First Days of School

First, I apologize for the LONG post, but figured I should include both the kids first days of school (even if they were 2 weeks apart!).

I should probably start off with my son's first day of Kindergarten. He actually started a couple weeks ago and bad mommy didn't record his first day, so I'll share his first day before I get to my daughter's first day. He is in his 3rd week of school. He takes the bus to and from school every day and loves it! His first day with the bus was crazy! The information we received in the mail was incorrect. The bus number it told us to look for did not stop. This was confusing for us as parents (1st time sending a child on a bus) and for him. He was in tears because he thought he wasn't going to take the bus that morning, but another bus going to the same location stopped and he was able to take it. The system does bus transfers, which is crazy! They go to their home school (which doesn't have Kindergarten) and then transfers to a different bus to go to his school. We felt we needed to go where the he transferred buses to make sure he got where he needed to go. We had to wait a while for his bus to finally show up and then made sure he got on the transfer bus. Very nerve racking!! I talked to the bus driver of the bus I thought he was suppose to get on from our house and found out they changed routes and he should have been on a different bus. We got all that figured out....

Then after school I waited at the bus stop until about 5:15 (about 1 1/2 hours past his scheduled drop off) when he finally arrived home. When it was almost 5:00 I tried calling transportation and couldn't get anybody on the phone and was about in tears until another bus stopped to verify our address and tried to help me track him down. In the meantime his bus finally arrived. What a long day for a Kindergartner (school let out at 3:15)!!

Here he is the morning of his first day in his new embroidered t-shirt. I was going to do something like Kindergarten Rocks, but he wanted a dinosaur, so that is what he got! The embroidery is from Lynnie Pinnie.

My little girl started her first day of preschool yesterday. Part of me is sad because she is growing up so fast and I did miss having her around all morning, but I do have to say I did enjoy a few hours of kid free time! After dropping her off at school I had a few errands to run (about 5 places to stop). What would have taken me all morning with both the kids took me just over an hour!! I love getting errands done quick! I then came home and did some uninterrupted sewing. I finished an order and was able to drop it in the mail after I picked her up from school.

When I woke her up yesterday she whined for the first hour that she didn't want to go to school. This is a new experience for her, so I'm sure there were some nerves involved. After big brother left for school she settled down and got excited about school. By the time I dropped her off she was ready to play with her new friends. When I picked her up she asked if she can come back another day! As we were driving home we talked about what she did at school and she then say a song she learned. She LOVES to sing!!

Since it was her first day, she had to have a new outfit. She is in the kangaroo class, so I found a cute kangaroo applique from Sewing For Sarah. For the shorts I used the Easy Fit Pants pattern by Carla C from You Can Make This and shortened them so they hit a little below her knee. I actually wanted them a little shorted, but at least now she wear them longer.

Recent Projects

A friend of mine placed an order a while back. I think she placed it right after we got back from vacation the first week of July. I had hoped to get it done within a couple weeks, but things were crazy with the kids and it took a while. Thankfully she was understanding and said to enjoy the last of the summer before school started! :-) I finally finished it and sent it out last week. She received it last Saturday and sent an e-mail telling me how much her kids loved their new items. Her 3 year old daughter slept in her new robe Sunday night and wanted to take it to school with her to school the next day!! LOL!!

An extra shirt for my friend's 5 year old.

Design from Lynnie Pinnie

An extra twirl skirt (now known as the Fiona skirt after my friend's daughter).

My own design.

Robe for a 3 year old little girl. She picked the fabric.

Pattern is Simplicity? (I can check number if anybody is interested). It was pretty easy.

Tooth fairy pillow for a 5 year old little boy who just lost his first 2 teeth in August.

My own design, but the pocket and tooth are from Sewforum.

I made a similar blanket for my friend's daughter when she was a baby. She has loved it so much it is falling apart and my friend ordered a new one for her. Hopefully she loves this one just as much!!

My son started Kindergarten last week and my daughter starts preschool Monday, so I will hopefully be doing a lot more sewing starting this coming week. She will be going to school 3 half days a week, so I will have almost 12 hours of free time each week!! Yippee!! I know I'll miss her, but I will enjoy the uninterrupted sewing time (maybe even some errands without kids, maybe even a 'coffee date' with a friend once in a while). I love my kids, but I'm dreaming of all the projects I can accomplish when they aren't home interupting me every 15 minutes. :-)

Pink Leopard Skirt and Flower Embroidered Shirt

I bought a 1/2 yard of this fabric sometime in the last couple years. I used some of it for another project (although I intended to fully use it to make something for my daughter). Turns out, there was enough to make a skirt for my daughter. I then debated for a week or more what I was going to embroider on a shirt to go with the skirt. Wednesday night I finally decided on a flower from Planet Applique and LOVE the way it turned out. I now have this embroidered shirt available in my Etsy shop....it's so cute!! I will be adding the outfit and matching bow to the shop too.

My daughter had her preschool open house on Thursday, so this was her outfit for the day. Isn't she cute!!

Birthday Presents - the Mia top by Pink Fig

My friend's 2 little girls had birthdays back in the spring (March and May). When the youngest one turned 5 I showed her some patterns and she picked out the Mia top by Pink Fig for her present. I've been so busy and just never got it done. They moved to the other side of town and my friend started a new job working Monday through Friday instead of the weekends, so I haven't seen them since May. The last time I saw them the little 5 year old asked if I finished her top/dress and when I told her I hadn't had a chance. She asked if I could have it done by the time she started Kindergarten and I told her I would. So, I made it priority to get it done and finished the tops Monday (actually Tuesday morning around 2:30 a.m.) so I would have them when I saw her Tuesday morning before she started her first day of Kindergarten. Unfortunately, the Tuesday morning play date got cancelled. Hopefully I can give these to the girls soon!

Sewing

So, I haven't gotten any sewing done the last 2+ weeks. Last week my Mom, niece and nephew were visiting, so the week was devoted to doing fun stuff with the kids. I had hoped to get some sewing done in the evenings after the kids were in bed, but I was just too exhausted (and I think a little burned out) and didn't work on anything in the evenings. My Mom and I did play around with material for the quilt (she is making), bed skirt and valances (I'll be making) for my daughter's room and also shopped at Hobby Lobby and JoAnn's. So, we didn't totally neglect crafts. My Mom did tie died shirts with the kids and they also worked on a stepping stone to create a memory from our beach trip in July. It was a fun, but exhausting, week and we look forward to doing it again next year. This was year number 2.....last year was at my parents' house, this year my house and next probably at my parents' again.

I spent the first couple days this week getting things back in order from last week, organizing some garage sale stuff and catching up on laundry. Laundry is mostly finished (washed, folded, just need to finish putting away). Downstairs is in pretty good order now (except for the toys the kids like to leave around the house), just need to do some vacuuming and scrubbing/steaming the floors. I'll have to clean the bathrooms again at the end of the week, but for now I don't plan on doing much more than running the vacuum and maybe spot cleaning the tile floors. The garage sale stuff is better organized (not taking up so much of my craft room), clothes sent home with my brother for my nephew and clothes/shoes for my kids to grow into are back in the storage closet. I'm making progress.

Today I'm going to work on some sewing. I've got 2 tops to make for 2 special little girls who have been patiently waiting for their birthday presents (one since March and the other since May). I've been so busy and they moved to the other side of town, so nothing has pushed me to get these done. I did promise the youngest I would have her's finished before Kindergarten started (1st day is Tuesday), so that is my push for getting them done this week! I let her pick out the pattern and picked up the fabrics last week at Hobby Lobby. I also have 3 orders I would like to get done this week, one I need to get done ASAP for a friend of mine from MOPS (a NOOK sleeve for her husband's birthday). Another order from a friend for a child size robe, a tooth fairy pillow and a blanket (I made a blanket for her daughter when she was born and she has loved the blanket so much that it is falling apart...luckily I have one piece of the fabric left so I can make a duplicate blanket). The last is a stuffed frog softie.

I guess I better get lunches made and then onto sewing!

Have a wonderful day!!