Single Wedding Ring Quilt

Two months before my wedding if you asked me how planning was going, I would have responded, "Well, I'm working on this quilt." Haha!  Some would call that crazy. For me, it was the complete opposite: it kept me sane. I guess that's love... of the craft and of the friends I gifted it to. 

This is the first quilt I've made for someone that wasn't a baby and I struggled with the design at first. Adults have style, decor, and personality to consider. It's risky! I had a few favourites picked out, but I kept searching and searching because nothing felt quite right. Then I stumbled across this image of an antique quilt on Pinterest and the search was over.

The block design is called the Single Wedding Ring and it's been around since the 1880s. It's also been known much less romantically throughout history as Crown of Thorns and Sawtooth, but we'll just ignore that. That blue and white palette is very traditional as well. Combined with modern prints and simple quilting, I couldn't think of anything more perfect for this couple on their wedding day.

One of the biggest challenges with this quilt was the thread colour. The majority of the quilt top was white, but what was I to do about quilting through the dark black and navy blocks? Mike tried to convince me it looked fine, but it drove me insane. So... I skipped all of those portions and then went back over them with black and navy as my top thread and white in the bobbin. Obviously it was much more time-consuming this way and the stitching on the back wasn't as neat as it could've been, but I don't care. I loved the result!

I was also on the fence about using the same chambray on the back, the border and the binding. Triple whammy. But, once again, Mike insisted and I'm so glad I took his advice. I love the simplicity. Less is more. In case you haven't noticed, there's a theme here.

This is exactly the kind of quilt I hoped to be able to make when I started quilting and I have a feeling that many more just like this are in my sewing future. I can only hope the newlyweds love it as much as I do and that they will enjoy many years of comfort and cuddles in its folds!

Our Wedding: Part 2 - The Ceremony

Ah, our wedding ceremony. Short, sweet... and a complete blurr. This was the time we stood up before everyone we love most in the world; the time we vowed to love, respect and stand by each other for the rest of our lives; the time we officially became husband and wife; oh, and the time a year of planning, anticipation and excitement finally came to be. All of that comes rushing at you at once! 

We were so utterly overwhelmed and nervous that we didn't hear half of what our officiant was saying. I kept taking deep breathe after deep breathe, simultaneously trying not to cry and to stop my entire body from shaking like a leaf. Mike had a similar internal dialogue questioning how to hold his hands and telling him to look at my dress without it looking like he's staring at my boobs. Hahaha! 

Hey, even if we weren't completely present, at least we were on the same page, right? And, I know I said it was a complete blurr, but that's not entirely true. There were a few favourite moments that stood out for us both, moments that we'll never forget and make us teary to this day. 

Our officiant was Reverend Deborah Coleman. She was recommended to us by a friend and one of the reasons we chose her was because she was very flexible with the wording of the ceremony. We spent a lot of time carefully picking and choosing the words to reflect exactly what our relationship and this marriage mean to us. It's a shame all the words ran into one another for us that day, but at least we know that everyone else heard what we wanted them to hear. 

One of our favourite moments from the ceremony was when she asked all of our guests if they supported our marriage and they gave a resounding "We do!" I think we both almost lost it right then and there.

Another moment I will never forget was my Aunt Jane's reading. We chose a passage from Captain Corelli's Mondolin by Louis de Bernieres and she delivered it beautifully. This time, I heard every word.

“Love is a temporary madness; it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of eternal passion. That is just being in love, which any fool can do. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Those who truly love have roots that grow toward each other underground, and when all the pretty blossoms have fallen from their branches, they find that they are one tree and not two.”

The kiss. So good, we did it twice. 

We didn't have a wedding party, so we asked my mother and Mike's father to be our witnesses. In retrospect, this was a lovely way to signify the merging of families.

I love this shot of my mom and Mike laughing. Everyone was just so gosh darn happy!

There was a lot of laughing!

"Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my great pleasure to present Erin & Michael 

to you for the first time as husband and wife!"

One other thing that was special to us about our ceremony was the music. Again, this is something we spent a lot of time choosing. We both love music and we wanted each song to not only reflect our taste, but, like everything else about our wedding, speak to us as a couple. This is not an easy task -- there was a point when Mike was going through every single song in our collection! 

I'm so glad we put the effort in, though, because I loved hearing those songs that day and every time we've heard them since. We had one song, now we have five. That is something.

Processional: "Holocene" by Bon Iver (percussion instrumental cover by Evan Chapman)

Signing Register: "Eyes on the Prize" by M. Ward
Recessional: "Hallelujah I Love Her So" by Ray Charles

Woo!

All photos by Hollie Pocsai.

Week in Review

Remember how I said I've been working really hard lately trying to get back into worker bee mode for Fall and how I pretty much spent my entire long weekend sewing? Well, since seeing is believing and it takes a crazy amount of time for a finished project to actually make it online (and I'm impatient), I thought I would give you a sneak peak at some of the things I have been working on. 

I completed only one single Farmer's Wife Quilt Block for August, #51 Hovering Birds. Lucky for me, this was the Needlework quilt-along block of the month and I won a $10 gift certificate for it! Woo!

I finished up some new women's aprons and photographed them this past weekend. As you can see, they have some pretty sweet details and I can't wait to make them available in the shop (hopefully next week)!

I know you all have been hurting for men's aprons ever since I sold out of the herringbone denim a few months ago, so you'll be happy to know that I'm finally making some new ones! You may have seen on Instagram and Facebook last week that I made a striped one as a special request for a customer (fingers crossed there is more of that fabric where it came from). I'm also making some in a dark indigo denim with contrast stitching. Ooh la la!

I thought the ladies might be feeling a little left out, so I whipped up a couple grometted aprons in this lovely soft plaid as well. I'm really liking the way these turned out... kind of country farm-girl chic. That's a thing, right? Well, it is now.

Fed up with my overflowing drawer of patterns, I did a little organizing and put them all in binders. The clothing patterns binder is already bursting at the seams! What do you do to organize your sewing patterns?

As a reward for sewing all those aprons, I made myself a maxi dress! Please tell me I'm not the only one who rewards sewing with more sewing. Haha!

The pattern is Mission Maxi by Jamie Christina and I've been holding onto it for over a year. I've never sewed with knits before and I was terrified to begin. I read the Colette Guide to Sewing Knits cover-to-cover twice for a boost of confidence and then dove in. My first attempt was a great learning experience -- not good enough to wear out, but good enough to wear to bed: I chopped off the bottom and made it into a nightgown. Luckily I bought double the amount of fabric I needed, so I made a second right away and it turned out great! I can't wait to wear it!

Who gets excited over new needles? This girl.

Something else new to get very excited about... my Cricut Explore! It arrived last Friday and Mike and I have been playing with it whenever we get a spare chance. It's an electronic design-and-cut machine that cuts just about anything you can think of: paper, fabric, vinyl, leather and even metal! It can also write and score too... at the same time. So far, we're impressed with the machine but not so impressed with the software. It looks like we're going to have to design in Photoshop and then import. But we're still tinkering away. I had high hopes for this machine and it's potential for Dear Edna for stencils, applique, embroidery transfer and labelling. It will be heartbreaking to have to send it back because of lackluster software. We shall see.

Do tell... what have you been up to?

Back To School

NotBookNotBuk; oneupdesigns; PrintStitchandBaste

jennarosehandmade; TheMotivatedType; BananaSaurusRex 

yevgenia; janehaydendesigns; stationaryboutique

I hope everyone had a great labour day weekend! Aside from an impromptu patio party and a couple meals out, I spent mine pretty much exclusively working. I'm well aware that probably goes against everything the holiday is about, but whatever. When I'm feeling productive, I go with it. 

I always feel a little surge of inspiration and motivation this time of year. I think it's ingrained in me from almost 20 years as a student. So, in honour of all those heading back to class today, here's a little collection of some of my favourite back-to-school splurges on Etsy at the moment. 

Have fun, learn stuff!

Our Wedding: Part I - Getting Ready

I can't believe September is only a week away! How did that happen? Well, I'm trying my best to pull myself out of the lazy days of summer and get cracking again sewing and blogging. And since public promises are powerful motivators for me, here's one... now that we have our professional photos back I'm going to share all the details of our big day here every Friday for a few weeks. Good plan? Today, we start from the beginning.

Our wedding day began just like any other day. Having a later wedding and a venue that won't let you set up before noon allows such miracles. After waking up (sans alarm clock), I iced our wedding cake (yes, I did) and Mike biked down to Locke Street to pick up some bagels and muffins, which we then enjoyed with a coffee and tea on our patio. We marvelled at the beautiful weather, mentally walked through our schedule one last time, took deep breathes, and savoured our last moments as boyfriend and girlfriend. We were so lucky to have that time alone together before the craziness hit. At 11:30 on the dot our friends arrived to chauffeur me to my hair appointment and Mike to the venue to set up. "It's happening!"

My girlfriend (who drove in from Oakville just to keep me company) and my talented stylist, Ange Blomberg, managed to keep me relaxed, distracted, and "hydrated" for the 2.5 hours it took to do my hair. But wasn't it worth it? Ange did such an amazing job!

After the hair got did, we stopped by the venue to deliver the cake and check up on things. My perfectionist nature needed for this to happen. But thanks to Mike and our incredible friends and family, everything was under control and I was then off to the hotel to finish getting ready. 

I've only had my makeup done professionally a few times and I've never really been happy with it. I think it's my super pale skin -- makeup artists never have shades light enough. So after a similarly disappointing makeup trial, it didn't take much convincing for me to decide to do my own makeup. Most days I simply slap on some tinted moisturizer and mascara before heading out the door, so this decision made me pretty nervous. There were many, many hours spent researching new products and techniques as well as 3-4 trial runs. I highly recommend Lisa Eldridge's videos, by the way. I watched them over and over. It was kind of fun, actually. I haven't been that excited about makeup since I was a pre-teen buying up all the Wet N' Wild my allowance could afford. 

All that practice paid off on the day when I was able to go through the motions without having to think about too much besides steadying my shaky hands. And I'm really proud of how it turned out. It looked natural and like me... but better. Ha!

"The dress, the dress!" My dress was from David's Bridal, and honestly, that is something I struggled with for awhile. For one, I have pictured my wedding dress for a long time and I always thought it would be vintage and short. Two, I didn't really want to support the cheap, fast fashion that David's represents. The in-store experience didn't help either. Just as I was ready to run out the door, Carla pulled this last, lacy one from the packed racks. Fine, what's one more? I put it on... and I cried. Yep. Total cliche, but it happened. I thought I might just be tired, so I slept on it, tried on some vintage dresses at Sweet Trash the next day and then went back to David's to try it on again... and I cried. Again! What a sap. 

So my dress wasn't vintage, but I sure made up for it with my accessories. My earrings, belt and purse were all vintage from Sweet Trash and my hair clip was a vintage brooch I already owned. My bracelet was a wedding gift from my God parents and my shoes are Liz Rene from Sheila's Bridal Boutique. 

Mike and I didn't have a wedding party, but we did have amazing friends with us every step of the way and we're so grateful for that. My bestie, Carla, was with me all morning, driving me around, calming my nerves and passing me eyeliner. Can we also take a moment to admire her look and that amazing blue dress? Stunning! It's vintage and she found it at The Edit in Hamilton. If Mike and I had a theme to our wedding, it was local love, so I was pretty tickled that Carla played along, even if she had no idea and just liked the dress.

Carla gives her final stamp of approval.

Twirling for Dad.

All photos (except the cake) are by Hollie Pocsai.