Puff Quilts 2 & 3

After I finished my first puff quilt the day before Easter last spring (so I could give it to my cousin and her baby on Easter), I started a puff quilt for Alex’s cousin who had also just had a baby.  Then came finals, graduation, the bar and recovery from all those things.  And puff quilt #2 sat unfinished.  Then our friends found out that they were having a baby and I decided I wanted to make them a puff quilt too.  Only problem was that puff quilt #2 was still not done and I decided that I couldn’t start another one before I finished the last one.  So I got my butt in gear and started sewing and sewing and sewing.  Puff quilts aren’t hard, they are just really time consuming.  I got Cole’s quilt (#2) done and in the mail the weekend before the shower for Baby J.  So I had a week to get Baby J’s quilt done.  And guess, what, I actually managed to pull it off.  Granted, I did the binding the morning of the shower.  But the point is that is quite the accomplishment for me, the World’s Slowest Sewer.  Here are some pictures of both quilts. The morning of the shower it was rainy and icky so the light was terrible, so the shots of Baby J’s quilt aren’t great.

This is Cole’s quilt:

And here is Baby J’s quilt:

Both of these seemed so much easier than the first one I did.  I messed up the piecing on Baby  J’s quilt, but didn’t have the time or patience to redo it.  I also don’t love the binding on either quilt.  That is something I can’t seem to get right and it frustrates me.  I even tried to do it differently on Baby J’s quilt, but it didn’t work either.  Practice makes perfect, so hopefully I will get a hang of it one of these days.

You may notice that the lion fabric shows up in all three quilts.  I love it, which is probably the ADPi in me.  I also have some trouble cutting the border pieces but they are the same width as the puffs, so one quilt’s messed up border is another quilt’s puffs.  I used two fabrics to bind Baby J’s quilt.  This was sort of planned and sort of not.  I originally wanted to bind it in green fleece.  I think that if I had more time and patience, it would have worked.  As it was, the week I was working on his quilt was also the week I found out that I had passed the bar so I wasn’t home every night.  When I finally got around to binding it a few hours before the shower, the fleece and I weren’t getting along and I didn’t have enough of any one fabric to make new binding so I used two different ones.  I actually like the way it looks and would probably love it if I could figure out how to sew it right.

Now I just need someone to have a baby girl because I am dying to make one of these in girly fabrics!

Monday Musings

0Alex, my parents and I are off in Jefferson City (the MO state capital for those who don’t know) so I can get sworn in.  That means that by dinner time I will officially be able to practice law in the state of Missouri.  I am really excited because this is what I have been working towards for pretty much my entire life.  I'm not sure what exactly my work schedule will be from here on out but I feel so blessed to have a job already. 

Here’s what we are eating this week:

Sunday: in Lee’s Summit with Alex’s family
Monday: BBQ Chicken Baked Potatoes
Tuesday: Slow Cooker Chicken Caesar Sandwiches
Wednesday: Kyle Chicken
Thursday: Bubble Up Enchiladas
Friday: American Royal Barbecue with my Dad
Saturday: Pork Chops

Here’s what I’m working on this week:

I have two wreaths that I started a while ago and need to finish so I can actually used them to decorate.
I know its early but I’m already starting to think about Christmas gifts, so I’m trying to figure out who needs a gift and what I should start making.
I’m also thinking about starting an Etsy shop so I will probably do some thinking/planning about that.

Here’s your inspiration for the week:

Source: yesandyes.org via Courtney on Pinterest

Baby Girl's Football Outfit

I know I already posted today but I wanted to share something related to yesterday's post. In Alex's group of close guy friends there is already one kidlet--you may remember back when I posted about her first birthday outfit. I couldn't let Baby J have all the fun so when I was getting the onesie for his football outfit I picked up a shirt for Baby Girl. But of course she needed something super-girly to go along with it so she got a Kansas City Chiefs tutu to go with her shirt. Personally I think she looks adorable. Now if the Chiefs would stop being terrible we'd be good to go for football season.

Pizza Waffles

When I make things, people seem to think I’m pretty cool.  They don’t really know that pretty much all I do is spend way too much time online (what else am I supposed to do when Alex thinks his video game is plotting against him and that is why he keeps dying?) and then I try, sometime with success and sometimes without, to recreate it.  And now that Pinterest is on the scene, I have all kinds of ideas to copycat.  And now I bring you pizza waffles.

Here is the original pin/link.  You will soon see that hers are a lot prettier than mine:

Source: momommamoney.blogspot.com via Courtney on Pinterest

I should probably also give you another heads up.  My favorite place to go shopping is my parents house.  They have really cool stuff and it is free.  Well more or less free.  They prefer to charge in man hours.  My current payment plan includes stringing pompoms onto string to be used for some project when little kids visit my dad’s museum.  (Note my dad doesn’t actually have a museum.  He just works for a place that does.  Although he has enough stuff he could probably start a museum).  So anyway, stuff there is free.  It’s also a you take what you can get sort of situation.  Why am I rambling on?  Well I though you should know before you see the pictures and start scratching your head and wondering what in the world I am up to that I don’t have a real waffle maker like the one in the picture.  My mom does, but she didn’t give it to me.  Instead she gave me the Mickey and Minnie Mouse waffle maker.  You’ll be glad to know though that it works just as well to make waffle pizzas.  Well, sort of.

This is the waffle maker.  It has some flour on it because prior to taking this picture I was checking to see if my dough was the right size.  The great thing about waffle pizza is that it can be super easy or super fancy, depending on your style.  I’ll let you guess which one mine is.  All you need is pizza dough and your choice of pizza toppings.  I used dough from Trader Joe’s—we had the wheat and the garlic and herb.  Both were good but the garlic and herb was pretty sticky.  I don’t know if it was just my batch or if it is always like that, but if it were that sticky again, I would probably just work some flour into it to make it easier to handle.

Here’s what you do.  Roll your dough out to the size of your waffle maker.  We did separate Minnie and Mickey pizzas because clearly I need to eat Minnie since I am a girl and Alex needs to eat Mickey because he is a boy.  Plus we don’t really like the same food, so I didn’t want to have to eat his.  Put your dough on the waffle maker, top with sauce and your choice of toppings, then put a second piece of dough on top, close that sucker up and let it cook.

 

The amount of time it needs to cook will probably depend on how hot your waffle maker is and how thick your dough and toppings are.  Our only took a few minutes—maybe five or six.  I did flip them halfway though but I also do that when making regular waffles.

In the link above, she says to trim off the extra dough.  I did trim off the parts that were hanging out of the waffle maker but as you can see, there was some around Mickey’s face that got cooked.  If you were going to for cute you could trim this off.  I chose not to because 1) I was starving and 2) I like bread.

One of the best things about this recipe is that you can customize it anyway you can customize pizza, which is pretty much limitless.  They were kind of like calzones, but better in my mind because the dough was more cooked—I hate when you get a calzone and the inside of the dough is still kind of doughy.

Diaper Party Gift

So I don’t know if you know this or not, but the boy version of a baby shower is a diaper party.  For Alex and his friends that pretty much meant what they would normally do on a Sunday afternoon (drink beer and watch football) but they all brought diapers.  I know diapers are practical and all, but they are not very cute nor are they clever.  However, there are a lot of onesies on Pinterest that are cute and clever.  I have a whole board of things that are ideas for gifts for other people’s babies.  You should check it out.  Only thing is that not all of these onesies are appropriate for when Great-Grandma is around.  They are however, appropriate for a diaper party.  I decided that I couldn’t let the boys have all the fun, and little baby J needed his own six pack:

 

I took an empty six pack container and spray painted it blue.  Then I got six bottles from the Dollar Tree (note, you could get real, nice bottles, but the bottles weren’t really the gift, what was inside the bottlers were).  Then I stuffed a custom onesie in each bottle:

These two are my favorites.  Both ideas are from Pinterest, so I can’t take credit.  I did put my own design spin on them though.  I used Sure Cuts A Lot, my Cricut and freezer paper to make the stencils.  (Yes mom, I took these pictures at your house.  I was running a bit behind so Molly helped me get it put together).

These two are painted too.  The brown onesie is from Hobby Lobby.  I couldn’t find solid brown onesies or kids shirts anywhere else.

Just to mix things up a bit, I did some appliques too.  I ironed Heat and Bond to my fabric and cut it out on my Cricut.  Just make sure your mat is really sticky and you cut slowly or it will mess up and you will be frustrated.

Baby J is going to be the best dressed kid on the block, if you ask me.  At least when dad gets him dressed, that is.

Worldly Wednesday

Venice, Italy

I love to travel and have been lucky enough to have visited a lot of amazing places. Every Wednesday I share one picture of the places I’ve been.

Bb is for Baby—A Baby Shower

One of Alex’s best friends and his wife (the best friend’s wife, not Alex’s) is having a baby sometime in the next month.  This past weekend, I helped throw her (the best friend’s wife) and baby Jameson a shower.

 

We hosted it at a local kitchenware shop.  It was a cute place and they did the food and clean up.  Our theme was Bb is for Baby because their last name starts with a B, it is a baby boy and she is an English teacher.  One of the other co-hostesses made this cute sign.

 

 

 

 

My contribution was mostly the decorations.  You already saw the diaper cake and cupcakes.  I also made three centerpieces.  I used one of the diaper cupcakes on each table and then a Dollar Tree vase (vase glued to candlestick) filled with black beans.  I made tissue puffs that are all over the blog world using yellow and black tissue paper (the colors for the day) and stuck them on sticks so they could go in the vases.  They were super cheap but also super cute. 

 

 

 

 

Like I said, the venue provided the food, but to make them it a little more personal, I made cupcake toppers for the mini-cupcakes.  I used cut the circles, B's and bees out with my Cricut.  I ran the B’s and bees though a Xyron sticker maker and stuck them to the circles.  Then I used round white mailing stickers to stick the circles to tooth picks.  They were so easy to make that even Alex could do it (I made him help).

We decorated bibs and onesies for little Baby J to wear once he gets here.  To make it a little less messy, we stuck with pain pens rather than puff paint.

We had super tasty cake pops too that two of the co-hostesses made.  They did red velvet and peanut butter/chocolate.  Super tasty and super cute.  It was a lot of fun throwing a part for the mom-to-be and Baby J.

Monday Musings

I don’t really know how to describe this past week other than that it was a blur.  Between co-hosting a baby shower on Saturday and finding out that I passed the bar I felt like things were always going a mile a minute.  I’ve got good stuff to share this week, so stick around.

Here’s what’s for dinner this week.  We are trying a new thing where I cook Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday and Alex cooks Monday, Wednesday and Friday and then we switch off on Saturdays.

Sunday: Tacos with Alex’s parents

Monday: Sausage Penne

Tuesday: BLT Wraps

Wednesday: Kyle Chicken

Thursday: Bubble Up Enchiladas

Friday: Alex is on his own because I’m going out with the girls

Saturday: Orange Chicken

I’m not planning on starting any new projects this week, just wrapping up some that have been sitting half finished for far too long.  We rearranged the furniture in our living/dining space so I’m going to be tweaking that until it is just right.

And finally, here’s a little inspiration to get you though the week:

Source: whenigrowupcoach.com via Courtney on Pinterest

Monday Musings

Do you ever get so excited about something that you take on a little too much and realize that you may have over committed yourself?  But you are so excited that you can't decide what to cut out?  Yeah, that's me with the baby shower this week.  So I'm going to be a busy little bee over the next few days.  And then there's the whole tomorrow-is-the-most-important-day-of-my-life-because-bar-results-come-out thing.  So yeah, its going to be an interesting week.

I don't have a menu for this week yet.  We're trying something new where we are going to switch off making dinner.  My days are Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and every other Saturday.


That's all I've got for now, but here's a little inspiration to get you through the week:

Source: google.com via Courtney on Pinterest

Displaying Alex's Mic-O-Say Beads

My opinion on collectables/sentimental items is that you should either display them or they don't really mean that much to you so you should get rid of them.  And if you are going to bother to display them, you should do so in a nice way that will preserve them.  Boy Scouts was a big part of Alex's life when he was younger.   In the Kansas City area, there is a unique aspect to Boy Scouts called Mic-O-Say.  Once you become part of Mic-O-Say, you get to wear beads and claws around your neck.  The different beads symbolize different things as do the different colors of paint on the claws.  Alex was so involved in Boy Scouts for so long that he has a whole bunch of sets of beads.  Since it was such an important part of his life, I wanted to be able to display them, so I did.

I got a shadow box from Michael's and put batting and fabric on the back.  Then I used fishing line to sew each set onto the fabric.  It's not perfect, but it's much nicer than having them hang on a bulletin board in our bedroom.

Worldly Wednesday

Cinque Terre, Italy

I love to travel and have been lucky enough to have visited a lot of amazing places.  Every Wednesday I share one picture of the places I’ve been.

Diaper Cake

I’m helping to host a baby shower for a good friend weekend after next and I’m making a lot of the decorations.  Of course, a must for any baby shower is a diaper cake.  I've been wanting to make one of these for a long time, so I was super excited when I was asked to help with the shower.  The theme is Bb is for Baby and we are doing a yellow and black color scheme.  The Bb theme is perfect because 1) they are having a Boy, 2) their last name starts with B and 3) she is an English teacher and loves to read so it is fun to incorporate little elements like that.  Instead of doing one big post on everything, I wanted to break it down into the elements, but I will be sure to share pictures of the whole shower after the party.

On to today’s main event:

I used two packages of the Target brand diapers—they have these cute blue and green polka dots on them.  I don’t have children so I have no idea if they are quality diapers or not.  I started by just rolling the diapers up and using a piece of tape to make them stay—a great football game activity.  Then I got started with the actual construction.  I did a bit of Googling and Pinteresting before getting started to figure out what would be easiest for me.  I eventually decided to start here:

Empty paper towel roll and cardboard cake base.  You could cut your own circle out of scrap cardboard but I opted to buy mine so it would look nice.  I’m terrible at cutting cardboard.  Then I glued the tube in the middle of the circle like so:

Just use a little hot glue and make sure it is more or less centered.  Now it is time to add the diapers.  This is a point where it might be nice to have an extra set of hands, but you can certainly do it on your own, like I did.  I started by putting a rubber band around the tube then filled in between the rubber band and tube with diapers. 

Start by just doing one row to make it easier on yourself.  This way diapers aren’t falling all over the place.  After you do the inner row, work your way out.

My bottom layer had three rows so my middle layer could have two and my top one.  After you get the bottom done, repeat with the middle.

Once the middle layer is done, stick a diaper in the top of the tube so that it will be level with the top layer of diapers.  This way you have a nice looking top and not an empty tube.  I didn’t take a picture of the complete cake without the embellishments.  This is where you can really let your imagination fly.  People use fabric, paper, ribbon, baby stuff, toys, just about anything you can imagine.  I wanted to keep mine budget friendly (this isn’t my gift so I didn’t want to buy a bunch of stuff) so I used fabric.  I find it to be more forgiving than paper even if it is a little more work.

Hobby Lobby as this cute bee fabric and I knew I wanted that to be a part of it.  I didn’t want solid black so I went for black with white polka dots.  And I got some black jumbo rickrack to top it off.

The top is my favorite.  I sewed the black fabric into a tube then ironed it flat.  I took a piece of the yellow fabric and added heat and bond.  Then I cut out the B’s on my Cricut and ironed them on.  On all of the layers, I attached the fabric by pinning the ends together then added a few more pins around to keep it up.

The middle layer is a tube of the yellow fabric with the black ric rack down the middle.  I hid the straight pins under the ric rack to make it look a little nicer.

The bottom layer it two tubes of fabric sewn together.  I love how it all looks together—sophisticated yet fun. 

I had some diapers and fabric left over, so I decided to make some diaper cupcakes too.

Instead of rolling the diapers, I used a spiral method on these.  Just Google diaper cakes and you’ll find someone who can explain how to do it.  This method allowed me to push the centers up a little to make them look like cupcakes.