Train Table

It was meant to be a simple wood working project for the boys Christmas... After a couple trips to Home Depot and A LOT of help from my dad... William and Henry now have a home made table for their trains.... or Legos... or anything else they can dream up I suppose. It was suppose to be a Christmas present but Christmas came about a week early. We'll paint it this spring... stay tuned for the final project... And for future projects now that I have a new drill... Watch out for Dawn with power tools.....

Baking night

I hosted my first annual baking night earlier this month. A few of my friends came over and we spent the evening baking cookies, dipping chocolates, sampling goodies and the like. It was hosted under the intent to get stocked up on your Christmas cookies... and though I can't speak for everyone, I didn't really get stocked up on anything. The whole plate of cookies was gone in just a few days... Mighty tasty. It was so much fun I've had many a request to make it a tradition. Yippee!!! Maybe I'll have more willpower next year.

Monkey hat pics...

okay, so I'm a little obsessive about this monkey hat eh... well.. I just saw a pic of the two recipients of the matching monkey hats, so I had to post it... hehehehe... too funny!

Quit your Monkeying Around.... the Sequel!

Okay, it's done... the adult version of the hat is finished. Of course from the pic you have no reference to size, so Morgan, one of these days you'll have to send me a pic of it on your noggin'! It got a bit big... okay, it got really big... but it works... Now you and little Noah can match, MorgO. The hats will be too big for both of you!!!!

Quit your monkeying around!!!

When I found out Morgan and Amber were having a baby, I already knew what I was going to make for them... in fact it was done before they were even halfway through the pregnancy! hehehe... too fun! There is an adult version of the monkey hat in the works. (Morgan was jealous and wants one of his own) I'll post a pic when it's done.

T..

So back in June we had a girls night in alex. We were a little crazy.. as always... and came up with an idea for a gift for one of our firends who couldnt be there that night. she is expecting a baby... probably any day now.. you would have to understand T... and the rest of use girls for that matter to truly appreciate this little onesie that Elmo is modeling... but I made this shirt for T on behalf of all of us girls. it matches all of T's many... many... many fleet farm shirts from her years in 4H. She got a big kick out of it!

Kitchen Shtuff.

I've been taking a break from blankets and afghans and worked on lots and lots of dish cloths (knit) and potholders (crochet). They are fun, and quick and easy. I made a set for some each of the ladies in the lutherans for life group that I worked with here in fort wayne and I made a set for a co worker of bens who recently moved into a new house. We been watching lots of Xfiles on DVD in the evenings so I've had lots of time to knit and crochet. fun fun fun!

Baby Girl

This was made over a year ago... when I decided to start quilting I made 4 quilts one right after another... this was the last of the 4. I had a lot of friends who were pregnant at the time and figured someone would be having a little girl... but NOPE... they were all boys... so I've been holding on to it just waiting for the special little girl to give it to! it looks kinda blue in the pic but it really is rather purpley... if that really is a word. One of Ben's coworkers had a little girl so I told Ben to take it to her. She will still be on maternity leave by the time we leave for MN, but someone in the office will be sure she gets it when she returns.

Baby Boy

This was made of material I had already... I wanted to try out mitering boarders so I picked a cozy fleece that was too small for anything else, and added boarders with a flannel... then I bound it with satin blanket binding... worked pretty slick! I used the walking foot for some simply quilting and "poof" and instant gift! I gave it to Buddy's coworker who just had a baby... well... his wife did actually. They liked the blanket none the less!

Papa Roo...

For my dad's 60th birthday I wanted to make him something but I didn't know how much a he would appreicate a really nice crochet doily so I decided to make him something he could wear. I found this fleece and thought it was fitting for him! I'm not much of a seamstress... making things that actually have to fit isn't my specialty, so hope it is at least close to the right size!
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I forgot I wrote this post a while ago, before his birthday on May 3rd but didnt want to post it till after he got the gift... I guess I forgot about it.. oops!

Brent and Alicia

This is a gift for Ben's cousin's wedding, given as a shower gift. I'm not really a fan of granny squares but since I used two yarns together and larger hook went a lot faster than my last granny (4 years). I didn't realize it when I took the picture, but the lattice yarn matches the carpet in our apartment... so it's almost camouflage. Oops... not much of a photographer I guess. I did figure out a new technique for crocheting the squares together so that there isn't many yarn ends. I kinda made it up as I went along. Maybe if I get really ambitious I'll put directions online... not that I think anyone is really interested in my techniques, but that way the next time I make a granny square something, I don't have to figure out the technique again... I'll just have my own tutorial! Wahoo!!!

OH NOOOOOOOoooooo.....

yesterday I started the stitching in the ditch of the court house steps quilt... when I realized I PUT A BLOCK IN UPSIDE DOWN!!! it's far to late to un-sew and re do it now, but it keeps staring at me... there it is clear as day... GRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! oh well, life goes on... I have yet to make a perfect project so this is no exception!

The quilting is going well... I've done enough ditch stitching to hold it all together... I was a little daring with my thread choice... I used a matching red on the top and in the bobbin since the tension on my machine isn't right so you can see the bobbin on the top and top thread on the back.... rather than trying to fix that I just improvised, the reason it is daring is the backing is the same light color I used for the background of the redwork, so we'll.. the back shows all the stitches... quite well.... I knew I would have to use a red for stitching in the ditch on the borders, and probably could have gotten away with using light color when I outlined the light squares... but I just wanted to do it all the same.... less times changing thread and winding bobbins means more time sewing, eh?

I still don't know what I'm going do where there is redwork... it needs something on those blocks to hold it all together but don't know what... any ideas?

Granny....

This is Buddy's favorite afghan. It sits on our rocking chair in our living room.... I finished it last fall... I only started it 4 years ago. (I would have abandoned it a long time ago if Ben hadn't kept asking why I hadn't finished it yet) the whole time I kept saying "I hate granny squares". All those loose ends to weave in... then when it seems like it's almost done you have all those squares to stitch together.. eek...

so what do I do after loathing this afghan for the past 4 years... I make another granny square afghan... it's for a gift so you'll have to wait to see it... I'll post it when it's given....

here comes the Judge... again...

Okay, I'm ready to think about the judge quilt again...
(check this out in case you forgot where we were...) http://prairiedawn.blogspot.com/2007/02/here-comes-judge.html
let us continue... shall we...
I've been thinking about the borders more... I went back to the original fabric I planned for borders and started to think it might be just what the quilt needs... . It isn't in the quilt at all so I don't know if that is good or bad. It does have the right color scheme, so I suppose that is good.
I like Morgans suggestion of the cornerstone with more redwork, but I really don't want to do that much more redwork.... I'm planning on putting another small redwork design on the label on the back along with using the same floss to embroider the label... speaking of label... got any clever ideas for a title or short explanation for the quilt... it's gotta make note of the fact that it's a courthouse steps design for sure... okay, back to borders...
here is a couple options...



The light boarders are left over strips from the quilt... I cut a bit too much... oops, but hey, it helps now....
I'm planning on doing a dark inner border... light red second border, then dark binding...




option 1: I like this best, but I would have to buy more fabric to finish it... (click on the pic for a close up)




Option 2: I have enough of this one... but don't think I like it as much... i like it.. but not as much... I think it's a bit too light or something...


I initially thought of using the same light I used as background of the redwork for the second border, but think that is too light for the border... especially since I think option 2 is a bit on the light side, the background ecru shade is definitely too light...

hmm... dilemmas....

Archive: Wedding and bridal shower gifts

I started taking pictures of my completed projects a few years ago but most of them were taken with a film camera rather than digital and since I don't have a scanner, I have no pictures to show you... here are a few digital pics that i had... some day I'll scan some more pics to share...

To Jed and Annika

To my cousin Suzy and Justin

To my cousin Mikey and Lisa

I think I gave this one to Kelly and Justin, correct me if I'm wrong

Archive Project: Kelly's Wedding

For my sister-in-law's wedding last December I decided my then 1 year old little boy needed a really cute vest to wear. Well, I'm cheap... I mean... thrifty... so I didn't want to buy one from a store and pay an arm and a leg then have him wear it for one day. So instead I found this great material at the fabric store in remnants and bought a pattern and a few buttons. For about 3 bucks and a couple evenings of work I had this cute little outfit for him. I'm still scared of making button holes so I made my mom do it for me. One of these days I'll brave that task! I'm sure I'll tell you all about it!

Since the wedding was in Dec. in Minnesota a coat of some sort is in order for the bride... (and a Columbia parka just doesn't cut it with a wedding dress) My sister-in-law was initially going to borrow a coat from a friend of mine but then I got the hair brain idea of making one. When we were looking at bridesmaids dresses months before, the bride saw a cloak at the shop that they rented out for winter weddings so I had a picture in my head of what I wanted to make. I found a pattern and white bridal satin was on sale. I had to make a couple alterations and added a lining but it was pretty easy. With a little fur from Bien, thanks Bien, the cloak was done... I think it turned out pretty good if I do say so myself!

Levi...

My cousin and his wife just had their second baby so I sent this afghan off to them today. It was made from some yarn I had at home left over from past projects that I really liked but couldn't match to new yarn due to dye lot issues...grr dye lots... so I put them together for this little project. I looked at it again last night to take this picture before packing it up, and realized how small it really did turn out, but hey, babies are small too, eh?

Four Square....

For my husband's grandparents 60th wedding anniversary, everyone in the family is suppose to make a quilt block for a memory quilt. Well... there are 4 of us in the family... so there are 4 blocks to make. I decided to do hand prints for the boys... Buddy wanted a twins logo on his, and I found a cool pattern of an appliqued loon, so I decided to make that for myself... just finished them last night... gotta send them off to Buddy's mom so she can piece the whole thing together... looking forward to seeing it when it is all done!

Here comes the Judge...

I've been working on a wall hanging for my husbands boss, a judge, for the past year. Okay, so I've been thinking about it for about a year when I first learned that this is a quilt block named, courthouse steps. Get it, judge, courthouse steps.. hehehe.. anyways. So I looked around and one pattern, from Fon's and Porter really struck me... I kept coming back to it thinking, "I love that, I could do that..." If you haven't already done so, stop, go look at the website, see the pattern I'm talking about... okay, now we can continue.. I wasn't such a fan of the fall leaves so after hemming and hawing, and getting some support from my quilt support team (you know who you are) I decided to drop the leaves and do some redwork designs in the open spaces. Well, I don't know if I've ever done embroidery before, but it didn't take me too long to get the hang of things. I wish I would have used some stabilizer or something under the fabric cause it's isn't a flat as it should be. I did finish all 4 designs (they were quilt stencils) and pieced the top. I need to add the borders now. I'm a "figure it out as you go" sort of gal, so I didn't really know what I wanted to use for borders ahead of time, well, I thought I did, but it doesn't look right so now I'm stuck. I need some help. Any ideas?

Prairie Dawn, blog-a-holic

Alright, so I'm kinda a big fan of crafting... I always have been! As a kid, my second favorite store to go into was always the craft store (first being my dad's store, of course). I could spend hours looking and letting my mind wonder about all the wonderful things I could make! And now, with the world wide web at my fingertips I feel like a little kid in the candystore, err, I mean craft store... looking at patterns and notions... thinking up enough projects to make so I would never have to buy a gift ever again. I'm one of those people who have 5 projects I'm working on at any given time and 6 more that I'm searching out the materials for.

My crafts of choice as of late have been quilting and general sewing and crochet. I'm intrigued by scrap booking, but am fearful that if I start, I'll start buying tons of stuff that goes along with it, so I've steered clear of paper crafts for the most part. I've done a little craft painting here and there, but I'm not so good with making a composition, so that'll wait too. I worked in a bakery as my summer job in high school and through college. I learned the basics of decorating a cake but lately have started making chocolates... ummm... chocolate! I know how to knit, but am pretty lousy at it. I'm much quicker with a hook, so I crochet lots. The only channel that comes in clear on our TV is PBS so I've seen a lot of sewing and quilting how-to shows. It inspired me to put my grandmothers old sewing machine to good use and made a few quilts. last winter I made a white fur trimmed cloak for my sister-in-law's wedding and a vest and matching bow tie for my little boy.

See future blogs about all my projects... since I make lots of things as gifts, If I blog about something for someone who may come across this little corner of cyberspace, I'll just hide those entries till the gift has been given... I have taken lots of pictures of past projects that I've made so I'll try to post some of those pics on here too... mainly for a journal of sorts for myself, but hope you enjoy it as well!