40 weeks… and a peek at the nursery

Well, today marks 40 weeks! There’s no sign of baby yet, but hopefully soon – we’re very much looking forward to meeting him! While we wait, how about a look at the nursery?

This room has been our office, then our guest room, and now a room for the new baby. This set up is by far my favorite!

Here’s a view from the doorway –

And this shows one side of the room, with the glider and closet door. As I mentioned previously, we opted for gray for the walls, and I totally love it. (Benjamin Moore Gray Horse.)

You may have seen the pillow I made for the glider in this post. The mirror and table are finds from a local antique shop.

This shows the opposite side of the room, standing at the closet –

The large pear is a wall hanging we made forever ago using a Marimekko panel, and I was so pleased to find that it nearly perfectly matches the bookcase (which I finally broke down and bought, despite the high shipping cost!) I posted about the crib here, including the crib skirt and sheets I made. The smaller art pieces are also fabric covered canvases, using some of my favorite fabrics from Hitomi’s shop.

The bookcase currently holds a variety of fun items – a few vintage toys I’ve found online, and a few that were mine as a child. The cute little turtle (we’re calling him Timbo) on the top shelf was made by my sweet friend Phiona, using a Wee Wonderfuls pattern. We also received a wonderful gift from Heather – a copy of Where the Sidewalk Ends, which was one of my favorites as a child. After doing a little digging, I discovered I owned another Shel Silverstein book, so now we’ve got the start of a collection!

The lower shelf holds the stack of quilts.

A couple stuffed animals, and that wonderful sweater made by Kate.

Above the crib is this fun Flensted mobile (love that little worm on a hook!). Currently it’s been keeping Morgan entertained, and I hope it will do the same for the baby!

The opposite corner holds the changing table and a smaller vintage table holding those fabric baskets I made recently.

The artwork above the changing table is some we made a couple years ago, using a variety of papers and a Martha Stewart paper punch (I guess I never posted about it, (though you can see them a little closer here) but the tutorial came from this blog).

The framed piece near the closet door is my newest favorite – an absolutely perfect print from Heather Ross, which we framed and hung yesterday.

And there you have it! We hope the baby will be very happy in his new room.

(and I hope that he’ll arrive soon!!)

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pretty fabrics

I’ve tried to be better recently about the number of new fabrics arriving at our doorstep, but I couldn’t resist these lovelies –

Gorgeous solids (with a few Essex linens on top)

Pure Elements by Patricia Bravo. Such beautiful colors, and so soft to the touch!

I had been admiring Jay McCarroll’s newest line, Habitat, for a while, but then after seeing Amber’s fabulous quilt top, I was sold. I opted for the purple colorway, since my stash always seems to be lacking in purple fabrics. (purchased at Fabric.com, though also available here or here)

And lastly, a bit of summery seersucker and gingham — I’m thinking bloomers, shorts & pants for the baby!

I don’t know how much sewing will actually get done over the next few days and weeks, but for now these piles are lovely to just look at!

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shades of blue… another Flea Market Fancy strip quilt

Ready for another strip quilt? How about another made of Flea Market Fancy, this time in blues and grays?

The blues are some of my favorites, and I love seeing them all grouped together like this.

On the back, I used Kona Ice Frappe, with a little yellow for contrast (and a bit of a pieced printed section, of course!). I thought about doing the whole backing in yellow, but didn’t have any on hand and didn’t have the patience to order and wait for it to arrive!

This time I decided to play a bit with the quilting, using curved lines as a contrast to the straight lines of the strip design. I went for this arch design – a series of archs on one half of the quilt with a (sort of!) mirror image on the other half. To make the arch, I marked the centerpoint of the quilt and then using a water soluble marker, I drew out the first arch on either side freehand (which is why I say it’s sort of a mirror image!). After quilting the first arch, I used the edge guide attachment on my machine to quilt 1″ away from that arch until I filled in half the quilt. This was then repeated for the other half of the quilt.

I love the design that’s created, especially on the backside of the quilt. And even though it took a while, it was fun to try out something a bit different!

I thought about hanging on to this one, but since we all know the baby doesn’t need another quilt, into the shop it goes! sold, thanks Emily!

Posted in [search] Strip Quilts, Posts about Quilts, Quilts | Tagged , , , , , , | 45 Comments