Birthday

This is what she chose to wear today. 

Today was Gracie's actual 5th birthday. Scott came home from work with a dinosaur toast cutter, and he made dinosaur cinnamon toast for her this morning. We cleaned the playroom and went to the end of summer reading program's pizza party at the library. Then we went to Casa Ole so they could sing to her and we played at the playground. My parents took her to Chuck E Cheese for dinner. They had a blast. She's such a blessing to us. 5 years! I can't believe it. We are very lucky. I pray many more years ahead of her!  

Rainy day

After a pretty long drought, it's been raining a little or a lot almost every day. Gracie's bday party is Saturday, so hopefully it will be not so rainy that day. Today we worked on laundry, cleaned the bathrooms and the floors. There was a lot of half-assery going on with the floors, but they'll have to be gone over again beforehand, so I'm not that worried about it. The bathrooms are clean - just need to clean the toilets before people get here. We'll be tackling other rooms later this week. It's not so bad. Not as bad as it had been in the past. We've done a pretty good job of not letting it get out of hand. Definitely vaccuuming. The play/craft room is a wreck. But I"m going to be working in there the rest of the day (hopefully) getting some projects done, so yeah. In honor of G's birthday we played hostess to our ladies group at church and it went over well. We have left overs to eat, but that's no hardship. Scott is on his way to a doctors appt. Hopefully they will do something with his medication where he's not so depressed and lethargic. We're just chilling. We'll put G's new bed together next week when she gets her sheets and bedding from her aunts. I think we're going to go to Schlitterbahn next Monday. After that it's just counting down and prepping until school starts. We both need to go through all of our clothes and get rid of stuff that isn't good for school or too small (or big). Now I'm going to quilt the watermelon placemats and bind them - scared, but I'm going to get into it. Then maybe make a dress with the leftover green material, then work on the quilt top. We'll see how much gets done.          

Quilt blocks

The center and the rectangles are from the fat quarters I won. The little squares are from a pair of G's shorts.

The middle square the little squares are from fat quarters. The rectangles are from G's shirts. 

So I hate cutting fabric. If I were just using the fat quarters, it might not be so bad, but I wanted to combine some techniques and it's taking more time and effort. I'm taking some of G's old shirts and dresses and recycling the fabric for the block pieces.  I think these turned out well. 

The middle square and the little squares are from one of G's shirts. The rectangles are from fat quarters.

The middle square is from one of G's  shirts. The little squares are from a pair of shorts. The rectangles are from fat quarters. 

The middle square and little squares are from fat quarters and the rectangles are from an old pair of my shorts. 

Taking in clothes

 So I've lost about 90 lbs. There are some clothes I didn't choose to part with. I'm not sure why. I made my first attempt at altering clothes the other day. I made another seam a few inches on each side, then took some of the elastic in from the top. It's still big, but not as bad. I don't think. I tried to do the exact same thing with an identical shirt in black this morning, but it didn't work and I had to bin the whole project. I saved the elastic and will resuse the fabric, but not as a shirt, unfortunately.  

This skirt was a size 20. I really like the fabric. I may use it as coasters or napkins later on. It had a linen-like lining that I took out, added some elastic and now I have a slip to wear under dresses and such.

Pinwheels

 As I was looking for ideas for Gracie's party, I found some pinwheel tutorials. Sweet!
Years ago I bought a calendar of origami papers and instructions. Sadly, origami and I were not meant to be. So they've been languishing in my desk drawer, just waiting for a use. I dug them out and, during the last few days of school (review days - the only time I get bored in school), I glued them together, picking coordinating colors (with some help from my students).

I had some dowel rods and thought I was set. So I begun this week. There were some setbacks.
The deal with pin wheels is that they need to wheel. My first few attempts didn't wheel. I was using hot glue and a hole punch and brads. Not good.

Fail! 

Wheels of many colors.

I finally ended up using a straight pin through the center. I'm going to get some pencils (always good party favors) and pin them through the erasers. I have to laugh thinking about the process though. I'm a bright girl. Pin wheels should wheel.  

I put a glob of glue to attach the pin to the dowel rod.

Ones that didn't wheel.

Birthday shirt

I'm not a real Type - A personality about most things. Age has mellowed me and I'm lazy anyhow. There are some things I've always done for Gracie's birthday. I always make her a birthday announcement with pictures and a cute saying rhyming with her age.
"How time flies while you're having fun, Gracie _ is turning one"
"Hey everybody, guess what's new, Gracie _ is turning two"
"Just as wild as she can be, Gracie _ is turning three"
"Dancing diva  and so much more, Gracie _ is turning four"
"Growing up and hitting her stride, Gracie _ is turning five"
Check.
Another thing I always do is make her a birthday shirt. I'm hoping to make her a memory quilt someday and use them in there. This year's shirt has not gone so well. Her theme is Strawberry Shortcake, so I ordered a cute little SS ballerina iron-on from ebay.  I finally got around to starting it a few days ago. I've used iron ons before. I'm a bright girl. There were directions. The directions would have put the iron-on backwards, so I did it differently.

This is what is should have looked like.

This is what it  ended up looking like. The iron was messed up as well. I should have just followed the directions and had a backwards girl. Though I think the directions were wrong as well. So I hopped back on ebay to get another, different iron-on because MY  BABY HAS TO HAVE A STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE BIRTHDAY SHIRT.  But I'm thrifty and didn't want to waste even more money on another shirt too, so I'm trying to "fix" it.  

I used red paint to outline a rather unfortunate strawberry on top of the ruined iron on.

Then I filled it in and let it dry.

The I added the big 5. I'll add her name and other things tomorrow, then the new iron on to the back when it gets here. It will be ok. Not perfect or professional, but ok.

The other thing I usually do is make her birthday cake. I like to make it look nice. But my mother volunteered to pay for a "real" cake from a bakery, so that's what we'll get. I'm dealing. It will be great. Save me time and stress. BUT NOT FROM MY LOVING HANDS! FROM MY BRAIN! MY CREATIVITY!  Dealing. Right here. Dealing.      For her :)

A quilt

I'm terrified to commit myself to this, but I already have. I have no clue. I'm reading directions and going from there. AHHHH! I'm using a pattern from this book that I won a few months ago. It's the fall one called Magic Carpet. It's a beginning pattern and calls for 8 1/2 inch squares, 8 1/2 x  2 1/2 inch rectangles and 2 1/2 inch squares. I cut out cardboard templates and I'm using Gracie's old clothes. Is that ok? Is that crazy? I'm using her cute old shirts with patterns and embroidery, and pretty colors and patterns. I have other, real fabric as well to fill in, but we'll see. We'll see how it goes. I don't know!! Some of the patterns aren't 8 1/2 inches square, so they'll have to have some other stuff added to it. I'll save those for last though. I'm scared to start sewing stuff together. I know that I can just unpick it if it's bad, but still. Still! I can do this! I can and will. I have to start somewhere. Right? Right.