shame on me

So first off, a great big sorry to everyone for being super super super late on my giveaways. Lets just say that I cut it pretty darn close on our Halloween celebrations! Here's a pic of everyone nearly dressed and ready to go to the carnival.

Please ignore the fact that I look as though I had totally given up on myself-it was a long day and carrying around a 25 pound baby for like 4 hours isn't easy!

We don't really do trick or treating here, the houses are too spread out and it's pretty cold so we go up to the University and they do trick or treating in the dormitories. They also run a cute little indoor carnival and a haunted house. Best of all, it's free!

I promise to have some giveaways posted on Sunday. There will be more than one, so when you leave a comment, just let me know which ones you'd like to be entered for. I look foward to revealing some homemade goodies to you folks this weekend!

I hope everyone had a terribly fun, super safe, and a tiny bit spooky Halloween!

Winner Announced...

The winner of Gift Giveaway #2 is....Eema-le. Congrats! Thanks to everyone who entered. I was SOOOO excited to see more than like 2 names posted. Who would have guessed!

Eema-le, as soon as I get your info, I will mail it out.

Stay tuned for the next giveaway (it will likely be delayed since posting a giveaway without pictures of what you're actually giving away is really lame).

welcome kelty

A few days back The Yimmy came home with another addition to our family, a georgeous little blue totie cat named Kelty. It was definately not love at first sight for her and Rupert. I have kept her arrival underwraps for a bit because it wasn't looking like a match made in heaven at first. Well things have changed.

She just adores Stinker and lays with Thing 1 everynight while she falls asleep. We are not completely sold on her name, so this weekend we will be having a family vote to change it. She really is a wonderful little kitty and is settling in well.

In other pet related news, I have moved our two bunnies from our garage into our greenhouse. I would love to have them in the house with us, but our house is old and gets unbareably hot at times. I would rather not come home to find them "sleeping". The greenhouse is attached to our dining room by a large glass door.

It stays pretty much between 40-70 degrees at all times. They love it! They have no cage, they get to just run around and look out the windows, dig in the raised beds and generally make a huge mess with the straw. They have also learned how to climb the three steps that lead to the door, so when you are sitting down eating dinner, you will generally find a furry critter or two staring at your food. Gosh they are cute!

I just ordered a new memory card reader, so hopefully I will have pics up and running again soon. Blog posts just seem off with all these words and no lovely pics to go with them.

happy halloweenie stinker

Since this is Stinker's first Halloween, I really was torn as to what he should be. I wanted it to be super cute, and obviously something that I made for him. I made Thing 1 and Thing 2's costumes last year, and am doing so again this year. But Stinker's is different. I get to choose what he will be. This may be the only time that happens as I am sure in future years he will have his own opinions.

So this year he will be a turtle. Partly because who doesn't love a baby dressed as a turtle and partly because since he was born I called him my little turtle due to this wierd neck thing that he did that reminded me so much of a turtle poking out of a shell. See?

Okay, so maybe you don't see it. Apparently, no one else does either. But that's okay. I'm his mom and I guess it's normal to come up with little nicknames for your kids.

And so this is this years costume. Sorry there is no pics of him in it. He was sleeping at first. Then when he woke up I got some of him all dressed, but then my card reader went to shit. So....I guess I'd say not to expect too many pics over the next few days.

I used a McCall's snowsuit pattern. I added a tail and some "toenails" to his mitts and feet. The shell was made by draping remanant fleece over a basket and pinning until I got a shape that I liked. The green fleece was in my stash. The mustard was leftover from a baby blanket I made for a friend a while back and the brown was leftover from a fleece jacket I made for myself. I'm really really really happy with how it all turned out. I made an Large but since he is only 5months old, I was worried he's look like a partially skinned turtle. But alas, he's a chunklet and it's not nearly as big on him as I thought.

P.S. the L is like 12-18 months or something like that. I'll dig up the pattern specs a little later and post them in case anyone is interested in tackling a baby snowsuit. It's really not that hard. I lost like 2/3 of the directions and still got it together. So I'm convinced that a somewhat experienced beginner can work it out.

* The pattern is McCall's M5220. It's sized from Newborn (8-12 pounds)to Large (22-25 pounds) in one envelope. It seems to be a pretty true fit. It works up fairly quick, the longest part is probably lining up the snaps! They can be a real pain in the ass!

How does he fit in his carseat with that you ask? Because I'm lazy and didn't want to add buttons, velcro or snaps, I just used diaper pins to attach it to his little back. I probably wouldn't rec. safety pins, diaper pins are made so babies can't really undo them.

I have just a wee bit of handsewing left to do, then this goes into the "FINISHED" pile. *breath a sigh of relief* One project down, like nine trillion to go....

Handmade Holiday Gift Giveaway #2

Yay! It's finally done (mostly). It's the Wein Library Bag. The only unfinished part is the library card holder, but I promise to have it done and in the package when this gets mailed out.

The main fabric is made from a twin sized dust ruffle. The polka dot is a remanat from my stash and the lining is some vintage goodness from my stash as is the big brown button. It's called the Wien Library Bag in honor of our local library that me and the kids visit at least once a week. It has one large pleat in the center front with a smaller tacked down pleat on each side seam. It's the perfect size for toting library books or whatever else needs a cute bag.

If you'd like a chance to win this neato tote, leave me a comment. I'll pick a random winner Saturday morning. Good luck!

Slacking Already!

Okay, so I know I said a new giveaway will be announced every Sunday, BUT...I'm not quite done with it. Stinker is teething again. He already has his lower incisors and now the ones on the left and the right of those are coming in.

And so this is what my days are filled with at the moment....

Needless to say, my sewing time is pretty irregular! I hope to announce it tomorrow afternoon. Sorry folks. Stinker says sorry too!

Winner Announced

The kiddos have spoken. The winner is The Lindahl News who said:

"Love the bibs! Pefect for our soon-to-be-born first grand-daughter (Yippee!)Answer to the question? I would like to be OCTOPUS WOMAN!!! Why? Because it would give me 6 more arms to carry, sew, hold books, cook, rake, clap, hug than I presently have!!!" (The kids thought that this was super funny!)

I will be mailing out your bibs ASAP as soon as I get your address. Congrats to the soon to be grandbaby too! And seriously, who wouldn't want 6 more arms?

Please be sure to check back tomorrow for the Handmade Holiday Gift Giveaway #2!