{*~My Take~*}

Rachel posted this fun little meme today & I thought I'd answer some questions this afternoon!

1. When do you feel happiest? I'm happiest when I'm spending time with Mr. McPorkchop. Car rides are especially my favorite. If I'm stressed or sad, he always suggests a car ride and I feel a lot better afterwards.

2. How do you take care of yourself? I sadly am not one to take very good care of myself. Today being a perfect example, I've been sewing allllll morning & afternoon and completely forgot to eat, even though I was with friends who were eating. As a result, I have a migraine from hell blooming. I have been painting my nails often...does that count? And I take my medicines every morning at the exact same time, I should get a bonus point for that!

3. Are you internally (by yourself) or externally (by others) motivated? I think I'm a little bit of both. Sometimes I have to turn off the computer & focus on what I'm working on because I find myself being overwhelmed by other peoples work, but other times I get so focused on what I'm working on that I burn myself out & love to look at other peoples work as inspiration and motivation! It goes both ways!

4. What do you do for fun? Lately I've been painting an hour a day! That's a big thing for me because I hate wasting any sort of time & I genuinely feel bad taking time for myself when there are a zillion things I need to do in a day, but I've started to realize I need a balance and painting calms me down and forces me to concentrate.

5. What intimidates you? Can I answer what *doesn't* intimidate me?! Haha. I'm very easily intimidated. Girls with perfect hair & bodies, I'm chubby & my hair is straight & a little boring! At the moment I'm intimidated by anyone who can stipple well, I've got a long way to go. Anyone who can sew a perfectly straight line too, no matter how hard I try, straight lines aren't my thing! Also anyone who can balance a zillion things at once. Oh! And 98% of the people I went to high school with, they all have fancy careers or are finishing up grad school, it intimidates me in the sense that I dropped out of college because I hated it & I don't have the sort of stability that a 9-5 offers, I think a lot of them think less of me & what I do. That's a very strange feeling, like I'm insecure and at the same time, defensive!

6. What is something you're proud of? I'm proud of how my sewing skills have grown! I'm proud of my design sense in quilting!  I'm proud that instead of wasting $$$ on my last semester of college for a degree that I didn't really want anymore, I walked away to pursue my dreams, it took a lot of balls! I'm proud that I've been a vegetarian since late December & it's inspired me to cook in a completely different way! I'm proud of the fact that I can mend my husbands clothes, cook him an incredible homemade meal & keep him warm with quilts, sometimes all in one day ;)! I'm proud of my cooking skills in general! I'm proud that I can sew, knit, crochet & make cheese from scratch! I'm proud of my fabric knowledge! I'm proud of my small windowsill herb garden! I'm proud of my best friends & I'm excited when they achieve things! I'm proud of how much I read!

7. Finish this sentence. I never _____________. am content! Ever! Each day I want to do more more MORE!!!!! I want to grow more as a person each day, both emotionally and physically. But not physically in the sense that I want to get chubbier...haha! ;)

8. Favorite vacation spot. Mmm so many options! Probably San Francisco, it's my favorite city! Although I'm pretty keen on

9. Today is a (rate from 1 - 10). 8.5! I got to sew with my friends, accomplish a lot of sewing, eat the first strawberries of the season, give a birthday gift to the cutest little 5 year old but I nicked myself with my rotary cutter & have a bit of a headache...so 8.5 it is! It'll go up to 9.5 once Mr. Porkchop is home for the night!

10. Finish this sentence. If you knew me really well you'd know _____________. that I sneeze verrrry quietly, I can't handle my alcohol at all & I hate having my photo taken with a fierce passion (see both in the photo below!)

Happy Thursday friends!!!! I hope your week has been going *great!*

xo

{*~complications~*}

If I could sum up the past few days, I'd use the following phrases:

"bloody nose","this is why we can't have nice things" and "does this taste like metal/fish/spoiled/off/gross to you?".

Mmmm yes. Excitement around this place! Broken electronics, total klutziness, strange side affects from medicines and a whole lot of cussing & laughing. Typical McPorkchop behavior!

I'm doing a little bit of sewing today...in between projects I made Mr. McPorkchop this doodle jump inspired mini quilt. It's all free motion quilted & applique. Wayyyy too much fun. It's a blast mostly because it's scribble-y! I'm sure if you aren't familiar with the opening screen, this mini just looks like a hot mess, but accurate to the game, haha.

I'll be updating etsy later on this week with slots for custom mini quilts (provided I have finished the 3 orders I already have!), some patchwork camera straps that are cuuute, four mini quilts, kindle pouches, some mug rugs & some patchwork zippered pouches! woohoo! I hope that if I type this out, I'll actually update it, someone should hold me accountable, haha. I have no self confidence with these sort of things, I talk myself out of selling stuff because I'm convinced everything has some tragic flaw which is my excuse if things aren't 100% factory perfectly made, for example, one of the custom mini quilts I'm finishing for the FOURTH time because I'm not satisfied with it. Yeah. I'm a bit hard on myself.

A few things I like today:

This bread which is free of all my allergens and still tastes great! However, it's extremely expensive ($7 a loaf!!!). But doesn't upset my stomach...so I'll buy it as a special treat every once in a while.

This set of paper, I got it as a gift! I'll be using it for this class!

This dress that I can't stop lusting after. It appeals to my New England roots & my inner smothered yuppie who's tired of wearing jeans, teeshirts, flannels & reefs.

This fabric which is begging to be beignet.

Speaking of patterns, I adore this but the largest bust size is too small for me!

I'm off to iron some fabric & work on a custom mini. I just finished season 3 of Buffy last night...watching her graduate high school & say goodbye to Angel was so bittersweet. How the heck did I get sucked in so completely?! Not to mention the first episode of season 4 is her at college...oh how I could relate to her first day college experience...minus the whole vampire slaying ;)

Have a great Tuesday!

xo

{*~TGIF!~*}

This weekend I'll:

• be finishing a custom mini quilt
• working on stuff for this class
• catch up on blocks for this quilt-a-long
• bake brownies from this cute post!
• catch up on the buffy dvd netflix delivered
• be finishing up on secret projects
• fill out my census form
• figure how why I can't get my gravatar to show up on my blog! It works on others! GAHHHH!
• crochet a cozy cowl!

Have a great weekend everyone!!!!

{~*Wordless Wednesday*~}

{*~Sunny~*}

I woke up this morning with a very warm face...the sun was out!!!!

I don't think I've seen sunshine in over a month. Like more than partly cloudy!

I had Mr. McPorkchop help me outside so I could take some quick snapshots of this in progress quilt.

For some reason I'm always scared to show in progress stuff. I'm afraid my photos don't do justice to things I create so I'll hold off until sometimes months after I've finished something to gather the courage to share it! Well, New Years Resolutions made me promise to share more & I'm so glad I did! After seeing the photo I realized there are a few mistakes, I inserted some of the blocks wrong...I'm not sure if I'll fix it or leave it. I'm thinking leave it ;)

I really really enjoyed working on this quilt. It was pieced both on my featherweight & Bernina, both at home & with friends. The fabric is Nicey Jane from Heather Bailey & the solid gray is my all time favorite because it's a green based gray, by Amy Butler, I'm not sure if the color is linen or slate. I bought it from Runs with Scissors in Auburn & am planning on buying some more! I love it *that* much. If anyone is interested in a similar kona color, let me know & I'll match it :) I bought the entire line of Nicey Jane in fat quarters at an after Christmas sale. At first I wasn't sure if I liked this line, but all together, it's GORGEOUS.

The pattern is Sparkling Cider by All Washed Up. Here is a blog post they've written about it. I love love love the look of this quilt, I've got a thing for stars, the one in their blog post made with Amy Butler fabrics hangs in a local shop & every.single.time I see it, I drool. It's so summery & vintagey & fresh & modern all at once. I think thats what I love about using a pattern to make a quilt, you can take a semi-traditional pattern, use modern fabrics and have a completely different feel! The neat thing is the pattern designers, Angie & Weezie live here in Humboldt & I've met both of them, they are just really neat ladies!

It was a challenge for me in the sense that I prefer my quilts to be very simple, very easy on the eye. I can't do "scrappy" quilts or "busy" quilts, it stresses me out for some reason. I need lots of negative space, solids & small patterns or big patterns in specific areas. So when this went up on the design wall at Scottie Dog Quilts, I needed a LOT of help with how to lay out the fabrics, the pattern says scrappy, I say "LAY IT ALL OUT FIRST!!!!" because I need control. Obviously. Haha. But the ladies helped me out as usual & I couldn't have done it without them! I was ready to throw in the towel & add some more solids!

Now that I look at this photo, I realize I love this fabric line because it looks like vintage bed linens. Which EVERYONE seems to find at thrift stores...except me. Haha. Along with pyrex which I also never find.

Last night I decided I need a little more privacy in my internet life & have made facebook friends & family only. I have my ten year high school reunion coming up & various family events & would rather keep business friends contacts separate, I've been watching Mr.McPorkchops friends add photos of him from elementary school & I'd rather not have everyone witness that should it happen to me;)!  If anyone is interested, I might create a business facebook page that people can fan & I can update with shop updates, blog updates, sales, etc.

I'm planning on sitting outside...soaking up some Vitamin Sunshine, reading kindle & coughing cough coughing!!! I swear I was coughing so much in my sleep last night that I thought Mr. McPorkchop was going to kill me...sadly he's starting to get sick now :( Poor Porkchop!

Have a great Sunday everyone!!!!

xo

{*~Turn That Frown~*}

Is it weird to say thank god it's Monday?

This weekend was so terrible and so awesome all at once. Mr. McPorkchop was only home for a short 2 days instead of 3 and a half. Him being home and just being him was the amazing part of the weekend. We've tentatively come up with a plan for after he graduates and where we'd like to live. It was partly just a nice time to have a goal to work towards instead of being so glum about our current situation!

The not so amazing parts? Wes's dog Molly passed away and I felt terrible that I couldn't be there for my mom, it was her last sort of living link to him. She was ancient, 17 years old for a doberman, she's had an amazingggg life, but it was still sad and even sadder to talk to my mom. It's times like these that I hate living so far away from her! Then a *huge* order that I finished (65 pads) ended up with a miscommunication and we mutually agreed to cancel the sale, thats putting it very very very nicely. I started working on my small batch of custom orders for the shop, only to cut some fabric wrong and have to reorder it and hopefully it'll arrive today and I'm crossing my fingers that overnight shipping really means overnight. We went to go see Up!, our local theatre just got a new 3D thingy and the projector broke, so after sitting there for an extra half hour, they refunded everyone, totally not a big deal, but I wanted to poke the eyes out of the other patrons, there was only like 5 people working, clearly, it wasn't their fault, and people, wow, they just thought they were entitled to free EVERYTHING. I was shocked and I genuinely felt so so so bad for the staff! I then went to a local fabric store for fabrics for a swap, only to realize the fabrics had been sold out. ARGH! I totally promised something and then couldn't deliver, that is *not* me and I'm very upset about it.

So what did I do?

Sewed. Started watching comedies. Had some beer. Cuddled. Bought some new fat quarters. Learned how to free motion quilt.

I've never free motion quilted before and my machine came with the foot, a special feature, blah blah blah. I was just too wimpy to try it, but you know what? When things are bad, thats a perfect time to try something new right! *grins* It was pretty fun! I don't know if I'll do a lot of stippling, I think its called? I found it more fun to "draw", if that makes sense!

We watched Reno 911 and season one of Seinfeld this weekend. I've never really watched either and I really really loved the dumb humor and dry humor of them both. Sometimes it's nice to take a break from over thinking and "thoughtful" movies to just laugh and be silly. We also saw Night at the Museum 2. Ohhh dear, what an unfortunate movie! lol! But we had fun holding hands, being snarky and drinking fountain sodas bigger than our heads.

Today I'm going to package up orders, work on orders, request my mail man comes tomorrow to pick up the orders, finish wrapping up some swap packages, go to the bank, you know, typical Monday stuff. I'm hoping a bit of work and running around will kick me out of my funk! Maybe I'll even get a coffee!

OH! And guess what? I won a gift certificate from pink chalk fabrics! Sweet! I'm not sure what I'll get yet, as having 2 months off from work pretty much slaughtered my clams (we call money clams, I'm not sure when or why, but we do) and I need to get to work!

On that note, have a fantastic Monday and tomorrow I'll post the winners of the giveaway!!!!

{~*Lucky*~}

I've just finished updating the shop! It took wayyyy longer than I expected because half way through importing my photos I bumped something and lost them ALL!!! Plus, this is my largest update that I think I've EVER done!!! Sweet!!!! There are some limited edition pads, liners, cotton backed pads, fleece backed pads...I tried to do a little of everything! YAY!

I've had amazing mail days the past few weeks, like amazing. Like swaps so fantastic that I haven't photographed them because I ripped into them so fast. Yup. That good. Yesterday I got these gorgeous Liberty of London from Kristen who just got back from London. I about died. They smelled AMAZZZZZING! I kept thinking "Liberty smells perfect, warm, cozy"...it turned out she'd packed them with some stuff from Lush! LOL! How great is that?! Hahaha! Even Liz yesterday commented on how nice they smelled! hahaha! These are going to be a quilt! I haven't decided on a pattern, I have found a few prints online that I'd love to have once my budget allows for it! Any pattern ideas would be great! Joelene sent me one that looks really great!

I was up wayyyy too late last night working on orders...I ended up doing an ENTIRE order wrong. Charming right? Sheesh. The order was going to be backed in cotton, I backed them in fleece. FAIL! That teaches me for staying up too late working! Next time sleep and get up early!

Tomorrow I'm going to the post office and farmers market. I have orders, swaps, etc to mail out. And yay for farmers markets!!! I'm dying to see what kind of local yumyums I can get! Mr. McPorkchop is on his way home from work right now and has stopped by Trader Joe's! YAY!!!!!

Don't forget that there is still time to enter my giveaway! Thank you so so so much to everyone whos emailed me, mentioned my blog, etc! I'm in awe of the positive response I've received! I love love love knowing that there are lots of people out there who are open to the idea of cloth! It keeps me going! Your kind comments have seriously made my week! I'm giving you all the hugest hugs EVER. EVVVVERRRR!!!!

Have a fantastic weekend! xoxoxo

{*Learning*}

I seriously can't believe its Thursday. How did this happen? Like, 4 minutes ago it was only Tuesday!!!

Today was quilting! It was a blast as usual. I quilted my clutch. I'm not 100% in love with it, my Pfaffs tension is real wonky and I couldn't adjust it right >:( I really *really* need quilting Thursdays, they just are such a great release! Everyone is so nice, so positive, it's GREAT. I wish I could get to purl n' hurl Humboldt on Thursday nights...sheesh. I start to get all anxious and nervous in public situations, clearly, I need to get out of the house more.

Liz taught me how to english paper piece! omg. ADDICTING!!!! I've made about 6 little pieces so far. Liz was talking about being unable to jut *sit* and thats TOTALLY me. I need to be working on something at all times. Watching tv? Knitting or embroidering. Reading a book? Sketching and writing down things that inspire me. Journal writing? Daily. Literally every second of my day is spent doing *something* creative and work related. I was going to make more and sit on the couch building and handsewing but we had unexpected guests of Aric & Ashleigh! WOOT! I <3 them so much.

We ended up going to Michaels where they had yudu supplies! YES!!! We got a ton of stuff and I bought a porcelian marker. Why do you ask?

Because I bought a neti pot!!!!

I ended up going to the co-op and they had a coupon so I got a cute ceramic neti pot for around $15. Score! I'm planning on drawing all over my little white pot. I want to put silly sayings on it, like "blow me", because you know, blowing my nose! Haha. I won't go into the details about it, but if anyone has any suggestions, please share! I could literally sit there for an hour and stuff would still be draining. Ick.

I'm about thisclose to a full blown sinus infection but I've been rinsing my nose every few hours to release the pressure and it's been helping. I don't want to get sick right now. I have too much fun stuff going on!!!

I'm almost done with my current batch of custom orders and they should be shipping tomorrow and Saturday! Yay!!!! I'm most likely going to extend the 72 hours to a week, just because I don't want to rush, a custom order means I take special time, ya know?! I also ordered new colors of cotton for the backings of pads, I found an amazing site with low shipping costs and it was within my budget, that always makes me so so so happy!! I've been getting SO many requests for cotton backed pads and I'm hoping people really really like them.

Tomorrow I'm getting up early to finish orders and list some liners. I'm not sure what time I'll update, as I have to go to the bank and run several business related errands in the morning (need more envelopes!!)

Yesterday I took an hour to work on a painting. I haven't painted in months. I reallllllly needed to pick up the brush again. Mr. McPorkchop & I have been collecting lots of beach trinkets lately and I want to paint them. They just make me so happy. Especially the broken shells. The little edges just make me so very happy!

I did try a watercolor block that I've never used before and I have to be honest in saying that I most likely won't finish this painting because the paper was driving me BATTY!!!! It kept buckling and wrinkling, which is odd to me because I'm a very dry watercolor painter. Go figure. But I did buy new watercolors from Daniel Smith last year for a painting class I was taking and wow. Just wow. Amazing pigmentation. Amazing colors. They just glide so evenly. They completely blow my sennelier paints out of the water. Which I *never* thought I'd ever say, considering that palette is 3 years old now and still going strong. Either way, it was really really nice to sit, listen to music and paint.

I attempted to sit down and knit last night. I was rummaging through some stuff and found an almost finished project. So I wanted to finish it and sheesh, it was rough knitting. I found a lot of mistakes I'd made and I just wasn't feeling it. Also, I'm pretty much obsessed with all of Yahaira's current triangle scarves. I super love the look of them, I've already attempted to copy her Ishbel and failed, springtime bandit is beyond my skill level, but frostberries might be perfect! Woot!!!! I might give it a gander!

This weekend we are having a very hilarious, very rowdy house guest. He canceled last weekend, so I'm not sure if he will again for this weekend, but yay for houseguests!

I have a small list of things I'd like to get done this weekend:

1. Finish custom orders
2. Update the shop
3. Make myself a pouch for my id and debit card. I'm torn on fabrics on this. VW buses? Japanese cactus fabric?
4. Finish my moms bag and apron
5. Work on Kelly's apron

A pretty modest list for me, but if we have a house guest, it'll be more like 1, 2 and 4. And maybe toss some knitting into it. I feel like everything hinges on if I can kill this sinus infection before it gets worse. One more meeting with neti before bed, plus some mushroom pills and vitamin C, I'm crossing my fingers that I wake up feeling better!!!!

What are you doing this weekend? Anything good?

{*New Stuff!*}

The shop is fully stocked with new cotton backed pads and pad bags!!!

Two of the pad bags ship priority for free! Woot!!! And if you purchase pads AND a bag, I'll refund your pad shipping! EXTRA WOOT!

I've gotten a lot of questions about the shop and I can't figure out how to reply to comments directly, it keeps saying email addresses are invalid...boo!!!

I know its lame to open the shop and have to click through each listing to see whats sold out or in stock. I *always* move the listings that have sold down to the bottom. I don't delete them until after they've been shipped and received. So when you visit the shop, the first listings are the in stock and ready to purchase items! Yay!!!

Speaking of GROWING pains, how about a LACK of growing thats causing me pain?! This is my dear Ishbel. It's growing and it's paused. I'm on the very first row of the lace, I have the correct amount of 173 sts going into it, but each time I get to "to 8 sts before centre stitch", I get messed up. You see, the last little bit, the sl1, k2tog, psso? Yes, well I only have TWO stitches before that 8 stitches when I clearly need THREE! I've frogged the same row 6 times!!! Thankfully this yarn is amazing and can handle it just fine, but I hate being lost on knitting.

Another pretty yarn photo to make the pain go away:

Tomorrow is quilting! WOOT! So excited!!! I'm not 100% sold on the color I chose for sashing, so I'm letting the quilt top just marinate for a bit. I'm going to bring my huge pile of scraps and work on cutting some coins, plus I'm going to see what my options are for accucutting and hopefully cut Momo Wonderland into a quilt! WOOTxten!

Also, some of you might know this, but you might not! I've struggled with my weight my whole entire life, I go from thin to heavy and back and forth. I gained 60+ lbs in 3 years of losing both my grandparents and my stepfather and basically eating my pain away. Eek. That's very hard to even type!!! Well, I joined Weight Watchers on the first of the year and I've almost lost 15 lbs!!! I'm really excited, but it sure is hard!!! I keep snapping photos of myself in my mirror, I *never* let my photo be taken, but today after working out, I'm noticing a difference in my face, so I'm being brave and admitting my food/self esteem issues!!!

It's so odd to look at photos of myself! So I'm working towards better self esteem and better health!!! It's hard to do for sure, my friend Danielle is a *huge* inspiration to me, she's an all around amazing person and has been so encouraging to me!!! She's doing an MS walk and her story and inspiration for doing it is awesome! Check it out here!

It's now April 1st and I'm working on more and more goals. I want to do Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred! Sheesh! I can only get like 8 minutes into it and I feel like my lungs are going to burst, so my goal this month is to get through the entire 20 minute work out. I need to be more active!!! Also, did anyone else go into wii fit today and notice its prank?!! How hilarious is that?!?!

Have you worked on any of your New Years Goals? Have they stuck? Or did some of them fall apart?

{*Phew*}

Phew!!! What a crazy weekend!!!

After the Wednesday pad giveaway, things got really really hectic around here. It turns out quite a few people are very very unhappy with the lack of custom order availability and I got to hear about it. I've never gotten so many mean and hurtful emails before. It was quite the shock. At one point my email topped out at around 190 emails. Most of them were FANTASTIC. Some left me in tears and I'm NOT ok with that.

So I ended up unplugging my computer and just focusing on working and finishing up orders. Wowzers, I got almost 100 pads done by Saturday morning, so tonight I've been able to list some custom slots! With these slots all you need to do is pick the top fabric! Easy peasy!!!! Just purchase the listing, I'll send you a link to a super secret website where you can pick your fabrics! Then I'll mail you pads! woot! This way all orders will be easy to manage and no more sewing 15 hour days! As orders get fulfilled and shipped, I'll be adding more to the shop! Sweet!

Don't forget that I'm *always* willing to combine shipping. I've set some of the shipping prices kinda high but I *always* refund over shipping costs or upgrade to priority. And since I'm updating the shop constantly, I'm also more than willing to hang on to your order so you can keep shopping for a few days! No problem! Just let me know!

After Saturday I was seriously BEAT. Mr.McPorkchop very kindly took me to a daffodil show on Sunday!!!! They are my ALL time favorite flower and it was so nice to walk around and just look at the flowers! So awesome! It was really neat to read all the names and see the different varieties! I pretty much want a giant batch of them. Did you know some varieties have pink trumpets? They are the sweetest things I've ever seen.

It was odd to not have anything super pressing to do, so I started to clean up the sewing nook. I get a ton of emails about what I do with my scraps and the truth is, I save every little last piece. I can't bear to throw any away! I'm not sure what I'm saving them for. But last night, it kinda came to me. Ok. That's a lie. This flickr group has inspired me to bits! I suddenly found myself sitting on the floor, cutting bits and pieces of scraps and laying them down.

Next thing I knew this happened:

And then this!

Whoa!!! Crazy!!! So so so so so much fun!!! They are going to be quilted and turned into a clutch! woot!!!!

I have several pads ready for tomorrow, it got too dark for me to photograph them. Also, want to see a mistake?

I made this super rad pad bag this afternoon. Was just putting the finishing touches on it when I realized I put the nylon too close to the zipper, so I trimmed it and...accidentally poked a hole in the nylon with my scissors! EEK!!! I ran to JoAnns and found a washable fray check so I'm going to try it. It totally breaks my heart because if you know Heather Ross, you know that the VW fabric is discontinued (so are the white flowers) and super hard to find, making it so so so expensive on etsy and eBay. I paid an arm and a leg for it, only to make a mistake on the lining...oh GRRRRR!!! Look at those cute little buttons?! So much fun to make. I might list it tomorrow and maybe offer free priority shipping? A small discount?! I don't know!!! Sheesh!!! I'm referring to this bag as the VENTI bag! lol. It's so big and nice!!!

I'm going watch antiques roadshow and work on some more pads for the shop! I'm still responding to emails, so bear with me!!!

Happy Monday!!! xoxoxo

{*Love It!*}

What a DAY!!!!!!!!

Firstly, thank you so much everyone for all your get well soon wishes! You all are so so so nice to me!!!

I woke up feeling ok-ish, so I got to work right away, I got done a super super fun custom order, three pads, I got to chose the fabrics, she said she liked jewel colors, big flowers and birds! AWESOME! I'm super jazzed with how cute these came out! I also ironed and got ready the fabrics for tomorrows custom orders! Score for getting stuff done!

I feel like I haven't left the house in years, even though it's really only been a few days and I needed some spray starch and a free motion foot for my machine, so we visited my favorite local fabric store, Scottie Dog Quilts, here in Eureka! Ok, I adore this shop to pieces, it's owned by a mother daughter team who are just the sweetest most knowledgeable ladies ever!!! I went in thinking "Ok, Amanda..steady...steady...don't sneeze on anyone...spray starch and leave..."! I ended up being "HOLY CRAP NEW AWESOME FABRICS!!!! *Sniffle. Sneeze. Sniffle*". I was so so so excited, they had some of the best new stuff ever, I think you can tell by my stack that I'm feelin early spring, greens and pinks! Hopefully these fabrics will turn into pads mighty fast! Also, Liz offered to teach me english paper piecing! How insanely cool is that? Once I'm not sneezing on every one I'm totally going to take her up on it!

So you all know by now that clearly, when I'm sick, I still want to build stuff and I generally can't even begin to sit still that long. I was up late a few nights ago as I mentioned before, sneezing, as always and I got so inspired by Oh, Franssons doll quilt from sewmamasew! I decided then and there that a doll quilt can totally be made while I was sick! Even better, I could make it in bed.

Quilters out there, don't worry, I can hear your laughter.

I started by grabbing my scrap bag of fabrics, I save all my pad scraps so I can make stuff from them. I cut 20 3 inch squares, by hand, in bed. See the ones that are wonky? Yup. In bed. No rotary cutter, clearly. Oops!

I then started to sew by hand the top row of fabrics. Also, clearly. Hahaha. Not so good. So I put it aside until this morning because I'm honestly not good at hand sewing. AT ALL! I stitched all my rows together with the machine and..viola! I made a mistake! See that bottom square where its 4 linens in a block? Yeah. Mistake. I need to take that apart. I'm going to do the sashing in dark grey corduroy, piece together my own binding from scraps and then back it in plaid shirting or wool. I got a free motion foot today and if it fits, I'm going to try and quilt it that way, but the idea of stitch in the ditch by hand sounds kinda nice too.

Tonight Mr.McPorkchop & I are going to go through a years worth of paypal and etsy receipts for my taxes. Goody! I got some new medicine at Long's so hopefully I'll feel a little better because this weekend we are moving around my sewing space in preparation for my top secret new project! And because my fabric collection, I don't know why, is out growing its space.

Go figure ;)

Really though, I'm sure I'll be asleep on the couch in five minutes, I'm B.E.A.T. Fabric shopping takes a lot out of you ;)

Have a fantastic weekend everyone!!! xoxoxox!!!

{*New Blog*}

this is my wordle!

isn't it cuuuute?!

Well, thanks to my amazing friends, my website is off to an amazing new start!!!! I'm going to be deleting typepad and during the time I'll hopefully make sure that all my older posts still have their original photos. I'm also adding to my bffs, so if you've linked to me, please please please let me know, on typepad I could see what sites referred people to me, but this one I haven't quite figured out yet!

I was tempted to post a photo of myself today with my amazingly red nose, puffy face and bed head, but I'm prrrrrrretty sure you don't want to see that! Today is my all time sickest day, sheesh. I've been falling asleep every few minutes and I've only been able to eat half an english muffin. I'm forcing myself to be better by tomorrow, I have orders piling up and I want to work darnit!!!!

Last night I got out of bed for an hour, not smart, but I'm so insanely inspired by sewmamasews doll quilt a long that I grabbed some fabric scraps and started cutting 20 3 inch squares...by hand...in bed. Yeah. That's how desperate I was for something creative!!! I have them all done and ready to be pieced! In my medicine fog I picked some strange fabrics, hopefully they'll all go together nicely. Also, did you guys see that the rad quilter oh, frannson is going to do a beginners quilt a long?! You know I'm on it!!! I really really want to learn to quilt and so many of my friends are talented quilters, like Brooke! My favorite quilting inspiration bff is Christin that scarf is so so so rad!!!

Ok, I'm ready to fall over, off to take more medicine and sleep. ARGHHH!!! I need an i.v. of orange juice!

xoxoxo