Thanksgiving clothes

So, I'm a little behind on posting. I started off thinking I needed to make some embroidered shirts/outfits for my kids for Thanksgiving. Before I started making them I decided my niece and nephew needed shirts/outfits too. I don't recall exactly when I started, but it was just a few days before Thanksgiving when I had the time. First I made shirts (onesie for my daughter) for each of the kids (4 total) and then moved on to make skirts for the girls and then finished a dress I cut out for my daughter before I ever started the Thanksgiving stuff. Silly me forgot to get a picture of the skirt I made for my niece (I REALLY wish I got a picture because it would have been a good sample for my website!!). I'll have to check with my Mom to see if she got a good picture of my niece wearing it. The girls also had bows for their hair. The kids all looked so cute in their outfits (my daughter wore the dress the day after Thanksgiving). I do know my Mom got pictures of all the kids sitting on the stairs in their outfits, but they won't show the skirt well. Oh well, bad me!! :-) Please excuse the wrinkles in the skirt and dress (they just got washed today and I just took pictures, so they aren't ironed).

Fabric Flowers

Today has not been extremely productive on the sewing end for me, but I did get a bunch of laundry and cleaning done (not all done, but lots accomplished). I did attempt my first fabric flowers and fabric covered buttons. I spent a good part of yesterday making felt covered barrettes for my daughter and niece (mostly for my niece since my daughter doesn't always keep them in her hair). I want to make a barrette/bow holder she can hang up somewhere in her room and for Christmas she will receive it filled with some bows and felt covered barrettes (amongst other things.... I tend to go a little crazy on handmade gifts for the kids). You will notice a lot of the barrettes are blue because she has to wear a uniform to school and they are blue and white.

Doll Coats

On Friday I was at Joann's looking at fabric for Christmas presents when a lady walks up to me looking for somebody to make 4 doll coats by today. She said she had asked the ladies at the counter and they weren't any help. She wanted to know if I sewed or if knew anybody she could pay to make the coats. I handed her my business card and told her I could make them. We then headed to the pattern section to pick out a pattern. She had been looking at a bunch and showed them to me. She wanted one that could be buttoned and had a hood, so we ended up going with the pattern she wanted because it had several options for me to play with. I continued my shopping and she went to pick out the buttons, have the fabric cut and then went and bought all the supplies. She handed everything off to me as I stood in line to make my purchase. I headed home and looked at the pattern more closely and realized we didn't get any satin fabric for the lining. I knew I had some in my stash, so called her and told her it would cost a couple extra dollars a coat for the lining. No problem!! Friday night I did a test run and realized I needed to use a different view on the pattern. I also realized I HATE working with FUR!!! Never again will I take on a paid project using fur. I thought I could sew all the coats up in about 4 hours and to my surprise it probably took 10!!! In-laws were visiting over the weekend, so I didn't get to start on her coats until Monday, but they were finished on Tuesday and she picked them up today. Hopefully this will lead to more orders from my new customer!!!!

9 Patch Quilt Blocks

For Christmas I'm going to make my younger brother some pillows for his new couch. His couch is a sage green and I'm waiting for pictures to see if I have some fabric that will work with his couch. While shopping at Joann's (one of my favorite stores!!) on Saturday and I looked for some fabrics that might work for his pillows. I will see him Thanksgiving and plan to send some scraps home with him so he can see if any of them work. As I was picking them out I was noticing how well they all go together. Then the other day I came across directions for 9 patch quilt blocks (http://allsorts.typepad.com/allsorts/2006/10/crazy_about_qui.html) and thought it was the perfect quilt block to make a quilt for my brother. Now I'm really hoping one of the fabrics I picked will work for his pillows, but if not, I have started a quilt to sell. Here are my first 9 quilt blocks....

Trick-or-treating #1

Yesterday was trick-or-treating at my husband's office. He's out of town, but we thought it would still be nice to take the kids. I was hoping to see some of our friends, but no luck. There were a lot of people and either they weren't there or we just missed them. The kids had fun anyway and came home with way too much candy!! Trick-or-treating #2 on Friday...

My son didn't like have something over his face, so had to make a separate hood so he wouldn't throw a fit while walking around. He wouldn't put the hood on until we got home and I asked him to put it on for pictures.

Big Girl!

My little girl is now 19 months and on her way to being potty trained. We have a ways to go, but she has got pee pee on the potty countless time and poo poo on the potty twice. Today she, in her own way, told me she had to go. She had already pooped in her diaper some, but when I went to put a new diaper on she didn't want it on, which is a sign she wants to sit on the potty. So, onto the potty and she went more in the potty! I'm so proud of her!! I have visions of being done with diapers by the time she is two!!

It's been a while...

Wow, has it really been over a month since my last post???? It's been crazy busy these past couple months and I've been bad about blogging!! Last Saturday (Oct. 18) I did a craft show, first one in 2 years. I spent a lot of time sewing to bring a variety of products to the craft show. I didn't get as many things done as hoped, but if you saw my list you would know why!! I really hoped I would sell a lot! I sold some and got a custom order for one of my tag blankets and handed out a LOT of business cards. Although I didn't make a lot, I consider it a success since I made more than I spent to participate and it gets my name out. My goal this next year is to find more places to advertise, participate in more craft shows and make more than just a few hundred dollars for the year. Before I start doing a lot with advertising I really need to get my website up to date. My computer keeps freezing up on me when I'm on the internet, so I'm waiting for hubby to rebuild it and get a second laptop set up exclusively for embroidery. He just left a little while ago to go a a business trip and arrives home early Friday morning (probably around 2 AM). He said he would try to work on it Friday, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed!! Until then, I need to get my messy craft room back in order, complete the order for the tag blanket (which didn't get done this past week due to visiting with family), start sewing for Christmas and maybe get some other projects started/finished.

Below are some pictures from the craft show. I didn't have a lot of space (one table)...had lots of stuff to show, so I had to be creative. With the help of my wonderful friend, Paula, I was able to get a clothes line up with some clothes and blankets hanging from it. I also got an idea from somebody on the Sew Forum to build a rack out of pegboard and was able to hang a lot of my clothes on it. Next time I will have the rack painted so it looks prettier!!

Laundry

Have I ever mentioned how much I HATE doing laundry!! I really thought once we moved I wouldn't mind it so much since we would have an actual laundry room instead of a laundry closet, but I was wrong. I dread laundry day every week and some weeks I just pass. I caught laundry up (at least the washing part) before my husband went on a business trip last week, but never got around to folding it all or putting it all away. Well, yesterday I decided it was time to do laundry again, so finished up folding and putting away the laundry from a week and a half or two weeks ago and started all over again. I started yesterday and continue today. One basket has been folded and put away, but there are three more clean baskets ready to be folded and put away. The fun never ends!!

Baby Burps...

I've been spending many hours working on making products for the craft show in October. Tonight I've been cutting out lots of sets (bibs, burps and tag blankets). The other night I tried out some new burps. I usually make contoured burp cloths, which I've gotten good feedback on. I've seen a lot of diaper burps and know many people like them, so thought I would make a few up for the craft show. I also wanted to make another version of burps, similar to the diaper burps, but made with all flannel. Here are a couple burps I finished the other night. What do you think?

Hubby's coming home...

My husband has been gone since Sunday afternoon on a business trip in Las Vegas. I wasn't looking forward to this week, but I have to say it hasn't been bad at all. Tonight was probably the worst with the kids acting up a little after naps and continuing until they went to bed, but I definitely have had worse days. We had a nice routine this week.... get up, grab some breakfast on the go (cheerios and raisins are a great on the go breakfast!!), go for a walk, let the kids play outside, have lunch, naps and then play more or run errands, have dinner and off to bed. Not a bad schedule and it worked great and kept me from getting stressed with the kids. Hubby flew out of Las Vegas about 9:15 this evening (Thursday) and should be home very soon. Missed him a lot and glad he is coming home, but sometimes it's nice to have my evenings to sew and do whatever I want without any distractions!! Friday will be nice with him home and giving me some relief from the kids!! Woohoo!!

Sunday's project

A while back I bought some chalkboard embroidery designs from Sewing For Sarah Embroidery (http://www.sewingforsarahembroidery.com/), but never got around to buying the chalkboard fabric. It's not an easy fabric to find around town and I could buy it online, but it costs at least $10 a yard online plus shipping. That was not an option for me, so I called Hancock's Fabric yesterday to find out if they had any in stock. Hancock's is about 25 minutes from our house, so it's not someplace I go often. It turns out, the fabric was $6.99 a yard minus 30%. Lucky me got two yards for less than it would cost me online for one yard. It is going to be discontinued at Hancock's, but I'm not too worried since it was listed as discontinued since 2007 and they still have a bunch left.

Sunday afternoon I started playing around with ideas and came up with a coloring/chalk tote for each of my kids. Only my daughter's is done, but will finish up my son's tonight, hopefully. After I got it together I realized it needs some stabilizer. So, need to open up the ends, add a piece of stabilizer and sew it back up, add handles and some Velcro to keep it closed.

The tote has two pockets on the inside for coloring books, paper, etc. and 28 crayon/colored pencils/etc. spots. The outside has a 6 slots for chalk/crayons, two chalkboards to draw on and a tic-tac-toe chalkboard. The font is Dunno. What do you think?

Walking update

So, last week the front wheel on my stroller/bike trailer broke off. I got frustrated and did nothing with it the rest of the week. I'm really determined to get back to walking and exercising, so this morning I took the kids outside to play and spent some time looking for the instructions and figuring out what I needed to do to fix it. There is a plastic piece screwed into the metal bar coming out from the trailer. The plastic piece is broker at each of the screws, but I was able to get it back on tight enough to keep it in place. While figuring this out I called the company who made it and I have a new plastic piece being shipped to me. They were very nice on the phone and didn't give me a hard time at all. Should have the piece in the mail within 3 to 5 business days. I plan on keeping the broken one on until it comes off again, but at least I will have a brand new piece to replace it. We went for a nice long walk and the weather was awesome, perfect for walking.... about 65 degrees!!

Indianapolis Colts Dress

A couple nights ago I started a Indianapolis Colts dress for my daughter. I didn't finish it that night because I wanted to figure out how to use my serger and serge the seams. Yesterday I figured out my serger and today I finished the dress. It turned out bigger than anticipated, so now the decision is do I keep it or sell it at the craft fair I am participating in in October. Please ignore the awful look on my daughter's face (she won't stand still for a picture) and the mess behind her. I only included the picture of her wearing the dress to show how big it is on her.

Serging....

I've had a serger for several years, but never had any success sewing with it. Pulled it out once a couple years ago and no matter what I did, the stitching never worked. Lately I've been thinking that it would be nice if I could figure out how the darn thing works so I could use it to finish off the insides of clothing. Well, today was a success!! YIPPEE!! I haven't gotten much done today except for figuring out how the serger works, but I'm OK with that. I started a Colts dress for my little 17 month old last night, but wanted to finish it off right. Thanks to a kind person on SewForum who told me where to find the manual (I lost mine and without it I was clueless what each dial adjusted). Once I found the manual and read through a bunch of it, it all made sense. I'm guessing a couple years ago when I tried to get it to work I didn't have the manual either (or maybe my brain just wasn't working that day). Take a look at my nice seams!! They aren't perfect and may need a little more adjusting, but I'm excited!!

Play Oven Mitt & Potholder

Yesterday's project was to get some play oven mitts and potholders made up. Well, I got some done, but not nearly as many as I hoped. Hopefully today I will get a lot more sewing done! Soon to be added to http://www.littledarlingdesigns.com/.

Walking...

A few weeks ago I decided it was time to get out walking each morning. My goal was to walk every morning during the week (Monday through Friday). The first week went great and I made it out 4 mornings (started on a Tuesday). Last week was not so great, only made it out 2 days. So, this morning I was determined to start the week off right and we went out for a walk at 10:30 this morning. I love when the weather starts off cool in the morning (it was in the low 70s this morning). The walk went great and we were almost home and the front wheel broke off my stroller! Talk about frustration. Had the push the kids the rest of the way home with them tilted back. Tried to figure out how to get the wheel back on, but no luck so far. Hopefully we can come up with a good fix until I can get a replacement part from the company. Only had the bike trailer/stroller for a couple months, so I'm very disappointed!!

Crayon rolls..

I decided last week that I am going to participate in a craft fair in October. I did the same fair a couple years ago when I was pregnant with my daughter and passed on it last year. Trying to find some ways to bring in some extra money to help out with the bills since we currently have two house payments! This weekend I started making products to sell at the craft fair and also to put some more things on my website, http://www.littledarlingdesigns.com/. Yesterday I made a bunch of crayon rolls. These are a medium size crayon roll, holds 9 crayons. I also have a larger crayon roll that holds 12 or 13 crayons, which I will get made up sometime soon. I also plan on making some more of the 9 crayon rolls in some Colts material. These are done, except for a small hole I need to stitch on the bottom. Today I think I will start making some apron/play mitt sets and some purses.

We have grass...

Actually, we have some grass. It's not perfect and will need some reseeding, but it actually looks like a lawn now. This was the first weekend my hubby had to mow the entire lawn! The first picture is the backyard (both taken through the screen) and the second is the front yard. Definitely need to reseed this fall. Hoping for some really nice grass in the spring!!

Finally....

The other day I attempted to embroider a shirt for my friend. The first attempt was not successful (at least I wasn't happy with it). I searched for a new shirt, but no luck! So, I spent a bunch of time tearing out all the stitches so I could attempt to embroider the shirt again. It you haven't done this before, it is very time consuming, but I was trying to save the shirt. Second attempt was much better, but the embroidery was not exactly over the first embroidery area. I wanted to make sure it would wash up well and wouldn't leave a bunch of holes in the shirt, so this morning I threw it in the washer. Before washing it, though, I notice a piece of thread on the shirt had been cut, so I put a little FrayBlock on the areas where the previous stitches showed. Little did I know, FrayBlock discolors a red shirt. UGGHHHH!! Luckily my friend was ok with me using on of the long sleeve shirts I had in stock to try again. Thankfully, this attempt was a success and the shirt is ready to be delivered or picked up!! WOOHOO!! Now, to begin sewing for the craft fair October 18th!

My 3 year old love his Grammy!

My son, who is 3, loves talking on the phone to his grandparents! Almost every day he asks to talk to either my husband's parents or mine. Today it was Grammy's turn. We were heading downstairs to fix lunch and my son says he wants to talk to Grammy and Poppy. Poppy is working, so he can't talk to him, but Grammy is retired and is home during the day now. I tell him he can talk to Grammy while I fix lunch. He talks and talks and talks, and then he hits his mouth on the kitchen chair and his lip starts bleeding and he has to get off (plus it was time to eat). Later he says he needed to talk to Grammy more, he wasn't done talking to her. I called later when I actually had time to talk and he talked to her some more. At some point he put the phone down, so I picked it back up and finished my conversation, then quickly finished up the conversation after hubby called to tell me he was almost home and needed help getting stuff out of the car in the rain. A few minutes later my son said he needed to talk to Grammy again because he was finished talking to her. I guess we are lucky we all have AT&T cell plans and can talk for free!! Gotta love free mobile to mobile calls!!

Embroidery...

About a week ago my friend asked me to embroider a t-shirt for a birthday present. No problem, except even with the help of people on SewForum I couldn't find the exact font she wanted. She said to find the best match and go with it. Great! So, I get some letters digitized from somebody on the forum, but I decided none of the letters were close enough to the one she wanted. Did I mention she was fine with one of them! :-) Anyway, today I decide I'm going to do some more looking and find a font that is probably as close as I'm going to find without going through thousands of fonts or knowing the font name (http://www.webpagepublicity.com/free-fonts-d.html#Free%20Fonts). She and I were chatting through Skype while I was working on this and she agreed some of the ones I found were good matches. I ended up using blueberry foxhound. Did a test stitch out, which stitches out great. Send her a photo of the stitch out and she agrees it looks good. So, tonight I stitch it out on the shirt and what do you know, I'm not happy with the stitch out!! I sat there the entire time, but the thread shredded a couple or three times and I stopped, rethreaded, backed up a few stitches and started up again. One of the problems was at one point one strand of the thread snapped, but I didn't realize it until many, many stitches later and it just didn't look right compared to the rest. Tried to fix it, but still not happy! All I can say is knit is tricky to stitch on and I probably should have used a different stabilizer (although I did use the ones I always use!). Now I just hope I can find a new red t-shirt to try it again!!

Computer....

I've started to type up a new blog several times in the last few days and end up quitting when my computer freezes up. When I'm on the internet these days my computer likes to freeze, more like my internet freezes and I can't do anything until I can get it to close out. This often times takes forever, the reason for not posting the past few days!! Gotta LOVE computers!!

Itty Bitty Dress success

Last night I made my second Itty Bitty Dress from http://www.madebyrae.blogspot.com/. I made some additional adjustments to the pattern and walla dress number two fits my daughter. It is such an easy pattern and really doesn't take that long to make, so I expect I will be making many more!! Still need the tweak the pattern a little more so the straps aren't falling on her shoulders. Also plan on shortening the next one some so she isn't having problems going up the stairs. At almost 17 months my daughter is always on the go, so it's hard to get a good picture, especially one where she is smiling. Stay tuned for the next Itty Bitty Dress.

Itty Bitty Baby Dress

I frequently visit http://www.sewforum.com/ to see what others are sewing these days and to get ideas. There has been an Itty Bitty Baby Dress challenge, so I decided to join the pack. I haven't done any sewing since we moved until this past weekend and the only thing I got started was a tag blanket for a friend's new baby. I finished it up this morning and started printing and cutting out a pattern for the Itty Bitty Baby Dress from Made by Rae, http://madebyrae.blogspot.com/2008/04/free-itty-bitty-baby-dress-pattern.html. The pattern was only available in NB and 1-3 months from Rae and a 3T from
CraftingInspiration.blogspot.com, so I had to make adjustments for a dress for my almost 17 month old daughter. My first attempt was a little small, so tonight I will try again. See the picture of my first attempt, what do you think?

Frustration...

Ever since I married my husband I've been doing most of the work around the house, even when I worked full time and most weeks I worked more hours then him. He helps out occasionally and every once in a while surprises me by doing something without being asked, but most of the time I have to ask him to do things inside the house. Even when I ask him to do stuff he sometimes decides not to do it and it just gets me so mad!! In the last house we hired somebody to take care of the lawn, which included mowing and trimming and also hired a company to fertilize our lawn. It always looked nice, so no complaints. We knew once we moved into our new house we would have to do the lawn ourselves because it would be too expensive to have somebody take care of two acres. We bought a zero turn riding lawn mower and my husband had to also buy a trimmer. The idea was for him to take care of the lawn with occasional help from me. Of course I will be taking care of everything else outside (i.e. gardens). I told him if he picked up some work inside the house I would be happy to help him outside with the mowing/trimming.

Saturday was lawn day. He said to me that it was time I learned how to use the trimmer. I replied I know how to use a trimmer (Growing up I shared lawn duties with my two brothers). He said, good, then you can do that this weekend. My response was NO, not until you start helping out around the house more. He comments that he does a lot around the house (what, I don't know!). At this point I was pretty mad because he helps out VERY little around the house. I commented that this week when I was at the old house cleaning (I spent around 6 hours one day cleaning, 3.5 while also tending to the kids) one evening he didn't even clean up after the kids ate dinner. I had set them up with dinner, so all he had to do was clean up the dishes and wipe off the table and high chair. His response to me was he was taking care of the kids. All he had to do after they ate was get them ready for bed, read a story and tuck them in! Then he had the rest of the evening to do as he pleased. Does it sound fair that every day I should have to take care of the kids, do the laundry, clean the house, etc., but when he has the kids he doesn't have to do anything, but take care of the kids???? On top of this, I spent about 5 hours at the old house Sunday touching up paint and asked him to fold some laundry while he was watching TV and do you think he did it? NO!

Kiddos....

My little big boy is doing great on potty training and my little 16 month old girl is working hard on potty training too! It is amazing how much more interested girls/2nd children are in potty training. My son showed a little interest before and around 2, but we never made much progress until just a couple weeks ago. I don't know if it's due to the focus on potty training with my son, but my daughter wants to sit on the potty any time I ask her or any time she sees big brother sitting on the potty. She's pee peed on the potty twice now, but there have been a couple times I know she would have gone if I just got her on the potty quickly after getting her diaper off. We are now trying to set a routine of sitting her on the potty before baths and bedtime. She's so cute when I ask her if she wants to sit on the potty. She runs to the bathroom and impatiently waits for me to get the potty seat out to put on the toilet. She doesn't like sitting on the potty that sits on the floor.... probably because big brother won't use it anymore either. Big brother continues to do well. He had a few accidents over the weekend when my in laws were visiting, but I'm going to guess it was because he was so distracted by his grandparents visit. After a couple days we are back to no accidents. He even woke up dry Tuesday morning and I'm guessing if I got up when he woke up at 7:45 this morning he would have been dry again. When I asked him to take his diaper off, sit on the potty and then put underwear on he refused and I was just too tired and achy to get out of bed and deal with him!

Big Boy...

My big boy continues to amaze me. I still can't believe less than a week ago he still needed to be reminded if I wanted him to go pee pee on the potty! He continues to do great with potty training during the day! He hasn't had any accidents during the day and seems to know exactly when he needs to go. I periodically ask him through out the day if he needs to go if it's been a while, but he goes when he needs to. He is still have trouble at night. We went without a diaper last night, but woke up wet. Although I had a bed to change at 8:00 this morning, he did at least go poop on the potty after he got up. The advantage to no diaper at night is he at won't poop in his underpants. Tonight is night number two without a diaper at night. I'm hoping with a few reminders before bed he will make it to the bathroom before he actually pees his bed. Keeping my fingers crossed!

Success continues...

Today was a great day in potty training. My big boy didn't have to be reminded to go today and he pooped on the potty for the first time, and on his own. He is still in a diaper at night, so when I heard him around 8:00 a.m. this morning I jumped out of bed (barely awake!!) to catch him before he filled his diaper. His diaper was wet, but no poop!! Yippee!! This is a HUGE step for him. The goal for tomorrow is for him to go potty on the toilet before he fills his diaper. He's done so well in a short time and I have high hopes for tomorrow!! I'm so proud of him!!

Success....

As you may know, my mom was visiting this past week. She was here an entire week and was a HUGE help!! You may also know my 3 year old has not been potty trained. Waiting to move in the new house has delayed the process by a year, but this past week, with a lot of help from my mom, we worked on potty training. It went great and he is now in underwear during the day and diaper at night. Up until today it was still up to me to make sure he sat on the potty when he had to go. He still hasn't pooped on the potty because he does it before I'm actually out of bed in the morning. Finally this afternoon he jumped up when we were watching the Olympics and said he had to go to the bathroom. I sent him to the bathroom on his own. He chose to use the downstairs bathroom, which doesn't have a potty sit and he did GREAT! He really did have to go and I was so proud of him!! Now, we just need to get him to tell us every time he has to go!! Tomorrow is a new day, so I'm hoping he will tell us each time he has to go. Wish us luck!!

Finally moved..

Two weeks ago we FINALLY moved into our new house!!! We are so excited to be here and LOVE the new house! Even though the mortgage company didn't have everything ready on there end for us to convert the loan from a construction loan to a conventional loan, our builder was kind enough to hand over the keys and remotes. We were thankful for his kindness!! We got most things moved in the first weekend, but still have a few things over at the old house. It is a slow process getting those last few things, but we made a lot of progress this week with my mom visiting and the extra large vehicle to load things into, plus having her around to watch the kids so we could have a night out and run errands without the kids. Mom left on Friday, so it is back to the usual routine!

Big Boy...

We spend a lot of afternoons during the summer at our friends' house swimming in their pool. Most of the kids spend the afternoon floating around in some kind of floating device, but my friend's older daughter, five years old, has started swimming. The three year olds, my son and her middle daughter, have come a long way and this year have started floating around in floating devices on their own. On Monday I was in the deep in with the five year old working on her swimming and treading water. She'd jump in and I was right there to assist as she tried to tread water. My son came over with his floating device and wanted to jump in. My rule is no jumping in with a floating device. If he wanted to jump in without it I was there to catch him. He didn't like my rule and jumped in anyway, so he was banned from the pool for the rest of the day, unless he wanted to give it a try without the floating device. He wanted back in the pool, so he gave up the floating device and jumped in. He grabbed me around my neck, very tightly, so I knew he wasn't comfortable. We moved into the shallow end, which he could stand in, but hadn't realized it yet. It doesn't matter what mommy says, she doesn't know what she is talking about. He continued to hold on tight as I pryed his arms away from my neck. I tried to explain that when he does that I have a hard time holding him up and staying above the water. He wined a little and wanted to go to the side, but I patiently explained to him if he would just stretch his legs he would be able to touch the bottom. He thought I had no idea what I was talking about. I eventually got him to touch his foot to mine and slowly moved mine to the bottom of the pool and then out from under his so he could feel the bottom. After doing this a couple times he was so proud he could touch the bottom. From that moment until swimming was done with for the day he walked around the shallow end, close the the edge, on his own. He seemed to really have a great time and I'm so proud of him. When we got home he called both sets of grandparents to tell him about his adventures for the day.

Stress relief...

We've been dealing with a lot this week, trying to come to some agreement with our builder on some costs he is trying to pass onto us. This started on Tuesday and today we finally met with him and came to an agreement. It has relieved a lot of stress for both my husband and me, even though I still think we are paying for things we shouldn't have to pay for. He asked us what we thought we should pay and didn't argue with our suggestion. We also went over to the new house to walk through and point out the things he marked as fixed, but weren't. He's suppose to get people in by Monday to finish up, final cleaning on Tuesday and hope to close everything out by mid week. I can't wait!! We also had our inspector do our final inspection today and other than a few little things, all looks good. He commented the house has come together really nice, which surprised him based on how things started out 19 months ago. Things really turned around and we have a beautiful house (and a lot of unexpected money invested). Although we have a beautiful house to live in for the rest of our lives, if we had the chance to go back, we probably would not have built. It has not been a fun experience for us and we are moving in over a year past the original completion date of July 1, 2007!

My new stroller...

A little over a week ago when our house was being shown we went shopping and bought a bike trailer/stroller for me to use for walks with the kids. I've been waiting, patiently, for my husband to put the trailer together. Last night he took my son out to ride his bike, he'd been begging all day to ride his bike, and while he was out there decided to put the trailer together. My daughter didn't make it easy and kept getting in the way, so she ended up in the house a very unhappy girl. I went ahead and got her ready for bed and then my husband came inside once the trailer was put together asking for my daughter to come back outside to test the trailer. My husband took the kids on a short bike ride in the neighborhood (son on his own bike and daughter in the trailer hooked up to the my husband's bike). My daughter loved the trailer once my husband started riding, so it was a success. This morning I woke up determined I was finally getting out for a walk. Boy, am I glad I went for my walk. The kids were great and enjoyed the 30 minute walk and the trailer was so easy to push. It was nice to not have to stop or slow down when I had to go over a curb. I got a great workout in and can't wait for my next walk!!

Potty training

As you may know from reading other posts, my son is three and still wearing diapers. I can't wait for him to be potty trained and keep trying different things to get him more interested in potty training. My friend's daughter, who is basically the same age as my son (only about 1 1/2 months older) was fully potty trained by the time she was two. She didn't have to do anything to train her, she just decided on her own she didn't want to wear diapers any more. I've been trying to get my son interest for quite some time and he just fights is, so I've tried not to push too much. I offer for him to sit on the potty at different times throughout the day. Well, today was an extremely successful day. He went pee pee on the potty three times. I'm so excited!! This is a big step for him. We've been giving him a little dinosaur for each time he goes on the potty. It works some times, but not others. Today he seemed really excited about going and sat without much of a fight three times and went pee pee each time. He went before going over to our friends to go swimming, before his bath and one more time before bed. He fought a little before each one, but when I reminded him he would get to go swimming if he went and the other times he would get a dinosaur if he went he hopped right on the toilet. Have I said how excited I am. Now I just need to get him to go when he feels like he has to go and not be prompted! Tomorrow we are aiming for four times on the potty. Wish us luck!!

Sixth Anniversary...

It is hard to believe my husband and I have been married for six years as of Sunday. It has been a good six years and I wouldn't trade it for anything. We didn't do much on our anniversary, but celebrated on Saturday. After watching our friends' daughter for a little while Saturday afternoon we headed out, with kids in tow, and ran some errands to get some things for the new house and then had a wonderful dinner at Olive Garden. The food was great, service was good and the kids were awesome. We started off with salad, breadsticks and some kind of cheese fondue appetizer. I love the salad and breadsticks at Olive Garden and the kids and hubby did too. We then moved onto stuffed chicken Marsala and mashed potatoes for me and crusted tilapea, yellow squash and zucchini and pasta for my husband. We shared a little and the tilapea was excellent. The stuffed Marsala and mashed potatoes were awesome and so were the veggies (my husband doesn't eat much in the way of veggies, but I love veggies). By the time we left the restaurant we were all stuffed. We then headed to the new house to see what was going on over there and not much got done there this past week. The kids had fun running around the upstairs and I got some new pictures. We then headed home and my husband ran back out to grab a couple movies and I put the kids to bed. Kids went to bed quickly since it was 10:00 and I headed back downstairs after my husband came home and not only did he pick two girly movies, he also got me a dozen roses! I don't get flowers often, but he likes to surprise me once in a while.

Potty time....

I have a three year old (turned 3 the end of April) and a 15 month old. If you asked me a year and half ago I would have told you my son would be potty trained by the time he was two. It didn't matter what others told me (everybody said, "boys take longer") I just didn't want to believe it. At the time I was pregnant with my daughter and others told me I was crazy to even think about it, not just because he was a boy, but because I was pregnant and wouldn't have the energy to potty train him. Everybody was right.... as I got bigger and had less energy and my son got closer to 2 I just didn't have it in me to potty train him. At one point he seemed a little interested in potty training, wanted to sit on the little potty often, but that phase passed and he is no longer interested. I'm tired on changing diapers! Many have asked if he has regular times he goes potty and up until today I said no, but around 10:00 this morning, both kids had yucky diapers. So, tomorrow after breakfast, around 10:00 BOTH kids are sitting on the potty! I'm determined by the time my youngest is 2 they will both no longer be in diapers!! And on top the many diapers changes I do each day I'm tired of the amount of sheets and pajamas he goes through. Most mornings his pajamas are wet, which in most cases means his sheets are wet too. Now, off to wash those sheets!

Another one bites the dust!

Every time we turn around it seems like there is another expense we have to incurr, either with the current house or the new house. This morning was no different!!! The morning started off ok. Got up around 8:30, changed the kids diapers, got them dressed for the day and headed downstairs for breakfast. We all ate and then I cleaned up. Sounds pretty normal, but as I finished cleaning up I notice water was dripping on the floor under the sink. At first I thought I spilled water over the top front when I cleaned up the dishes, but didn't notice anything dripping down the front of the cubbard. I opened up th cubbard and the bottom was covered in water. Got myself comfortable on the floor and started clearing everything out and drying everything off. Every few seconds I would see water drip from what appeared to be the disposal, but it seemed weird that water would be dripping from the bottom of the disposal. Once I got everything out my husband got down to take a look. He turned on the water and water just poured out of the bottom of the disposal. All we can guess is something rusted out inside. Now to find a decent disposal for not too much money!! It's going to be fun cleaning up dishes today since I can't run water on the disposal side!!

Today's adventures...

Today we had a house showing at 12:15, so we had to be out of the house for a couple hours. It was fun getting ready for the showing, especially since I wasn't suppose to do much to help get the house ready. Well, I did more than planned, but was very careful not to stress my back. I was afraid I might have done too much, but my back doesn't feel too bad. Now I need to continue to take it easy this next week and hope by the end of the week all pain is gone!

While we were trying to make good use of our time we ran a few errands. Our first trip was to Best Buy to use a $10 coupon we earned with previous purchases. After looking around the store and determining if there was anything we really needed (mainly thinking about the new house) we ended up buying a movie, Ghost Rider, which we just finished watching and it was pretty good. I'm not sure we would have bought the movie if it wasn't for the free movie ticket to Hancock my husband wanted. We spent $5 on the movie and got a good movie to add to our large collection of movies and my husband get's to go to see a movie he has been talking about all week for free. Not a bad deal!

Our next trip took us to the mall. We stopped in Dick's Sporting Goods to look at the bike trailers in hopes we would find one I liked and buy it. As we got to the escalator my 3 year old son grabs onto the moving handrail and starts to get carried up the escalator without us. It was quite a funny site, but scary for for all. Luckily my husband has long arms and was able to grab him and set him back on the ground. I really wish we had a video camera to catch the event because it would have been a good one for Funniest Home Videos!! He has been on an escalator many times before, so we aren't sure what he was thinking when he grabbed onto the rail the way he did. I guess it looked like it would be fun!! We made it upstair with both kids in tears and found the trailers. After looking at the two different models they had in stock we decided on the InStep Quick N Easy bike trailer for $109.99. This is probably one of the cheapest you can find with the stroller attachment and has good reviews, so I'm hoping to get lots of use out it, starting this week. Now I just need to get my husband to put it together before the weekend is over!

House showings...

This morning we received a phone call from the realtor letting us know somebody wants to show our house on Saturday. This is great since we haven't had a showing for a few weeks. The down side is my husband is going to have to do just about all the work around the house to get it in order for the showing. If you read my previous post you know I threw my back out over the weekend and can't do much right now. My good friend keeps telling me YOU CAN'T DO ANYTHING!! She's a nurse and has worked with people with back injuries and has also had a back injury herself, so she knows what it takes to get a back healed. It really is tough sitting back and not doing anything these days. Besides doing what I can to take care of the kids, I get to sit on the couch with a heating pad on my back and laptop in my lap. It is driving me CRAZY not doing much of anything else because I HATE when my house is a mess and that is what it is right now. My husband has a lot of work to do tomorrow to get this house back in showing order. He doesn't usually have to do much because I've been doing a good cleaning every week, so in the past when we got a phone call all that had to be done was some minor cleaning. Have I said how much I hate just sitting here, but I know that is what I need to do! I'm just thankful nobody wanted to come by today!!

Back pain...

This week has not been a fun week in this household! This past Saturday morning as I was separating laundry and threw my back out and for about 4 days was in the worst pain even!! It was a sharp pain that didn't go away no matter what I did. Sitting, standing, walking, any slight movement caused a horrible pain in my lower back. Monday I went to the doctor the get it checked out. My doctor asked me to do some different movements with my legs to see what was causing the pain and then prescribes some medications to help alleviate the pain. I also received a shot in my hip, which was a temporary solution to the pain. It didn't get rid of it all, but it gave me a couple hours of a little less pain. Finally yesterday I woke up with less pain, still sore, but I can at least sit without a sharp pain in my back. My husband stayed home for a couple days to take care of the kids and me. He was suppose to be working from home, but I know, based on his comments, he wasn't get a lot done. By Wednesday I told him he could go back to work. The day was tough, but it was manageable and we spent some time over at a friend's house for lunch and a swim in the pool, which was nice for my back.

Rain, rain, go away!

I can't believe how much rain we have gotten the past couple months!! We get about two days of dry weather and then it pours down rain. Our new house is patiently waiting for the septic system to be put in, but with all this rain it hasn't been dry long enough to get it installed. It took forever to get a permit to install the system and now we are just waiting for the weather to dry out for a few days!! The house, as of today, should be done in a couple weeks, but if we don't get enough dry weather we won't be moving any time soon!

Bug update....

For those who read my post last week, I am happy to say the little black bugs are pretty much gone!! YIPPEE!!!! We took the advide of my father-in-law and bought Malathion concentrate for the outside and Ortho Home Defense for the inside. We (more like my husband) sprayed once on the outside and sprayed a few times on the inside. We were still getting a few bugs in the house, nothing compared to what we were getting before, but we would find a few each day. Last night my husband sprayed again on the outside and the inside and I only found ONE little black bug this morning by the front door. I didn't find any in the kitchen, family room or dining room. This is a HUGE breakthrough for us!! We've been fighting these bugs for at least FOUR years and Orkin didn't do much at all for them. We paid them $70 some dollars every two months for four plus years and they could not get rid of them. Nobody has figured out exactly what they are, but I'm SOOOOO happy they are just about gone. Hopefully tomorrow I won't find any!!

New Appliances...

Monday I decide to give our builder a call to find out where we are on the new house. It seemed like so much still had to get done for it still to be finished sometime next week, but he says we are still looking at sometime next week. I expect we will do our walk through the end of next week and there will be a few minor fixes before it is totally finished and handed over to us. While on the phone I ask him my long list of questions. At some point he comments that he better spill the news now..... the storage at his office was broken into and three of our appliances were STOLEN!!! Ugghhhh!!!!! Anything that could go wrong with the build of this house has gone wrong. He is paying for us to pick out new appliances, so at least we won't have to shell out even more money!!

Last night around 7:00, after hubby got off work, we went to Sears to see if the original appliances were still available. The refrigerator had a transition number, but is basically the same as what we had in storage. The washer was available, but the dryer was not available (at least not in the color we wanted, they ONLY had white), so picked out a new washer and dryer. The original washer and dryer we picked were a top of the line Kenmore Elite top load without the center agitator. We ended up with a front load, but it is still top of the line Kenmore Elite. The front load sits a lot lower to the floor and with my back problems I really need the stands so I don't have to bend over as much. We are hoping the builder will pick up the stands. We just sent him a list of what he needs to buy, so we will see!!

Hopefully this is the last of the problems we will run into with this build! I can't wait to be in our new house!!

Tile...

I have spent so much time figuring out tile for the new house. We bought the tile for the floor about two years ago when we were going to auctions to get supplies for building our house. Then we decided to do a back splash in the kitchen and put tile around the whirlpool tub. Not a problem... or at least you would think!

So, I check out several places and get some samples. The last place I check is the Tile Shop, which was recommended by our builder. He get's a discount, so this all sounds great! Get a bunch of sample there too and then I have my husband look through the tiles from all the stores and tell me which ones he likes best. He picks out four and then I pick out the one I like best out of the four. All is good at this point!

We finally meet with our tile installer and tell him what we want. Our builder has to order it to get the discount, so he orders it and then the tile guy goes over last week to install and realizes, it's not the right tile. So, he talks to the builder and goes to the Tile Shop and has them order, what we all believe to be the correct tile, again. It arrives Tuesday and once again we get a call from the builder telling us the manufacturer has sent the wrong tile AGAIN!!!! I now need to go back to the Tile Shop and pick out more tile. Pick out one I like, but once I get it over to the new house and back home it just doesn't look right to me right next to the floor tile. It goes great with the countertops in the kitchen, so we are using it there, but still have to find one for the bathroom. I call the Tile Shop and talk to the guy I've been working with to find out if they have enough of the tile I really want back in their storage. They keep a little in stock for samples, so I had hope..... NO luck. They didn't have enough to do the bathroom. Back to square one.... Tuesday I got to go to the Tile Shop without the kids because my husband worked from home, but today I had two kids in hand. My littlest was great, but the older one had fun running up and down the isles. Guess he had some energy he needed to get out!! Ok, so I pick one out and leave with a sample to go onto my next stop and not five minutes after I left I receive a phone call from the Tile Shop. He informed me the one I liked best today was low on stock and who knows when they will have more in stock!! Just my luck! Back to the Tile Shop, but this time he picked out some samples for me to bring home and do some comparisons so I didn't have to get the kids out of the car. I've picked one out and pray this is the last I have to do with the tile!!

Bugs....

Every year around the start of spring and warmer weather we get these little tiny black bugs in our house. We find them only on the first floor, mainly in the kitchen. They like to hang out on our back screened in porch. When I spray bug killer or anything liquid on the porch they start jumping. They don't fly, at least not that I have seen, but they do jump. They started getting worse this week and by last night my husband decided it was time to try something new. He asked if we could leave the house for a few hours today so we can set off some bug bombs. So, my day of staying home and finishing up laundry turned into cleaning out all the dishes from the cupboards and packing them up and then leaving the house all afternoon. Such a fun afternoon with a wild three year old and a cranky one year old. They really needed there naps today, but not possible. They didn't even fall asleep in the car!!

I arrive home about 4 hours after the bombs were set off and open the windows for the 30 minutes we are suppose to air the place out before coming inside for good. We head over to the new house to see progress and check out my tile samples for around the whirlpool tub in the the master bath. I think I have picked one out and hope this one will arrive as it was ordered! More on this topic to come in a later post. Now, back to our bug issue... we are still killing bugs!! We bought some bug killer for inside and out today and have sprayed it everywhere we can think of inside the house and all around the back of the house in hopes that we will eventually win the battle!! Wish us luck!!

Building frustrations...

For those who don't know, we are building a house. The house was suppose to be completed a year ago July 1st. We had to fire our original builder and hired a new one mid December 2007. It took 2 months for the city to get back to the builder and let us know what our options are for sewage. We were told originally we could hook up to the city sewer, but when our new builder looked into it he couldn't figure out a way for us to do that and that was confirmed by the city. So, septic it is and we aren't happy about it!

The 100 days the new builder told us it would take to get the house completed would have been around April 1st, but the city put us behind by approximately 2 months. The house was then suppose to be completed by the end of May, but now that has moved to the middle of June! Just found this out today, and only because I asked!! Also found out today that we don't have enough hard wood floors for my husbands office. We knew this was a possibility and asked our builder when we first started and reminded him again last week, before the trim started. Now the trim is almost done and he finally tells us we don't have enough. So, we ask if we have enough wood laminate flooring, which is going in my craft room. He's going to check into that, but pointed out the thickness of the laminate is thinner than the hard wood and the trim wouldn't look right if we went with laminate. I pointed out that we have been asking him for some time to look at the supplies we already had for the house for this very reason. If he had just checked this all out before starting the trim, this wouldn't be an issue. He did say if need be he would redo the trim in my husbands office!!

Seems like every time we turn around there is another additional cost to building this house!! Things haven't gone so well for us. For those who have built, hope you haven't had the problems we've been having and for those thinking about building...... I wouldn't build again!!

New house...

Times are exciting around here!!! The new house is only a few weeks away from being completed! I'm amazed every time I walk into the house how much more it feels like a home and not just a wood frame! They have been working the past week on trim, built ins and replacing the temporary stairs with new stairs. I'm amazed how everything is coming together and can't wait to be in our new home!!

Business hang tags...

Wow, didn't realize it had been so long since I blogged! Bad me!!

For a while I have been wanting to make some hang tags to put the products I make and sell and the last two days I finally took some time to complete this task. It took three trial runs, but I love the way the third one turned out and made up around 50 or so tags. I printed out my information onto white cardstock, did a fancy cut on the top and bottom and then glued onto different colored card stock.

I also have been wanting to purchase some fabric tags to sew into my products and accomplished that a couple nights ago. Can't wait for them to arrive!!! They can either be folded and sewn into my products or for those products I don't have the ability to do that I can cut the tags in half (when folded the print is the same on both sides) and iron them onto my products.

Now, I need to motivate myself to start making some more products! It is so hard to motivate myself to make stuff these days because every time I make something I end up emptying half my closet out to find what I need and then have to load it back up because you never know when we will get a call for somebody to come see the house!

Brick is done!!

The brick is now finished on the new house and it looks beautiful!! Had to share some updated pictures!!

Beautiful weather!

The last few days have been beautiful outside..... mid 60's and sunny! Saturday was spent inside with sick kids and hubby, but thankfully I haven't caught what they have yet!! Praying I don't because if I do, things till need to be done and I can't just sleep and sit on the couch like hubby!! So, I've been waiting for warm weather so I can get the flower beds in good shape. With the house on the market, this is a very important task this year!! Sunday I spent 2+ hours weeding just one portion of the flower bed, the worst part and then today I finished up the rest before putting down new mulch. It is a little after 6:00 and my oldest, 3 in just a few weeks, is standing at the side lights at the front door. He then opens up the door and asks me what I am doing. I explain I am cleaning up and ask how he likes the flower beds. He doesn't respond to the question, but asks if we were going to be sleeping in them now. I had to laugh. It is funny how little ones don't always understand things when it is a word they are use to using in a different sense. I told my mom tonight when we were talking and she couldn't stop laughing!!

Hoping for another beautiful day tomorrow so I can buy some flowers and get some flower pots planted!! Maybe another nice day I will get the outsides of the windows washed!

New products!

My friend told me about this company that has environmentally friendly products for the home, as well as personal hygiene products (i.e. deoderant, shampoo, conditioner, soap, etc.), plus they have some healthy snacks. I got my first shipment at the end of March and LOVE my products. I've been approached a couple times about this company, but at the time didn't want to change things over in my house, but now that we are moving it seemed like the perfect time. I haven't changed everything over, but we are working toward that and I plan on having just about all my household cleaners and laundry changed over to the new products by the end of May, before we move. So far, I have tried the deoderant, shampoo and conditioner, soap, tub & tile bathroom cleaner and some of the snacks and I LOVE them all. I've been using The Works to get tough buildup and soap scum off my bathroom counters and tub and the Tub & Tile cleaner works just as well and isn't toxic like The Works. I have never found a clear deoderant that doesn't feel all sticky when you put it on and the deoderant from this company doesn't make me feel that way at all! If you want to learn more, check out www.workathomeunited.com/wilkinson or www.livetotalwellness.com/wilkinson.

The joys of building a new home!

A few years ago my husband and I bought two acres of land to build a new house on, then in 2006 we decided it was time to start building. So, in October 2006 we signed with a builder to start out new home. We were suppose to break ground in the second week of November, but that didn't happen until about a month later. This should have been a sign that things weren't going to go as planned, but we had hope. We went with a builder that had been working in the industry for over 16 years, but was working on getting his own custom home business started. He build his own home, which was a nice home. Going with him meant we got good pricing because he was trying to make a good name for himself. Things moved along with the house for maybe a couple months, then the work stopped and every once in a while we would see something new get started. Every time we enquired what was going on he said he was trying to get his finances back in order and a couple good size jobs he worked on he never got paid for and didn't have the money to pay the contractors that did work on our house. This went on for months and as we got closer to the time the house was suppose to be finished he continued to have one excuse after another about why things were moving along as they should. He had hopes it would get done by the time our construction loan was to be done. That time passed and we had to ask for an extension from our mortgage company. They gave us three months. Things still weren't getting done and it was now August/September and we decided to fire the guy and find a new builder. Our contract with him ended as of July 1, which is the date the house was suppose to be completed.

So, onto finding a new builder. We looked at several builders and then signed with one that built our friends house, which is beautiful. This builder is doing great and has a made a good name for himself over many years of building custom homes. The only downside to going with him is things are costing a lot more money!! Things were slow moving with him at the beginning, but the city is to blame for that! He was trying to determine is we could get hooked up to the sewer system, which it didn't look like we could, or could we get a permit to have a septic system. Well, we are stuck with septic and although we don't want septic, we don't have a choice!! It took the city almost two months to get out to the land and make their determination. Things definitely have not gone in our favor, but things are looking up!!

Now is the fun, but stressful, time! We are getting to pick things for the house out, which is exciting!! We picked the cabinets and those have been ordered. Picked the countertops, not just need to pick the faucet for the kitchen and the sink. I think I am going with a solid surface sink, which my hubby has tried to talk me out of, but he doesn't do much in the kitchen, so it is my pick!! Found faucets for the bathrooms, a Moen Caldwell Brushed Nickel faucet, on clearance for half the price they normally cost. Going to pick those up today as long as the plumber says they are good! We have most of our flooring, but need to pick out carpet. We are going with a backsplash in the kitchen, so now I am in the process of picking out tile for that. Oh, and the brick on the house will be finished today!!