Baby Life Quilt

Over the past year, there have been quite a few babies born to friends and family.  At last count, there were 4 new babies born within the year.  One of these sweet babes is little Lily.  Lily’s mom, Becky, and I are cousins and we grew up together.  I probably spent just as many holidays with Becky and her sisters, as I did at my own house.  Actually, this is still true, since we head over to Aunt Aida’s (Becky’s mom) every Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. 

Even Piper has a special connection with Becky and has told both of us that if something were to happen to hubby and me, she wants to live with Becky.  The pool in the yard might have a *little* something to do with it, methinks.  I was a little concerned (teeeeeeny bit) to learn that my 12 year old already has a contingency plan in case of our early demise.

Tangent, sorry. 

When Becky announced she was pregnant, I knew I wanted to do something special.  I searched through a lot of patterns, but when I came across the Baby Life quilt, I knew THAT was the one! 

Making the quilt was a collaborative effort.  Piper wanted to help trace and cut out all the letters.   As much as I have come to love appliqué, I am not a fan of tracing and cutting, so I wasn’t about to turn down the extra help.   The only thing she asked was that I tell Becky that Piper helped make the quilt too, which I was happy to do. 

Pi and I decided to use a bunch of purples for this quilt.  As much as we both love pink, something just screamed purple.  Now this is where it gets ESP freaky.  I hadn’t asked Becky what color her nursery was going to be.  One day, while over for a BBQ, she showed me the nursery that had just been painted… purple!  Uh-huh…that is some freaky cousin connection there. 

Loved making this quilt and I love love love the way it turned out. 

 

For the back, I pieced together the leftover purple fabric. 

As pretty as it is alone, a sweet baby always makes a quilt look better.

Seriously, who couldn’t love that face?

It's been awhile...

Wowzers, has it really been 16 months since I last posted?  Talk about being a major slacker! 

A lot has happened in that time, so I’ll just give you the 3 second version.  After months of searching and interviewing for an internship, I finally landed one last November at a facility that treats offenders.  This is a PG blog, so I’m not going to say what kind of offenders.  After the mandatory background/fingerprint stuff, I was finally able to start in January and interned there until July.  I got hands on experience doing group therapy, assessment, and psychoeducational classes.  I officially graduated in May, but stuck around the internship a few extra months because I enjoyed the work so much.     

Fast forward to now.  I’m currently looking for a position in my field, so I can get the experience hours needed to get licensed.  The economy is making this a bit of a slow process, but I’m being patient and hoping that something great will pop up soon.  In the meantime, I’m still at my regular job and enjoying life without research papers or late night classes. 

Seems like Pi is on fast forward mode too.  She started 7^th grade yesterday!  Insane how time flies. 

I didn’t craft much while in school, but I managed to finish a few small things and even though I wasn’t blogging, I took pics of everything.  I was hoping to be back eventually.  Since school has ended, I have been on a roll.  I can’t craft enough, it seems.  Let’s see how many Christmas gifts I can squeeze in before I slow down again.  :)

I’m obsessed with sewing right now and have even gotten Pi into it.  She went to sewing camp for a week and has become the queen of patchwork squares.  My scrap stash was raided and I helped her cut 3 inch squares, which are slowly becoming 16 patch squares.  She plans on making enough to make herself a quilt.  No small goals for that one, but  gotta give her credit for confidence.

 

And because no post is complete without a picture, here is a little Owl Coin Purse from Michelle Patterns (formerly known as KeykaLou).  It was made with the teeniest of scraps and was such a quick project.  Perfect for an instant gratification fix. 

So, I can’t promise I’ll post as regularly as I once did, but I’m around.  Hope the last 16 months have been good to you too!