Long time no blog...

Blogging has gone on the back burner, sorry!!

Since May 27th, let's see. Kate turned one and started walking, not in that order. =) She got a little tykes house from my parents and a Melissa and Doug shopping cart and wooden fridge and pantry food from us so she was a happy camper. I love the shopping cart, it's super sturdy and doesn't tip easily. Dash loves it too.

I'm just going to start posting pictures. How about that? Everyone likes pictures. =)

These are from her invitation shoot, and I totally sent out zero invitations. =) I didn't get them in time. At least I have them though.





Her cake:



Her cupcakes which I'm super freaking proud of. =)



Her shopping cart:



My birthday girl:



I made that hat, too. Super freaking proud of it as well =)

Dash wanted his own birthday cake and we got a smash cake for her anyway which I wasn't super eager to use. I'm just not a big fan of the smash cake. Kate would have made a mess of it too, she's all about using her hands for stuff. I didn't want to mess up her dress nor did I want to make a mess at my parent's house. And since Dash wanted his own cake, he got the smash cake instead. He was stoked.



I've posted this next picture on facebook and pretty much everywhere I can post a picture so I might as well post it here, too. =) My new favorite picture of my kids...



I think that pretty much covers the last two months. My external drive crashed and burned and I lost a crapload of pictures, but I think I can get them all back. I've sent it off to a friend who has a magic adapter and as long as the drive can still spin we should be ok. I had most of them backed up anyway but not quite all of them. Lesson to me to back my stuff up better. Now it goes from card to computer to DVD to drive. And it's not getting deleted off the card or computer until all of those steps are done. Live and learn.

John's leg is doing awesome, he has his last PT strength test next week and a doctor's appointment right after that and then he'll be released.

Weight loss is going good, down 35 pounds and about 35 more to go. Hopefully by this winter I'll be back in my normal clothes and it'll be like neither of my pregnancies ever happened. =) Minus the two rambunctious kiddos running around.

I'll try not to go another 2 months without blogging, I know Kate is going to change so freaking much in the next 6 months and I want to document it, and if you think my blog is neglected, you should see her baby book. =)

Quilts!

Finally. Sorry. =)

First, the finished one...



And then the next one I'm working on, this one was quick and easy...



And finally what's coming up next...

http://dontlooknow.typepad.com/

Specifically this one for Kate's bed.

And John's surgery went fine and he's recovering well. It kills him in the morning when he's gone several hours without pain medication but it's manageable the rest of the day. Says the wife not going through it. But really, I think he's doing well. His mom's coming to stay with us this week, she'll be here today to help with the kids. And I turn 30 this week! AHHHH! Not ready for that one.

Little Girl Standing

This has always been my favorite time ever in my kids' lives. I love the stocky baby, footed jammies, crawling/sitting/standing time. I love snuggling her and having a good amount of baby to hang on to. And I love their independence. Kate started crawling for real on February 10th, about a day after I posted that "almost crawling" video, and started pulling herself up on things she can get a grip on the next day. She uses the wire tracks at the top of this toy to pull herself up. And doesn't she look proud of herself!

A Quilt Top...

And a 10 on Thursday...

First, here's the quilt top.





I still have to pick out the reverse side fabric and actually quilt it together, which I have a feeling is more difficult than sewing the quilt top! I'll let you know.

And my Ten on Thursday, the quilting edition.

1. Make sure you check the size of the quilt you're quilting before you get started. I seriously thought this was a lap quilt. I'm pretty sure it will fit on a twin size bed. =) Whoops.

2. Don't try to think up 10 things about quilting while you're trying to sew a straight line.

3. If you tell yourself "it's ok, nothing's perfect" ten times over about a particular imperfection, it's not ok and it's going to drive you nuts.

4. Rotary cutters are the coolest invention ever.

5. They're also wicked sharp. Ouch!

6. Just because you can cut 10 layers of fabric with a rotary cutter doesn't mean you should.

7. Quilting isn't as hard as I thought it would be. It's just fabric and thread.

8. If you don't cut something precisely, it'll drive you nuts when you have to sew it. The sashing on the side (the white pieces) were cut like 10 layers at a time and there's a tiny wiggle in my cutting that echoed through all 10 layers. Trying to sew that in a straight line is no fun at all.

9. I need one of these. Aren't they beautiful?

10. I totally see why some quilts are $200 bucks. They're not the cheapest things if you use nice fabric and it's a fair amount of work! I'm sure the more intricate designs REALLY are. This one probably cost me around 75 bucks not counting the tools to get started.

Here's the Product list...

First, the quilt top I saw that made me want to do it...

http://retromummy.blogspot.com/2010/01/quilt-top.html

(See? Does it look huge? I was thinking lap quilt and just forced that image into a lap quilt size, I think.)

The Pattern

The remarkably helpful directions.

The fabric was from here, but I bought the last set. It was Amy Butler Daisy Chain fat quarters. There were 10 of them, and they were 30 bucks.

Then batting, and sashing fabric from Hancock, the batting is cotton instead of polyester and was 34 for 3 yards, and the sashing was 16 bucks or so. Add a couple of spools of thread and there ya go.

I'll post pictures when I finish it, which saying that is like the kiss of death as far as actually posting them, but I think in this case I most certainly will show it off. Maybe I'll get it done this weekend, we'll see.

Crawling... almost...

So... close...

10 on Tuesday

1. We had a lovely Christmas. Did you?

2. Dash and Kate with their loot from our house.



3. Dash sweetly gave his sister both of her presents. He didn't even try to keep them for himself. =)

4. We played around with the camera the day after Christmas...

These are my favorites.







5. John got a fry daddy for Christmas from me, we've already Christened it with onion rings and chicken fingers. Yum.

6. Did you know Big Bob BBQ sauce mixed with white sauce is delicious?

7. The radiator is acting up on the truck so I drove the car today and John was going to look at the truck while I was at work. I also accidentally took the truck keys with me to work. Whoops.

8. I'm looking forward to Krispy Kreme on New Year's Eve. =)

9. I'm also looking forward to 2010. Surely it will be better than 2009, right?

10. We got our nooks at work and I'm on the fence about keeping it and downloading every free book known to man or selling it on ebay and buying something else.

11. (Bonus!) We're tearing up some new Super Mario Brothers for Wii at our house. =) I bought the Mario and Sonic olympics game, too, we're checking that out tonight.

Christmas Finery

I had to bribe Dash with a Christmas present to get him to sit with her for our Christmas card photos but in the meantime I got a few good ones of Miss Kate...