Olive's Baby Nursery

It took pretty much the whole 9 months, but JB and I finally finished the baby's room, and I snapped a couple of photographs a few days ago. I am really happy with how it turned out. Almost everything in the room is DIY or upcycled, so we were able to put the room together very inexpensively.

I would have to say that my favorite thing in the room (when the baby isn't in there of course... ha) is my "rocking throne," as I like to refer to it in my head. We picked it up off of craigslist and it has this green-70's fabric on the cushions, so I recovered them in the red, and at that time it also wasn't a rocking chair. So handyman JB went to work and built rockers and attached them to the bottom-- cool, huh? then we painted it white. JB also built the front facing book shelves under the window.

I know it's hard to see the artwork, but there is an ABC embroidery that I made a few months ago, as well as two prints from Persimmon and Pink's Etsy shop. The wall hanging is a vintage gift from my friend Katy-- her great aunt made it and hand appliqued all those pockets for her when she had her first baby!


I sewed the crib skirt and also had an afternoon of paper-mache fun when I made the mobile. We decided that they kind of look like beehives, but I like them anyway ;)

The pictures on this wall are simply pages framed from "The Little Red Hen" which was my favorite children's story when I was little.

And now three weeks...

...she has grown so much already! I promise not to overload my blog with too many photos of Olive for the next 18 years, but for now she is just so new and precious I can't help it :)


See my cute front facing book shelves in my nursery (in the background)? I promise I will post photos of the whole nursery soon.



When JB saw this photo he said, "Excellent!" (Think Montgomery Burns)

Newborn Baby Shoot

When Olive was 5 days old, I had my good friend Megan come over to my home and do a photo shoot. She did a great job! Here are a few of my favorites.

She's Here!

Olive Anne Harris was born on Wednesday of last week. She's 6 lbs 15 oz. and 19 inches long. She is healthy and both her and I are doing great. JB and I are feeling very blessed and overjoyed to have this new little spirit in our lives :)

34 Weeks

I'm starting to feel really pregnant!

baby shoes

I sewed these a few weeks ago. I can't wait 'til we have some little feet to put these on. I'm thirty weeks now so only a little time longer... :)

Tutorial found here.

My Makeshift Family Photo

***UPDATE***
Because I have received many emails regarding this family photo diagram, I am now offering custom design services in my etsy shop. You can find the listing HERE.

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Original Post:

My little brother moved to college this weekend and is starting his first day of college today! He is getting so grown up. I wonder if my mom is shedding a tear or two over her "baby" growing up right now? He would like to think so, but really we aren't that sentimental of a family so I would guess no. Sorry bud!

Anyway, I remember when I moved to college and how awesome I felt to "live on my own." And even better than that? Actually getting MAIL at that new address! So, I decided to send my little bro a quick package to his new apartment. In it I wanted to include a family photo for him to put on his new desk in his new room of his new apartment. However, we haven't had a family photo taken in over two years! Shame on us. The most recent is missing two neices and a nephew, and that just wouldn't do.

I decided to design him a "makeshift" family photo until we get the next one taken. I originally planned on just collaging photos of the family together in a 8x10 frame. However, when I sat down at the computer to make it, I got this genius idea to to a radial diagram of our family with my parents in the middle, their kids (and spouse, where applies) in the first tier, and grandkids in second tier. Then I ran our family name in the blank space so it didn't look so awkward that Ty is the only one without a kid (or one on the way... if you noticed my little 3D ultrasound photo there!). I am very happy with how it turned out and definitely need to print one for me too!

Sneak Peek of our Nursery

Our baby's room is FAR from being completed, especially since we are currently at a stale mate over the wall color. I thought I knew what color I wanted it to be, but after I bought the paint sample and put a portion of it up on the wall, I wasn't so sure... 5 paint samples later, and nothing has changed! In the mean time, I sewed some fabric baskets to go on our changing table. Here is a peek:


I mostly followed a combo of this tutorial from vlijtig, and this tutorial from Pink Penguin (they are really similar). However, all the fabric basket tutorials I found online were much too small for how I wanted to use them, so I made mine way bigger than these two tutorials. Just case you want to make yourself a basket big enough to hold more than two things, I will share my dimensions with you so you don't have to do the math too:

• Top outside fabric: cut two 18x5 inches
• Bottom outside fabric: cut one 18x16 inches
• (After I sewed these together, I laid them on batting and cut out a piece the same size. This is especially important in a basket this big because otherwise it will flop over and not hold its shape.)
• Lining: 18x25 inches
• Straps.... hmm didn't really measure these but probably something like 3.5x6 inches
• (One last note: when you do the box corners, I measured 7 inches across the bag and marked, then sewed it)

Dish Cloths

Here is a quick peek at my 26 week belly:
And a quick note about what I have been up to lately. I have been craving a lot of salty food (and a fair share a sweet things too, but that's beside the point) and so my feet have been swelling up like balloons! That leaves me with the desire to only sit on the couch every night with my feet elevated... and not much to do! We were in bad need of some new dish cloths, though, so I have kept busy by crocheting a whole set of dish cloths:

This is the pattern that I have used on most of them. I like it because it's a really tight pattern without a lot of spaces-- much better for scrubbing! I have enjoyed making these as well because I'm all about instant gratification and there aren't many other crochet projects you can completely finish in one episode of Project Runway!

Craft Hope

Craft Hope just posted their next crafty service project: making Christmas stockings for Tornado Survivors. If you remember, I did a craft hope project at a baby shower I threw earlier this year. We made birthing kits for women in Haiti. It was a big hit at the shower and also felt great to help women that aren't as fortunate to have access to medical care like I do.


I think that this stocking made from vintage fabrics which is on their website is adorable. I also quickly found this roundup of stocking tutorials (and this one too!) on tipjunkie.

Scrap Girls!

Hello!

I am excited to announce that I have started designing digital scrapbooking products for scrap girls.

All my stuff I have deisgned so far can be seen here, but I will post a few of my fave's.






Wow I think I have blogged more this last week than in the last three months combined. Hopefully I can keep it up :)

I never was good with the self portraits

I have a new appreciation for all those bloggers that take pictures of themselves all the time. It is hard! This is the best that I could do. I was talking to my aunt on the phone the other day and she wanted to see a picture of what I look like pregnant. So here I am!
But really. this is the best of like 30 shots I took...

Check Yes!

I don't think I have ever mentioned this on my blog, but one of my clients I do regular design work for is Intermountain Donor Services.

Here are a couple of my favorite things I have designed for them:



As much as I love all the other design work I do, I especially love the work I do for IDS. Designing cute ribbons and hearts to go on scrapbook pages is fun, but I feel like the stuff I do for IDS has more "substance." It educates people and (hopefully) motivates them to become organ donors, and ultimately, save lives.

I have been thinking more about this lately because my Aunt Julie is going in tomorrow to receive a bone marrow transplant as the next step in her battle against leukemia. She is fortunate enough to have a sibling that is a match (my dad, in fact!), and her chance of recovery goes up greatly because of that. Other people aren't as fortunate. So, today as I am thinking of Julie and wishing there was more I could do to help, I figured I could at least blog about organ donation and encourage everyone to check yes and possibly save someone's life in the future.

Just a little something I sewed for...

...the baby girl that I am expecting in November!

We went in last week and had the ultrasound to find out the baby's gender. JB and I are thrilled to start our own little family.

I know this may be silly of me, but I have been waiting to blog that I am expecting a baby until I had something cute to blog with the news. JB was out of town this last week for scout camp, and so I was able to have quite a bit of time to sew, so now I do! I bought the pattern from a relatively new etsy shop from italy that I just discovered: Puperita. It was a little beyond my skill level of sewing, but I learned a lot while making it. I finally had to step back and stop trying to follow the instructions so hard, and just think, "well, if I were just going to figure out how to do this without instructions, how would I do it?" and from there on it was pretty smooth sailing. What does Benny the Jet say in to Smalls in Sandlot? Something about "thinking too much." Yes, that was my problem... I think :)

Just a few things...

First.
I have to tell you how crazy it is to live in Tucson sometimes. I feel like I really live in the WILD west. A while ago I was out in my backyard clipping the dead roses off my bush and I noticed something in the corner of my eye. A BOBCAT was taking a nap on my neighbor's porch! Not that I knew it was a bobcat at first... I had to call JB and have a whisper conversation that went something like this: "JB! There is a large cat like animal on the neighbors porch. Should I be afraid? Do I need to go inside? Will it hurt me? What kind of animal is it?!"


(ps. This is my official apology to my next door neighbors, if you do or will ever read my blog. I am sorry for being a creeper and taking pictures of your back yard. But it was A BOBCAT! I couldn't help it!)

Second.
I have been sewing a ton lately and as soon as I get some pics of myself in the clothes taken, I will show off my cute new shirts I have been whipping out!

Third.
Do you follow Oh Happy Day and did you see her free 7 day trip to Paris giveaway? If not, run over there and enter! It can't hurt, right?

Matchbox Notepad

I have always thought those mini matchbook notepads were so cute, so this week I designed a few for the Silhouette Online Store.

They are fairly simple to assemble but here is a quick tutorial to clear up any questions:

1. Fold outside cover of matchbook notepad along perforations.


2. Insert blank white pages (cut out of regular weight printer paper) under bottom flap and staple. I estimate that around 14 pages is all my stapler could handle, but test it on your own stapler. It could fluctuate based on your paper weight!


3. Fold over the cover and tuck it under the bottom flap, above the staple. It's that simple!

Fabric Flower Brooches

A few weeks ago my friends and I threw a baby shower (I know! Another one! But I think we are done for a while...) for two expecting mothers-- one expecting a girl and one expecting a boy. We played off of "boy vs. girls" for the shower theme, and divided the guests into teams as they arrived.

To divide them into teams, we had them pick a fabric flower pin to wear. Pink to represent the girls team and blue to represent the boys team. The games we played were pretty chill-- actually the whole shower was pretty chill-- my favorite kind! And, as a bonus, the flowers acted as a great favor! I'm all about party favors that will actually be used after the shower.




I basically followed this rolled fabric flower tutorial from My Sparkle with a few changes-- I backed it with felt, glued a safety pin to the felt to use to secure the brooch, and added some fabric leaves!

Teapot for Silhouette

Hey! This week in the Silhouette Online Store, watch for my 3D teapot design. I am including some pictures and instructions on how to assemble it in this post.

1. Cut out all pieces.


2. Fold along perforations. (but i don't fold the ones along the top of the teapot until for ease of assembly.)


3. Use tabs along the length of the teapot body to glue it into a hexagon shape.


This is what it looks like after you glued all the sides together.


4. Use the tiny tabs along the bottom of the teapot to glue the panels together, so that it tapers in.


This is what it looks like when you glue all the bottom panels together.


5. Take the hexagon shape and fold all the tabs, and glue them. Then take the piece and set it in the bottom of the teapot.



6. Fold perforations along the top of the teapot.


7. Use tabs to glue top panels together.


8. Take the little circle and stick it thru the slit on the top of the lid.


9. Turn lid over. Fold and glue the little tabs down to keep the handle in place.


10. Last step! Glue the little tabs on the side of the lid to adjacent panels.