I do not know how long ago we started the first one. At some point I showed him the sign for "I love you," and told him that wherever we are we can always tell each other that we love each other. We use it quite a bit.
The second one started after we became owners of the Disney movie Tangled. We had gone to the theater to see it. (With the daughter, my brother and nephew--just to clarify that it isn't totally a girly movie.) But we didn't really pick up our second "thing" after the first viewing.
At some point after the daughter had viewed the movie for the umpteenth time *sigh*, Bubbie Boy started the dialogue.
I said to him, "I love you."
He'd replied, "I love you more."
I knew what he was waiting for; he wanted me to say, "I love you most."
These are lines from the movie between Rapunzel and her awful "mother." But the lines are cute.
So began many, many nights of a ritual between myself and Bubbie Boy.
Unfortunately, I think he believes that I mean that I love him more than I love his brother or sister, but I am not going to fight that battle. THEY know I do not mean to say that.
Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, I got a fabulous idea:
I decided to make a pillow for him combining the two traditions.
Here's how I did it.
1) I traced my handprint--all five fingers down on the paper. I rounded out the bottom of the print under my palm. Also, I was going to smooth out my fingers because they are no longer really young and are a little knobby, but I decided that it is those hands that tell him I love him, so I would leave them be.
2) I cut out the paper handprint, pinned it to red felt and cut out a second handprint. I ironed on heat and bond to the back of the hand (the palm, thumb, pointer finger and pinkie). For the two middle fingers, I cut a narrow strip of the heat and bond and applied it to the front.
3) Using my Silhouette and this tutorial I cut out the letters M-O-S-T from a coordinating fabric. I did not use the Silhouette fabric interfacing, I used the heat and bond from my local fabric store.
4) I was planning on using a 16-inch pillow, so I cut my front fabric at 17-1/2". I centered the felt handprint and letters onto the fabric, being sure to place them with care, then I ironed them in place. I had to be careful of the two middle fingers on the hand as there was heat and bond on the front of those. Once everything was ironed down, I folded down the two middle fingers, leaving space at the top to give them dimension, and ironed them in place. I used this tutorial on blanket stitching and stitched around the handprint. Where the fingers were not attached at the top, I just stitched through the felt, not the felt and pillow front.
5) Then I used my sewing machine to applique stitch around the letters.
6) Using another pattered coordinating fabric (I probably would have used the same fabric I used for the letters, but I didn't have enough), I cut two 12-1/4 x 17-1/2 inch pieces. On one of the 12-1/4 inch sides on each of the pieces, I turned under a half inch then turned under and inch and stitched a hem.
7) Then I pinned the two back pieces to the front piece, right sides together. The "hemmed" sides overlapped each other in the middle.
8) I stitched around the whole thing using a half inch seam allowance.
9) I turned, clipping the corners, ironed well, then top stitched using a quarter inch seam.
I then sneaked the pillow onto Bubbie's bed.
He was very excited to find it and I got lots of hugs.
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