Mike's Hat, Flower Quilt, desk front view, and cards!

So- Mike has been watching war movies and survival movies/shows etc. and he decided he wanted a hat with a flag on it, his blood type and name. He bought a flag patch, owned his name tag from a bullet proof vest he had to wear on his mission, and bought the hat, I sewed the patch and name on, and then I embroidered with my machine his blood type, he LOVES it. Why this man doesn't join the military is a mystery to me, but I guess that's his deal.

I had requests for a front view of my desk- problem is a few feet away from it is a wall of windows, so I couldn't back up enough to take the pic- so this was the best I could do.

I screwed the tins on the desk. Question: Do you think it makes my desk look tacky now? I wanted the desk to look nice, so I can have it out in the open but still look somewhat nice, now I am worried the tins make it look cheap or crappy.... comments?

Card I made for my mom- LOVE this paper, and I have many more to come, but I don't want to display them until these people have received their cards :)

Inside of card- I was able to cut out that hat with my cricut- I LOVE my cricut The BLESSED flower quilt. So this is as Amy (my neighbor, no this is not Mike typing, he did not make this quilt :) this is the quilt that Amy and I have jokingly referred to our BFF quilt, because we were both at joanns- found an adorable quilt book, fell INLOVE with this one, and decided to make it, and try to find the exact fabrics, so it could look JUST like the picture. And I have to tell you- it pretty much looks the same! I should take a picture of the quilt book pic. Anyway- we started it, got half the flowers done, and then I got cancer, and moved. SO- Amy would visit me at chemo, show me the update on her quilt, and then we'd compare eachother's and ofcourse Amy, being who she is, would ask a nurse, "so, who's do you like better?" SO- during chemo treatments, I would work on it 2 days before my next treatment when I was feeling better, so the rest of the quilt was gradually made through my entire cancer. Then, this week I finally finished the rest- Now I have to quilt it. I don't know if I want to do it by hand or machine, I love the look of hand quilting, but hate doing it! We'll see. I absolutely LOVE this quilt, and never want to do applique again :) But ofcourse I have already been brainstorming some other applique quilt ideas, and have told Mike to not let me do any more applique, it is so tedious- but I love the look. And now for the cards- The Winegardners- Nate, Brooke, Dave and Marie, bought me some "cancer is over gifts" They got me some new paper, and money to buy stamps, and some cricut cartridges and a card making class, I haven't been to the class yet- but anyway- with my money, I bought this quote, butterfly stamps, and bird stamps, so anyway- here are some cards I made.

Megan's quilt

My sister Megan has always loved a similar quilt that I made for myself. She says she wants to steal it every time she visits. SO- I decided to make her one for her birthday. I took my quilt to the fabric store and tried to find the exact same fabrics, I managed to find 6, and the rest I had to just find similar ones. I usually don't do presents this large, but being that this year has been a stressful one for the whole family, I wanted to do something a little special this year. She was very surprised and she loved it, that made the whole thing worth it.

If you're wondering, there are 25 different colors. Each square measures about 2 1/2 inches.

snake for tanner and kate

I had the Lamms for Christmas this year, and I tried to think of something I could make with something I already had since we're low on the mula. And then I thought of it: I could make them snakes. I already had teh stuffing and this crazy snake fabric I got on clearance a long time ago. When I was little I asked my mom to make me a snake, I just loved the idea of having a huge long snake, so i thought maybe they would too. Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures- so this is all I have from Lizzie's camera. Maybe I should I have her take a picture of the snake for me, it is probably 8 feet long, with eyes and a tongue, and then I made Kate a momma and baby snake- probably 1 foot long, and then half a foot long. They love stuffed animals (especially Kate) - so they loved them!

Cricut machine

Well, after having Brooke's sister come over with her Cricut machine, it got me thinking..... -it can do so many amazing things, I was completely sold after using her machine, but I will get to that later- so they are originally 200 something- well, before Christmas Eve, they were on sale for 99 dollars, plus I have a business (Etsy) card- which gives you 10% off your total purchase at Joann's, (so if you have any kind of business, get one!) So that would bring down the Cricut to $90. So how could I get the mula? Well, I made some doll clothes, with matching outfits, made 50 off of that, then I got a surprise gift card to joanns from a sweet angel that took care of the rest- so off to Joann's I went- and I GOT---------- DRUM ROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL- A CRICUT!!!!!!!! I don't even know where to begin- It is so amazing, I get anxiety trying to figure out how to explain to others how amazing it it, I just want to bear my testimony that it's perfect, and wish that everyone would just trust me and get one, because the list of how amazing it is, is SO LONG. Let me tell you a LITTLE bit about it. It looks like a printer, but it cuts. It can cut light and heavy cardstock, paper, vinyl with sticky backing (for signs) and bigger drum roll..... FABRIC. I've already been obsessed with signs, and go to the effort of actually painting on the letters myself, I already applique quilts, and I have recently picked up card making, so you can see why this machine was meant to be in my LIFE!

Each machine comes with 1 cartrigde. A cartridge comes with oh.... maybe 100 characters. There are "letter" cartridges, and "graphic" cartdiges, and some with a little of both. The cartridges are spendy- 90 dollars, but go on sale at Joanns for 40, plus, with my 10% coupon- that brings it down to 36. The machine comes with a letter cartridge, and a few symbols- flowers, hearts, stars.

WELL, I got some Christmas money, so I got the paper doll cartridge. You might wonder why I got the paper doll cartridge, since I dont' play with paper dolls.- well- Each paper doll (which is about 50)- comes with what is called "accesories" - so- the "cave girl" comes with dinosoars adn mountains- the "princess" comes with a castle- etc. So- really- in this cartridge you get alot more than what you ask for. Basically- you name it- this cartridge has it, graphic-wise. See, usually- if you want a snow man, you have to get the "winter cartridge" but the santa clause paper doll, has a snow man, etc. So really, if you get this cartridge, the only reason you'd need to get another is if you wanted a different style of lettering, but as far as graphics, this one covers anything you would want. Plus- the paper dolls! You can print them with or without tabs. It is REALLY COOL. So- my sister Lizzie is thinking about getting one, and since you can't look inside the pamphlet until you buy it- I took a picture of - I think every page- or almost every page- so you could see the accesories. so- here they are- OH YEAH- the cricut can cut as small as 1 inch- to as large as 5 1/2 inches. I did the letters and green flowers with my cricut: This is me testing it on fabric I don't care about- It cut out that heart perfectly, and then I adhered it to another fabric. Worked great. (that is the only way you can cut out fabric- is with a wonder under some adhesive backing to make it stiff, which is what you want anyway for applique

skeleton, paper doll, and wig-

this is what it looked like after I peeled it off the mat-

This is an example of how the paper dolls work- it will cut out all these individual things to make up a paper doll. Only there are 50 different kinds!
Different positions of face, and face expressions:

borders:

As you can see the paper doll is on the left, and the accessories are on the right:

CARDS

Well, on my chemo days I got sick of sewing, and Brooke's sister showed up just in time with the idea of making Christmas cards- So i got on a real card making kick- I'm not a card maker- well- my family knows I am a card maker in the fact that I make silly cards, but I'm not a cute card maker- so this was kind of strange for me- because I probably made over 30 cards. Before I knew it I was purchasing ink and rubber stamps- ( just 1 dollar at Joann's and Craft warehouse). THEN- I drew Marie's name (mom in law) for Christmas- not knowing what to get her for Christmas with so little money, Brooke gave me the great idea of making her cards! So these are some the cards I made her- they are birthday, "just a note" and "best friends" themed. Now I don't have a "nice" camera like all you richies out there :)- so imagine a nice fuzzy blur in the back round, with a magazine look to it :) By the way- alot of people are into chalk, for scrap booking and card stamping- WELL- I know I'm new at this- but I just used colored pencils and lightly colored it in- and I think it looks exactly the same- and it's alot less messy. Not to mention- cheaper.

I love the owl birthday ones- once again people- 1 dollar for these stamps!

These are the Christmas cards I made. I was able to do the "Let it Snow" with Brooke's sister's Cricut machine. So cool.

These are my old fashion looking ones- these were Mike's favorite:

And the elf ones- love them!- and all the sayings on the elf ones, I just made up and printed off the computer- this was before I got stamps-

I don't know why, but the elf ones remind me of my mom, I feel like she would really like them

Then for Christmas Brooke gave me this box to keep all my cards, in, and I got some different colored envelopes to make it more fun- and I decorated it. Having things decorated, even though it's just storage, makes it so much more fun:

Rebecca's curtains

The Arnold women pitched in to buy the fabric for Rebecca, and I made the curtains. The top still needs to be turned down, it won't have that white on the top.

American Girl doll Disney Dresses

So- these are the dresses I made on my new Kit doll that I got for an early birthday present. 60 bucks on craigslist. I will not do them for Etsy, but they are fun to do for a gift for my neices.