Mollie's 4th Birthday

Mollie had a pretty laid back birthday this year. Originally Stu was going to be working, but we had an important doctor appointment to go to on the morning of her birthday, and he was able to stay in town for a few more days. I'm so glad he was able to be there. After an encouraging appointment, we went to one of Mollie's favorite restaurants, the City Diner in Anchorage, or the "shiny restaurant" as she calls it (see why here). They brought her icecream for dessert and sang happy birthday to her. She was totally surprised!

The first present of the day. Some friends of ours came into Anchorage to watch the girls during the appointment, and then came to eat with us. It kind of made up for the fact that we didn't have a birthday party for her this year. They picked out the perfect present for her!

Stu, me, and the girls went to H2Oasis, an indoor water park. It was "parent/toddler time", so they only had the shallow areas open, but it was super cheap to get it and there was hardly anyone there. The girls both loved it! We headed back to the valley and hung out at Stu's shop for a while.

Eating dinner (pizza) at Humdingers..

Back at home to open presents. Delia copies everything that Mollie does...

We had Coldstone icecream cake leftover from Stu's birthday a few days before. That's one good thing about their birthdays being so close together :)

3 Years Old in Pictures

I been having a really hard time wanting to blog lately. We are moving and have sold a lot of furniture, including our computer desk, so our computer is sitting on the floor, making it really uncomfortable to be on the computer for long! 

 This post was supposed to include Mollie's 4 yr old "birthday interview" (see last year's here), but I think if I don't go ahead and post these pictures, I will never get around to it..

..so here are some of my favorite photos of Mollie as a 3 year old:

I will post the interview, and pictures from Mollie's birthday soon :)

Sewing For My Boy: Quilt Progress

Thank you to everyone who gave me feedback about what fabric to choose! I ordered my fabric from Stash Modern Fabric on Etsy, who let me put together a custom bundle of the fabrics I wanted. I cut it up into triangles as soon as I got it. I didn't count them, but there has to be at least 200..

I played around with them, arranging them different ways, but none of them looked right to me. I loved the way they looked when I lined them up from the darkest to lightest...

So I tried arranging them that way, with the darkest fabric starting in one corner, and fading into the lightest fabric in the opposite corner. It's totally different than what I was planning, but I like it! It has kind of an ombre look. I've sewn all of the triangles together, so the whole quilt top is done and basted to the batting. I'm determined to get it done before we move out of state in just two weeks, so expect to see the finished product soon!

Delia's Easter Dress

Here is Delia's Easter dress. I was inspired by the color blocking, and bright floral prints that Lottie Da (an amazing Etsy shop) uses. 

I love this huge floral print!

It's hard to tell in most of these pictures (see the last picture for a better look), but the top of the bodice is made out of white swiss dot, so there are tiny raised dots in a circle pattern. I love the texture and detail that swiss dot adds

My other favorite detail is the pearl buttons in the back...so girly :)

Mollie's Easter Dress

I finished Mollie's Easter dress the night before Easter, inspired by a dress I saw on Pinterest. It's been a few months since I've sewn her anything, and she's become more picky about the dresses she wears (not too fancy), so I really tried to make this dress something she would love. Since I didn't have a pattern, it was fun to figure out how to recreate the dress, and the best ways to make each element.

Believe it or not, it was my first time making the super simple "peasant style" dress. I will definitely be doing more. My only regret was that the elastic around her arms seemed a little too tight, although it didn't bother her. I asked her if they felt too tight and she said "no", despite the pink rings they left around her arms! At least it can be past down to Delia.

Sewing For My Boy: Quilt Plans

One of the things I've been most excited to make for our baby, whether it was going to be a girl or a boy, was a quilt! I've been looking at fabric and planning what I'd use if it was a boy, and what I'd use if it was a girl since I got pregnant...okay maybe even before then :) Finding the perfect boy fabric was tough for me, I'm kind of picky when it comes to boy style/fabric/clothing, and don't like anything too cartoony or sterotypical (vehicles, sports, etc.) I thought I'd decided on this fabric line, and I still like it a lot...but then I saw this collection and fell in love: 

  

It's called "Constellations" by the designer, Lizzy House. I think it's perfect! It comes in three "color schemes", but they can all go together too. Now I just have to decide which colors I want to go with. It's pretty much down to the outer two stacks. I'm not too keen on the yellow and mint/turquoise shade in the middle row, but I do like the second from the bottom in that stack. 

The stack on the right is the one that jumped out at me the most. I like the brighter shades of blue that this one uses, but I'm not too sure about the purple. Depending on what pictures you look at on different websites, it either looks very purple, or mostly blue. 

I also like the look of the stack on the left. Luckily I've found a seller on Etsy who will let me mix and match to create a custom bundle! Now I just have to decide which 9 to go with, and I would really like to know what you think (hint, hint, leave me a comment)!! 

So, on to the quilt pattern.. this is what I've chosen. It's simpler than I'd planned on (check out my Quilts pinterest board to see some others I thought about), but I kind of like that about it. Believe it or not, it took me a while to realize that it basically looks exactly like the triangle prints in the fabric I've chosen!

So, depending on which fabrics I choose, the quilt will turn out looking a lot like one of these:

                                              

So seriously, what do you think?

Sewing For My Boy: Baby "TOMS"

I tried out this pattern for baby TOMS that I shared in my last post. I thought the last pair of shoes I made was tiny, but these are really tiny!