Baby's Room: Bumper Pad

So I finally got around to making the bumper pad. What a nightmare. I decided to just pick apart our old one and re-cover it. So I ripped apart the whole thing and sewed the new one.... and it was all wrong. So I had to pick it out and start all over again. Awesome. Anyway.... I am pleased with how it turned out.
Such a fun fabric. I love all the bright colors up against the white.

I don't know if I would make one of these again..... maybe.... if I was having a girl and I couldn't find one to match (don't worry... I already have the colors picked out for a girl nursery if I ever have a girl).

Baby's Room: Name

I have about 11 weeks left until baby gets here. I have a few projects I need to get done before baby (because I will NOT be doing any sewing for at least a couple of months after). I love how it looks to put the baby's name above the crib. There are lots of different things you can do with the letters, but I wanted to do something a little bit different. Before we moved, I hit up DI and bought a frame for each letter. I think I ended up spending something like 9 dollars for 7 frames. Super cheap. If you bought them new (and on sale) you would probably spend that much on one 8x10 inch frame. I picked up some white spray paint from home depot and sprayed all the frames. I got rid of the glass and mod podged some scrapbook paper to either the cardboard that was in the frame. I had to cut some new carboard for some of them because they were pretty tattered. I got some letters from Hobby Lobby, painted them, and glued them to the cardboard. Then I attached some ribbon to the back!

I am really happy with how they turned out. I LOVE them. I actually sat in the baby's room for a while and just admired them. haha.... I am weird.

The colors will all make sense when I finish the bumber pad and bed skirt.

Gift Basket

Before we moved I wanted to give my friend a gift for her baby that would be born soon. Since my standard gift is hooded towels because I love them so much and still use them on my almost five year old.... I wanted to give her some too. Instead of just handing them to her (like I normally do) or sticking them in a bag, I ran over to the local thrift store and picked up this basket for a 1.50. Throw in some shampoo, lotion, and a rubber duck...... viola! Super cute. If I had more time I probably would have wrapped it in cellophane and put a big bow on top.... but like I said, this was shortly before we moved.

Mirrors

I had these for extra mirrors and I have had them above our headboard for a long time... but I wanted something with a little more style. So I had my sister help me cut out some vinyl on her cricut with a catridge I had bought. (Mine wouldn't cut the vinyl big enough) The turned out REALLY cute and I am way excited about them.
Now to just finish unpacking and organizing.....

Old Yucky stroller

I bought an umbrella stroller when my first boy was about 1. We were on vacation and didn't want to bring our huge stroller so I just bought when while I was there. I have ALWAYS hated it. I didn't like the color and the canopy was useless... it never blocked the sun. Honestly, I don't know why I ever bought it. I forgot to take a picture of it before but here is the fabric:
I don't know about any of you.... but I really don't like winnie the pooh for my boys for some reason. I love watching winnie the pooh... but I am not a huge fan of Mr. Pooh's paraphernalia. So first I dismantled the stroller. Then I picked all the stitching out so I could trace the ugly fabric.

The whole project turned out to be much easier than I thought it would be. The new fabric is WAY cuter and MUCH sturdier. I am very happy with my new stroller. :) (Minus the useless canopy).

I even picked the straps off the old seat and sewed them on to mine. It still even has the warning label.

I might still make a little bag or something to go on the back..... maybe brown? We'll see. For just the cost of my clearance outdoor canvas fabric, I know have a very stylish stroller that doesn't make me mad every time I look at it.

Talented Friends

One of my good friends told me a long time ago she would paint a picture for me. She recently had her second child and I wasn't going to hold her to it. She invited us over to their house for dinner on sunday and gave me this beautiful oil painting!! I LOVE it! I am very excited to put it up in our new apartment. She is very talented at everything she does, and she is very creative. Go check out her blog.

Baby Bedding

My mom gave me this really cute white wicker dresser for the baby's room. We were just borrowing a crib with our first two boys and I am going to get a white crib to match the dresser. I have been to all of the fabric stores lately brainstorming ideas for the nursery. I finally found the one I want to use.
Isn't it cute? I think it will look really good up against the white crib. I am going to use it for the bumper pad. I would have bought it already, but they didn't have enough at my JoAnn's so I will just wait until we move. If they don't have it there, I can order it online.

Baby Towels

My neighbor is having a baby girl any day now. Since I am having YET ANOTHER BOY... I love making girly things for people that I will never get to use. I know I post a lot about hooded towels, but they are so fun to make and I think they are super useful. I asked my friend what color she preferred for girls and she said purple. I had a lot of fun getting the towels and finding a really girly fabric to go with it.
Here is my little model. Disregard the messy face. :) He is a good sport to help me with this. I usually buy smaller towels for newborns, but my neighbor has a toddler too, so they can use them for both their girls if they want to.

I think this is one of my new favorite ways to make towels.... with just a strip of material on the hood and one down each side on the front.

I get to make some new boy ones for our little boy..... I still have a few months though. :)

Reward Jars

I know aren't the best pictures...... but here are the reward jars my sister and I made for the boys. It has their first and middle initial in vinyl on the front and some cute images on the side.
We found these funny sayings on one of my sister's cricut cartridges....

And my brother-in-law made these holes in the top for me. What a nice touch. They love putting marbles in and getting rewards when it is all full.

The only thing I would do differently is use a smaller jar. It takes them a LONG time to fill these up and they kind of lose motivation. :)

Flower Wall Hanging

I got the idea for this from www.makeit-loveit.com..... as many of my ideas come from her. :) It was fairly simple to make and turned out really cute. I made mine larger than hers so it looks a little different.... but it matches my bedroom great and I love it!

Christmas Presents

In years past I was way better about Christmas. I hardly made anything this year and this sweet present was just sent to it's recipient on Friday.... oops. I also post this with the risk that my sister in law might look here before she gets the package, so Torrie.... if you still want to be surprised, don't look any further. Anyway, this is pretty fun. So I found a really fun thing to do with the Cricut. I cut out the saying that I wanted with freezer paper. You can iron it right on to the fabric you intend to use and use it as a stencil. You then just paint it with fabric paint. So fun, so easy.... and super cute results!

I also made her a a little skirt to go with it. It is the same idea as the Bumble Bee Tutu on a much smaller scale. If I ever have a girl I will definitely make her one! :)

I have been busy okay

So this craft blog and my regular blog have kind of been suffering lately. I have been pretty busy lately and haven't taken out my sewing machine since Halloween. I have completed some cute things that I still need to photograph.... and I recently got the Sure Cuts a Lot software for my Cricut. I have started to do some fun things with that too. In the next couple of days we are going to make Christmas shirts for our family. I got the idea from a lady in my ward. Every year they would make some kind of shirt or sweater and the family would take a picture in them. I don't know if we will do it every year.... but we are going to try it out this year and see how it goes. I need to get my house under control tomorrow and we need to finish them before Christmas Eve. The other problem I have been having lately is my washing machine kind of pooped out (okay... maybe I put a little too many clothes in it) and it won't drain or spin. Lucky for me it belongs to our apartment and the management company has to pay for someone to come out tomorrow and fix it. :) Hopefully they can get the problem resolved quickly. We have a lot of laundry to do and I am running out of underwear.... yikes. I'll keep you posted. :) Merry Christmas!

Wizard Hats

I don't know if you remember the wands I made a while ago... but I promised the boys a more permanent wizard hat than the paper ones we made that day. I finally made them... and they turned out super cute!
I don't know why my little models were hiding behind their wands..... but they were.

I just made a hat out of paper then cut a straight line one side and used that as a pattern. I used two layers of felt so the hat would stay up straight and just sewed it all by hand. It didn't take very long at all.

Bumble Bee Tutu

My sister found the cutest bee wings and antenna at the halloween store. So I volunteered to make her a tutu. I got the idea at http://www.makeit-loveit.com/ and used her tutorial for the fluffy chiffon skirt. I put in a lot more layers and used tool instead of chiffon. It turned out pretty cute though.

She didn't get to wear it for very long because Halloween was kind of weird this year being on a Sunday and all..... But what a sweet costume!

Frilly Apron

My sister and I had a fairy tea party sleep over with my 7 year old niece this last weekend. Poor little thing is surrounded by boys. There are 9 grandsons and only 3 granddaughters on my side of the family. The other 2 girls live in Russia.... so she is seriously surround by boys at every family gathering. She is a really good sport about it all. But my sister and I wanted to do something totally girly for her. So we had a tea party, did her hair, painted our nails, and watched the latest Tinkerbell movie.... super cute by the way. We gave her all sorts of goodies. My sister made her an awesome wand with a butterfly on the top and I made her this:
I LOVE the colors! When I finished I wanted to keep it for myself! I am glad I didn't though. Her face totally lit up when I tied it on her. You can see the table in the background where we sat for our tea party. Isn't that fairy garland my sister made super cute?

Isn't she a cute little girl?! We had a lot of fun at our sleepover and I will miss her when we move away. :(

Here they Are

I am not even going to attempt to describe how I make these. There were a lot of different pieces to each costume and I wouldn't even be able to explain it very well. Here we all are after our ward party tonight.
The boys costumes looked AWESOME! I was very happy with how they turned out.

I think the things I was most proud of were the slip covers for their boots. :)

The little one was running around punching the air all night. What a character!

Obviously parts were made and parts were bought. The underwear I am proud to say was all me!! haha. I guess if we got real desperate for money and couldn't afford any underwear.... I could make them some....haha. :)

Been Busy Lately

I have been really busy with a bunch of different sewing projects. REALLY busy. Here is a little preview of the halloween post to come.....

Baby Girl Towels

I made some hooded towels for my friend who was having a little girl. I have taken pictures to put together a tutorial on how to do the towels. So hopefully I will have that up soon.

Taggie Blanket

My sister wanted a Taggie blanket for her cute little boy so while we were visiting my mom we went to Jo Ann's and picket out fabric and material. My sister has super good taste and chose green and brown. It was the cheapest to buy ribbon by the yard and we only needed 1/2 a yard of each of the ribbon.
So first I pinned the ribbon on the fabric like this.

Then I sewed it into place.

Then I sewed my two pieces of fabric together with the ribbon inside. Turn inside out and Stitch all the way around the edge of the blanket.

I also sewed a piece of crinkly stuff inside so it makes noise when her little boy plays with it. I used a bag from the kirkland wipes from costco. You can do it without the crinkly stuff and it is still so adorable.

So jealous of all this fun baby stuff to make that wasn't around when my big boys were babies. If I ever have another one.... I will have so much fun stuff to make. :)

Superhero Garb

My sister and I had a super hero party for our little boys. It was all of my nieces and nephews that would be attending so of course we had to go all out. I made them all capes. First I just printed out letters (the first letter of each of their names) on Microsoft Word. I think I used tempus Sans and had it set to like 400 font or something. I cut the letters out of felt.Then I sewed them on to a circle.

Then I cut out all of the capes and sewed the circle on.

Sew the two sides together and turn inside out. Add a little Velcro... and viola! They turned out super cute.

We had a couple of babies in attendance... so they got super hero bibs. Basically the same thing, but I added a piece of vinyl on the front and put bias tape around it.

They needed to have masks too right?

I just bought some masquerade masks from Micheal's and glued felt and sequins on the front (with E6000 of course). It all turned out really cute.... and I think I know what my boys will be for Halloween this year. :)