The Christmas Octopus!

Tonight Derek and his roommate Devin came over to my place to make some Christmas sugar cookies!  Even thought we had a tree cookie cutter, a star, a gingerbread person and a few other Christmas-y cutters, the buckets of fun animal cookie cutters won out!  Here are a few highlights from the night!

Our Inspiration:  hippos, octopi and worms, Ooh My!

 

 

Even Buttons got in on the action!  My sweet little boy kept sniffing around under the table and got flour knocked all over him!

Gemma in her Minnie Mouse Dress!

These pictures were actually taken in October when Kim, Jacob, Brandi and baby Gemma came to visit me in Kentucky and I just never got around to posting them.  I must say that she is a MUCH better model then my stuffed monkey! 

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens . . .

Now that I have finished Derek's safari quilt (don't worry, there will be pictures of the finished product up soon!) I decided that it was time to make one for myself.  I wasn't able to settle on a pattern because there are just so many things that I love and that is why I decided to make a "my favorite things quilt".  It is going to be a combination of patchwork, applique and embroidery using my favorite fabrics, patterns and designs.  The first two squares are an applique teacup, and pair of owls holding hands (or wings, rather). I finished them up this weekend because really, who studies for finals anyway? Hehe.   The owls are in an 18" square and the teacup is in a 10" square.  One of my favorite parts of this quilt design is that it will be made up of all different sized squares that are fit together with different patchwork strips and borders to add to the quirky, eclectic feel :)

Beauty and the Beast

From time to time, someone decides to start and advocacy thing on facebook thought either status updates or default photos.  The new facebook "thing" is to change your profile picture to your favorite childhood cartoon character in awareness of child abuse.  I decided to search for the perfect photo of Belle from Disney's Beauty and the Beast and came up with so many.  So, you, Blogger, get to see all my other options :)  I've always thought of Belle as "my" character because she longs for adventure, loves to read, loves to dance, sees the good in people, and talks to household objects.  And I just had to add that last picture because I am pretty positive that is the face my boyfriend makes every time I make him go ballroom dancing with me, hehe. 

Come away with me

I am 100% certain that I would go wherever he ask me to go. 

"Forget them, Wendy. Forget them all. Come with me where you'll never, never have to worry about grown up things again"

My very own Madeleine Mini Bloomers!

While finishing my quilt, I looked up some sewing information and stumbled across this pattern for a little pair of ruffly shorts called Madeleine Mini Bloomers.  The pattern was free online (just print it out and tape it together!) and looked simple enough.  Plus I thought they were so adorable that I just had to make a pair!        

When I was in florida in May, Ma Bea gave me this fantastic fabric she found for $1/yard and I absolutely adore it.  Notice the tiny hearts in between the stripes?

  

The shorts take less than a yard and less than an hour to make.  The waistband is two rows of elastic.  The original pattern called for 1/4 in, but I only had 1/2 inch.  I think with the smaller elastic it might have been more ruffly and delicate, but the 1/2 inch makes them super comfortable and snug, while still having a nice feminine ruffle and shape.

Another aspect of the pattern that I tweaked is the legs.  The pattern uses ribbon to cinch the legs (the ribbon goes through a casing and out of two buttonholes), but I didn't want to have to mess with ribbons and ties, so I simply used more of my elastic.  Using elastic makes bows completely optional and I have been playing around with where I want them positioned.  What do you think?  Waist only?  Legs only?  All or none?

I love them to bits, though part of me feels like I need to just stick them in my hope chest (wink) and make myself a pair of slightly longer shorts out of some bright cupcake fabric to wear around my house for now.  hehe :)  If you are interested in making a pair of your own (which I highly recommend!), you can check out the pattern here Free pattern - Madeleine Mini Bloomers

Gemma's Minnie Mouse pillowcase dress (and headband!)

"pillowcase dresses" have been around for a while now and are pretty simple to make, but I had never made one and decided to make a Minnie Mouse themed one for my friend's baby girl, Gemma.  Gemma (and her parents) happen to live in Florida and I didn't have her to model the dress, so I had to put it on my build-a-bear monkey (who is, in all normal situations, a boy.  hehe).   The dress was pretty simple to make, but I really enjoyed playing with the different stitches on my machine and used a fun stitch that looks like a string of bubbles to secure the yellow ribbon to the dress.  I also found a Disney font download, so I was able to monogram her name just like Minnie Mouse!  

Busy Bee!

    Happy 60th anniversary to my grandparents!  The got married on (Friday) October 13th, 1950.  To celebrate my whole family went to a cabin this weekend in the mountains and at Nanny's request I made matching celebratory shirts for all of us to wear to dinner.  Here is a picture of Nanny and Pa wearing their shirts today to celebrate!

In other news, my sister-in-law, Holly, and I have been working on baby gifts.  We've made several bibs, as well as some other cute baby things.  :)  Here's some pictures!

 Here is the little onsie for a baby sister (Aubry)

 Fleece for baby sister

 Fleece for big sister Savannah!

 The whole package!

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Adventure

I've been pondering adventure lately and decided that one of my main goals is to lead a life full of adventure.  Some people are content to live their lives the way they have always lived it and that may be all fine and well, but that is not the life for me.  Anyway, I don't really have anything to inspiring to say on this subject, so instead I'll post some of my favorite quotes on adventure.  :)

"If adventures will not befall a young lady in her own village, she must seek them abroad." - Jane Austen Northanger Abbey

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” — Mark Twain

“A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are built for.” — John A. Shedd

“Remember what Bilbo used to say: ‘It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”” — J.R.R. Tolkien


"I want adventure in the great wide somewhere, I want it more than I can tell.  And for once it might be grand, to have someone understand that I want so much more then they have planned" -Beauty and the Beast

Sigh of relief

*Sigh* My Futra is back!  It was just such a relief that it could be fixed so easily (and with no cost thanks to the warranty!).  Derek and I drove to Louisville on tuesday morning and dropped it off.  We decided to go look at their version of Peddlers Mall and laugh at all the crazy shirts with dragons and unicorns on them.  I should have taken pictures because they were so funny.  Anyway, as soon as we sat down to lunch they called to tell us she was all fixed and we could come pick her up. 

I have a MAJOR exam next Wednesday and I am trying to keep reminding myself to study and not work on projects - but we will see how much self-control I have ;-).  Anyway, hopefully after wednesday I'll have some more fun pictures of projects.

So over the weekend my incredible machine that I use for everything died on me.   Isn't that tragic???  It is an amazing Singer Futura 250 and  I was devastated.  Thankfully it is under warranty (It was a gift that I received in June)  and I will be getting in repaired this upcoming Tuesday (huuuuge sigh of relief).

  Because my machine was down and I couldn't fill any orders for tote-bags, I had to resort to pulling out my dinosaur (aka, the sewing machine I made everything on up until I got my new one in june) and work on a quilt that I began piecing over the first half of the summer.  The quilt is an Safari themed queen-sized project and happens to be my first quilt ever.  I've loved piecing it but we'll see how much I love the actual quilting aspect in a few days.

By tomorrow I should have all the borders put on so the top of the quilt will be completely finished, but this is what I have thus far :)

This is the fabric I used.  The first thing I found was actually the stripe, and it made me think of Africa so I found some animal print, some tan cotton that looks like burlap, and little green with vines on it, a deep red and a fun swirly brown. 

I laid all the squares on my bed and tried my hardest to put them in some form of organized chaos.  I knew I wanted it to look semi-random but still pulled together enough to keep it from looking tacky or over-the-top.

 Since taking this picture I have added a 10inch dark brown boarder on every side and appliqued some small animal print accents into the edges.  :)  I'm pretty darn proud that my first quilting experience is turning out so nicely.

welcome to my sunshine hut!

Hi!  My name is Mary Alice and nothing makes me happier then turning up some fun music, turning on my sewing machine and dancing around my little room making wonderful projects for my friends and family.  I love to sew, crochet, scrap book, decoupage, paint, mosaic and do just about anything else that is crafty and pretty.  The world is full of beauty and I love to do what I can to add more to it.  (This included planting a ton of 5 foot tall sunflowers in front of my boyfriend's house, hehe). 

While having a girls day out and painting pottery today, my friend Jordy told me that I should create a blog so the whole world wide web could know about my creations!  I don't know if anyone will read this or be interested in my little sunshine hut, but here's to the power of the web! 

My latest projects are custom embroidered tote-bags.  I've made about 15 for the girls in my graduate program.  I think my favorite part is picking out the ribbons to go on them and making the bows :).  I sell them for $15 each and get more orders every day!  It's so fun to make something that other people love so much! (and yes, I did have to make two for myself.  I justify this by having a tote for my school things and a tote for my everyday things *wink*)