Maybe Matilda: Christmas and a Baby Quilt

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Christmas and a Baby Quilt

I hope you all appreciated the lack of a Merry Christmas! post here over the weekend. When I noticed that my Google Reader had over 200 new items, all with some variation of the title “Merry Christmas from the ________ Family!” I decided to refrain. You can only read so many Christmas posts, right?

I do, however, have a plethora of pictures that you probably won’t actually care to see. I’ll limit myself to just a few; feel free to skip them and leave me a “He’s adorable!” comment instead. (I bask in those comments.) First up, we have my attempt to get a picture with Forrest in front of the Christmas tree without his precious new toy telephone:

christmas picture I think that’ll be our Christmas photo montage for next year’s card. I almost wish it had been a video instead of photos so you could hear the dialogue . . . me in my super-high “everything’s  cool!” voice saying, “Forrest! Picture time! Woohoo! No more phone! Put down the phone! This is fun! Stop crying! WE’RE HAVING FUN!” almost drowned out by his whining and shouting and staunch refusal to loosen his little vice grip on the phone. I finally gave up, and good thing, too, because we did manage to get a few cute pictures together. With the phone, of course. It is an important member of this family already.DSC_0584-1 We had a lot of fun with my parents and siblings—Forrest is head over heels in love with Grandma and Papa, a love that was only reinforced when one of their gifts to him was . . . a cell phone. Notice that Papa is the one playing with the toy cell phone, and Forrest has claimed a real one. May this go down in history as The Year of the Phone.DSC_0599 And I’d like to thank Michelle of Decor and the Dog for introducing me to the Forever Lazy, which we got my brother for Christmas. I purposely did not ask his permission to post this picture, because I can’t imagine I’d get a “sure, go for it,” so just don’t tell him. Besides, everyone knows that covering up the eyes means you can’t tell who is in the picture.

DSC_0606-1I received a lot of great gifts this year (including some spectacular homemade ones that I’m excited to post about), but one gift in particular really stands out.

DSC_0595-1I COULD WEEP WITH JOY. My parents got me a Bernina. A BERNINA!!! (Here’s the best part: it was my dad’s idea. How about that!) I took it for a test run on Monday . . . this thing is incredible. Absolutely incredible. There is no clunking or grinding or whirring when I sew. It does not randomly choke or cough or spew out a wad of tangled thread. The stitches are perfectly straight, instead of each being tilted to the side, making a “straight” line look more like a lightning bolt. LIKE SOME OTHER MACHINES I USED TO KNOW. Welcome to the family, baby. I’ll love you forever.

Now that I’m saying a not-so-fond goodbye to my horrible, horrible old machine (I like to call it The Machine Who Must Not Be Named), I’d like to show you the last thing I ever sewed on it. This project, which should have taken a few hours to make, sucked up a few weeks of my life between working up the courage to break out my awful old sewing machine, picking out messed up stitches, working on my self-control to hold myself back from physically harming it, and, finally, finishing the project. Despite the awful machine, I think it came out pretty cute.

DSC_0535 A new little nephew will be making his debut this Friday, so my mom and I  worked together to  make him a quilt. It’s the first quilt I’ve made in almost a year and a half, which says something about how much I despised my old sewing machine. I had almost forgotten how much I love sewing and quilting.

The quilt is a disappearing nine patch, inspired by this one from Cluck Cluck Sew (a blog I am a huge fan of, by the way . . . her fabric and color choices are so inspiring to this neutral-loving, color-fearing girl). My sister-in-law said that she preferred fabrics and colors that didn’t look too baby-ish . . . she wanted it to look a little more grown-up, with greens and deep blues and some gray tossed in to give it a more modern look.

DSC_0540 Hopefully we gave her the look she was aiming for! This was a really fun, easy quilt to put together, made even easier by our decision to do straight line quilting instead of my personal favorite, free motion quilting, which we thought would have looked awfully busy on this style.

DSC_0537 (You know what really adds a touch of class to photographs? A trampoline in the background.)

The little fellow also received the crochet edged receiving blanket I posted about here, as well as a little owl hat that I hope will make its way into his newborn photo shoot. I was setting up the blanket and hat to take some pictures when a little helper stopped by and offered to model it for me (and by “offered to model” I mean “snatched the hat and jammed it onto his humongous head”).

DSC_0531 I think it’s just a tad small for his gigantic 1 1/2-year old noggin. But hopefully it’ll fit just right on a sweet newborn.

23 comments :

  1. Getting pictures of little ones is always fun! The quilt and hat you made are super cute!

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  2. Seriously love the photos - and the hat?!! Beautiful!

    Congrats on the new machine!

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  3. I love the pics of you and your cute baby! Very jealous of your new sewing machine. I've got to get one for myself! The quilt is darling... I'm sure they're going to love it.

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  4. Cute pictures! I'm a little jealous of the Bernina! : ) I'm sure you and your fabric will love it!

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  5. Hey Rachel! All the Christmas craziness has me behind on comments I wanted to leave, so consider this a bunch rolled into one :)
    -Love your hair! Are you growing it out? You seem to be pulling off the grow out stage really well!
    -I totally know what you mean about phone (or any toy for that matter) obsession. I think we're in the year of the phone as well.
    -WOW on the Bernina. Not jealous at all :)
    -The little stuffed toy you crocheted Forest was adorable! I got a kick out of your entire post, especially trying to slip in the blanket you made.
    Happy New Year!!!

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  6. Love the quilt and the hat and most of all your new machine. The dream machine is what I'd like to call it. :)

    Your hair is getting so long!! Still looking fabulous too.

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  7. Looks like you had a wonderful Christmas! Love your hair! The pictures of you and Forrest are hilarious. Does he "call" anyone in particular?

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  8. Haha! I felt the same way as you about doing a Merry Christmas post...Awesome quilt, and, enjoy the new sewing machine!!

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  9. Love the new machine! I just looked at one of those today because a new machine is also my xmas gift. I got $$ that I get to go spend myself. Which model did you get?

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  10. 1. Great. Now your brother knows who to hate. Thanks for the mention. ;) But wait, he probably loves it. Nevermind. I'll take full credit. I'm quite sad I didn't have one under the tree for me.
    2. I love the photo of you hugging your sewing machine. Melts my heart.

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  11. Kathy--hooray for new sewing machines! Mine is a Bernina B330 (here:http://www.berninausa.com/product_detail-n2-i317-sUS.html). I haven't been able to use it a ton yet, but it is without a doubt the greatest thing I've ever sewed on, and from what I hear, Berninas are worth their weight in gold--great quality, hold up well over the years, etc.

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  12. He really is so adorable. And I'm super jealous of your Bernina!

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  13. #1. SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO jealous of your new machine.
    #2. I think your even cooler than I did before for buying your brother a forever lazy---a snuggie was my back up plan for my brother if his Simpson's paintings didn't get finished.

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  14. Una máquina de coser encantadora¡¡¡
    Feliz año nuevo¡¡¡¡
    Susana.

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  15. Congratulations on getting a Bernina! :D I am *so* jealous of you! ;)
    xo,
    wink

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  16. Congratulations on the new Brenina! Sure hope Dad got something extra special for Christmas ;)

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  17. I think you need a correction on this post. "Forrest is head over heels in love with iPad and Papa."

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  18. AHAhahahaha! Maybe all those times you've chatted on the phone, he's been asking if the iPad can come over and play.

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  19. What a splendid Christmas!!! Great photos!

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  20. Your hair is so cute, which means it looks good no matter what length or style you have it! Jealous! And congrats on your new Bernina!!!

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  21. Your hair looks so good! Your baby is a cutie too :) I think Tate and him are about the same age-ish

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  22. You will absolutely LOVE your bernina. I love mine, that's for sure. My mom has your same machine, and she's loving it (but has been too busy to sew much on it yet). Have fun!

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