Handmade Christmas

Every year for Christmas I make myself crazy trying to make Christmas presents for everyone on my list.  My husband begs me every year... "can we please just buy that?"  This year a little voice in my head is telling me to back off and do your Christmas shopping at Target like everyone else.

But I can't do it!

Seriously!  Something's wrong with me!  After all, I do have a new baby to take care of (not to mention the 1 yr old, and the 3 crazy boys!)  My house is sort of falling apart... the boys broke another window today bringing the count to 3 broken windows in less than 3 months!  And my husband is threatening to take away my computer if I don't stay away from Made & Ana-White!

So this year I've agreed to take it easy... kind of.

Here's what my list looks like:

Family tree-  I do these every year for my husband's very large family.  It doesn't require any genealogy research or anything like that.  It simply lists my husband's parents at the base and the families of their 6 children on the branches.  I try to mix it up and do something different every year and do a LOT of idea shopping on Etsy.  Later this week I'll show you a couple of ideas and how to get them yourself on the cheap!

Paper dolls-  I've found a really cool way to make paper dolls that look like my nieces favorite teen celebrities on the Disney channel.  These are pretty easy to make (even easier if you've got a Quickutz Silhouette!!)  and I'll be posting a tutorial on how to make these either magnetic or clingy!  So much fun!!

Freezer Paper Stencil Shirts-  If you've got teenagers on your list, this is the way to go!!  Super cheap and super easy.  There's a ton of tutorials online for how to do this but I'll share some ideas that won't get you laughed at by a 15 yr old and I can almost guarantee they'll actually wear!

Guess Who- Family Style!  I'm stealing this idea from a fellow blogger at ObSEUSSed but it involves swapping out the game pieces with pictures of family members.  I can't wait to start on this so I can play it... "Do you have a big nose" "no.  Are you old?"  Ha!  It's going to be hilarious!

 

And a ton of building projects from Ana-White.  I'll be building the entire kitchen set for my little girl, the dress-up cart for my 5 yr old niece and the workbench for my 1 1/2 yr old nephew.  The best part is we already have all the wood and the plans are super easy and FREE to build!

But I still need ideas for: 

my husband- the networking computer dork in denial

my mom- the hard working lady who taught me everything I know about being about being a genuine cheapskate

my little sister- that gorgeous, fun chick every momma wants to be 

my father-in-law- your typical guys guy... spends a lot of time mowing the lawn, thinking about the lawn and talking about the lawn and watching baseball (if it's too dark outside to mow the lawn)

Any ideas?

So, what are you working on for Christmas?

Gravity

Do you ever have one of those extra weepy, extra hormonal kind of days?   Those days that your emotions are so shot that you start questioning your sanity or perhaps run out and buy an ept?

Yep. Today was one of those days for me.

I think I woke up having a bit of a pity party for myself.  Pouting and whining about all the crap I want but can't seem to touch.  Meanwhile, everything I begged and pleaded with God for in my prayers is running around naked and enjoying life on the couch.

It's crazy scary how much you can miss out on while feeling sorry for yourself.  Somewhere in the middle of my day this song started playing and put some things back into perspective for me.

twice as much ain't twice as good

And can't sustain like a one half could

It's wanting more

That's gonna send me to my knees

And so, like magic I snapped out of it.  The world was right again. 

I was able to enjoy my little naked kids hanging out on the couch.  I watched the entire Spy Kids part 2 movie without rolling my eyes. 

I made my deep fried chimichangas without beating myself over the lack of a nutritious meal .  And ate said chimichangas with 5 crazy kids... 2 screaming, 2 whining and the other talking about boogers without wishing I was someone else. 

We ate apple pie on the living room floor and I didn't have a spaz attack when Livi dropped her plate and then stepped on her syrupy apples, squishing them into the rug. 

After my dinner/movie date with the kids we got our PJs on and drove to daddy's work... we decided the apple pie was just too good for him to miss out on. 

And I carried each and every one of my 5 sleeping babies from the car to their bed and thanked them for an amazing day.

Why would anyone waste any of their precious time wanting more than this?

Just keep me where the light is.

The Wackadoo Dress

So Project Runway has been over with now for about a month now right?  But I still can't seem to get Mondo's collection off my mind.  Every piece was full of life and color and energy and made me smile.

Put together by I'd Rather be Shopping

The judges went back and forth for a while but eventually Heidi and Jessica gave in and Gretchen (bleh) won.  But something that stood out to me during the judges deliberations... Nina Garcia kept asking who would buy Mondo's clothes.  She said his line was "too young".

 Who?  Mondo?

While I couldn't disagree with her more, she got my wheels turning.  I may be too old to pull off any of the looks Mondo sent down the runway (by Nina's standards of course) but my little model could totally rock his look!

And so the Wackadoo Dress was born and I just love how it turned out, don't you?

It's a pretty little boat neck dress with 3/4" sleeves.  It's hard to see from the pictures (I had to chase that silly little girl around to get these pictures) but the sleeves have a pop of hot pink underneath them.

Do you think it's Mondo enough?  Maybe she needs a crazy headband with a giant flower or stacked blocks? 

Hmmm... maybe not... maybe something like this...

Embroidery design from Urban Threads

Thrifty Thursday

I know, I know... How original.  But I love reading about all the lucky finds and always find myself wanting to share my own.

PLUS this week I found the most amazing thing at a garage sale this week.  You probably wont even believe me because most women only dream of finding this very item at a garage sale.  And if you could find one at a garage sale chances are it wouldn't be only $20!

Can you guess what it is?

Here's a hint...

Need another?

Okay one more...

That's right... it's a Professional Series Kitchenaid Stand Mixer.  This bad boy has the power and capacity to make 8lbs of mashed potatoes.  I opted instead to make a massive guitar shaped cake for my 3 year old's party.

I warned that you wouldn't believe me!  The best $20 I've ever spent.  Today I think I'll take the previous owner a mountain of cake balls to show my appreciation.

So... should I feel guilty? 

Spell it Out For Them

When I was still pregnant and planning our hospital stay I knew the boys would be coming to visit us and see their new brother. I wanted to make them "big brother" shirts but couldn't find anything that didn't look babyish or completely dorky.  Then I remembered making shirts for the boys a couple of years ago with each of their names on the chest.  They loved them and wore them until the letters started to peel and the shirts barely reached the top of their pants. 

To start your alphabet art shirt you first have to compile your letters. There’s plenty of ways to do this from photographing your own letters to searching online through royalty photos. But the easiest way to do this is to go to Spell with Flickr. It’s a really cool generator program that lets you simply type in a word and it will search through Flikr for the letters you need.

Type your word in the white box and hit spell and see what you get!

Cool huh?

Now you can choose to keep these letters like they are or if you are trying to use all one color or simply don’t like the look of one of the letters you can click and change each letter individually.

But beware! Once you change a letter it’s gone and you cant find it again unless it randomly comes back up again!

After you’re happy with your alphabet art scroll you are ready to save your code!

Scroll down and find the large box filled with a bunch of letters and words you don't understand... this is your code!  Click within the box and it should highlight the whole thing (if not or if you double click you'll have to manually highlight all the text... not at all difficult but pretty annoying).  Now right click and select "copy".

Now you’ve got your code.

Now open up the notepad on your computer and paste your code here.  It will probably paste as one big long line and that's A-okay... don't fix it!  Just save your notepad as an html document.  To do that you just click "save as", tell it where to save and name it _____.html  I named mine "hello.html"

Now close your notepad and open the file you just saved.  It should open up your default internet browser and you should see your beautiful name! 

How exciting right?

Next  you're going to get your letters ready for printing!  Go to "Print Preview" under the file section of your browser.  Chances are your letters are going to be too small.  Click the pull down menu that reads "shrink to size" to resize your letters.  It'll take a little bit of playing with to get the sizing to where you want it and you may need to print your letters on regular paper to really know how big they are.

Once you're happy with the size of your letters you can print it out on your iron on transfer paper!

I prefer to use the dark t-shirt transfer sheets (even if I’m not using a dark shirt!) With these you don’t have to flip or mirror your image… you simply print cut and iron!

After you print your image on the transfer sheet, cut out each letter so no white shows, peel off the back and position your letters on the shirt.

I like to overlap a bit and rotate them so they are tilted to the right and left and look fun but they also look good just straight up and down!

Now follow the instructions for the transfer sheets and iron those letters on and you're done!
 
Well that was my first tutorial!  What'd you think?  Did I totally lose you?  Was it completely lame?  If you liked it let me know!  And if you run out and make one I'd love to see how it turns out!!

I'd like you to meet: Jacob

When I was pregnant with my first baby I imagined in my head that he would look mostly like my husband.  Mexican, with darker skin, brown eyes and straight black hair.

So when Mikey was born with light brown hair, fair skin and bright blue eyes I was shocked to say the least!  A year and a half later Elijah was born and looked exactly like Mikey only with blond hair.

And then came Jacob.

The moment he was born (three years ago this week) they placed him on my chest and I couldn't believe what I saw... a head full of jet black hair.  He instantly looked like the spitting image of my husband and still does.

This handsome little man is the most nurturing of my 5 kids and does an amazing job taking care of his little sister and baby brother.  He has a mischevious side to him and when we don't hear him running around like a wild man, we know something is wrong.

Happy Birthday Jacob!

Remember Me?

So it's been a year now since I've posted on my pretty little blog. I came back a couple of times to look at it... it sure is cute. I hate to let a good thing go to waste.


Sooo can I try this again? I promise to ummm... well promise is a BIG word... but I'll try to do better. I have so much I want to share with you!


Like this little guy

Yep in the year that I've been gone I've managed to get pregnant, bake and give birth to a beautiful baby boy! And now... believe it or not... I am now a mommy to 5 kids!!

I know, I know, things are crazy around here. Crazy good.

What have you been up to?