11 years ago today...

I married my best friend.

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Thanks for taking me along on this crazy cool ride!!!

Paris, France 1998
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Trafalgar Square, London, England, 1998
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Our Wedding Day (the happiest day of my life!), Florida, 2000
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Madrid, Spain, 2000
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Cordoba, Spain, 2000
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Seville, Spain, 2000
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Tangier, Morocco, 2000
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Montreal, Canada, 2002
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South Beach, Miami, FL, 2006
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Coco Cay, Bahamas, 2007
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Yes, that's us!!!
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Illinois, 2009
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Here's to a lifetime of wedded bliss! Let the good times roll!

Will you still need me,
will you still feed me,

When I'm sixty-four?
Show me your Sanctuary

Now that my 5th fabric collection (wow, I actually had to turn around and count them!) for Michael Miller Fabrics, titled Sanctuary, is in stores worldwide, I am starting to see projects popping up left and right in my Flickr pool. If I haven't told you before, the most rewarding part of being a fabric designer is seeing what all you creative minds out there do with my fabric. I could sit at the computer all day and browse through your photos but then I wouldn't get any more fabric designed and that would defeat the purpose. ;)

But anyhow, I wanted to invite all you out there to post your photos in my Sanctuary Flickr Group. From time to time, I pick a few of my favorites and post them here on the blog. Here are my current favorites:

This breathtaking Frida dress by Bailey Girls:

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This adorable top by Melanie at Above All Fabric:

Haley's new Sactuary Outfit

This amazing quilt by Red Pepper Quilts:

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Here's a full view (love the symmetry!)

Sanctuary ~ Patchwork Quilt

This super cool and funky pillow by imalisawork. I just adore the fussy-cutting on this!

Pilliow Talk Swap 4 - For cilvee!

This super cute bag by Valerie at Sew Much More:

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And let's not forget the KNITS!

Check out this knit version of Kyoko made by the über-talented Jenny at Sew Pretty Dresses:

Sample for Above All Fabric

So let's see those beauties! If you have a project that you've recently completed using my Sanctuary wovens or knits, I invite you to share them with us in my Sanctuary Flickr Pool!
Favor Box Redux for the Season

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A couple of years ago I designed some cute favor boxes for my sister's bridal shower, which I shared a tutorial for here on the blog. I thought it would be neat to do these in pink for Valentine's Day favors. I made a couple of prototypes and the girls went batty for them so I thought I'd share these with you guys since they're so easy to make.

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I have a couple of templates you can use for this. Click HERE FOR THE PDF or HERE FOR THE JPG of the favor box. Both templates are the same, just different formats. Print them out at 100% on a letter-size sheet. Use card stock or other thick paper.

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Now... as you can see, the templates come without personalization (no names -- unless your kids have the same names as mine, in which case email me and I can send you mine!) You can either have you child sign their name on the flat sheets with a permanent marker or if you're feeling extra crafty, open up the JPG in your preferred image editing software and type in your child's name. I used the font Century Gothic in white with a soft drop shadow, but any sans-serif font will do.

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Assembly is easy as pie:
  • Cut them out on the solid line.
  • Fold them on the dashed lines.
  • Glue them where it says to.
  • Punch holes on the circles at the top and thread some pretty ribbon through.
If you are the visual type, click here for a step-by-step photo guide of the ones I made for the bridal shower.

There were only a few of things I did differently:
  • I used a hot glue gun to glue the flaps, but if you are having your children help you with assembly, I strongly suggest using my original idea of double-stick tape or a glue stick.
  • I cut my ribbons at 12" long and omitted the beads.
  • I filled my favor boxes with shredded papers and a small assortment V-Day chocolates, which already come in pretty colors & shapes, instead of my custom candy wraps.
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Finally, if you look over there >>> on my sidebar, I have a BLANK template, in case you want to use some sort of patterned paper or create your own design for the inside of the box. How fun would it be to print blank ones and have the kids decorate them?! :) There is also a teal-colored version on the side bar (the original one I used for the bridal shower) in case pink's not your favorite. ;)

Happy V-Day, all! :)
Another hairy situation

A couple of years ago, our sweet Sophie donated more than half of her beautiful red hair to Locks of Love, a public non-profit organization that provides hairpieces to financially disadvantaged children suffering from long-term medical hair loss. Well, this weekend she decided to do it again and we couldn't be any more proud of her! Here's a little step-by-step documentation of the process.

One last look at her long locks...

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Sophie's hairdresser, Brooke, had to divide her hair into two pigtails because it was too thick to cut through one...

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And so it begins...

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Chop, chop, chop one side...

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Chop, chop, chop the other side...

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DONE!

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Now, getting ready for a sweet, new, more "grown-up" do...

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Mission accomplished!

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Thanks, Brooke, you did a fantastic job and Sophie is so, so happy with her new hair! :)

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Sophie's locks of love are currently in a zip lock bag and ready to go out to a new recipient tomorrow. :) Happy Sunday, all!
Blizzard 2011

First off, I'd like to thank everyone who voted in last week's poll. Your feedback is very much appreciated and I simply cannot wait to put all these findings to work. Our next pattern release is already well under way and I'm happy to report that a lot of your requests are already being addressed, but in the following one we hope to get to the rest of the requests. This is all so fun! (a lot of work, but tons of fun!)

Well, I don't know about you, but Jon and I have been spending A LOT of quality time with our kids this week. Unless you've been living under a rock (and believe me, sometimes I feel that way) you most likely have heard all about the BLIZZARD OF THE CENTURY! We totally predicted it was going to disappoint, but believe you me, it lived up to all that hype. We picked up the kids from school Monday afternoon and already the snow was coming down by the bucketfuls and the wind gusts were out of this world. All I can say is that I was extremely thankful for our brand new tires and for a hubby that can take command of the road like nobody's business (this tropical girl would've crashed into someone in no time!)

This was the view from the passenger seat on the way to school that Monday afternoon...

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The next 3 days were spent here at home doing some mega cooking, mega baking, mega dancing, mega Wii playing and lots of mega sleeping. Oh and crossing our fingers that the power would stay on so we could do all of the above, well, except the mega sleeping.

After a major case of cabin fever I insisted we go outside and brave the circumstances today but I was pleasantly surprised when we saw clear skies and the sun shining brightly through the snow covered branches... it was the calm after the storm.

The girls immediately wanted to climb this mega snowdrift in front of our house. This thing is taller than me!! (yes, I know, bring on the short jokes.)

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Queens of the mountain!

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Don't let these smiling faces and the sun rays fool ya... the temps were still in single digits! I only stayed out long enough to snap these few shots then my little (ehem!) Costa Rican butt ran back inside as fast as it could...

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This was the view out our back door. Yes, the snow is almost up to the top of that table and our grill -- the same one that was ice skating all by itself on the porch at the beginning of the storm -- is now buried somewhere under all that! I guess we won't be grilling for a while...

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I know this storm affected lots of you out there, so I am sending big hugs and warm wishes across all of the Midwest and Northeast regions!!! Tomorrow, it's back to school for the kids and back to work for us!! Can't wait!
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