Christmas 2014

Christmas morning was very eventful and fun! We woke Mish up to head downstairs for presents! This was the first year she really understood what Christmas was, and knew to expect presents :)

Santa brought her a cool big kid scooter! She immediately hopped on it and tried it out. How is my 2 year old already such a big kid? Waah!

Santa also brought her a stocking full of fun goodies, and Mama and Daddy gave her some fun presents too ;-)

After presents we drove over to my parents' house to exchange gifts with my family, and to have a delicious brunch. 

Mish and her cousin Izzy with Papa

The cousins with Grammy

After brunch and presents with my family, we drove into Napa to celebrate the holiday with my in-laws (we spend xmas eve with my parents, so it's two busy days back-to-back). 

My father in law is notorious for falling asleep during gatherings. Lol!

 

Me and my big old 24 week baby bump :) And yes, that is Michelle's VW van tent in the background. Her aunt got it for her for xmas. Lol! In fact, Mish was spoiled and got TONS of amazing gifts from both of our families. Is it normal to be jealous of a toddler?

Mish and her uncle Anthony had fun playing with the giant Jenga set that Michael and I made for my sister in law :) 

My mother in law made a huge delicious dinner. Manicotti, baked crab, and ham! Whoa baby! 

Kisses from mama <3

My handsome yeti <3

It was a great Christmas! We had fun celebrating and eating with our families :)

Quick update and new camera!

Today has been a hot and busy day! I made a veggie pot pie, two platters of enchiladas, Mexican rice, and a blackberry cobbler. It was 100+ degrees outside today, and baking all day didn't help with the heat, but I'm excited to have a few days of dinner already cooked :)

For my birthday Michael bought me the nicest Canon DSLR and I have been going picture crazy! Speaking of my birthday, Michael took the day off and took Michelle and me up to Oregon where we played in Ashland at Lithia Park, shopped in Medford, and got ice cream. We got dinner in Yreka, and ended the night with cake at home. He is so sweet.

Of course I have to post some of the pictures I've taken with my camera ;-) Here they are below.

Late Spring Post

For St. Patty's day Michael and I made the BEST Reuben sandiwches! Mine was vegetarian, but it was still ridiculously good! Mmm. 

Mish wore her green rag skirt that I made, along with cute matching green hair accessories. I was feeling festive this year ;-)

For Easter weekend we spent a lot of time with family. On Saturday we went out to my parents' small town for an Easter egg hunt! Mish had fun collecting eggs but was so scared of the Easter bunny! It was so sad to see how afraid she was, but the faces she made were so funny.

After the hunt we went to my parents' house to play with their chicks! My parents have a chicken coop and just got a new little set of chickens. Mish loved looking at them but did NOT like holding them! Haha.

Mish, Grammie and the chick

 The next day, Easter Sunday, we had my in-laws over for Easter fun. It was a really nice day!

Easter Egg Hunt

Wearing a hat like Uncle!

Blowing bubbles with Uncle Ant and Auntie Rachael

Here's a pic of Michael and his siblings. They're all ridiculously good-looking, which is annoying for us normal folk. Lol

And here's a pic of their whole family, plus my little Michelle :)

It really was a happy Easter!

Blogging Fail!

I fail! I haven't updated my blog in 3 months! I kind of had my feelings hurt when someone I care about told me that she won't read my blog, and I sort of thought, "well, no one else is either, so why waste my time?"
But then I was thinking about it, and I realized that I started this blog in the first place as a personal log to track my pregnancy, newly married life, and fun adventures in being a new mom.

So, I will try my hardest to update more, and to not share updates when I post my blog. If someone wants to follow along, then great! But I need to remember that I write this blog for me :) No point in getting upset that someone doesn't want to follow along.

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Life has been very routine these past few months. We've just been driving home on weekends and coming back to Y during the week. The weekends are usually jam-packed with appointments, to-do-lists, and meet-ups. The week days are boring, almost like we just live the bare minimum until the weekends, then we go full-force.

Our house in the Bay Area had a termite scare, which ended up just being water rot above our sliding glass door. I say "only" because termites would have been a disaster, but this water rot is actually a big mess. We are taking the door out tomorrow and putting in french doors! In anticipation for the re-do, I got excited to start re-designing our living room. I painted the walls, bought some new decor, and re-did a really nice coffee table (which I'll post about soon).
The room looks great, but it'll finally be done after this weekend; which is great, because Michelle's 2nd birthday party is going to be in 3 weeks! We definitely are working against the clock, but I think we'll get it done. I'm staying in the Bay this week, so I will have 10 days to do everything I need.

So here's my quick update! Sorry blog, I shouldn't have abandoned you. <3

Sewing Sewing Sewing

If there's one thing I've ever wanted to learn it's sewing. I've tried to learn so many times throughout my life, but I just can't sew a straight line for the life of me. Well, I had some ideas about the outfit I wanted Michelle to wear for her Elmo Birthday Party and I figured it was time to figure something out.
After pinning 1,000,000 things on Pinterest onto my sewing and Elmo party boards I decided it was time to tackle my project.
I ended up making Mish a fabric scrap tutu and some coordinating bows. It was my way of making her outfit but not having to pull out my sewing machine ;-) I know, cheater!

The one on the RIGHT is the party tutu. The left currently has more green and is for St Patty's Day

CUTE!!!

Top bow is on tutu, bottom is for hair, middle will have Elmo faces on them and get attached to the shoes!

The bows aren't finished because I'm waiting on my plastic Elmo faces to come in the mail, but once they're here, they will be ready to go on Mish's shoes. My mom also text me a picture of Elmo fabric she found at the store today, so I might add some of that to her tutu since the party isn't until June 7th.

Oh! And then I went totally random and made some fun (and adorable!) flower crowns. My family was thrilled.

Now you'll notice the title says "sewing sewing sewing" and not tying, hot gluing, and ripping. Lol. Well after making forty-eight million rag tutus for Michelle, her cousin, and 3 American Girl dolls, I decided to pull out my sewing machine and frustrate myself and waste fabric ;-)
I started easy and sewed some bedding for my niece's American Girl doll. It came out so cute! And then Michelle stole it, so I made another (better) one to give my niece.  I didn't take pics, but it's puffy and cute ;)

THEN I came across the freaking cutest vintage pillowcases while treasure hunting some thrift stores. I bought 6! One is going to my cousin for her adorable daughter's vintage themed bedroom that's in the works, two were sacrificed to a bow banner/garland I'm making (here's the inspiration), two are set aside for making half aprons (my new obsession) and one was made into a pillowcase dress for Michelle!

I am very very pleased with how it came out! It was such an easy and fun project to do.

So then I started thinking about other things I could sew. It was almost manic! What can I sew next? Does Charlie need a bow tie? I want to make a quilt! Wait, I can't sew straight lines and quilts are all about lines. I decided to use some ribbon and a cute pink tea towel to make Michelle a little apron to wear while playing with her kitchen. I had enough left over to make a mini half apron for Mish's play kitchen at her Nonna's house and got to try my hand at making pleats. It wasn't hard, but I think I did it wrong. Ha, oh well. Mish won't mind!

I can't wait to make some more goodies for Michelle and her Elmo party. I've made so many things with the Cricut cutter that I had to buy a new mat for it! haha, the old one completely lost its sticking abilities. So all of my fun with paper and glue will have to wait until the mats come in the mail (should be here this weekend!). I'll try and share some pics of what I have up my sleeve with the Elmo party soon.