March Photo a Day Challenge complete!

I did it!  Not that I'm surprised I was able to take 31 pictures in one month.  I take an excessive amount of pictures of my kids, it's true.  But I stuck to the themes, and I collected them all nice and pretty!  I wasn't sure how I was going to do it:  check the theme and then purposely find that picture in my day... or just take my normal thousand pictures a day and find one that fit.  So I mixed it up and did both.  :)

Here, for your viewing pleasure:

1.  green lining on my cape

2.  Crying in the Cold

3.  3 princess dress up shoes

4.  my grandmother's meat tenderizer

5.  raina's colorful bathtub water

6.  lamp-posts and windows at the mall

7.  peanut butter cheerios

8.  the birthday girl, taking a breather at the park

9.  starting work on our st. patrick's day shirts!

10.  birthday celebration.  3 lucky years.

11.  LAUNDRY.  Always piles of laundry to fold.

12.  freezer paper shamrocks

13.  Madness!  How is my baby girl sitting up by herself already?!

14.  round is a shape!

15.  me and baby girl, taken by Raina :)

16.  a leprechaun did a rainbow jig on my floor!

17.  Lucky Lucca!

18.  D is for dragon

19.  Raina's new hobby: soccer!

20.  My naptime snack:  cookie dough, coffee, more coffee

21.  fishy pattern, on a dress that got worn one last time

22.  what I see by the night lights... tiny tired feet

23.  dora chutes and ladders

24.  Raina's book shelf

25.  pouring rice

26.  Raina's gadget... she can work the XBox all by herself already...

27.  this robin brought me a homemade gift!

28.  No milk is as good as whole milk in my coffee

29.  beautiful thoughtful 3 year old eyes

30.  corduroy sequin pillow,  extra close-up vision

31.  Walk the Dinosaur :)

A Summer Romper (by Sew Sweet Patterns)

Last week our weather here was incredi-bibble!  Like, summer nice.  30 degrees above normal March temps.  Outdoors in tank tops and skirts.  Break out the water table.  Eat lunch outdoors.  So nice.

It got me inspired to start making some summer clothes for my girls!  Lucca has this romper from Baby Gap that I love:

I got it on clearance on a day that I was ONLY shopping for Raina, but I just couldn't resist!  I am in love with the romper style.  So I bought this pattern called the "Summer Romper" after a pretty intensive search of Pinterest and the interwebs in general.  I was actually a bit surprised by the lack of patterns I found, but since I fell in love with this one, I don't mind so much :)

I used this super cute fabric

Here it is partially finished, waiting for me to sew the neck casing...

While I was sewing the casing, I somehow misplaced what appears to be the only safety pin in my house.  Leaving me in quite a pickle when it came time to thread the ribbon tie through the top.  Here's a trick I discovered that you can use in place of a safety pin, and I think I might actually use it again...   PIPE CLEANERS!  Of course, I realize not everyone has pipe cleaners in their house, but if you do, give it a try :)

and here's the finished romper!  I added a few rows of off white lace to the top for some decoration, "cause I love me some ruffles!

And here's my awesomely chubby little model!

New fabric, coming my way :)

This week, after a lull, my Etsy shop sold 4 blankets!  Woohoo!  To celebrate, I treated myself to two fabrics I've been drooling over...

Michael Miller's Happy Hills

and Balloons in Aqua, from the Children at Play line by Michael Miller and Sarah Jane Studios (I have wanted this one for sosososo long!)

I am so excited for them to get here I can hardly stand it!  But now... what to make, what to make?  Obviously, it will be for the littles, in some way, shape, or form!  Any suggestions out there?  Pretty please?

Felt flower love

****I've been working on this (incredibly super long and picture-heavy) post for a while now, so if anything seems weird or out-dated, it's because it is :)!  Also, I keep editing, and I've just come to the realization that I'm never going to be satisfied with this 100%... so time to post as is! ****

Ribbon hairbows are pretty, but sometimes you need to mix things up a little.  I bought myself a pile of bright felt and went to town with it!

For the flower patterns I went online and printed off a bunch of templates and black and white drawings of simple flower shapes.  I re-sized some and printed again so I could vary flower sizes and petal sizes.  I also looked at Pinterest for some inspiration, and found TONS of tutorials and patterns.  What did I do before Pinterest? Also, google "felt flower template" and you'll get 101 awesome results.  (And then do a google image search just for "felt," which I did at first by mistake.  SO many cool ideas!)

raina helped with this one!

So, I pinned the tiny (since my flowers are for little girl heads, I kept them small.  You could keep them big if they're for bigger heads!) cut out flower patterns to the felt, and cut around them with sharp scissors.  Some flowers were trickier than others, and I wasn't always exact with cutting.  I used a mix of sewing, fabric glue, tacky glue, and hot glue when assembling/holding together the flower pieces, depending on the design. 

Some of the tutorials I found were more successful than others.  Some were labor intensive, to the point that it just wasn't really worth it.

LOVE these flowers, but they are a lot of work!  You gather each petal individually, then roll and sew the entire thing. 

Beautiful, and painstaking to cut each of these tiny petals!

Some ended up looking like brains!

 Some I love, some I don't.  Those will probably be the ones Raina likes best!

cute from the top...

too tall on the side!

just asking for a button center!

I made a Pinterest board with some ideas/inspiration/tutorials.  You can find it here: Felt Flower Idea Board