How to embarrass your teenage daughter without hardly trying

the pioneer girl

I think her shoes are different from each other!

This is what I do instead of clean my house...

My entryway is now sporting a brand spanking new wall quilt.  What a joy this project was.  This was one of the projects that my sister and I bought last year at the Houston Quilt Show.  This was "we can't come back unless we finish at least one of the projects we spent money on this year" quilt.  It's a quilt-as-you-go by Prairie Sky Quilting.  This one is named "Easy Diamonds Quilt"  Being the OCD woman who likes to play with big machines, I converted the pattern into an 'in the hoop' project on my embroidery machine.  I can't really say how long it took, as real life gets in the way of what I really want to do in my sewing room. (That would be laundry and feeding my family)  I bought the fabric in January, I cut the pieces in April and have slowly put it together since then.  I highly recommend this quilt pattern company, the designs are fairly easy to assemble and lots of fun.

How the prom dress turned out

Yeah this should have been posted months ago, but you know "out of sight, out of mind".

The creation of A's prom dress began with 2 patterns circa 1959.  What fun to fit these two together.  Basically I took the bodice off one, and the skirt off the other, tweaked the mid section and re-drew the lines to put a cap sleeve on it.  The original had an off the shoulder flounce kind of thing (don't you love the precise technical terms?) Anyway, she accessorized with green stones and gold shoes.

More Summer Sewing

Today was a sewing day!  Yay!

Miss R arrived with one of her father's t-shirts in hand, and we got started on this very fun summer skirt.  The idea from this came from one of my friends who saw it on sewlikemymom.com  It turned out to be a very fun and doable project

Miss R is ready to start!

concentrating....

it all started with one of Dad's t-shirts

cute shirring on the waistband

playing with the fancy decorative stitches on the sewing machine

the finished project!

I'm thinking that the ease of this project will result in a lot of skirts this summer.  Basically we hand wound elastic thread onto the bobbin.  Then using a strait stitch with medium tension, we started at the top edge and continued around 7 times.  Tied the ends of the elastic in square knots and voila! it was done.    

Summer Sewing

Miss R and her finished project

close up of the surprise birthday present for her mom.

I love to be in my sewing room.  I love creating different crafts.  I have a friend "R" who also loves creating.  So this summer we are playing with all the fun tools and toys in my sewing room.  Lucky for me she has a working knowledge of the sewing machine, so we were able to start right away.  With my scraps, a rotary cutter, the iron and sewing machines, we whipped this up in a few hours.  She was especially thrilled with playing with the ruffler attachment.   Stay tuned to see what the rest of the summer brings.

Getting Ready for Girls Camp

I don't want her to grow up!

June found us frantically getting ready for camp.  The 6th year youth leaders had a pirate theme for the whole week.  Well you can't have pirates without Peter Pan, so we whipped this one up.  We also made an indian costume and a fairy.  I will post as soon as she uploads her camp pictures.

Sewing for Grandbabies

mini-monsters for my mini monsters!

Every 2 year old needs a tutu, even if her Aunt tried it on first!

April found me off to see my grand daughter and to welcome her new brother to the world.  I think I like the whole grandma thing!  I went with bags loaded with important things like monsters and tutu.