A few finishes, a snowblob, and a crawler...

Oh my word.

I thought I was getting a good start on Christmas gifts this year...

I was proud of myself.

By the 1st of the month

I had all necessary supplies purchased, everything cut and prepped,

tutorials tagged, pages of sewing books marked, and pins on Pinterest up the yin-yang.

Everything got stacked neatly in a laundry basket, just waiting to be picked up and

sewn together with love.

But, I think I got a little cocky.

Because now...

I am in complete panic mode.

The good news is that the first Christmas party is 9 days away.

The bad news is that the first Christmas party is 9 days away.

Am I excited?

Heck yeah.

Am I totally stressed?

You know it.

Should I even be blogging right now?

Not a chance.

I just love giving the perfect handmade presents

- maybe a little too much-

because I've actually overflowed into a second basket.

Oh goodness.

I would love to show

all the Christmas presents

I'm working on, but I can't, because that would ruin the surprise for those getting the presents.

DUH!

So instead, I will show other things I made that aren't Christmas presents, like this:

It's my latest finished quilt.

It felt good to finish up a quilt.

I haven't done a quilt in a while, and this one was, well, it was just nice.

I made it for a woman my hubby works with.

I love it.

I think it's perfectly girly and sweet.

I was sick of patchwork, but I had already cut all the squares,

so I turned them all on point.

It was my first time trying that out,

even though I've wanted to for quite some time,

and I dig it.

And I love the stripy binding.

But, I mean, who doesn't love a stripy binding?

I hand-stitched the sweet little name in one of the

less-busy squares

to add an extra little touch of 'special' to the quilt.

***

Here's my November contribution to do.Good stitches' Grace circle.

I took this picture at night,

so the colors are WAY off-

but that's a coral square and a navy square.

We all used this tutorial for the 'hole in the barn door' squares from Mary Catharine's blog. She's really sweet. And talented.

And I'm also using another one of her tutorials for a Christmas present.

But I'm not going to spoil it, so that's all for now.

***

And Willow got invited to her first birthday party

(that wasn't a family member).

So, of course, I decided her friend needed to have a handmade, hand-stitched dolly.

And I made this decision the night before.

At about midnight.

Hence the bad picture taken at said party...

***

We also made a 'snowman' who is actually more like a snowblob.

You need a certain kind of snow for the making of snowpeople, and we just didn't have it.

Note to self: check snow before promising snowman to small child.

So, with that preface, I introduce to you, Carl:

He's basically a pile of snow with a hat, scarf, celery nose, tomato eyes and stick arms.

He's actually quite adorable.

Or, was quite adorable. Carl has since vanished.

Note to self: Warn small child what happens to beloved snowblob when temperature rises.

We had fun in the snow while it lasted...

***

And this little one is getting SO big.

Look who's crawling!

That's all for now because the doctor's office just called to remind me of Ellie's well-visit today, which I completely forgot about,

and now I must go bathe, dress, and get 3 people ready for the public eye in a very short amount of time.

Wish me luck.

Chasing Charlotte and do.Good

Way back in February

I got an email from a woman named Kelly who was interested in ordering some

WillowBean Creations for her little one.

I get these kind of inquiring emails all the time, but this one was different.

She told me she was in the midst of adopting her soon-to-be daughter from a foreign country.

It sounds funny, but I could almost hear the nervous excitement in her voice

through the words on the screen.

I was instantly hooked, because my family has gone through adoption, too.

I'm from one of those big, intricate, crazy families that's had the fair share of

divorces, re-marriages, and adoptions which results in plenty of siblings,

not unlike many other families, I'm sure.

Step-siblings, half-siblings, adopted siblings...

There's a lot of us.

It's hard to explain to others, really.

And those words- step, half, adopted- I never really liked them, to be quite honest.

We're all just brothers and sisters.

You have no idea how many times I've wished for a Venn diagram when asked how many brothers and sisters I have... for real.

I don't really know where I'm going with this.

Like I said, it's hard to explain.

But what I'm trying to get to is that 3 of my 4 little brothers are adopted.

Which is probably why I felt an instant connection when Kelly emailed me.

Especially when I knew she was adopting her little girl from the same country my brothers are from.

Weird, right?

But wait- it gets better.

So...

Oh yes.

There was an email, and then a couple more emails, and then Kelly told me her daughter's name:

Charlotte.

And then she told me that Charlotte had Down Syndrome.

And I'm sure some of you have heard of my husband's cousin, Kelle, and her blog,

Enjoying the Small Things.

If you haven't, go check it out.

Oh, And get out from under your rock.

Long story short, Kelle's blog is great and fun to read and inspirational and all that good stuff.

Her daughter, Nella, also happens to have Down Syndrome.

I mentioned the blog to the other Kelly

(I know, it's a bit confusing with the same name... stay with me.)

as something she might enjoy taking a look at.

Then she told me that Kelle, and the words on her blog, were partly what inspired her to adopt a special needs child.

CRAZY, right?

I mean, out of all the millions of blogs on the internet,

what are the chances

that she would find both of ours that were connected in so many tiny little ways?

Well, I'm a sucker for small world coincidences like that-

so I was super excited to get to make sweet Charlotte a special present that will wrap her up at night and keep her warm and snuggled.

Over 6 months and 60+ emails later deliberating over the perfect present...

this is Charlotte's quilt:

It's one of the softest quilts I've ever made.

It's big (80x88") and warm and soft and everything you need in a quilt, really.

And it's bright. And fun.

And soft.

I wish you could reach through the screen and touch this.

It's so soft I decided to hand-stitch the binding on this whole thing so I could have it longer.

Not. even. kidding.

Here's a shot of the back:

It's a pieced back with random prints from the front and that solid aqua color.

The quilt is bound in a solid pink, which I think works really well to frame the front of the quilt as well as the back.

And you can see from the back that I machine-quilted 1/4" from each side of the seams.

Here's a special label I made for Charlotte's new quilt:

Congratulations

to Kelly and her husband,

who are still in the process of bringing their little girl home.

You can read more about their story on her blog, Chasing Charlotte.

And thank you for letting me take part in making something so special for your daughter...

***

Here are my October blocks for the Grace circle of do.Good stitches.

2 Wonky Log Cabin blocks...

I haven't made these kind of blocks in a long time, they were super fun and a good way to use scraps.

Maybe there's a new quilt to add to my list!

Happy Thursday... the weekend is coming, the weekend is coming!!