day one

somewhere in the middle

4 weeks

we love her

I love her

Oh Yeah....

babies all smell the same. Perfect. I wonder if that's what heaven smells like?

at the end of the day I also smell - like sour milk.

baby girls can have a blowout out the back AND the front of the diaper.

at the same time.

having a newborn snuggle up to your shoulder and konk out is pretty much the best. thing. ever.

it's incredibly hard to put one down when they are sleeping. so much more fun to sit and stare at them than to accomplish anything around the house.

losing a pound a day is fun - even if you know it will stop long before you'd like it to.

and then there's that extra skin that you just cross your fingers will stick back to your muscle wall....whenever you manage to retrieve that muscle wall from wherever it is it went.

they DO smile. to heck with anything the professionals say.

Those 9 months, and those hours of labor?

Yeah. Worth it.

Our Little River Jane

She was born on Monday, at 11:17.

8 lbs. 3 0z.

20 1/4 inches long

About 6 hours of labor, my first epidural (oh HEAVEN that was AMAZING!).

Every time I see my doctor, I like him more and more. He was fantastic, the nurses were great, the anesthesiologist was a superstar.

No complications, unless you count the umbilical cord snapping so the doc had to deliver my placenta by reaching in and digging it out... (again, good thing I had that epidural, oh my goodness)

After a couple of nights with no sleep, she is sleeping great, eating great, and we are all adjusting pretty well.

Happy, happy.

Baby Shower!

My baby shower was on Saturday - and this is the invitation that was sent out to everyone. The invitation, I must add, that I did not see.

So when I showed up,

and my hostess slash dear friend Hannah was dressed like this,

I was a little shocked! She immediately presented me with a bonnet and gloves to wear (thank HEAVEN I was wearing a cute long skirt!) and led me to the back yard where there were tables set up with tea sets and small sandwiches and all good things.

Everyone came in some state of dressed up - shawls and gloves and dresses; it was so great!

And, everyone who came had a fantastic time. There was much talk about making Jane Austen Tea Parties a permanent fixture in our lives.

Hannah had several plain onesies available, and lots of pretty fabric, and everyone cut out a pattern and used fabric glue to make baby River a lovely onesie!

She also had this one: with Mr. Darcy's proposal on it!!

I was also presented with a new copy of Pride and Prejudice, which everyone had written a note in for the baby. Her first copy!

I will be reading this to her in the hospital, oh yes.

I told my mom all about it and she summed up the day perfectly, "Aww. You have the best friends." I do. I really, really do.

And, another blanket. This one has a nice soft flannel on the back and the sides of the front, and a gorgeous orange-and-black Michael Miller cotton print on the front.

I edged the cotton panel with black lace, because I could. One more stash-only project!

Of course, to celebrate, I bought a couple of yards of Minky on sale yesterday.

It's fuzzy, but there you go. 34 weeks. We'll see how long we can get her to stay in there. She's already trying to get me to go to the hospital. I resist. Have an appointment tomorrow, we'll see what he says. Hopefully it won't be "bed rest for you, darling". (Yes, he says darling. In his Irish accent. It's awesome)

Update - "all's well dahling, business as usual". The contractions aren't doing anything so far besides make me uncomfortable.

The insanity contintues!

I made another outfit today, using a bunch of free patterns from the internet.

Here are the links: Shoes, Diaper Cover, Dress, Bonnet

If it's too small for the 4th of July, it will certainly work for Memorial Day!

Baby Blanket!

A few years ago, I found this end table cover - crocheted or tatted or however it was made - at a yard sale. It came with a table runner/piano cover that I've been using as a scarf. I thought that eventually I'd use it as part of a bohemian style skirt or something BUT - this is much much better!

First, I wove some pretty ribbon through the lace - it's blue because blue is what I had on hand (I didn't have to purchase anything for this blanket! I had everything at home already)

My friend Betsey (who just had her baby a few days ago! Yay Betsey!) gave me this vintage calico print. I love it. Craig hates it. I win.

I made a super simple baby blanket by layering batting, then the calico right side up, another layer of calico right side down, and then sewing around the edges and leaving a hole for turning inside out. Then I sewed the hole shut and sewed again about half an inch inside the border all the way around.

Last, I layered the lacey cover on one side of the blanket and used my walking foot to quilt it onto the blanket. It was a very quick project, and I love the victorian vintage look!!

Yay!

BEFORE:

a men's shirt, given to me by our neighbor. She asked if I thought I could do anything with the fabric. Well, it's a pretty hideous color but I had some old lace on hand, handmade by a friend's grandmother, and I thought they might go well together.

Enter Simplicity 8761, from 1970, which I found in my mother in law's garage several months ago.

AFTER:

All about the baby. (Just don't tell him I still call him that - he gets mad)

This pic was taken by Craig's Aunt Pam, who visited us at the start of the year. She got a tour of DreamWorks while the big boys were in school.

Trying out the goggles. He made that face on purpose.

The arrival of "wolf friend". Wolf friend came into our lives after I got desperate for him to go to sleep one night and decided to tell him a wonderful story about himself. And his little wolf. And the train that they rode together to have great adventures.

I had to buy the wolf the next day.

Pondering the greater meaning of life.

Self portrait.

Naturally this is MY favorite...
So happy when he got big enough to hang out with Hannah's cat and have her not run away. Bliss.

Unfortunately, shortly after this photo was taken, sweet Chiquita left us (she was an old kitty) and now Van has a new kitty to woo. I'm sure she'll get used to him....

Sleeping on the Job.

(that's MY bed, by the way. How they all 3 managed to be in it that early in the morning, and me out of it, I do not recall. It was a few months ago)

I realize that blog hiatuses (what IS the plural of hiatus?) are lame. But this baby growing business is taxing and I'm not feeling much of anything interesting lately. We are all good, things are going well, I'll try to post pics of the kids for grandparents frequently. :)

See you soon.

Merry Christmas!!

wishing you and yours a merry and bright holiday season!

Not Really A Tutorial...

My middle son asked for THIS for Christmas - a Venom, full zip, hoodie. It was only made in men's sizes, as far as we can tell, and it's been out of stock for years, as far as we can tell - but he saw it on someone and that was that. I told him we could not find one. The face crumpled.

and then I said it.

"Well, we could try to make one..."

oh boy.

So. I used McCalls pattern 6158 (don't tell him it's a girl pattern) because it has the thumb hole that the other sweater has. Anti-pill fleece was on sale, so I used that.

First, I made the template for the Spider front.

I laid it on the fold of the white fleece and cut it, then cut the fleece in half on the fold. Then I pinned it to the front of the sweater, leaving a little room for the seam.

I drew a shape for the mouth and cut out the tongue, then the little bitty annoying teeth.

I sewed those on to the lower part of the hood.

I had to fudge the instructions just a little - the hood is supposed to go on after the zipper but since this is a full-zip hoodie the zipper needed to go on later.
I also cut out eye holes and sewed a thick tulle in their place.

The instructions said to sew the zipper on to the front, right sides together. It was later turned to the inside, and a facing applied to the other side. The fleece was bulky for that - I would use a different fabric if I were to do this again (which, I won't).

You can see I managed to make the mouth uneven. Am I going to fix it, you ask?

hahahaha.

funny.

I DID have to add about 4 inches of width to the center back of the hood, narrowing at forehead and neck, so it would wrap around his face without suffocating him.

After sewing on the waistband and cuffs, the last step was to sew the spider leg shapes into the white front.
Ta Da! It's definitely not perfect, and I used the longest zipper I could find that was open on both ends - without using a 36 incher, you know. The zipper was still a couple of inches short and the zip ends right as the waistband starts. So it's open at the bottom.

Still, I'm fairly certain he's going to love it.

.....he'd better.

Update - he loves it. Success. :)

The Evite dreaded by every crafter, ever.

Several weeks ago, I received an evite for a "Handmade Christmas Party" which was hosted by 4 ladies up in the Santa Clarita area. One of them I have known since college, and rarely get an opportunity to see. The invitation informed me that there would be lots of food and a White Elephant style gift exchange - with the catch being that the gift each person brought had to be handmade. By them.

Enter Stress. Enter dozens of ideas being thought up and then discarded as lame or "too easy". Then I thought - I've never made a purse. It would be fun to try to make a purse. And lots of late nights on Pinterest ensued. I bought a book; The Bag Making Bible, and figured I would make something smallish from the patterns inside.

The bag I ended up making is not small. It is a carry-on sized weekend bag. How could I not? It was the cutest one in the book! I spent one day cutting the fabrics and then fusing them to the interfacings - the outside fabric to a woven interfacing and the lining fabric to a wool/fleece interfacing.
There is an outside flat pocket with a magnetic snap closure. That snap was incredibly easy to install. I'm addicted.

A flat zip pocket on one side of the inside. This was one of the more difficult things to put in. My fabric didn't want to press flat so there was a lot of pinning to be done. I broke 3 needles on this project!

3 row pockets on the other side. The bottom is hard - made so by inserting a plastic grid base which I bought at JoAnns. (I got all of the materials there. I had wanted so badly to make it out of oilcloth but the fabric is just too darn expensive and as it was this was not a cheap project by any stretch of the imagination)

In the end, I get so say, "I made a bag!!" and I didn't even have any major catastrophes during the construction! I omitted the long shoulder strap because I did not like the way it was attached to the bag (looked lazy) AND I could not find a sliding strap ring to save my life.

I came home with something which I will say was definitely equally awesome. My children think I more than came home with the better deal! Behold:

3 giant pillows. You can guess who they are. :)