Life in Color Photo – Page 308 – Celebrating crafts, kids and the everyday through photographs.

I don’t know about you, but crafting always makes me feel better.

October 26, 2008

So ya, that totally sucked. I'm still not over it (the tree cutting thing). Today I peaked out my bathroom window to see what my neighbor was doing and he was sitting in his driveway on a lawn chair facing our house. Creepy. Ugh. I talked to the neighbors on the corner about the flood light. They were super nice, but can't turn it off because it's activated by nightfall. And they've had five break-ins. So I give them that one, and put up extra blackout fabric behind the curtains for now. We'll see how I do tonight. My nice neighbor Tracy gave me her old changing table, so you know, I'm leaning towards that side of the street :).

But that's not what this post is about. See way back in September my mom was supposed to take me to Portland for a fun day to celebrate my birthday. But that was scheduled for the day after grandpa fell, and she got to take me to my Dr.'s appointment instead. So Saturday was the day. She picked me and my belly up in the morning.

We went to the last farmer's market of the season and got lots of yummy fresh veggies. We had an early lunch there. I had the most delicious creamy lentil and ham soup with grilled cheese sandwich. I don't think I've ever had soup and sandwich out side on a cold sunny morning before, it was fabulous. We popped into a fabric store so that my mom could get buttons for a project she's not doing such a good job at keeping secret from me. I was trying to stay away, and once I saw she was checking out I came over and my mom was talking to an acquittance. She exclaimed upon seeming me, "What happened to you? Well, I mean I know what happened…." It was pretty funny. All the ladies in the quilt shop were laughing. We headed to my mom's house and I was just going to work on more little blankets, but I figured with my mom there I should tackle something a little trickier, since she could help me with the hard bits. And I made this:

A little sleep bag! It's so soft (I made it out of flannel) and stylish. I used some fun quilting fabric to make the bias binding and even learned how to do snaps for the side.

Can you tell that they are awesome snaps? Because they are. I bought them locally, and it turns out she is on Etsy so you can all check her out at Epic Erma. These are the Cowgirl Snaps. After that project took almost all day (and another trip to the fabric store) I wanted to do something quick. So I worked on this project:

I've been wanting to make this pin cusion from Last Minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts for about a year. I had no pincusion. Now I want like fifty, this was so fun to make, and uses just scraps. It was a great day, thanks mom! I have enough flannel to make about a million soft things, but am going to wait before doing anything too major because I have showers coming up! Can you believe I'm far enough along to have a baby shower thrown for me?

Now can you? Ya, check out that belly! Bj took some pictures of me today after I realized it had been 6 weeks since the last batch. But to be fair we had a crazy last 6 weeks. The one thing I've been doing every night is write in the journal Michele got me. It only has room for a couple of sentences, so it's easy to make time for. At the beginning of each month there is a spot for a picture (and measurements and stuff). The ones of me at the beginning are just insane. I can't believe I was ever that small (ohhhh my poor boobs!!!). I don't know what I'm going to do about the shirt situation. I think maternity shirts should be a bit longer, the larger sizes just get bigger everywhere, so that's annoying. Anyway for those of you coming to my shower some registry information. I know someone needs help on this because the store called me, but I can't figure out who it was that couldn't find my registry, so spread the word:

Use the sidebar of this site to find our registry at
Little Urbanites
in the Pearl
916 NW 10th Ave.
503.227.8729
They also have a new online store/site right here. You can search for me in the registry section but it is missing a few of the special order items and things that are not yet listed online.

We are also registered at
Wee Bunz
1-888-WEE-BUNZ
Speaking of diapers, Bj just said to me tonight, "I just realized that if we have a girl we're going to have to be very careful of how we wipe it." Hehehe someone's been reading the baby books.

And yes we did do the big box baby store
Babies R Us
It just has a bunch of little stuff, safety stuff, and the convertible car seat for when the baby outgrows the infant one we got from Michele.

Of course we'd be happy with anything, so don't feel like you have to get us something from a registry at all. I know that I'm the first among many friends to have a little baby so some asked for a little guidance. There you go!

7 comments on I don’t know about you, but crafting always makes me feel better.
I weep for them

October 25, 2008

Two days ago I came back from a walk around my neighborhood to teenagers in my yard with chainsaws. This is never a sight one wants to see, especially when they have ropes dangling from the tops of arborvitae separating you and a neighbor (and the view of the intersection). I was upset, though the plants are clearly on mixed soil. I don't know who planted them, or when, but they've been there for a while.

I was mad, mostly that my neighbor didn't talk to us about it, that he used my yard to do all the work,etc. Bj was like, "Don't stress! You need to get over this, it's done, and we wanted them trimmed anyway." So I tried, I let it go. It was just the tops, and though sloppy, wouldn't really effect anything major. Then yesterday I got a call from another neighbor. She felt she should warn me that my neighbor had out the chainsaw again (well not him, but these teenage boys that we don't know where they come from). He chopped down all the trees from the edge of the fence to the arborvitae and now there was a huge gap between our yards. I'm glad she let me know because I think I would have gone into labor right there from shock. We're putting a nice big porch on the front of the house and now it's going to be not private at all. But my friends that was not the worst of it. What he did next he had every right to, but color me extremely upset anyway.
I'm not sure if many of you remember this idyllic scene from this last summer:

It is no more. The beautiful Japanese maple, the shrubs, all of it:

GONE. Why would you do this? Why?!?!?! I have a theory. I think it is because he hates me. See I put up that fence when I first moved in so that my back yard could be locked and no one would be able to get to my basement windows (and thus the Ribbon Jar). He can't get over it. I told him we were going to do it, and at that time he said nothing to me about it being a problem. I only found out after that he told everyone who came over he hates it. Um, I'm sorry but I have to fence in my backyard. So anyway. Now I have a new problem. The next neighbor over from him has three big floodlights. One:

Is like a personal streetlight. While annoying before, with nothing between me and it I now find it unbearable. I could not sleep last night it is so bright, and I was so upset about the tree thing. I may find this early morning post a bad idea later but I just had to get it out of my system. I can only hope little baby looks out its bathroom window to this:

And never looks straight down. I'm going to go be crafty at my mom's now.

6 comments on I weep for them
The easiest baby hat ever!

October 24, 2008

It worked!

This is seriously from a rectangle of knitting, NO DECREASES, NO DOUBLE POINTED NEEDLES. I may know people afraid of these things (and they shouldn't be), this resolves all their hat fears. You do have to seam up the back:

But I doubt many would notice it much. Especially because the sides are so great:

Here is the Ravelry link. I almost got the hat and sweater out of one skein of medium weight Socks That Rock. You could do it if you cast on a few less stitches for the hat (which would be fine because it seems a little big). Of course I couldn't resist doing this:

Hehehehe. My little stuffed dog is also wearing little cloth diapers, but you can't see them. I pretty much try all my knits on "alpster" The Ravelry links: Raglan Sweater and Pixie Hat. Next up: tackling the awesome yarn Kay sent me, mmmm I think I found the perfect pattern for it.

edited to add: if you need anything fabric/craft related check out Jo-Ann's, they pretty much have everything on sale. Seriously I had to use my 50% off coupon on a 3.99 item because it was the only thing regularly priced I needed. Just a heads up the sale goes through Saturday. And it was nut balls crazy in ours, so beware.

4 comments on The easiest baby hat ever!

I don’t know about you, but crafting always makes me feel better.

I weep for them

The easiest baby hat ever!

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