Mommy hood

Well I have been a mom for 9 months (if you don’t count the pregnancy). I have learned a lot in the last 9 months…

1. Babies are not what you plan for or expect. Before Rohan was born I thought people were just exaggerating about kids. Some of those people were. Some were right.

2. Babies take up all of your time. I never realized how much I was able to get done until Rohan was born and now I don’t seem to accomplish anything I used to be able to accomplish.

3. Babies are the messiest living things on the planet. I know this may be an exaggeration, but when you have to change 4-5 poopie diapers, 30-40 vomit messes, wash everything in your babies wardrobe, and bathe the baby twice, all in one day, you too would think babies are the messiest living things on the planet.

4. Babies prevent you from getting any kind of sleep. They tell you that when the baby is born you are supposed to sleep as much as possible (anytime the baby sleeps, you sleep). This has to be the absolute best advice there is. I also believe that very few new moms listen to this advice. First off how can a new mom sleep, she wont know if her baby is alive or not? Then if you do fall asleep, how in the world is all the laundry and dishes going to get done? I know, I know, a dirty house doesn’t matter when you have such a precious being that needs your full attention and you need sleep to achieve that need, but I can’t stand the smell of a dirty house more then I need sleep.

5. Babies are the most unpredictable, cutest bundles you could ever hold. The feeling of holding your baby for the very first time, and every time after that, reminds you that every negative thing is worth it. There eyes gazing into yours, their smile when they see you, even the mischief they get into (knowing they aren’t supposed to be doing whatever it is they are doing), it is all worth it.

I’m Back

So I have decided instead of trying to catch everyone up on everything I did in the last year, I would just start fresh from today. Of course I will probably add in some of the crafty things I did here and there, but it just seems too overwhelming to do all at once.

As you probably know I had my baby! His name is Rohan James and he is quite a joy to have around. He is 3 months old and by the size of him you would think he was 6 months old. He definitely is the boss around here. He tells us when to wake up, when to play, when to eat, when to  sleep, everything. But isn’t that some of the fun of having an infant around? A lot of my future posts will include things about our doings, since that is 85% of my life now (the other 15% is divided between my husband and sleep). I do still get a fair amount of crafting done which keeps me sane and in touch with the world.

I have some new loves in crafting and some new toys to play with. I love quilting and anything that goes with it. I also love to embroider now, especially with my new machine. I am really enjoying the making of baby and kid related stuff and can’t wait to get to make more as Rohan gets older.

I will do my best to stay on top of this blog, but time is precious and who really wants to spend good crafting time typing? So, I Sew!

Updated list of things to do

Here is my list from June 30 of things I want to finish by November. I have crossed out the things I finished and the stuff I added to make in bold. I have been working really hard to only work on what is on the list, but sometimes get distracted with other fun projects. I only plan on making the starred items when and if I move, so that I have fun a coordinated kitchen and a fun coordinated craft room.

• 12 x 12 Calendar
• Scrabble tile pendants (probably won’t do this)
• Placemats and napkins
• Large white and pink tote (cut)
• Butterfly tote (cut)
• Bright Hawaiian tote (cut)
• Purple singlet shopping tote (cut)
• Hawaiian singlet shopping tote (cut)
• Birds of Paradise lunch tote (cut)
• Sunflower lunch tote (cut)
• Apple apron (cut)
• Nursing cover
• Diaper bag
• Clothing separators
• Baby shoes
• Baby Onesies
• Bibs
• Travel sleep mat and case
• Changing pad
• Diaper & wipe travel bag
• Burp cloths
• Bento Box Quilt
• Baby hooded towels
• Crib sheets
• 6 pairs of PJ sets (probably won’t do this)
• Baby Dress (probably won’t do this)
• Toddler Shirts and pants (probably won’t do this)
• Handprint quilt
• Photo magnets
• Magnetic Paper dolls (probably won’t do this)
• Sewing Machine tote *
• Sewing Machine Cover *
• Serger cover *
• Sewing Chair cover *
• Sewing Machine organizer *
• Mixer cover *
• Toaster cover *
• Bread Machine Cover *
• Rainbow Quilt (cut)
• Black & Pink Quilt (cut)
• Woven Placemats
• Polka dot apron (ASG)
• Pink Butterfly purse
• Apron (tbd)
• Tote bag (tbd)
• Kelahna’s Tutus x 2
• Kelahna’s Pillowcase Shirt
• Kelahna’s ruched skirt
• Diapers (10)
• Tortilla Warmer

Finally cool

It is finally cool enough to leave the air conditioned room, so I have gotten some sewing done.

My Sister-in-Law and I went shopping and saw some super cute pillow case shirts that were $35 each! To top that there were also some tutus that were $40 each. There is nothing to either of these so there is no reason to pay that much when I could make them for her for way cheaper. I really do support the creative people out there trying to sell there stuff, but even on Etsy they don’t charge that much for either of those projects.

The only problem is my SIL and I have very different tastes in fabrics and colors, so I told her she had to buy the fabric and I would make the projects. We went to Wal-mart and picked out a couple colors of tulle and some cute prints of fabric to make 2 tutus, a pillowcase shirt and a ruched skirt for my niece.

Here is what I have accomplished so far with what was purchased:

Front:

Back:

Rock Star Style: 

The Pillowcase shirt. I made this as a sample with left over fabric from the skirt she wants (which I haven’t done yet, just cut it out), the real shirt will be brown with pink polka dots:

 

The ruched skirt (this is also a sample, the real skirt will be out of the black and white fabric):

Front:

Back:

I did also get inspired to work on some of the quilts that I have just sitting around all cut. My SIL and family came over for dinner on Sunday and walked into my craft room for the very first time since I have moved here in November. She was disgusted by the amount of fabric I have and the amount of projects I have started that are just sitting collecting dust. She is starting to get back into sewing and made me feel sad that I had gotten so bad. I know that I am not nearly as bad as some  people, but I really want to be at a point where I decide on a project, go get fabric, cut it, and sew it all at once. I don’t want to have such a large stash of “I don’t know what to do with” fabric. And I certainly don’t want a ton of works in progress sitting around.  I started with this monkey flannel rag quilt that I have had cut for well over 2 years:

   

And I started on my rainbow quilt that I blogged about here. This is 1/3 of the top part finished. The little strip on the side is going to be the binding. It is coming together so nicely I can’t wait until it is finished:

I am off to my ASG meeting, it is all about sewing machine feet. Then tomorrow I have another sewing day with a Home Depot job interview thrown in. So, I sew.

Busy Me

I have been super busy with sewing lately. Well I can’t really say that I have only been working on sewing, because I have really only spent about 10 hours in the last two weeks sewing, I have just managed to get a lot done in that time period.

I made a total of 18 burp cloths. These are super easy to make. They only require some scrap flannel and the pre-folded diapers. I bought the Gerber 3 ply diapers because I wanted them thick and white otherwise I would have just bought the organic diapers from Simple Cloth.

• Wash and dry the diapers 3-5 times on hot before using.
• Measure the thick section of the diaper length and width and add 1/2” to the width (mine was 14”x16”)
• Cut your flannel pieces to that measurement
• Iron the seam allowance on width sides for easier sewing
• Sew the flannel down so that the pretty part is all showing (there is no turning involved here)
• Finally serged the ends of the diapers to even everything and protect it all from fraying (the ends are typically serged already, your just making sure your flannel doesn’t unravel)

See wasn’t that super easy (if not, let me know and I will make a real tutorial, but you can always Google it and find lots of great burp cloth tutes out there). These were fun because I was able to use up lots of scraps of flannel from all the jammies I make myself.

 

I also made a crib sheet to go with the awesome jungle bumper and dust ruffle I found at Value Village. I found this great fabric at Joann’s that matched all the colors in the bumper, but it was $7/yard. I am normally not picky about prices for fabric, but I needed two yards and $14 for a crib sheet is ridiculous. I decided to use my 40% off coupon to help with the price. When I got home I realized the lady at the cutting counter only rung me up for 1 yard of fabric rather then the 2 yards I had gotten, so I guess this sheet only cost me $4. I was going to call and let them know, but from working at Home Depot I know that they would just say ‘thanks for letting us know, but there is nothing we can do’. So I just accepted my stellar deal. The sheet was easy to make, but still a little annoying, because the tutorial I used wasn’t super accurate. I finagled it and made it work though. I probably won’t be making anymore sheets, because they really aren’t that cost effective, I just got lucky.

 

 

 

I broke out my WIP basket and decided that I wanted to make everything in it before starting any new projects. Here was the first of that endeavor, a brown corduroy market tote with butterfly fabric lining. I made it with brown polka dot ribbon for the size adjusters. Nick said this was my ‘grandma Mary Poppins’ bag because it is so big and the fabric reminds him of an upholstery bag.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next project in my basket was this Hawaiian print and denim bag for a friend. She had tons of fabric to make various things with, but she doesn’t know how to sew, so she gave it to me to make things for her. She didn’t really like this bright fabric so I decided to ‘hide’ it as a lining to a very simple tote bag. This bag would be great for groceries or a trip to the lake. 

I also needed to finish the Tortilla Warmer that I had started at an ASG meeting back in April. My mom and I were sharing a sewing machine so rather then finishing mine I let my mom work on hers mostly and I would finish mine when I got home. Well I just finished it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another 3 projects in my basket were these singlet shopping bags. One of them is for a friend, but the other two have been cut for well over a year just waiting for me to tackle the handles. The handles on these are very cumbersome to make and I dread doing. Well I figured out a really quick way to make them (as long as you don’t mind a little serged edge showing. The original has a gusseted bottom, but I didn’t like that because you can’t put as many groceries in the bag, so I excluded that. Apart from the Hawaiian print for my friend the fabric is from $0.50 bandanas that I had found at the store. I love it when I can make things, and they are actually cheaper and better then what you can get at the store.

The final project I finished from my basket is this super easy tote bag with a log cabin square in the center. I had intended to send this off with a swap package, but ran out of patience with the colors. I can only handle so much of the same fabrics. 

In addition to all of this stuff I finished, I completed 4 baby washcloths, 1 bib, and 3 swaddling blankets. I didn’t take any pictures because there is nothing spectacular about them and I put them away before getting around to it. I still have 3 projects in my WIP basket to work on, and I want to finish those this week so I can complete a total of 100 projects for the year so far. It is so hot here right now that I don’t want to really do anything, but sit in front of my AC unit in my bedroom, so we will see what all I get done this week. So, I sew.

Some projects I have done

  I have done a lot of crafting in the past couple of days. I finished some stuff from my list and some extras.

Here is the 12 x 12 calendar. I can change the paper in the background to match the season or monthly holiday. I am using some window markers that I bought a long time ago to write the days and the month onto the plastic calendar cover page.

 

I also made these children’s closet organizer hangers. I found some wood pieces at the craft store and had Nick cut the holes into them for me. I then painted them and mod podged paper to them. I printed out the ages onto clear address labels and stuck them on. I found these animals at the craft store and thought it would work perfectly with the jungle theme I have going on in the baby’s room. The sad thing is Nick put the holes a little to low and they don’t fit on the closet rod, so Nick said he would work on lowering the rod for me to use them.

I sewed up 5 baby bath towels in various colors and sizes. I just cut various size squares of terry cloth and flannel for the hood, then serged it all together. I think I might add bias tape to the green ones later, but I don’t feel like doing that right now, they are just for me so perfection is not required.

I cut up some towels that I had sitting in my craft room to make 16 reusable baby wipes/washcloths. They are really simple, just 8 x 8 squares of towel, serged together. I didn’t want to go fancy on these since there purpose is to wipe poo from baby’s bottom.

I also cut and ironed 18 burp cloths. I just need to sew them onto the pre folded diapers. I am waiting for those to get washed about 4 times first so they are all shrunk down to size.

This weekend I will be by myself so I will work on the cloth diapers that I have fabric for and hopefully finish those. I really want to make some bibs, booties, and washcloths from all my scraps that I have accumulated. I want to use up some of my yardage though too, so I need to find projects to do that with. So, I Sew.

Cloth Diapers

I went down to the local cloth diaper store Simple Cloth and registered for a ton of great products from her. I also want to try and make some of my own diapers. I did the calculations and here is what I have:

The info I used was that a child uses 70 diapers per week for about 2.5 years (130 weeks). Also here are some great comparison websites:

http://verybaby.com/dollars ( I used this the most)

http://www.naturalfamilyonline.com/5-diap/45-diaper-cost.htm

• Lifetime cost of Diaper Service – 130 (weeks) x $18.00 = $2340 + 12 (covers) x $13.00 each = $2496
• Lifetime cost of Disposables – 9100 (lifetime amount of diapers) x $0.25 (average cost of one diaper) = $2275
• Lifetime cost of Home Laundering Pre-fold Diapers – $0.15 (average detergent per load) + $0.95 (average electricity usage per load) + $0.20 (average water cost per load) x 260 (3 loads of laundry per week) = $338 + 12 (covers) x $13.00 each + $180 (cost of pre-folds) = $830
• Lifetime cost of Home Laundering Ready Made Pocket Diapers (The ones I prefer of most like disposables) - $338 (diapering lifetime home laundering cost) + 24 (one size pocket diaper) x $18.00 each = $770
• Lifetime cost of Home Laundering Home Made Pre-fold Diapers - $338 (diapering lifetime home laundering cost) + 12 (covers) x $7.00 (fabric and notions needed) + $180 (cost of pre-folds) = $602
• Lifetime cost of Home Laundering Home Made Pocket Diapers - $338 (diapering lifetime home laundering cost) + 24 (one size pocket diaper) x $10.00 (fabric and notions needed) = $578

I figure that Nick and I will have 2 kids, so the price doubles for Diaper Service and Disposables. For all the other options most of the diapers can be reused (I have heard you do have to invest to buy about 12 new Pocket Diapers with your second child), but the covers and pre-folds all can be reused.

Based on my calculations (which are rough, but good estimates) I can save about $4250 over the life of two children if I make the Pocket Diapers myself. Of course we will probably mix and match different types of diapers and home made and store bought, but for that kind of savings we can do that. Nick and I are also thinking of the “green” savings will have by cloth diapering and that is 18,200 less diapers in the landfill (which never deteriorate).

Since seeing these numbers I have already bought the pattern and the first batch of supplies needed to make my first 3 Pocket Diapers from Kayla’s Cloth Kit. Her site has great kits that include everything you need to make 3 one size fits all Pocket Diapers. You can customize what colors and materials you want, also if you need the pattern or just the notions. While working on this post I got the pdf pattern link in my e-mail, so now I can make some mock ups before the precious fabric arrives. One thing that I like about Kayla’s Cloth Kit is that she allows you buy the license to sell the diapers. You just make one and send it to her and if it is up to her standards she will allow you sell unlimited amounts of her diaper for just the cost of her labels and the license fee. What a great way to make a little extra cash.

I can’t wait to get the fabric and start making my own. So, I Sew

I got a few things done.

The other day I cleaned up my craft room so it was easy for me to use again. Then I went shopping for some basic onesies to decorate. I ended up with 7 completed onesies and I am quite proud of most of them.

The first three I painted using some stencils and the other four I did iron appliqué. I chose not to sew these appliqués for pure ease of making them. The baby doesn’t get to wear them that much anyway.

Yesterday I went to Simple Cloth in downtown Olympia. They sell everything you could possibly need to cloth diaper you baby. I got so much information from the owner. I now know exactly what I want to do use and how many I need. She was giving me prices of a cloth diaper investment and I was a little surprised, but realized how much I could save from not using disposables, also they can be reused from child to child. The investment would only be once for a lifetime. I think I could even make them cheaper, but I might have to do some research. I haven’t really found a pattern that I like for diaper covers yet, so we will see.

I’m Back

So I know that it has been awhile, but I am back. I have been really busy lately with two jobs and not feeling very well. Now both jobs are done and I am feeling better, I am ready to craft and blog all about it.

I have some very exciting news for anyone who hasn’t heard yet…..

I am having a baby boy in mid November. This is why I haven’t felt the greatest, but now I am in the clear for a little while. Nick and I are so excited, neither of us can wait. We have compared this to waiting for a Christmas present that you know your getting for 10 months. We will not discuss names with anybody or tell anyone the exact due date, as we want those for just us. Don’t worry everyone will know when the baby is born right after it happens.

I have lots of ideas of stuff to make for myself and for baby, so I figure I better get started. Here is my list of things I want to make or try to make:

• Diaper bag
• nursing cover
• baby towels
• burp cloths
• portable sleep mat
• wipe bag
• receiving blankets
• bibs
• blankets/quilts
• dirty diaper bag
• diaper covers (we plan on doing a cloth diaper service)
• toys
• clothes

However, I have a whole list of things I want to make for Christmas this year, but Nick and I are in debate about it. He thinks that we shouldn’t buy do anything for all 9 of our nieces and nephews as neither of us ever received anything from our aunts and uncles for Christmas. I think I could easily make them all something small and call it good. So why don’t I ask you:

Should we give gifts to each individual or should we just do a family gift?

Comment and let me know what you think.