Pirate Tooth Fairy Pillow

A few months ago, my 6 year old suddenly had a loose tooth. I felt like it went from a little wiggly to dangling by one tiny root in a matter of days although I think it was really weeks. A friend once told me that these would be the longest days but fastest years of my life. She wasn't kidding. I have a kid who is losing teeth. When did he even outgrow his bassinet?

Anyway, my little tough guy and I took to Pinterest to find just the right tooth fairy pillow to hold his precious baby teeth and he saw a pirate tooth that he fell in love with. He took one look and said, "Wow, cool, I want THAT one." Unfortunately the link to the blog post from the pin doesn't go anywhere so I can't give credit where credit is due.

Here's the one I made based on that picture though:

I just used some scrap felt and a bandana that I had but never used. Here are the parts laid out:

To stitch this together, I first used my sewing machine to attach the mouth, teeth, eye, patch, and tooth on the patch using matching thread. Then I baste-stiched the UN-TIED bandana on his head. I then pinned the tie ends towards his face so they wouldn't get caught wrong when I stitched the two sides of the pillow together. Finally, I stitched the hanging loop to the top edge (when you do this, make sure the loop is facing down with the cut ends up, that way when you turn the project in the end, the loop will be on the outside of the pillow).

I top stitched just the pocket flap with white thread (not in place, this was separate from the tooth pillow). I laid the two tooth pieces with right sides together and stitched along the side where the pocket would be. I opened the two pieces back up and stitched the pocket in place, wrapping it across the seam.

I then pinned the front and back with right sides together and stitched nearly all the way around, leaving a hole along one side to turn the pillow.

I turned the pillow right side out and stuffed it then hand stitched the hole.

He lost his tooth 2 days later.

He tucked his tooth and one of my hair bands in the pocket and had me write a note to the tooth fairy to tell her the hair band should be delivered to Tinkerbell.

Thank you for reading,
Julie

I've Missed Blogging

What can I say, I've missed blogging. I vanished because there was suddenly so much to do, I couldn't get anything totally finished and didn't feel right blogging about unfinished business. I'm going to walk you through how I get myself deep into too many projects all happening at once. Let's begin with the problem ...

Here's what my kitchen looked like after I redid it (but before I did the faux granite counter tops):

I picked this picture to show you because over on the left is a rolling cart that was about 12 inches deep with a full depth butcher block top on it so I would have additional counter space. The storage was really inadequate though so I always had it in the back of my head that I would someday remedy that problem. Well, one day I got sick of that and the fact that the counter was always covered in junk (mail, laptop, more mail, bills, kid artwork, etc) and got to really dreaming which led me to an internet search for a cabinet desk. I found a beautiful one that would go great with our existing decor but they were out of stock so I was crushed. But wait! I kept checking and a week later, suddenly they had one online so I ordered it then waited very impatiently for it to arrive. As soon as it got here, I put it together then stood back to admire its awesomeness.

 

(I love it)

Well, that was all fine and good because I did manage to get that crap counter cleaned off but then I started dreaming of more kitchen storage which led me to Craigslist where I discovered the perfect sized base cabinet someone was giving away for free!! I jumped on it and brought this home:

OK, well, not exactly. The one I brought home didn't have any doors.

I should add this was all happening while I was getting the boys' costumes ready for Halloween. In case you missed it, here's a picture:

OK, back to cabinet making. I painted the cabinet to match my kitchen and built out the doors then painted those too. Unfortunately I realized I couldn't do 2 fake drawer fronts so I scrapped those and still need to create one long one to be consistent with the rest of my kitchen.

Here's the baby helping me get it loaded up:

I'm so excited about how much extra space there is in it and will be blogging about the process of custom building a cabinet or two when I'm finally done but you see, once I got that in (and not even finished mind you), I decided I needed to build an upper cabinet that I'd long been dreaming of. Here's the logic behind starting that part of the project before finishing the bottom cabinet: I needed more wood to do the fake drawer front so instead of just buying enough wood for that, I might as well get a whole sheet of MDF and use the rest of it to make the top cabinet.

Of course, I built it to fit in the space then found out that the side of our fridge bows out so I had to get a little creative with installation but at least I painted it before having the hubs lift it into place 'cause it was a tad heavy.

Sigh, I have to make a door for that now too but at least my stuff is loaded in and that's really handy.

Oh, hey, I forgot to mention .... besides Halloween costumes, we also had a garage sale where we made just enough money to cover the cost of replacing the shelter we borrowed from a friend for the garage sale (groan) and we also *finally* got the new driveway we've been waiting all summer for.

Phew!!! We dabbled a little in side yard progress but not a whole lot. The weather has turned mostly nasty so we haven't done much over there. We did have the driveway guys pour a slab at the back of the garden where we can put the "Crapport Memorial Pergola" but it is out of sight in this picture since the cement is still curing.

Oh, one other thing - I got a screamin' deal on 25lbs of zucchini at Cash and Carry so I prepped all that for freezing:

Soooooo, if you'll recall, the inside project all began because I was irritated by all the crap sitting on that one counter so I'd like to leave you with one final picture:

Yeah, that's totally better. (In my own defense, most of the stuff up there pertains to the project but still, when will the chaos end?)

Thank you for reading,
Julie

Where HAVE I been?

Well, I fell off the face of blogland again but this time, unlike last year, it isn't because I'm preggers or anything. I wish I had such a good excuse (well, except for the part about being pregnant, I'm happy not to be pregnant) but really, it just comes down to regular summer business. We've been celebrating friends' birthdays, going to parks and cookouts, enjoying the beautiful weather, cursing the bad weather, playing, working and generally just soaking up the always too short summertime. The DSLR also broke so I have no decent pictures of what we've been up to. I just picked it up from the shop a few days ago though so once I get a new media card, I'll be back in business. I've got some photos off the old point and shoot to share with you though.

The baby turned 7 months old:

We took the boys swimming:

Made some side yard progress (post to come soon):

Read some good books:

And I've been experimenting in the kitchen some more:

We've definitely been having fun. Sugarpop (the baby) is also creeping which keeps me on my toes. I can put him down on his mat and 5 minutes later, I find him across the room. He gets around by rolling or pushing himself backwards on his belly. It definitely means I can't stay at the computer long, in fact, in just the time I've typed this last bit about his mobility, I've looked over at him 8 times (and I'm a fast typer). I had to babyproof the house in a big hurry a few weeks ago.

So, as you can see, we've been busy. I hope to get a few posts up with some specifics on the creative side of my days but the days just keep flying by so I'm going to have to carve out some special time to devote to the posts. I'll do my best.

Thank you for reading,
Julie

1 Minute DIY Layered Nursing Top

This will be the easiest tutorial I'll ever post. I'm excited to share my findings with you though so read on.

Nursing on the go is never all that easy but with the right tops and a good nursing cover, it doesn't have to become a peep show for those around you. The problem is, those nursing tops can be expensive and aren't always all that attractive or subtle. I like to layer my clothing which means this combination with jeans is one of my favorites:

I tried wearing that outfit once recently and was really uncomfortable when I tried to nurse the little one not to mention I couldn't have nursed with any semblance of privacy since I had to pull both shirts up.

Here's the solution I came up with:

What you'll need -

• 1 long-sleeved shirt (this is actually a white maternity shirt that I wore before I got huge)
• Scissors
• Optional: Sewing machine

If you're using an old maternity shirt that is bell shaped and you want to fix that, just stitch down the side seams to take it in a bit. I didn't have to, my shirt was just longer, not wider, than a regular shirt.

Now try on the shirt, look at where your bust is, mark it if you want (or just eyeball it like I did).

Take the shirt off and cut two vertical slits as you see here:

To be honest, my slits start a tad high, I didn't eyeball the placement very well. Each cut is about 7 inches long and you'll notice they don't run straight down the center of each breast, they're actually off to the side of each, just a couple of inches in from the sleeve seam. Placing them there means you don't see wrinkles through my outer shirt.

When it comes time to nurse, here's how it's done:

The t-shirt material won't fray so you don't have to finish the edges or anything. It is easy as can be and when you need to nurse, the shirt stays down covering your middle. With this setup, I don't feel at all exposed when I'm nursing. It isn't any secret what I'm doing but I remain well covered.

Thank you for reading,
Julie

Cloth Diapers are Easy and Inexpensive

Today I'm taking some time to write about something I'm passionate about. This isn't a project, a recipe or a tutorial, it's really a way of life. You see, about 4 years ago, as we were preparing for the birth of our first son, I met someone who turned me on to the world of cloth diapers. Once I started looking around at all the options, I was absolutely astounded by all the different varieties but most of all, by how easy it could be to join the growing community of families who choose to use cloth to diaper their babies.

"Tigger" age 3 weeks, just over 9lbs

Like many people, I thought that cloth diapering meant wrangling a rectangular piece of fabric (a "prefold") onto a squirmy baby then pinning that in place and covering it with an ugly white plastic underwear looking thing. As I researched our options, I learned that there are lots of people who use prefolds although the covers can be downright adorable but it still seemed like a bit too much work for me. Then I discovered the world of "pocket diapers" and "all-in-ones" which truly are as easy to put on a baby as disposables. I don't have a problem with learning a new way to diaper my baby but when I learned about pocket diapers, I got so excited that this was an option I wouldn't hesitate to ask a friend, babysitter or the grandparents to use on my kiddo.

Because we chose pocket diapers, I'm going to mainly focus on the benefits we discovered through using these diapers. Please remember, there are lots of different options out there, many of which can be found in my favorite online cloth diaper store, Cotton Babies. I hope that by reading this post, you too might consider using cloth on your favorite little bum.

Benefits:

• They're adorable. See photo above if you're not sure about this. That's Tigger modeling a bumGenius 3.0 in Ribbit (color). His big brother wore that very same diaper just a couple of years ago.


• They save us money. Did you know that the average baby goes through around 3000 diapers in his or her first year? Now, I'm a couponer and I'm very frugal so I'm going to estimate each diaper costs $.19 (that's based on the Costco Kirkland brand size 1-2 diapers). That comes out to be $570 for the first year of diapering on the first child. In our stash, we have 24 bumGenius 3.0s which we bought for $16 each 4 years ago. That comes out to be $384. The laundry detergent I used on the cloth diapers cost $.16 per load. I probably did a load of diaper laundry every other day so the laundry detergent that first year with Snickerdoodle, probably cost me around $30. That means we forked out around $414 for diapers and detergent that first year. The best part though . . . while all my buddies had to continue to buy disposable diapers in year 2, I continued to use those same cloth diapers. And wait, it gets better, we're going to use those same 24 diapers on Tigger. I'd also like to note that we could have bought these same diapers gently used for even less and saved ourselves even more money. I didn't know that at the time that we bought our original stash but will probably be buying some additional diapers from a friend soon (hey, little Tigger deserves something his big brother didn't already use plus I'm hooked on cloth). UPDATE: After reader Amber commented about the wipes, I wanted to add in the cost savings from those too. I'm going to conservatively estimate you'll go through around 40 packs of wipes per year with disposables and at the cheapest I've ever found, that comes out to around $40 per year. With cloth diapers, it's easier to use cloth wipes too. A bunch of those cost me $3.99 at the fabric store for a yard of flannel fabric (which I cut down to squares). 


• We're not contributing to landfills. I don't think I need to explain this one, it's simple, we're not throwing away thousands of disposable diapers that will sit in some landfill for hundreds of years. Plus, did you know that you're actually not supposed to leave poop in even a disposable diaper? Rain falls on the landfills, runs through those diapers, picks up feces and becomes our groundwater. It's actually not good for the environment . . . would you put human feces in your home compost pile? The treatment plants at the end of our toilets are designed to deal with human waste, the dumps are not. 


• We rarely see diaper rash. Think about it, would you rather wear soft fabric against your bum or sit around in/on some strange ultra-absorbent gel all day? I'm a fan of the fabric - it breathes, it doesn't contain chemicals, it is soft. The only time we saw diaper rash with Snickerdoodle was when we accidentally used too much detergent or forgot to do a second rinse at the end of the wash cycle. 


• We rarely have blowouts. Every once in awhile we'd use a disposable diaper and I kid you not, our first son could blow out any disposable. Talk about unwanted laundry!! I found it far easier to throw a load of diapers into the washer all together than to toss in a poop-covered onesie with the rest of his clothing. Ewwww!


• Potty training is often easier for cloth diapered kids. Yes, you read that right. The thing about cloth diapers is that no matter how absorbent they are, a toddler can still feel when it is wet which helps tremendously when it comes to potty training. This means that many cloth diapered kiddos are potty trained earlier than their disposable diapered buddies. 


• One size diapers work for multiple children at the same time. Can you imagine how convenient it would be if your 2 1/2 year old could use the exact same diaper her 6 month old sister used just last week? Many of the cloth diapers out there are just that flexible. The diapers we use have a system of snaps that allow us to customize the fit as well as different inserts to dial up or down the absorbency as needed.

Cloth diapering really was easy with Snickerdoodle and will be easy with Tigger too. I didn't find that extra load of laundry every other day to be a huge burden. I'd just toss in the diapers all together (not with clothing, diapers only), wash them using the recommended soap then toss them in the dryer. Pocket diapers contain a washable pad inside a pocket between the layer of fabric closest to the baby and the outer waterproof shell which needs to be positioned inside the diaper and we chose to do that before restocking them by the changing table. That way they were as ready to grab as any disposable diaper. The extra work was minimal but completely worth it to me knowing how much better these diapers were for our son and for the environment. 

I feel like I could go on and on about why we love cloth diapers but I don't want this post to be overwhelming. My hope is that maybe it'll get you thinking about what an easy move this could be for your family. I'm always willing to answer questions about our experience too. If I get lots of questions, I can also do a follow up post to address those. 

Now here's the best part - although I received no compensation for writing this post, I am entering it in a contest and if I win, I'll receive 12 bumGenius diapers to add to our stash PLUS 12 bumGenius diapers for one lucky reader who comments on this post. Do you already use cloth diapers? Do you want to start? Do you know of someone who might want 12 new adorable diapers? Please leave a comment below to be entered into the contest.

The end.

Thank you for reading,
Julie

I'm Proud to Welcome...

You may have already guessed why I disappeared again. Well, I'm super excited to show you that one of my longest running projects (second only to the Snickerdoodle) finally came to fruition one week ago. Without further ado, here is the final product:

He was born on 12/16 at 12:57am via c-section (I knew I'd likely need one but he came on his own before the scheduled surgery date, hooray!!). He was 7lbs, 10oz and 20 inches long.

I'm so madly in love with this tiny little creature. 

Everything is going really well. He's a great sleeper most of the time, he's very easy going unless he needs to burp and he's softer than anything I've ever felt. Big brother even thinks he's pretty cool:

I hope you're having a wonderful holiday season and for those who celebrate, may you have a very Merry Christmas!

Thank you for reading,
Julie


PS The nursery is working out great too:

Happy Thanksgiving!

Here are just a few things I'm thankful for this year:

What are you thankful for?

Thank you for reading,
Julie

Happy Halloween 2011

Happy Halloween!!

We love Halloween around here but this year I'd say the scariest part of it all might just be the pictures I have to include in this post. The dismal weather outside and lack of natural light is challenging my budding photography skills. BUT, without further ado, I bring you...

LIGHTNING MCQUEEN!!!

I customized the jumpsuit pattern from Butterick (3244) that I had also used last year for his astronaut costume. Snickerdoodle has a long torso and I like the added belt with elastic around the back as well as cuffs to keep everything in place. I also created the custom iron-ons using MS Word for the back and the lightning bolts down his arms and just used Google to find the images for the sponsors on the front as well as the checkerboard pattern down each leg. I LOVE printable iron on paper. I always use the stuff for dark t-shirts as I like that the colors come out bolder than they do with the traditional iron-on paper.

And now my costume:

Disclaimer: Although I had the concept before seeing others, when I Googled for the images to base the bones off of, I found someone else had beaten me to the idea. Being extremely short on time, I opted to use their design rather than reinventing it. Similar shirts are available for sale but I did this with a basic Target maternity shirt, a few pages of printable iron-on paper, a pair of scissors and a whole lot of swearing. At any rate, it was a huge hit when we went trick-or-treating at a friend's office on Friday.

It was easy enough to make. I just scaled the images I wanted to use to fit my body and printed them on regular white paper to use as a template. Then I stacked my un-printed iron-on paper with the printed images and cut out the bones. I followed the directions with the iron-on paper to stick them down. For the arm bones, I was actually able to use a file I found in the Silhouette marketplace and let my machine do the work on those.

FYI I started out trying to use contact paper so I wouldn't have to sacrifice the shirt but thankfully didn't get all that far before I realized the paper just wouldn't stick to my curves (the belly really is ginormous) so if you're thinking the same thing . . . well, don't bother.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Thank you for reading,
Julie

Memory Box

I recently came across another blogger's brilliant craft and had to make one of my own. I pinned it so I wouldn't forget but I was so eager to do the project, I hardly needed the reminder:

Source: tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com via Julie on Pinterest

This box was created by Cheri from I Am Momma - Hear Me Roar and I saw it on a guest post over at Tatertots and Jello. The box holds index cards with quotes from her kids. I love this idea because Snickerdoodle never stops talking and says some stuff that leaves us in stitches. I also thought this might make a nice baby shower gift.

Here's the one I made with how I made it just below:

The process is probably pretty self explanatory but I'll include photos of what I did with a few words.

Get yourself a plain box, mine was from JoAnn.

Make sure index cards will fit inside (or I suppose you could cut your own colorful paper to size).

Lightly sand the edges to smooth things out and remove the hardware.

Paint the outside.

Cut out the letters for the word "remember" from a magazine then Mod Podge them on to the lid.

Glue paper to the inside to line it. Mod Podge this in place as well.

... do the inside of the lid too.

If the edges of your paper stick up above the edge of the box at all, carefully trim the excess using a razor blade.

Let it dry for a few hours.

Add some index cards and when your kid says or does something you want to make sure you remember, take a moment to jot it down and stick it in the box.

"Mommy we need to go to Target because your belly sticks out of all your shirts."

For the record, it is really just the bottom of my belly and I AM almost 7 months pregnant.

Thank you for reading,
Julie

I'm sharing on:

Vanishing Blogger

Well, it seems as if once I finished decorating the nursery, my energy all just went down the drain. I'm just at the start of third trimester and boy do I feel it. I've been attempting to tackle some things on my to do list that I just know won't get done for months once the baby arrives but they're not fun things worth blogging about individually.

Here's one - I fixed the wall that I had originally patched poorly and I painted the ceiling in the bathroom. Unfortunately I never caught any photos that showed the mistake in the wall (it wasn't even something other people noticed but I did and I wanted it done right). I can show you where the problem started though. You see, when we moved into our house, the bathroom was U-G-L-Y and there was this giant built-in cabinet facing the toilet. When I gutted the bathroom soon after we moved in, that was the first thing to go but when I patched the wall, I didn't do a great job getting the new drywall flush with the old drywall. Here it is before and after (although you can't see the problem after):

                 

So, I was able to check off 2 things that had been on my home improvement to do list for awhile

✔  Paint the bathroom ceiling

✔  Repair the bathroom wall

I also removed all the worn-out hook-and-loop tape from my first son's old Bum Genius cloth diapers. We LOVED the BG 3.0s but the tabs wore out in the laundry. I ordered the kits to replace the tabs but the pile was just sitting in my sewing area. Well, one day when I was feeling especially exhausted, I grabbed that stack and a stitch ripper and removed 48 tabs while sitting on the couch.

✔  Remove the hook-and-loop tabs on the BG diapers

Beyond those two more time consuming projects I've just been trying to stay ahead of housework, motherhood and we even enjoyed a visit from my parents who live in St. Louis. Oh, and I've been growing a little monkey in my belly.

Rock on little dude!!

See, aren't ya glad I didn't try to make a post out of each of those items (particularly housework and motherhood).

Thank you for reading,
Julie