completed quilt and more fish...

I'm at my parents' house and my mom was kind enough to let me take some pictures of the completed quilt... though I realized I just got *half* of the quilt since it's folded in half over the back of her couch.

But really, I've already posted the full top, so half will just have to do. And really, you should be glad I forgot to take pictures with my own camera. Hers is MUCH more lovely anyway. A new, fancy camera is absolutely on my to-purchase list... (okay, I'll admit, I probably have a list a mile long... but this is certainly in the top three... fabric *might* have it beaten out... though looking at these pictures, I'm not so sure).


And more fishing...
The youngest actually LOVED playing with the fish head for a long time... it was when she suddenly looked at it and said, "Mom, I think it's dead..." that she got that look on her face.


This has to be one of my all-time favorite pictures ever. It's the perspective of it all that just has me tooting my own horn on my photography skills (see?! get me a good camera and life is amazing! It doesn't hurt that in my past life -- aka, pre-staying-at-home-with-the-kids days -- my job did involve taking pictures for my paycheck).
Don't your children play with fish heads?
(... are you like me and keep singing this song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cn73Wtem0No ? I can't help myself!)

Pureed flowers

My mom's birthday is this coming Monday (Aug.25) and I figured I better do something for her, since she is my mother and I love her DEARLY!

What better way to show love than a quilt? At least that was my way of thinking... so into the stash I dove. I came up with a stack of 20 fat quarters that I got at the most amazing discount from my local quilt shop. They aren't all prints I would normally put together (and really, only about half really appeal to me on any level), but I'm always up for a challenge and decided I would try it anyway.

Because time is of the essence, I figured I'd go simple in the technical construction of the piecing of the top. And so it's together. One day for cutting and sewing the strips. All while homeschooling too (yesterday was the first day of school).

I even pinned it to the batting/backing and got just a few lines quilted thus far.

It was hard to work on for a while because I wasn't loving it. At all. I don't know if it was the simplicity (and that it's not quite what I had in my head) or if I just didn't like the prints at all... but it was challenging.

So now I need to finish the quilting and move on to the binding ... and we'll see if I can get it completed in less than a week.

edited to add: I'll sneak in the dimensions here... it's 62" x 72" ... all the strips are cut 4" wide and at varying lengths....

And then... oh, I can't WAIT to move on to other projects. I have a Feliz I've been just dying to cut into but I'm a bit nervous and worried it might take some time... after this is done, I just need to dive in. I can't let it just sit because I'm nervous I might mess it up.