Goodbye 2010 and Hello 2011

As I sit here tonight pondering the events of 2010, I am grateful for all of life's changes this year. We welcomed our newest(and last baby) into our family while at the same time grieving the year anniversary of my dad's passing. Life and death, you can't have one without the other, one brings so much joy and the other so much pain and sorrow. I hope that my little guy, Tristan David will grow up to be as great a man as his namesake, Grandpa David. And I find myself hoping all of the time, that like the song, there are holes in the floor of Heaven and my daddy is looking down on all of his kids and grandbabies, grinning ear to ear as he watches over them. I try not to take my loved ones for granted and let them know how much I love them on a weekly if not daily basis. My #1 goal this year, LOVE more and LAUGH often with my family.

I know that I have not been a great blogger lately, I am sorry for that. My #2 goal this year is to blog more often. I still find the time to sew, but haven't found the time to blog about my sewing. Tristan is still very fussy, colic is not our friend right now. He is right over 4 months, so I am praying that time does heal all wounds and he grows out of the pain he is in now. Thankfully he does great at night time, so I am able to sleep, a really sanity saver! I have so many projects that I am working on, so many new fabrics and ideas! I can't wait to share them in 2011!

And my #3 goal this year, lose the rest of my weight and stay healthy! I do not want to be a stick, but I do want to live long enough to see my great grand children one day! I know that means that my diet needs to get even better! My walking trail needs to get longer too! I am down 50 lbs of prebirth weight, yes I was fluffy before becoming pregnant! 30 more and I will be doing the happy dance!! I know that I can do it, I just have to give myself a big push for the New Year!

And now I am off to watch the Rockin' New Years show with my 7 yr old, Noah. He is super excited about bringing in the New year, he has yet to stay up for one! But this year he says is his year!

I hope that everyone has a very blessed New Year full of family and good friends! Lots of sewing too!

And because I can't resist here is Tristan at 4 months. He is wearing an AI2 that I made him from the mosaic moon diaper pattern(I will post more soon), love this one. Love the PUL print that I bought off of etsy too, I wish I had more! Oh and the beanie I crocheted him before he was born. He is my blue eyed chunk of love! Happy New Year everyone!

Girly Sewing! Oh and Santa too!

Every great once and a while, I love to take a detour and sew something with a girly fabric. This owl knit happens to be one of my favorite fabrics right now! So much so, that I have contemplated making me a tee out of it, but my kids would not approve! I opted not to sew for me, and instead made a sack gown and romper for the shop.

http://www.etsy.com/listing/61723054/floral-owl-baby-sack-gown-set-newborn-to


http://www.etsy.com/listing/61759322/floral-owl-baby-romper-newborn-girl

And then I just had to get a little boy sewing in there somewhere, so I finished up a pair of fleece longies that I had embroidered the other day. Love this candy cane stripe fabric!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/61758679/santa-claus-fleece-longies-6-to-9-months

And now I am off to bed, where I should have been hours ago! Why is it, that when the little one sleeps, I can find a million and one things to do instead of sleep too??Good Night!!

Sweet Sack Gowns Added to the Store!

Tristan has way too many clothes and way too many gowns. These were all made for my sweet baby boy, but never worn. If you want one grab them quick, they usually sell within 24 hours of posting them!

I hope to have a girly one to add to the store later today

Surf Sack Gown and Hat

http://www.etsy.com/listing/61688114/surf-baby-sack-gown-newborn-to-6-months

Owl Sack Gown and Hat

http://www.etsy.com/listing/61689089/owl-baby-sack-gown-newborn-to-6-months

Ooga Boog Sack Gown and Hat

http://www.etsy.com/listing/61688631/ooga-booga-sack-gown-newborn-to-6-months

Now I am off to put Tristan down for a morning nap and hopefully get some sewing done! I hope everyone has a great weekend!!

12 Weeks Old and Loving it!

I haven't posted much lately. Seems like I either have a few minutes to sew or to blog and I have been choosing sewing. My baby boy turned 12 weeks yesterday. He has outgrown almost everything that I had made. Weighing in a little over 12 lbs now, he has more than doubled his birth weight. He is our little chunk of love!

I have slowly began sewing a Small size diaper stash, but I am finding that I am not happy with what I have sewn so far. I LOVE the minky diapers that I made, but the Ladida Smalls are really getting too small already! The Darling Diaper smalls however, fit about perfect with room to grow. Makes me seriously consider doing one size diapers the next go around.

My new love, fitting in great with the Fall weather we are having, anti pill fleece longies. So much fun to make and they work great over fitted diapers. I have sewn up a few for Tristan and added some to my etsy shop too. Just in time for Thanksgiving, I have some adorable Turkeys reading to go out the door and to your little ones bum! Link to my etsy is on the left! I have 3 gowns to put into the shop too. Tristan never wore all the ones I made, I think I have an owl, an ooga and a surf sack! Those will go in tonight or tomorrow!

I am also in the middle of reorganizing my pattern collection. Well my tracings mostlly. I was not happy with the way they were stored, so I have a new idea in the works. Just need a few hours of uninterrupted peace to make it happen(yeah right!, like that is going to happen!)

At night time I have been going through all of my ottobre magazines and writing down the baby patterns from each issue. I have made quite the list! Much nicer to reference when I am looking for a certain style without having to flip through magazine after magazine. I will type it up and add it to the blog when I have finished it. Maybe someone else will find it useful.

Here is the first fall outfit that I sewed up for Tristan. My friend from Australia sent me sleeves that had been removed from a tee. They were just big enough to get little sleeves out of a sz 62 ottobre tee! Yeah!! Love this and found cool koi embroideries at DK. The jeans were self drafted going by baby boy's measurments.

And here is a picture of baby boy in his skunk costume this Halloween, very unhappy little skunk! His sister is the ladybug in the middle. I would love to say that I made this, but truthfully it was purchased at it goodwill, brand new for 3.99, can't beat that! Thanks goodness too, because he wore it all of 30 minutes before we took it off.

Happy Halloween

I know that I usually only post sewing for my baby boy, but I couldn't resist showing you my other baby boy's costume.

Noah my 7 yr old desperately wanted to be a Britsh Red Coat Soldier from the Revolutionary War. I searched for a pattern, but after not finding one just winged it. The coat is based loosely from an ottobre jacket, the vest ottobre, and the knickers were a jogging pants pattern from ottobre. I looked online for a while and finally decided just to do our own version. Probably not historically correct, but close enough for my little history buff! Added a couple of bags with long handles to form the X and some boot covers that I hope no one looks too closely at!!

I hope everyone has a safe and Happy Halloween!! All treats no tricks!!

Fall Festival....16 Yrs Later

Today was the McIntosh 1890's Fall Festival. My mom, her sister and me would go every year when I was a young girl. Rows and rows of booths set up with so many wonderful crafts! At the age of 19, I took my 1st born. Over the years, it seems that many things have changed. Cross stitch used to be the big thing way back when and now it seems that jewelry and purses may have taken over! For my 7 yr old the rubber band gun booth was a big hit. Gone is the day that a rubber band gun was operated by a clothes pin! Now there are fancy mechanisms that allow you to shoot 7 or 8 without reloading! And instead of one style there were at least a dozen to choose from.

But one thing hasn't changed.

My baby boy wore the same patchwork vest that I had made for his brother to wear to the festival 16 years ago. Dustin was about 9 months when he went and WAY chunkier than Tristan, so I added a little elastic to the back of the vest for a better fit. I also decided that Tristan needed a new pair of jeans to go with the vest and at 7 AM this morning, I thought an embroidered tee was in order for the day too!

So after all the preparation, all the sweat, Tristan slept the whole time and I didn't get one pic at the festival!! What a bummer!

I did take some pics this afternoon at home. Hopefully next week we will visit the pumpkin patch and Tristan will stay awake long enough for some pictures then.

Oh and here is a pic of my now 16 yr old a weekend or so ago. It was his first Homecoming Dance and his first dance taking a girlfriend. Hold on to the memories mommas because they grow so fast!! My chunky little baby is now 6 ft tall and has lost his chunk!

2 Months Old!!

I can't believe Monday was 2 months since baby boy came into the world. Time sure flies when you are busy with 4 kids!! I haven't been able to sew near as much as I did before baby, but when time permits I am still sneaking into my studio.

Tristan has been extremely colic-y the last month or so. If you have had a baby with colic you know that it is no fun. It's so hard to see your baby scream and know that you can't do anything to help them.

My mom found a pediactric study done on infants with colic using probiotics. The study found that it helped with the symptoms of colic. So we decided to give it a try. We purchased a box of the probiotics at Target and I have been giving him the powder in breastmilk this week, once a day. I am so hopeful! In the last 3 days, we have had no signs of colic, during any period of the day. Keeping my fingers crossed that this is a cure for us. Here is the study if you would like to read up on it.

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/119/1/e124

I did manage to sew 2 tie dye diapers up this week when I should have been sleeping. I guess mommas always find time somewhere! This was a tee that my 16 yr old wore and now Tristan has 2 diapers from it. I plan on making an appliqued tee later on this weekend. The diapers were knit outer, hidden layer of PUL, hidden bamboo fleece and the inner was microterry. Oh, these are so soft and squishy! They work great too! We went 3.5 hrs yesterday with no signs of leakage or wicking, yeah!!

The tee is a onesie that I freezer paper stenciled before Tristan was born. I cut it off and hemmed it this week so he could wear it with diapers. I used acrylics and next time I will buy the fabric paint. The acrylics tend to fade even after just 1 wash, lesson learned!

Another freezer paper stencil tee and the end of a big smile!

This is a set that I have shown before. Safari tee and plaid shorts, both otto, about a sz 56 I think. The shorts were the ahoy ones and the tee was the sign tee, heavily modified because it runs huge.

Oh and here is a sleepy time pic of Tristan in the first gown that I made him. I love this one! I do still have the plans of turning the sleep sacks into a PDF, I just don't seem to be able to get the pattern sized right for printing out. One day soon hopefully!

Off to sew something up while Tristan is sleeping! Happy sewing mamas!