Easter Outfits 2012

Happy (late) Easter! It was a great Easter for us, filled with candy, church and family. I love all the fun that comes with holidays, but Christmas and Easter are my favorites because of the spiritual events they celebrate.

New Easter outfits are also good fun! I had planned on making new ties for the men, in addition to the dress I wanted to make for Pretty. But when I found myself at the mall 2 days before Easter, and I hadn't done any sewing yet... I took Hero over to the Tie One On store and let him pick out his own tie. I knew he would pick green, because it's his favorite color, but I loved the nice bright spring green he chose! We bought a matching for Jake and went home. I'm the only one who didn't get new anything. I just used the tattered chic skirt I made about 2 years ago. It's turned out to be a super comfy maternity skirt.

For Pretty's dress, I used the project from V and Co's new book. The instructions were very clear, and she included an easy method to adjust the dress to your own girl's size. I was lucky to have this green fabric in my stash. $3 for a queen sheet in the as-is section at IKEA and I've now made 3 dresses and 1 skirt from it, (see the other projects here and here). What a great buy!

The pattern only called for a small opening, and one button, but I measured and made it a bit snug. So I had to make it open farther down and add a second button to make it easier to put on and off. My husband loves the wooden toggle buttons for one reason.

"Squire. Tell her. What color will my tunic be tonight?"
"Uh. . . it's green. . . trimmed in a sort of pale green. . . with wooden toggles."

I think I might make another dress with this pattern soon. I was able to sew it up in a few hours and Pretty loves it!

Pre-Baby To Do List

I'm into the 3rd trimester with baby #3. This picture was taken 2 weeks ago, so now it's 10 weeks away.

While I haven't actually done much, I've been making a list in my head of all the things I need to get done before this little guy comes. Maybe writing it down will help motivate me.

1. Make new baby bedding. I have boy bedding that my mom made for me when Hero was a baby. But I wanted a new set that matched the new boy room I am creating in our new home. I wanted geometric patterns, and I wanted them to not be really "baby". I also wanted several different patterns to mix together.

 I search through 3 stores with my paint cards, yarn and curtain fabric, taking pictures and looking for a perfect match.

Finally, I found these! All the right colors and 5 of them! Enough for multi colored bumpers, the skirt and 2 sheets. Woohoo!

I will be using the pattern from Amy Butler's Little Stitches for Little Ones book for the bumpers and the crib skirt, (anna from noodlehead used it here), but I'm going to leave out the pockets in the bumpers. For the sheets I'm going to use MADE's tutorial.

2. Finish the crochet blanket and hat set. I like to crochet a blanket for each of my babies. I used this same pattern for my sister's last little boy (here) and loved it. I picked the colors to match the boy room I'm putting together. I also will make the same hat I did for my nephew, too.

3. Unpack and re-wash the little baby clothes. When Pretty was a baby, I pulled out the white onesies and pajamas from Hero. When I went through the boxes, I was surprised at how yucky dirty all the clothes seemed! I swear I washed them before packing them away! Well, I found this pin on Pinterest and knew I had to do that before the new baby came.

4. Make a Straight Jacket Swaddler, and maybe a few burp cloths. All I have for me is the "prototype" of the swaddler I made for Pretty, with felt for the Velcro to stick to. It's not as good and ripped holes... plus it's pink. I'm going to make a new awesome one from my tutorial. Burp cloths will depend on what I find when I wash all the clothes. I can't remember how many I had, or what size they were...

5. Make a sock monkey. This one could be an after-the-baby-comes project, since I don't need it until the baby is one month old (like the other kids).


6. Sew Pretty's curtains. I know this isn't really baby related... that's why lower on the list. I want to get the curtains for Pretty's room sewn and hung before the baby comes because I've had the fabric FOREVER and haven't made them yet. Maybe this deadline will make sure it gets done?

7. Sew a new quilt for Hero. I bought the Houndstooth quilt pattern from V and Co. back in October. The plan was to make it for Christmas. Then I couldn't function as a human being with the infection and all. I now have the fabric, and I hope I can make it before his birthday in July (when I will have 1 month old)... This one might not happen, let's be honest.

Wish me luck. I'll check in with the projects as I complete them. 10 weeks until my new baby boy comes I hope I at least get half this list done before then!

Hero's New Room

When we moved to our new home, I asked Hero what color he wanted his room and he didn't even hesitate to say, "Green. Dark green." After some persuading I got him to get excited to about these stripes. We both won with him getting dark green, and me getting to do stripes!

The other 3 walls are a light grey.

I also just finished these curtains for the room. I decided that I wanted to introduce more colors into the room, and this orange is great!

I like the way they look with the sun shinning through.

I did three rows of stitching on the top and bottom of the orange cuff.

 I love the way the room is coming together. I've got more coming with getting ready for the new baby. I can't wait to show you!

More to come!

Pretty's New Birthday Toy

My little Pretty turned 2 a couple weeks ago! I can't believe it, but then don't we moms say that about every birthday our kids have?

On the day of their birthday, Jake and I like to have a large bag of balloons blown up with a new toy in the middle of it all for the kids (like Hero's birthday pig). For Pretty this year, it was this new set up.

Last summer, I found a listing for these three wooden toys for $5. Total score! I'll share the make overs of the other two later, but today it's about the ironing board.

It was in rough shape. It looked like it had never been painted, just primed, and not even all over... And the previous owner had colored on the top with pencils.

So, I sanded it down,

and spray painted the whole thing white with a combo primer/paint spray.

It sat in our play room like that for the past six months. Then, one day while I was ironing a ton of fabric for curtains, Hero told me we needed an iron for the toy ironing board. I considered making one, but found this awesome homemade wooden iron on Etsy for a good price! (She's got a ton of cool wooden toys, you should check it out.)

I decided last minute to make this simple cover for the board out of flannel I had hanging around because the thought of the wood rubbing on the wood made me worry about it scratching.

Man, she is adorable! But she was so busy jumping with the balloons that this fuzzy picture was all I could get of her with the iron before the hopped off again!

Happy Birthday, Pretty!

Baby Doll Cradle Make-Over

For this past Christmas, I decided to make Pretty a big doll, and Santa brought her a little cradle for her doll to sleep in!

I found the cradle at a discount outlet store for a company that does monogrammed things. This store is where all the mistakes go. Poor mom of "Reese", who ordered this and it came back upside down. Oops.

I bought it with the intention of peeling off the vinyl lettering and being done with it. It was only a few days before Christmas when I realized that the letters were engraved about 1/8" down! I wasn't looking forward to sanding it down and painting over it. That's when my awesome husband said, "why don't you just put paper over it?"

Bless him!!

Technically, his idea included normal old copy paper.  But I only used it for the template, and chose a scrapbook paper for the final look.

I smooshed the copy paper into the space, then cut it out so it fit.

Then I used it to trace on the back of the scrapbook paper. I used ModPodge to stick it down and repeated it on the second side.

I also made a mattress for the cradle using some left over 1" foam and spare fabric.

I love it!

 As for the baby, I was hoping this one would replace her favorite toys and be all she played with! Not so much. Maybe when her new baby brother comes in June?

Vogue Pattern 7418

So far the only thing this baby does is sleep. Christmas morning, she opened the cradle first, since it is from Santa. As soon as she opened the "baby" it went in to the cradle and that's where it has stayed for the past 2 months. Not even joking.

Sadly, she doesn't quite fit, unless you squish her legs.

Also, a funny thing. Hero watched me make the doll while Pretty napped. He even handed me pins while cutting out the fabric (and oh my, did that take forever. "Do you want red, or blue, or purple?" with every pin!) Anyway, it wasn't until he pointed it out that I noticed I was using the same purple fabric for this doll's dress as I did for last year's Christmas doll. Hmmmm.

Pretty's birthday is next week (2 years!) and I'm planning on making a blanket and pillow for the bed. Maybe for next Christmas, she'll get another dress for the baby. . . that's not the same purple?

Wow. It's been how long?

Last October, my husband and I bought our first house! We packed and moved with the help of awesome friends and family.

Then, it took forever for me to get my craft stuff unpacked. Not because I was busy, per say, but because I was exhausted. If you follow my FB, then you've already seen this:

That was a month ago. I'm 5 1/2 months along with baby number 3. Hero came with us to the ultrasound and couldn't wait to find out what the baby was. He is so excited that the baby gets to sleep in his room! 

One of my biggest deterrents for not crafting and blogging, is that I have been so tired. Not just because I'm pregnant with my 3rd baby, which is reason enough. . . but because I have an infection. I'm going to go ahead and tell the world (or at least the small number of you who still ready my blog) because I've never heard of this before.

In my first visit to the OB, they wanted a urine sample (normal) and it grew e coli (not normal). The doctor had me take a 10 day course of antibiotics to clear up the bladder infection. One of the side effects of the meds is drowsiness (as in: do not operate heavy machinery). Then two months later, another sample that grew e coli again. Another round of antibiotics was taken. Then, at the 20 week visit, they took a urine sample via catheter (yuck) to make sure that I wasn't contaminating the samples, and guess what?! E coli again. After a third round of the 10 day antibiotic, I am now on a daily suppressant medication (again, drowsy inducing) because apparently if the bladder infection gets to my kidneys, I could end up in preterm labor. YIKES!

I have been told that a bladder infection like this is very common with pregnant women. And that e coli is naturally in your system, so it's not that crazy for it to be what grew, but I'm not a person prone to bladder infections. My mom can only think of one when I was 2, and I can't think of any. So, I'm wondering, has anyone else dealt with this personally, or had a friend who has. As far as I know, I'm the only one EVER (which I know is not true, but boy does it feel this way!)

This is my excuse for not keeping on top of things. I'm now starting to feel better, and have done a few crafty things, including Christmas gifts that I never shared. I plan to get back into the swing of things now that I'm not feeling so tired all. the. time. 

We moved! and Halloween!

If you follow me on FB or on Twitter, you know that my husband and I just bought a house and moved! It was a busy week, with us getting keys on Friday, and a week later on Saturday, moving. It was hectic with packing up all our stuff and trying to clean and paint in the new house. (I'll show you the paint later).

This is how I hoped I would be through the whole experience: happy, excited and lookin' cute.

(google image search)

Instead, I looked more like this, except even worse, because this woman has make-up and earrings, I had neither. They were packed...

(google image search)

I am so lucky to have my in-laws who helped me just dump stuff in boxes the night before the move so that when our friends/family showed up the next morning, we were out of the old place and into the new in less than 2 hours. Not joking.

(google search image)

After 3 weeks, I am mostly unpacked, with one big exception: my craft stuff. I just haven't had the energy for sewing/crafting anyway. It's coming out this weekend though, and I'm excited! It's a big endeavor. 

I only had 4 boxes of clothes (including hangers and shoes), but I have 7 boxes of craft stuff. And that's not counting the 3 plastic storage tubs of fabric... I think it might be a sickness. . . or at least a good entry for Linda's (at Craftaholics Anonymous) "You might be a craftaholic when..." contest.

Moving on to the Halloween part, I didn't do much for the holiday because it was right after we had moved. I whipped up a costume for Hero before we moved. At first, he wanted to be a tiger, then a gorilla. But knowing that I was going to be busy packing and moving, I didn't want to attempt anything big and was thrilled when I suggested Cat in the Hat (inspired by MADE) and he went for it! I did have a moment when he whined about wanted to be a gorilla instead. My response was the choice of Cat in the Hat or nothing. He chose the Cat, thank goodness! I made the hat (a bit too big), and the bowtie. I bought a black shirt and pants, and white gloves. The bowtie is just stitched onto the shirt. I took it off to store and Hero can now use the shirt while it fits.

I reused Hero's old panda costume for Pretty. I moved the bowtie onto the hat for a hairbow instead. . . make it a bit more girly. I figure I can move it back and forth depending on the gender it is needed for. It was a simple thing.

We always go trick or treating at Jake's mom's work in the morning.

And that night we went trick or treating in our new neighborhood. Hero refused to pose for pictures for me, but I tricked them with "Hey, Buddy!" and I'm happy with the resulting picture of both kids. It wasn't until I was almost done with Hero's costume that I noticed they would both be wearing red, black and white. Cuteness.

Hero wimped out on trick or treating after half the street, so he and Jake went home to pass out candy. Pretty was going strong and we did the whole street, both sides. She was so funny because as long as the bowl of candy was on her level, she would keep taking treats and putting them in her bucket. I tried to stop her, but the people thought it was cute. She ended up getting 3 or 4 pieces at each house! On the walk home, she wouldn't let me hold her heavy bucket or hold her. Stubborn girl walked and carried her own bucket the whole time!

Happy late Halloween! And here's hoping I get the sewing machine out this weekend! Wish me luck!