Here are some things I don't like and some things I like.

Here is a list of things that make me sad and/or angry:

• Anti-GMO activism
• Experiments that don't work
• Being hungry
• When I forget things at the store after buying them
• Donald Trump
• Ben & Jerry's Blueberry Vanilla Graham frozen yogurt (it has no flavor)

Here is a list of things that make me happy:

• Nachos in baseball helmets
• The babycakes
• Playing Race for the Galaxy
• Cross stitching
• Ben & Jerry's ice cream that involves any combination of chocolate and peanut butter
• Weekends and vacations

Fox Quilt Finished!

Hooray! I finished up the quilting yesterday and put on the binding. It's my favorite quilt I've made so far! It's also the first time I used an actual binding instead of just folding the backing over the front. I think it definitely looks much cleaner this way!

All finished!

And here it is again after washing... Different lighting so the colors look slightly different (this is closer to how they look in reality), but really all that has changed is that is now has a slight crinkle from the batting shrinking... Looks great!

On the back you can see the quilted outlines of the foxes! I also really like that the binding is a great accent for both the front and the backing.

Close-up of the backing fabric because it's so darn cute!

Now hopefully I can move on to moving back to finishing my periodic table quilt!

p.s. Shout out to my mom on Mother's Day for inspiring me with a love of sewing and crafting! And for letting me take her sewing machine with me to St. Louis!! You rock, Mumsie!

Quilt Sandwich

All my paper pieced foxes are done and sewn together, so now it's time for a delicious batting sandwich! Here is a picture of everything basted together:

Bonus points for mismatched socks!

I've also come to terms with the fact that quilting/sewing is an art and NOT a science. So therefore I am going to accept the fact that there will be mistakes! While sewing together all the strips of foxes, they somehow ended up at different lengths across the bottom. So I had to add some patches of fabric to each column to get everything to the same length. You can see that the column on the far left has much less green below it than the column on the far right! But that's okay, because overall it's still an awesome quilt!

Wedding Planning

So this isn't something that I've crafted myself, but I am still super excited about it! Our wedding keeps becoming more and more Lord of the Rings themed (invitations, cake), and I wanted to continue that trend with the centerpieces for the reception tables. I found an Etsy shop that sells twelve different prints of various locations in Middle Earth, so we are going to have seating assignments based on them! I got all twelve in an 8" x 10" size, and am planning on getting some cheap frames from the dollar store for displaying them. The best part is that after the wedding we will have a lot more art for the apartment! Bonus!

Here is a link to the shop that sells the prints: Harknett Photography Etsy Store

She also has similar styles of prints for Star Wars, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and more! They would make great gifts for the geek in your life. :)

Wedding Invitations

School has been pretty stressful lately, so when I get home I've mostly been cooking dinner and then playing video games the rest of the night instead of crafting... But this past weekend I had to just make myself sit down and do wedding invitations! Only a little under 3 months to go, so I figured it was probably time to send them out... Luckily it's a somewhat smallish wedding, so I only had to make around 80 invitations.

Here are the covers, inside text, and registry information cards all cut out and ready for assembly! I bought a box of 750 photo splits (like mini pieces of double sided tape; you can see them in the top of the picture) and used nearly all of them... There was a lot of paper laying around!

All I have left to do is print and cut out the RSVP cards and then I'll be ready to send these guys on their way!

Cute Owl and Woofer

Slowly but steadily I am making progress on my fox quilt! I have all of the foxes done for one of the orange fabrics. The baby was born this morning, so I better hurry up before he gets too old! :)

Since I have not posted in a while, I thought I would share these pictures I found of two adorable friends:

The owl is a Little Owl, and his canine friend is a German Shepherd. They live in Germany (so I suppose he is a German German Shepherd!), and "belong" to a falconer who also takes care of a couple hawks. Check out her page for more pics: http://www.ingoundelse.de/meine-greifv%C3%B6gel/

More updates on my crafts soon! I have been super busy with work lately so haven't gotten the chance to work on them very much...

Fox Quilt Progress

I finally got around to taking pictures of my fox quilt blocks! 

They are turning out really nice! So far paper piecing is awesome. There are just a couple things that I will do differently next time.

 Lesson #1: Don't cut out all your fabric until you've sewn a practice block. Most of my pieces were the right size, but I messed up and cut all the ears out slightly too small. Luckily I had some extra fabric and was able to cut out new pieces.

Lesson #2: Cut out the pieces with a seam allowance bigger than the usual 0.25". Maybe not everyone needs to do this, but I think I would enjoy the process more if I wasn't worried about aligning everything exactly right. Especially with the triangles! Those guys are tricky.

I think I will be doing a lot more paper piecing in the future!