Vacation

Lukas David N. was born on May 31, he was 10lbs. It was a very stressful time for my family. There was many complications leading up to and after the little guy arrived. After 9 days of being in and out of the hospital he is finally home and mom and him are resting up. He is so adorably chunky and my lil buddy. 

I still did the shop hop over my first weekend of vacation. We hit up 5 quilt shops (Cailco Girls, Endless Mountain Quilts, Quilter's Corner, O'susannahs, Patchwork Plus). It was a lovely time and I got some great items for my collection. At each shop you got a fat quarter and applique and enter in a daily drawing along with treats and demonstrations on techniques or new products that are out. I loved the theme of the shop hop April in Paris; so all the applique's had something to do with Paris (a total of 7 applique's). I bought a ruler with a 45 degree angle (for this new way of doing a mitered binding), a Dresden ruler, and a lil twister ruler (to do a twisted piece patchwork). I also have an interest in learning paper piecing and picked up a couple of paper piecing patterns for coasters along with a bunch of fat quarters and a book on how to be a confident quilter. The Old Bear and I had fun spending some quality time with each other even though it was during a quilt store shop hop.

I only have a few day's left of my vacation so I have been spending time with my lil buddy and working in my craft room. I will have some pics posted in my kraft corner that I have been working on!

Quilting Store Shop Hop

I start vacation on April 4th at 4pm and cannot wait for it. Hopefully my nephew will make an appearance that week or before. My Old Bear and I are planning a two day shop hop called Paris in April (4 Shops in NY and 1 in PA). It's going to be a great  for me and boring for him but a great time with each other. Hopefully I get some great finds and possibly win one of the sewing machines up for grabs.

Baby Shower

 This past Saturday we finally had my sisters baby shower for my nephew Lukas  (name finalized). After much planning and shopping and setting up, it was a great shower. Food was delicious (ordered from a local deli Spera's). She got just about everything on her registry along with lots of Diapers due to the diaper raffle. Anyone planning a baby shower should definitely do a Diaper Raffle (prices of diapers these days are ridiculous), we had to gifts to raffle off. (Bottle of Red Cat Wine w/ Gertrude Hawk Chocolate, and variety of lotions from Bath & Body Works). We ordered the cake from Cakes By Michele, it was Chocolate on top and chocolate chip on bottom; very delicious.  My mother painted the LUKAS letters to fit the theme that my sister is able to use as nursery decor afterwards!

 We used baby turquoise tulle ribbon to run down the centers of the tables. The placemats are single scrapbook paper (2 different ones), I handmade the B-A-B-Y tent cards for the center of tables along with a glass jar with candy and little pinwheels.

 We gave mini anti-bacterial for hands from Bath and Body Works as favors to our guests.

 My sister got a Diaper basket, Diaper Cake, and a Diaper Baby from family.

Overall, the baby shower was a success. I also quilted a baby blanket for Lukas, along with sewed a bunting banner for his room. Those pictures will be posted in my Krafty Corner page of my blog.  I'm glad that it is finally over so I can focus elsewhere like creating more in my new Kraft Corner/room in the house! 

Since my last post!

Been busy planning my sisters baby shower for my little nephew. They have finally finalized a name 'Lukas Allen'. I'm so excited and looking forward to the new addition to our family. I have been trying to make a quilt for him. But I had my sewing machine break and had to fix it along with trying to learn the process of making a quilt. I've done placemats and baby doll blankets but not anything so big.  This is the top layer of the quilt:

This is the back layer, batting, and top layer:

This is a close up of the patch work:

I'm in the process of basting and deciding on what type of quilt pattern to use on it also waiting for my walking foot to come in the mail. 

 I also I want to try and make a bunting banner for the baby shower. I came up with some other ideas for the shower. I'll put pictures up next Sunday. 

Also, I was busy celebrating my 27th birthday! I got to spend some time with my old bear, friends, and family. I'm looking forward to this coming year and seeing what's in store for me.

A little insight on me...

I'll be 27 in less than a month and of course I always have to plan my own celebration cause my friends lack in that department. So dinner at Red Robbins and Galactic Bowling with lots of drinking and talking about old times. Hopefully my Old Bear can get the night off to celebrate with me. I call him my Old Bear cause we got 18 years difference in age. We are so in love and looking forward to a future together. My family and friends are really important to me, the help center me and know the real me. My nieces are everything to me, they are so funny and are like my own children, I'm so excited to meet my nephew so come on April!!

I work nights as a Customer Services Rep. I've been doing it for just over 5 years. I love working nights cause I still get to enjoy my days and spending time with my Old Bear who's kind of on the same schedule. I do a lot of my crafting during work cause there is a lot of down time and there is only so much TV and reading you can do besides cleaning house (yes I work from home). I'm the Sunday School Teacher leader at my local church. I do it for myself and my nieces. I enjoy it so much.

I have a lot of things I would like to accomplish this year as a person, employee, leader, and aunt.
Some of the things I want to accomplish are:
   *get healthy (I'm the heaviest I've been and its effecting me mentally and physically)
   *save money (To buy my future house with my Old Bear)
   *start to create my own quilt for my bedroom (I've always wanted one and me creating my own is the cherry on top)
   *create more wood decorations for my house (I love painting bird houses. creating Christmas decorations, along with some home decor)
   *golf at least once a week during the season (I've been golfing since I was 17 and really enjoy it)
   *create some good dinner concoctions ( I CAN'T COOK but I've always wanted to create new things to try besides easy to make things)
   *get more involved with the church  (our church is made up of baby boomers and needs some new fresh ideas and younger people stepping in or there wont be a church in a few years)

[With my mentioning my church and being a Sunday School Teacher, I am not a super religious person and I don't preach. I'm just confident in my beliefs and have no intention of defending anyone, just trying to give you an insight to the person I am.]

  *spend more time with my nieces Ashlee and Shelby along with help my sister out as soon as my lil nephew comes into this great big world.


Hopefully I can accomplish some if not all. I'm always up for a challenge.  I'd also like to meet new people. The people I surround myself with are my family and friends (since Elementary school). With my friends we are all at different stages in our lives and are interests are getting different. I would like to meet some people with some common interests. I hope that I can do that thru my blog.

Something New

I have so much free time and so much to say, I need to find things to do and ways to express myself. Experimenting in the kitchen, learning to use the sewing machine, expanding my reading selections, and of course capturing life with my Christmas gift to myself along with the occasional rant I decided to blog mainly for myself but in case others care to read or see. 

Me cooking, hahaha (I can't cook). I have to call my mom to ask how to boil eggs. So it will definitely be challenging and interesting to see how my concoctions. While using my great GG's recipes and many others I have collected over the years, I will post pics and recipes. My first recipe is going to be French Apple Cake for my churches Chicken N' Biscuit Dinner next weekend.

I bought a sewing machine a year ago (sitting in its box collecting dust). Just before Christmas I had to much time on my hands and all my Christmas shopping done that I wanted to give some homemade stuff to my close family. I made baby doll blankets for my nieces, place-mats for my sister and mom. I'm slowly learning my way around the sewing machine and quilters community. I've had to search youtube, quilters blogs, and books to figure sewing/quilting out. I find it hard to learn somethings from experienced quilters cause they use words i'm still trying to figure out. After my Old Bear finishes my craft room, I will think of my next project. Possibly my own place-mats or my nephews quilt although I still have time before he arrives to do that.

Oh I how I love to curl up on the couch or in bed and read a book. I love to get lost in a story. I read all kinds of books. Series or Trilogies are a love/hate relationship with me. I need all of them in my possession when reading them. I can't stand starting one and then not having the next one to read. I also think some authors take series to far.  One of my favorite series is the "The Southern Vampire Mysteries" series by Charlaine Harris, but I think it was dragged on to far and lost interest by the 9th book. I still plan to finish the series. I prioritize what I read by their cover (Don't say it, I know) but it's human nature in my opinion. I'm currently reading the "Private" series by James Patterson; I'll let you know what I think when I finish. 

My pride and joy is my NIKON. I am no professional photography by any means (Although I think I am). Between my mini Road Trips (bonding time with my sister) and my weekend adventures (with my Old Bear) I zoom, click, flash trying to capture everything about my trip. Some pictures come out great (most are blurry or to dark), I'm still finding my way with my camera. Pictures to come!!!