Sister Sewing Day

I had so much fun yesterday, we picked out fabric, thay practiced on extra squares from my skirt while everything was being washed, and there were lots "this is so fun," "i think i have a new hobby" and they did really good. It was there first time at a sewing machine for both of them, poor paige had to use the old brother of my moms that i learned to sew on (cause she lives with it and can use it when she gets home too). oh that brought back the memories. that thing is a pain to use, the tensions rarely right, and the top thread like to break no matter what thread you use or tension level, and it screeches the whoole time. it really just needs a nice little trip to the sewing machine doctor, for its first check up in 25 years of use with no oiling or maintenance whatsoever. poor paige. Blythe was using my machine, cause she doesn't have one anyways so she can use my nice one.

Paige made a cute plaid flannel big bag purse, and blythe made the head of her little big planet sackboy, then had to take off. Blythe also had her first ultrasound today at the hospital i work at, and i got to go with her and see her little 1/2 inch bean with a heartbeat, 7 weeks old. So she has lots of time to finish this doll before the baby is here.

I was really lame and took zero pictures, so i will try to get some, either by email or next week when we meet to sew again!!! yay hanging out with my sisters.

In other news, my husband and I are going to Europe this summer with a group called Royal Servants International to be small group leaders for the euroquest team and get a chance to talk with churches and missionaries in Europe and the UK. we will be gone for 10 or 11 weeks, and I'm super excited because I've gone with this group in highschool to china and scotland, so this feels alot like going home for me, and my husband is coming too, yay. We are hoping to see what God has for us, since we know tim is going to end up working for the church, and we really feel like we need to move away from SoCal. All in all, this seems like a step in the right direction.

I am also working on inventory for an etsy store, and i will hopefully have a few things listed in a week or 2, along with links to my store.

happy monday

all the christmas presents i gave away

ignore the random out of order-ness. these are the cookie mix we made for everyone, the purses for my sisters and me, and the apron for my mother in law. those are not good pics of the apron but i forgot to have her pose, so thats what i have. and she was soooo excited about it.

My sisters also like the purses so much they want to learn how to sew too. super cool. paige(16 and driving) wants to copy a reversible purse blythe(21 and preggers) has. blythe wants to make sackboy from little big planet. so tomorrow we are off to my favorite fabric store, then back home for a sewing party. if anyone knows how to make a sackboy already(that isn't knitted) let me know so i can check it out and be ready for tomorrow. she want to use sock-monkey fabric, and how convenient that my fabric store sells it. i think its moda, or micheal miller that has the sock monkey line, either way i'll know for sure tomorrow.

i'm super excited about this sewing day with my sisters, my family has never cared about my crafty side til now, when i have the space to make a mess and actually finish a project, instead of never starting anything cause mom makes me clean my stuff off the dining room table. cause who wants to start a project, finally figure what your trying to do, then clean up? not me, i do better in a messy messy room. i'm pretty sure blythe is starting to think of me as her own personal baby gear sweatshop, but it'll be fun.

Merry Christmas!

Well, tonight was part 1 of 3 Christmas family gatherings, this time with the dysfunctional side of my family. 3 long hours of people who mostly don't like to be together. Well, everyone has at least 2 people from the group they don't want to spend Christmas with, so we dance around playing nice or avoiding each other. Gramma and step Gramma always create the most drama, and there are weeks of detoxing and bitter comments to wade thru afterwards. I try to avoid it as much as possible, not laughing at the mean jokes or things said under the breath.

But the worst is over, and tomorrow we are going to my great grandma's, for the best chili ever, then to my husbands parents for a big Christmas dinner. With good, normal, no drama people.

much love and happy christmas, and pictures tomorrow

blogging is addictive

Hi my name is codi, and i am a blogger. it started during the summer, when i set up my sewing room, and started looking for quilting stuff online at work, where i only get google related pages. so most of what i was looking at was blogger pages. which obviously led to me needing to make my own blogger account. while i was at work. I posted about twice, and didn't check it for a month, and got sad cause i had no posts, with so many 100, 300, 500 post give aways happening. so i needed to blog more, especially easy when you are just entering giveaways and posting links, or joining a pay it forward (btw, i still have one more spot on mine, if you can find it).

And so i blogged, which made me want to sew, which led me back to blogging. Most of my posting happens at work, i either upload pics and save it as a draft for later, or just write, like now. And then i joined sewcraftblog, and began to notice people were actually coming to my site, and commenting, and i wasn't blogging in the dark anymore. WOO HOO!!!! and the traffic from having my own fantastic giveaway, plus having it listed on agiveawayaday and sewmamasew was amazing. and addicting. i now want my post to be at the top of my sewcraft blog roll, and i want to have posts with amazing pics (which i am working on, getting to be good with my camera and editing pics). and i love seeing my name on someone's blog, whether you link back to me or i'm on a blog roll. such a confidence booster and ego trip.

sorry guys, but i do love that people that i have never met in person are interested in what i'm saying and making. cause my fam doesn't know about this blog. except for my husband, who thinks i'm funny anyways.

And so we come to the point, if this can be considered the point of it all, what with having nothing to do with the title of this post, that i feel like doing a giveaway for every 50 posts i have on my blog. because i feel like it. and giveaways are fun. That being said, I will announce the prize (be it small or large) before post 50, and post 50(or 51 if i forget:) i will announce the winner.

because i like to blog, and you like to win stuff.

3 days till Christmas?!

It snuck up on me this year, not gonna lie.
Everything was slowly going forward after thanksgiving, i bought all the stuff to make presents for all the fam, we put them all together last week, and i've gradually pulling out fabric for aprons and purses for 5 or 6 ladies who are receiving more than the cookies in a jar stuff.
So far, all the jars are filled but not decorated, and i have one apron finished. another one needs to be done tomorrow night, to be used for cooking on christmas eve and christmas, and i'd like to finish the purse for my mom, and the stocking, ipod cover, and computer case for my hubby. I also want to make something for my little sister, probably a purse. And i should make an ipod cover for my brother in law, since he's not to jazzed about cookie mix this year. oh, and get my hubby to decorate cookie jars, while i'm away at work tomorrow.
Did i mention i work 10 hour days at the hospital, and cook dinner when i get home? we'll have to eat out tonight for sure, so i can make lots of stuff. then work tomorrow.
At least i am off on wednesday, so i have until 4 ish to finish.
theres no time anymore.
2 more hours till i'm off work, lets hope i get everything done in time

OMG......

i can't believe how many people come over to my site. seriously.

i thought like 5 people looked at this, and, wow.

i've had like 140 hits today now that i finally have a counter. that's so cool.

thanks a bunch for looking at my blog, to all of you who are coming over. leave a comment or follow me, i promise i'll go see your blogs too.

wow. and thanks for making my day, all of you out there in cyberland

a reversible apron for the new mama to be in my life

whipped this up today, first attempt at free handing (by measuring and using rulers of course), the only down side is once i had it on my side fat was showing too much, so the next one will be couple inches wider, and not so pointy on the bottom. maybe tomorrow. i plan on making these for my sisters and mom, and mil. the coolest part tho is that this apron fits into a quart jar, so everyone still gets a gift in a jar this year. so fun.

How did i do that?

for anyone who wants to know how to make a patchwork circle skirt, head over to Just Tutes, thats where i got my info. She has a great tutorial for a dress with a patchwork skirt, and explains the math behind how it works out. She also has tons of other fun clothing tutorials for kids, its definitely worth looking if you want to make this or something fun for a little girl.

I also reccomend Craftster, do a search there, some other ladies have made some really cool circle skirts, i think one got her idea from justtutes as well. Seeing that another adult had tried this and survived, and that it looks really cool when finished, made it a whole lot easier to start, but a childs size should be alot faster that mine.

finally finished

i'm in love.

just a little update

umm, yeah, so if you read the previous post, you saw that i guesstimated 2 or 3 hours for pinning.

it was more like 6.

and that was just the pinning, it was really closer to 8, but i subtracted the time for dinner, and a little helping my hubby with his homework.

i wanted to die.

its still not a real skirt yet.

i now know how it could take someone 5 months to make this. its really weird and time consuming. its a very straightforward project, but tons of work.

back to work

why yes i do speak a little sewing machine

here's my baby, a brother cs 6000i. My hubby got it for me about 2 years ago for xmas, before we were poor. and yes i had go look and see what it was to tell you. Today i have learned quite a bit more of her language. for instance, if i hear every stitch loudly going into the fabric instead of its normal going fast humming, it means this is going to happen.
that's the bobbin thread. and i left it in and kept on sewing because this is the gathering zigzag, and I'll still be picking it out later, all 55 feet of it. it happens because my top thread jumps off the first spot that holds it when i sew too fast. she doesn't like to go too fast when i'm doing a zigzag. straight stitch is just fine. Anyways, i started noticing the thread jump and fixed it before it made noises, so the rest were more like this if i got too fast. not so bad there, huh.
my darling machine also wants me to delint the bobbin area very thoroughly after each bobbin change, which involves taking off like 3 or 4 pieces to do it right, or she'll start screaming because theres too much lint. she still sews just fine, but yells at me until i clean out the lint. and i seriously thought my machine was dieing the first time this happened. which once also led to me dropping the lint brush down into the machine, being unable to get it out with tweezers, and having to undo a couple little plates on the bottom, which seem to be there so you don't take off the case when you are stupid enough to drop something in. i did have to jiggle it to get it to a place i could catch it from, but i was gentle, i do not have the money to take this girl to the doctors.

This is part of the skirt btw, i have used 4 spools of thread so far, as well as 8 full bobbins, and 4 or 5 partial bobbins i finished off when i was piecing it together. My machine also prefers to have the same exact thread on top and bottom, altho sometimes i get away with different ones if i play with the tension for a while.

i have also learned to always check the tension when i change threads, since i don't want to pick it out of the skirt, i pull out some scraps to make sure all is well.

i am off to gather the last row and pin it to the others, it should take 2 or 3 hours, and i bought a new box of pins since i ran out last row, so i will take a pic so you can see how much pinning is involved. its alot since i was pretty sure i would never need more basic sewing pins. I want to get some of the flowerhead ones, since they're longer and flatter, but i thought i had enough normal ones.

off to pin stuff for a few hours

another giveaway

check out this giveaway, she i giving away a huge stocking full of fun stuff in time for Christmas. http://mommamcblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/stocking-stuffers-giveaway.html

the skirt

so here are the stacks of squares i started with, then a couple of the strips put together.

these blues and greens will be the last row. i plan to cut one strip from each, and get however many patches i can. if this isn't enough i will pull in some purples.
and this is the skirt as of now, laid out on a cal king bed, and covering the whole thing. the top row will be gathered into the waistband and lining, i'm not as fat as that hole on the middle :)

its not as heavy as you would think, just bulky

frakkin huge skirt

this skirt, when folded, takes up my entire backpak. and its heavy. and bulky. it was a joy to push row 5 thru the sewing machine to attach it to the first 4, and i haven't even cut out the squares for row 6.

there will be 120 6in squares for row 6.

thats 55 feet when its all put together.

55 feet of skirt needing to be hemmed.

which has led me to think of cutting row 6 as 6x7in pieces, so when i hem it i don't lose the length. because its pretty close to the floor, and i want to be pretty close to the floor. if i add the inch, and i fold it back up into the hem, i won't lose length?

comments are appreciated, let me know what you think i should do about the hem. pictures tomorrow. i should have taken some sooner, its quite a process.

bonus points if you know the reference for frakkin

Craft addict christmas!!!

go to confessionsofacraftaddict.com

she is having an amazing amazing giveaway of crafty things.

you want them, because i know i do.

go now!!!!

And the winner is.....

I know you are all dieing of suspense, and since i can't sleep for visions of that freaking huge project im working on, the deadly patchwork circle skirt, i thought id pick a winner.

before that tho i will vent about this skirt. i know the suspense is killing you. you can handle it.

i do not recommend this project for the faint of heart. or those who occasionally get cramps in their fingers from hours of pinning and sewing, sewing and pinning, not to mention picking out threads because the 55 feet of skirt panel you just tried to gather was sewn wrong. because you don't even know how to gather. and yeah, i said 55 freakin feet long. my car could wear this skirt twice. the math works. but its that crazy sewing math, where its right in your head, looks good on paper too, and doesn't seem to work out when you try to explain it. like when my husband saw i had a strip of fabric that is longer than the house we live in in my sewing room, and didn't think it would all work out, since my sewing math and his real math weren't communicating very well. the picture didn't work either. but once i figured out a good way to gather (extra wide zigzag stitch over yarn) and was pinning and sewing, sewing and pinning, he thinks it might work now. and it better, or i may have to burn it, cause i am not picking out any threads when its done. no way. but i will finish. i want to wear it, it looks pretty.

its really one those things that should come with a big DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME!!!!!

bleh

anyway, i know you want to see who the winner is, its coming, i promise. The winner will need to email me with the name you want on the reservation for the hotel. I will call them and change it, as well as give you the confirmation # and my cell phone number in case of problems day of. ok?

do you want to know the winner?

i picked the super scientific way by putting all the names in the hat, and picking one. except i forgot 2 names, so i added those and picked again. so it was fair. and no i will never tell what i picked first time around, so don't even think about it. it doesn't count unless everyone gets a fair shot at it.

The winner is

Miss Anne!!!!!

you win!!!

and i know you scrolled your way down here first, to see if you won, all of you. go back and read the top...its probably funny. please know i am a sarcastic person, so blame any thing weird on that.

Congratulations MissAnne!

i don't have your email but please email me via my profile

Last chance

today is the last day to enter to win a four night stay in portland dec 28 to jan 1. you have until 11:59 pm to enter, so please don't miss out. I am very excited to be giving this away. the Winner will be announced around noon on thursday (california time). go here to enter and for full details.

Good luck!

5 hours later

i spent 21.61 today, and got 13 yards of fabric. woohoo. the ruler fabric on top is throwing my average off, it was 8 bucks for the yard. boo. but that ones for the purse. plus, the store had 20% off everything today, which was super. i have also included pics of the ipod cozy/case's that i have made, the spidey one has a pocket for earbuds or the cord, but one of the legs didn't line up. boo. the top pic is my camera case, for my Nikon p80. i love that camera. and the case has a long strap so i can wear it over my shoulder. which i love, hands free.

just realised there are some onesies up there too. i appliqued those my self for my new cousin in laws baby. what do you think, are those sellable? they're pretty stinkin cute.

you can still enter to win the hotel give away (til dec3, hurry up). scroll down alot or go here.

Off to the fabric store

Very soon i will be leaving to go buy fabric(yay!) for various Xmas gifts. and my new purse. I am hoping i will find everything i want in the flat fold section. this year its aprons and hot pads to match. mainly because no one i know has a cute apron. And i like to make them.

there may also be some stash building going on. please don't tell my husband. he thinks my fabric is worth alot less than it is. ie, its all flat fold and he hasn't seen my receipts. (or the 2 bolts under the dresser). occasionally i buy full price if its fantastic. Which i will do today. for my new purse. because all my waiting has not gotten this fabric into the flat fold section where i want it to be.

Tim if you read this sorry i'm being sneaky.... i love you!

yay shopping!