Preparations

Our home these last few months has been nothing short of a flurry of activity and self care. Of slowing down and knowing when to say “I can’t”. And I’ve been preparing and getting everything in order and ready for the birth of our little one. Spring may not be here yet because the cold of winter wants to keep its icy grip tight a little while longer, but this mama is dreaming of warmer weather and is ready to welcome her little Spring baby into the world.

It’s hard to believe that we’re into a single digit countdown these days. 9 days today to be exact. I’ll be honest, I am anxious and really nervous. It’s been 9 years since we’ve had an infant in this house and 9 years since I’ve had to heal from a c-section. At the same time, it’s not just the fact we’re having a baby that’s driving the nerves a bit. I think I’m more nervous about the decisions I will be making (like breastfeeding or pumping this time around) and having to go back to work in 8 weeks after my maternity leave runs out (I miss being a stay at home mom). But at the same time, we’re in a different place in our lives than we were 9 years ago. And though I worry constantly about our guy being a big brother and how their relationship will be, every now and then he surprises me with how much he’s really looking forward to having a little sister.

The other day I showed him the latest sonogram of his little sister and when I told him how long we have left to wait until we get to meet her, he was just over come with emotion and started to shed tears. I asked him what was wrong, and he just looked at me and said “I’m just so happy to be finally having a little sister. I can’t wait until she’s finally here.” (Yeah that triggered my own tears, thank you hormones)

In the midst of all the chaos, things are slowly coming together. We’re still making her nursery perfect and getting the finishing touches in it (it only took me 9 months to finally find a crib set we liked), like storage bins for the shelf and such. But I’m pleased with how it’s coming along. Her room is the smallest in the house, but with a little bit of mama cleverness, I’m hoping that it’ll be one very cozy little nursery.

The nursery from the hallway

You remember the lace lampshade? Yup that’s finally hanging now and I just love how it looks in her bedroom.


There are also little treasures that were taken from other parts of the house and brought into her little bedroom like the little hummingbird light that will be perfect for night time feedings. And the wing back chair that was given to us by my Oma and Opa.  The curtain? That was a twin bed sheet that I sewn in half and added some purple ribbon ties.
 


Mama handmade goodness is scattered throughout her nursery with much more to come I’m sure as she gets bigger. I still have a number of things I’m working on, including a crochet blanket I’m still working on for her. 


                                                                                   The mobile after needing to adjust the length

When we found out we were having a little girl, I knew she needed some little faeries to dance about her room. So what does any crafty mama do? Make a faery mobile!
 

 
                       Each of the faeries made from muslin and felt


                              




                         The mobile after finished

 There are other handmade touches, like the hand painted P above the crib and soon to be artwork that aren’t finished yet.


Her room may not be completely finished like I had wished it would be, but by the time she is ready to sleep in her room, it will be perfect! So here’s to the last 9 days as a family of 3 before we become a family of 4!!

DIY Doily Lamp Shade

 

In our house, we don’t have over head lights in the bedrooms unless we’ve put them there. In the bedrooms, the light switches are connected to one of the outlets.  But with the baby’s room, I want a hanging light to save on space. Because frankly, her room is the smallest room in the house and it could use all the space saving it could get. My original idea was for a pretty little cream and crystal chandelier like the one below. But these days, I don’t have the money to spend on something like this. So the next option.. DIY!

Image from Luxoz.com

I’ve seen them all over Pinterest and Google. My original idea was to just to get a large paper lantern and glue some pretty paper flowers to it or to make a twine lampshade. But thanks to chatting with one of my friend’s at work, the idea to use doilies popped back into my head. And what do you know, we just happen to have some for $1.00. Lucky for me I found some white ones!

So armed with 10 doilies, Elmer’s all purpose glue, a paper bowl, some waxed paper, a punching balloon, and a roll of packing tape, a sponge brush, I went to town!

I loved using the punching balloon. I was able to get the size I wanted for the lampshade that would fit perfectly in the baby’s room without it loosing the round shape unlike normal balloons. And being that it’s made for punching, it was thicker than your normal balloon and wouldn’t pop. Lucky for me, it came as a twin pack, so if for whatever reason it did pop, I had a back up. And to make sure that it was completely round, I put a couple pieces of masking tape over the spout to keep it from popping out.

I used a watered down glue mixture because that’s what I had on hand and the idea for this whole thing was to keep it cheap without having to get expensive glues and such. I mixed the glue and water in batches, being that my doilies were on a thicker side, they soaked up quite a bit of glue. Dropped a doily in the bowl full of my glue mixture and worked it until it was covered in glue and placed it on the balloon, with each new doily added over lapping the last.

The roll of packing tape helped hold the balloon up until I added more doilies. Then the balloon would be heavy on one side and I’d have to constantly readjust it. So I’d layer more doilies on and readjust the balloon.

 

This is about the point I realized I had a slight problem. I didn’t have enough doilies (I originally picked up 8 thinking it was going to be enough) and I ran out of glue. Sigh.. don’t we all just love miscalculations? So what’s a girl to do when you can’t continue until you get more doilies? String it up so it keeps it’s form! I grabbed my curved sewing needle and some super strong thread and threaded the edges of the doilies to keep them close to the balloon until I got more doilies and glue.

 

Fast forward 24 hours (give or take a few), an additional 2 doilies and a huge bottle of glue later, the lampshade is now drying! I’m going to give the lampshade another good 24 hours of dry time before letting the air out of the balloon and attaching it to the cord kit.

So what did I learn from all this?

~ Thicker doilies require less water added to the glue. The first few doilies kept sliding off the balloon or the edges wouldn’t stay overlapped because there was too much water in the mix. Again with my curved sewing needle and thread, I’d carefully sew the edges that overlapped down with a knot.

~ A foam sponge brush makes applying the doilies a bit cleaner than using your hands. But I enjoyed getting messy anyway!

~ Patience, patience, patience is key!

Over all I’m thrilled with how it’s turned out so far. To make sure it’s doubly secure after it’s dried, I might take my needle and thread and just knot a few of the edges on the newer doilies to the original set so it’s all secure and won’t fall apart on me. I can’t wait until it’s completely dried and installed in the baby’s room.

All lit and ready to hang. I’ll post a picture once it’s hanging and hopefully with a finished bedroom!

 

 

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: DIY,Tutorial,Baby,Doily Lampshade

Crochet Baby Poncho

 

A few years ago, I stumbled ( I say stumbled because to this day I forget what I was actually looking for, but that’s beside the point) upon the cutest little poncho that I’ve been pining over ever since. The problem then, I didn’t know anyone at the time who was having girls so that I could make one or millions. Everyone I knew at the time was having little boys. I may be the “best mama in the whole wide world” (to directly quote the kiddo), but my request to make a poncho for the kiddo would fall on deaf ears.

So it sat, bookmarked on my web browser for what seemed like forever. But when we found out we were having a little girl, I knew EXACTLY what I wanted to make for her and I knew the perfect yarn. I had 2 skeins of yarn in 2 colors  that I bought some 8 years ago when I was pregnant with the kiddo. Originally thinking I was going to make a blanket or something for him. Yeah that never happened and since then I’ve lost the labels on the yarn and lost one skein of the pinky color when our basement flooded some years back. And so the yarn sat in my plastic yarn bin, waiting for inspiration to strike when I’d want to use it for something.

I absolutely loved the mix of the pale pink and pale blue that gave the yarn a light purple color. The problem, I didn’t think I had enough because I only had 1 skein of it. But lucky for me, I was able to find some yarn that was similar in texture and thickness at work. So I dove right in. Of course there was another problem. I didn’t know how to make granny squares. Nor did I know how to double crochet. I only knew how to single crochet and the only thing I knew how to crochet was scarves. That’s it! Nothing more.

But there is a wonderful tool called Google and You Tube so I set about learning how to crochet granny squares and double crochet. Which are pretty easy in fact. I don’t know why I never tried to learn them before.

 

And so Persephone’s (yup! Our daughter is going to be named after a Greek goddess. It’s only fair, her brother was named after a Norse god) poncho is finished. It’s a bit larger than I thought it was going to be, but that’s ok. She will get more wear out of it that way. And I love how cushy and warm the poncho feels. It’ll be perfect for autumn afternoons romping around the yard or going for walks.

Now that I’ve finished it, which took maybe 3 days total in the end (1 evening after work to make the granny squares, 1 evening to sew them together and start the edges, and 1 afternoon before work to finish the bottom edge and weave in all the ends), I might just have to make one for me! Because let’s be honest, I’m a bit jealous now! But that will have to wait as this mama has other projects in the process of being worked on, including one that uses the yellow green yarn that I bought at the same time as the purplish one that I just used.

So here’s to the start of a productive and creative 2014!

 

 

 

 

Technorati Tags: crochet,baby poncho,crochet poncho