Baby Shower Pics: 2nd Set

During our trip to PA this past Christmas, my sisters threw a wonderful baby shower.

I posted the pics of the gifts he received shortly thereafter, but I didn't yet have pics of the people who attended.  I received them this morning! See below.  

We had so much fun playing creative shower games, enjoying yummy food, and cake too

(from which Maria ate 3 bright, blue icing balloons and had a blue mouth the rest of the day!)

My beautiful sisters in front of the B&B where the shower was held!

My good friend Amberly!

Maria was such a well-behaved young lady at the shower!

Here she was playing a sock matching game against Amberly!

Maria won of course!

And here she's tucking all of baby's animals in for a nap!!

How sweet can a girl get!!?   I just LOVE her :)

My good friend Candy, and that cute turtle she hand-knit for baby!
She's sooo talented!

Here I was smiling at a REALLY cute watercolor painting
her eldest son had drawn as the card for their gift!!

A sweet family photo after it was all said and done, AND after they were inhaling helium!!
Thanks again for all your hard work, ladies!

Helium Silliness!

After the shower, the balloons inspired some good-ol-fashioned fun with helium ('He')...
Little Maria had never before heard what happens when you inhale helium.
She thought it was soooo funny!!

Showered with Love!

I'm a member of the local "Newcomer's Club."  The ladies of the club recently 

showered baby and I with gifts, celebrating his coming arrival!

 It's taken me a while to get the pics posted (my apologies).  

Thank you again to all the ladies; we truly appreciate your thoughtfulness and generosity!

Hubby and I are becoming very excited as my belly is growing like crazy! 

34 weeks and counting!

I just love handmade items -- here is a knit sweater and HUGE blanket!  

And here is a handsewn, hooded towel :-)

My Growing Diaper Stash

Most of you "out there" know I'm planning on cloth diapering and after going to a local "cloth diapering swap" a while back, my stash is growing!  I also made some homemade prefold diapers out of T-Shirt material!   Tutorial posted here!

So now I have a few different brands of "All in One" (AIO)  type or All-in-2" (AI2) type diapers from my Amazon.com registry that are One-size-fits-all (OSFA) style diapers that will work for baby from infancy to toddlerhood.  They'll be especially useful (hopefully) for easy nighttime changes and babysitter changes as well!  

Some of the brands are: 

1. "Happy Heiny's"

2. "BumGenius 3.0"

3. "Mommy's Touch"

4. "Goodmama" organic/bamboo velour (yellow one demo-ed below)

This one is the Goodmama brand.  

It seems like it has an overwhelming amount of snaps, but it's really pretty straigtforward. 

What's SO cool about this brand, is that it coverts VERY simply from 

the roomy TODDLER size shown here:

On it's largest toddler setting

To this TINY infant size!!

This pic show how it happens so easily...the snaps in the front fold down & out 

to shorten the length of the diaper!!   

How creative!  Necessity IS the mother of invention, 

and many times those inventions come through MOTHERS :) 

Plus, I also have a couple white diaper covers by Green Earth (velcro closure kind) to use with the prefold diapers I'm sewing!  And one of the women I met at the diaper swap knows how to make the snap kind (shown in blue below) so I'll be ordering some of those from her soon in various colors as well!   Thanks for looking!  I'll add to this post as I add to baby's stash!

Update: I ended up HATING the ever popular Goodmamas, FYI...

Embroidered Onesies

Here's my progress so far on my embroidered onesies for baby...
I've finished 2 of 7!!
It takes me almost as long to choose which design to put on which onesie
and transfer it, as it does to actually embroider it!!
I ended up free handing the family!!
Stay "tuned" for more pics as I finish them!

Baby Shower Pics: 1st Set

My wonderful sisters, and my mom, graciously hosted a baby shower the Saturday after Christmas!

We had LOTS of fun playing some creative shower games

and enjoyed yummy food, and cake too, of course!

(I wish someone had taken a pic of Maria's blue mouth from 

eating 3 of the blue icing balloons!!  Ha Ha!)

Sorry we missed seeing some of you, as it was held in PA!

Thanks again to those of you who sent gifts to baby even 

though you couldn't be with us in person.  It was very thoughtful of you!

I've posted most of the gifts he received below so all of you can see and enjoy!

Also there's some nice pics of my sisters and I as well. 

More pics will be in another post.  

Aren't these stuffed animals sooo cute!!?  

The turtle was hand-knit by my friend Candy!

Thanks Aunt Candy!!  

It's hard to read here, but the frame says: "My first 12 months."

I'm so excited to fill that frame as he grows and his baby book is on the left, 

I've already made entries into it!

This wasn't from the shower, but I found it and LOVED it,

 so I had to get it for baby for the harsh NC winters...Ummm, right!!?

Just look at that vest and jeans!! Adorable!

A "Melissa & Doug" Chunky puzzle!

AND some "All in one" cloth diapers I didn't get to take a pic of, sorry.

I received organic cotton towels as well (Sand color) and plan to make 

hooded baby towels out of them and bath hand-puppets for Munchkin!!

This will be his baby quilt!  Sooooo cute!   

(I used the web's pic of the puzzle, quilt, pad, and the

towels--better image quality than mine!)

Things the camera couldn't catch: The blanket has a lovely knitted diamond pattern, and the lotions smell heavenly!!  I've selfishly endulged in them already... 

Sorry, I couldn't wait for April 9th!!  But a happy mom is a happy baby, right :)

The pics just don't do these 2 outfits justice!  

The one on the right is like a knitted wool sweater, but lighter weight for fall.

This is baby crib from Grandma Beckie!! 

Thanks Momma!  I'm so excited for it to arrive! 

  

Red one reads:

"Who needs Santa, when you have Grandma!?"

These were all the socks from one of the games

and a pair of really cute softy leather shoes!

Classics!!!

My beautiful sisters in front of the B&B where the shower was held!  

Thanks again for everything, you two!

Bonnie is the one on the left, who has 4 of the cutest kids I know!

Jessie (middle) is the one who's moving to Canada this month :(

We'll miss you sooo much, Jess.  

Good luck, and I hope you're gonna start a blog... 

we all will want to see pics of your latest adventure!

What did I do while in Orlando!??

While hubby was in training during the days, I got to go visit the local 

Goodwill stores and start/complete some of my craft projects for baby!  

White Baby BLanket I've started for baby as an 

heirloom blanket for our family!!

Green Baby Blanket I've started for baby!

I found a site online that shows how to take old wool sweaters 

and make diaper covers, pants from the sleeves, 

and/or crib pads to protect the mattress!

I found this awful sweater, but LOVED the animals, 

there were 12 animals total.  

While in Orlando I was able to take the time to carefully cut all of them out!

I bought the monkeys (they cost more than the sweater!)

So baby's bedding will now be animal themed!  I'm so excited!

Here are 2 more wool sweaters I found in Goodwills!

This one is a 4 pc set that was 40.00, but of course I go it for 6.00!!

This one, if you remember, had nothing on it, 

but I thought it'd be cute with puppy buttons on the shoulders 

and the paw print embroidered in the center!

This one didn't have any embellishments on it either, 

but I thought the blue would be a nice backdrop for the sports buttons!!  

Soooo cute!  Thanks for lookin',  ya'll!!!

I've been shopping...!!

Since I found out it's a boy, I've been going to all the consignment shops and 

goodwills and hit the "infant boys" jackpot!  I've probably found 20+ onesies (various sizes), 8+sleepers, a swaddler, and a bunch of other cute outfits.  Craigslist has been a great resource--

I found a "pack-n-play" (those portable bassinet/crib thingys) for $25 that's in great shape!  

And I also found 2 blankets I just COULD NOT make myself cheaper than what 

they retailed for, so I let myself actually pay retail for them--what a concept!  Ha Ha!

I also found a creative invention called "bib clips" that snap onto any 

piece of cloth, so the neutral-colored flannel blankets will become 

burp cloths and I'll cut some down to become bibs!  So cool!   

I thought that my sisters ("kids clothes gurus") would love to 

see all my bargains, so below are the pics of many of my shopping treasures!

Can't wait to use this swaddler!  

I have a feeling he'll be a swaddle baby!!

The onesies above are all organic onesies I foud for $1 ea, normally $3-4 ea!!!

These are my favorites I've found thus far!  I just love embroidery and appliqué!

I found some sleepers that say Little Cowboy and Daddy's Cowboy since hubby LOVES westerns!

These are SUPER soft blankies I found!

These were some great flannels I found for use with 

the bib-clips (2 different kinds are pictured below!)

This style (using a set of metal suspender clips sewn to ribbon) can be used for:

Pacifier clips: to keep pacis attached to baby and off the dirty floor!

Bib Clips: to create a bib out of anything, a cloth napkin, a flannel blankie, etc

Toy clip: to keep baby's toys attached to the car seat and off the car's floor or attached 

to the shopping cart and off the store's dirty floors!  I LOVE this idea...

I just can't find the suspender clips--HaHa!!