WIP and one more finished project!

I have made some progress since I last checked in with you all. I started working on the Feliz dress for my niece Mady's birthday. Her birthday isn't until May, but I was really excited to try out this new pattern. I am pleased with how easy it has been so far. The instructions are a little sparse and don't have much detail, but I haven't run into any problems yet.
Here is the overdress so far. The underdress will be a red with white pin dots.
DSC03274
Here is a close-up of the hem ruffle. I love how the red serging looks on this!
Feliz in progress
Here, also is a close-up of the ricrack I used on the front.
Feliz in progress

I also finished a project for my dear friend Amanda's sweet little boy's birthday. I won't post pictures of that one yet so as not to spoil the surprise. I am a little late getting it in the mail. Sorry P!

I finished this twirl skirt set, too. It is hard to see in these pictures, but the green fabric at the bottom of the skirt has ladybugs, dragonflies and butterflies and says "girl bugs" on it. The skirt is really, really full. :) This one will be going to Associated Sewing here in town. My good friend, Dawn, is the manager there and she lets me put things in her shop. I haven't made anything for quite a while, so I thought I'd take this one in there.
Girl Bug twirl set

Applique tee

Twirl skirt

So, now that I have two "new projects" finished and a third almost done, I am going to have to find some old projects to finish. I figure I finished two older quilt projects that I had, so I finished two new projects. I'll finish the Feliz dress and then I'll find an old project to finish. Maybe my Happy Hour quilt. I am interested to try out my new desk for quilting a larger quilt.

Oh my goodness!

My website is the featured website on "The Boutique Hub" forum for this week! I am so very honored!

Home sick...

I decided to stay home from work today. I don't feel really horrible, but I am getting a cold and figured that they probably didn't want me sharing my germs. It isn't often that I call in to work. I had some breakfast and a little hot tea. Crimson Berry, I tried it for the first time today. I enjoyed it a great deal. I think I'll have some soup for lunch later.

Since I was home, I figured I would make a blog post and show you some of the things that I have brewing. I have this skirt that i started. It is completely from my stash. It is almost done and I am really excited to see how it is going to turn out. It is going to be really, really full. The bottom tier is nearly 28 feet around. LOL I used two width of fabric pieces with the selvages trimmed off for the top tier, four for the second tier, and eight for the third. It took FOREVER to gather and pin it. Two evenings to just gather the bottom tier. I have decided it might be time for a ruffler foot. LOL



These are the fabrics that I bought for Mady's birthday dress. I am using my new Feliz pattern (Farbenmix/Studio Tantrum) for it. The underdress will be the red polka dot and the blue will be the front of the overdress and the yellow will be the sides. The ruffles in the back will be both the blue and yellow fabrics. I bought the red a while back from Mill End. Because there were some flawed places in the printing, I got almost 7 yards for the price of 4! :)
There are some lovely examples of this pattern finished here, here, here and here
I can't wait to get started on it! :)



I also decided to participate in the Haute Couture for Kids 3rd Annual Runway Launch. I bought 6 yards (the rest of the bolt, LOL) of this fabric to make something for that with.





I love the silver glitter in in. I think I will be making a dress from it. It will be modeled by Whitney from Petite Cover Girls. Her sister Amanda modeled my last set.

Ok, I think I will go and lay down for a while now.
See ya later!

Getting my butt on the ball....

So, here she is... my new desk. After several modifications from my original idea, I finally have a workspace that I think will be really functional. No more lifting one machine to the floor to use the other and then back again and so on and so forth! Hopefully I will have room to do more free motion quilting on this desk, too. I plan on painting it white come spring when I can open the windows and get some ventilation.

I had room for more storage containers underneath. My crazy cat decided to use her claws to pull one of these open and hop into it before I filled them. LOL I shut her up in one of them and she thought it was a cozy little kitty hideout. :)

You might be asking what that big green ball is doing in the middle of the room. That, my friends, is my "chair". After reading articles like thisand this, I decided to give sitting on an exercise ball a try. I have to say, it took a little getting used to, but now I really enjoy it. I have to be extra careful with pins and scissors, though. I have always had to be extra careful with my pins anyway (I have a cat who thinks they might make good snacks), so this isn't a huge adjustment for me. It is kind of nice to be able to bounce on it a little if I find myself getting a little stiff from sitting. The ball, however hastened the need for the new desk because I needed a surface that was lower than a normal desk. The height of this desk is only 24.5 inches from the floor, which is perhaps about half an inch higher than ideal for me, but it works ok.

Hopefully, now that this is done, I can get back to some sewing. :)

Sorry....

Sorry for my extended absence lately. I really have not finished anything in the last couple of weeks. I have been working on trying to build a desk for my sewing room. It has been, well, lets just say an adventure. I have been to Home Depot more times than I care to think about in the last week. Is it a bad thing that I know that the wood screws are in aisle 16? Many thanks to my patient and helpful DH for putting up with me and my hairbrained ideas. It is finally nearing completion except for painting which I think I will leave until spring when I can open the windows and get some ventilation. I wanted to make the height adjustable, but that just wasn't going to happen, sigh. Oh well, I have at least learned some lessons on construction with MDF and hopefully I will have a table that I will be better able to utilize than the little computer desk I have my machines on right now. I got very tired of picking one machine up off the floor and using it for a while and then putting it back in the floor and moving the other one over to use and then pushing it back out of the way and picking the other one back up off the floor to use it again. Oy! No wonder it takes me forever to get anything done!

In other news, I just ordered a new pattern. I have sort of gotten away from using commercial patterns, but this one, well..... I just couldn't resist! I spent way too much money on it, but it is soooo dang cute! It is a european pattern and from what I hear the translation of the instructions is less than stellar, so hopefully I can figure it out. I can't wait to get it and start playing with it. :)
Follow on Bloglovin