Harry

Our newest grandchild, Harold Adam Sommers, aka Harry, was born on April 9 at 4:50pm. Kate had a scheduled c-section with the twins because they were both breech. Men never ask for directions! Harry had the good sense to come head first, although he was 9 days late and his labor had to be induced. Once the induction was started, things progressed rapidly and Kate ROCKED IT! At one point she decided to get an epidural, but there was no time. Being a labor and delivery nurse, I have seen hundreds (maybe thousands) of births, but this one was the most memorable. It was hard to see my daughter in so much pain, but I am so proud of her for the way she persevered. She had the unmedicated vaginal birth that she had hoped for. Harry is beautiful and seems to be a pretty laid back baby. I did finish his quilt before he was born.

And here he is with his beautiful mama...

Wedding quilt

This is the quilt that I made for my niece, Olivia, and her husband. They had a very small informal wedding and I wasn't able to make anything as a wedding gift, so I made this for their first anniversary  I used fat quarters out of my stash (yay!) and quilted it on a long-arm at Quilt Your Own, which unfortunately has since closed. I was pleased with how it turned out, and she was thrilled with it. Up next: baby quilt for my newest grandchild.

One fewer W-I-P

I finished piecing this top from the Cabbage Rose mystery block of the month (ca. 2009) a while ago, but wasn't really motivated to have it quilted as it didn't have any place to go. I recently learned about a place here in Houston that lets you use rents you time on a long arm quilting machine. I have been intrigued by these machines at the quilt festival, so I decided to give it a try. There was a 3 hour orientation class, which I took last month, and then I used this as my guinea pig. It actually turned out fairly well. I did a kind of straight line spiral design. I had decided to give this to our son, Donesh, as a housewarming gift for the condo he just purchased in Milpitas, CA and I wanted to give it a more masculine feel. I must be a very linear thinker, but maybe next time I will try something with curved lines, or maybe will try a pantograph. I have another top done that I will be quilting on October 4, so stay tuned!

A couple of things...

I never think to blog about my sewing projects any more. I usually post them on Instagram, and forget that I even have a blog. But here are a couple of things I made recently...

This is a little (22" x 26") wallquilt/tablemat I made with a Sandy Gervais Giddy charm pack and the Cherry Season pattern. It was a birthday present for my dear friend, Nancy.

 

My niece has been hinting that she would like some sunsuits for her daughter (the one I made the Shy Little Kitten quilt for). I downloaded a PDF pattern and used some fabric I had in my stash, some left over from the Hungry Animal Alphabet quilts I made for the boys' first birthday and some I'm not sure where it came from. The downloaded pattern was kind of a pain to assemble, and the directions were a bit different than one would find in a purchased pattern, but I muddled through and must say it turned out very cute! It is fun having a little girl sew for again...

 

Still here

I can't believe I haven't posted anything here for over 1 1/2 years! It's not like I haven't been on the internet...just haven't been in the blogosphere, mine or any one else's. Seems like Facebook and especially Instagram have taken over as quicker and easier ways to share. I will try to update things here more often and maybe even give it a facelift.

Here is my most recent quilt, Yellow Brick Road done in The Shy Little Kitten fabric out of my stash. I must have bought it before I knew I was having grandsons, because it has a lot of pink in it. I made it for my grand-niece Heidi's first birthday and sent along a copy of the book.  I just backed and bound it with pink Kona from my local Hancock Fabrics and did some parallel lines of stitch in the ditch. One of these days I am going to learn to do something fancier than that!

 

My next project is to assemble some Kaffe Fassett blocks of the month I made several years ago and recently found while cleaning out a closet...stay tuned!

The boys are one!

And I made these cute Hungry Animal Alphabet cheater quilts for them...two more pieces out of my stash!

                           

If anyone still reads this blog, thank you! If you want to see lots more pictures, I am on Instagram @pamela_newberry.  Thanks!

The main event

I did finish both of the quilts.  I still have to hand sew the binding onto the second one, but here is first one.  The yellow knitted blanket hanging on the end of the bed is one my mother made for my daughter Kate when she was born.

I kind of put my knitting on hold to get the quilts done before I came up to Minneapolis on Monday.  I did manage to get a few rows done on the plane and a couple while I was in the waiting room waiting for the boys to arrive.  And now they're here! 

Charles Michael weighed 7-7 and Arthur John was 7-1.  Yes, that is a total of 14.5 pounds of baby!  I am so proud of my daughter and so happy that she was able to carry these guys to 38 weeks.  All my worrying was for naught.  I am SO thrilled to be a grandmother!

Progress

I haven't made as much progress on my projects as I had hoped.  I have been working full time for the last couple of months in preparation for the opening of our new hospital, the Texas Children's Hospital Pavilion for Women.  It opened on March 26 and is a fabulous facility!  I have one more week to work before I start my grandmother's leave of absence.  The boys are scheduled to arrive on April 25th and I will be going up to Minneapolis on the 23rd.  I have made some progress on the knitting projects, but have decided to put them on hold as I can finish them up once I get there. I have just started on the white stripe.

 

I do need to finish the quilts before I leave.  My old sewing machine is at Kate's house, but I really want to finish them here.  I have all the blocks done and quilt top #1 is finished.  I will machine quilt them myself...just stitch in the ditch.  Now to get off the computer and on the sewing machine!

Sneak peek: baby projects

I have started on a couple of projects for my twin grandsons, due May 9.  Both are fairly simple, but since I need to make two of each, I decided I had better get started!  The nursery will be done in shades of yellow, aqua and gray.  I am knitting chevron baby blankets in these colors.  The gray isn't quite as dark as it appears in this photo.

Of course I wanted to make quilts for them, so when I was in Minneapolis two weekends ago, Kate and I went to Crafty Planet and she chose these fabrics.  I am using them in this pattern for a zig zag quilt that was also originally from the Purl Bee.  I'll keep you posted on my progress...

Did I mention I'm going to be a grandmother?

My daughter Kate is expecting twin boys on May 9th!  We are all very excited, but I am still very nervous...being an L&D nurse I know everything that can go wrong.  So far so good though, boys are growing well and no signs of preterm labor.  I went up to visit for her first baby shower last week. I took a few pictures that I haven't uploaded yet, but here is one her friend Erin took of us and and the huge number of gifts she received.  Erin, who is also pregnant, blogged about it here.

 

While I was up there, we went to Crafty Planet and bought fabric for two crib quilts.  I will be sharing my progress here...I promise!

Finally finished...

This is the block of the month quilt from Cabbage Rose I started last year. This photo is a bit overexposed...the colors are actually much richer. I had it machine quilted and managed to get the binding on in time to give it to my mother for her 80th birthday last Friday. Of course she loved it!

Fall color

My best friend recently moved from the Chicago area to Jacksonville, Florida, kind of like how I moved from Milwaukee to Houston 8 years ago.  She loves acorns and all things autumn, so for her birthday (today) I made this little piece from a Fat Quarter Shop kit.  I hate to break it to her that it is probably the only fall color she will see living down here in the south...

Block of the Month finish...well, almost

Remember these? Well, I finally got around to finishing all the blocks and piecing them into a quilt top. Just need to find something for the backing and this one will be off to the quilter!

Fabric giveaway!

Although I certainly could (and probably should) give some fabric away, what I'm referring to is the giveaway at everyday beautiful...check it out!

A little quilt for a big accomplishment

Last Friday I went up to Lawton, Oklahoma to witness my baby sister receive her master's degree hood. She completed this accomplishment in 3 years while working full time as a middle school teacher, wife and mother of 2 teenagers...no small feat! Here she is receiving her hood from one of the professors whom she admired most.

Here she is with her beautiful family.


And with my mom...

And with my mom, my brother and me. We are all so proud of her.


I only realized about a month ago the this was happening now, so I decided to finish one of several works in progress to give her as a gift. She is a big Mary Engelbreit fan, too, so I thought this one would fit the bill. You may recognize the fabric from a decade or so ago.



The ME page a day calendar had this illustration on it a few days earlier for Teachers' Day, so I scanned it in and printed it on some fabric to make the label. So true...

The quilt's out of the bag

My older nephew got married last Saturday in Dallas, where the high on Friday had been 73º. The ceremony was held outside, during which snow flurries began. Fortunately, the reception was held inside and it was a lovely affair.

I made this quilt as a wedding present, and while I'm fairly sure neither he nor his bride even know this blog exists, I didn't want to risk spoiling the surprise by showing a work in progress. I used the same Just a Piece of Cake pattern that I made my sister's 50th birthday quilt from last year, this time using a Moda Basic Grey Blush layer cake. Due to time constraints (aka my own procrastination), I machine quilted it myself. One of these years I am going to learn to do something besides stitch in the ditch!

Machine embroidery on the border...

And a cute Susan Branch label...

The newlyweds are off to Maui for their honeymoon...hope they have a fabulous time!

Everybody loves a giveaway...

...especially when fabric is involved! Check out the fabric giveaway at Everyday Beautiful...maybe one of us will win :-)

Did I say bi-weekly? I must have meant bi-monthly!

I have really thought about blogging a few times in the last two weeks, but just haven't gotten around to it. I have been working a bit more, my sister and niece were here last weekend for the Quilt Festival and we were in Milwaukee this past weekend for a wedding. Enough with the excuses, though. I have a few things to show you.

Here is my latest block of the month:

And here is a little (12"x 34") table runner I made from some of these fabrics. Not bad for two bucks.

I bought this chair as a birthday gift for Mike to go with our new couch.

We have had this chair for at least 15 years. We bought it at an antique store with no seat. We cut a piece of plywood to fit, had a piece of foam cut and I covered it with this 90s green fabric.

When I ordered the new chair, I also ordered a yard of matching fabric and recovered the cushion. Not a great picture, but you get the idea.

We decided that we needed a different coffee table to go with our new look. We considered buying a new one, but decided to take this route instead. Mike has had this trunk since his mother died. She used it when she moved from Chicago to San Francisco in 1939.


This is the shipping tag that was still attached. People misspelled Gillin even back then!

We had glass top made for it and are very pleased with the result.

As previously mentioned, I have the binding machine sewn onto this quilt, and have started the laborious process of blind-stitching. Wish me luck!

No, I haven't fallen off the face of the earth...I was just in Fort Worth

Mike and I went up to Mansfield for Labor Day. We spent the weekend at my mom's and got to visit with my brother and his kids and our kid (who lives in Plano). Mike flew home on Monday afternoon (so he could fly to SFO on Thursday) and I stayed the rest of the week. My BFF Marjorie was in the metroplex for a company meeting and we got to spend the weekend together. Her timing was perfect, because it was the North Texas Shop Hop. In a day and a half we managed to hit nine of the fourteen shops, which was especially impressive because it was pouring rain all weekend (including a good portion of my drive back to Houston Sunday morning.) We saw LOTS of pretty things, got some great ideas, a free fat quarter at each shop and did buy a bit of fabric and a few patterns. When I finish the laundry, maybe I will get around to taking a few pictures. I also got my last quilt back from the quilter and have the binding machine-sewn on. Now for the blind stitching...

And then a miracle happened...(my 200th post!)

So, this morning our DSL was still not working. I went to a meeting at work, then out to lunch with some friends from the F2O, then stopped at the AT&T store to buy a new modem, hoping that would solve the problem. I got home, hooked up the new modem, but still had the solid green power light, solid green ethernet light and flashing red DSL light configuration. Since AT&T is scheduled to come out on Friday morning, I disconnected the new modem, carefully repackaged it to take back to the AT&T store for a $54.95 refund, and reconnected the old modem. That is when the miracle occurred...solid green lights all the way across! And working internet access! Mike said that the old modem must have just needed a rest (never mind that it had been turned off since Monday afternoon) but that doesn't explain why the new one didn't work. Oh well, I am just happy to be reconnected!

But you're not here to hear about my technology trials and tribulations, you're here to see my latest quilt! I didn't post anything about it when it was a work-in-progress because it was a surprise for my sister's 50th birthday. She and her kids came down last weekend, so I was able to give it to her in person. It was made out of a layer cake of Tula Pink's Nest fabric.

For the label I scanned a picture of her and me taken in one of those four for 25¢ booths in 1961 or so.


I also had the opportunity to give my niece Emma a quick sewing lesson, and she made this cute pillowcase out of Amy Butler fabric. It was her first sewing project, but hopefully not her last. She comes from a long line of seamstresses and I hope she grows to love the craft as much as I do!