The earthbaby arrived!

Alexandria Bernadette
Born at 1922
24 Jan 2010
8 lbs 2 oz
19.5 inches long
lovely dark curly hair

 and since I am not at home, I will post a pic of the wee little lassie (hopefully) tomorrow.

Thank you everyone for for the prayers and well wishes, I will never forget my birthday this year...what a smashingly perfect day. Now, for some sleep, hugs to all....Elaine

Earthmama called...

...her labor is in full swing, she needs me...later!

Happy Feet Dance!

wahoo!!!! I won a giveaway at Meredith 's blog and SCORED! I was expecting JUST the magazine, of which I have coveted, like forever, but, I received 2 large envelopes, THE magazine, 2 different lengths of this lovely Glace by 3 sisters, AND a glace layer cake! The pattern that she enclosed is for an hour glass quilt using the fabrics she sent....I am so out of here, off to make this quilt NOW! Thanks Meredith, you made my day, Elaine

                                                  

Waiting for the sun to come up

I won a giveaway from a nice lady on the east coast and it arrived today, wahoo. But, it was 2 large envelopes...oh dear. I just don't feel right opening them, not yet. The giveaway was for a Quiltmania magazine. I need to talk with her first...what would you do?

                                                 

Life is interesting

I asked the hubs if he wanted to go into town, 6 miles away, last night for a quick fastfood pickup, so off we went. Grabbed it and came home to watch the news and found out we JUST missed a tornado...then it proceeded to travel by our home and ruin a few things along the way. We are all fine...as reported to Vickie , no goats impaled into the trees, no mini stallion airborn to FT.Worth, God is truly good.

Now something funny...do you ever read Rhonda's blog about living simply and frugally? Great woman, my mentor. She has had a feature on her site on kitchen sinks from around the world....well worth checking out. So I was looking at it last nite and realized that the kitchen featured was (I had thought) just down the road from us! It was farther east, but still a neighbor, so I intro'd myself...glad to meet you, my name is Elaine, we're neighbors and I met you in Australia! She wrote back...twice, the second time to check on our welfare since we were in the area the tornado hit! What a small world the internet has made for us.

I am posting another blog later, just wanted to update on the weather here. Have a great evening...Elaine

Do you have an extra red scrap...please?

I exchanged emails with a sweet lady, Jeannette,  in New Zealand, who is doing a breathtaking paper pieced  project called Simply Red. It is really pretty. But, unreal as some of you might find...she has run out of red! How can that be? Pop over to her blog and check out this quilt.

All you have to do, if you want to help out, is to email her for her address and pop a piece or 2, small ones, of red fabric into an envelope and post it to her. She has posted the size she needs.

It will cost the price of a stamp...but how fun to do something that has the potential to make another quilter happy. I have some fun red batiks to send. And thanks so much...cheers, Elaine

Money grubber Monday

I had to go to wallyworld for some goldfish and observed 3+ aisles of Christmas decorations and wrapping paper at 75% for most of it...and it was still there! A real sign of the times. It seems where ever we go, we can all see the effects of the recession. There are just somethings  we can do to save ourselves from overspending and this is my contribution for today.
As you all know, (oh my Lord, she is gonna bring it up again!), my kids, the earthfamily are expecting and are very frugal people. My son had pointed out to me that he found a pattern for making diapers from old t-shirts...so I ran with it.

I checked google for expectant parents on the cost of cloth vs. disposable. The range went from $1600-2400 per infant, and that is not even the carbon  footprint you are starting the baby out with. I had no idea. Then I started thinking about, what do parents do in a disaster situation for diapers? I can't fix the milk issue but the nappies are easy peasy and literally free. There are a jillion places online, including ebay and etsy, that sell the "new" cloth diapers. They are made from PUL...a sheer soft plastic underlining with a pretty double knit cover. I bought 3 yards on etsy from this seller and have made re-usable breast pads. The PUL is a breeze to sew, comes in 60" widths and washes very well. My daughter has been using them with her baby and loves them. If you check etsy, you can find a lot of sellers who make these. Very tres chic...but, the baby is going to pee in it! They can be rather expensive. They are, what we older mommies from Noahs' era, used to call rubber pants. They still need the liner, hence, the t-shirt nappie.

I checked at my local favorite thrift store and asked the owner if she throws out clothing...like t-shirts. Yep, several a week. So I had her save some=free. I washed and dried them and cut all the seams out.  (a typical fabric/hoarder stash...a huge box of t-shirt knit fabric minus the seams, lol!)

I cut a template out of an old piece of plastic and shaped it like what I perceived a diaper should look like.

                 I had some pieces of sleeve that I folded up and laid into the center, then took the other piece of (the same) shirt and folded the edges under and laid it on top and pinned it in place. 

(The hardest part for me was finding the "right" setting on my machine. This is the important part: I AM NOT A SEAMSTRESS....I AM A QUILTER!  Whoa, I feel better now. Anyhoodles, play with your machine, get wacky with the dials and stuff. Every setting I came up with was a bigger mess then the last. I went thru 5 machine needles and lots of nasty words before I finally found the setting for this. T-shirt fabric, since it is knit, is a pain in the butt to sew. This worked for me!)

Lets see, oh yeah, right. So pin the little dickens together and sew with 1/4" seam. I did go over a few areas with the intent to keep the wadding (am I not just getting the greatest words from my bloggy friends in the Southern Hemisphere?) from shifting.

                                                     

No, it's not very pretty...but it's free and it's use belies the aesthetics. I purposely made the underside a little thicker...it's a girl. For a boy, I would have added a little more padding to the front part. This nappie is for use with the AIO cover

AIO=all in one

or a wool soaker. I haven't finished the soaker yet, still in the thinking stage, but it's cut out. I just can't decide if I need to do it by hand or machine, after all, I do have a few needles unbroken.

Now, here she is, Vanna, do me the honors please:

I have read that a lot of the AIOs don't fit the newborn, this is perfect! No plastic for the earthbaby...lol. I know this is a quilt blog, but I had a request on my blog and 2 emails asking for this tutorial. Thanks for bearing with me.

                                    

I am actually working on my embroidery quilt pattern, don't give up on me yet...and a little peek at another embroidery...yep, a baby quilt, lol!

Maybe tomorrow ,oh it's delicious!

Are any of you doing anything special to save money or stockpile or just another way to do something a lot cheaper...hmm, I am curious.

The Earthfamily took us out!

Son and the earthmama invited us out for dinner to celebrate my birthday. It doesn't happen for another week, but they don't want to push it with baby! We went to a new seafood restaurant and it was yummy! Fried oysters and sweet potato fries....a very new taste for me, unusual but soooo good. The kids had salmon and orange roughy. The salmon was phenomenol! It was a lot of fun and daddy took a pic of the kids and I. E-mama is holding her lying in blanket, she loves it! I had a happy evening...

                                            

                                                            

What's hanging on your line?

I have had a lot of fun sewing for the earthfamily and the new wee one, not yet here....but in a few weeks, if she can stay put that long! After reading a few new mommy blogs, I have noticed that the moms that are using the AIO's have the common complaint that they can't find 'em small enough to fit their newborns. So I whipped up 3 dozen that are a little different, lol. I have used all sorts of interesting colors of t-shirts, cut all the seams out, padded them and FINALLY figured out the best way to sew them. Good times.

New Items available in my shop

Oh things are hopping here, mostly good. I was excited to get yet ANOTHER box from my good friends at Moda, yeah.

                                        The fat quarter bundle of Collections for Charity finally arrived from Moda. It is that highly anticipated collection designed by Howard Marcus. The colors are so wonderful. I won't bore you with the entire collection but if you want to see it all, go to unitednotionsmoda.com and click on view products. There is a little bubble that will show the entire swatchs, very pretty.

The other item that arrived is a Breath of Avignon jelly roll. Since a lot of quilters have removed their Christmas decorations for the year, I have been seeing that there seems to be a common complaint of lack of color. Check these bright springy colors out, wow!
                                                              I am still waiting for the charm packs that go with this jelly roll. The Freebird jelly rolls and charm packs are coming any day, along with honey buns,
jelly rolls, layer cakes and charm packs
of Hunky Dory. So check the Moda

site out for the swatches for a peek at these new fabrics. My etsy button is on the sidebar. If you mention that you found me on blogger...I'll throw in something extra!                                                                   

Do you ever wonder...

...what the woman was thinking about while she pieced that quilt top...or hand quilted it? While I was having fun adding decorative stitches to earthmamas' breast pads, I couldn't help but to think back about my son. I crocheted this baby blanket for him before he was born. I was not confirmed to have a boy, but I guess I knew. This child has been the added joy we strove for in our marriage, that extra dollop of frosting. We love all our children equally...but, what is it about our babies...that last one born?My little pumpkin face, my sweet little baby, all 8 lbs and 3 1/2oz and the prettiest baby in the worldHis kindergarten teacher called dh and I in for a conference and showed us self portraits of all the students, hanging up, then she show us our babies' self portrait. She appeared concerned he may have a "difficulty". It certainly

put us on alert. His picture, of himself, was of the back of him...from head to toe. I had to call in professional help. The doctor laughed, said he loved it, that our little boy had simply taken the easy way out!! I was one of those goofy moms who gave my baby blunt nosed scissors and construction paper...he has always been artistic and has had a flair for the unusual.Hey Bisonboy...your mama thinks you are special and well loved.

Here's a quickie post

Seems my internet is down, 24 hours and counting. They (monkey boy who climbs pole) and the other (monkey boy who sits in office, probably has huge hairy knuckles and eats bananas) have called and sweetly informed me I MIGHT GET ON THE NET LIMITEDLY (is that a word?) A FEW MINUTES HERE AND THERE THE NEXT 24 OR SO HOURS! Good times.

Down to the nitty gritty...bison boy...and to think I let him out of the closet for parochial school! Never listens I tell ya! Anyway, got into my etsy shop, hmm, grabbed addresses to mail goods. What a great way to do business, again, good times.

Hey, I love you guys, if you buy anything from my shop, please be patient, I will call the earthmamas' dh, aka, my darling son, aka, bisonboy for your address.

Oh...almost forgot...the HOUSE GOATS...what are you guys thinking, of course I would never, ever own a white leather sofa, I have dogs too!  Geez, lol.

Maybe tomorrow for the new diaper pics...think of what grams on wine would make....omg!

Winner!!!

My computer is down. So I called my son to random generate the winner and the winner is...





Rhonda P. Number 2. From Indiana.



Send email mom your address so she can mail your package to you. I would like thank everyone so much and Earth Momma is still not in the hospital. Mom will be back on tomorrow for normal update and all things fun. Thank you, thank you very much.

BisonBoy aka Earth Momma's Husband.

The earthmama blanket

Here it is, the EARTHMAMA LAYING IN blanket. Since she is of Scottish descent, I added those elements. She spent a few years in Canada as a tween and I found the perfect towel for that. I also put in towels from her and ds birth years and since there was a chunk of his wool fabric left over from his wedding kilt, I HAD to incorporate that. All in all, it was fun to do but not easy. Its sewn envelope style, like a true southern summer quilt, and has 2 rows of top stitching. If it should ever warm up, please Jesus, I will attempt a better pic. Oh...and try to do anything with 2 dogs assisting!

                                                       

I found this darling little 40's Scottish tea towel and flanked it with the kilt wool, isn't it precious? (I am a lousy photographer...I freaked when I saw the tea towel, shadows, thank you God!) I have had this piece of linen forever and have always been reluctant to use it, now I know why! It's perfect for earthmama...and is that French General peeking out?
Now, on to the reusable, milk proof breast pads. I made a ton of them for my daughter and she loves them! PUL is awesome stuff.
          

Now I can concentrate on baby stuff tomorrow, maybe. I draw for the giveaway winner tomorrow nite, wahoo, stay tuned...Elaine

Baby, it's cold outside~~~don't forget the giveaway below!

Don't forget my giveaway below. But I have to tell you...do you ever do the fabshophop? I am such a sucker for looking at other quilt shops and use this as my excuse to lollygag along and check things out.

I met (emailed this nice lady) this awesome shop owner and SHE WROTE BACK AND ANSWERED MY QUESTIONS! It is a miracle. I asked her about her website hoster and she was forthright and honest. OMG! I know, but I don't get out much. Now, you have got to check out this site for the most awesome sewing cases in the world!  Click on the patterns page and scroll all the way to the bottom, you won't be sorry. She also carries scrumptious hand dyed fabs and cute little chicken pin cushions. Since my b-day is coming up I am leaving mr.happy a note in some obscure place...rubber banded to the remote control I think!

Now I know it's cold, but, HELLO this is Texas for crying out loud! I don't like this, the chihauhau's can actually run and pee at the same time, and they are girls, our cactus is, well, you decide...   

I did ask for a new house coat....but 2 WHAT!!!

You know, I was going to explain about the "house goats", but the picture is so worth keeping it to myself until Monday when I draw the winner...yep, well worth it!

100th post~~~ wahoo~~~sounds like a giveaway!

I am a talky one, huh? Or as my Canadian sister would say...eh? She claims they say "eh" because there are so many letter "A's" in the word Canada. I think she is on to something, lol. That girl is as crazy as I am!

So short and sweet. If you would like to be included in this giveaway, shoot me a reason why....why you would like to have me send you the new MAKE LIFE charm pack by Moda and a fat quarter each of 3 French General Rouenneries in the roche, oyster and faded red colorways. I might find something else to toss in just to sweeten the pot. I'll draw a winner on Monday...unless the stork strikes early, then I'll be with the earthmama!

Do ya'll just love embroidery? I do. I am starting to really get into it, like really big time! I am working on a quilt kit, for my shop, of an awesome 30's type of quilt with butterflies and embroidery. It is really breathtaking.

I'll have to get on with my baby projects first...later, Elaine

2010 Projects to do

I have mentioned that I love to look at what others are doing and have found a quilt that, not only do I heart it to pieces, but I want to make it! I found it on this blog. Sherri makes the prettiest quilts and picks the best colors...check out her Cameo quilt, very cool. I kept looking at it and realized I carry the center cameo fabric in my shop....bonus! Now, just to gather the rest of the fabrics for it, call Moda to order the patterns and re-order more snowflake Moda Muslins for the borders.

Yes, I am still working on the diapers, just taking a little selfish sewing break. Cheers, Elaine

My bloggy bff's

Do you ever get excited to see one of "those" bloggers posted a new post? Like, omg, crazymomquilts has done it again, another quilt complete with tutorial...what a prolific girl she is. Then I read her last blog. She is quitting her blog.

I feel bad for her, I really do. It does take a lot of time and effort to properly keep at her blog. The pressure must be incredible for her.

I am happy for her though. Now she can relax and not feel like she's chasing her tail thru the wind. Maybe do something she wants to do.

But in the meantime....I am grieving. AmandaJean...I will miss you! Hmm, maybe I should think up a crazymom quilt. White borders, crispy, well placed scrappy geometric....oh the possibilities...

What I have been doing

The dil, earthmama, is going to use cloth diapers on the new baby, due in less then a month. Now these aren't the cloth diapers from my baby days. Nope, these are fun! Well, as fun as can be...lol. She has purchased a lot of AIO's (all in one) from ebay and is happily waiting for the moment to use them. So, lets have a show of hands on who has had babies...now, who used cloth diapers on those little buns? Yep, me too.

The diaper rundown...AIO is a cover that is made from PUL (soft cottony fab on the outside, super soft vinyl-like fab on the inside) that is water proof. The cute little inserts are removable and washable and a little pricey.

Earthmama is not aware of how often or unexpected an infant will require a change. It drives me insane that ANYONE WILL WILLINGLY SELL A PRODUCT AND NOT WARN NEW MAMAS that babies will actually need more then 6 diaper inserts or 2 covers for the first week of their lives. I know, who knew? So earthmama/daddy are frugal, and keeping with their lifestyle, I have decided to whip up some additional inserts and covers. Earthdaddy had mentioned before about using t-shirts for diapers. Hmm, ok, I'll bite.

So I gathered a bunch of tshirts and cut all of the seams out, and searched the net for ideas. Oh how I love the internet!

I am also working on her "laying in" quilt and booby buddies. More pics later today, peace out, Elaine