Quilt update...again

After getting the birthday party out of they way and christmas under our belt I thought I'd re-visit the quilt that has been patiently sitting at the side of my craft table for the last couple of months.


I managed to piece together the strips that will make up the binding so that I don't have that step to do when I get to the end. I also put together all the extra little squares that will make up the strip across the back of the quilt.


I also got all of the larger squares put together which actually didn't take too long with chain piecing. I have even got the first row sewn together!

The squares in place to show the layout. The border strips look shorter as I haven't allowed for the seams when laying the squares out.

Now I just have to keep the momentum up and get all the pieces sewn together. With no more pressing projects I will hopefully get it sorted soon. It is very indicative of my OCD that I am looking forward to sewing together the rows to see if all the seams line up.


Looking good so far. This pic should give me the inspiration to get it together.

Rainbow Party

Party day finally arrived. I was really excited to put together all the things I have been making over the last month or so. Here is a selection of the decorations/food.

Top: Bunting with pictures of the kids - one per month for the last year
Left: Windmill from Seedling in an old cream bottle
Middle: CAKE!!
Bottom: String of balloons hung over the table

You can kinda see the food under the cover

Food included: Fairy bread; jelly in shot glasses; mars bar slice; assorted lollies; rainbow of fruit; asparagus rolls; mini quiches; sausage rolls; cocktail sausages with dinner rolls to make mini hot dogs. We also brought out a frozen pizza towards the end to make sure the men had been fed properly.

Another view - Chloe and her friend digging in

This photo you can see the bowls of different coloured M&M's that I painstakingly separated. I wasn't sure how many I would need for the cake and it appears I overestimated. Not a problem as I now have M&M's to last to the new year.

The awesome rainbow balloon arch hubby made

The party was a great success (even though it rained, grrrr). Lots of food was eaten, toys were played with and there were no 1yr old meltdowns. Now for christmas....

Rainbow Invitation

Here's the invitation I made up for the Rainbow Party. Yes, it's a joined party for the kids. I'm gonna try and get away with this as long as I can, which I don't think will be long!




On a side note: 60 posts! It would seem I have too much spare time for crafting, yet there never seems to be enough for the housework...

Rainbow Skirt

So this is the next part of Chloe's Rainbow Party outfit. 

It is a modification of the Market Skirt on dana-made-it. As she suggests, lots can be modified on this skirt. I added a couple more strips and made them a bit thinner. 

Each strip has 2" showing so I cut them 2 1/2" wide. For the top strip I added an extra 2 1/2" to allow for the elastic casing. For length, I measure Chloe's waist at 20", so cut the red piece at 28". This way I could increase the length by 4" on each strip and not go over my fabric width.

All the details are on the Market Skirt tutorial but here are some photos from putting this skirt together.

Each strip started like the orange one before gathering the top to end up like the green and blue strips. (The colour order is wrong here so some un-picking followed).

After gathering sew each strip to the previous strip, right sides together.

Sew open ends together. It tickles me that when I ironed the seam open the colours stacked like this.

The whole outfit.

Rainbow T-shirts

This idea was from my awesome mum. I have a plan to make a rainbow skirt for Chloe for the Rainbow Birthday Party, but wasn't sure what to do for Alex. I was contemplating using the fabric from the skirt and some Heat n Bond To do a rainbow on a t-shirt for him when mum suggested I just paint one. Brilliant!! Especially as I already have fabric paint. All I needed was a couple of $5 t-shirts from Baby Factory.


I took a rainbow I had made in Photoshop and printed it in black and white. I cut around the outside and traced around it onto the t-shirt with pencil. I then cut off the top strip and traced along the top of the new top stripe. I kept doing this until I had traced each stripe.


Then came the fun part - painting in between the lines. I got the red, orange and yellow done, but couldn't mix a green I was happy with so had to go out and buy another pot, and I got some indigo at the same time cause I just knew I wouldn't be able to mix that either. 


The end result is so cute. (Yes, I did one for Chloe as well).

Cushion mattress - part 2

I finally got around to finishing the cushion mattress. It didn't take very long in the end, just lots of long bits to sew. I started by folding over the selvage edges about 1" and sewing close to the selvage edge. 

I then folded my material in half so that the selvage edges were together, and sewed the ends closed. My sections are going to be 50cm wide so I measured 1m from the middle to get the point where I sewed the ends closed. Then I trimmed the ends and zigzaged.

Fold to a long strip

Sew the ends (hard to see with red thread on red, sorry)

Then I marked every 50cm with a pin. The velcro was cut to 45cm and centered between the pins, and sewn in place.

Then you just turn it right side out and sew the middle divisions.

Fill with cushions and your done :)

Rainbow cupcakes

So, I haven't put any baking on here yet, but I had to share these as they are so cool!!


I have found numerous pictures of rainbow cakes and cupcakes on the internet and decided to give them a go. I have an idea to use them in the kids birthday cake and didn't want to be trying them for the first time the day before the party. I used a basic cupcake recipe (butter, eggs, sugar, flour, milk) and did a half batch to save time (and my waistline).

Spoon the coloured mixtures on top of each other. This was them just before going in the oven.

Straight out of the oven.

Side view.

THE MIDDLE!!

They look very effective with plain white icing on top, but Chloe and I just had to eat one straight away. Next time I'll be careful to put the same amount in each layer, or maybe a bit more in the bottom layers. YUM!