Birthday Bash & Giveaway

Good morning! I know that Monday’s are normally reserved for my organizing posts, but today is SPECIAL! It’s my 30th Birthday!! Woohoo!! I LOVE birthdays, don’t you?! AND I love being pampered on my birthday:) hehe

I’ve been kind of nervous and excited about this birthday. It’s the big 3-0. I’m no longer “young” anymore. I’ve crossed that threshold and I’m not sure what the future will bring, BUT, I’m still celebrating my heart out, none the less, and I thought it would be fun to have a birthday giveaway for all of my wonderful followers!! I have some very fun prizes to giveaway and I’ve made some wonderful friends in the process!! I can’t wait to see who wins what!

Soooo…. without further ado, here are the prizes and the bloggers giving them away. I’ve included a little blurb so you can get to know them. Please go visit their blogs and say “Hello!”. If you make it to the end of this post the giveaway will be there 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!

First up we have, Susan from Organized 31, who is giving away the cutest zippered pouch!! I LOVE the little animals!

Hello, I’m Susan. I’m married to my dedicated active duty Air Force husband and have 3 wonderful children. I’ve moved into 27 different homes and have organized homes in 12 states and 3 foreign countries. I’ve been everything from an Air Force officer, to a Parent Educator, to a stay-at-home mom, with many other experiences along the way. I believe that life is better when organized.

Next up is Jenn, from Thoughts, Rants and Art, who is giving away a bracelet and earring set. I love it!

Hello there, I’m Jenn! I’m an artist and designer living in Annapolis, MD. I dabble in anything that could be considered a creative hobby. I sell my jewelry and some collages on etsy and I blog about art, food and life on my blog Thoughts, Rants and Art.

Chrystie from Pocket Full of Posies is giving away a CUTE Journal Card Mini Scrapbook. She blogged about it here so you can view what it looks like on the inside. I am just in LOVE with all her little mini albums!! I won one of them, which you can view on her blog too. Here’s Chrystie:

Hi, I’m Chrystie! I am married to a wonderful man who loves me back. I have 4 awesome kids, who get along well most of the time! I homeschool and love it! And in my spare time I Scrap and Craft like crazy! I also LOVE photograpy!

Deanna at From Wine to Whine is also here to giveaway a FREE snapfish 5×7 photo book!

Hi, I’m Dee. I am a late twenty something, pin-a-holic Mom to a beautiful little girl and a step mom to a wonderfully well-rounded teen. When I can find a few free moments from the busy work we call life, I enjoy DIYing, couponing and crafting wearable/usable things…and let’s not forget my best work happens while enjoying an adult beverage or two!

And last, but not least, since this is the reason all these great prizes are available, is me, Crafty Meggy! I will be giving away an adorable button headband as well as three 30% off coupons to my Etsy shop!

And, you all know me, right? If you don’t, you can learn more on my about page. I hope you’ll stick around and become a new friend!

So, that’s 8 winners total!! Hurry up and enter! The giveaway ends Thursday, May 2nd at midnight. There are a few of the entries that can be done each day, so come back and keep entering! ALSO, I have a fun post planned for each day of the week! What a treat, right?!! I have a couple guest bloggers scheduled and I can’t wait for you to meet them! They are AWESOME! 🙂

What are you waiting for? Click the link below and it will take you to the gateway to win some awesome prizes (I know, I’m really weird, but it is my birthday so cut me some slack:) hehe).

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Oh, I almost forgot!! Someone else is having a birthday today and you can receive 20% off on a purchase from them today! AND they’re offering 6 amazing items!! Yes, it’s true, head on over to Pick Your Plum‘s facebook page to grab the coupon code and start shopping!!

ALSO, since this is a birthday BASH, I’m going to give you a coupon code to use in my Etsy shop for today only! You can receive 30% off your total order! I hope you’ll come on over and celebrate with me! 🙂

Thanks for stopping by!! I hope you have a wonderful day! Enjoy some cake, or something sweet. Hey, it is my birthday, you can celebrate too:)

Whatcha Craftin’ ~ Spring Raincoat

Can you believe Spring is already here? This past week has been soooooo NICE!! I LOVE having 50 degree weather in April!! Although there have been a couple GLUM days this month, so far, it’s better than I thought April would be! 🙂

I have something very fun for today! You all know that I LOVE sewing and I have my 30 sewing projects before I turn 30 that I’m trying to complete in the next week and a half. I’m getting down to the wire here! I kind of felt like a little kid waiting for Christmas for a long time on this little challenge of mine. It seemed like my birthday would never come, but, alas it’s almost here and I still have a couple more projects to complete!

Today I’m going to share a raincoat I made for my 6 year old about a month ago. I am so IN LOVE with it!! But, it wasn’t the easiest thing to make! In fact, if my other 2 kids really want one, I will probably just go out and BUY them one. That’s how hard and frustrating this pattern was! I don’t really think it was the designers fault either, I think it was mainly the laminate cotton fabric I used. It was SO HARD to work with! I threw my hands up and walked away more than three times! It took me 3 days and MANY hours to complete, but I got it done and I’m VERY proud of the way it turned out!!

And Brynnan LOVES it!!

I think this is my favorite picture of him in it, but it also makes me cringe when I look at it. Not because of my cute little boy, but because of what happened AFTER I took this picture! ….

Long story short… I always take about 50 pictures of one pose, especially of my kids, to make sure I get ONE that is just PERFECT. Well, in the process of taking those 50 pictures Brynnan was moving around a lot. At one point his legs were in the position they are in the above picture, but the rest of his body was falling over to the left of the picture. WELLLLLL, there was a nail sticking out at an odd angle, Brynnan’s coat got caught on it and resulted in two small rips in the back of the coat!! AAAHHHH!! It wasn’t his fault, I’m not mad at him, but it happened. I should’ve known better than to have him actually LEAN against the old wood fence! 😛 I still have yet to patch it up. I’m very tempted to just buy some white duck tape and draw some black dots on it so I don’t have to sew it up! LOL

The red circles are where the 2 rips are. You can barely see them in the picture. Sorry!! I promise they are really there!

Here are a few pictures of the inside.

I just LOVE the fabric I picked out! The Jo-Ann’s in Idaho Falls doesn’t have a huge selection of laminated cotton so the dots was as good as I was going to find, but the inside fabric I could pretty much choose whatever I wanted. I thought the blue and green would look cute with the white and black. It was knit, so of course it would be soft and cozy, which is what I wanted for the inside of the rain coat.

The lining fabric on the inside stops quite a ways before the end of the sleeve. I like that because then hopefully the lining won’t get so wet.

I’m happy with the results, but VERY glad to be done with it! Maybe I’ll try making another one in a couple more years. Once I get more sewing experience under my belt!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you’re having a Wonderful Wednesday!!

Whatcha Craftin’ ~ Zig Zag Tunic & Other Sewing

Tunic is such a weird word, right? It just sounds wrong. LOL BUT I do think tunics are cute for little girls. I’ve bought a couple different patterns that can be made into a dress or a tunic and I have yet to make either one of them. They’re CUTE, but I don’t have any girls to sew for so I’m not always that excited to sew them, even though I know I am, if that makes any sense at ALL!

Anyway, last week I was contacted by a blogger/designer that I admire, Kate, from See Kate Sew. She had a new pattern and needed some testers. I immediately replied saying I would LOVE to test the pattern for her and volunteered for a size 4T. I’ve been wanting to make my niece something cute and easy for a LONG time, so this would give me the opportunity and also FORCE me to get it done quickly! There’s only 3 more weeks until my birthday and I still have 10 sewing projects to finish!! Aaaaaahhhh!! (Well, that was before I started sewing this tunic. I am currently down to 8 and a half! Wooohooo!)

I knew which fabric to use when I got the email. I’ve been dying to use it since I bought it about 6 months ago.

…… It wasn’t a great success. I was very sad and frustrated about the outcome. It wasn’t anyone’s fault but my own. I would work on it at night and stay up late and when I do that I don’t always make the best choices. *SIGH* SO, here’s that first attempt with the fabric I’ve been dying to use:

I’m not done with it. I have to undo half of it before I can salvage it. I’m going to take off the ribbon and not put anything around the waist.

The ribbon you see on the waist was supposed to be piping, but I couldn’t find any that I really liked so when I got home from the fabric store I found this ribbon and decided it would look cute. The only problem was that I couldn’t see it as I was sewing so it turned out all uneven and you can’t really even see it in some places.

Since I was testing the pattern for a designer I decided to start all over again. I wasn’t up for fixing what I messed up. LOL The second time around I skipped the piping & ribbon all together and just made the tunic plain.

It turned out SO MUCH better!! What do you think?

I spent FOREVER working on these pictures today! I just couldn’t get them too look the way I wanted. BUT I finally got it and I’m pretty happy with how they turned out. The original pictures look NOTHING like this!! hehe

My favorite part of the pictures is the dress!! Or tunic, I should say. I just LOVE how it worked out with this fabric!! I bought it at Hobby Lobby in Vegas over the summer and when I was in Boise a couple months after that I HAD to buy more of it. Isn’t it just darling??!! I’m SO in LOVE with yellow and grey right now.

And, in honor of my birthday in 2 weeks and 5 days, I thought I’d also share with you my list of sewing projects. My birthday is on April 29th and it’s fast approaching! I can’t believe it!! And I’m completely stressing out about it. WHY, oh, WHY do I procrastinate so??!!

30 Sewing Projects Before I Turn 30:

1. Aviator hat for Jonas

2. Aviator hat for Brynnan

3. Aviator hat for Tinian

4. Bean bag frogs for Jonas

5. Bean bag frogs for Brynnan

6. Bean bag frogs for Lynn

7. Lil Gentleman’s suit

8. Burp Cloths

9. Batman PJ pants

10. Ruffle Tote Bag

11. Winter pj’s for Brynnan

12. Valentine’s Day Sew Along Dress

13. Sun Hat

14. Character PJ’s for Jonas

15. 3 Tiered Ruffle Skirt

16. Ruffles Galore Play & Party Pants

17. Knot Overalls

18. Puddle Jumper Rain coat

19. Super Hero Cape Jonas    

20. Super Hero Cape Brynnan

21. Guitar Strap

22. knot Overalls

23. zig zag dress

24. zig zag dress

25. Boys swim trunks

26. Pillowcase Dress (for project Yesu)

27. Pillowcase Dress (for project Yesu)

28. Boys shorts (for project Yesu)

29. Boys shorts (for project Yesu)

30. Dino blanket for Tini

So, there you have it. My final 30 Before 30 sewing list. I’m sure it will change even in the next couple weeks, so I actually can’t say FINAL until the day of my birthday!! BUT, it feels good to have so many of the projects crossed off!! Tomorrow I’m finishing some knot overalls for a customer and possibly starting on the boys swim trunks (another pattern I’m testing! Yay!). I’ll be back next week to talk more about Project Yesu. I’m really excited about helping out with it!!

Thanks for stopping by!! I hope your sewing and crafting adventures are going well!! I’d love you to post links in the comments to your current projects!! I will be starting a link party very SOON and I can’t wait for you all to start sharing what you make on there!!

Hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday! 🙂

Whatcha Craftin’ ~ St. Patrick’s Day Knot Overalls

I was contacted by Whimsy Couture Patterns to test sew a new pattern for her and send her some professional photos. She let me decide what size to make so I chose to do a small size, 3-6 months. I’m so glad I did that size!! I think little baby clothes are just SO cute and FUN to work with! And then I get to take pictures of a cute baby wearing what I made! It has a sense of satisfaction to it that I just can’t explain.

Anyway, I really enjoyed making these overalls and plan on making some more. In fact, the mom of the baby that modeled them for me ordered a size bigger for her baby girl for the summer! CUTE!! She told me I could pick out the fabric and everything!! YAY!! So I’ll sew those up in the next week and totally come back and share how they turned out!! 🙂

Ok, I keep getting side tracked, but here are the cute overalls on the precious baby:

 

Isn’t she just adorable?!! I LOVE taking pictures of happy baby’s! It makes my job as a photographer so easy and FUN! 🙂 She was so sweet and smiley the whole time! It was great! I can’t wait to get started on sewing her pair of overalls!

I am hosting a special link party again of one of my bloggy friends tomorrow so I will be posting Tasty Thursday tonight. Come back and check out the fun and easy recipe my sis has picked out this week!

Thanks for stopping by today!!

Whatcha Craftin’ ~Sew Along Dress

I mentioned a while ago that I was participating in my first sew along. One of my favorite designers, Seamingly Smitten, had her first sew along on her blog in January. I was excited to participate, but it took me a few weeks to actually start sewing. I seem to put off sewing, even when I really want to sew something. It’s weird!

Anyway, I finally finished the dress a couple weeks ago and I was able to photograph it on a model last week. The model was so TINY!! She’ll be 3 this year and the dress was still a bit big on her. It was a size 1-2T.

The thing that threw me off on making this dress was the buttons. I put that part off for a few days. I would get all ready to sew the button part, but then I would get too overwhelmed and decide not to do it. I’m cool like that:)

I really love how it turned out, though!! The fabric I picked out to use for it was just TOO CUTE!! I really wish I had a girl to sew for!! since I don’t, I just do it for fun and sell whatever I make in my Etsy shop. I’d love to know what you think!

Isn’t this little girl just the CUTEST??!! I absolutely LOVE her curls!! I used to have curls like that when I was little. I really wish I still had them!

I just died when she did this all on her own during the session!! It was so perfect!!

I’m glad I finally finished the dress and took pictures of it on this cutie! I just love photographing kids. It’s so much fun! 🙂 I think I might tackle this dress pattern again, someday. The buttons actually weren’t that hard to do once I just gritted my teeth and did it. I hope next time around I’ll be able to do it all in one sitting. I love having the satisfaction of completing something in a short period of time. I wish it would happen more often! 🙂

Well, thanks for stopping by! I hope you have a wonderful Wednesday! I’d love to hear/see what you’ve been creating lately!!

Fashion Friday

Happy Friday! I hope you’re having a great week! Mine has been busy! I’ve finished a couple more presents and actually been cleaning! Yay!! 🙂

Today I thought we would talk about cashmere. Have you ever owned or warn a cashmere sweater? I haven’t, in all of my 29 years.

Well, that changed in August when my Aunt Elyse let me go shopping in her closet!! 🙂 she gave me so many cute shirts and outfits!! It was so fun.

I didn’t even realize the sweater was cashmere until after washing it in cold water with other clothes!! I looked at the tag last night and sure enough it said to dry clean only!! Yikes. Bikes. (As my friend Karlenn would say). Now that it’s been washed a few times with cold water it’s not the same. It’s starting to pill up and look old.

But let me tell you one thing, it’s still feels so soft and keeps me  warm!!

Here are a couple pictures of me wearing it:

Thanks for stopping by!! Have a great weekend! 🙂

Whatcha Craftin’ ~ Crafts & Photography

I’m busy. Busy as a bee. BUT I haven’t really had time to write up a post about what I’ve been doing so I’ll just show you snip-its and do a more detailed post down the road.

The boys wanted some new bookmarks so Mark made some in Illustrator and we printed them out and cut them on the Silhouette. I will have these available for you soon. I’ll do a tut on them:) Didn’t they turn out great?!! The boys LOVES them!!

I’m still chugging along on the Mario brothers quilts for the boys. I’ve decided that they won’t be ready for Christmas, though. There’s just NO WAY I could finish all three of them in 3 months!! I just have too much going on! I almost have all the peices cut up though, just about 1000 more 2×2 squares to go:)

The new idea I have for their Christmas present are these Aviator Caps. I got the pattern for free and will hopefully finish them all this week. I’m very excited!! Peek-a-boo patterns is my new favorite!:)

So, that’s what I’ve been up to lately. OH, and some photography too…

My cousin, Aubry and her hubby, Ricky. I was so excited to take their pictures while I was in CA visiting!! I only wish I had more time to take my Aunt Vicki’s pictures, with my other cousins. AND Maurya and Danny’s pictures. *SIGH*

And, my bestie, Karlenn, has me take her family pictures every year. She’s so amazing and I LOVE that she still lets me take her family pictures!! This is Micah. I LOVE this kid so much!! Isn’t he just a CUTIE??!! Can I tell you a secret? Shhhh… He’s my favorite:) That kid can make me smile, he is so sweet and just makes me laugh. He reminds me a lot of my Brynnan. They have their bad moments, but it just makes their good ones so much better!! Boys are special, in ways that girls aren’t and I’m thankful I have 3 of them… but I’m getting off topic here…. I hope this little teaser will hold you over Kar:) I wish I could do photography all day long! That’s my dream job. Someday.

So, what have you been up to? I have so many ideas in my head. I’m going to make a fall wreath. Maybe. LOL I have all the supplies to make it, I just need to find time to do it. *SIGH* wish me luck!! I hope you’re having fun crafting!

Thanks for stopping by!!

Pinterest Pick (Kind of)

I think I found a new sewing project I want to add to my list so I’ll have to bump something or just do more than 30. That would be awesome if I actually do finish all 30 projects and get to  31!!:) I found it on Sew Can She and pinned it on my pinterest sewing board so I wouldn’t forget about it and lose the tutorial. I LOVE it!! I wish I had a little girl!!

Just adorable right??!! I mnight just have to make this first when I get home. I just can’t resist the cuteness!! I want to go fabric shopping… I NEED to!

What have you found recently on pinterest or a website/blog that you can’t resist? Share it with us!!:)

Thanks for stopping by!

Fashion Friday ~ sunglasses

Happy Friday everyone!! This week has gone by way too quickly!! Have I been cleaning and organizing my piles? HA!! That’s a GOOD question… I won’t dignify it with an answer because I’m sure you can guess what it is lol:)

Today I thought we’d talk about Sunglasses because I’ve been in need of new ones for over a month now and I bought some at Walmart for $15. They seemed like they would last a long time, but I had them for only a week and they broke while I was holding them in my hand! I might’ve hit them against my bag or something, but that really shouldn’t have broken them!! I was annoyed!:P

Well, Mark and I went to the mall this week and decided to buy me some glasses. I know the style right now is the big round sunglasses look, but I’ve never really liked it. They might look good on SOME people, but not on me, at all! I look like a bug, with huge eyes!! lol Maybe my head is just too small for them, I don’t know. I tried on a bunch of them and they all just looked WRONG!!

I settled on a small pair and I’m in love with them now.

I wasn’t sure about how much I liked them when I bought them, but they were only $7 so I didn’t feel like I was making a huge mistake.

I didn’t like the bling at first, but now I think it adds something fun to the glasses:) I’m not a huge fan of bling in the first place so when there is a minimal amount I think I tolerate it better. Some of the glasses we looked at were covered in it!! That’s just too crazy for me!!

Let’s take a look at some of those bug eye glasses so you can get an idea of what I’m talking about:)

All I can say is WOW! Those are some big glasses!:)

I like this picture of Jessica Alba, but it is severely photoshoped!!! I’d like to see the original. I’m sure it looks better. But that’s just my opinion. I think people like her are probably the only ones that look good in anything.I love her earrings in the picture!:)

Notice how most of these are pictures of celebs? Weird. lol

Personally, I love these ones Jennifer Aniston is wearing. They don’t look too big or too small for her face. Just perfect. Wish I looked like that at least once a week! hehe:)

What’s your opinion on sunglasses? Do you wear big or small or medium? What do you think people look good in? I’d love to hear your opinion or fashion advice on this topic.

And to get your weekend started off right I have a song to share with you. It reminds me of being in high school and how carefree life used to be back then. It makes me just want to dance and sing and have fun. I think it’s my new favorite song. I feel silly and giddy when I listen to it. We need a little bit of that in our lives as moms:) Have fun listening!! hehe

Thanks for stopping by!!

A Tutorial Tuesday ~ 4th of July shirts

I told you I was going to make 4th of July shirts for the boys. Well, if you know me I procrastinate A LOT!! I put it off until Sunday night, the 1st!! And we were leaving Monday afternoon for a 2 day trip so I wouldn’t have any time to make it after Monday.

Sunday night I got on pinterest, what else?!!, to figure out what exactly I wanted to do. I had an idea, a flag with fabric. I had a bunch of 4th of July themed fabric scraps that would work perfectly so I used a couple different patterns for each shirt.

I settled on a flag shirt that had 4 strips of red fabric and then a blue rectangle with stars on it. I can’t find the blog for the life of me now. I guess I didn’t pin it on pinterest, I must’ve seen it at a link party. I’ll keep searching for it and let you know if I find it.

I cut up my fabric a little bigger than the lady on the blog suggested. My measurements were 4 1/2″ x 1 1/2″  for the 2 smaller strips, 8 1/2″ x 1 1/2 ” for the longer ones and the blue rectangle was about 5 1/2″ x 4 1/2″.

After I cut them all out I places them on the shirt how I wanted them. I then took out my fusible interfacing and proceeded to iron it onto the fabric pieces. This is kind of a funny story so sit tight and listen/read while I explain:

I was really confused and thinking that I was using Wunder-Under and not interfacing!! SO when I went to pull off the interfacing from the fabric it just pulled off and left no sticky residue to iron into place on the shirt. I was so frustrated with myself. I thought I had left the iron on for too long on all the pieces… ‘lo & behold when I got to my Mother in laws house and we talked about this incident she said, “OH you want to use Wunder-Under!!!” Oh, yeah, DUH!! I had used it at my mom’s to make a monkey applique bib and I thought it was amazing stuff! apparently I didn’t care to remember the name of it though. LOL

So, I gave up without knowing what the problem was on Sunday night. I pinned the pieces in place and started to sew.

I used red thread for the red pieces and a grey color for the blue rectangle.

It turned out ok. The fabric kept moving, even with the pins so I was annoyed by that, but I still think it looks cute!:)

I made one for my toddler too, so those measurements were a little different. I made the blue rectangle a little longer in length and shorter in width. It just worked better with the smaller shirt. I didn’t write them down though so I’m telling you from memory. I think the blue rectangle was 3 1/2″ x 2″ and the smaller strips were about 3 3/4″  x 1 1/2″. The longer strips were about 5 1/2″ x 1 1/2″.

I didn’t feel like pinning the strips onto the onesie because I was tired and being lazy. I decided to just use fabric glue to keep them in place. I wish I had taken the time to pin them down! 😛

Sewing on the fabric. I started with the blue piece first this time around.

Let me tell you, sewing on a onesie is a LOT harder than I thought it would be!! But I got through it!:)

This is the shirt I made at my mother in laws house on Tuesday night, since I didn’t get a chance to finish it before leaving and I left all our luggage, including the supplies to make a shirt for Brynnan!

It turned out better though because she had Wunder-Under!!:) Woohoo! So I cut it up and ironed it on. It stayed in place perfectly and didn’t move an inch while I sewed. It was amazing!! She had invisible thread so I used that. It was interesting. I’m not sure I like it, but it was cool to use.

Here’s Brynnan on our drive home on the 4th wearing his new shirt proudly.

My crazy boys sporting their holiday spirits:)

They were all really excited about their new shirts. I’m glad that they liked them so much!!

What did you make for your kids for the holiday? I wish I had a little girl that could’ve worn the little twirly skirt I made a few weeks ago! But, I don’t so I have my cute boys to make stuff for:)

Thanks for stopping by!! I hope you’re having a great Tuesday!:)