The Sewing Machine Has Emerged!

After many weeks of sitting in the trunk of my car and then a week or so at the bottom of the stairs, my sewing machine has finally seen the light of day! My mom had her machine tuned up for me for my birthday (six months ago...) so its ready to go. I had some issues with the thread catching on the bobbin holder and then breaking, but I'm determined not to get frustrated. Overall, it was a very positive experience!

Now she just needs a name...

Quilt-spiration

As usual, I contiunue to be amazed at the sheer number of quilting blogs out there. I've been skimming through them a lot lately, gather inspiration and excitement.

Here a couple of the blogs I'm turning to for ideas:

Diary of a Quilter - By reading just a few entries (although you won't want to stop at just a few!), you can tell how much Amy loves all things quilting. She has some fantastic tutorials, including her "How to make a quilt from start to finish" series. I think I'll be referencing this one a lot! I love her use of fresh, bright colors in her designs, like this one with Amy Butler fabric.

Image Source: Diary of a Quilter

I also love the color combination used in this quilt.

Image Source: Diary of a Quilter

 

  Quilt Story - Sisters Heather and Megan started Quilt Story as a way to compile all the beautiful quilts they found on the web (neverending, remember?) as well as share their own crafty projects. Many of their posts link to other quilting sites and thier Fabric Tuesday feature is a great way to get inspriation from other crafters. They sell patterns from the Etsy shop and have some great tutorials, including one for this beauty! I love the applique at the bottom.

Image Source: Quilt Story

What are some of your favorite quilt-y blogs?

Back to Blogging

I don't remember what made me stop blogging after only 3 posts...well, 18 months later, I'm back! As the title of my blog suggests, I grew up as a math and science dork (not that there's anything wrong with that, I'm am very much still a self-professed dork!) and was never the most creative/crafy/inspired-type person. Sure, I did my fair share of simple latch-hooking, took some basic pottery classes and helped design my room re-decor when I was 12, but once I hit high school, I never pursued things any farther.

I can't point to a single "A-ha" moment that finally sparked my new found passion for all things design/crafts/sewing/quiliting (!), etc., but I'm fairly certain that Pinterest has a lot to do with it. (Follow me: pinterest.com/laurenmj!) I'm officially obsessed and pin everything from interior design and recipe ideas to crafts and vacation destinations. Recently, I subscribed to just about every magazine under the sun (House Beautiful, Traditional Home, Southern Living, Martha Stewart Living, and on and on...) and web addresses from hundreds of blogs and passed under my fingertips. I am continually amazed at the seemingly endess supply of inspiration they provide.

So, why, you ask, do I want to go back to blogging? Everyone's doing it, right? Although I would love to have multitudes of followers and sponsors and what not, a blog is also a great personal space to catalog everything I'm currently drooling over and projects I hope to one day create.

Sometime last winter, I decided that I wanted to learn how to quilt. I think it was born out of my love of fabrics and mixing and matching patterns. I like projects that have a plan and precise directions (remember, math dork!) so the straight lines and measurements of quilts are appealing to me. I bought some books, started building a fabric stash and had my mother's old sewing maching tuned up. Then summer and pool weather happened and certain things got pushed aside.

Last weekend, I traveled to Columbus for the Country Living Fair. (I have a subscription for them, too) and spending the weekend surronded by such creative people and their beautiful creations renewed my desire to create beautiful things myself. I purchased a quilt pattern from Sweet Jane's etsy shop and am planning to use fabric from Joel Dewberry's new Heirloom Collection for the quilt.

How absolutely gorgeous are these fabrics?

Image source: Joel Dewberry

I am beyond excited to get started! Let's go :)

Coral Red and Robin's Egg Blue

This is my current favorite color combo. So bright and fresh! So springy.

A beautiful example of this color combo is the wedding shower of fab photographer Jessica Claire. Below is a shot of the tablescape at the gorgeous backyard party and the adorable heart-shaped measuring spoon favors. I love that the colors and styling evoke a cute, throwback feeling, with a bit of what Jessica call's a "Happy Housewife" theme.

Favorite Blogs: #1

I found a new blog yesterday that I can't get enough of...Oh Lovely Day. The blog is written by a woman named Chandra and she describes her site as "Dedicated to vintage, chic, stylish, homemade, handmade and do-it-yourself inspriations for wedding, home and all things lovely." I pretty much want to be her...or be her BFF.

(Side note, Blogger has finally gotten itself together and I can actually see all of the pictures on these sites, which makes for a much more enjoyable blog-reading experinces. Ahem.)

Anyway...back to Chandra! Her inspiration boards are gorgeous and her ideas are modern and fresh and she recently planned her own wedding, so she knows what she's talking about.

Here's her "Vineyard Wedding" inspiration board. Gorgeous!

Wish Upon a Curtain

I saw these on Anthropologies' website and immediately fell in love. Love the bold graphic design and the purple, of course. And their called "Wish Upon." How fun would it be to design a whole room around them?



There's a good chance that this lamp (also Anthropologie) will be in that room, too!