Sewing – Page 20 – Thimbleanna

Sewing and Mourning

33 Comments / March 13, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Sewing, Wedding

Thanks for all the SweetiePie apron love! I forgot to tell you that the apron came from a pattern — Simplicity 3752. And for those of you who asked, the fabric is an Alexander Henry print called “Life is Sweet”.

It’s busy, busy here this week helping MyDadLovesMeBestSister prepare for a wedding shower this weekend. I’ve been making these little favor bags from Monica’s wonderful pattern. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — that Monica is a genius.

This is the perfect pattern for quick gifts. (And btw, I’m seeing all over blogland that Monica has a beautiful quilt in the new issue of Quilts ‘n More. As soon as I can un-chain from my duties, I’ll be procuring a copy!) We’re putting a little Body Shop gift pack in each bag, along with a poofy shower scrubber. I hope the girls like them. Anyway, a big huge ol’ smoochie goes to Sharon for letting me know about this pattern — I love it!

Now, once again, I must request that you all join me in a moment of silence.

{Sigh}

My beloved Hester has had a massive stroke. Here she is all bundled up in preparation for her emergency trip to the hospital tomorrow.

I love my Hester. I’m flailing around without her and there’s a gaping hole in the dungeon — it’s so lonely down there now. I’m just holding my breath that this stroke hasn’t affected her brain. We’ve been so close, sharing many hours and late nights together. I thought our relationship was all one-sided, that she really didn’t care about me. But in her final selfless act, she waited until I finished all the monogramming for the favor bags before she slumped over. I still have several bags to put together but I can do that on my old machine. I don’t have a backup embroidery machine though, so her compassion makes me love her all the more. And, I suppose it could be worse — I saw a funny line at Kelly’s today: Things could be worse, we could be trying on bathing suits. Indeed.

Come back to me dear Hester (and please don’t bring that awful Big Bill back home with you!)

Have a wonderful weekend my sweet peeps — I have no blog reading time this weekend, so you all have my permission to take the weekend off LOL!

XOXO,
Anna

I’m Dead, Jim

42 Comments / March 10, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Sewing, Wedding

Continuing with the Star Trekkie comment from the previous post, I think the weekend did me in. It felt like it was non-stop running and to punctuate how tired I was this morning, I got to work and realized I’d left my computer at home, so I had to come all the way home to get it. That’s never happened before, so it was a little distressing!
This was the weekend plan:

Saturday:

Drive 2 1/2 hours to Dayton, early Saturday morning.
Drop TheFirstChild and SweetiePie off at their day long pre-marriage counseling session.
Visit potential rehearsal dinner restaurants.
Visit The Fabric Shack to pick up fabric for the quilt that we will be tying at SweetiePie’s wedding shower next weekend.
Nice relaxing evening of dinner and games with the future in-laws.

Sunday:

Nice relaxing morning with possible visit to church where TheFirstChild and SweetiePie will be married.
Pack some of SweetiePie’s belongings to bring back home.
Bridal shower for SweetiePie in the afternoon.
Taste-testing at reception venue at dinner time.
Home not later than 10 p.m.

Then….Dayton had a blizzard-thingy on Friday/Saturday. They declared some sort of snow emergency level so we were advised to stay home for awhile. It was touch-and-go whether they would cancel Sunday’s bridal shower.

So, this was the weekend reality:

Saturday:

Run a few errands with SweetiePie in the morning while making frequent calls to check the snow situation.
Visit MeMum for a few games of hand and foot.
Visit MyDadLovesMeBestSister to finish up details for next week’s bridal shower.
Decide not to go to Dayton today. Return home at 5 p.m. and decide to clean bedroom level of house with SweetiePie. That took 5 hours with dinner thrown in. Feel sorry for SweetiePie — TheFirstChild is a slob.

Sunday:

Drive 3 hours to Dayton.
Check out one rehearsal venue on the way into town.
Drop TheFirstChild off at future in-laws.
Go to The Fabric Shack with SweetiePie to pick up fabric. (Can I just have a little sympathy from you quilters — we blitzed in, got the job done, and blitzed out. Do you know how hard it is to go there without browsing time? So sad.)
Very lovely bridal shower all afternoon.
Leave unfashionably early to run and check out 2 more rehearsal venues. One closed, one ruled out.
Meet group at reception venue for taste-testing.
Return to future in-laws at 7:30 p.m. and pack SweetiePie’s things.
Make it home at midnight.

We crammed the weekend into one day and now I’m tired. But it was all fun and mostly successful. Except for that rehearsal dinner thing. Woefully unprepared for that. McDonald’s in formal wear is looking good.

The pictures are of an apron that I made for SweetiePie’s shower. We make chocolate chip cookies together, so I gave her cookie sheets, spatula, parchment paper, and the mandatory just-right-size ice cream scoop that we use to scoop the cookie dough, along with the apron. After the shower when SweetiePie showed the apron to TheFirstChild, I commented that it was for Naked Newlywed Cooking Sessions. To which they both rolled their eyes and said “that’s disgusting.” Which, I guess, is the appropriate thing to say to your mother.

And, just how was your weekend?

XOXO,
Anna

The Valentine Swap

23 Comments / February 23, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Sewing

Thanks for all of your wonderful comments about TheSecondChild’s exciting adventure to Australia! We’ve had a quick call to let us know he arrived safely in Brisbane. I think he’s in a good program and probably as soon as they got all those E.T.’s gathered together, they gave them each 60 seconds and told them to phone home. I just hope my little monster isn’t exhibiting any of his alien behavior yet!
(Note to Jeanette: If you haven’t received your swap gift yet, read no further!)

My fun Valentine Swap gift from Jeanette arrived all the way from Norway yesterday. She sent me a lovely set of dishtowels, some woolen pot holders and a fun little tetra bag. Look at all the wonderful hearts on everything and all of the hand stitched blanket stitching on those potholders. I don’t know how she knew I needed potholders, but I’m nearly desperate, as the ones I have are very grungy looking. And, I can always find a good use for small bags — this one will be just perfect for my camera cords and batteries that have been wandering around looking for a home. Thank you, Thank you Jeanette, I heart it all!!!

Jeanette is away on vacation, so I’m taking a chance that when she gets home, she’ll open her mail before she rushes off to read my blog LOL! It took me a long time to decide what to make for Jeanette, but one day I read on her blog that she liked Nancy Halvorsen and Voila! I just happen to have True Friends embroidery designs by Nancy Halvorsen for my embroidery machine. And since I carry a little sewing bag (thank you quilty peep Gurney!) around everywhere, I decided to make something similar for Jeanette*. I included the scissors, thread and needles and some Nancy Halvorsen fat quarters that I forgot to include in the picture. I hope Jeanette can use a little sewing kit since she does a lot of hand embroidery. Thank you very, very much Mrs. Pocket for hosting this fun swap!

I’ve had a fun morning in the dungeon. I cut out a pantsuit (pantsuit??? does anyone even use that word anymore?) that’s been aging in the stash for several years. My work wardrobe is getting pretty threadbare, so I thought I’d try and whip something out this weekend. (Notice how my pincushion (thanks Jade!) coordinates with my fabric LOL!)

The pants are done, but sadly, I’ve decided that the jacket will hang better if it’s lined, and since I have no lining, it won’t get done this weekend. Hopefully, I can find a nice lining fabric this week. I really should be working on the little gift bags for the wedding shower, but why work ahead? It will be so much more fun to stay up sewing all night the night before the shower. You’re all with me, right?

I hope you’re all having a wonderful weekend.
XOXO,
Anna

*The little bag pattern is from Sew Pretty Homestyle by Tilda.

Valentine Boxers

31 Comments / February 13, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Chat, Sewing

Whoops! That was a little unintended mini-blogging break. TheManoftheHouse was hogging the computer doing taxes all weekend. Or as I call it, the yearly affirmation that my filing system sucks.* Moving right along.

I’ve been tagged by the loverly Cami to do the seven weird things about me meme. I’ve done this meme a few times before, so, in honor of Valentine’s Day, I’m going to list seven weird things that I love.

1. I love TheManoftheHouse. He’s by far the weirdest thing I love. We’ve surprised more than a few people that we’ve survived this many years, including ourselves.

2. I love dipping french fries in soft ice cream. Yum, Yum. Milkshakes qualify too.

3. I love knitting socks. Oh sure, it’s not weird to most of you, but some goonball at work once told me that it was weird, so it qualifies.

4. I love shoveling snow. Especially late at night when everything is eerily quiet. (Hmmm, that might qualify more for the original intent of the meme — shoveling snow isn’t weird…loving it is.)

5. I love TheEmptyNestChild. He’s pretty weird too. He’s more like a dog than a cat, maybe because we’re dog people at heart.

6. I love reading/learning weird facts. Or weird stuff in the news. Makes me feel just a little bit more normal.

7. I love making boxers out of fun fabrics. These are boxers for the boys for Valentine’s Day this year, skillfully modeled by ~~Giselle~~ SweetiePie. I tried a new waistband application this time — the previous versions have always used the elastic with channels that you sew on so the fabric gathers up. The boys complained that the waistbands were too bulky. Hopefully they’ll like this version better.

I made three pairs this year, for TheFirstChild, TheSecondChild, and for my new nephew Boo. Poor Boo though, he’ll be receiving his boxers late as I won’t be able to get them in the mail until Thursday. Guess he’ll just be receiving them 364 days early!

I’m supposed to tag seven people, so how ’bout some newer bloggers (well, some are newer) … Stitchin’ Friends, Colors Outside the Lines, In the Garden with Miss Jean (who currently has a to-die-for sugar cookie recipe posted), Muddling Through, Quirky Bags, and Patches, Pieces and Me, and YOU. If you haven’t done this yet. Give it a shot and let me know so I can read seven weird things about you!

XOXO,
Anna

*You can skip this part. It’s just my yearly TaxRant. I really don’t mind paying taxes — I know we all must share the burden. But I REALLY resent how long it takes to prepare taxes. Time that could have been spent sewing. What kind of cornfed system are we working with here? You add stuff in, then you take stuff out? Are you a stripper with breast implants? Go ahead and deduct them! Are you sick and the Dr. told you that you need more exercise? Put in a pool and deduct it! Growing pot in your basement? Ok, that one’s a stretch, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Why can’t they just say “How much did you make? Ok, send in X percent?” Fair for everyone! How hard could that BE??? The End. Aren’t you glad?

My Weekend Entertainment

31 Comments / January 15, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Family, Sewing

I hope you all had a great weekend! Mine was fairly quiet. On Friday night we saw The Bucket List — I loved it — highly recommended! Then, my youngest niece had her 11th birthday last week, so on Saturday morning, I finished up her birthday present and took it to her house. I took a few pictures while I was there.

First we have TheYappers. You may remember that I mentioned them — TheEmptyNestChild could squish them. They’re sisters, about 5 years old, and loved and pampered by the whole family. Here they are wondering what in the heck is going on — things were a little wild at their house.

My niece decided she wanted a 70’s themed birthday party and she had two of her friends over. The girls cracked me up. I dragged them outside and took pictures of them. The two on the left kept saying “Ooohhhhmmm” as if they were meditating, and the one on the right kept striking a disco pose, ala John Travolta.

My sister did a great job on the party. She had a disco ball, a vw bug pinata and lots of other fun decorations in their basement. When I got there, the girls were playing twister. If you have kids this age, this is a great idea for a theme — I was laughing the whole time I was there.

Here are some pictures of the gifts I made for my niece.

I made her a little apron to go with the cake decorating kit that she is holding. The apron is from this pattern by Cindy Taylor Oates. Another great pattern — Cindy is going to think I’m stalking her. It took less than three hours to make this apron, start to finish. I love Cindy’s patterns! I also had a good time using some of the tools that I rarely use on the ruffles — the narrow hem stitch from my serger and my ruffler foot on my machine.

As for the shirt, I couldn’t resist embellishing a little sweat jacket with that saying. It makes me smile and it made MyDadLovesMeBestSister and my niece laugh! Now, if you have germ issues, you must avert your eyes. Here’s proof that I speak the truth. Yapper1 and my little niece in action:

Eeeewwww!!! Sorry, I couldn’t resist. I’ll try to clean things up around here next time!
XOXO,
Anna