Sew and Tell-My First Edition

My cousin Laura, who I hang out with a lot because she is way too cool to not hang out with (although I wish we didn't live 25 minutes apart so we could hang out more), has what she calls, a "sickening sister in law." Sickening only because she is good at everything. In reality Laura adores her and talks about her all the time, so I happened to start blog stalking said "sickening sister in law" and fell in love with her sewing ideas...hence the "hoobaby that's a nice bag" post from 2 weeks ago.

Anyway, on her blog, sickening sister in law does a weekly "sew and tell" where you post a picture of something you have sewn that week on your blog and link back to hers and basically everyone just gets to show off their stuff and it can motivate you to keep sewing and having fun creating new things.

It really has motivated me to sew, something that I love to do once I get going.

So, in the last couple of days I went through my stash of remnants from old projects and used them. I have fabric pieces sitting around in my sewing drawer that have been there for 5 or more years and it feels great to put them to good use...sewing one of my favorite things-aprons! I even got creative with the last one and added some cute ribbon.

So, here they are for my first ever sew and tell!

Tell me this isn't adorable?


ps-Thanks Josh for being so patient with all my project "messes" (should more properly called explosions) all over the house. My mother can sympathize with you. :)

Happy Valentine's!

So this is late, but these suckers were so cute (and so much work) that I have to post a picture of them. Instead of store bought Valentine's, cause where's the fun in that, we made suckers for the boys to give out to their school friends. They turned out so great! Of course Nathan came home from school telling me that I forgot to buy the cards to go with them. He obviously missed the point that these were way cooler than a generic card.

I have a problem.

Hi, my name is Amber and I am addicted to two things-to baking and chocolate. And of course those two things go hand in hand. And it is getting worse. I just can't help it.

When I put on this:

and discover sites like this: Bakerella

This teach me to create things like this:

I just can't stop myself. Every single day I want to bake something. I just love it. I love to bake with my kids. Or, if my kids aren't around then I turn on the music and dance or listen to an audio book and just lose myself in baking. I love it. But the scale is starting to rebel. (I am hoping that has more to do with the fact that I didn't exercise for 3 weeks while recovering from surgery than my chocolate intake...)

What to do? The obvious solution (other than to just stop baking but where's the fun in that?) is to take the baked goods to friends-which I do. Quite often. But, the problem is that I have to sample while I bake right? Sigh.

I did manage to make it through the entire day yesterday without chocolate crossing my lips. And that includes resisting the chocolate candy filled package my mother in law sent us. That's something right?

Hoobaby-That's a Nice Bag!

I am not a girly girl. I am not interested in shoes. I don't wear jewelry and I never even used to like the color pink. I grew up with all brothers and was raised by a mom that also grew up with all brothers, what can I say?

But I find that I do have a few girlish tendencies. Pink is now my favorite color, I like flirty aprons (which I will elaborate more on in my next post) and I like bags. Not purses. Purses make me cringe. I could never carry one. But I like a nice, fun bag.

When I look at this bag, I want to say "Hoobaby! That's a nice bag." And that's what people have said to me. Well, ok, maybe they didn't say the "hoobaby" part. But still. And then I smuggly reply "Thanks! I made it!" I haven't sewn for pleasure in so long. My business burned me out on sewing and so I stopped. Completely. But the itch is back and this is how it took it's form:

Ahh, isn't that a nice bag? Jack says he wants it. :)

My Christmas Present

As you most likely know, I own a business. Oh, and by the way, happy 6th anniversary to my crazy "little business" that was supposed to just make me a couple hundred extra dollars a month and now is better than a full fledged, out of the home career. My site officially launched February 6, 2004. I can't believe I went from an awful looking site on angelfire to this: My Sweet Dreams Baby. I am a proud mother of my little business baby.

But anyway, that wasn't the point of this post. For Christmas, Josh did a wonderful thing. In the garage there were boxes. Piles and piles of boxes filled with colorful and fun, child oriented products. And every time I went out there to get something to send to a customer, I had to dig around in the boxes to find what I needed, and then I stood up and banged my head on the bikes that hung over them. Happiness-or not.

So, for Christmas, Josh did this:
A full shelving system with all of my products nicely organized by item and easy to access without banging my head. THAT is happiness. My head thanks you Josh.

Mormon Battalion

The Mormon Battalion marched into San Diego in 1847 and each year they commemorate their arrival with a big celebration in the heart of San Diego's Old Town. This was our second year attending, and again, like last year, we had a blast.

(First of all, can I just say that it is awesome that we can be outside having a great time in January.)

This year we were smart. We knew there was way too much fun to be had for a family with three little boys who get tired and cranky around lunch time to handle it all. So we picked our favorites from last year, stuck to them, and then headed home.

We cooked biscuits on a stick over a fire (this was everyone's very favorite part and the first thing we did when we got there). Now can I just mention that I thought it would be fun if our boys wore their vests and cowboy hat costumes they got for Christmas, you know-to at least sort of fit the theme. But instead, we ended up with 2 Batmans. Very Mormon Battalion like. You can't see Nathan in this picture, but he even had his Batman costume had complete with sticking up bat ears on for this. Oh well. At least my kids can never say we didn't let them express their individuality.

The other favorite part for the boys was the mock march. They became soldiers wielding guns, something mom never lets them do at home, and marched around Old Town to the beat of the drum.

Even Dallen got in on that action. Why are boys, even from such a young age, so obsessed with guns?

Other than that we sampled scones, made miniature bricks, made pioneer dolls, looked up an ancestor who was part of the Battalion, and listened to some stories. This is something we will look forward to each year as long as we are in San Diego.

Dal's Birthday Fun!

Unfortunately, my unexpected surgery fell just 27 hours before Dallen's birthday this year, which meant that on the day of my sweet little one's birthday celebration, I felt like doing little more than laying on the couch all day. Luckily, he was turning 2, and since he doesn't even know what a birthday is, let alone what day it should be celebrated, we decided to bump his birthday back a few days.

So Saturday, 2 days after his birthday, we celebrated instead. He got up that morning and went to breakfast with daddy and came home to find the house decorated and presents waiting for him. He opened them, had them snatched away by big brothers and was confused about what all the fuss was about. I think he was less than impressed.

But to make things extra fun, Grandma and Great Granny and Great Gramps came to town that day, so later that evening we had a little party with 3 grandparents and cousin Laura and Sam.

I, of course, had to make a cake-because I love to go over the top on cakes. I blame that completely on my mom. And now, for your viewing pleasure (and after much nagging from my mother in law to get it on the blog:), I present it to you:

In the few moments that he slowed down enough to look at it he thought it was pretty cool. I think his big brothers were more impressed. But I had fun making it and that makes it worthwhile.

He actually did a good job blowing out the candle:

For our after cake entertainment, cousin Laura, my adorably cute 80 year old Granny and Josh demonstrated their ability to "shuffle off to Buffalo" (a tap move for those of you unfamiliar with dance). I too would have joined them, but my belly button was still hurting pretty good at this point and I didn't think bouncing up and down would help it much at that point: