The Big Nursery Reveal

Boyd's room is FINALLY finished! I guess that is what happens when you decide to DIY everything! Sewing his bedding and curtains was far easier than I had thought and I must say it was very fulfilling. Not to mention it kept me occupied on those freakishly hot days when going outside was not really an option!

Yes, I know, it kind of looks like a 30 year old woman should be living in his room but I'm not a "baby" person so we went with a more grown up style. And yes, I am aware that we are about to have baby but that doesn't mean that it has to look like Babies-R-Us threw up all over our house.

 We may not like "baby" stuff but we do like lambs! See, we are making progress!

 We used the same dresser that was already in the room and found this great map for FREE online!

Because every baby needs a stash of his very own personalized burp cloths! It's like the pocket square for babies!

The paddles came from my grandfather and we figured they made the room look a bit more manly!

In case you didn't know, his full name is Boyd Sutherland Caldwell. Both Boyd and Sutherland are family names of ours and good strong Scottish names each with their own tartan. The pillow on the chair is actually made from the official Sutherland tartan. What kid doesn't need his own fabric after all?! Here are some other variations of the Sutherland tartan and here is a picture of the Boyd tartan.

His stash of cloth diapers... that is an entire post of it's own!!

His giraffe was given to hin by my mom's youngest sister and her family. I.LOVE.IT!

Morbid Mexican postcards from our trip to Austin. Very appropriate for babies, right?! Can you see Tyler in the reflection!?

Strongbow patiently waiting for his brother to get here. He likes to tell me that he is breaking in the chair for us. What a giver!

One of my very imperfect preggo projects. Tyler is so thrilled that Boyd is now well stocked with dresses!

So there you have it, our low budget nursery fit for a 30 year old woman or a baby boy with impeccable taste!

Speaking of baby boys, I'm a few days shy of 39 weeks and dilated 2 cm in case you were curious. According to the good doc that translates to " any day now." Wish us luck!

** if you are interested in sewing your own baby bedding, PLEASE feel free to pick my mind. I am no expert but I can tell you about my experience. It was super easy and where there is a will there is a way!

Patio Perfection

I apologize for my absence but I have been traveling like a mad woman this past week and Tyler and I head out again this afternoon for the Hangout Music Festival in Gulf Shores. Whoo hoo!! From there I will fly straight to a business meeting in Chicago but things will hopefully slow down after Wednesday of next week!

The patio is finally finished and we think it looks pretty good! We still have to get some comfy furniture and a few more odds and ends to make it feel cozy but all in all we love it!

 
Jeremy Vinson graciously donated some sod that he had no use for so we filled in some of the areas around the patio and hope it will spread. We now officially have 200 sq ft less dirt and weeds in the back yard!

Get ready for a patio party at the Caldwell's!!

Patio Progress

I don't remember if I told you or not but Tyler and I decided that it was time to expand the patio. When we moved in we had grand plans of either ripping out the old patio and starting from scratch or building a wooden deck over the existing patio. We recently came to our senses and decided that just adding a brick patio next to the existing concrete patio was our most time and cost efficient option.

With that said, Tyler turned on the manual labor last weekend and started digging. Apparently you have to dig out about 8-10 inches before you begin and with 200 sq. feet looming over us him, it was a daunting task.

He managed to get everything dug up on in about 2 evenings and on Saturday he brought in the gravel. You see, I thought "yo, this will be easy, all you have to do is dig out a few inches then slap those puppies in place and there you have it, an exquisite new patio!" Yeah not so much.

Next came the gravel and it took two truck loads to fill up the darn hole. He has to tamp down all the gravel then he will be ready to add a few inches of sand.

Our bricks were delivered yesterday so this weekend Tyler will be a busy bee adding the sand then actually laying the bricks. I promise to show you the final product the second he finishes! Wish us luck, it's going to be an exhausting weekend!

V is for Victory!!

Get ready for another Sound of Music reference! I just made my first set of "play clothes!" Okay, I only made one pair of shortalls and unlike Julie Andrews I did not just whip them up using heinous old curtains, no pattern or sewing machine. Either way, they are cute, they are easy and ,of course,they are cheap!

So when I win this year's sewing competition at the Alabama National Fair my acceptance speech will go as follows:

"I would like to take this time to especially thank my wonderful husband for buying me a sewing machine and encouraging me to do my best! To my parents for accepting the fact that their only daughter would never be an athlete or genius but merely a quasi artsy wannabe.Thank you to Sarah Barry Spooner for the wonderful coaching and training. To Lauren Vinson for being my generous benefactor and to Hubb Vinson for being such a cooperative and patient model."

Wow, this is what happens when my imagination runs away with me!

What have I been working on?

How do people blog every day, or even 3 times a week for that matter? My life is just not that interesting and I have been struggling to come up with what to post about. I mean if you really want to hear about my boring everyday life then fine but I have a feeling most of you are just not interested.

Here is a very short compilation of some of the interesting (at least I think it's kind of interesting) stuff I have done this week.

Don't kid yourself, I'm not a great gardener! I saw this broccoli pop up and almost cried with excitement only to find out that it is just "buttoning." This means that these plants will never product big good broccoli like they should but only little guys that are big enough to eat in one bite. Again, it's our weird winter's fault. For real this time, I even tested our soil to prove it! Although they were little, I ate them for dinner last night and they tasted pretty good.

So now onions are in, more carrots and turnips are in, and the lettuce is finally doing well. Next up, getting ready for the spring veggies. 

I have also been on an embroidery kick. I'm not that good yet and I'm soooo ready for this trial and error thing to be over. Notice how the monogram on the bib puckers and is not even centered. Ugh!! If anyone out there has any good tips on embroidery PLEASE share. Does anyone really use ball point needles? Why does my computer embroidery program keep changing my hoop size? How do you embroidery on awkward shapes and sizes? I have sooo many more....

Lastly, if you don't have a pineapple corer, get one. Nuf said.

I should have been studying...

This week very well might kill me! I'm just sayin'.  I have a presentation and paper due tonight, test tomorrow, test Wednesday and another presentation on Thursday. Not to mention the 10-15 page paper that is due next Thursday that I haven't started! I am SO ready for my July 30th graduation date!!!

So this weekend during the time that I should have been studying, I decided that I needed a little sewing therapy instead.

I would like to introduce you to my laundry room... pretty bad aye? Not such a great first impression when you walk in the side door!

After a little bit of measuring, cutting, and hemming we have this:

 I am so happy with how the final product turned out! Who needs a masters degree when you can just sew curtains for the rest of your life!

Happy Monday!

From Hoarding to Quilting

I am a hoarder. There I said it. Don't worry though; I'm not the kind that you see on TV I really only hoard a few things.

 

Such as:

1. Wedding invitations
2. Fabric scraps
3. Tupperware
4. Shoes
5. T-shirts

 

The last one is the worst. I CAN NOT throw away a t-shirt. I mean come on, a lot of them have sentimental value and I would bet that a lot of you can't throw them away either. So I decided to take action and put together a plan for my first t-shirt quilt. Don't worry I don't plan on proudly displaying it on the sofa or guest bed; it is currently neatly folded and placed in our linen closet for my unborn child to snuggle with.

 

 

 

Here are some good instructions on how to make a t-shirt quit; however, I changed a few things:

1. No fancy borders for me.
2. I cut my squares to 15 inches by using a clear plastic quilt square and cutting around it with a rotary cutter.
3. I used 20 shirts, 4 across and 5 down, since I was not to worried about it needing to fit as a bedspread.
4. For my backing I used 2 kinds of cute flannel fabric. Both are polka dots with the similar colors but different scales. Since most of the fabrics that are soft enough for a blanket are only 48 inches wide I had to buy 2.25 yards of each and piece them together lengthwise.

If you are interested in making one and could use a little help just just let me know and I'll try to answer any questions you have!  

Just Like Botox!

The pillows are donezo so I have succeeded in giving my family room a little temporary cosmetic procedure! Nothing big, just something to make it feel a little better about it's self. I wish they were bigger and fluffier but that is what I get for buying them on sale at Hancock Fabrics. Whatever, they will do for now. Next stop: learn to make pillows with zippers. I need to option of switching the covers out when I get sick of them; which I can guarantee will happen.

Before:

After:

Another tiny project that I finished in about 15 minutes on Monday's "OMG there is going to be an ice storm you don't have to come in to work, oh wait I changed my mind you have to come in at noon" morning off was trying to update the look of this little beauty.

It was Tyler's late grandmother's sewing stool and I decided I needed to add it to my collection. I both painted and recovered my other one but I decided to take the lazy route and just cover this one.

If you don't have a sewing stool, get one. They are so worth the $10 at most flea markets and serve as a great looking junk drawer for any room!