Josephine's Butterfly Quilt

Sorry that I haven't updated my blog because I've been so busy getting everything ready for Christmas.  I thought I'd post a picture of one Christmas project.  I'm making Josephine a quilt for her toddler bed.

Here it is.  We've themed her room with butterflies.  I just need to quilt it and it'll be all ready for Christmas morning - but I'm not sure when I'll have time to do that. Hmm....

Merry Christmas to everyone!!

Sick Again?

Just when I thought we'd recovered from the cold, Josie caught the stomach flu. Thank heavens it was only a 24 hour bug.  My favorite thing when Josie gets sick is how much she loves to cuddle.  I could cuddle all day, and in fact, that's what we did all yesterday.  Nothing reminds me of how much I love my sweet little toddler than when she lets me rock her.  It's a lot like the book I'll Love You Forever.  As long as I can hold you in my arms, you'll be my little baby.

Seat Cushion Cover Tutorial

Buy foam and cut into desired size.  I'm making a window seat cushion, my piece of foam is 2' x 5' x 2".

Lay foam on the wrong side of the fabric and draw around the foam, use a pen or chalk that wont show through the fabric. I used a yellow marker, I could kinda see in on the other side.  You will add side length and seam allowance when you're cutting.

Using my rotary cutter I measured half the width + seam allowance away from the foam line (drawn in yellow) and cut.  My foam is two inches thick and I'm giving myself 1/2 inch seam allowance.  So I cut 1.5 inches from the yellow foam line.

 Then I mitered the corners.  I folded each corner into a 45 degree angle and sewed a line 90 degrees from the yellow foam line.

 I hate zippers, and every time I put one in I have to re-learn how to.  So this is how I do zippers, but if you have a better way -- use it.  I laid down my zipper and pinned the fabric where the zipper began and ended.

I sewed between the pins using a basting stitch.  I then picked every third stitch so it would come undone easily.

 I pressed open the fabric from where I just sewed and laid my zipper on the inside.

I pinned it in place, and used my  machine's zipper foot to sew it in place.  I back-stitched at the beginning and end.

Next I zipped it closed. Flipped the fabric completely over so the right side was up and started sewing the other side in place. You may want to place a few pins to keep everything in place.  I had to unzip the zipper to sew at the very top of the zipper tape.

 I then pulled the seam apart, here's where the picked stitches come in handy.  That's how I put in my invisible zipper.

Finally, I pinned the whole thing together, pinning the corners first and working towards the middle, and sewed it together.  Remember to open the zipper a little before sewing, so you can easily turn it inside out.  And TA-DA a seat cover.

 

Here is my princess laying on her finished window seat cushion.

Then I used Steam-a-Seam and ironed on some cute butterflies in coordinating fabric colors.

Giving Some Joy at Christmas

This year for Christmas Russell and I decided to give some joy to people who might be a little lonely.  That joy took the form of sugar cookies. I love sugar cookies! They are one of my three favorite cookies. Our list had thirty two families on it and that translated into 124ish cookies. It helps that I have the World's Best Sugar Cookie recipe, which makes 80ish cookies with one batch. Here it is:

 World's Best Sugar Cookies

2 c butter or margarine, softened

2c granulated sugar

3 eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp lemon extract

6c flour

1 tsp baking soda

Cream together butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, and lemon extract.  Add flour and baking soda.  Mix until all the flour has been mixed into the dough. Refrigerate for 2 or 24 hours. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease cookies sheet.  Roll dough to 1/4 inch thickness and cut out desired shapes.  Bake for 8 to 10 minutes (I baked mine for 12 minutes because my oven runs a little cold) or until edges start to brown.  Freezes well for up to 6 months.

 

Two batches later I had about 180ish cookies.  Then I like to make homemade butter cream frosting - it's also super easy. 

Butter Cream Frosting

4 c powdered sugar

1 cup butter, softened

2 TBS milk

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 tsp salt

Blend with hand mixer on medium speed until well blended. One recipe of this will cover one batch of the cookies.

Then we had three awesome families come over and help decorate cookies, put together plates, and play with Josie's toys.  It was such a great evening.  After we'd decorated them all, we divided the 32 families and everyone went out sharing joy.  This might become a new Christmas tradition, it was that good.

Easy Fish Recipe

As a girl from Washington State, with a father who used to be an avid fisher, I'm practically required to love fish. But in the words of Jim Gaffigin, "I love fish, when it doesn't taste like fish. So, you don't like fish."

Unfortunately, my husband does like fish.  So it's my job to make fish that doesn't taste like fish and this is how.

Ingredients:
-1 fish fillet
-Lemon juice
-Clove Garlic
-Thyme
-Basil
-Olive oil
Drizzle the fillet with lemon juice, mince your garlic and put it on top, sprinkle with thyme and basic, and lastly drizzle with olive oil.  I cover the fish and let it sit in the refrigerator for a couple hours. The secret to this recipe (which took me years to figure out) is to put the ingredients on the fish in the order listed. It looks like this:

I used to wrap it in a foil packet and bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes, but I recently started pan frying it.  I take the fish and cook it on one side on a medium heat.  Then flip it when the thickest part of the fish is halfway done.  I allow it to brown a little.  To make certain it's done you flake it with a fork.  This only takes 15 - 20 minutes, which is so much faster than baking.

For a complete meal I throw some rice into the rice maker and cook up some vegetables. Nice and healthy!

Stringing Beads

This year I hit a jackpot for Josephine at the Quilt Group Christmas party.  During the gift exchange I chose the present with beads, bells, wire, and thread.  This is for creating embellishments on a quilt (in case you were scratching your head).   However, as soon as Josephine saw what was in the bag she wanted access.

We took out one of the bags of beads and I showed her how to put the wire through the hole in the bead.   Then how to let it slide down the wire, so she could then put on another bead.

If you decide to buy some beads, a shoe string is a good option for beading.  Especially since Josephine complains about poking her finger sometimes.  Also, make sure that the beads you buy aren't a choking hazard.  This is a concern I have because when the next baby comes, these beads will be a choking hazard.

After posting this I realized that a great (and inexpensive) alternative to this would be macaroni noodles -- All circular noodles really.  Then your kids can string noodles instead of beads.

Plastic Grocery Bag Holder Tutorial

I've been meaning to make one of these for myself for a long time. So I ended up making one to give away instead (not very helpful). Here's how I did it. Please excuse my sewing jargon; I'm definitely not a master sewer.
I took a scrap of fabric and cut it in half. Its width is about 17 inches and its length can be as long as you need it to be. For my next bag I'll probably make it a bit longer, I think its length is about 24 inches.From a coordinating fabric I cut a circle using a cottage cheese lid. I picked my circle size by finding the largest circle my 17 inch wide scraps of fabric would fit around with a little space for seam allowances and some gathering.
I also cut a coordinating rectangle. My rectangle is about 2 inches by 5 inches.
I took the fabric for the body of the holder and sewed them together into a tube along both 24 inch sides, not sewing the 17 inch side. On one side I stopped sewing two inches up from the bottom, skipped one inch, and then continued sewing to the bottom. I skipped the space between the pins, back-stitching before the pin and then after the pin. This is the place the ribbon goes through.

Take the small rectangle and fold it over itself and pin. Then sew where the fabric end lies. For this one the fabric is right in the middle. If you don’t want the sewing to show you can fold it in half with right sides together and sew it together, then turn it inside out. I didn’t really care about being able to see the sewing – I just wanted to avoid the hassle of turning it inside out afterwards.Then I folded my circle in half and pinned the middle for both sides.

I lined up the side seams of the rectangle and pinned them to my middle points. Make sure you're pinning the circle to the side of the body that doesn't have the hole for the ribbon. I then pinned all the way around the circle, creating a fold where there was extra fabric. This will make it look ruffled when it’s complete.
After pinning all around you’ll need to place the rectangle for hanging. Do this by removing one of the pins (I put mine along the seam opposite from the ribbon opening), folding the rectangle in half (preferably with the raw edge on the inside), and then line the raw edges of the rectangle with the raw edge of the circle. The rectangle will be inside; it’s present in the above picture. Then you can sew it all together and turn the whole bag inside out. Next I took care of the bottom hem. First I pinned and sewed around the hole for the ribbon like it was a button hole, except I just used a straight stitch. I laid the seam allowance flat while doing this to reinforce the hole.Then I folded up my hem an inch, pinned it in place, and (using a zig-zag stitch) sewed along the top of it. This makes the case for the ribbon to go through.
Afterwards I cut my ribbon to 32 inches and, using a big safety pin, threaded the ribbon into the hole. Then I synched it slightly and tied a beautiful bow. TA DA! I felt a little silly bringing this to the gift exchange, but the lady who drew my name was super excited about freeing up her cabinet and I got an offer to buy one. So in the end I was pretty happy.

Favorite Things

One of my favorite things about Christmas is all the gift exchanges. Not only is it an opportunity for me to be creative and make things, but I also get to receive the fun things other people bring.

So, this week I had two exchanges and I made a plastic grocery bag holder for the kitchen and some coasters (from my pinterest).

I made six coasters for the set. The two close ups were my favorite. I decided to add vinyl quilting phrases to the coasters. Here are my two favorite.

Playdough

My day-care experience with Playdough has always been very messy. But, I have discovered this week that it's not so bad when there's only one kid playing with it. Not only that but Josephine was entertained for hours! That's awesome.

I also gave her four cookie cutters to use, that expended the play.




Recipe
2 cups white flour (I tried wheat and it was super gross)
1 cup salt
1 Tablespoon oil
3/4 cups water (add 4 drops food coloring to water)

Down and Out

Thanksgiving was great! The house was clean, the company was warm and welcoming, and the food was delicious. The shopping was also pretty good.

Perhaps it was all the people, but we've been sick in bed for the last two weeks (recovering from Thanksgiving). We all caught some nasty cold and Russell's has turned into a major sinus infection - gross. To put it simply, we had a good time with family and wish they hadn't shared their sickness.

We were all ready to jump into Christmas with both feet, but have halted all future plans of cookie making or visiting with people. Too bad. I feel like I'm missing out on Christmas this year, but I just need to remember that it's only the second week of the month and not to be melodramatic. Now that Russell is on anti-biotics he should get better and the festivities can continue.

That's what I'm waiting for!