric baskets I made recently.

The artwork above the changing table is some we made a couple years ago, using a variety of papers and a Martha Stewart paper punch (I guess I never posted about it, (though you can see them a little closer here) but the tutorial came from this blog).

The framed piece near the closet door is my newest favorite – an absolutely perfect print from Heather Ross, which we framed and hung yesterday.

And there you have it! We hope the baby will be very happy in his new room.

(and I hope that he’ll arrive soon!!)

_ _ _

One thing I’ve really been enjoying making is baby blankets. My absolute favorites are these made from fabulous Anna Maria Horner voiles and flannels. Truly a perfect match!

I’ve actually wanted to try these out ever since Anna Maria posted about them here, but at that time, I had no reason to make tiny little blankets. So of course, as soon as I found out I was pregnant, I returned to her post to drool over these blankets.

I made the first three a couple months ago, before we knew it would be a boy, and as it turns out, there are a couple which may just be the wrong colors for what we need (oops!). I decided to remedy that this weekend, stopping over at Nido for a couple extra yards of voile in blues and greens.

My favorite so far might be this blue one, using one of the new voile prints paired with this great solid blue flannel. [The flannel is by Robert Kaufman (purchased at Purl Soho) and is quite possibly the nicest solid flannel I've felt in quite some time (and it comes in lots of great colors!)]

I really can’t say enough about this voile/flannel combo – it’s soft on one side, silky on the other, and has a really great weight. I can’t help but think I need to piece together some voile and flannels to make one in my size!

I don’t know… It feels a bit early to pull out the red and green fabrics since we only just got past Halloween, but then yesterday I noticed that the stores already have their Christmas candy on the shelves, so maybe the time is just right!

The other day I had an urge to sew with a little red and green, so I decided to go for a smaller project – namely these fun potholders. I don’t own any actual Christmas themed fabric, but I do have lots of red and green fabrics, and I kind of think it’s fun to use these to give a Christmas-y look.

I paired the red and green with some chocolate brown and made up a few string block potholders and a couple that feature improv blocks. Each are paired and have a matching backing fabric, along with a cute matching hanging tag.

They each measure about 8 1/2″ square and use one layer of Insul-Brite and one layer of cotton batting.

The string block sets are listed in the shop (sold, thank you!) in case you’re planning ahead and looking for a little holiday gift!

I had to make a couple scarves. How could I not? Anna Maria Horner’s voile fabrics are just perfect for a light scarf… they practically begged to become one!  Anna Maria had already shown a beautiful voile scarf in a few of her photos (there’s one shown in this post). And I know I’m not the only one with scarves on the brain. Everywhere I look I see beautiful examples, and lots of tutorials.

I played around with some elastic thread to try to make something a la anthropologie. It’s less anthro and more homemade than I was hoping for, but I’m happy with them anyway. They’re soft, slightly ruffly, and add a little something fun to my outfits. I’m already thinking of a third… green perhaps?

Has anyone else made one? Add a link in the comments if you’d like!

So I caught the hexagon bug, and badly (and it seems I’m not the only one!).

It started innocently enough – I just figured I’d try one or two to see what the fuss was about. I always loved looking at all the beautiful hexagon projects on Flickr, and in my mind I knew that it was something I’d eventually get around to trying, but I had convinced myself that I didn’t like handsewing and consequently wouldn’t like these.

So anyway, needing a bit of entertainment (and a little fabric fix while I was going to be away from my machine) I cut up a bunch of fabric and took it with me to California. And now I can’t stop – I’m working on hexagons in a few sizes, flea market fancy hexagons, and hexagons to match a quilt… plus, (not pictured) hexagons in Echino and also Little Folks voile!

I don’t know what they’ll turn into, if anything, but they sure are fun to make. If you haven’t tried them yet, you might want to! Below are a few posts I looked at before starting -

The Sometimes Crafter – two posts about sewing hexagons here and here.

Posie Gets Cozy – Hexagon Piecing

Here you can print out your desired size hexagon templates (or you can purchase them already cut here).

And lastly, in the right sidebar on this page, you’ll see a listing of what size squares of fabric you’ll need for the various hexagon sizes. (I think this is what convinced me to start making these – the realization that I could just cut out squares of fabric rather than having to cut out hexagonal shapes!)

But don’t say I didn’t warn you!

As I said in the previous post, I based my measurements for Whitney’s pillowcase on a pillowcase that we have here. I don’t really know what a standard pillowcase size is, but these measurements result in a pillowcase that measures about 20″ x 29″. If you have a larger pillow, you may need to adjust your measurements accordingly. What’s nice about pillowcases is that the measurements don’t have to be so exact – there’s a pretty good chance that even if you’re shy an inch or so of fabric, you’ll still be able to stuff your pillow in its new case!

Materials:

1 yard of fabric per pillow (Note: if you want the cuff of the pillow to be a different fabric, you can reduce the main fabric to 3/4 of a yard, and add in 1/4 yard of a coordinating fabric for the cuff)

1.5″ x width of fabric for the trim (or, alternatively, you could use other trim here – I used rick rack for these pillowcases).

Note: For these pillowcases I used Anna Maria Horner flannels, which are a standard 42/44″ width. All fabrics have been prewashed.

2nd note: This works best with a non-directional print, due to the way it’s sewn together.

Let’s make a pillowcase!

Cut your fabric pieces. For each pillowcase you’ll need to cut one piece that’s 9″ by the width of fabric (this is for the cuff), and one piece that’s 26″ by the width of fabric (main body of the pillowcase). Leave the selvedges on the fabric. This will give you an extra bit of width, and they’ll be hidden when we finish the pillowcase with french seams later on. Cut the fabric you’re using for trim to 1.5″ by width of fabric.

Prepare your trim by folding it in half lengthwise, wrong sides together, and press.

Next we’ll sew the trim and cuff to the main body. To do this, stack these three fabrics together in this order — on the bottom, open up the 9″ cuff piece and place it face up. Next, align the long edge of the 26″ main body piece on top of the cuff piece, also face up, matching the selvedges. On top of this, align the raw edge of the trim and pin all three layers together. You might be able to see this better in the photo below:

Sew the entire length, sewing all three layers together using a 1/4″ seam allowance.

Now if you lift up the fabric for the cuff you’ll have a little something that looks like this -

Press the seam up, towards the cuff fabric. Then iron the top edge of the cuff under 1/4″.

Next, we’ll make the actual cuff by folding down the ironed edge to meet the trim. Leave about 1/4″ of the trim showing. Pin in place and iron the cuff edge.

Top stitch along this edge using a scant 1/4″ seam allowance, covering the stitch line you made when sewing on the trim.

It should be looking a bit more like a pillowcase now, and we’ll finish it up by sewing together the body of the pillowcase. As I mentioned in the beginning, I use french seams so there aren’t any exposed raw edges.

In order to do this, you’ll fold the pillowcase in half, wrong sides together, aligning the edges. Pin along both edges, making sure that the cuff edges match.

Sew along the two edges, using a 1/4″ seam allowance. Trim your corners, then flip inside out. Press both seams so you have a nice straight edge.

Sew these two edges again, this time using a 3/8″ seam allowance. This will enclose the raw edges inside the new seam.

Flip right side out and admire your pretty new pillowcase!

The leaves around here are already starting to change, and there are even some that have already fallen, so I just couldn’t resist another fall leaf photo shoot.

I made this quilt out of a variety of fall colored prints and solids, including several of my favorite Heather Ross prints. I really love the addition of the pale pink prints -the tadpoles on the blush background, as well as a japanese stripe that matches quite perfectly.

And doesn’t it look great in this fall scene? All we need is a few apples, some cider and maybe a pumpkin or two to really complete the look!

The back uses this lovely solid (how many times have I mentioned this color in the last few posts?!) I added in a few larger blocks along the top and bottom edge, and then a few of the smaller blocks near the center.

I stippled this one and then bound it in a nice medium brown solid.

Final measurement: about 36″ x 45″.

And it’s washed and ready to go! I’ve listed it in the shop for the moment, but I’m still debating… it really matches our couch quite well!

I should be showing you the two other quilts made from these fabrics before I show you this mini one, but, well… those aren’t technically finished yet. Soon enough though… I have a deadline, you know! Actually, you don’t know, so I suppose I better back up and tell you the whole story so this post makes sense…

A few weeks ago I received an email from Jenean Morrison, asking if I’d be willing to make a couple quilts for her. Jenean seems to be busy with a wide variety of projects – painting, photography, designing stationery, and now even rugs… oh my! (check it all out at her website and blog). What you might be most interested in is the fabric she designs for Free Spirit. Her latest line, California Dreamin’, is coming out this fall and she was hoping for a couple small quilts to show off these lovely new fabrics at Quilt Market. Was I interested? Of course!

Well, the quilts are almost complete, and I was left with a little pile of smaller scraps… what to do but make a fun little mini quilt for Jenean!

I’m a little obsessed with these stars lately, and I thought that her beautiful fabrics would look really lovely paired with a lot of white. I made up several stars, using a variety of the prints from the Venice Beach colorway – lots of fun pinks, oranges and lime greens, and filled in the rest with Kona white solid.

For the back, I used this pink print to make a wide stripe.

And then near the bottom I included a portion of the selvage… because, really, when your name is on the selvage, shouldn’t it be included in your quilt?!

It’s bound in Kona olive, and I did some fun straight and curved quilting lines. It measures about 24″ x 32″.

I hope you love it, Jenean! Thanks for giving me the opportunity to play with your wonderful new fabrics!

(oh, and yes, I definitely have plans to make a larger quilt in a similar style!)

Remember my fall quilt top? I love the colors so much that I decided to do a mini version as well. Mainly, it was so I could try out some new (new to me, anyway!) quilting. Have you seen the quilting that Lauren of My Aunt June does? I’ve long admired it, and I’ve always wanted to try it out. If you haven’t already, you should go watch her video which explains how she does this type of quilting – it’s quite entertaining.

I used a grayish-brown thread, and just started sewing away. I used my bigger machine (because it’s way faster!) and just the regular foot. (For those who might ask, this machine doesn’t have a walking foot, but it didn’t seem to matter.) I didn’t drop the feed dogs, just pulled the quilt a bit from side to side as I moved along the quilt. Sometimes I went all the way down the length of the quilt and then turned and went the other direction, and sometimes I went just a part of the way down and then put the needle down and flipped the quilt around to go in the opposite direction.

I love the way this quilting looks! As Lauren mentions in her video, there was one brief moment when I wondered what I was doing to this quilt, but then once more of a pattern emerged, I really was quite taken with the look. I’d love to do it on a larger quilt, but I’m not sure I have the patience! I’m going to keep it in mind though… maybe a good project for one of those long winter days…

For the back of this one I used a solid green. This is Kona Olive, one of my new favorites.

It’s bound in a tan solid and measures 17″ x 20″. I’ve been spending some time just admiring it.

And now for sale in the shop!

The weather here has turned decidedly Fall-like… and quite suddenly. Last week we were swimming, this week I’m pulling out wool sweaters. I should know by now that that’s how it goes here in VT, but yet each year I’m taken aback by the abrupt change. Instead of lamenting the change, I decided to embrace it with a nice fall inspired quilt. I pulled out a bunch of fall colored fabrics from my stash -lots of olive greens, golds, browns and some orange.

I decided to go for just a simple patchwork square design. After looking at the fabrics for a while, I decided the orange was too bright for the look I wanted, so out went those prints and in came some other solid greens and browns for some contrast. I cut a bunch of 3.5″ squares, and then layed them out and moved them around until I was happy with the layout. Here’s where I’m a bit jealous of everyone with their design walls – here’s mine… the floor. I figure all that bending must be good for something though!

(I’m sure some of you are cringing to see that sometimes I can’t even be bothered to iron my fabrics before cutting!)

I sewed them all together into this quilt top -

and I love it!

And for now, I feel ok about Fall as well… providing I have a nice fall quilt to keep me warm!