Hotty Owl and A Football

Have I mentioned I know I lot of pregnant women right now?  And have I mentioned that I am sewing like crazy to make just the cutest gifts for these expected babies?  I think I might have once or twice before.  I finished up another set of baby gifts and they are oh so adorable!  Check them out below:

 I was only going to make one or two things but I was having too much fun and ended up making a simple baby quilt, a crinkly football taggy, and a cute little owl softy.  This set is for a dear friend who just loves owls (way before they become the "it" think to love) and her husband is a serious sports geek. Hence the owl theme with a football thrown in for good measure. 

For the face of this baby quite which only measure 30"x30" (perfect for a tummy time mat!), I just cut up some nice square from a soft green knit and some pastel owl print I had on hand.  I pulled this polka-dotted blue print out and loved it for the backing of the quilt - however, one small problem.  There wasn't enough to do the entire back of the quilt!  So I just worked in some of the owl print into a criss-cross stripe to make the blue print stretch farther.  I lightly quilted it all together with a simple straight line pattern.  Since I purposely made the back 2 inches bigger than the top of the quilt, I was able to use the back as the binding for the quilt as well.  I just love how this quilt turned  out!

This little football was just fun to put together.  I wanted to keep it simple in appearance but still have something to it to catch a wee one's attention.  So I added in some ribbon loops to play with and a crinkly middle layer (made out of an empty cereal bag) which made it nice and noisy.

And finally, Mr. Hotty Owl was inspiried by a tutorial I stubbled upon over at Karen Gray Design.  I changed him up a bit by making him about an inch skinnier and I also added some of the blue polka-dotted print I used in the a fore mentioned quilt to the owl's wings and a little heart patch on the owl's back. 

 I home my friend and her wee one enjoy all of this as much as I enjoyed making this set for them! :)

Graphic Gardens & Pigeon Poses

Don't you just love this fabric?  Its from a line called Graphic Gardens and I bought this when JoAnn's had it on sale this past spring.  I have to admit, I'm having a slight love affair with bright colors and greys as of late. :)  Anyways, I bought it with the intent of making a certain project out of it, but then I never got around to it and changed my mind so its been sitting in my stack of fabric for a few months longing to be brought out into the sun.  

I've been taking yoga classes over the past couple of months to help with some of my back issues and it has really been helping.  Well, I finally broke down and bought my own yoga mat.  I even found one that was extra long!  I no longer hang off of the mat while doing yoga! Ahhh the joys of being tall right?  Well, anyways, I digress. The yoga mat didn't come with a strap or bag so it was a little annoying to carry around as it kept wanting to unroll on me.  Yesterday afternoon, while I was snuggling with Little Bear watching Curious George, inspiration struck!  I could make my own yoga bag!  I took a quick look at my stash and new that this fabric would be perfect.  I measured up my yoga mat, sketched out a simple pattern and went to town cutting, ironing and sewing.  A mere 45 minutes later, I had the cutest yoga bag all sewn together. 

I just love this bag.  Its so cute and cherry and modern looking.  I can't wait for yoga class now to try it out! :)

4th Anniversary Celebration!

This weekend marks 4 years that my dear sweet husband and I have been married!  Its been a crazy four years, but there is no one else I want to be sharing life with! :) 

To celebrate this momentous occasion, we decided to try to get away for the weekend.  My mom so amazingly and graciously volunteered to watch Little Bear for the entire weekend so we could do something special!  I dropped him off at my parents' place in the country Friday morning.  

After running errands all day, I was ready for some fun by Friday evening.   Tim and I went into Downtown Buffalo and had dinner at a little restaurant on Pearl Street called Encore.  We love going there because the food is always fantastic and the atmosphere perfectly charming.  

After filling up on deliciousness, we drove over to Delaware Park to see the Shakespeare in the Park's production of "Hamlet". On our way to where the play is held, we passed the rose gardens in the park which were in full bloom and simply breathtaking.

It was a gorgeous evening to sit on a blanket on a hill enjoying Shakespeare's "Hamlet".

And of coarse the play wasn't complete without the oft quoted line of "To be or not to be!". 

The next day - Saturday - after being able to sleep in for a bit and actually get up at 5 am to use the bathroom without having to worry about waking up a sleeping toddler, we set off for a packed day of fun.  We first drove over to the Penn Yan are to visit The Windmill Farm & Craft Market.  I have only been there once before years ago with my sister and I've been longing to go back.  It's a fantastic place to go as there are so many little shops and delicious food to feat upon. 

Tim, of coarse, found the one shop that was selling model train stuff and had to check it out. 

One little shop was selling a vast array of hand puppets.  They had just about any and every kind of puppet you could think up.  We found this adorable hippopotamus that has a nice big mouth which Little Bear will just love.  Tim had to test him out while we were waiting for our lunch to make sure the puppet would be fun enough for Little Bear.  

Lunch was fantastic!  We filled up on Kettle Corn and Pizza and this humungous blooming onion! 

Yum!

For our first dessert, we devoured these simple amazing fresh strawberries!  I forgot just how amazing strawberries taste when they are fresh from the farm and not the sad ones you buy at the grocery store. 

Second dessert was had when we stopped at Mac's Ice Cream Stand on our way from The Windmill to Waterloo.  This girl can never pass up a chance at delicious ice cream!

 After checking into the B&B where we were staying for the night (a cute little place called Through the Grapevine), we went over to Fuzzy Guppies where we rented a pair of kayaks and set out the Seneca River.  It was a perfect afternoon to spend some time kayaking on a calm river. 

 

 We even saw a doe swimming across the river at one point.  My camera was too slow and we were too far away to actually get a picture though. 

 

There is no one else I'd rather be kayaking with! ;) 

 

We paddles all the way up Seneca River to Kendig Creek which we decided to explore.  We came upon a whole gaggle of geese!  The baby geese were at the funny adolescent stage where they aren't so cute any more.  We did see a lot of other wild life on the rive such as turtles, ducks, lots of fish (some dead and some making loud splashes), two blue herrings, and a few other water birds. 

 

All to quickly, our kayaking adventure was over and we had to head back to Waterloo Harbor to return our kayaks.  

On to the last adventure for the day - dinner out at Belhurst Castle!  

 For those of you who don't know, my dear husband has a slight infatuation with castles.  Hence on most of our trips, we seem to somehow end up spending time at a castle.  Which is all right with me because I love castles too and its just fun to see my sweet husband get all silly and excited over them.   

We even go all dressed up for the occasion!  It was a lovely evening spent at the castle.  The dinner was very good and we even got a complimentary strawberry daiquiri cheesecake to celebrate our anniversary.  After dinner, we walked around the castle grounds for a while and spent time sitting on a bench overlooking Seneca Lake enjoying the view and watching the super moon as it rose in to the twilight sky.  

If I thought the day couldn't possibly contain any more, my sweet husband managed to score some serious brownie points with a nice foot rub once we got back to the B&B.  It was a very pleasant way to end a very special day!

The next morning we got to sleep in - again!!  And then we had the most delicious breakfast of puff pancakes, bacon, fresh fruit, fruit bread and more! 

All too soon (yet not soon enough as I was starting to really miss our Little Bear), it was time to pack our stuff back into the car and head home.  But not before snapping a quick picture of the purple roses they had growing in the garden outside the B&B. 

Upcoming Quilting Project

If any of you are like me, it seems as though my list of projects that I want to do never seems to get any shorter!  As soon as I get one project finished, I find two more that I want to do!  At least this way I never have to wonder whats next or what to do with my spare time (whatever that might be).  

One of the projects that I have coming up soon that I am most excited about is a new quilt for my Little Bear!  He is getting so big on me so quickly and before I know it in a couple more months, we will be moving him into his very own big boy bed.  To make the move extra special for him, I want to put together brand new quilt made just for him.  And the best part about it is that I am sure no matter what pattern or fabric I use or how it turns out, I know that Little Bear will love it as he loves all blankets! 

I saw this forest animal print fabric on sale at JoAnn's and fell in love with it!  Isn't it just adorable?  The lady who cut it for me wanted me to make her a quilt too! hehe  Now I just have to get a few other projects finished up so I can get my hands on this lovely material!  I can not wait! :)

Ruffled Tote Bags

A while back, I happened to check out the remnant bin at Walmart and surprisingly, I found this really cute, green floral material for a great price.  I've been wanting to make a general purpose tote bag that I could use for Yoga class or that I could just through everything in for Little Bear and me while we run errands.  This material would be perfect for such a bag.  I think its some kind of canvas or duck cloth and so with its thicker weight, it would make a nice sturdy tote bag.  

I found an adorable tutorial over at Morning by Morning Productions that I wanted give a try for this project.  I adjusted Abby's tutorial just a bit to make the ruffle part wider and on both sides of the bag.  I also made my own straps out of left over material since I didn't want to go out and buy anything special for the straps.  It was a pretty simple bag to put together and only took one evening to cut everything out and one Sunday morning before church to sew it all together. 

My Mom saw me with it when we visited them over Memorial Day and she loved it so much, she wanted to know if I could make her one.  Which is funny because my mom and I have about as opposite of taste as one can have.  I told her I could and left it at that.  But what she didn't know, was that later that week, I made a stop into Hobby Lobby to pick up some fun black & white print duck cloth to make a tote bag of her very own.  I put this bag together in pretty short order as well and can't wait to give it to my mom as I think she will really like it. 

I didn't tell her what I was up to because I wanted to surprise her with it as a "Thank You" since she has so graciously agreed to watch our Little Bear for an entire weekend!  That weekend is this weekend, and Husband Dearest and I are looking forward to a chance to get away for a bit and have some time to ourselves to celebrate our 4th anniversary.  I all ready dropped Little Bear off at Mom's house this morning.  I'm sure he will have a grand time this weekend chasing chipmunks and chickens, pulling up his grandma's flowers, dragging sticks around, drinking from the hose, and visiting Aunt Katie's farm across the road. 

Nursing Cover

I was looking through my pictures I've taken of my numerous projects and I realized that I haven't yet posted pictures of the nursing cover I made for a friend.  So here it is.  

I picked up the material at JoAnn's on sale for $2.50 a yard!  The more I worked with the material, the more I fell in love with it and almost didn't want to give it away.  Too bad I had only purchased 1 yard of it and I didn't have any left over after making this nursing cover.  

I followed a tutorial posted by Kristyn over at Lil' Luna which you can find Here.  

 I really like that this cover is an all around cover.  Because if you have a squirmy baby little my Little Bear was, its nice to be covered from all sides.  I also like the boning in the color which makes it easy to keep an eye on baby.

This project is going on my to do list if and when we have another baby!

Super Daddy

I think watching my dear husband become a daddy has made me fall in love with him all over again.  And now as our baby is turning into a toddler and I watch my husband get down and play with our son and teach him things, my heart continues to melt.  

My husband like most typical males, loves superheros especially Dr. Fate.  So I thought it would be fun to make Tim and Little Bear matching superhero capes for a Father's Day gift.  Dr. Fate's colors are blue and yellow so I used those in deciding what colors to make the capes.  I found some great super hero letter templates I was able to use to make a "B" and "T" for the capes.  I couldn't wait for Tim and Little Bear to enjoy these so I actually gave them the capes a day early.  Tim loved them and periodically throughout this entire weekend, Tim and Little Bear have been chasing each other around the apartment with their capes on and yelling "WHOOSSH!".

Since Tim and I both love photography and we have a very photogenic son, last weekend while we were on a walk through the local nature preserve, I pulled out some cardboard letters and went to town snapping pictures of Little Bear holding a "D" and an "A".  I love how these "D" "A" "D" photo collage turned out, so much so that it was hard to choose just one collage to share. 

Happy Father's Day!!

A Day at the Zoo

In honor of Father's Day, Tim decided that he would like to spend part of the day at the Buffalo Zoo (since tomorrow is supposed to be rainy and such).  So off we set!

Little Bear seemed ready to go on an adventure perched in the new red wagon we got him at a yard sale this morning for a steal!  He is ready for anything as long as his faithful puppy Oliver is there with him. 

In the rainforest exhibit, Little Bear was fascinated by the bright pink birds that were everywhere!

And he was also fascinated by the piranhas. 

We tried to get another cute photo of Little Bear and I in front of the waterfalls at the rainforest exhibit like we had last summer when we were there, but he wasn't too into it this time. He couldn't wait until we were done there and moved on to see the monkeys!

And look - Monkeys! 

And Lions too!  Mr. Lion was being very lazy just sitting in the sun.

Little Bear decided that posing in front of a large tank of fish was a great idea.  He probably sat there for a good 5 minutes or so before he was ready to move along. 

It was a lovely day to spend at the zoo. :)

A Box Full of Lovies!

The other day while driving back from running errands, I happened upon a yard sale that looked like it might warrant a closer look.  I ended up scoring a Fisher Price plastic toy boy for $5!  Granted, it needed some serious scrubbing, but it had potential.  Last night, after Little Bear went to bed, Tim and I took the box to the basement and gave it the good scrubbing it deserved.  The bottom of it was a lost cause but for what I had in mind, no bottom wasn't going to be an issue.  

After cleaning it up, drying it off, I took it into Little Bear's room and gathered all of his stuffed animals and lovies up and gave them all a new home.  At first, I just put all of his stuffed animals in there, but there were too many of them!  So I sorted out his puppets and put them in their own basket.  Now what animals were left fit just perfectly.  

This morning, I went in to get Little Bear up and before I could even pick him up, he was pointing to the new box full of lovies sitting next to his crib asking "What's that?".  I helped him out of his crib and he was instantly over to the bin of lovies showing them the proper love they deserved. 

I think he would willingly choose to sleep in that box if we would let him.

I call that $5 and some elbow grease well spent.