Mail call and an Uglee, but not an Uglee mail call.

Caroline of The Kansas Hooker kindly offered to let me test her new pattern, Rectangle Uglee. I love Caroline's stuffie patterns, so I jumped at the opportunity. They're always clear and make the cutest toys. Did I mention free too? Remember my Halloween spider? That's a Kansas Hooker pattern too.

This little guy is anything but ugly. Ok, he's not your everyday, normal stuffie, but that's what makes him so cute! He's made with TLC Heathers, white felt, and ami eyes.

Rectangle Ugly is going to live with the big brother of the new twin babies that I made these bibs and burpcloths for. Big brothers need presents too, don't you think?

The mail man delivered some good stuff too. I'm a daily reader of Tales from Twisty Lane by Snap. Snap's Blogiversary recently passed and she had a giveaway. She sent the book "12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women" and some great note cards. Thank you so much!

I already know who is getting the first note card... my neighbor that just moved. I miss her already.

I hope the mailman brought you something other than bills today too!

Mmmmm, chocolate!

The family took a little road trip to Hershey, PA this weekend to visit Hershey Park and Chocolate World. It was so much fun!

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Can you spot my little daredevil?

Five pounds of chocolate! Mmmmm!

These were for the 3-D show. See me?

It was well worth the nearly 3 hour ride because we had a blast!

Welcome Baby Adriana!

My cousin Nicole gave birth to a little girl named Adriana! She was a few weeks early and made an appearance at her own baby shower.

I gave her this quilt and bunny, which you've seen here before. I also made the Grace Cardi and hat from Lion Brand. These will probably fit her when she's six months or so.



Also, a bib using the Chickpea Infant Bib pattern and this funny flannel print.



This teeny crochet preemie hat was made with sport weight yarn. It's so small that I was worried it wouldn't fit, but it's just the right size for Adriana now.



Here's the little princess herself. Look how small she is!

Reminds me of when this big girl was born.

Nikki opening the quilt.

How stinking adorable is this idea? Nikki's mother hung all the baby clothes she bought for Adriana on a clothes line and hung it up as a decoration. So cute!

Look who made an appearance, wearing the cardigan I gave her for Christmas. Oh yeah, none other than Dirty Grandma! I love that woman!

Welcome to the world Baby Adriana!

School's Out!!!

Pi's last day of school is today, which means it's officially summer in the "K" household!!

We wanted to give a small thank you to the three teachers who helped Piper adjust to NJ's curriculum. It's way different than NY's and their help was invaluable. They each got a Dunkin Donuts gift card, Hershey kisses in a disposable coffee cup, and a coffee cozy.



I winged the pattern for the cozy by tracing a cardboard one from Starbucks and adding elastic to one seam.

So to all you teachers out there, Thanks a "Latte" for all you do! Heehee, I love the cheesiness of it!

Being productive

Hubby and I had a super productive weekend. We cleaned our place from top to bottom and I even got some organizing done. I cleaned out my craft books and my sewing area too. The sewing table was a huge disaster and really needed some TLC.

After it was all done, I was so happy with good it looked except for one eye sore. My sewing machine! I've had it over a year and have been covering it with an old, ratty, red towel. I finally had enough of that towel and sat down to make myself a sewing machine cover.



The fabric is home dec weight fabric from IKEA. I had about a half yard left over from THIS project and decided to use that. Now my sewing machine cover matches the wall hanging in my bedroom. The pattern is from S.E.W. Everything Workshop.



Adios nasty red towel!

Happy Father's Day!

I hope all of the dad's out there have a wonderful day!

What did I get for the Dads/Grandpas/Hubby in my life who all claim they don't want anything?

Lotto Cards!

Happy Father's Day!

Goodbye Neighbor

One of my neighbors moved to North Carolina this week. She's been a great neighbor since we moved and is one of the sweetest people I've ever met. I wanted to make her a little something to say "good luck and I'll miss you."



I used THIS pattern from Lion Brand and 3 skeins of Chenille Thick & Quick. My N hook disappeared somewhere in my craft area mess, so I used a P hook instead. The shawl seemed to be a good length, so I didn't make the shawl nearly as long as the pattern suggested.



Goodbye neighbor! I hope you enjoy your new home!

Our garden

Hubby decided to try planting our container garden from seeds this year, instead of using starter plants. Some of the plants are thriving and others were total flops.

Piper gave me this plant for Mother's Day this year. Hubby re-planted it in this pot that our neighbor gave us and it's growing leaps and bounds.



Our tomato plants are growing nicely.



On the left is a green pepper plant and on the right is a cucumber plant.



More tomatoes... hubby loves them.



The biggest disappointment is that our basil died. We've planted a few more seeds and are hoping those will take. We also had a snow pea plant which produced a few snow peas, then it died too. I've read those don't last long though.

I can't wait for the first tomato buds!

Principal's Quilt, all done!

The Principal's quilt is finally finished! It measures 35" x 40".



I love the way the backing fabric goes with the main red fabric and that my binding is improving. Those small red triangles give the principal the option of hanging the quilt with a dowel.



Some of the kid's squares...



Piper's square.



I thought this was a really cute one.

Piper will bring the quilt into school on Monday and her class will present the quilt to the principal at her goodbye party next week.

I'm glad I was able to be a part of wishing the principal a memorable goodbye.

Front page!

I'm on the front page of Ravelry today! What a cool surprise. Thank you to Andrea of Knits and Knots for pointing it out. I wouldn't have noticed otherwise!

My first NJ Joanns.

This past weekend, hubby (who happens to be extremely patient on my craft fueled outings) and I went to a few stores, looking for just the right fabric for the Principal's quilt. After not having much luck, we decided to google map the nearest Joann's, which we hadn't been to yet. It's more out of the way than A.C. Moore or Michael's, but the trip was well worth it.

While browsing Joann's, I received a message while in the sewing machine demo area. If only hubby hadn't been standing right next to me, I might have convinced myself this was true. Ha!



I also found the perfect fabric for the backing of the Principal's quilt.



I think it's called Oh school days or Oh dear school days. Something like that. Isn't it pretty?



Significant progress was made on the quilt this weekend. It's been sandwiched and quilted with the stitch in the ditch method. That's my only method so far. ;) I also made enough bias tape for the binding.



Hopefully, it'll be all finished by the end of this week. I can't wait to show it to you when it's all done.

Blast Off!

About a month ago, each kid in Pi's class was given the name of an inventor or influential person that they had to write a report on. Pi's person is Mae Jemison, the first African American astronaut.

The project included writing a research-based report, a 3 minute speech, and a costume. Pi mentioned that the costume was due towards the end of the year, which meant mid June to me.

Pshaw!!! Shoulda checked the calendar doofus!!


Two Mondays ago, Pi casually mentioned she needed the costume by Friday morning. Wait...back up... THIS FRIDAY? Oh yeah, not even a weekend to buffer all the work I needed to do. This is where I lost a few minutes breathing into a brown paper bag, ha!

I called my dad, who has hazmat type suits at work, to see if he could spare one. He asked his boss, who was more than happy to give him one in a size small because none of the guys at work wears a size small. I got lucky becuase the guys don't go easy on lunch, haha.

I printed out pictures of Mae Jemison and generic astronaut costumes to give me an idea of where to start. Using black felt that was leftover from Halloween, I got started.




Using freezer paper and an 8.5" x 11" peice of fabric, I printed NASA patches right from my inkjet printer. The fabric wrinkled a bit, but I was in such a rush, I honestly didn't care. Good enough!


I backed the fabric with some HeatnBond (that I bought when I was pregnant with Piper) to make the patches sturdier. I sewed those bad boys on pretty quickly.

My neighbor was kind enough to give me a USA patch she had lying around.

She's also a retired stewardess and lent us her wings to use on a patch. With no time to embroider the name on nicely, I went with the fast and dirty way... white out pen!



The only thing we bought for this project was a plain white baseball cap from the craft store. I couldn't think of how to make a helmet in such a short amount of time, so we settled on the hat with a NASA patch sew on.

After a few nights of getting less than 5 hours of sleep, it was finally all done. Here's the final result.

Want to know the best part? Piper brought the costume back home on the Friday she said it was due, because she realized that she made a mistake. The costume wasn't due that Friday.... it was due the NEXT Friday! *headdesk*

Well, at least it got done early!