Threadmade by Rebekah Stewart

We bought our house in 2009 with the intention that one day we would do the kitchen.  It is a large room with great space that was poorly underutilized.  So when the sink broke in April, we decided it was finally time.  The cabinets, original to the house (built in 1963), were starting to show their age and half the doors wouldn’t shut anymore.  Not to mention the kitchen was completely not functional in layout or design.  Add to that some country blue laminate countertops and I was ecstatic to go from this:

to this!

We absolutely love the way everything turned out!  It is sooo much more functional and clean.  We still need to do backsplash and paint, which we will do later this summer.

My parents were a huge help and we could not have done this without them.  My dad’s help is what allowed us to do most of the work ourselves and save a lot of money.  We hired out the cabinet install with a family friend, but the rest was all of our blood, sweat, and tears.  And 8 weeks without a functioning kitchen. (Kinda like camping, but not as fun.)  FYI, bathrooms were not designed for doing dishes.

A few highlights from the finished product.  Getting rid of the wall cabinet that held the stove opened up the room and allows in so much more light.  So did moving the refrigerator and extending the countertops down to the other window.  We added a lot of lighting as well with under cabinet lights, recessed lights in the ceiling, and a pendant over the sink.  Now I can actually see to do dishes at night instead of discovering they are still dirty in the daylight.  We also ran a gas line from downstairs so we could have a gas stove.

So much better!  I will never want to sell this house.

I am a baby quilt making machine these days!  This one is for my cousin and his wife who just had their second baby, a little boy.  Again, I needed quick and easy so I went with a whole cloth quilt.

Owls on the front, stripes on the back, animal print binding.

And quilted with circles.

Simple, easy, and cute.  Off to the mail it goes!

A sweet couple from our church is having a little one soon.  We are seriously growing our kids ministry from the ground up at Green Hills!   Her baby shower was this weekend and it was beautiful.  My friend Tabitha hosted it and she had the cutest things set up like these cards to write a prayer for the baby.

They want the gender of the baby to be a surprise so we helped them come up with some names.

Side note: Tabitha has the cutest, most perfectly decorated house of anyone I know.  I only wish I could have a small amount of her style.  I’m thinking about hiring her to decorate mine.

For this gift, I tried something new and went for a simple cotton blanket on one side and soft minky goodness on the other, then used a coordinating fabric for the binding.  Simple was good because I squeezed this project in amidst our kitchen renovation projects.  (When the grandparents have the baby for a week you can do stuff like that!).

I love this bicycle print by Michael Kauffman and thought it could work well for a little boy or girl.  I was surprised by how heavy it was when I finished it, but it gave a really nice drape to the blanket.

Congratulations Abby and Jesse!

Most of the things I make, I give away as presents.  But, this one belongs to Adeline which means we get to keep it.  I bought the charm pack this quilt was made of on our anniversary trip to Maine a few years ago.  I thought it would make a really nice quilt for our baby one day.

The charm pack itself wasn’t enough to make full quilt, so I used some vintage fabric from my grandmother’s stash.  They coordinate so well together, it is hard to tell what is old and what is new.  I quilted the squares on the diagonal and then used a wavy pattern on the boarder.

I kept it simple on the back with one piece of fabric and used yellow for the binding.

I think she will like it just fine.  :)  It has already found a permanent home on the side of her crib and we find it with her each morning.

Sadly, Ben’s step father passed away on March 29.  He had been in the hospital since December with many complications and his body just couldn’t fight anymore.  It was a hard decision for the family and a life ended all too soon.  He was loved by many people and left a lasting impression on those in his life.  We are thankful he was a Christian and loved Jesus.  He will be greatly missed.

Mom and Dad came down to visit for a week in March.  While they were here, I took some time off as well.  We had a great week and Adeline got spoiled rotten by her grandparents.

We played around the house, did lots of walking up and down the steps, and experienced new things like bubbles and wagons and dirt.

We also went to the zoo to see the real animals. (Thanks Clay and Beth for our zoo pass, we love it!)

 And it gave Ben and I some time to get things accomplished around the house, like planting the flowers and PLANNING OUR KITCHEN REMODEL!!!  So excited that this is actually going to happen!  All in all, it was a great week.

Our close family friends, Luke and Heather, just had their first baby.  Baby boy Declan arrived a couple of weeks ago and is a cutie!  Well, from what I can tell on Facebook at least.  :)  We won’t get to meet him until our annual beach trip to Florida in June.  We can’t wait!

I finished this project a while ago, but then life got in the way and I finally mailed it off last week.  Which means I can finally show it to you all!  I have been wanting to try the half square triangle chevron pattern for a while and this was the perfect opportunity.  I found this great navy blue houndstooth print and thought it would work well.  I added a pop of orange to break it up.

Congratulations Luke and Heather!  We are looking forward to seeing you soon!

This girl is 15 months and has so many expressions!

We love her.  A lot.

I do have some crafty things in the works to show you soon, I just need to find time to finish them!

My friend Monica got a new Kindle for Christmas and asked me to make a cover for her.  She picked out a few on Pinterest and sent me some fabric ideas.  I researched Kindle cover tutorials and ended up combining features of a few to create this.

It has a flexible inner piece to put the Kindle into and a flap with a velcro closure.  I lined each piece of the cover with interfacing and used a single layer of cotton quilt batting to give the cover the structure it needed.

 This was a really quick project and I really liked how it turned out.  I think Monica liked it, too.  :)

It’s 2012 and time to for a new journal.  My old one is full of records of many hard and wonderful things in my life.  With the new journal is the promise of what is yet to come.  What will fill these pages this year?  What events?  What life lessons?

My journal of choice is the moleskine.  I like that they will always be the same shape and size.  I like the feel of the pages and the way it lays flat when you open it.  This year, I chose red on a whim rather than the classic black.  I’m still not sure about it, it is more orange than red, but it’s growing on me.  I made a pen holder for the front so my pen is always right there.

I divided my journal into 3 sections this year.  One for daily writings and sermon notes.  One for prayer requests and one for Eucharist Deo, one thousand gifts inspired by this book.

Finally, I am committing to reading the Bible daily this year.  I had a really good routine going prior to Adeline’s arrival.  Once she came along, that quickly went out the window and I have struggled to get back on track.  I am determined to make the time each day to spend time with the Lord.  To help with this, I am going to try this Bible reading plan.  I like that changes enough each day to keep it interesting.  I printed it out and glued it onto an index card that can go with me anywhere.  And it has boxes to check off.  I like checking off boxes.  So, we’ll see how it goes.

New year.  New beginnings.  The promise of great things yet to come.