Baby Dear Baby Shower

 

I had so much fun putting this baby shower together. Baby Dear was my favorite book as a little girl. I especially loved its beautiful illustrations. I still have a thing for Little Golden Books today (I collect them, even).  I'd been looking for an excuse for years to throw a Golden Book themed party and this little girl baby shower was a perfect chance to do it! 

 

I tried to have a bit of a vintage feel to the shower, since the book was written in the 1960s.  In a moment of serendipity, right as I decided to have the shower feel a bit vintage, my mom called and asked if I wanted a stork decoration.  She was cleaning out some storage and thought I might like it.  Yes!  This cute little stork, while not from the 1960s, was used at my baby shower--the one where I was the baby!  It may be from the 1980s rather than the 1960s, but it definitely gave the vibe I was going for. 

 

 I used some sweet girly fabric to make a pennant banner. 

 

 

I think my favorite part of the decor, though, was this Baby Dear banner:

 

I scanned in illustrations from the book, found a similar font to the one used on the cover, and worked some Photoshop (Elements) magic.  I printed the resulting images out onto cardstock and cut them out.  I attached the letters to baby pink ribbon and hung it in my living room.  I think it's adorable, if I do say so myself. 

 

 

 

(Well, really, my favorite part were the invitations, but I already wrote about those...)  :)

 

 

 

I scattered some Little Golden Books around the party area, especially ones that were illustrated by Eloise Wilkin (the illustrator of Baby Dear).  Her little baby cheeks and pudgy fingers are so cute. 

 

 

 

Add in some doilies and yummy food and you've got a fun vintage Golden Book party!

 

  

 

 

 

I made cupcake toppers with some pink scrapbook paper and these 1-inch Pretty Vintage Little Girl Circles from Free Pretty Things. 

 

 

 

It was really nice to have an opportunity, in this house full of boys, to enjoy such girlishness!  It was such a fun baby shower!

 

The Doctor

Both my son and husband wanted to go as Doctor Who for Halloween. I was going to have one be the 11th and the other the 10th, but as I didn't have a pinstripe suit or tan trenchcoat for either of them, they both went has the 11th. He's easier to dress. :)

For my son, I made suspenders out of burgandy ribbon, and a bowtie and fez (fezzes are cool!) out of felt.  Then he just wore his sunday shirt, a pair of blue slacks, and carried his awesome LED sonic-screwdriver flashlight.

 

 

We went a similar route for my husband, donning a tweedy-looking blazer from Goodwill instead of suspenders, and a cowboy hat instead of a fez.  (I wear a stetson now.  Stetsons are cool.)  

Granted, nearly nobody knew who they were supposed to be, but my guys knew they had cool costumes even if nobody else did.  :)  I think it may be time to start encouraging all my friends to watch Doctor Who on Netflix.  :)

Mad-Eye Moody

I better hurry and get the rest of the Halloween costumes posted before Christmas, eh? :) Is it just me or are the last 3-4 months of the year like a train speeding towards a cliff sometimes? I swear it was just September, and now there's just a month left in the year. The time just seems to evaporate!

One of my twins wanted to go as Mad-Eye Moody this year.  He's a big Harry Potter fan.

And, his costume was pretty easy.  No sewing involved this time.  He wore a brown t-shirt, khakis, and an old "pleather" jacket of mine.  He carried a wand that was really the staff of one of those little American flags everyone waves on the 4th of July.  

 

The main construction part on his costume was the "mad" eye.  Years back, we bought a box of plastic animals from Michael's or somewhere.  Its lid was a spinning globe.  I held onto it, thinking it might come in handy sometime.  And it totally did!  I painted the globe to look like an eye.  I hot glued it to some black felt, and attached a ribbon.  Easy (and free, since I already had all the supplies!) mad-eye.  

A Treat from Treat!

I have a great offer today from Treat!  Treat is Shutterfly’s new greeting card brand and their cards are totally fun.  You can add pictures and personalize cards for any holiday, including birthdays.  And now you can send one for FREE.

They have cute cards for every holiday.  How cute is the two-little-turkeys one below?!  I think my favorite is the super hero one, though.  I think my little guy might be getting one of those for his birthday soon. :)

Use the code TREATBLOGR on Monday 11/19 & Tuesday 11/20 for a FREE card from Treat!

Disclosure: I was compensated for this promotion.. All opinions are my own.

Weeping Angel

Any Whovians out there?  If so, this Halloween costume will either thrill you, or totally freak you out.  :)  I went as a Weeping Angel this year!  I'm not sure why I went to such effort for a costume that like 2 people at the Halloween party actually got.  But, the rest of them either thought I was a statue or the Statue of Liberty (which, IS a weeping angel, if you've seen the latest Doctor Who episode!), which I guess is close enough.

If I were a really on-the-ball blogger, I would have had this costume done in September and blogged it the first week of October (and would now be posting Christmas tips).  But, I'm not.  I'm a busy mom of three who got all the costumes done just in the nick of time.  :)    I've got a few more in the pipeline for...when I get to it.  (Just keeping it real, people, just keeping it real.)  :)

I had a few Facebook friends tell me they couldn't look at my pictures (or look away, if you know what I mean), as it was too freaky.  Can't say I blame them.  Weeping Angels are, in my opinion, the scariest Doctor Who villains.  

I've never done full Halloween makeup before.  It wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be (and I didn't break out after, either!).

I used this tutorial as a jumping off point.  I wasn't going to go quite as gung ho as she did, as this was just for a few hour church Halloween Trunk or Treat.  But, it gave me a few ideas as to how to execute the costume.  

I used foam poster board to do the wings.  I cut wing shapes out of the foam board, and used the extra left over to cut "feathers" out of.  I hot-glued the feathers to the wings.  

 

  I used duct tape to tape the wings together, looser on the outside and tighter on the inside (if that even makes sense...), so they'd stay in a partly closed position.  

I then spray-painted them well, duct tape and all. 

I then added some elastic to them so I could wear them (in the same manner as the costume/little kid fairy wings you can buy).  I should have used heavier elastic, but all I had on hand was skinny little stuff, and by that point, I was ready to just.be.done.already.  :)  By the end of the night, my wings were pretty droopy (see picture above--I had to keep remembering to pull them up) because the elastic over-stretched.  Eh.  It worked out fine for one night.  

I used gray tights as long gloves, just like the original tutorial did.  I probably could have just bought gray winter gloves, as it was rather cold the night of the (partly outdoor) party, and I wore a grey long-sleeved shirt over the long "gloves" for warmth.

For the dress, I drafted a yoke for the top, then draped about 2 yards (1.5 maybe? Bad blogger...no good records were kept!) of fabric, gathered well, and attached it to the yoke (both in front and in back). 

 

I sewed the sides together, leaving the arm holes very large (and sleeveless) because I was just too lazy to bother with a zipper or anything.  I wanted this quick and easy and able to slip over my head!  I then tied a grey ribbon around the waist and we had a dress!  I duct taped (yes, sewing blasphemy, I know) a hula hoop to the hem, to give me a statue look.  

The wig was one of my favorite parts.  I sewed grey yarn to a...ahem...pantyhose cap, then braided and twisted the yarn into an angel-esque hairstyle.  I added a ribbon headband and everything.  Bobby pins don't really work with a yarn wig, of course, so I secured the bun with a few stitches.  

It was a very fun costume to wear, even if only a select few knew what I was.  I knew what I was, and my Doctor Who fan family members knew who I was, and they had a great time with me as I pretended to be a Weeping Angel and tried to "get" them.  :)  I had a seriously fun time wearing this costume and fully embracing my nerdiness.  

Tiny Prints Giveaway Winner!

The winner of the Tiny Prints giveaway was reader Christopher! His entry was picked by the random number generator over at Random.org.

Congratulations, Christopher!  Send me your email address so I can let you know how to claim your prize.  And thanks to everyone who entered and for reading my blog!

Tiny Prints Christmas Cards (And My Very First Giveaway!)

Yes, yes.  I know it's still October.  Perhaps I should be posting something Halloweeny.  (Soon enough, soon enough...)  I'm a planner, though.  I'm already thinking about this year's Christmas cards.  We did our family pictures a few weeks ago, so I'm all ready to go.

My favorite place for Christmas Cards is Tiny Prints.  Seriously, their cards are so cute.  I used them for my Christmas card last year.  Don't you love it?!

I'm having a hard time deciding which card to choose this year--they're all amazing!  Check out all these great Christmas card designs!  (And, of course, there are many, many more to choose from!  These are just a few of my favorites.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you decide to use Tiny Prints for your Christmas cards this year, they've got quite a few deals over on their Special Offers page.

And, you're in luck!  I'm hosting my VERY FIRST giveaway today!  (I'm pretty excited about that.  :)  )  You can win your very own adorable Tiny Prints Christmas Cards!

The great people at Tiny Prints are providing a promo code for $50 off your total order (not including shipping and cannot be combined with any other promos) for me to give away to one of my lucky readers!  To enter, just leave me a comment!  I'll announce the winner on October 29th.



Disclosure: I was given a set of holiday cards from Tiny Prints for this review. All opinions are my own.