Baby Blanket- Faux Chennile

I found a tutorial at Aesthetic Nest for a faux chenille baby blanket that I fell in love with. I was just waiting for the perfect person to make one for. When my sister announced that she was pregnant, I knew that it was time to make this adorable blanket.

If you do make a faux chenille blanket, do your hands a big favor and buy a chenille cutting tool! It is so worth the money and time!

Alligator Baby Shower

My sister is having a boy this fall! This is their first child, and the entire family is super excited! I have been working on getting her shower together and making a sweet little baby blanket as a gift, that I haven't really thought much about the blog. Thankfully, life is slowing down a bit and I can share with you her alligator baby shower!
My sister-in-law and I made this awesome motorcycle diaper cake- it was very easy to put together, we just followed the tutorial at sweetaprils.com. I couldn't find a large enough alligator to "drive" the motorcycle, so Mr. Lion got the job, and the biggest alligator that I could find got to ride on the back! I think it turned out really cute!

We made a clothesline full of onsies, one for each month of the baby's first year.

We made these individual veggie dip cups, which eliminated any double dipping, unless it was in your own cup!

We had these delicious cake pop's made by a very special friend.

She also made these cute owl favors!

We had so much fun celebrating the newest boy to be added to our family!

Pleated Apron with built in hot pads

I found this apron tutorial on Pinterest a few months ago, and I knew that I wanted to make several of these as Christmas presents this year. I found the tutorial to be very well written and the pictures helped when I was faced with trouble. This is a great project to make! I really liked the built in hot pads, because I am always setting mine down and loosing track of them when I need them!

 A big thanks to my wonderful apron models, Cathy and Megan!

Menu Board

If you are like me, you like lists. You like to know what is going to happen at certain times. Our weekly menu is something that I really like to do. I would faithfully write up our weeks menu plan and invariably, I would loose the piece of paper that I had written the menu plan on. I graduated to putting our menu plan on my blog, but it isn't the most handy of spots for when you are doing seven things at once and your son asks you what we are having for dinner. I came up with our menu board. I took a metal board that I found in the clearance bin at our local craft store, letter stickers, clothes pins and squares of cardboard. After a good 40 minutes of work, this is what I came up with. I really like that the boys and my honey can see what they are going to eat, and it satisfies the list maker in me that I have a list proudly displayed in my kitchen!

What I have been up to . . .

I have been a busy bee! I have been making my first ever rag quilt. It was actually really easy, the hardest part was snipping the seams. That took longer than putting the quilt together. I followed a great tutorial here. I can't wait for my newest nephew to be born so that I can send this out to him!

My Latest Projects

I have been busy sewing these past few weeks. I made this car cozy for a sweet two year old who will be sitting in a car for 2 days. I hope that he will get a few hours of distraction with this! I used this tutorial to make the cozy. Easy directions to follow.

My next project was an eye-spy bag for another busy two year old. She has a serious case of the wiggles! I hope this will give her mama a few minutes to catch her breath! I followed the directions from this tutorial.

And lastly, I made up a couple of  pool bags with new towels for two of the sweetest girls that I know. I hope that they will look nice for them when they get a chance to go to the pool or the lake. One of the best things about these bags is that they are soft and wash great! I followed these great steps from this tutorial to get the job done.

I love love love to make things, but I really enjoy to make things for others. To my dear friends who received these gifts, I hope that you enjoy your time away. No one deserves it more than you all do. I love you ! Mwah!!

School is Out!

This year has been a harder year for us in many ways. Moving 700 miles away in the middle of the school year really disrupted us. However, we persevered and we finished this past Friday. I don't know who is more relieved to be done with this school year, the boys or me? To start off the summer  with a bang, the boys woke up on Friday to this summer stash. I have been stockpiling all sorts of fun summer things. They got a slip-n-slide, mini-lacrosse set, horseshoes, water cannons, glow sticks, marshmallow roasting sticks, water ball slingshots, Crunch-n-Munch, pop rocks and squirt guns. They were so excited! I also left them a note telling how proud I was of them for finishing the school year strong when I know that it was hard for them at times.  The bowl holding the glow sticks and the pop rocks was a fun craft that I did one afternoon. I followed this tutorial and got messy. It took me two bottles of glue, but it turned out really cool. I am going to use it for the fourth of July! Happy Summer! I hope that you get to go out and play in the sun!

Happy Birthday!!

Happy Birthday to my very best friend! I am so thankful for the man that my husband is, and who he is striving to be.

The boys and I made a cake for his birthday dinner. It really turned out neat! It is so easy and has a huge appeal.

A Hobo bag . . . I made it myself!

I found myself at Hancock Fabrics this afternoon. The boys let me have a few minutes this afternoon to browse without complaining. It was awesome! I found the coolest little kit to make a purse. So instead of folding the laundry, I whipped out this little number. It is reversible. I love the black and white floral print. I am going to make more once I figure out how to do different handles. I just love sewing. It makes my heart happy!
I am linking up with Creative Itch who hosts Sew Cute Tuesdays:

Stawberry Freezer Jam

One of my New Year Resolutions this year was to try my hand at canning and preserving fruits and veggies. I thought that I would give it a try with something simple. I searched the Internet and found many people making this very easy freezer jam.

Ball Freezer Jam

4 cups crushed strawberries

1 1/2 cups sugar or Splenda

1 pkg. Instant Fruit Pectin

Combine Pectin and sugar in a small bowl. Add crushed strawberries. Stir for 3 minutes. Ladle jam into clean 8 oz plastic freezer jelly jars. Let it stand for 30 minutes. Freeze for up to one year or in the fridge for up to 3 weeks.

This is my littlest guy who was my helper for this project. Here you can see him helping himself to one of the big fat juicy berries! Grab yourself a helper and give this jam a try!

Car Seat Canopy

One of my very favorite things about being online is the ability to find awesome tutorials on great (frugal) gifts to make. I feel 1000 times better about giving something that I have made. It really makes me happy! I also LOVE to get handmade items as well. I followed this tutorial about how to make a Car Seat Canopy for an infant car seat, but I did make a few adjustments.

I made mine reversible, and I made a way to secure the ribbons on the underside so that the baby doesn't get tangled in them. I am excited at how this turned out, I will be making more in the future!

I am linking this up with A Soft Place to Land who hosts DIY day every Tuesday. I am excited to link up there for my first time!

Baby Gifts- Embellished Onesies and Burp Cloths

I have been busy this week. A very sweet lady is expecting a little girl and I wanted to make her something and was very short on time. So what is any crafty girl to do? Scour the internet for ideas of course!! I kept seeing embellished t-shirts that were awesome and I can't wait to try them out for my boys, but then I thought about those plain white onesies that all babies have a ton of. I thought that it would be great to jazz a few of them up. So I got out my trusty heat bond paper and went to work. I made a flower, hearts, a butterfly, and a shamrock. The flower is my favorite! I can't wait to see the new little girl in her jazzed up onesies!