Slaap Lekker, dear J

J's quilt is finished! 200cm x 200cm using one of my all-time favourite fabrics, 2d zoo in pond.

I decided to just get over myself (sheesh, didn't you just want to slap me after that post?) and used the black dot fabric. It looks totally fine and, best of all, it's done! If I were to make this again I would reduce the size of the sashings between the blocks or make the borders just a little wider and I would ditch that light green centred block in the bottom left corner. I didn't like how that colour looked as soon as I put the block together, I don't know why I persisted with it and left it as it was. And, of course, I would use a different fabric for the binding but you know that already and I promise not to talk about it again, okay? It sucks to have perfectionist tendencies and poor skillz.

The kids put together a twister-style game and have been turning themselves inside out, pulling muscles and collapsing in fits of giggles playing it. It blows me away how creatively kids can play when give no direction, plenty of boredom and a good supply of coloured pencils.
PS Slaap lekker (which is embroidered in the light blue block) means sleep well/sleep nicely in dutch.

2 years old

Happy birthday darling JW! Everyone gorged themselves on carrot cake, cheese and crackers, fruit and tiny teddies and played poison ball on the trampoline until it got dark. Birthdays don't get better than that!

Favourites

Hi Mary, you liked my past Favourites post so here's another quick little list for you. I hope you're well by the way, do post some more photos for us to enjoy, won't you?

We watched Eastern Promises a few weeks ago and I spent a large part of the film trying to figure out how Naomi Watts manages to look so good in jeans and a jacket. Apparently, I am not the only one who loved how she looked because there is info online about the jacket she wears in almost every scene. It's apparently a Belstaff Motorcycles brand called the Cordura New Tourist Trophy jacket 1500 (how's that for a catchy name?). Gorgeous! I have no idea how much it costs but it's probably ridiculously expensive given that they list it's specs on the website, don't you think? Her boots are also lovely, just flat soled knee high black boots that I've been admiring in all the store windows for a while now. Hm, time to go shopping?

I bought this fat quarter pack and am going to make a quilt for the couch now that the evenings are getting chilly. I love greens, aquas and blues together so I think I'll enjoy snuggling under this over the coming months.

I've got a few stitching projects that I want to work on but there are also some things making me itch to get the woodworking tools out. Marble run, anyone?

And, if you haven't seen it yet, stop by MadebyJoel for some crafty inspiration. His modernist doll house is divine.

JW turned 2 today (I know!) and my book editing sister, S, who always gives the most amazing books gave her a little gem called Millions of Snow. Aunty S needs a blog to keep track of all the wonderful children's books that are out there, don't you think? But, you know, no pressure!

Unexpected things that Hugh Hefner and I have in common

Sex addiction often seems like a very convenient excuse to me.

Working on...

I could also name this post 'the trouble with buying fabric online' because I got my order from fatquartershop.com last week and the dark brown pindot fabric I bought to use as binding on J's quilt is far too dark. It reads as a black rather than a brown. I think I let myself be swayed by the fact that it is named Chocolate Garden Pindot but even the picture on the website looks definitely brown. Such a pity! It's not worth the cost of postage and the 20% restocking fee to try to return it so I will keep it and I am sure I will find a use for it in future projects but I now need to decide what to use for binding on this quilt. I am pretty keen to have a brown binding but I am open to suggestions, what do you think?
Also, dear readers, do you know which online fabric shop has a colour matching function? I am sure I have visited a site that allows you to view a fabric and then search for co-ordinating fabrics by selecting one of the colours in the original fabric but I can't remember what it was called. That would be a great tool to help me finish this quilt!

The other thing I have been working on is this quilt for JW's cot. I saw this lovely quilt on flickr and am making my own version. I love the pieced inner border and that is what I am working on at the moment. The school holidays and after dinner games of double patience with Mr Duyvken have slowed my progress down considerably but I hope the get the sewing machine out over the weekend.

PS Sorry the photos are sideways, Blogger occasionally plays with the pics I am uploading and today is one of those days. I figure since these ones don't have people in them I'm just going to leave them as they are and you can all tilt your heads to your right to see them properly. On the upside you can cancel your chiro visits this week!

Happy birthday Mr Duyvken

The kids and I gave him some bar towels and pillow cases from Branch Handmade. They're so beautifully made (I love Etsy) and I knew they'd be well received because Mr Duyvken loves cycling. We try not to talk about it in terms of addiction but that's basically what it is. I figure it's better than crack, right? By the way, both those photos are from branch handmade, I would love that black and purple blanket to be on my bed and to have artfully arranged pears for you but, sadly, I did not.)

I also made him a photographic present but I'll post about that tomorrow when I have had a chance to take some better pictures. In the meantime, these are a couple of my favourite shots;

That's JW making a cameo appearance in the last photo. She was very patiently waiting to grab Lightning McQeen.

Things I love

The view from here...

Enjoy the long weekend!