Where I've Been

Well, I didn't intend to take over a month long break from my little blog. Things just sort of ended up that way, after a series of surprises (some lovely, some not) interrupted my regularly scheduled life and now, here we are--Thanksgiving is over, Christmas is over (two heavily blogged about topics in past years) and we're just a few days away from a new year.

So a brief list of what's been happening since my last post on November 17th:

• Charlotte has brought home no less than 403 colds since she started preschool, many of which occurred in late November thru now. And some of which she has kindly shared.
• My work life took on a new level of insane, with the acquisition of part of another agency that added 95 employees and 51 clients to our existing organization in the span of about three weeks. We grew from a 300 employee agency to a staff of almost 400 hundred just about overnight. It's been...interesting, to say the least. And busy.
• Typical holiday preparations, coupled with an unusually late start on my part led to a far more hectic than usual holiday season. I was wrapping presents on Christmas Eve, something I have never done before. 

I think that's about it. 

Oh wait. One more thing.

• We're having another baby.

!!!!!!!!

Yes, you read that right. I'm pregnant with Baby #2, due in July. It was the best kind of surprise we could have asked for, but also one that has left me feeling like garbage for the past seven weeks (and counting). I'm at the tail end of this lovely first trimester (it will be over the week of my birthday, which is the best gift I can imagine) and I'm crossing my fingers and toes that the all day nausea, headaches and tiredness disappears. This is similar to my pregnancy with Charlotte, and the feeling crappy part wore off by the end of the first trimester, so I'm hopeful this is the same. Babies. Troublemakers, even when they're the size of a prune :)

So that about sums up my life. I haven't had the energy to do much of anything (seriously. The other night I cooked a real dinner that actually included a vegetable and almost cried from both the effort and sight of something on our plates that wasn't crackers, bagels, or some other sort of beige). 

I'll post more soon, but in the meantime I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and I wish you a Happy New Year!

~Stacy

Well That Escalated Quickly

Snow in November is usually somewhat surprising--at least, snow that sticks is. I can only remember a few times where we had heavy snow accumulate and hang around this early but I think this past weekend takes the cake.

It all started Thursday with some cute little flurries flying around. They were sweet and I watched them fly around for a bit and then I went back to work and forgot all about it.

Things settled down after awhile, and then I came home from work and was making dinner as Charlotte kept exclaiming "snow!! Wow, mommy, look at all that snow!" and when I looked out the window it was white. By the time dinner was over, there was enough to build a snowman and shovel--which she and Chad did both.

Then Friday happened, and things got a little out of hand.

Charlotte was so excited she could hardly stand it--this girl loves her some snow. She couldn't wait to use to her sled, so we did the only thing that made sense during a blizzard at dark: took her on a sled ride up to the corner deli to get ice cream.

I feel like I should be wishing you all a Merry Christmas, or Happy-middle-of-January, but no. Happy Not Yet Thanksgiving...

~Stacy

DIY Barbie Bed

My girl has discovered the wonderful world of Barbies. It was kind of by accident, and started after she got a Barbie-sized Princess Anna doll. Soon after, she received word that there may or may not be a treasure chest of my old Barbies in my parents' attic (there is, but shhhh, don't tell her yet). Then when Chad's mom and sister were visiting last month we went to the toy store and her aunt bought her a Barbie bathroom set and doll that she had to have.

The decision between the bathroom set and the bedroom set was a bit complicated, and while she certainly didn't have buyer's remorse she pretty much has not stopped talking about the Barbie bed ever since. She regularly reminds me that she would like Santa Claus to bring her the bed for Christmas.

Well, Santa Claus did a little research and quickly discovered that the Barbie bed (and any related knock offs) were, not surprisingly, overpriced. As in, to the tune of $30--granted, this included a dresser and lamp, but still. That's too much money for a bed for a 12" doll. So I took matters into my own hands and made one out of a shoebox and some fabric scraps. Behold.

I started with an empty women's shoe box and lid (perfect size for Barbie), some fabric pieces large enough to cover the outsides of the box and the lid (coordinating prints), and a stapler. Yep, I just stapled the fabric right to the box and did a little creative folding to cover the staples.

I covered the outside of the box and stapled the fabric in place to the top inside edge--folding the fabric around it like gift wrap. I did the same for the lid, except I put a layer of stuffing on top first before covering with the fabric, to give Barbie a little bit of a softer mattress. After covering and stapling the fabric to the lid, I put the lid on the box--which covered the staples. This way the lid can still be taken off and used for storing any of Barbies clothes or accessories.

It still needed something, so I decided to add a headboard. I cut off the flap of a cardboard box I found in our recycling bin (I was determined to keep this a no cost project) and then cut rounded corners at the top. I covered it with the same pink gingham fabric as the "mattress" and then stapled the whole thing directly onto the box. You can see staples on this piece, but they're on the back so I'm not too worried about it. Charlotte won't care, and if it ends up going inside a dollhouse that part will be against a wall anyway.

The next step was more fun: bedding! Barbie needed a comforter and some pillows, naturally. I cut two pieces of fabric 15"X12" and sewed them right sides together, leaving a small opening, turned it right side out and then top stitched. Then I made two pillows out of the gingham (cut 4 rectangles 4.5"X3.5", sew, turn, stuff with a small amount of fiberfill, stitch closed) and one larger, decorative pillow out of another scrap. Does Barbie need a decorative pillow on her bed? No. But I was having fun making pillows so there you have it.

Not to brag, but I think this looks way better than any plastic bed that I could have bought her in the store. She will be a very happy little girl on Christmas morning. And the best part? It was free. Free, and very fun to make! I might tackle living room furniture next...

~Stacy

Trick or Treat...in November

I posted a few weeks ago about Charlotte's Halloween costume--a purple fairy godmother--but never got around to posting about Halloween. In short, it was super cold and rainy on the 31st but she still went out trick-or-treating for over an hour and proudly carried her pumpkin candy basket the whole time. Success.

We carved pumpkins the day before, and by "we" I mean Chad and I since she lost interest by the time we were done removing the pumpkin guts. She did hang around long enough to watch me draw a happy face, per request, on it as a carving guide.

She had a Halloween parade at school the day before where the kids all wore their costumes to school and then at the end of the day families could come to see the parade. It was all very cute, and she soaked up every minute of parade time to wave at everyone (to the point where she walked out of the line and into a wall she was so focused on waving). I took pictures, but it's too hard to crop out the other kids so I won't post any here. Here she is in her fairy godmother glory:

I hope you had a lovely Halloween (and October)!

~Stacy

Birthday B&B

Chad turned the big 3-0 last week (which means I've now known him over half his life...which is both cool and horrifying). To celebrate, we went to a bed & breakfast for the weekend called The Inn at Brandywine Falls. You'd never guess from the name, but it's located right near Brandywine Falls in Northfield (about 40 minutes southeast from us). Our hope was that the fall leaves would be bursting with color and while they were certainly colorful they were also almost entirely on the ground. Ah well, it was still gorgeous. And we had perfect weather, so we were able to hike around Cuyahoga Valley National Park all day.

We visited Hale Farm (right near Peninsula), Peninsula, the Falls, some covered bridges, many hiking trails, and Country Maid Homemade Ice Cream. We also saw a movie, in a theater, something we haven't done together in about a year (we saw St. Vincent, which was good but I'd suggest you wait for Netflix).

So without further ado, here are some photos:

~Stacy

Fairy Godmother Costume

So Halloween is next Friday and I'm not sure how that happened. Thankfully I got my act together enough to make sure Charlotte has a costume.

This year was interesting, since she (mostly) gets the idea of Halloween and what it's all about--which meant she had opinions about her costume. Many opinions, that changed frequently. She had announced her decision to dress up as Dory the fish, Jessi the cowgirl, Cinderella, a bride, a dragon, a mermaid and, oddly, a donkey. The one that ended up sticking was a fairy godmother, so I ran with it (because any more time to think and she would've insisted on dressing up as Elsa or Anna, and I can only imagine how many little Elsa's and Anna's will be trick-or-treating this year). She was firm in her color choice for her costume: purple.

Next was pattern hunting. I didn't find any tutorials online that I liked so I looked at regular patterns and found this one:

I wanted a full length skirt and some type of jacket piece that she could wear over a long sleeved shirt. I went with this view:

My mom make the skirt, which was good for me and traumatizing for her. I wasn't about sew four layers of slippery tulle on top of a layer of slippery satin with a ton of gathering involved. No thanks. She would've been a fairy godmother in leggings if that had been up to me :)

I was in charge of the jacket/vest portion. I made it out of a sparkly satin type fabric and lined it with fleece for warmth. My hope is that she can wear layers of long sleeved shirts if it's cold out and use the vest as a jacket...fingers crossed it isn't too cold on the 31st.

The last step came this morning, when I made the hat. I used a large piece of purple foam and cut a half circle about 10" tall, formed into a cone shape, and stapled shut. Before stapling I took four strips of tulle and knotted the end a few times and inserted that into the hat. Lastly, I used a hole punch on both sides and tied ribbons so I can tie it under her chin to stay put.

I'm pretty excited about this costume :) I like that it's homemade and was (mostly) fun to make. Another bonus is the cost. If I add in my and my mom's time, the cost comes out quite high. However, since sewing is a fun hobby I am NOT counting our time. The overall materials cost was just under $20, which is fantastic considering the crazy prices stores charge for ready made costumes. I used a few 40% coupons at Joann's, which helped keep prices down as well. And she loves to play dress up, so I know the costume will get used beyond just Halloween.

I actually haven't tried this on her yet--I know if I do she won't want to take it off. So pictures to follow next week of her as Fairy Godmother Charlotte.

Happy Halloween!

~Stacy

Quilted Baby Carrier

Charlotte loves her Baby Stella doll (and really any doll, but this project specifically has Baby Stella in mind). She carries it around with her a lot and I thought it'd be cute to make her her own baby carrier. Enter Pinterest, where I searched "diy baby carrier" and found this:

Click here to go right to the pin

I thought it was adorable and the tutorial looked simple enough--to see, it click here to go directly to the blog!

It's a great tutorial and the whole project took one evening and one afternoon. I split it up because the pieces all needed to be quilted--which was easy, but time consuming. So I did all the cutting and quilting last night and put it together this afternoon. All told it probably took a total of about 2 hours.

I used leftover fabric from this outfit I made her over the summer:

I had juuust enough left to make the carrier! And the tutorial called for high loft batting, which I did not have. So I improvised and did one layer of fusible fleece and another layer of low loft natural cotton batting. It worked out fine, and I'd definitely recommend doing that if you don't have high loft since it needs some heft to hold its shape. A heavier weight interfacing would be fine for the hood, but I wouldn't suggest it for the basket since it wouldn't be very soft and squishy. And the pretend baby that will be laying inside will require soft and squishy ;)

It's so cute and the perfect size for Stella (it'll comfortably hold a doll up to 15").

~Stacy