The Soto Family

Friday, October 23, 2009

Still In Love

At Lorrie's wedding we let Isaac be the photographer and he got some amazing pictures. He captured this one of Paul and I dancing. We were all in the wedding, hence the fancy dress that you can't really see and Paul's tux. We look pretty good together, I have to say. Cheers to many more years!

Rockwell Wedding Quilt

Paul's sister Lorrie recently got married. I have always wanted to make someone a quilt for their wedding. Thanks to Lorrie, I had the chance! Since she was going with a fall theme for the wedding, I decided to go with that for the theme. It was the largest quilt I've ever made and wasn't the easiest to get a photograph of the whole thing. As it was, I had to hang it sideways and it still wanted to drag on the ground. Had to put chairs under it to hold it up, hence the lopsided look to the right.

This is a little closer and shows some of the squares. The pattern was for a quilt half this size, so I had to double it to make it king-sized.

Here is one of the "double" layer squares, they kind of look like a square within a square. I had so much fun picking out all the different fabrics for this one.

And as always I included a shot with the back folded over. The quilt was so large I had to add in some extra fabrics to make it big enough for the quilt top.

Skateboarding

Right near our house is a high school with a smooth rink area. Sometimes we head over to let Isaac skate. We snapped a few pictures recently and here they are. I can barely stand on a skateboard, so Isaac must get his "mad skills" from his daddy.

He totally loves skateboarding and it's really exciting to see him try something, struggle, and keep at it.

His school has a skateboarding club and every other Friday they go to a skate park. The other Fridays they go to a park near the school and practice.

Isaac claims that skateboarding is his "thing" right now. Interestingly, just like he swims "left-handed" by breathing on the left, he also skateboards left-handed--by pushing with his right leg instead of the left.

Seattle Sky

Once again I am miserably behind on blogging. Sorry, it's so much easier to just throw pictures up on Facebook than to make Blogger do what I want it to. But I'm going to try to catch up some. This is a quilt I made for one of my dearest friends from way back when. She had her second little one earlier this year. Since I made her a quilt for the first one I couldn't very well not make one for the second...at least that's the excuse I used to justify making it. The first picture shows the whole thing.

Next up is a little closer to show some more details.

A closer look to show the fabrics. Followed by a look at the border and quilting.

Lastly, part of the back folded over the edge so you can see it with the front.

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Molly Ringwald's Butterflies

My friend Julie had a baby last August named Athena. Julie loves butterflies and Athena's room is all pink and green. Being me, I wanted to make her a quilt. I bought all the stuff and then while I was at her house, found out that her family had already made her a quilt in all the same colors. Darn! So I decided to make the quilt anyway and then donate it to Quilts for a Cause. They auction off the quilts and donate the money to cancer research in Southern Arizona. But when Julie saw the quilt top, she wanted the quilt. How could I refuse? I recently got it back from the quilter and now that I gave her the quilt today, I can post pictures and not ruin the surprise. To the left is the whole thing.

Here is a close-up so you can see some of the fabrics a little better. I found lots of fabric with butterflies, but also some flowers, polka dots and fruit.

The next picture shows the quilting. I don't do this, I pay someone else to do it as I don't have the skill or the several thousand dollar machine to do it.

Last is a picture that shows a little of the back--pink with green polka dots. I actually made her a French memory board out of the same fabric. I couldn't help but name it Molly Ringwald's Butterflies because the color combination reminds me of all of the great 80's movies with Molly Ringwald that I grew up on.

Solo Kayaking

Watching his cousins go on their first solo kayaking tours this summer Isaac told me "Daddy is never going to let me go by myself ." But what do you know, when it was Isaac's turn, he, too, got to go in his own kayak with Paul nearby on his kayak. He was so proud of himself. I got lots of pictures, but this one shows him paddling in through some rocks as he gets back from his trip. As always, looking forward to next summer!