Pillowcase Dresses for Haiti

So this week I have been spending some time making dresses from pillow cases for girls in Haiti.  A member of our church is leaving in a couple of weeks on a medical mission trip to Haiti, so a few of us from church are making some dresses to send with.  

Here is Olivia, Hailee (a little girl I watch), and Allyson modeling a few of them. 

The picture is a bit blurry, but it is not at all easy trying to get the three of them to stand still!

The pillow cases were donated from a local hotel and some youth members spent some time tie-dying them all, and others of us are sewing them into dresses.  The are very simple to make and are quite fun. 

The girls are having fun helping me with them, and I hope it is teaching them to give to others that aren't as blessed as we are.

Monkey Business

First of all, I apologize for not posting in forever.  I didn't have time to get one done before Christmas, and since then I have not been able to upload any pictures. But finally today I got it figured out.  I have several blogs written, just waiting for pictures, so now I can get them posted.  

Here is my little Ally-Kitten all covered in snow.  The girls sure loved the 20" of snow we got right before Christmas.  Myself, not so much, but the girls spend most of their waking moments outside, if it's not too cold!

Allyson, picked out this monkey fabric while at the quilt shop on the first day of school for my oldest daughter, Olivia. There was only a 1/2 yard cut left in the shop, so we had to get creative. It is adorable fabric, so it was easy to be creative with it!

 Allyson was really missing her big sister and felt very left out not getting to go to school herself. So to keep her busy, she and I made this quilt together while Olivia was in school. I had a great time teaching my three-year-old to sew, and it was a great way to keep her mind off of her sister.  

She got a chance to be a big girl for once, and now she has her "monkey quilt" to snuggle up on the couch (or in this case on the floor) on those days that it doesn't get above zero and it's way too cold to go out and play.

Small Things...

We have decided to move, not too far, just a few miles away, so that we are closer to my husband's family farm. That way we can spend more time with Daddy while he is doing his farming thing, and we will have more space! 

We now live in a small rambler in town and it is just not big enough.
With all of three girls, their horse activities, Daddy's tractors, and my quilting, we have out-grown our house.

So, in preparation for the move, I have had to pack up my quilting frame and store it safe and sound in my parents basement. 

 

Since I can't quilt any tops at the moment, I have been trying to keep myself busy with small projects.  Here are just a few to show:

Here is a scrappy 30's table runner. 

This was just left-overs from a quilt that I made this summer.

 

Blossoms in the Garden

 

And I also have been having fun using up scraps to make yo-yo's. 

I don't know what I am going to make with them yet, but they are fun and keep me busy.

 

And this is a fun apron that my Mr. Amazing actually picked

out all of th fabric for me.  

The pattern is Spring Cleaning by Fig Tree & Co.

 

 

This was a pre-cut that my mom got for me called Hot Dish.

 

 

And this is my favorite of all, my Sweet Caroline!

She sure had fun this fall playing in all the leaves. 

I just can't get enough of that sweet smile.

 

I'm Back!

So needless to say... I've been a bit busy the last couple of months.  Busy with life, and not so much quitling.  But, between vacations, school, horse stuff, weddings, selling our house, and just the crazy's of life, I have gotten a few projects done. 

 

In my last post, I had a project going that I couldn't say a whole lot about because it was a gift.  Well the gift has been given, so now I can show you.

 This is Winner's Boquet. 

I made this quilt for my sister-in-law Kristine and her new husband Luke as a wedding gift.

This quilt was a blast to make.  My first attempt at curves, so I had prepared myself for a challenge, but it was very easy. I found it a bit time consuming with all the pinning, but very simple to make.

 

 

I had a good time choosing all the batik fabric for this quilt. And it was also a lot of fun to quilt. A bit challenging because it filled my entire frame (I actually had to cut it down by 2 1/2" to get it to fit), but fun.

 

Kristine and Luke's wedding was the highlight of our fall.  It was beautiful, so much fun and we are so happy for them. The girls are especially glad to have a new Uncle Lukey (who they adore)! 

 

 

Here's the happy couple!

 

 

And that's us. 

Olivia and Allyson were beautiful flower girls, and had a great time getting to be princesses for a day!

 

 

I even got to dance with my Mr. Amazing! 

The last time I got to do dance with him was at our wedding 8 years ago. 

He only dances when he has to:(

Well, that's a little of what we have been up to. Can't wait to tell you more, but that will have to wait for another day.

 

-Rebekah

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bunches of Creativity

At the moment I am working on a project that I really can't say a whole lot about.  It is a big project that is taking me a while. My family always comes first in my life, and since they have been keeping me very busy this summer, I have been trying to sqeeze in time here and there to spend at my sewing machine.  So since I can't show you what I am working on now, I thought I would bunch a few of my past projects together. 

Starting from top to bottom with the quilt rack and shelf.  I found this piece at a garage sale for $2, reinforced it and spray painted it white. I love garage sales!  In fact, most of my house is decorated in garage sales, thrift store items and hand-me-downs!

Next is the quilt, and it's name is 'Twist'.  This is the second quilt that I made and it has a story behind it.  This is my husband's favorite quilt. After I finished my first quilt, my husband told me how proud he was of finishing it, and he loved how much I enjoyed making it.,so he took me to the store and picked out the quilt pattern and the fabric for this quilt, and gave me my next project to start on. He loved the pattern and he thought that it symbolized how the two of us were 'twisting' our lives together into one beautiful quilt.  Needless to say, we had only been married for a few months! I don't think my husband realized then, what a hobby this would become in the next eight years of marriage, especially when it comes to seeing the checkbook after I have made a trip to the quilt shop.  But he has always supported my quilting, and has only encourage me to challenge myself and grow in my talents, and I love him very much for that.

And lastly is this table. 

This table was my grandparents.  I lived with my grandparents for a good portion of my childhood, and this table was in my bedroom there, but always covered up with a table cloth. As a child the drawer was a great hiding place for things that I didn't want my older brother to take from me since it was hidden under the table cloth. Even the inside of the drawer was covered in crayon scribbled 'secret messages' from my childhood. So when my grandparents passed away recently, I asked if I could have this table, not realizing why it had a table cloth over it for so many years.  It was ugly!  So I decided to make it pretty. 

I still have nowhere to put it in my house, I had to move my husbands recliner just to have a place to take a nice picture of it, but I had a lot of great memories of this table, so I will keep it until we have the house of our dreams and the perfect place for this table.

There is usually a purpose or a story behind most of my projects, and I love to share those stories, so I hope you enjoyed them.

-Rebekah

Summertime Fun!

This summer seems to be the busiest one yet, and it is filled with lots of fun.  I don't want to miss a moment of it so I am trying to capture as much as I can with the camera.

My sweet Caroline, who is now three months old.

Our county fair will be held in just a couple of weeks, so my older two girls have been spending lots of time on horseback lately getting ready for the horse show.

Allyson, who is two-years-old, will be competing in her first horse show, so she's been busy practicing! Here she is on Hank.

Allyson with her best bud Cocoa.

Here's my four-year-old, Olivia, and her best bud, Buckshot.  They competed together last summer and won!  So now this year we are stepping it up and they will be competing in more difficult classes and some games. 

Buckshot is an amazing little pony.  He just follows Olivia around everywhere like a little puppy. As long as there is grass, he is one happy pony!

 

 Both girls are so excited for the show, and I am one proud mommy of these beautiful girls!

Creative Photography

 Last night I recruited my Mr. Amazing to help with my next blog post.  I wanted to be able to show you some pictures of some of my quilts, and not just with them laying on my living room floor.

So I packed up all of the quilts that aren't currently being used and headed a few miles away to "The Farm" a.k.a my in-laws. 

My husband farms with his dad. His parents live on the farmstead, and we live a few miles away on the edge of town.

We loaded up the John Deere AMT with some of my quits, headed out to adventure around the farm and find fun places to take some pics, while Grandma got some playtime with the girls.
So here are some of my favs!

This is my very first "real quilt". My Mom gave me all of the fabric, a cutting mat and rotary blade for Christmas the year that I got married. I cut it out with 12" school ruler because that is all I had for a straight edge at the time, and I had no idea there was such as thing as quilting rulers!

Jennifer Chiaverini's New Year's Quilt

"Royal Order" From American Patchwork and Quilting Magazine

This my favorite building on the farm- the old chicken coop.  It has tons of character, but it's only inhabitant now-a-days are the bees that have overrun it.

This quilt I actully stole off of my daughter's bed, but thought it would make some fun pictures.

I think photographing the quilts was almost as much fun as making them. Sorry there is a lot of pics, but I had a VERY hard time picking just a couple of pictures!  I had too much fun climbing around the farm with my Mr. Amazing finding some fun places to photgraph my quilts!  This is just a fraction of the quilts that I have made, but I have to save some things for another time.