Crafty's in San Francisco

It's the end of a very long week... a very long training season... and a very long semester.

Mr. Crafty & I are in San Fran this weekend. Our first real vacation (not a trip to visit family) in... I don't know how long. I'm running th Nike Women's Marathon on Sunday.

We've had some fun today, I'll share the pics when we get back. Mr. Crafty has been using our dslr camera for most of the pictures.

Before we left, we had a hectic week. Cute, adorable, troublemaker Trixie decided to eat the elastic string from one of her toys on Saturday morning. And she had (not cheap) surgery on Monday to remove the elastic string. We had to scramble to find someone to take care of her while we're in SF...

I found this fantatic chandelier today. Mr. Crafty doesn't agree that we need it :-( For $4500, I guess I agree...

See you when we get back to Tucson!

The Craftys

Love this!

I totally forgot to tell this as part of yesterday's post. But I guess it deserves it's own post.

Last week, I got this email from my aunt:

Lindsey is Star of the Week in her class this week and today's activity is to bring in a special item and tell the class about it for Show and Tell. Lindsey brought in the crayon holder that you made her for Christmas last year!! Awww... :-)

Lindsey is my 6 year old cousin. My aunt and {former} uncle adopted her and her sister Hayley {age 8} from China. They are the cutest little girls ever. They love Mr. Crafty. He is their personal jungle gym when we see them because he flips them over and gets silly with them. {The last two times we saw them, he made the mistake of doing a tough arm workout at the gym in the morning and kept complaining to me how much his arms hurt. Hehe}

This is the crayon holder that my aunt is referring to {except that Lindsey's has an "L" on it}:

You can make your own by following the very first tutorial I ever wrote here.

And the owners of a wedding quilt I made last summer posted this on Facebook recently too. With the caption: "Thanks for the quilt, Jennifer! Molly loves it."

Just gotta love when people love the things you lovingly made for them :-)

Tomorrow, I am getting together with the Tucson Modern Quilt Guild ladies for a little sewing time. Yippee!!! We're each going to make a block or two for a Breast Cancer quilt that we'll then donate.

Still alive!

I assure you I am still alive. The past couple weeks have been busy ones in the Crafty household. Unfortunately, most of that busy-ness did not involve crafty-ness. Boohoo!

But I have some fantastic news! Mr. Crafty got a new job!!! In the past two and a half weeks, he's been a much happier Mr. Crafty. Which I am a BIG fan of!

He had the world's worst boss at his old job. He was sad to leave the people (except his boss!) but his new job has some fantastic opportunities. He's an Education Specialist for Cord Blood Registry. He's currently in training and learning all about pregnancy, stem cells, and lots of other information. He'll be helping families decide whether or not to store their babies' cord blood. So exciting!

I did get one project done recently. And it really made me wish I made the trip to Joann's and bought the specialty ruler. Ah well, live and learn!

My friends and coaches for Team In Training Ashley and Ryan are expecting their first child.
Ashley and Ryan are waiting to find out the baby's sex. And let me tell you, it is more and more challenging to find gender neutral infant stuff at the store. I did find a super cute duckie sleeper with ducks on the feet and a duck face on the butt and some cute onesies with zoo animals.

I made the family a fleece blanket. My mom had given me this fabric and I thought it was perfect. I made the blanket more of a rectangle than a square too.

Ashley is due basically any day now... her "due date" is October 26th but I keep advocating for a 10/10/10 baby! {I mean, seriously, how cool would that be???}

{Sidenote: Mr. Crafty's bday is 8/8/81. Pretty cool, right? We had a "Super Golden Birthday" party for him on 8/8/08. And yes, if you did the math, I am about a year and a half older than him.}

We also got a new member of the Crafty family... a new gnome from our alma mater!!!

The blue one we got last year at Homecoming. He's also my profile picture and his name is Tobias Archibald Anthrax. There is a story behind the name... The yellow gnome with the #1 finger is our new addition to the family. {We actually got 2 of the yellow gnomes because Mr. Crafty wanted one for work because he works with a lot of University of Arizona Wildcats. Boo!}

Frustration...

I actually had a whole different blog written. It was my venting about the frustrations I've had the past couple weeks, mainly since Mr. Crafty left for his business trip.

The AC died last week {and is still very much needed here, it's been over 100 all week} and last night/this morning I found out that our mailman sent all our mail back to the senders. Including my tags for my car. And the DMV is closed today. But I have my printout showing I paid and I don't plan on getting pulled over so I should be OK. Just annoyed. Earlier, I might have been a more than annoyed...

The original post went much more into all that. And I just deleted it. I am letting it go.

So there's a back story to the next part of this blog post. When Mr. Crafty and I were planning our wedding, we wrote our own vows. I wanted them to be really personal and really us. I wanted to promise to always eat the pickle from his hamburger. But he thought that people would take that the wrong way. *clears throat* I mean you, Justin & Trevor.

You see, Mr. Crafty hates pickles. And I love them. He used to order his burgers without pickles. Now he orders them with pickles and picks them off and puts them on my plate. He also loves mushrooms. And I hate them. So I pick them out and put them on his plate. So I wanted to promise to always do that...

Mr. Crafty comes home tomorrow and I am ready for him to be home. We've gone two weeks without really being able to communicate with each other. He gets no cell reception in the part of rural Nebraska where he has spent the last two weeks. He had no desk, computer or phone of his own at work so I couldn't really email him. And there was no phone in his room, weird I know. He's my best friend and I miss him.

He's spending the night in Omaha before his flight home and the girls he's been working with in rural Nebraska were telling him all the "big city" things to do in Omaha. Apparently, they started making fun of sushi. {This was told to me via IM a bit ago when he got to an area where he actually gets cell reception. Hallelujah for cell reception!}

So I told him not to eat sushi without me. {I actually have wanted to ask him all week if we can have sushi for dinner tomorrow after he gets home but haven't had a chance.} He said he would never dream of it.

Mr Crafty: "Nor would I eat the pickle on my burger, that's yours"

Awwww, come home Mr. Crafty! Come home!

Trixie is ready for Mr. Crafty to come home and cuddle too!

Happy GleeKy Tuesday

{I'm going to apologize if this post appears twice. I was out of the office at a recruiting event and sent the post from my phone. Love that mobile posting via email. But the post I wrote never appeared on my page. And it's not in my gmail sent or draft folders. It's apparently lost somewhere in internet-land.}

GLEE Season 1 on DVD!!! And the special issue of people!

Happy GleeKy Tuesday!!!

I'd like to thank Target for having the DVD set on sale the day it came out {Target opened at 8am, I stopped by to get mine on my way to the recruiting event at 9:30am}.

I also may have had an irrational thought when I saw all the other cars in the parking lot of Target. I was worried they were ALL there to get their copy of Glee and they might be out. And then I realized the rest of the Target shoppers probably did not plan their morning around picking of their copy of Glee Season 1 like I did. OK, maybe a couple other shoppers... like my friend Scott who got his at 8am and was at the door waiting for Target to open.

Now I just have to explain this and the other things I got at Target to Mr. Crafty...

Happy Friday

So this week has been crazy! Like crazy, crazy.

Last night was the first meeting of the Tucson Modern Quilt Guild! Yippee! The time I should have used to read the 200+ pages I have to get done this weekend, mini-paper & journal response (both due today), I spent meeting the lovely ladies of the new Tucson Modern Quilt Guild. Our kinda-sorta fearless leader is Melanie of All Above Fabric.

I have no pics to share because I left my camera and projects to share at home. What??? I know! I ran home, took a quiz for one of my classes, changed and drove over to the meeting. There was a group picture taken and I know it will be posted on either the guild website or Melanie's blog on All Above Fabric. Fantastic ladies! Definitely my type of quilters. And we all seem to have the same fabric problem. We joked that we should be the fabric-holics anonymous.

If you are in Tucson, love quilting and fresh & modern fabrics, come join us for the next meeting! We're going to meet the 2nd Thursday of each month and have some other activities planned.

But here's the real Happy Friday for me... as of yesterday afternoon, this beauty is mine. ALL MINE!

Photo from Mac website

Yes, I am now the PROUD owner of a 13-in MacBook Pro! I have always been a Mac girl but somewhere along the line, I ended up owning a PC laptop. And then a PC desktop - which really is Mr. Crafty's computer. I was tired of using the PC, especially being tethered to the computer desk. So I finally persuaded Mr. Crafty that I NEEDED this. I was stalking my laptop via FedEx tracking all week. And yesterday at 12:53pm, it arrived.

Mr. Crafty also got a 160GB iPod Classic to replace his dying 5-year old 64GB iPod. So don't go feeling bad for him. Except that his new iPod arrived on Tuesday, the day after he left for his two week business trip. So he doesn't even get to enjoy it yet :-(

Now I just have to figure out how to set up our old wireless router...

{unless one of my neighbors wants to let me "borrow" their wireless}

Some Thursday fun!

My parents have lived in their house since my mom was preggers with me. So they've been there about 31 years now {no, I'm only 30, remember I said she was preggers}. The house is still nearly all original. Or is it vintage? They still have the original chocolate brown shag-ish carpet and the dark wood kitchen cabinets. The dark brown carpets were pretty handy for raising two kids and several pets!

For the past several years, my mom has been talking about the renovations she wants to do. And other than replacing the sliding door to the backyard with French doors last summer {or the summer before} not much has happened.

Until now! Mom retired from teaching the end of this past school year and now they are starting some of the renovations. They are getting new kitchen cabinets and countertops, basically a new kitchen but with the same appliances they already have.

In preparation for the new cabinets, they need to clean out 31 years worth of stuff in their old cabinets. Last night, my dad emails pics of a cordless electric ice cream maker he found. I have a sneaking suspicion that it was a gift at their wedding in 1975

And this morning he emailed this:

To which, I had the following email conversation with him:
Me: I want it!!! Can I have it????
Dad: Rescuing it from the Upward Foundation donation on the sidewalk, now! What would have happened if I hadn't taken a picture of it?!
Me: I would have been devastated. Completely crushed. That snowcone maker is awesome!

I remember making Snoopy Sno Cones in little Dixie cups with my older brother. We'd cover them in Kool-Aid.
 
And now it is mine. Just like our original Nintendo {I claimed that one several years ago}. My brother needs to be faster on the draw! Or maybe this is just karma coming back at him for when he used to sell me his old toys for my allowance.
 
In case you were wondering, the AC got fixed late Tuesday morning, thank heavens! It was a blown fuse ($200!) but the whole unit is 15-16 years old and will need to be replaced soon. Bleh!

Know what makes me smile?

Do you know what makes me smile? Seriously grinning ear to ear?

When someone uses a quilt I gave them as a gift. This is a pic of my friend Dana's daughter Taylor. {Since she is not my child, I covered her face.} She is still using the quilt I gave her as a baby. Taylor is 3 {I think, her birth announcement is still on my fridge at home so you'd think I'd know that answer!} and she just moved into her big girl bed so mom posted this pic to her Facebook page.

Seriously makes me grin from ear to ear. Not because it's a perfect quilt by any means. But because it is being used and loved and not stashed somewhere in a closet {like I know my nieces' quilts are, don't get me started on that!}. My boss' daughter is 5 and still uses her quilt every night. She calls it her "cold blanket" because the cotton is cool.

This is why I quilt gifts for friends and family.

Problem = crafty solution

Last week, the new semester started. And I had a problem. And it required a crafty solution!

My online class that runs from now until mid-December has an 800+ page text book (and yes, I will read basically all of it). And for some reason, the textbook manufacturer made this textbook a paperback. And I found it way too floppy and knew it would drive me nuts.

So I made my paperback book into a hard cover!

(Book cover from Target. Hurry, you might still be able to find them on clearance! It's paper and comes in a pack of three. It's meant to be colored with Sharpies but I'm also using crayons & highlighters)

I didn't take any in progress photos, mostly because I wasn't sure if it would work.

Here's what I did:
1. Found a couple sturdy boxes that I could cut up.
2. Trace around the book to get the 2 outer layer cardboard pieces.
3. Line up the 2 cut pieces to make sure they are the right sizes and trim as needed. I ended up trimming about 1/4"-1/2" off one of the long sides
4. Trace the outer cut pieces again for my inner layer cardboard pieces. These need to be cut about 1/2" smaller on the long side because they go on the inside of the cover.

(You can see why the book cover was necessary...)

5. Layer the outer layer on top and the inner layer inside the front cover and secure with rubber bands. Then tape the outer edges of the carboard (NOT the book, if you want to sell this book back). One thing I wish I had done was smooth out my rubber bands before taping. I can feel their twistedness through the book cover. Oh well, if it really bugs me, I can fix it.

6. Cover your new hardcover book with a book cover. I learned how to cover books from my junior year pre-calc teacher in HS. Never knew it would come in handy 14 years later!

I'm sure there are instructions on how to cover a book online but if you have questions, I can walk you through it.

On an unrelated note, the AC died last night. Ugh! I left at 5pm to meet some people for a run, ran to Target and Chipotle on my way home and when I got home at 8pm, the living room was 85 degrees (and got up to about 87). And the AC was blowing hot air. Of course this happened the DAY Mr. Crafty left for a 2 week long business trip. As if I wasn't going to miss him enough, he usually deals with things like this (not that I'm not capable, he just usually does them). So now, instead of going to work, I am waiting for the AC repairman to show up. Sleep last night was pretty miserable. I'm a grumpy (and sweaty) version of myself. I guess that's enough of my pity party.

Here's a couple pics of the crafty assistants "assisting" Mr. Crafty with his packing.

Rory making sure the garment bag flap did not blow away

Maggie supervising

Trixie tried to sneak a ride to Nebraska in Mr. Crafty's duffle bag. She played in that thing for like 20 minutes.

A Bee Block for Bibi

For August in the Coast 2 Coast Block Party Bee, Bibi asked us to make a block for her son using some of her fantastic scraps and Oh Fransson's Map of the States tutorial. I really like how this turned out. It was a fun bee block to make, although I'm not sure that I'd like to do it for a whole quilt. It is a bit time consuming because you are basically fussy cutting each piece. But I did love being able to pick which part of the fabric I could use.

And for those Trixie fans out there {I keep joking with Mr. Crafty that I need to make her a Facebook fan page} she was "helping" me when I got out my cutting board to cut my batting down to size for my brother's quilt.

Don't worry, she was no where near the sharp sissors. She spent some time in the bathroom with her toys. She cried the entire time and made me feel bad. But she hasn't learned what is and what is not a toy. She also hasn't learned that I am not actually a jungle gym and that she should not play on me with her claws out. Trust me, I have the scratches to prove it!

This morning's amusement

I don't often talk about work around here. I work for a state university in their Extended Campuses. Which means these days {not the "glory days" three years ago} there is very little money for even office supplies.

Mr. Crafty likes to joke about how I work for Northern Arizona University in southern Arizona. Yes, I work for Northern Arizona University in southern Arizona {we're a 4 hour drive from the main campus but the entire Extended Campuses divsion accounts for 1/3rd of NAU's students}. I don't know why Mr. Crafty finds this so amusing, he finished the degree he started at the main campus in Flagstaff here in Tucson and is the "poster child" for Extended Campuses. Ok, maybe not the poster child... but he really is exactly like the students we see here. But I digress...

Part of my job, and now an ever increasing part of my job, is recruiting. Remember how I said that we are a state university and we have very little money? When our higher ups announced this new recruitiment push, we asked if we could have our color laser printer back. No printer :-(

So next I asked if I could get 1 ream of each color of paper. Yes, just one ream. And I got it. I think I actually did a happy dance when my coworker told me she was ordering color paper for me and what colors did I want.

So today, I am updating my recruiting bag {which is a 5 year old scrapbooking bag bought online from Joann's for half price that is falling apart} and I pulled my reams of color paper out of their hiding place. Oh yes, I have to hide them or our faculty would have used them up by now. No joke. One of our faculty members took the brand new spindle of 100 CD's from the supply cabinet. We haven't been able to replace it yet so if I need to take a powerpoint or something with me, I have to put it on my personal thumb drive or email it to myself. So you can see why my reams of color paper were hidden. Ahhh, I digressed again...

So these are the pretty views I got while manning {or womanning} the copier.

Anyone else see a future quilt in there? I sure do! The white sheets in between the colors are my originals and they definitely look like sashing to me.

Look at those strata of pretty! Yes, that's a geology reference. It's like the layers of strata in the Grand Canyon or Sedona but in color paper.

Couple of things I've been working on

Hmmm, my month of crafty-ness during my four week break from school really has not materialized. And now I have 2 classes that start on Monday. Boo!

What was I thinking doing another master's degree? Some days, I have no clue! And although I haven't had classes to worry about, August is always killer at work. Working for a university, it is usually one of our busiest times of the year.

I have done a couple projects I wanted to share with you. And I am finishing up a couple things this week too. I'll show you those when I am done.

{I also have finished 3 and a half non-school books. All of them total chick lit. I found during my first master's program that chick lit was my anti-school reading. It's easy on the brain. And usually a fast read. Perhaps that might be part of the reason I haven't completed many projects?}

A couple weeks ago, I had to travel to Phoenix {4 hours roundtrip in the car} for work twice in three days. The first trip, I didn't bring anything in the car with me since quilting is not typically very mobile. But I was insanely jealous of my co-worker/friend Emily who worked on a crocheted blanket in the car. So the second trip to & from Phoenix, I made this.

Pardon the crappy pics, I took them in the car with my cell phone. This is currently in our kitchen but it's been raining each night this week when I got home from work so I haven't gotten a better pic yet. Also, the towel was an old towle because I am still learning and didn't want to "screw up" a new one.

Oh, and Mr. Crafty's comment when I showed him: "Cool! But why'd you use the towel I wiped car grease on?" Ummm, Mr. Crafty, why are you using our kitchen towels on the cars when we have an entire supply of shop rags from Costco? {sigh, MEN!}

Both are Jenny Hart's Sublime Stitching designs. {I added the "Sweet!" to the old man lemon}

Last Saturday, Mr. Crafty & I drove to Phoenix/Mesa to celebrate my dad's birthday. He loves bowling, so we went bowling after lunch. And by some miracle, I beat BOTH Mr. Crafty {Dan} AND my dad {Steve} in both games.

{My brother, who flew in from Missouri for the weekend, beat me both games. But we won't talk about that, it'll just give him an even bigger head than he already has}

Anyway, the crafty part of the visit...

I STILL haven't finished my brother and sis-in-law's quilt that was their Christmas present. The top has been done since December 23rd but I just have not gotten it put together. I have excuses galore... but...

To make peace, I ran to Target Saturday morning on my way home from my run with the Team {still accepting donations for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. And I ain't too proud to beg} and grabbed some clearance kitchen towels. I actually was looking for some striped ones but couldn't find any but stumbled on these on one of the clearance endcaps. Oh, how I love Target! I wasn't sure how they would work since they are waffle towles but they came out OK. There is a second towel for my brother, but I only got this one finished during the ride up there so I just didn't mention the second one. These are also Jenny Hart designs, from her China Town collection.

The top symbol is double happiness and my brother and {Chinese} sis-in-law used this all over in the decorations for their wedding reception. I used backstitch and stem stitch for these.

More to come later this week... hopefully including the Raspberry Limeade Pinwheel quilt tutorial/pattern

Dream On Winner

Wow, 249 comments! I originally thought I would be happy with like 50 comments.

I enjoyed reading all your comments and am trying to respond to every comment personally. I still have a few more to go. And I am not sure if the emails I sent from my phone went through, sometimes I think my phone hates me, but it's close to time to get new phones. {Don't get me wrong, for the most part the G1 has been great and I have yet to pay for an app but sometimes I email Mr. Crafty and he doesn't get it}

I selfishly asked the question about your favorite part of summer because this is the time of year where I get fed up with summer. Living in the desert Southwest, summer lasts a really long time. And it's monsoon season so now it's hot AND humid. But many of you reminded me the good parts about summer. And now I really want to try to plant a little garden here next spring. Our townhouse has less than perfect conditions for a garden, a teeny backyard that gets sun nearly all day. Oh yeah, and I have a black thumb. I once killed bamboo in my office. But I digress...

{In case you were wondering, my favorite season is spring}

And now for the winner...

Drum roll please...

And the winner is... Joy!

Joy, I'll be sending you an email in a little bit. I'm off to run 14 miles with my friends in Team In Training so it might be later today. {Yes, it's 4:30am as I am writing this}

Crafting for a cause

Looking for my blog-iversary giveaway? See the next post... but please read here first! Thank you.

I have talked about this a couple other times but I am currently raising money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society as a member of Team In Training. As part of my training for the Nike Women's Marathon on October 17th, I pledged to raise $3500 for this great organization and their mission. They provide support for patients and their families, as well as research for new treatments and to find a cure for blood cancers. A cure for blood cancers could mean a cure for ALL cancers.

While this is a cause near and dear to my heart, it really hit home for me again recently. Our coordinator, who lost her husband 11 years ago to cancer, was just diagnosed with breast cancer herself. Ironically, her husband was a scientist who worked on the early stages of a cancer treatment drug that probably would have saved his life. Here is a woman who spends her days helping those and their families battle cancer, assisting people like me with their fundraising, and coordinating recruiting new participants, travel plans for our races and basically working her butt off. And her response "I'll be fine" and somewhere in there she also reminded all of us to get our yearly exams too. My 12 mile hill run {yes, I said 12 miles and hills together} on Saturday morning was dedicated to her and others that have been recently diagnosed.

Now you don't have to get up at 4am and do a 20 mile training run, I'll do that for you. There are too many children and adults out there going through their own marathons - with cancer treatment. I want to help these people but I need your help to do that.

As part of my fundraising for LLS, I am raffling off two quilts I've made, pictured above & below. Both a lap quilt-sized, with the Land & Sea (blue & green) measuring approx 46" x 52" and the Raspberry Limeade (pink & green) measuring approx 42" x 60". Every $10 donated to this cause gets you 1 raffle entry, and each $50 gets you an additional entry. Example: donate $30, get 3 entries; donate $50, get 6 entries; and donate $100, get 12 entries. Winners for each quilt will be drawn at random August 25th.

Make your tax-deductible, secure online donation here: http://pages.teamintraining.org/dm/nikesf10/jennifer

AND you get an extra TWO entries for each friend that you refer to this raffle that makes a donation. Have your friend put your name in the "additional comments" section on the donation page or email me at jennifer.wellborn@gmail.com.

Thank you for your support!

First Blog-iversary Giveaway!!!

GIVEAWAY CLOSED!

A couple days ago marked one year since my first crafty blog post ever. I missed celebrating with all of you on the actual day for several reasons. The main reasons are that I finished 2 summer school classes the day before, then reported to jury duty and was trying to figure out what to do for Mr. Crafty's birthday {which was yesterday}. I am happy to report that in the past week, I  have read TWO non-school books. But not much crafty to report. Oh, I did make these delicious snickerdoodle cupcakes for Mr. Crafty...

By the end of this month I hope to have a pattern/tutorial for this quilt... saying it out loud will make me do it, right?

Anyway, now to the giveaway. I thought about this over the past couple months. What did I really want to share with all of you? When I saw the Dream On line by Urban Chiks for Moda, I knew I wanted to give some Dream On away... and then I got it in my home and started thinking I might keep it. I love the vintage sheet-ish feel to it and I am a floral fan but more the 60's & 70's florals than your traditional florals.But I am not keeping it, I am giving it away to some lucky reader!

Here's what you get: Uptown Girl pattern by Carolina Patchworks and three charm packs of Dream On

GIVEAWAY CLOSED!
AND you get more than one opportunity to enter to win. Here's all the ways you can enter {please leave a separate comment for each}:
1. Tell me what you favorite part of summer is
2. Follow my blog {or tell me that you already follow}
3. Blog about this giveaway and leave a comment with a link to your blog
4. Make a donation to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society here and leave me a comment letting you know that you donated. This also enters you to win one of two quilts that are being raffled by me for this great cause.

Please make sure that I have a way to contact you :-)

A winner will be randomly drawn on August 20th at 9pm Arizona time. Happy crafting!!!

Happy birthday Mr. Crafty

Sunday is Mr. Crafty's birthday but I just made these snickerdoodle cupcakes when I got home from work today. I wanted to share with you. I haven't sampled them yet {OK, maybe a bit of frosting} because Mr. Crafty is stuck at work :-(

Edited: OMG, they are soooooo delicious! I had to take some to work for fear that I would eat all of them myself.

I'll post a link to the recipe soon. Writing this post on my phone from my kitchen while I make dinner for one :-(

Edited - Here's the recipe: http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2010/07/snickerdoodle_cake_for_cinnamo.html. I didn't use the applesauce & used an entire stick of butter for the batter. I threw in a little bit of extra cinnamon in the frosting too

First Blog-iversary Coming Soon!!!

I'll be posting a fantastic first blog-iversary giveaway very soon. Make sure you check it out...

{On a somewhat related note, I am DONE with summer school and have almost 4 weeks until the start of my next classes. I think I am still rocking the 4.0GPA too! Oh, the crafty things I have planned...}

OMG, Holiday Happy giveaway!!!

Kerri at Lovely Little Handmades is giving away Holiday Happy by Monica of Happy Zombie!

Just look at that fabulousness!!!

P.S. Here's my previous blog about my love for this line... You can see more photos of the line and links too.

Quick baby tutorial

Haha, I guess that should read Quick Tutorial for Baby. That sounds like I am giving you a quick tutorial on how to make a baby, not make something for baby...

Hehe, that photo's title on my computer is "baby tie onesie 007". Little baby James Bond :-)

Happy Anniversary Mr. Crafty

6 years ago, Mr. Crafty & I got married in beautiful Flagstaff, AZ. It poured rain and hail for our outdoor ceremony {we planned it for 1pm since it normally rained later in the afternoon but no such luck} but we still had a fantastic time.

Couple of weeks left...

...to enter the raffle to win one of these quilts!

I am raising $3500 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society {as a member of Team In Training}, I am raffling off two quilts I've made, pictured above. Both a lap quilt-sized, with the Land & Sea (blue & green) measuring approx 46" x 52" and the Raspberry Limeade (pink & green) measuring approx 42" x 60".

Every $10 donated to this cause gets you 1 raffle entry, and each $50 gets you an additional entry. Example: donate $30, get 3 entries; donate $50, get 6 entries; and donate $100, get 12 entries. Winners for each quilt will be drawn at random August 1st.

AND for each friend you refer that makes a donation, you get another TWO entries into the raffle! (Have your friend put your name in the "additional comments" section on the donation page or email me at jennifer.wellborn@gmail.com)

And your donation and raffle entry is 100% tax-deductible. For more information about this great cause or to make you donation and enter the raffle, please visit http://pages.teamintraining.org/dm/nikesf10/jennifer.

More information about these quilts, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and my fundraising, please visit my original post here. {I am too tired to put it all in this post too... hey now, I am going to go run 3 miles of hills in a few, I need my energy!}

Newest member of the crafty household...

I called Mr. Crafty late in the work day yesterday because we hadn't chatted on Google Talk all day. Sometimes that happens because he is too busy and other times it happens because he forgot his phone {his company doesn't allow him to download the app to his computer like mine does - I guess that's a perk of working for the university because it's certainly not the pay!}. Anyway, Mr. Crafty mentioned that there was a summer special going on at the Humane Society and did we want to go there after work...

I said "Of course! But I forgot my phone at home so you want me to meet you there?"

And when I got there, Mr. Crafty was nowhere to be found. A couple minutes later, he came out of the cat adoption room and said "I found a really sweet kitty named Boots." So we went back together to look at "Boots" the female kitten he found. She was in the cage below the kitten he had seen online that he thought I might like but that kitten was sleeping. "Boots" was up against the bars of her cage meowing and purring. She was even kneading the bars of the cage. We walked around looking at the other cats and kittens because we always want to rescue a cat because more people come to adopt the kittens.

We also had to think about how the new kitty would fit with our current kitties {a.k.a. the crafty assistants}. But I also knew that Mr. Crafty had fallen for "Boots" - this from a man that never wanted to have a cat when we met. I grew up with cats and he grew up with dogs. Maggie was his first cat ever. And he totally loves her. And Rory too.

So Trixie came home with us last night! She's about 4 months old and was a feral cat but is a total sweetheart. She has not stopped purring and climbed all over me on the couch last night. She kept trying to "help" me with my homework while the laptop was in my lap.

Needless to say, Maggie and Rory are not too happy with us right now. They both should be fine after the adjustment period. My sweet {but punkass} Rory even bit and hissed at me this morning when I tried to pet her. But earlier, while Trixie is confined to the bathroom for part of the day so Maggie & Rory can have much of their house back for a bit, Rory followed me in the kitchen and meowed for my attention. She let me pick her up and love on her. She just isn't used to having to share attention with any other cat.

Trixie & Rory are about to meet up for about the 3rd time. This one didn't go much better than any of the others, it involved hissing but no actual fighting

Woot! Finally keeping up!

After getting horribly behind in my ONE quilting bee - as in finishing my April & May blocks in late June! - that I'm involved with, I am actually caught up and alredy sent off my block for July yesterday. I seriously do not know how some women are part of several at a time!

Susan wanted us to make pinwheel blocks for her son, who's turning 15 this month. He picked out the cool Michael Miller guitar fabric. She asked us to make them using Rachel's block 2 tutorial from the Pinwheel Sampler Quilt Along.

{You know, the quilt along I started in February and only got 2 of the 8 sets of blocks made!}

She asked for 2 blocks but sent enough fabric for 3 :-)

Rearranging

Mr. Crafty & I spent part of yesterday rearranging half our house. We swapped our living room and dining room areas. We discovered recently, after 5 years in our house!, that the AC blows directly onto the far wall of the dining room area. The cats knew it but we didn't.

Process pledge

Have you heard about the process pledge? Over 200 quilting blogger have pledged to talk more about their process of creating quilts. I signed the pledge this morning... been meaning to do it and just kept getting distracted. (Mr. Crafty says I am like a cat and I get distracted easily by bright shiny objects. Wish that was the case, I've just been buried under schoolwork).



So I will be talking more about my creative process when quilting and making other craft projects. Right now my list of projects keeps growing so I should have plenty to talk about. Once Mr. Crafty & I reanrrange our living/dining room areas. He told me that I will get my own crafty corner, which will be nice since currently my messy crtaft/dining room table is the first thing you see when you walk into the room.

What I've been working on

As promised, here are some of the things I've worked on recently.

Tracy's block for the Coast 2 Coast Block Party. She wanted blocks inspired by the Story People artwork. So this is my Queen. I embroidered her eyes and mouth and the clouds. And then I set down my needle and cannot find it for the life of me... luckily my bare feet haven't found it either!

Ellen's blocks for the C2C Bee too. She wanted "inside-out" blocks. I used Little Miss Shabby's tutorial for the second block and created my own design for the first.

I learned to be careful when working on a block in progress and removing cat hair with a lint roller...

And here's the front of my mom's birthday quilt I started last summer. I've had the quilt front done since August (of last year!) but was scared to quilt it since it is the largest quilt I've ever made. Mom volunteered to take it to a long-arm quilter so I gave it to her yesterday.

 Front

 

Back

Close-up of front