Quiet Book, Page 5 & 6

This barn page was so much fun to put together, I loved how the finger puppets turned out and the barn itself.  I don't know how Jill came up with so many awesome ideas but I'm grateful for them. 

I made a cute little cow puppet too but he got lost.  Take it from me, when you go outside to use the sidewalk to pound in your grommets take out all the little pieces if it's windy.


The paperdoll page has a pocket underneath her name to store all the clothes and there are jeans, two shirts a skirt and a dress.

An Update

So I've always thought Apple was a good company and then there was the gift card incident.  The whole thing has been cleared up so quickly that rather than being angry at Apple I'm impressed.

Brad sent one email of complaint and we were offered a full refund for the gift cards.  I also received a very nice response to my letter.  I'm impressed that they contacted us so quickly and that our money is not stuck in gift cards. 

Thanks Apple.
L

So Angry

Dear Apple:

My husband and I have been long time iTunes users.  We have both owned iPods and have been very pleased with them never having experienced a problem.

Recently we both made the switch to iPhones and again have been very pleased.  This switch was made shortly before my husband’s birthday so he requested gift cards to iTunes.  He received $90 in iTunes gift cards and was excited about all the new apps he could buy.  It was only after our credit card was charged that we discovered that iPhone applications cannot be purchased with gift cards through the Canadian iTunes store.

We are incredibly angry over this discovery.  We do not purchase music or movies through iTunes and we have no desire to but we now own $90 in gift cards that we won’t use.  It isn’t clear anywhere on the cards that applications can’t be purchased with them though it does state that they are only valid in Canada so we can’t even sell them to someone in the US.

To not include this information on the cards is dishonest and I’m sure I’m not alone in this complaint.  It gives me serious doubts about the way Apple runs it’s business.

L

Quiet Book, Page 3 & 4

The goldfish was the first page I completely finished and it turned out so well that it encouraged me to continue on to the following pages.  The fish velcro off and on.

Above Catie's name are the embroidered words, "My Name Is" and then the letters of her name button off an on.  As a not very experienced sewer this page was my first introduction to the really tight zig zag stitch and it turned out better than I thought.  The only thing that could have made it easier was using new thread.  I've been lucky and have been able to borrow my Mom's supply of thread so I didn't have a buy a bunch of colours but her supply is actually her Mother's old supply so the thread is probably all 20 years old meaning it's really, really curly.  Occasionally the curl becomes too much for my machine and a re-thread is necessary.  The inconvenience has been worth the money saving though and it all worked out in the end (the "M" seems to have disappeared).

Quiet Book, Page 1 & 2

Part of the reason I've been so neglectful of the blog lately has been because I've been making a Quiet book for Catie.  I'm really thrilled with how it's turned out and it's finally close enough to done that I thought I'd post pictures.  I haven't sewn any of the pages together yet but unless I have any other page ideas then I'm declaring this book done.

Most of my ideas I've taken from Jill who made an amazing book for her son.  I loved just about everything she did though I wanted some of the pages to be a little more girly since the book is for a girl.  I thought I'd post a new page layout a day so you can see them all.

I hope you enjoy.

I love these pages so much, her way of cutting out and sewing all the leaves onto the tree makes it look adorable.  I added the apples that snap into the tree and a basket to slip them in and Catie loves pulling them off.  This is probably her favourite page. 

The flowers have this cute bee that zips up and down (Catie says bzzz, bzzz). 

I embroidered the words, "Good Morning" and "How Do You Do?"  on the two pages.  By now the song In the Leafy Treetops should be running through your head because that's where they're from.  I'm calling page 1 and 2 a complete success.

L

Possession

One of the things that Brad and I love most about our new house is that it has a dishwasher.  It's something I haven't had since I lived at home and we're really enjoying not having to do all our dishes by hand.

There is a little something about this dishwasher though that's a little odd.  On multiple occasions (and we're not talking about 1 or 2 here) Brad or I will turn to the other and say, "Did you start the dishwasher?"  We'll have suddenly noticed that it's running though neither of us have started it and there isn't any soap in it.

Our dishwasher spontaneously starts and we're constantly going over and shutting it off.
L

Catie Updates

It's been a surprisingly long time since I've had a Catie centered post.  She'd gotten onto a great schedule and hadn't hit any development milestones so it didn't really feel like there was a lot to report. 

Since the last Catie post she's learned to roll from her stomach to her back and she has started to scoot herself backwards.  Her wake time has lengthened and she's decided it's time for her to drop a nap which means bedtime is now at 8:00 pm instead of 9:30.  I'm loving the time to myself in the evening and it's helping to further my new fun projects.

She also loves to stand these days.

Here's Catie all dressed up for church, she's wearing her cute beaded socks that Grandma made for her and the bow from KD.

I blame the iPhone

I have multiple posts running through my head but with the purchase of the iPhone I find myself sitting down at the computer less and less. I do everything I need to do from my phone but I have no desire to type an entire blog post on it so content here has been missing.

I've recently discovered the beauty of working with felt.  It's super cheap and so much fun to use.  Michelle and I had both seen the same brilliant idea so we got together, pooled our resources and made some of these. 

I was about to say we whipped them up but that implies that it was a quick project and there really wasn't anything quick about cutting out and stuffing all the little pieces for 4 potato heads.  I'm not sure why we thought 4 at a time was a good idea but we're both pleased with our results.  We learned a few lessons, we're smarter now and had a great time together, yay for felt.

I'm also working on a quiet book and some adorable felt food so stay tuned.
L

Sewing Issues

My latest craft project has led to a lot of sewing on my machine.  Lots of little pieces, all different colours.  For most people this would mean they had to re-thread their sewing machine a bunch of times with different colours which isn't really a big deal, but for me it's caused other issues, the root of the issue being this... I only own ONE bobbin for my sewing machine.  So every single time I switch colours I have to load a new bobbin.  It also means I never load very much at a time because I don't want to have to throw out a bunch of thread which usually leads to me running out of thread mid piece and having to load the same colour again.

Yesterday I started yet another new project with Michelle and we sewed at her house and the beauty of owning more than one bobbin finally hit me.  What a glorious thing to not have to load all the time, so today I solved the problem and I'm now the proud owner of 12 brand new, empty bobbins with a case for them all.  I'm excited to put these to good use and I'll include photos of the recent projects eventually.
L

Ribbons and Bows

I recently stumbled onto a few crafty websites and there were so many things for little girls.  I feel a little obsessed and want to amass huge amounts of ribbon and cute fabric.

I did choose a couple crafts and completed this bow holder.  I love the way it looks on her wall and her different bows are so easy to find now.  The best part was how affordable it was.  I used paper and ribbon I already owned and bought the frames for $1.50 at the dollar store.

I've also made a flower for her hair that I love.  It's the pink one in the frame to the right, the bottom left corner.  I'm moving on to a quiet book and so far I'm really thrilled with how it's turning out.

I've often heard Mom's talk about how they don't have time for these kinds of crafts and sort of scoffed secretly thinking, "You have one child at home, you have loads of time."  I've since discovered that I was right as long as you want nothing else to get done in your house except the craft and if you want to resent your child for having the nerve to wake up from a nap while you're crafting.  My kitchen was a disaster, there was stuff all over the living room and Catie didn't get as much attention as usual.  I'm now attempting to tone down the project, take it a little slower and be a bit less neglectful.
L