MIA...

This blog is something I really want to do, but life just keeps me busy lately.  I think I've got a good reason for why I've been MIA though...

 We're having a baby!  Little Man is due the end of September.  Little Man is being named after my grandfather and my husband's grandfather.  My grandpa will be 92 on Halloween of this year, and I can't wait for him to meet his little namesake.

With the baby coming, I have been doing some crafting.  I've got a few projects in the works for his room, but so far this is the only one that is complete. I took 12" canvases and covered them with fabric, then attached the wooden sports balls (we're doing a modern sports theme.)  We painted his room gray and orange, and are using navy blue accents.  Here is his crib with the canvases hanging on the wall above.

 My amazing sister-in-law made the quilt for him.  Little Man is so loved already!

I also recently finished my first crochet hat for him.  We have a family joke based on one of the AT&T commercials where the guy is asking the kids questions, and the one little girl talks about turning her brother into a puppy so he could be her puppy brother.  My brother and sister-in-law think of the Peanut every time they see it because they could picture her saying that.  So, he now has a puppy hat!

The Peanut's doll, Zoe, is our newborn hat model.  She works cheap. ;-)

That is all for now, hopefully I can update this blog more often, especially as I make things for Little Man.

A finished hat

So I've slacked on this blog already.  I was busy with the Peanut's birthday planning, and some other things in life have gotten in the way.  But I did finish the hat I was working on, and the Peanut wore it in some of her 4 year pictures.  Here's one of my favorites, because of that smile, and she's wearing the hat, so it's a bonus.

If you live in the Cincinnati area, I highly recommend Jennifer Rose Photography, http://www.jenniferrosephoto.com.  She is amazing to work with, and I have fallen in love with every picture. 

The Peanut wanted a dress up party.  We have enough dress up for an army of kids, so we were ready for that (although I did pick up a couple of non-princess dresses after Halloween to give the little boys some other options.)  I hung a tablecloth from the dollar store as a backdrop for our photo booth.  Made candy mustaches and lips for the kids to use in the photo booth.  Got plain wooden picture frames from Michael's and some foam stickers to decorate them with, and I think that was a hit.  I'm sending the pictures I took to the kids with thank you notes, so they can put them in their frame.  Oh, and we also made superhero capes for each kid, which I think went over well, and as a mom, I know I'd rather come home from a party with something like that rather than a bag of junk favors.  At the end of the day, it kills me that she's 4 already, but I do love seeing what an amazing little person she's becoming.

Now that her birthday is over, I'm  hoping to find more crafting time.  I'm currently working on a baby afghan for a baby shower I'm going to next month, and also hoping to make some hats for the baby boy. 

And because I just loved all of her pictures, I have to shamelessly share a few more of my beautiful girl.

I thought I would start off by showing some things I've made in the past.  This is the shirt I made for the Peanut's 2nd birthday.  I would like to make her a shirt every year (at least until she gets too old and it's not cool anymore) but I'm struggling to come up with an idea for her 4th birthday next month.  And how the heck is she turning 4 already??

Two years ago I decided that she needed a personalized Cookies for Santa plate, so here's what I came up with.

This is probably one of my very favorite items I've made.  I gave it to church to sell at a festival.  The first person who walked up bought it.  I really need to make one of these for myself. 

Here's a little before and after picture.  We don't have a fireplace, thus no mantle, in our house, so we were in need of a stocking hanger.  My husband and I bought this ugly one.

And I turned it into this, and I'm thrilled with how it came out.  Oh, and yes, our dog gets a stocking too.  Her life of being spoiled came to an end when the Peanut was born, but there were 4 hooks, so Shadow made the stocking hanger.

I'll also be using this blog to show crafts that I do with the Peanut.  This might be one of my favorite Christmas decorations ever.  I found the idea on Pinterest. 

As you can see, getting a not quite 3 year old to hold her hand still for hand prints is no easy task, but I think that makes it that much better!  Hope you enjoyed seeing some of the crafts I've done.  Happy Saturday, and hope you find some time to do some crafting this weekend.  I'm off to start a new crochet project, I'll post pictures when it's complete.

My maternal grandma was crafty.  She could do anything.  She once knitted me a dress.  I was in middle school, and I was a tomboy who hated dresses, so I didn't appreciate it at the time.  Now I look back and appreciate the effort she put into that dress.  I think I get my craftiness from her, or at least that's what my mom says.  She passed away when I was 15.  Now I think back and wish I would have shown more interest in crocheting and knitting, so I could have learned from her, rather than YouTube. 

When I was 13, I made Color Point sweatshirts for both of my grandmas for Christmas.  If you don't know what Color Point is, you basically iron a pattern onto your garment, and then you make the design with little dots of paint.  They were probably ugly, but both grandmas wore them with pride.  In fact, Grandma R may still have hers, and wear it.

As an adult, I got into scrapbooking.  I used to watch the Cricut infomercials and practically drool over them.  Never thought I'd have one because they were too expensive.  On Christmas 2008, I was about 8 months pregnant with the Peanut, and my husband surprised me with a Cricut, so I could make a scrapbook for her.  And that's when I feel I really started being crafty again.  Since then, I've upgraded to the bigger Cricut.  I've made countless gifts, and a lot of things for the Peanut.  I'm inspired by her, and my frugal side.  There are so many cute things out there for little girls, but I refuse to pay for something if I can make it myself.  So, I teach myself new things.

This blog is a place for me to show off my craft wins, as well as my craft fails (like bows - who knew bows would be so hard??)