FO Floral Blanket

While I was planning to have this floral blanket done by late January, I couldn't send off a product I wasn't happy with. The pattern called for the baby blanket size to be a lot smaller than I was happy with. Instead, I ended up added 11 inches in order to be happy with the size.

I loved working with all of the colors and had a lot of fun matching the right shades together. I really had a difficult time mailing this out last week, seeing as I didn't want to give it up. I am sure my little princess will have one very soon!

WIP Floral Baby Blanket

I have fallen behind on this floral blanket. The good thing is that my friend who ordered this blanket is having a boy so will be packing this away for a while. Nonetheless, I wanted to get this blanket done about 3 weeks ago. The leech that is draining my energy has prevented this.

FO Word Blocks for Christmas

Yes, I procrastinate. An issue that is getting better with owning a business and school. I was pretty backed up for Christmas. I spent both Christmas Eve and Christmas night finishing gifts for people. I even started a few on those nights! On Christmas night I started (and finished) my mother-in-law and Allyson's gifts. I had bought blocks for their gifts back in August, but got overwhelmingly busy with orders that the first chance I got to work on them was Christmas night.

FO Baby Doll Bed and Tutorial

The little miss that I babysit, Scarlet, while her mom is in school is one of the cutest little things ever. She has amazing hair and such a feisty personality. She loves being the mommy and would spend a lot of the time at my house either playing with Ryenn's babies or playing mommy to Ryenn.

FO Four Twisted Headbands

I have been over run with knitting these last few week, and still have so many more to finish. I did kick my butt into high gear yesterday with starting AND finishing four twisted ear warmer headbands.

FO Baby Cowl

The last part to Annie's order was a baby cowl. She wanted something that could be pulled up over her bitties head. I remember seeing the perfect pattern for such a thing!

FO Hello Kitty

The cutest pair of pants ever! I can't get over the cute factor of these. Before I finished the face on these pants, I tried them on Ryenn and decided she needs a couple pair of these. I just told you how this pattern was a lot of Stockinette stitch, but I love the way it looks.

WIP Hello Kitty!

I have so much fun creating things that are characters. Like the Pikachu hat or the Geo hat from Team Umizoomi. I received a request to make the cutest Hello Kitty pants. I was so excited to get working on these!

F isn't for Finished AT ALL

I have been slacking hugely on updating this blog. This isn't due to lack of things to do, trust me. I have been so busy that I have forgotten to take pictures of products I have sent, forgotten what day it is, and forgotten to eat on certain days. I have a brutal school schedule, Christmas is coming up (where has the time gone?!), and orders are coming in like no other.

Purple Bears and Babies

Kalie, who I consider my niece, had her baby girl on Tuesday at 2:07pm. When she found out she was pregnant with a girl, she asked me to make a bear hat, like I made for Khloe for her birthday, for her little one.

Ryenn's Birthday Banner

Much like the decorations at Nolan's birthday party, Ryenn's were handmade. Actually, they were almost identical, just differed in color. Her theme was based of the adorable cake at her party, but was pretty vague; purple and pink. I turned this theme into a princess theme with a few added decorations, but mainly everything was purple and pink. I started with her birthday banner as well. I again found this idea on Pinterest and had to make one. Seeing as it was so easy to make Nolan's banner, Ryenn was getting one too!

I followed the same steps in making her banner but was lacking in amount of paper I had for each color. Instead of having one color for the background and one color for the letters, I decided to do a pattern. This actually worked out better than the single shades would have. I added a white ribbon that had pink and purple polka-dots in order to give it more personality. It was a huge statement piece at her party!

Independence Day

I am the queen of procrastination and I wait until the last minute for everything (anyone who knows me can attest to this). I attempted to rid myself of this procrastination with at least one holiday. I was hoping this would be the 4th of  July. Of course, this was not the case. I bought a red, white, and blue plaid fabric in order to make Ryenn a festive pillowcase dress. I also bought red, white, and blue striped ribbon for the ties. I thought I would make this dress weeks in advance. With Nolan and Ryenn's birthday parties, I was tied up with other crafting projects. And then I woke up on Wednesday morning, still not feeling well and still needing her dress finished.

stars, stripes and plaid!

 When Ryenn went to take her nap at around 11am, I rushed to get my sewing machine, fabric, and ribbon. Nolan was excited to help (he wouldn't stop trying to push the pedal). I also found an easy tutorial on making a pillowcase dress at Aesthetic Nest, which is also loaded with numerous other dresses and DIY projects. It made the process a lot easier. When I finished the dress itself, it still didn't look much like a holiday dress. I remembered that I had also bought felt stars for my 4th of July scrapbook pages in the dollar section at Joann's. I decided to add one of each of the colors: red, white, and blue. This made the dress exactly what I wanted it to be!

Without her little capris

I didn't take her measurements before she went for her nap so the dress ended up a bit shorter than I was hoping for. Instead of pairing it with the white diaper cover I had hoped to, I put on her white legging/capris. This looked great! I was pleased with the outcome and I thinking about making many more of these very soon!

FO Owen Blocks



Supplies minus the mod podge and adhesive spray

About a month and a half ago, we helped our friends celebrate their son's first birthday. Owen is such a cutie. Shelby, his mom, and I went to high school together. We went to his house for his birthday. I decided to make him the adorable blocks that I made for Nolan and for Avery back in May. I am also in progress of making Ryenn some too.


Owen!!!

Anyway, I asked Shelby what his nursery theme was. Seeing as they were moving shortly, there wasn't really a theme established. She said anything blue would be fine. So I took the color scheme and ran with it. Again, I love making these, so it worked out great!


Aren't they cute?!

Invitational

I felt completely lazy when I bought the invitations for Nolan's birthday party. It was decided then that I would handmake Ryenn's invitations. I found one that I really loved on Pinterest and began recreating it immediately.

Paper used to cut out bunting

It was tedious in the fact that I had to cut out each little triangle for the "bunting." The work was worth it though. They are gorgeous! Everything I wanted them to be!!!

Invitations (had to blur my address)

Nolan is 2!

At times it feels like just yesterday I was pregnant and counting down the days to Nolan's birth. And at others, I can't imagine my life before I became a mother. It's unbelievable that 2 years ago, on June 15th, I was rushing into the hospital to deliver my first child. I was anxious, nervous, scared, yet prepared. I know that everyone who has been pregnant wishes they could fast forward through the last few weeks of pregnancy (that's when I REALLY popped). I wasn't due for another week, so I felt lucky that I could be meeting my son that day. I was also unsure if I was actually in labor. Nonetheless, I was admitted into labor and delivery. This was the real thing! I felt like this was no big deal and that I could handle this. Then it got painful! I experienced the most excruciating pain for a short hour, before I got my epidural, but it felt like an eternity. My labor was 8 hours in total, with only an hour of pushing. Nolan Myles was born on June 16, 2012 at 4:11am weighing 7lbs 14oz. He was absolutely perfect.

It's amazing to think that my bouncing baby boy is now a rambunctious busy toddler. It's hard to process this information. I have been a mom for two years! We celebrated this past weekend the 2nd birthday of our baby boy! We invited his friends, our friends, and family and celebrated his birthday at our house. We celebrated his 2nd birthday in style. He is obsessed with Cars 2, particularly Mater. We have a dozen Mater cars kicking around our house. Even one he can ride on. As you can probably guess, we chose a Cars themed birthday! He was geeked! Everything was racing, Cars, and red/black/white. It was so fun. He had so many people come and help celebrate and got so many great things!Just a warning, this blog post is a picture frenzy (thanks to the help of Allyson, Adam, and Angie)!

I made this yard sign!

Also made the bunting and sign here (bunting was cut by Allyson and my mother-in-law)

Garage set-up

bunting and gifts

Stoplight rice krispies

Racing trifle

Oil dipsticks and spare tires

Tableware

Nolan in his car

Handmade shirt by my mother-in-law

Allyson and Khloe

Scarlet

Noland and I opening his gifts

Kali drawing

Ryenn and Uncle Matthew

Mom, Jessi, Lily, Blake, and Tiffany

Rebecca and my mother-in-law, Susan

Ryenn in the skirt I made her

Khloe

Cake made by my mother-in-law

Nolan's smash cake!

Khloe blowing bubbles

Eating cake off of his cars

Loving his cake cars

Everyone watching Nolan open his gifts! Thanks daddy for the panaorama picture -love, Nolan!

Alterations

After learning to sew, I feel that I look at everything wondering if I can recreate it. I have been doing this with knits for a while now, but I have broadened my curiosity to sewing. I was searching my closet for something to wear to Ryenn's baptism and I couldn't help feeling discouraged. Granted this was for good reason. I seriously could not find anything to wear that still fit. Everything was way too big! I was excited yet not at the same time. I didn't have the time or desire to find a new dress for her baptism in a less than a week (I did mention that I like to wait until the last minute, right?).


25 weeks pregnant with Ryenn, WAY too busy of a print and wearing the black long-sleeve!

I found a few things in my "garage sale/donate" boxes down in my basement that would fit, if altered a bit. Most were maternity items that wouldn't be missed for a while, way too busy in print, or had tears in them. I have this black long sleeve t-shirt that I absolutely love. I haven't been able to bring myself to get rid of it, even after I tore an amazingly huge hole n the elbow. It fit so perfectly!


Notice the hole the ripped in my elbow!

33.5 weeks pregnant and it was still on of my favorites!

Well I combined the extremely busy maternity shirt and my favorite black long-sleeve shirt that I couldn't part with, to make a "dress" for Ryenn's baptism! I cut the sleeves from the long sleeve shirt and cut some of the length from the body of the shirt. I then detached the bottom "skirt" from the maternity shirt and attached it to the black shirt at the waist. I the paired the "dress" I made with a chunky black belt at my natural waist and black leggings. It was a great compromise; something I can wear again, worked for the occasion, and FREE!

The dress! Not the greatest photo of the dress, but you get the idea.

Baptism Invites

My schedule looks pretty intense for the next couple months. There are numerous birthdays coming up in my family, which mean numerous knitting gifts to get done. I have a baptism to plan for my daughter, 2 different birthday parties (Nolan's 2nd and Ryenn's 1st), and let's not forget my schooling. I also have baby showers and other kids birthday parties as well. Summer is an amazingly busy time of year!

The first thing on my to do list was to finish the invitations for Ryenn's baptism. The most difficult thing about this project was coming up with exactly what I wanted to do. I surfed the Internet and found one on Etsy that I loved beyond belief! I decided to try and make something similar.

I decided pink black and white would be the color scheme here. I typed something up on Word that I was more than happy with. I don't have access to a printer from home, so I had to email the proof to Adam, where he would print it. I took a picture from my phone and sent him a picture of my computer screen to make sure that it looked the same. To my disappointment, the cursive font that I picked for the words "baptism of" and "adaly dykhuizen" didn't carry over to where he printed it from.

I was a little upset because I knew that I would have to start from scratch....again. Then it hit me. I decided to chop up the printed version my husband gave me and write the cursive words myself. This was a great idea because I would have had to finish them tomorrow and mailed them Friday. Instead I can mail them tomorrow and give people more notice. I am loving the outcome of the invitation! It is exactly what I wanted; handmade, inexpensive, elegant, and simple!

most of the invite, chopped off the bottom to avoid sharing my phone number