Tuesday, February 8, 2011

From dragging a baby blanket to a full size comforter

Katie's white feather down comforter had holes poked into it from "Smokey" the cat; So the blanket ended up being put into a bag so that the feathers could stay retained into the comforter for a "mending" day.  The mending day came and as I sat there sewing each hole, I am looking at it and thinking "it really should look better than that!  I mean I am all for white for certain things, just not comforters.  They just show way too much on the dirt scene. 

With this mentioned above, that is how we ended up creating a Duvet cover for her down blanket.  We began looking for material - Okay it may not go together all that well, but it is unique and she will know if anyone steals it :O).

swatches of fabric left; we are going to be making some cool pillows with the remains
Katelyn and I debated and went over all the fabric with these being the choices.  We kicked around a couple of ideas, only to decide to choose this one.  The blanket needed to be 70 X 70 inches, so with the fabric being 45 inches, it was large enough to sew two pieces side by side and not cutting off the selvage sides.  I went ahead and ironed down the seams after straight stitching the fabric meeting and then placed a zig zag stitch over both sides.  I think its a wonderful accent.  The middle fabric on the front are little hearts with sayings that are basically the same as the one piece of fabric that was split in half and one side was pinned and sewn into place like above with the zigzag stitch. The back is decorated with circles with multi-colorcircles, not to mention some hearts, and the peace sign.  I basically just pinned together front to back and went to town sewing the three sides together and pinning the back to the front with the front of the fabric both inside.  I sewed the main blanket (front meeting the back). 

In order to keep the blanket from moving around too much, I cut ties and sewed them into each corner of the blanket and then another tie in the same area that it would be inside the blanket and sewed the ties to the blanket so the ties are inside the cover.  I also chose to use a different scheme of fabric for the ties so that they are able to be found better when trying to put the cover on.  I also put an extra tie in the center on the top so it would not sag in the center. To complete the bottom and make it easier to change out for washing the cover only I also placed five(ten- one for front and back) ties of fabric on the bottom of the cover to keep the blanket inside.

This photo shows one of the ties at the bottom of the blanket and Duvet.  If you look closely, you can see the stitching on the front in between the different fabric on the front. 





For some reason Katie was happy to make her bed.. but to show you exactly what the front and back look like, I pulled the corner to show you the back also. At first I was tickled because it looks like a scrapbook page awaiting it's photos. After I got this all sewed up with the blanket attached inside, she took it along to bed with her, fixed her bed, crawled into to it to try it, and fell asleep.   All at or before 7:30 PM.  She was all nice and cuddled like a bug in a rug. 
 When Katelyn stepped off the bus from school tonight, she went straight for her bed and pulled this blanket off her bed and WALKED around with her.  I couldn't help but make the comment "Sheesh Katie, you went from carrying your baby blanket to carrying around a full size comforter!" and it just kind of stuck from that point!

7 Months, 1 day and see what Gracie's learning now?

See what I caught on the camera today?



Awe!!! Well, Cute isn't she?  BUT..... This is NOT the photo I was looking for.... Let's see, I know it's around here somewhere...








Hmmmm.. I absolutely LOVE that smile.. And it's a wonderful smile to find when you go to get her out of the crib in the morning and after nap times....Let's see.... It was here, HONEST!




    
Hey! Here it is! I found it!  It's Gracie at  7 months, 1 day and she's figured how to get up on hands and knees!!!!! HOORAY GRACIE!!!  Now let the real fun begin!!  Waiting on the rocking to begin now.... you know, "get your motor started, head out towards all the things you're not allowed"!  She is beginning to like getting her picture taken...and yes, it's a good thing as I have enough photos of her crying or sleeping!!


Friday, February 4, 2011

Gracie is almost 7 months!

I have been neglecting my blog... Sorry! I have had my hands full dealing with.. well just dealing.

Decluttering of the house has been ongoing... needless to say my garage shows it. I have been washing down walls and carpet cleaning, hitting "hot spots" and I was very excited to wake up this morning to only 1 load of laundry and the house was looking very nice... Until the kids started up! As soon as I realized that the kiddos closed my bedroom door to "let mom sleep", I was out to the living room to find all three not me, I didn't do it and nope not me either along with the little awe mom! all out in the living room with the Wii on and they were entertaining themselves with games. Alright. Fine with me.. At least the house wasn't trashed!

So I have seen some major changes with Gracie in the last couple of weeks. She is eating baby food with us in her high chair and at dinnertime with all of us. She is loving her mixed veggies, bananas and rice mum mum's. For the first couple months she despised being on the floor, but in the last week and a half or so she has been screaming to be on the floor more since she is finding her freedoms and how to play with some of her toys. She was having a hard time picking up her plastic balls, but I caught her today with her holding one in her hands and it going straight to her mouth with that mouth showing her always happy smile! She is finding keys, pushing the buttons on her piano, army crawling all over the floor in circles, but not rolling any although she has rolled a lot belly to back, and only 1 time back to belly. A little trick she has been attempting though is getting up on her toes and trying to push her tushie up in the air and balancing. Her little pudgy legs and toes are so cute as she normally keeps her feet crossed at her ankles. She loves her mommy and daddy time too!

We ended up getting Gracie a new bathtub for Christmas. It's a pretty cool one that has a piece of plastic that pops out so that when I can trust sitting her up more she can also sit and play too, but for now she is reclining back. I think she honestly loves to get her baby food all over the place so that we give her a bath. She knows when we take her into the bathroom and put her on her hooded towels on the floor that she is in for a nice warm bath and that's all it takes. She starts bouncing her arms and hands up over her head and back down next to her torso and laughing and giggling. Grandma got her a V-tech turtle that is for bath time that has holes in the bottom of the unit to drizzle water down and she loves playing in the streams. It also came with an octopus, a star and a crab that streams/sprays water and sings songs reminding me of warmer summer weather. Oh Oh how she adores this toy!

Can you tell I love this age?

She is a snuggle bug too, always giving hugs and sometimes gives you the most wonderful gooiest sloppy kisses ever when you try to kiss her on the cheek. She sometimes tries to hold her own bottle but really has no interest in doing so when mommy and daddy hold that for her.

She is a routine child, for sure! Honestly I love this age. I wish I could keep her this age and size forever. A pure Sweetie!

I am going to try to get pictures this Monday to keep track of how much she has changed!