baby quilt finally done!!

I finally finished the quilt for my baby boy (who is growing up way too fast, btw)! My mom helped me with the binding, as usual.  And by helped, I mean she did it for me of course. One day I'll bind my own quilt!

 I love it!! I made a similar one for my friend's baby last year and loved the fabrics and pattern so much, I bascially copied it.  This one I decided to do a second border and when trying to find to time get to the quilt shop with a newborn and a 3 year old, I found the strips of blue and polka dot sewn together.  I had intended to use them on my friend's quilt, but cut them too small.  I made new ones for her, but these worked perfect as a border!

It's backed with super soft minky - thanks to Fabric.com's sale at $5/yard!!!

 Love it!!

Last week in preschool #2

Monday: Made banana bread (with chocolate chips!!) and learned new words: recipe and ingredients.  We also talked about reading a recipe and the different sizes of measuring spoons and cups.

 Tuesday: Intended activity - sorting her massive collection of balls by size and comparing how many fit in various sized containers.  Lesson I learned: use only one container.  Also, don't do preschool during what used to be nap time.  Actual activity: Word World on PBS

Wednesday: Skipped preschool because we were swimming in the morning and grocery shopping in the afternoon (having something to eat for dinner trumped school!!)

Thursday: found these darling letter matching cards at Target's dollar spot (LOVING back to school stuff!!) and we practiced matching Mommy letters to baby letters.  She loved this activity so much.....

 ....we did it again Friday!!

On Saturday we were doing stuff around the house and busy all day.  At the end of the day, she said, "Mommy, we forgot to do school!!!" She was totally disappointed! I'm so glad she's enjoying it- because I am too!

Last week in preschool #1

My cute daughter is 3 and I've been meaning to do some preschool lessons with her.  I have some skills in this area, since I am a certified teacher and taught for a few years before little bit came along.  But the disadvantage to being a teacher is that I tend to overthink things.  I couldn't start her preschool lessons until I had a curriculum outlined.  What?  Seriously?  Last week I finally decided that I just need to get going - something is better than nothing!! I'm not really into drilling preschoolers with flashcards - I really believe that this time in her life, learning should be through discovery and play and most of all, fun!! I'm all about introducing literacy concepts, but I'm not stressing about having her on a certain reading level before kindergarten.  If she shows interest in reading, I'll teach her. If not, we'll stick with reading readiness activities.

To help me remember what we've done, I decided to do a weekly post talking about what we did in preschool that week.  Plus, it will keep me honest in keeping up with it!! Next month, I'm running a little preschool out of my house (just 2 other kids will be coming) and I'll post some ideas from that one as well.  

So here we go! 

Last week in preschool...

 We played with her name! I wrote her name on a sheet of printer paper and gave her some cranberries.  I showed her how to cover the letters with the cranberries.

 When she was done, she got to eat them!!

 Since the cranberries were small, the next thing we used to cover her name were goldfish crackers.  About half way through, she said to me, "Mommy, this is very hard work.  Can you help me?" So I helped with the last few letters!

Then she got to eat them!

The next day was a simple literacy activity.  I wrote the names of things on sticky notes.  Then we looked at the word together and she had to place the sticky note on the appropriate object.  She loved it! When we were done, she gathered up all the notes and put them somewhere.  The next day she asked me if we could play school again and pulled out the sticky notes! It was so cute!! 

I only started on Thursday, so hopefully next week will have a few more activities.  My goal is to do school for about 20-30 minutes 5 days a week.  

My ambitious sewing project

In January, I decided I needed a new project.  So I started making this quilt for my daughter's birthday.  I've still got a long way to go, but after 4 trips to the quilt shop and countless hours, I'm making good progress!

I started with this fabric.

And this pattern

I spent a lot of time cutting

 more time piecing

 I made 15 "friendship star" blocks and 24 "churn dash" blocks, cut a few setting triangles....

 I think it's going to look great!!

Now I just have to sew it all together, back it, quilt it, and bind it.  My daughter's birthday is in 1 week.  I think this might be a Christmas present....

Why I don't make toys

 I worked really hard at making my daughter some cute paper dolls.  I found the fabric at the quilt shop, cut out all the dolls and their clothes, backed them and even made a cute carrying pouch for all the clothes and dolls.  I knew it would be so much fun for my daughter to play with and keep her quiet during church. 

But everytime I get them out, my daughter looks at me and says, "no, let's just clean them up."  Fine, I'll just play with them by myself because I think they are cute and fun!!

What I've been up to....

I recently turned this

and this....

 into cute "paper" dolls with clothes.  And had some leftovers to use for gifts for other little girls that may like them!

 

I made a table runner for my MIL and one for myself for Christmas.  

My quilt class is finished now, so I have turned my eyes to making Ellie a big girl blanket for her big girl bed.  Imagine this....

with this fabric...

Here's hoping I can pull it off!!

My first quilt

 I made this cute quilt for my friend's new little baby boy. It is the first quilt I have ever done.  I did all the cutting, sewing, recutting, unpicking, resewing, quilting,  My mom did the binding because I just can't quite figure that out yet! While the pattern is simple, I fell in love with the fabrics. I am hoping the bright, pretty colors will help my dear friend look past the oh-so-many imperfections. It was made with love!

I took the finished product to my monthly quilting class for show and tell.  Quilters are so wonderful! Even though it is such a simple quilt- look at the other show and tells!!- they made a big deal about how pretty it was and took my picture for the blog (because it was my first quilt).  And yes, I am headless in the picture.  It's probably better that way! :)


I'm linking up!