Santa!!

We just met Santa, well actually we saw two different Santas in one day!  This one (try #2) was "nice" per Chloe so she was willing to sit on his lap for a photo.  Yay!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!!

Trying to get that perfect shot

When photographing kids I think the best motto is: "It isn't the outcome, but the journey that matters".  That or maybe "take as many photos as possible in the blind hope that jut one will turn out!".  I try to embrace both mottos every time :)  This was the outcome.

 Drool is a constant at month 4!

 Goofy Chloe.  It is hard to get a straight face from her these days.

 "Oh Geez Mom!"

Advent Calendar done!!

I have been working on this project for entirely too long (about a month!).  When I first had the idea for a Christmas tree advent calendar I searched the web for ideas and of course came to the conclusion that I could do it better than anyone else and it would also be super easy.  A red flag should have gone up, but I somehow forgot how much time it takes to do anything at all , let alone a sewing project, with kids......

I picked out lots of red fabrics for the ornaments.  This was a joint project with Amber who was in charge of making the green ornaments.

Then I designed and cut out all of the iron on decals for each ornament using my always awesome silhouette.

ironed the decals on to the fabric

added sweet white suede ribbon from the ribbon jar (Thanks Julie!!!),

turned the fabric right side in and sewed in circles with a piece of felt for structure

turned right side out

repeat times 24. (23 actually due to an unfortunate cutting mistake).  Then I hand sewed each ornament closed, and made the tree and background on which the ornaments were to hang.  

I found these awesome number buttons at a local store and decided to use them instead of ironing on the number decals I made earlier.  Aside from the total pain it took to hand sew each button, I love how it looks!

 the star is ornament number 25, and goes on for Christmas!

 Here is what the project looks like all done!  Super cute right?!

The "funny" thing is, after all of this work- Chloe wants nothing to do with the advent calendar.  Apparently it isn't very interesting to a 2 1/2 year old.  Swing and a miss, but hopefully next year it will be better received.   You better believe that I am putting on the ornaments each day though!  I love it!  

baby Madeline

I am trying my hardest to keep taking as many pictures of Madeline as possible so she doesn't have the typical second child- no photo syndrome.  Sometimes Madeline looks so much like Chloe it is amazing.  Can you tell the difference?  Which is Chloe and which is Madeline?

Did you guess?  The top one is Madeline and the bottom one was Chloe at the same age.  It seems like so long ago that Chloe was so tiny!  Long before first words and whole sentences.  Every day really is better than the next.  Chloe is quite the talker but every once in a while she gets her words mixed up and leaves us cracking up.  The other morning Andrew asked her what kind of cereal she wanted and she replied "CRAP-PURPPLE-POP!!!!" (aka snap crackle pop)  Kids are such a gift!

Maddie is always on her tummy now, and pretty much always drooling.  Every time I put her down- flip- on to her tummy she goes.  She doesn't like being on her back anymore.  That was so one week ago :)  Luckily she is sleeping much better again, allowing the dark circles and bags under my eyes a little chance to fade away.  Last week she was up at least every hour all night long, sometimes every 30 minutes.... last night she was only up every 3 hours.  It was amazing.  I don't know what I am doing right but I hope I keep it up :)