Tea for two

Almost from the time my niece Abigail was born, we've been having tea.  My favorite pictures of her are when she was 2 and wearing Nana's hat, pouring tea from my tea pot (Aunt Bobbie staged alot of photos with the kidlets when they were small.)  Each year I try to have a tea party for her birthday,  sometimes with just the two of us, sometimes with family and other times we've sent out invitations to friends.
Last year she asked if she could have a tea party with one friend.... For some reason it never happened,  schedules conflicted and the such like.  So today we made it happen (only one year and a half later). 

     Abby's brothers and parents are in Iowa for Jr Bible Camp, so Abby spent the week at Nana Camp (the boys had Nana Camp in July while Abby was at Teen Camp)  part of Nana Camp includes a day with Aunt Bobbie.  We  had to split our day up, yesterday we painted pillows with Emma Bean and went to the playground.  This morning we had tea with  Christa. 

I took my coffee table (which is an old trunk) into the backyard and decorated the tree and clothesline  with fabric flowers and tulle.  I wrapped some pillows in fabric for the girls to sit on and brought a vintage suitcase &  books out.  I used bridesmaid's bouquets and loose flowers as well as fresh flowers from my garden. Hats and scarves were provided. 

 

 

Menu : Strawberry Cheese  Tarts with whipped cream,  Nutella Shortbread (Girl Scout cookies with Nutella) and Cinnamon Earl Grey  tea (*somebody* put the box of  the tea I had planned to serve- Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride - away empty and I only had Earl Grey and Cinnamon Stick left... The girls drank two pots full so they must have liked it)

 

I left the girls to themselves until after the second pot of tea,  it's rare that they see each other without crowds of siblings.  Christa brought a set of American Girl books and they played the game that was attached.  Then we read some poetry and Emma joined us. After Christa left Abby and Emma played dress up with the scarves. 
The weather today is perfect for being outdoors, it's hot but there's a beautiful breeze and the tree had fantastic shade until about 2pm.
Now it's time for Aunt Bobbie to go play in the sewing room!  Have a great day!

 

 

Cozy Afternoon begins tomorrow!

I am super excited to start Jacquelynn Steves cozy afternoon quilt tomorrow! I have all my fabric awaiting me in a little tote.  I mistakenly thought this started on the first of June and I believe I signed up for it at the end of April.... So  my anticipation is running high speed!  This is the first time I've begun a BOM at the very beginning, and had all my fabric picked out and ready to sew.  I've been collecting raspberry and greens for a long while and I think this will be the perfect time to  use them.  

Raspberry and Greens
-sorry for the  horrible picture

someone suggested I make a quilt out
 of this picture... maybe someday soon!!!

This week I had the privilege and pleasure of  baby sitting my niece - I was able to do some s summer fun things that I had on my Pinterest board.  I told Emma Bean that I had a list and it has at least 111 things on it.  We flew kites,  had a picnic,  started reading Pippi Longstocking, 

one foot two foot purple foot yellow foot

 practiced painting with our feet (for a fun footprint gift later) built a fort (camped and roasted imaginary marshmallows), colored, made pink pancakes,  splashed through every Puddle we could find,  danced,  made up silly songs,  took walks and had a ton of fun. 
My list hasn't really shrunk much-I think it's like a hydra: cross off one project and two more appear!  Tomorrow I get to play at Bean's   again and  start a quilt!  Sounds like a fabulous Monday to me!

You can sign up for this free BOM Here

puddle jumping fun

Whoop Whoop!

Today I am linking over to Confessions of a Fabric Addict -  Tuesdays  note: well  I *tried* to link over, but the linky  is closed,  I've been trying to get this post published since Friday but blogger app would not cooperate.  
I have a fabulous Friday finish! 
But this finish goes with a quilt I don't believe I have mentioned here!  Wow I am behind. 
Oh I am not as behind as I thought - Emma's quilt was mentioned here
I finished Emma's quilt in September.  When I held the quilt show in February, Emma was asked if we could show her quilt. She refused stating that she was afraid it would be ripped. When assured by her mom that Aunt Bobbie wouldn't allow anything to happen to it, she said it could be shown , however she had to stay with it all day. We decided the show could do without an energetic 5 and a half year old and left her quilt at home. :) 
Now for my fab Friday finish - Emma Bean just turned 6 and for her birthday we were supposed to go shopping with her cousin Abby (whose birthday is 4  days before Emma's) but Emma was unable to go. It wasn't till a couple days later (it's been a crazy month,  lots of confusion has reigned) that I realized that Aunt Bobbie didn't get Emma a gift because the plan was to buy it while we were shopping. Oops! So I wracked my brain and couldn't think of what to buy or make. Then as I was reorganizing some fabric I came across the fabric from Bean's quilt. Light bulb!  I'll make her a pillow with the leftover blocks.  Then I decided it should be a shaped pillow and made an owl.  I sorta used this tutorial from Ashley but tweaked it a bit. And made it very large (I didn't plan it that way but the quilt block was so big I had to make the owls belly bigger) 
I used all the fabrics in the quilt and some fleece I bought for a fox scarf
(so glad I bought extra.) it was all ready to stuff and then I realized I only had a small handful of stuffing. Not quite.  I got stuffing yesterday and used almost the whole 32 ounce bag. It's so SQuiSHY!  I think I want to keep it.  I really like the strip of fabric in between the two pillow pieces. It gives it a boxier look.

Back at it

I actually sat down at Sherman and was able to sew.  I hurt my back and then the flu knocked me for a loop and then had a big luau at work to host so Sherman has been feeling neglected. It's been like a month - I did get to work on Emma bean's quilt a bit last night - it's so  close to being finished two more areas to quilt on the main section and the border to quilt. 
This week is a new hop over at sew we  quilt "Rush Hour"  the button on the side of my blog will take you to the schedule.  My day is Friday.   Have a great day ☺

I'm linking up to show off Saturday @sew can she