Christmas in June

Liam and his Christmas Palm Tree

 We are officially six months away from Christmas. Monday was June 25th, and to celebrate the day Liam and I celebrated "Christmas in June". *FYI, no spiritual undertones, just silliness. It kind of came to me the day of when I put Felicity down for her morning nap and Liam was taking a self-initiated time out in his room. I wish I would have thought of it soon, cause I would have planned better. Oh well. We worked with what we had.

I tried to find some Christmas clothes to put him in but everything was long sleeved, so we went with a red and green tie-dyed shirt from his Tia Hannah. Next year I think I will have to make some kind of Christmas shirt or tank for them.  We created a Christmas palm tree from some brown paper bags I found laying around. Liam painted the star ornaments and I painted the trunk and the leaves.

While it dried, we watched Frosty the Snowman with our snowman ornament and cut out some snowflakes. Liam really has no idea who Santa Claus is. It's all about snowmen to him.

Watching Frosty

I couldn't think of anything fun to do for dinner, so we had breakfast for dinner but the main event was Liam's first hot chocolate. Well, it was really luke warm, but it still counts. He was really into the whipped cream and asked me to refill it about four times. I'll say it was a hit.

The main event

Working My Way Through Pinterest

If you don't know, Pinterest is the best website out there. Endless pictures of inspiration for decorating, cooking, crafting, cleaning, organizing, etc. It really is addicting. After many "pins" I decided that I actually should start making things rather than just saying that I wanted to make them. So in the last week, I tackled a couple of my pins and wanted to share which ones I tried and what I liked/didn't like about them.

1. Chicken Broccoli Supreme: I searched for a chicken and broccoli casserole so I could freeze half of it for when the baby came. This was really good. I used a little more chicken then what the recipe called for but figured we wouldn't mind the extra protein. At first I was going to serve it with rice, but my husband hates rice so I went with the next recipe.

2. Hasselback Potatoes: I kept seeing these on Pinterest and just had to try them. They didn't come out as crispy as I was hoping. Maybe I was just too impatient to wait for them to cook all the way I don't know. The bottoms were nice and crispy but the rest of the potato was just normal.

3. Snickers Salad: Just 3 ingredients. Snickers bars (frozen), cool whip, and granny smith apples. It did taste good but it can't figure out the right ratios for everything. First I thought I had too much Cool Whip and by the time I got to the end of the dessert I had too much Snickers. I think next time I might add some caramel syrup to it to get more of the caramel apple feel.

4. Mummy Dogs: I just made these yesterday for a Kids Halloween party. Super easy and cute. I used turkey dogs to make them a little bit healthier, but what's one mummy dog gonna hurt.


Once we get a more steady income, I decided to set aside one day a week for Pinterest projects. This way I can hold myself accountable to actually making something rather than mindlessly pinning pictures. It will be fun to finally start checking things off my list.

Felicity's Quilt

So first of all, our daughter's name is Felicity. Yes, it was inspired by my favorite TV show. It's not my fault it's the most beautiful name and right now not that many people have it. It means "happiness", "joy", "bliss", etc. Her middle name will be Sarai, which means "my princess". So she will be our princess of happiness.

Now that that is out of the way, her quilt is finished. I sewed the quilt top together myself and was pretty happy with how it turned out. This time instead of finishing the quilt myself, I paid somebody to do it. Liam's quilt was just too much work for the little machine I had and honestly, I didn't have the energy to finish it. So the people I used provided the batting,backing fabric and thread, quilted it all together with a pattern, and even did the binding. So what probably took me a month to do with Liam's quilt, was done in one week. I am really happy with how it all turned out. The quilt pattern I chose looks great and doesn't take away from the beautifulness of the fabric. Now I just need a little girl to put on top of it.

(All the pictures are taken with my iphone so they aren't that great, but maybe later we will do a real photo shoot)

The full quilt. I used about 12 different Echino fabrics in the colors green, teal, purple, and pink. I was trying to make it babyish and girly, but I couldn't stay away from all that color.


A close up of some of the fabrics. The thread color we chose was like this purple/wine color. It did a great job of blending in with the patterns on the front.


For the back I chose lavender. The thread really stands out and you can see the pattern of flowers and vines.


How the front and back look together.

They did the binding using a machine and put this little pattern on it. I think it's a nice little touch.

Another quilt down. The professional look of this one makes me want to redo Liam's but that seems a bit crazy. I guess the homemade look is cool too.

SYTYCD Season 8

I haven't said anything about SYTYCD yet this season, but it's been great. I love the new format with the mix of dancing as a couple and then with the All Stars. I really don't want to say much but share my favorites from this season.

First of all, from last night



This didn't get as much praise as it should of



Classic Lyrical Hip Hop from NappyTabs


Ryan totally rocked it in this one


I think Clarice and Robert were perfect in this Bollywood


I really could care less about Ricky in this routine, it's all about Allison for me. She's amazing. I love the tension in her body.


Just fierce


I'm sure there are much more, but these are the ones I really liked

New Quilt

My new project is making a quilt for the baby girl. There is a designer that makes the most beautiful fabric and I've been dying to use them. There are 12 different prints that are a mix a purple, green, blue and pink. Its not really baby girl colors but I'm hoping it will be something she uses for a while. All of my fabric came in this week and I've been endlessly cutting it up. I'm pretty excited to start sewing. Hopefully it turns out as well as it looks in my head.

Eventless Planner

During our year in Orlando, we had the opportunity to do a lot of assessment tests to see where our skills and strengths are. It turns out my skills are planning, organizing, and creating. While we were considering our future and Dylan was leaning towards leaving staff and doing graphic design, I kind of freaked out because that meant that I would have to get a job. And I had no idea what I would be good out. But after going through these tests I thought, Hey I think I would be good at event planning. It's something that I'm interested in and excites me. Thankfully God lead us down another road, to a future that is much more rewarding.

However, I find that event planning is something that still lingers in me. I'm always thinking of party plans, watching wedding shows, looking up ideas online, etc. But I am planning events for no one. I have a bookmark tab that is full of websites, but I've never been able to use them. As I added another website to my list, I started to worry if I would every have the opportunity to throw someone a shower, plan a wedding, or a birthday party. No one has ever asked me and I feared that no one will. As I shared my disappointment with Dylan, he told me the simplest things, "Go to God with it". I've been incredibly blessed to have a husband that is fully saturating himself in the gospel and is able to speak hopeful truth to me. He assured me that if God gave me these skills and desires, that he had a purpose in them. Maybe I will be able to use them in different ways.

As I write this, I feel like it may come across as something very trivial. But anyone who has been passionate about doing something but can't figure out how to make it come to be will sympathize with me. If only I had the money I would just throw awesome parties for myself.

Arts and Crafts Day

Liam and I attempted some arts and crafts today. Needless to say it didn't go as planned. I bought him some new Toy Story paper and a set of watercolors. We sat down and all he wanted to do was dip the paintbrush in the water. So I thought maybe I should make some finger paint. I mixed yogurt with some food coloring in a little pallet and immediately when I set it on the table Liam stuck his finger in it and ate it. He didn't even hesitate. Finger painting quickly turned into paint eating. Maybe he's not ready for all this, but he had a good time.

Liam's Quilt

I meant to put these pictures up a long time ago since I finished Liam's quilt in February. I had great dreams of having this photo shoot with it so you could really see the the whole thing, but that hasn't happened and three months have passed. I said while I was working on this that I never wanted to do a quilt again, but now I'm having the itch. The learning curve was big, but I think I could do one again in less time. Also, maybe I need to make the next one bigger since this quilt only has room for Liam and I.

This was a trial run of laying out the fabric to see what it would look like together. This was before the solids were added.

Here is all the fabric with solids and my plan for attack. You are really supposed to do this at random, but I wanted all the colors to be distributed evenly.

My first strip sewn together. Only 9 more to go.

My collection of strips

Skip a few steps ahead and this is me quilting all the layers together. A very long process

A horrible picture of the finished product with black binding and a solid grey back. I like how it came out, just wish it was a little bigger. Oh well, maybe next time.

A Quilter I am Not

I have ventured into the world of quilting and I don't think I like it. I enjoyed picking out the colors, fabric and creating the designed. I was okay with cutting a bunch of squares and sewing them together into something beautiful. But putting it all together with the batting and the pinning and the taping was not fun. The quilt I'm making was too hefty for the machine I have so it wouldn't feed through properly and kept pulling cause it was so heavy. So all my lines are crooked :( Oh well. The next time I do a quilt I will just piece together the top and send it to a quilt shop to be "quilted". Lesson learned

Thank you Ree Drummond

Thank you Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman, for your photos, recipes, craft projects and all around awesomeness. And thank you also, for creating an impossible standard for bloggers. I mean who has time to do all that? Honestly who has time to take and upload photos, make food, homeschool your kids, clean your house, love your husband, AND blog about it all EVERYDAY. It's crazy. I barely have time to take a shower. I will never be as good as you at blogging and I'm okay with that.

Liam's Taggie Blanket

This weeks project was to make Liam a taggie blanket. Since I loved all the fabric I recently got I couldn't decide on one and just made a patchwork on one side. I loved the way it turned out, just wish the fabrics were a little softer. I also learned 1. that I can't sew a straight line and 2. working with soft fuzzy fabrics isn't easy.

All the strips laid out

The top all stiched together

The back was white minky fabric and I got all the ribbon from Jo Anns.

The contrast of the front and back

I attached some velcro to hold a pacifier or to attach to a stroller.

Fabric Frenzy

So I might be a little obsessed with fabrics as of late. I've been wanting to make Liam a baby blanket for a while so I started searching for fabrics online. Boy did I get in over my head. I literally spent hours/days looking at fabric online before I made a decision. And since I liked so many fabrics my decision was to make 2 different blankets; one taggie and one quilt. Through all my researching I fell in love with patchwork quilts. They don't look like grandma blankets and they seem easy. I've never made a quilt before but we'll see how it turns out. I am anxiously awaiting my fabric in the mail and until then I am learning all I can about about blanket and quilt making.

Fabric for Taggie Blanket

Fabric for quilt

Thanksgiving Photos

Here are a few pictures from Thanksgiving. We didn't do a good job taking pictures because we were so busy. And none of them are edited, oh well.

Neither of us had cooked a turkey before so we were a little intimidated.

Disgusting

We almost dropped the turkey putting it in

Our cutie all dressed up. He busted his eye the night before and started getting sick that morning so it was a great day for him.

Our fancy place settings

The turkey was beautiful. Dylan had already started carving it before we realized that we hadn't taken a picture of it yet.

The hostesses.

Christmas stockings

My project this week has been Christmas stockings. I saw some on Etsy that I liked and decided to try to make them. Dylan's stocking is made out of burlap and some wool. It was super easy to make and my best sewing job to date. I was really happy with how it turned out. Mine on the other hand was a little more difficult. I had an idea but couldn't find a picture of what I wanted to do so I just made it up as I went. After many days and hours of trying to figure out the flower arrangement, I just now committed and sewed everything down. I really like it. It's rustic, girly, and vintagey (sp?).

Now I just need to Liam's. His is going to be an elf shoe with some bells. It should be the easiest one

Officially Fall

When I woke up this morning it was 60 degrees outside!!!! Hooray. I quickly put on a sweater and took Liam outside to soak it all up. Memories of college in the fall quickly flashed back to my mind. I remember freshman year, moving my bed under the window so I could sleep with the cold air blowing on me. I would study with the window open listening to Diana Krall. So naturally, I cracked open all of our windows and put some jazz music on. This is fall to me. All I need is a pumpkin spice latte (but I probably shouldn't since I had one yesterday). I am contemplating making pumpkin spice cupcakes again though. :)

Last night I think I made one of my favorite dinners. So easy and fresh. I was too busy eating it that I forgot to take a picture so I stole one from the website. They are mini pizzas with fresh grape tomatoes, arugula, and pecorino. I just bought some pizza dough from the Publix deli, about $2.60 for a pound and it made 4 mini pizzas. I loved it the way it was, but of course Dylan was wondering where the meat was. So I think next time we make it I'll put some Italian sausage on his. Top it of with a nice glass of Chianti and it's a great, easy, and light dinner.


Individual Pizzas with Arugula, Pecorino, and Tomatoes
from Martha Stewart

Ingredients:

Olive oil, for baking sheet and for serving (optional for serving)

1 cup grape tomatoes

Coarse salt and ground pepper

4 individual pizza shells from 1 pound Whole-Wheat Pizza Dough, fresh or frozen

1/4 teaspoon red-pepper flakes

3 cups baby arugula

3 ounces shaved Pecorino Romano cheese

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, for serving

Directions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Turn a large baking sheet upside down; rub with oil. Using your hands, crush tomatoes into a pulp in a small bowl; season with salt and pepper.

Spread crushed tomatoes on pizza shells; sprinkle with red-pepper flakes. Bake until crusts are golden, 18 to 20 minutes.

In a bowl, toss arugula with Pecorino; top pizzas with salad. Drizzle with vinegar and, if desired, oil.

Read more at Marthastewart.com: Individual Pizzas with Pecorino, Arugula, and Tomatoes - Martha Stewart Recipes

Baby Food

My latest hobby has been making baby food. It allows me to put my creativity to good use. The resources I've been using are Wholesome Baby Food and Baby Love. This weekend I may have gone a little overboard with the baby food making. My mom came and stayed with me while Dylan was away, so I used the extra help to get as much food as I could made. For like $35 I got enough supplies to make butternut squash, carrots, apple-prunes, plums, peaches/mango/pineapple, and pears. I seriously think I made enough butternut squash to last all winter, oh well. There's great satisfaction in knowing that Liam is having yummy, wholesome food that even I would want to eat. Seriously, the fruit is like little popsicles. I've been often tempted to steal one of his cubes of plums. So here is everything I made this weekend (plus the peas I made last week). We'll see how long it will last, Liam is packing it in these days.

Lately

I'm attempting to write my first blog in like 10 days. Things have been a little hectic lately. I'm sure that Liam will wake up from his nap while I'm writing this, so I'm gonna keep it short and sweet. Last week was the week of visitors. My parents, Dylan's parents, and my brother and sister-in-love all visited during different times. Let's just say that Liam wasn't lacking attention. It was so great to have lots of hands to help but yesterday was really hard to recover.

I've been keeping myself busy learning to juggle taking care of Liam, keeping my house in order, making food, and getting life organized. One of the projects that I finished this week was a peg board for the kitchen. Our apt only has 3 drawers so I had to figure out something to do with all my kitchen gadgets. It was really easy to do and only cost about $30.

All the supplies

Dylan helped with all the drilling

The final product painted green (I couldn't resist)

Every Wednesday we get together as LHS for some development. Last Wednesday we were privileged to hear from Dr. Jim Coffield. He is a counseling professor at RTS here in Orlando. His talk was good, but the Q & A afterwards was great. One of the things that he said was "Sometimes I love the story of the redemption rather than the redeemer." And that is so true of my life. I find myself loving the gospel more than the one who created it. It's so easy to get caught up in the work and the mission instead of just loving Jesus. He also touched on parenting which was exactly what I needed to hear right now. Here are a just a couple of snippets:

"Parenting is more about you being faithful then how your kids turn out. It should be measured by faithfulness, not results"
"Our sacrificing is for out behalf not our kids"
"Maybe God just wants our hearts to be broken about parenting"

This is liberating. There is no formula for having the perfect child, and it's not my job to produce the perfect child. I just need to be faithful to the charge that God has given me.

Our group listening to Dr. Coffield

Purple Velvet

It has been a long time since I've made cupcakes and was so excited for a reason to make them this weekend. In honor of a friends upcoming wedding, I made purple velvet cupcakes. Well, red velvet is my favorite, but purple was one of the colors in her wedding so I decided to switch it up a bit. Now, I'm not one to make cupcake batter so I always use a box mix because decorating is more fun. I started with a red velvet mix and figured I would add blue food coloring to it. FAIL. The batter turned out maroonish. So I moved on to Plan B. I used a white cake mix, dyed it purple and added about 1.5 tbsps of unsweetened cocoa. I could have added more but the batter was starting to turn brownish. I used these white damask baking cups that I found at Michaels and they actually made about 18 cupcakes instead of 24. I topped the cupcakes with Paula Dean's cream cheese frosting and edible purple glitter. They came out great. I only wish I had made more.

Before the frosting. The batter kind of looked like poi, but tasted way better.

The finished product.

Today Show Finds

I watch the Today show everyday and love it because I always find something new whether it's websites, food, music, etc. Here are some of the great finds of today.

1. Wine Coasters (www.dimmalimm.us)

These are a great alternative to wine glass charms and are a coaster within themselves so you don't have to worry about water rings on your tables. They come in a set of six different colors: light pink, mint, yellow, orange, moss, strawberry.








2. City Pass (www.citypass.com)

If you're a person who loves attractions and museums, this is the thing for you. You can save up to 50% off ticket prices of attractions in 11 cities. Unfortunately Orlando isn't one of the cities, but maybe one day it will be.






3. Sideshow Press (www.sideshowpress.com)

Just 3 ladies and a letterpress in Charleston, SC. You do wholesale orders, custom designs, and even have some products available on Etsy.com