Our Walk

If I have talked to you about what it is like where I live in Virginia, you no doubt heard me complain of the heat, humidity, and my hardwood floors. All three were the bane of my existence this summer. But I knew once the weather cooled a bit, I would have a much rosier outlook on life and my location. And though fall is a bit hesitant to show it's head here, it has definitely cooled off some, allowing me and Morgan to actually go outside during the day and get some much needed exercise. A couple weeks ago, as I was on my walk, I realized how beautiful my little part of town is. My walking route here is probably my favorite out of all the routes I have ever had. So I decided to snap some pics, not only to prove it to you, but also so you can now imagine where I live. I always like to be able to visualize where my friends and family live as they tell me stories of their lives, taking place thousands of miles away. So here ya go:

{Here is Morgan, getting hydrated before our walk. The messy sidewalk is due to a ginormous pecan tree in our front yard that's dropping nuts like it's goin' out a style.}

{This is the bay, which is usually smooth as glass and so beautiful (just not on the day I took this pictures). Across the way is a Nordstrom (I just had to point that out for Jana and Libby- maybe they will come visit me).}

{We live in a real historic area and this part of town they have worked to keep it restored and beautiful. These streets are fun to walk down and read the history plaques they have for many of the houses.}

{These trees, Crepe Myrtles, are everywhere and they are so beautiful. They line the streets and blossom all summer long. Still blossoming.}

{Just a beautiful historic home!}

{Paddle boat ferry which will take you across the bay.}

{Really, just some beautiful homes. This blue one on the corner is one of my favorites.}

Oh, and me and the hard wood floor have come to a begrudging compromise. I will keep the dust off it and not care so much that I can see little grubby footprints all over it.

PS: Remember my friend who makes birdy slings bags? Well, she is having a giveaway for one of her bags. Go to her blog to check out the details, and then go to her website to see all the cute bags (and now tutu's) she has for sale (and notice how she now has a bag named after me. I had to beg).

Nesting?

I may or may not be nesting, but if I am, it isn't the clean up the house kind of nesting. It's the creative energy kind of nesting. I have been doing a lot of sewing and crafts lately. I am not at all prepared for the baby boy (for instance, my sewing area is where his nursery will be and nothing for his room has been set up, NOTHING). I am not super worried, even though I have less than two months. I am not worried but procrastinators don't worry until crunch time.

So here is one of the things I have been doing:

I have been having fun making these little fabric flowers- they are easy, pretty, and have so many uses. The first thing I used them for was making a belt to wear with my black dress. I only have one maternity dress and it is plain black. I get a little sick of wearing it the same way every week, so I made this sash to wear with my dress (and with some other shirts I have) to change it up a little bit. I really love the way it turned out.

(this fuzzy black shirt isn't my Sunday dress, but I wanted to show you what it looked like as a belt)

Here is my attempt at a self-portrait, but I couldn't get a very good picture of the belt. Hopefully you get the idea.

This is me, 32 weeks pregnant. I, of course, chose the most flattering angle as you all don't need to see the full gloriousness of all my weight gain.

These flowers are pretty easy to make. You just need some polyester fabric (I used this pretend-silk fabric, organza, and some tulle). Then you cut little circles, singe the edges with a lighter (polyester fabric curls when it gets burned). Then layer your circles together, sew them together while adding some beads, and presto. These can be used for belts, head bands, bobby pins, or put a safety pin on the back and put them anywhere.

PS: If you want a birdie sling, but have zero desire to make one, I have two friends that make and sell the slings. They even do custom orders- how cool are they!

Funky Threads
Sassy Seamstress

For Lizzie Jane

Okay Lizzy Jane,

It's finished and will soon be on its way to its new home.

Hope you enjoy and welcome to the birdie sling club!

Layers

So I have to go back to this picture, once again. It is evidence that I am, in fact, a bit of a space cadet. No, I am not rehashing the whole I showed up for school a day early debacle. This is something different, that maybe you noticed and were to polite to say anything.

Let me start at the kids doctor's appointment two days ago. I will spare you the details, but it was one of those times when things were so bad that I actually had to step out of the dr.'s office into the hallway to avoid a complete meltdown. Because I was on the verge. I was holding back tears. I was wondering what I was doing being a grown up (in case I am worrying anyone, I was upset because the kiddos were behaving bad, and the drs office was taking forever). So after I had calmed down, and right before I had to pin a screaming and flailing Claire in my arms to give her shots, I was sitting there looking at Claire when I noticed it. Her hair. It look different on one side, like it had been cut. It had been cut. The little stinker, for like the fifth time in her life, cut her hair. But when?

Last week my friend, Amy, asked if Claire had gotten a hair cut. I told her, "no, its just her bangs that are growing out" and just brushed it aside. So while I was sitting there in the doctors office, starting to fume that she once again cut her bangs that were almost long enough to go in a pony tail, I remembered this conversation and realized Claire had been walking around this way, with one side of her hair a good two inches shorter than the other side for over a week and I hadn't noticed. I looked back at her school pictures, taken over a week ago, and sure enough, her hair is butchered. When did this happen??? How did I not notice?? And more importantly, why have I not fixed it yet? Some things we will never know.

Productivity

I don't know if you have noticed, but i have been crazy reading this year. Especially since I moved here to Virginia. I always read more when I am pregnant, because I am tired and need more rest, which equals reading books until I start narrating my actions in my head in the same tone as the book. But this time it has been an obsession. I would say it is more of an addiction. I felt like I couldn't function if I didn't have a book to read. I was addicted to the library, to goodreads, to falling asleep to a chapter and waking in the night with the story still on my mind. I kind of felt like I was in a literary haze.

32 books so far this year.

I decided to take a bit of a break, to slow down with reading and start working on some of the other goals I had made for myself this year. So for the last three weeks, since I returned from my vacation, I have stayed away from the library. During my new free time, I made a quilt for the little baby blue that we are expecting, and I made a tooth fairy pillow for Claire.

Tooth Fairy Pillow: I wanted to try this flower pattern my mom gave me, which I tweaked a little because I apparently don't like to make things exactly like other people do. I also wanted to try the pin-tuck technique. I loved the way it turned out.


(And Laurie, a tooth fairy pillow has a little slot in the back to put the tooth, so it doesn't get lost and the tooth fairy knows exactly where to find it and where to deposit some coinage.)

And here is the quilt I made for baby boy. I really like the way it turned out, with the blanket-stitched stars and border, and the blue ticking fabric on the back. Does it look familiar? I totally knocked it off from Pottery Barn Kids, but added some of my own design. Oh yeah, and I tried quilting it myself- I must stop doing that. I am no good at it. Next time I am sending it to my mom to quilt. She is amazing.

First day of Kindergarten

Ah, the first day of kindergarten. So much anticipation, so much excitement, so many photo ops. The night before, we were trying to hype Claire up on being excited about kindergarten. We had a little ceremony as we packed her lunch box. We carefully went through the list of school supplies and loaded them into her backpack. We set out her clothes. She went to bed with visions of sharpened pencils dancing in her head.

The next morning was a bit more chaotic than we had planned. First off, my alarm didn't go off, so I slept in, but we still had time to get ready. We step outside and it is pouring buckets. The streets were flooded. But we made it on time. Plenty of time. We arrived a day early.

Apparently I didn't pay too much attention to the actual date of the first day of school. So I and about 7 other parents had to take home our disappointed kids, who we had previously hyped up for this big moment. Big let down. Oops.



So today was really Claire's first day of school. Thankfully when we arrived, there was a parking lot full of cars and a classroom full of Claire's future friends. I am so glad to be back on a schedule. It is going to be a great year!