ABC's

Today I went over to my grandma's house and worked on Baby Quilt #6. The last time I went over I finished putting the borders on, so this time I started to work on embroidering the alphabet in the centers of the blocks.

I only got to letter J today, but now that I'm getting the hang of it I'm sure it will go much faster.

I chose to use a caramel colored thread for the letters because I didn't want them to be too bold and take away from the quilt. I pulled the color from one of the designs in the fabric so it blends well.

I hope to be able to work on the quilt again soon. The baby is due in August and I don't want it to be late! But, I think since I'm going to do simple quilting that I should be able to meet the deadline. ☺

Vacation on the beach

This past weekend my family and I took a trip to Long Beach Island, NJ. It was so nice to take a break and just relax. I would say that the beach is probably one of my favorite places to go. I love the sound of the waves and the smell of the fresh air and salt water.

One of the special places we visited while on the island was the Barnegat Lighthouse. We climbed all 217 steps to the top and let me tell you, it's a workout!!! But the view at the top is well worth it.

In this picture you can see almost the whole island since the lighthouse is on one of the ends.

I had a wonderful vacation and didn't want to come back. Hopefully we will be going again next year!

Just for Fun

A couple of nights ago I was laying in bed waiting to fall asleep, and all of a sudden and idea just popped into my head! I have no clue what made me think of it, I just did. I remembered that I had put together a block with some fabrics that had come together in a packet a long time ago, but I had never really finished it. So I decided that the next morning I was going to.

I'm surprised I even remembered it the next day, but I didn't forget and headed down to my basement where I have all of my sewing things set up. After searching through my stash of fabric for a while, I found some fabrics that went well with the previously made block. I brainstormed and sewed and after about an hour or two I came out with this.....

A fairly good sized pillow! It was a lot of fun just to take a break from my everyday routine and sew something up for a change. ☺

Gettysburg Battlefields

Yesterday, my grandparents took me on a bus trip to the Gettysburg Battlefields. It was such a beautiful day to do it! I was able to learn a lot of new and interesting things.

We visited some different places that are located right on the battlefield. Above is a picture of a peach orchard. It was a really cool experience to stand right in the place that soldiers would have been standing so many years ago in the Civil War.

Another spot we visited was the Pennsylvania Memorial (above). The names of all of the soldiers are listed around the base of the monument.

I really enjoyed my time there and I would like to go back there in the future to look at more! Thank you, Grandpa and Grandma, for taking me along on this trip. I had a wonderful time! ☺

Strawberries....and more strawberries!

Every year my mom, brother, and I go strawberry picking at a local strawberry patch. Freshly picked strawberries taste soooooo much better than the store bought ones. Yesterday was a great day to go picking. Unfortunately, we went a little overboard! ☺ We picked a total of 11 buckets of strawberries! After we got all of them home, it sunk in. What in the world were we going to do with all of them!!!

So we got to work cutting them so they wouldn't get smushy in the heat. My mom made some strawberry pies.

And I worked on making strawberry freezer jam.

I still have a few more batches to make. We have a huge bowl filled to the brim with sliced strawberries just to eat by themselves or with shortcake. We gave some to my grandma and my brother went around the neighborhood giving them away. But still, we had some left! We concluded that next year we are not going to pick this many! ☺

Finished and Moving On

Hello everyone! So sorry that I have not updated my blog for what seems like a century! I was very busy with the end of the school year activities, so I did not have much time to be on the computer.

My 5th commissioned baby quilt has been completed and given to the lady that asked me to make it. Here is what the finished product looked like.

I have to say that out of all of the baby quilts I've made so far, this is one of my favorites.

I now have started on my 6th commissioned baby quilt. It needs to be completed by August. The baby is going to be a boy so I chose the colors green, blue, and cream. I'm going to use the same pattern that I used for my 2nd commissioned quilt (square inside of a square). I thought it would be cute if I quilted one letter of the alphabet in the center of each square.

Today my grandma took my shopping for the fabric. Here is what they look like.

I washed them when we got back from shopping. I decided to hand wash them in my bathroom sink because when I wash smaller pieces of fabric in the washing machine, the edges tend to fray a lot. Hand washing is much gentler and it does just as good of a job.

It was such a nice day that I decided to hang the fabrics outside on the line to dry.

I'm hoping this quilt will turn out as good as the rest of them did.

Have a great day!!! ☺

Check Mate

Last Sunday was an absoultely beautiful day! My brother and I both were bored, so we decided to take advantage of the wonderful weather and play a game of chess outside. We spread out a blanket in the middle of our lawn and sat down to play. In the end, my brother ended up winning because a wasn't paying enough attention! But that was ok because we had fun anyway.

I hope everyone can enjoy the spring weather wherever you are! ☺