Needles and a Pen » Knitting, Sewing, and Nursing School

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  • Welcome to my blog!

    Hi! I'm Traci. I'm a Registered Nurse who loves quilting, knitting, cross stitch, and the great outdoors. In my pre-scrubs life, I owned Real Photography, and you can still see my old wedding and portrait photography site here .

    I've created a map that shows links to our camping/hiking/general family fun review posts that you can find here. It's pretty much the coolest thing on this site. Thanks, Google!

    I great big puffy heart *love* comments, so please let me know you visited! I try to always reply!

Will named Ellie Cucumber James.  Which is fantastic. It’s like Indiana Jones.  I have, however, requested that she be Cucumber Jane since it’s a little more girly.

Look what came in the mail on Friday!

I re-caught the fabric bug too late to catch the Flea Market Fancy fabric line, but I was up early enough one morning this week to snatch up this amazing quilt by Ashley of Film in the Fridge.  It’s exactly what I’ve been wanting to make for baby/kiddo shoots, so I had to test it out on my little ones this afternoon.

Ellie loves it and I’m pretty sure she begged me to let her call it her own.  I mean, look at those big puppy dog eyes!  So we came to an agreement that if she lets me borrow it for shoots, it can live with her the rest of the time.

Will likes it, too.  For some reason this out-of-focus shot is my fave.

Mom - GORGEOUS!!

a chicken skirt

I love chickens.  I want to keep chickens and would probably really lobby Nic to make a chicken coop for me if it wasn’t for chicken poop.  I say it’s the foxes that we see all spring, but really, it’s the poop.

So if I can’t have chickens I *can* have a chicken skirt. I used the Addie Jo Skirt pattern from Izzie & Ivy and Monaluna fabric from Robert Kaufman.  To turn the skirt pattern for little girls into one for me, I used the pattern for the largest size, and then my own waist measurements to make a non-elastic waistband with an invisible zipper at the side.

It looked beautiful.

And it probably would have worked really well on an 8 year old, but on a mother-of-two the 6 inch tall straight waistband was a bit of a disaster.  So I ripped it out, cut it down to an inch and a half, and tried again.  It fits perfectly, but having a 1 inch zipper is a bit stupid.  Next time (and there will definitely be a next time–I love gathered skirts with giant big bows and no one sells them in adult sizes!) I will make the waistband with just a bit of elastic at the back.

Nic is lucky that the weather is rapidly turning too cold for this skirt.  Because as much as I love it, I can tell that he’s not a fan.  (He felt the same way about my patent leather Mary Janes.)

Edith - This is such a cute skirt. IF I had a little girl, I would be making one just like this. That brown tie is my favorite part.

Will has mastered pronouncing Eloise.  Which makes me sad because for a long time it was Ellie-Weeze and then it was Ellies for a few weeks.

Ellie’s baby quilt

Ellie’s baby quilt was my first ‘breaking the rules’ quilt.  I started small–just breaking the “quilt finishing” rules that I hate anyway.  I didn’t use batting or binding–just made the top from a Moda charm pack, slapped some bright pink fleece on the back, ran a couple of lines of quilting through it and called it a day.  Since it doesn’t have much quilting (just quilt-in-the-ditch around the striped border) it’s very soft and the fleece makes it very cozy.  The perfect Colorado quilt!

Mom - Love it–and so jealous! I want to sew together!!!!!!!!!!!!!

glamgarden bag

I was seduced by the Practicality Bag pattern for one very important reason: it involves no interfacing or canvas lining.  Huzzah!  It makes a great diaper bag, but next time I might sew a zippered pocket into it because I do worry about my phone falling out of it since it’s so floppy.

Pattern:  Practicality Bag

Fabric:  Glamgarden and Kona Cotton solid in Pomegranate