A Sweet Ice Cream Dress for a Sweet Little Girl!

I really suck at updating this blog, but here is a dress I made last night for a friends daughter.  The pattern for the dress came from Amanda over at Snazzle Craft.  Feel free to give the pattern a try yourself at this link... it's quite easy to make.

A Strawberry Dress

I made this dress a while ago but the neck was a bit too low for me so I gave it to my sister.  It looks pretty cute on her although I will definitely have to hem it up a bit.

My Fastest Cake Ever

I made a cake for my friend Ashley's Mardi Gras themed birthday party.  I didn't have the time that I would have liked to make the cake, but I think it turned out well.  It's a Devil's Food Cake with a special butter-cream icing with Bailey's Irish Cream.  I also made some cake balls in Mardi Gras colors.

Gnome Tote Bag

My mentor teacher is a big fan of gnomes so I decided to make her something with gnomes for her birthday.  I didn't have the time to make a quilt and she doesn't share my love of unusual skirts so I decided to make this tote bad for her instead.  It's quilted and reversible!

Super Bowl Truffles

I made these football shaped Oreo cookie truffles and chocolate covered pretzels for our Super Bowl party.  Let me just say, those truffles were delicious!  The whole party was a great success, even though the Steelers lost.

My Biggest Quilt Ever!

So I went to the wedding of some good friends this weekend and gave them a quilt as a wedding gift.  I'm not going to lie, this one was definitely a challenge.  I had two weeks to purchase the fabric and put it all together in addition to teaching and taking two grad school classes, but somehow I got it finished.  The quilt measured out at about 60 x 50, the perfect size for a lap quilt for two.

Here's a photo of the happy couple!

Quilts

I finally finished the quilts I was working on... just in time for Christmas!  The pink and purple one uses variations of the boxy stars pattern and the rainbow one is a bargello pattern.

 

Housewarming Cake

Just a quick post as it is after 1am, but I just threw together this cake tonight for a housewarming tomorrow.  It's a 3D house with buttercream icing.  Half of the house is devils food cake and half is golden butter cake.  Here's hoping it survives the drive to Philly without falling over....

Edit:  Well... it didn't exactly survive without falling over.  Somewhere between the Delaware border and North Philly it fell... it still tasted good though from what I've heard so I guess that's all that matters.

Quilt WIP

Here are a few blocks from my current Work In Progress.  I'm deciding whether I want to do all of the blocks in the same style or vary them a little but still keep the same color trends.  We'll see how it goes I guess :D

Bring on the Holiday Season!

     As I stated in a previous post, my current student teaching/grad school schedule has left me little time for anything but homework.  However, the Christmas season draws closer which means it's time for me to make some time!  I have always been a big fan of the Christmas season.  I love the music, the weather, finding those perfect gifts, the fact that people always tend to be a little nicer that time of year and of course, the time off from work! 
     You can always tell when it's the holiday season in my house by the smells... a fire burning in the fireplace and daily smell of fresh baked goods.  While it's a little early for the baked goods, my husband and I did start up our fireplace this past weekend and it was fabulous!  Here are some photos from last year's Christmas season...

The tools of the trade.  My kitchen, and especially my dining room, are in a permanent state of messy-ness at Christmas time but it's totally worth it!

I tried a new recipe for gingerbread men last year and as you can see, they turned out great!  No molasses !

There are 18 varieties of cookies pictured here, but I think the grand total came to 23 varieties last year.  Mmmm...

     Now that I have reminisced about last year, it's time to talk about this year.  My brother had a huge yard sale a few weeks ago and I was kind of bummed to see him selling this really cool toy that Larry and I had given to my nephew Elijah for Christmas the year before.  While I understand that kids grow out of toys and clothes, it's kind of a bummer that they grow out of them so quickly.  This year, I have decided to make quilts as Christmas gifts for a few of the kids.  I know quilts don't light up or have cool TV commercials, but I figure that they will still be great gifts.  If the quilt is made well (which mine always are of course) and isn't too childish, it can be a gift that the kids really can keep forever!  I spent a few hours at JoAnn Fabrics this weekend picking out fabrics (Larry was kind enough to accompany me) and have already started working.  I just finished the quilt top for the first one.  It's for Becca, a rambunctious 3 year old with a love of bright colors.  I decided to go with a rainbow strip bargello quilt for her.  I wasn't able to find any light colored cloud fabric for the border strips so I went with a wispy turquoise fabric instead.  I'm thinking about doing a blue "nighttime" fabric for the backing... kind of a night and day thing. 

The quilt top

A close up of some of the fabrics.  I just love the bright colors and patterns :D

     Well, I think that's all for right now.  I am still deciding on which type of pattern I plan on using for the next quilt on my list.  I am definitely going to go for a block with that one as opposed to the bargello. 

     I hope that this has helped get you into the Christmas spirit and, as always, feel free to leave me comments or suggestions!