Wednesday, July 30, 2008

He's home!


The first week has been great. Porter has such a good disposition. His sisters have been so gentle and loving with him. Porter got the hang of nursing and I remember how newborn poo smells like buttered popcorn (I'm not kidding!) Thanks for all of your well wishes. We love him!

Getting a little bath.
Getting a little nap.Getting a little bonding time with dad.

We were blessed with so many great gifts from friends and family. I did do a few projects for the babe. Jonathan asked me how many blankets I've made.

Only four.

Monkeys (fabric on the back) were the inspiration for this rag quilt. The other fabrics are polka dots, mini stripe, and solid white.


This seersucker quilt is made with leftover material from the girls' Easter dresses and a couple of worn out shirts of Jonathan's. It's a perfect lightweight summer blanket.


This is his crib quilt. I embroidered the circles, then machine quilted the grid.

A simple fun cotton and flannel quilt. There is decorative stitching around the edge to hold it together.


I am still the sewing friend, after all!

Sunday, July 20, 2008

The Police and Babies

Guest post by your neighborhood Cycling Friend


Fear not my Bernina obsessed sewing friends. Put down your thimbles and rickrack and lets talk some rock-n-roll and newborns!


So after a hard night of Rocking at the Police concert last night (Thanks for the tickets James. The show was amazing). Those old farts can still rock pretty hard!



We got a call at 7:15 am this morning. I heard the phone ring, rolled over and wondered who in the hell would be calling my house at that hour on a Sunday Morning? Didn't the SF get released from the Primary Presidencey a couple of weeks ago? Oh its the American Fork Hospital. They wondered if we could be there by 8:30 and they said they would get the party started for us. So we pulled the kids out of bed, got them dressed, called Grandma Valentine to see if they could take the kids to church for the day and we were out the door.



We made it to the hospital and got settled in pretty quickly. The Sewing Friend and I are kind of old pros at this birthing thing now. Its our fourth time and we have had all of them at this hospital. We feel like we practically own the place. So the Doc made his way in, broke out his darning needle and broke the Bag O' Waters. We hung around for a while talking, watching T.V. , and reading our books. The SF finished reading a biography about Porter Rockwell while I was working on a book about David Breshears (Everest Mountain Climber). The contractions were coming and going but nothing too serious.

So about 1:30 we talked to the nurse about putting the SF on a small dosage of Pitosin (sp?). Oh I should probably mention here that the SF was planning on doing this birthing thing sans medicina and was a little apprehensive about making the situation any more painful than it needed to be. Nevertheless we decided to get the PIT line going and sure enough the contractions started coming in consistent and hard.

Now for the Sewing Friends out there who don't know the SF's cycling friend (me). Rest assured that the cycling friend and his buddy's know all about suffering through pain as we race our bikes up the high altitude climbs of the Wasatch mountain range. But the SF can put us all to shame. This chick is tough. She doesn't complain and does whatever it takes to get the job done. All of the nurses and doctors were amazed (and so was I) at how well she was dealing with the pain and how much control she had over her body in keeping it relaxed and focused on the task at hand. In fact she didn't even swear! Which we were all greatful for because she spent 15 minutes apologizing profusely to the entire hospital staff after baby #3. She said there was just this one word that really helped alleviate the pain.....Sh*t I said it again!

Anyway about 3:00 o'clock the pain was getting to be unbearable and the SF was questioning her resolve and commitment to this whole "all natural" approach. But after the nurse checked her and we realized she was almost completely dilated and ready to start pushing she doubled her efforts and decided to stay the course. Holy smokes ...... a couple of good hard pushes and we got's us a baby boy!



Porter Robert James was born just a couple of minutes after 4:00 and tipped the scales at 9lbs 3 ozs and was 20.5 inches long. That's a lot of baby boy. He looks just like a little James baby with big lips and a healthy nose. He was super quiet and mellow the first couple of hours. In fact he was so mellow the nurses were trying to rough him up a bit to get him to scream out a little fluid that was in his lungs. They were all laughing because no one could get him upset....even when they broke the needles out and starting sticking him.



We feel so luck to have this little guy in our family and rest assured there will be no lack of attention paid to this baby. Ya think?

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Nesting

After a lot of planning, shopping, painting, and sewing the bedrooms are done! This is the before for the little girls' room (that used to be the big girls' room):


The after:The yellow room was painted apple green. I sewed the duvets (split one in half and used a cheap sheet for the back side to save money), decorative pillows, bedskirts (added trim to a premade bedskirt), and drapes (added trim to premade sheers). The girls helped decorate the "S"es.

Do you like how I decorated mine backwards? Yeah, a 5 and 7 year old put their "s" the correct way. I quickly did the other side so it could hang correctly!

I recovered some bulletin boards. The lamp is from IKEA, with a little trim added.

This is the nursery before:
Now, transformed into a big girl/little boy room by some batten board, paint, and a lot of furniture!
Jonathan working hard-isn't he great?

The after:

I sewed the slipcover for the headboard, decorative pillow, bedskirt, cribskirt, bumper pads, crib quilt, and valance. The lamp is from IKEA with a little trim added.

I have a lot of photos of some of the projects: making the duvets and crib quilt. Let me know if you'd like to learn more!

Tours are available at the minimal cost of a plate of goodies!

P.S.
I had to make one for myself!



So, can I go into labor now? Please!

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

I was recently released as the Primary President in our ward after serving for two years. I had great ladies who served with me. While we are a church of lay clergy, (we don't get paid) I wanted to give something to these women to show them how much their dedication and support meant to me.

So, I sewed them purses to thank them for "carrying their load." I know, I'm such a cheese. Oh, it gets better.


Each have unique personalities and strengths. I captured this by embroidering an appropriate phrase inside each bag.
I can figure it out.

The ladies seemed to like them, and I was pleased with how well they turned out.

TECHNICAL INFO: I found the pattern online at Artsy-Crafty Babe . Click on Free Patterns for a PDF pattern. It is a great pattern and very easy to follow. (The blog and author is also what I aspire to do and be.) It makes a good size purse--very mom
friendly. I used cotton quilting fabric, home decor weight cotton fabric, and a looser weave home decor fabric for the bags and handles. I used plain muslin for the lining.

I used an iron-on midweight stabilizer for all parts. I fused the stabilizer before embroidering the sayings. I also embroidered the sayings and attached the ribbon before assembling the bags. The inside pockets are the same fabric as the outside fabric.


I added interest to the handles by sewing ribs with 1/4 inch spacing. I found decorative buttons for the simple closure, although I think a snap or magnetic closure could be adapted easily.

You should probably make some. Call me before I go into labor, and I'll help you!