Wedding Flowers and Samplers


Last Friday Mom, my older sister, Heather,  and I were busy making bouquets, boutonnieres, and corsages!  Some very dear friends of ours were getting married on Saturday and Mom offered that we could do the flowers for the wedding.


Early Friday morning Mom and I went out to different stores to find the flowers for the wedding. It was pretty stressful trying to find all the flowers we needed but the Lord graciously answered our prayers and we brought home a 5 gallon bucket full of flowers plus a dozen roses that could not fit in it :-)
I thought we would have too many flowers, but at the end of the day we had just enough flowers to make a beautiful cake topper as well!
Mom arranged the bouquets and Heather and I taped the flowers. It was so much fun working together :-)
After we made the two bouquets we made five boutonnieres and five corsages. Unfortunately I did not get pictures of them but they turned out so pretty too!

The flowers before being arranged
Dozens of roses :-)
 
So stunning!

The bride's bouquet
The matron of honor's bouquet
The bouquets at the wedding; "just a few more minutes of making sure nothing happens to them" :-)
The beautiful cake that our pastor's wife made


Last week I worked on this cross stitch sampler as a gift for the new couple. I really like how simple yet pretty the design is. It was so quick to make and I was able to frame it very easily. Yeah!




Blessings,
~Rachel

Day Trip

 Hello dear readers,
     How has your week been so far?
     I've been having some busy days here and I have been wanting to share some pictures of a recent day trip I went on.
    Last  Friday Calvin (one of my older brothers) and I took some Indian friends down to Amish Country and Columbus. We had lots of fun going to Lehman's Store, two cheese houses and driving through Amish Country. Then we went to Easton Mall close to Columbus so that our friends could do some shopping there. After lots of shopping we went to downtown Columbus. We walked through a really pretty part outside of downtown Columbus called German Village.  There was brick everywhere. Most of the houses were made out of brick and looked really cute and cozy. Plus the roads were brick and some of the sidewalks were brick too!  It would be a pretty place to live if you needed to live close to Columbus :-)

Here are some pictures from the trip!

At Easton Mall in Columbus
 


German Village, Columbus
Walking on the brick sidewalks
Canal Boat


Longaberger Baskets Headquarters
Some nature pictures that I took at Easton Mall and in German town.




Blessings,
    ~Rachel

New Hair Do!

Hello! How was your weekend? Mine was pretty normal until I got my hair cut  :-)


I started out wanting my hair trimmed but the hair trimming turned into a hair cut!
Since I was around ten years old I have donated my hair every 2 to 3 years. It had been 2 years since I last donated my hair so my hair was getting long but I did not think my hair was long enough to donate. But when I found out that I would have to take off around six inches I decided to take a big leap. I had Mom cut off 11 inches! 
Now, I have made my goal of donating my hair 5 times; well that is when I officially send it in the mail  :-)
I was really nervous when my hair was a lot shorter than I was planning when I first asked for the hair trimming but Mom did a great job layering my hair and making this new hair do one of my favorites :-)


Spring is coming!


Blessings,
~Rachel

Hexagon Flower Patches

   


 Last Friday Mom and I went over to help family friends who had just welcomed a new baby into their home. One of their older daughters (who is around 9)  asked her Mom what to do with two pair of pants that had holes in the knees. Since her Mom had just given birth to their 7th baby the day before; she decided  they would have to throw the pants away because they did not have time to fix them.  I offered to take the pants home and try and patch them.
I have often patched my clothes with store bought patches but this time the holes in these pants were big and on the knees, so I decided I would make my own patches. I wanted the patches to be girly and pretty. So the first thing I did was look for ideas on Google and I found this wonderful tutorial:  http://sewmamasew.com/blog2/2009/08/paper-piecing-hexagons/
The first patch turned out very pretty and the pattern was easy to follow. But I wanted to change the pattern from using paper to using interfacing and since I was going to make another patch I thought it would be fun to make a tutorial of how to make these hexagon  flower patches. So I got my brother's wonderful camera and started the next patch.

Here are the materials you need to make these darling hexagon flowers:

-Scissors
- Pen
-Scraps of fabric ( I used 3 different patterned fabric)
-Iron
-Thread
-Interfacing
- Hexagon template ( I used a Feta Cheese lid) first I made a hexagon on Microsoft word with 1 inch sides to make the hexagon template for the lid

First, trace out 7 hexagons on your interfacing. Then cut out all the hexagons.


Next, Iron the interfacing on the back sides of your scraps of fabric. Make sure your fabric is fairly wrinkle free.


After you have ironed on the interfacing cut out your fabric hexagons being sure to leave a 1/8" to 1/4" seam allowance between the interfacing and the edge of the fabric.

Now you are ready to start sewing your hexes together.  
Finger press your fabric along the side of the interfacing on two of your hexes. With right sides together match up your center hexagon with another hexagon with corners matching up. Make a knot on your thread and begin the ladder stitch picking up a tiny bit of fabric each time. Tie off at the end of each side.  Join all the sides of the hexagon together to form a flower. You will have to twist the fabric so that you get right sides together and make sure that it lies flat when it is sewn together.

After you have sewn all the hexagons together finger press the outside edges of the fabric onto the interfacing and sew it down. I did tiny french stitches but now that I think about it, it would be a lot faster to quickly baste it. You can do it however you like :-)
Now you have a beautiful patch!


Last step: Sew the patch onto your clothes that need a  fresh and new look!




Blessings,
  ~Rachel


Raggedy Anne Dolls and Muffins...

Last night I went over to my sister and brother-in-law's house to watch their little girls. I stayed overnight at their house and got to spend the whole morning and part of the afternoon with them.
It has been such a blessing to have my sister living so close to us and being able to spend time with her family; being a part of the lives of my two sweet little nieces is such a joy:-)  
I dressed Fiona up in her Raggedy Anne doll clothes right before lunch, she was so cute wearing them that we took pictures.

Fiona wearing Raggedy Anne clothes
Aunt "Rowee" and Fiona :-)
After lunch Fiona and I made muffins together. It was so much fun working with her and it was amazing how much a 2 1/2 year old can do!


I thought it would be fun to share a picture of when I was little and when I fit in my Raggedy Ann Doll clothes :-)


 

Blessings,
~Rachel