Anaïs's Quilt and Wedding

            About a month ago, I started cutting up fabric for a quilt I was making for my friend Anaïs's wedding.  The one other quilt I've made for a wedding (last July) I finished more than 3 months in advance.  Since I was only starting the quilt with about a month to go until the wedding, this was very last minute for me.

            Luckily, the blocks did come together rather quickly once I started the sewing.  Nate's family was in town last weekend and Nate's mom helped me baste the quilt and mark the lines for quilting.  I had some fun with the binding; when I was at JoAnn Fabrics last week, I found the Bias Tape Maker machine I had been eyeing on sale!  So that should help with a lot of quilts to come :-)

             The fabric I used was a jelly roll of Amy Butler Love fabrics.  I like the different colors in this Amy Butler collection, and I also like that some of the patterns come in flannels as well as cotton, so I made the backing a warm cuddly flannel.  The front of the quilt was a Daisy Chain pattern which I got out of a book of Jelly Roll Quilt patterns by Pam and Nicky Lintott.  This is my first Jelly Roll quilt, but I had some fun doing it, so I definitely will try more of the patterns.  The main color of the quilt, yellow, was a fabric I found at JoAnn to supplement the jelly roll.

          With about 24 hours to spare, I finally finished binding the quilt and threw it into the washing machine.  Friday evening was spent box the quilt, wrapping it up, and finding the perfect card (a repro of an old postcard) to go with the gift.  

            It wasn't planned, since I didn't know which wrapping I would use, but the wrap job ended up matching my wedding outfit perfectly!

            The wedding was a very nice affair, just outside of Chicago in Elmwood Park.  We had a whole table full of Colgate people, many whom I "knew" from Colgate, but had never gotten to talk to before yesterday.  Many Congratulations and Best Wishes to Brian and Anaïs!

4th Annual Easter Brunch

Easter started a few days early for me, on Thursday.  What would normally have been a totally terrible afternoon (my car practically broke down on my way to work; I had to turn around, and leave it at the shop, so I cancelled work and came home) was magically turned around when I was home to receive a special delivery from my mom: a beautiful pot of hydrangeas, which helped get my house in the Easter spirit.

            Today was our 4th Annual Pot Luck Easter brunch.  I played Easter Bunny yesterday, filling little baskets for everybody (16 people!) and snacking on lots of candy while doing so.  The brunch was a huge success, and the weather cooperated this year.  It was the perfect temperature for a little post-brunch walk, which I went on with a few of my guests.  The spread of food was epic as usual.  Lots of full plates, and, soon after, full bellies.  The guests have all dissipated to sleep off the meal, but it will be Easter for a few more days at our house, where leftovers have taken over the fridge.

Crafty Day with Jenny

Since Jenny's been going to UIC Architecture school, we haven't gotten a chance to have a crafty day in a looong time.  Luckily, this week was her spring break, which coincided with some of my students' spring break, meaning we both had time off at the same time.  To celebrate, we planned a little day of crafts.  Nothing as intense as some of our other crafty days, but just some Eastery fun.

            During a quick trip to Target (where we bought a frozen pizza for our lunch) we found a box of cookies ready to be decorated, and decorate we did.  It came with 4 different colors of frosting to decorate with, and sprinkles, but we thought it didn't look like enough frosting so we supplemented with some quick, homemade buttercream.  We each had a cookie and a half.  And we feel sick.

            No Easter craft day is complete without some egg-dyeing, so we got out all of my old egg-dyeing cups and dyes and set to work making rubber band eggs, "magic crayon" eggs, and some new plaid and other-themed eggs, inspired by Martha Stewart's current issue on egg decorating.  Luckily, I just happened to have some electrical tape lying around from when Jenny and I made duct tape wallets.

            These are our favorite eggs.  Both were made using electrical tape to help make the designs.  The star one is mine - I cut out stars with a star punch and taped them on (easy enough).  The city skyline is Jenny's (a true architect, eh?), which reminded us both of a really cool poster she bought at the Renegade Handcraft Fair back in August.
            Jenny isn't sure what she's up to this summer.  I for one am hoping she'll stay in Chicago and be crafty with me!

First Day of Spring in Chicago

            After a week of mid 60's (slash lower 70's) temps in beautiful Chicago, spring rolled in like a polar bear.  On an iceberg.  Eating a snow cone.
            I had a lovely Saturday planned and reserved - a trip to the Field Museum to finally see the Diamond Exhibit (it ends next weekend), dinner at the Chicago Firehouse Steakhouse, then walking 1 1/2 miles north to the CSO to hear and see Mitsuko Uchida conduct the orchestra and perform 2 Mozart Piano Concertos.  The first time Nate and I went to the CSO back in 2006, we heard Uchida perform a Mozart Chamber piece, as well as a piano concerto, so we were very excited to hear her play again.  And I cannot wait to tell my students how low she bows - she almost gets her head down to the floor.

            Anyway, the lovely Saturday went off without a hitch, save for the weather.  Our walk from the Field Museum to the Steakhouse was luckily not too far, but the sights chilled us a bit.  I suppose our Chicago statues are quite used to the cold winters, but they still made me feel extra freezing.
            The walk from the Steakhouse to the CSO was much more grueling.  Although our bellies were full of warm, delicious food, they weighed us down and made the whole walk seem so much longer.

            Now, Sunday night, we're home after a matinee showing of A Single Man - Colin Firth was great, and the visuals throughout were amazing.  It's time for me to really get going on a new quilt I'm working on for a friend who's getting married in just over a month.  It's a jelly roll quilt made from Amy Butler Love fabric (plus a few extras).  I keep saying that once I get going on it, it'll come together really quickly.  I suppose if that's going to be true, I'd better get a move on!

Major Magazine Purge

            Every few months, I go through my recent issues of Real Simple and Martha Stewart Living Magazines, cut out the articles and ideas I want to keep, then recycle the rest of the magazine.  I am terrible about reading magazines cover to cover; I always peruse and rarely read the articles.  So, when I am cutting pages out, I always keep the things that look interesting enough that I might want to read them someday.

            I'm considering doing a little project (a Julie & Julia, if you will) where I force myself to do as many of the projects, cook as many of the recipes, and follow as much of the advice, from those clippings, as I can.  We'll see.

            But the real point of this post this morning is to talk about Nate the Great and his subscriptions to biking magazines.  There must be at least 4 different cycling magazines that come here every month.  I call them "bike porn" because he's always so excited about them.  And for years, he has sworn he can't get rid of any of them.  So this morning, in a real effort to make some space on the shelves and the coffee table, I urged him to do as I do, and go through the magazines and keep only the good articles.  

            Well, I brought out 4 big piles of bike magazines and what does he do?  Looks at the cover of each one, then throws them in a pile on the floor, claiming he doesn't need to keep any of them!  Hallelujah!  More shelf space for crafty articles!  

    vs.

Liberty comes to the Land of the Free

I was in my jammies, ready for a full day of relaxation today, until Crafty Jenny talked me (well, we talked each other) into heading out to Target to pick up all the Liberty merchandise we could.  A lot of choice items had already been snapped up, but I found the storage bins I was looking for (and lots of other stuff) and Jenny found the last set of prep bowls that she wanted.  Our cart was almost 100% full of Liberty when we rolled up to the checkout.

Here's a pic of most of my loot at home:

And one of me (please forgive my Sunday hair), trying on the dress that I didn't try on at the store, because the line for the fitting room was too long.  It fits pretty well, but I might try it in a size smaller, if they have it in stock, next time I'm at a Target.