This little decorative "pillow" bowl filler or shelf sitter above has been my best seller the last few months - both online and at markets.

She's super small, just 5" by 7", but she makes some pretty awesome home decor.

I carry these pillows year round at markets, as long as I have space for them, and they do sell year round.

Sister mini "pillows". Both the single star and ring of 13 stars are available in the Etsy shop too.

And some fun decorative stars - they're available on stands, as bowl filler, or with red twine to hang.

These fun patriotic decor pieces and more can be found in the Etsy shop.
 

These quilts were crafted from a few "jelly rolls" I was given, using a pattern I was also given.

Super quick and easy and the end result is amazing!  I did add in the borders to add some calm to the quilt, I'm a border/sashing fanatic, especially when I can involve white.

These beauties are in the Etsy shop here and here.

 

It's in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop waiting for a new home.

It has been far too long, but I've finally found time to make some quilts. And I dusted off the long arm quilter for some of them. I'm feeling very satisfied with myself, and can't wait to make more, more, more.

Here's the first of the finished quilts - 

It can be found in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop here. 

Simple pattern, but taken up a notch by turning the blocks on-point.

Many of the fabrics come from Lori Holt collections, some others I'm not as sure of the origins. My mother had a friend who could no longer sew and asked if I wanted some of her fabrics. Um, YES! And that's how I inhered two file boxes jam packed with mostly wonderful Lori Holt fabrics (and a few others being used for upcoming projects). I've had so much fun with these new fabrics (and don't get me started on the fabrics I picked up at some great prices at Joann over the last month - I've had to add many, many long shelves to the sewing room to accommodate that haul).

In other, even more wonderful news, I got a call at the beginning of December asking if I'd care for a newborn baby when he got out of the NICU. Um, YES, yes, yes! He's been with us for almost six months now and is a joy. We're head over heals in love with him and are very blessed to have him in our company.

 

I'm OBSESSED with making cute little things. OBSESSED. Not even an understatement. 

It all started with a few things to sell at a spring market ... now the little bits of cuteness are my biggest sellers at markets. 

I'll share the Christmas holiday trees and ornaments very soon, but I finished these Valentine hearts recently and couldn't help but post about them. And they're mostly red, so definitely could be coordinated with Christmasy things.

The mini pillows are about 6.5" wide and 4.5" tall, crafted from a linen-look cotton and finished with raw edges, so they'll fray wonderfully.  

The two heart pillow has two appliqued hearts and is finished with an htv vinyl black running stitch and bows.

The single heart pillow is a quilted red plaid heart appliqued to the small pillow.

The bowl filler hearts are also finished with raw edges for perfect vintage-inspired yumminess. They'll fray wonderfully and can be trimmed or not. They're great bowl or centerpiece fillers and come in either small (4" tall) or large (4.75" tall).

Both the quilt heart and 2-hearts mini pillows and the hearts are available in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop. The pillows are $7 and the hearts are $3 and $4. Honestly, the shipping is enough (thanks USPS) that I highly recommend spending $35 (can be on anything in the shop) and getting free shipping.

I had the pleasure of recruiting one of my favorite pets to model for me today. 

Ellie, my oldest daughters dog, is a perfect model (and a pretty perfect pup), and was super accommodating and adaptive today. 

Today she's modeling some new bandana prints in our reversible cotton bandannas, this time for Christmas. I sell bandanas at markets and they are quite popular, but these are the first I've listed in the Etsy shop (more to come!).

Choose from either plaid with candy canes or plaid with holly and berries.

All my bandanas are crafted from 100% cotton fabric, are super durable, and are machine washable.

This is not Ellie. Or my cat, Lucy (I tried, she wasn't in the mood today.). I forgot to get pictures of Ellie in the holly and berry print so had to improvise. 

Ellie is wearing a medium size bandana, stuffed dog is wearing a small bandana.

I'm kind of hooked on these little flags. 

Really, all things 4th of July are doing it for me right now.

Be prepared for some some super fun Independence Day themed throw pillows coming very soon. I haven't quite figured out my throw pillow plan, but I do know it has a lot to do with some postage stamp quilted stars (God bless anyone who does a postage stamp quilt ... those tiny pieces take forever to make into something of a reasonable size!).

And dog and cat bow ties. And, as always, I have more ideas than time. No surprise there. :)

The pillows can be found in the Jude Harbor etsy shop, one star here and thirteen star here.

Two years is a really long time not to post. I had the best of intentions too! 

I do have an excuse though, I really do, aside from blogging no longer being an in thing. As my kids have grown up and gotten older (they range in age from 15 to 30 now ... I have no idea how that happened) they've started moving out and being all adulty. I love it, I really do, I'm amazed at the awesome people they've all become and I love interacting with them on a whole different level (they're all really, really cool and each is so unique).  As they've left the nest the house has started to feel big, I've had empty bedrooms in this house that raised six children. I turned one bedroom into my sewing room. 

As I looked at the remaining empty bedroom I realized it was finally time to embark on a new adventure - foster parenting. It had always been in the back of my mind as something I wanted to do but the timing was never right. Until now. 2 1/2 years ago I began the process to become a foster parent and two years ago, right after my last post, I accepted my first foster child, a wonderful energetic 15 month old boy named Aaron. About a month later I accepted a 5 week old little girl, Annie. My foster son stayed with me for about 10 months and my little girl was with me for almost 23 months, she headed home just over 2 weeks ago the day after she turned two. 

I'm now taking a break from fostering, I'm not sure for how long - it's going to be a while before the hurt of Annie's departure heals. I'm staying busy now sewing and trying to catch up on everything (yard work, yikes!) that I didn't stay on top of the last two years.

The stars have been listed in the Jude Harbor Etsy shop. There are more new listings to come. I've been doing local and not-too-far-away markets with so, so much new stuff - now it's time to get it online too.

As we approached fall market season, and after spending a minute in the grocery store where the world suddenly resolved around pumpkin everything, I thought it'd be fun to make some fall-themed keychains.

These are so fun, and kind of make me forget I'm in Florida where it still reaches 90' most days.

These keychains, and more, can be found in the Jude Harbor stand alone shop and Etsy shop.

Happy fall, y'all!

Recently some decadent dinosaur flannel fabric magically appeared on my doorstep, along with a whole bunch of other fabric from Ziggie Lane Fabric. <- she has great sales, worth checking out and then I won't be alone in my fabric-aholic-ness.

Back to the dino fabric. I had to make quilt from it right away.

I opted to use the yummy dino flannel as the backside and created six appliqued dinosaurs for the front, on a white Kona cotton background.

The quilt is quilted with lots of straight lines 1" apart and sewn on the diagonal. I also quilted around each dinosaur.

 The binding is the yummy coral / sherbet print.

After sewing the top I shared a picture of it on my personal Facebook page and immediately sold the quilt to one of my favorite mamas to my most favorite eight month old (currently, by choice, my one and only daycare baby).

There is a second quilt in the works, very similar to this one, which should be finished in the next few weeks.

The blocks on this stunning toddler or baby quilt were so much fun to make and the end result is just fantastic!

To make the blocks a Moda Woodland Secrets charm pack was coordinated with some other simple prints to create six 9-square blocks. The blocks were then cut on the diagonal, mixed up, and sewn back together. This block is known as a Disappearing Nine Patch.

White Kona cotton provides the sashing and border. The backing fabric is a fun dotty coral, and the binding is a coordinating green print. The quilting is done with meandering loopy lines.

The toddler or baby quilt measures 38" by 51", long enough for a small sofa throw quilt if desired.

Available at either our website or Etsy shop.