Loose Ends-- Sometimes it is the little details that truly satisfy.

The details these days are fun and mundane. Just the way I love em. :)

Emmett is still obsessing over letters.

Coincidentally, he's also discovered how to unzip his pjs.

And when the 2 coincide, I find a stash of letters IN his pjs.

I read to Caroline's class on Dr. Seuss's birthday. She reminds everyone EVERY chance she gets that that is NOT his real name. 

She was BEYOND excited!!!

Gwen has been experimenting with hair. Luckily not her OWN head, too much, but she is going crazy with doll hair!

And me? Well, it has been a stressful but well-resolved week. I had crazy anxiety at the beginning of the week, but it ended up working out and that little bird of hope that landed in my soul wasn't squished. What a relief. I did the 17.1 Crossfit workout with my friend, Diane, though we lengthened our time and lightened our weights below the regulation requirements. But we DID it and that is what matters! I've walked through our house with 3 separate moving companies this week and we had a lengthy talk and tour with our realtor. Now I've got this urge to do as much as possible to get the house ready for selling. Still too wintry to do our spring house face-lift projects or to pack away the winter blankets and coats... So what am I supposed to do to scratch this insatiable pack-it-up itch? 

I'll tell you what I landed upon:

I am SCRAPBOOKING!!!

lol, and while that seems like an incongruous leap of logic, bear with me while I explain. 

I can't get rid of this paper and these supplies and this stuff because I might need it to finish my scrapbooks... from High School and college days!!! Yup, that is right. Everything I do for our family photo albums now is digital photo books. But I have all these hard copy prints from back in the day when THAT was the kind of photos I took...

so. Turn this huge pile of hard copy photos

 and this 

 and this into...

THIS. 

And look at the gems I've uncovered! Sisters in Mexico... ah, the exciting memory of my sister getting heat exhaustion after ascending the pyramid ruins and having to carry her on my back returning to our tour bus bc this was before cell phones and we weren't with the rest of the fam.

Or the memories of this gem of a day in Eureka Springs with these awesome HS friends!

 Or this post-caving pic with these gals at Devil's Den!

Weekly soccer with these college pals!

Teaching a fan? English fast? Ah, the wonderful memories with my MTC companion!

Scrapbooking complete. 

Extra supplies donated. 

Itch successfully scratched. 

Next up: donate all the extra stuff we don't intend to take with us. Then:  Take down all the picture frames hanging on the walls and pack them nicely wrapped up in bubble wrap.

Sewing Sewing Sewing

I have been sewing like CRAZY!!!

Seriously, there might be a slight manic to it all. See, I have this stash of fabric and want to deplete it enough that it doesn't spill out of my tupperwares for our move, but I already winnowed out the fabric I don't love. So what remains is all stuff I want to use rather than get rid of... And therefore I have had lots of sewing to do as part of my moving preparations! I've been averaging one completed project a week--- which is lightning speed for me!

I made these awesome leggings which I absolutely adore! I bought the double-brushed poly from printknitstudio.com  and LOVE the buttery-softness and the non-sheer stretch! I found a pair of LulaRoe leggings at Goodwill and used them for a pattern, so basically they are my own version at a fraction of the cost. It wasn't hard, but I did have to take the waist yoke apart and re-sew it because originally I made it too large (I gave extra seam allowance bc I figured I could always make them smaller). So happy with the result!

I sewed the girls Valentine's clothes. Fabric from Girl Charlee-- it has adorable hearts and flowers in a trendy tribal print! I did Gwen's first, so her tunic-style handkerchief hem dress (I used a square circle skirt, if that makes any sense) is exactly what I wanted. Gwen loves the spin! Caroline got the fabric remnants for hers, so a dress was out of the question. She wanted a shirt so she could wear it to school. From all the remnant pieces I managed to get the stripes to line up in the front, BUT the sleeve stripes are not symmetrical, which drives me crazy. But she doesn't care, so I am letting it go. I finally had to put a ban on that shirt because she was wearing it multiple times a week and I wanted it be special for Valentine's Day. At least I know she LOVES it!

Striped handkerchief hem dress with a drop waist dress for me. I got this fabric on clearance, so it was a real bargain, and I knew I wanted to use it for a dress like this. Trouble is that the fabric I had constrained me to certain things because I got the bargain lot cuts. For example, the stripe up the sides is a cool color-blocking design element, right? One that I HAD to use because the panels weren't wide enough. I rather like that element. I would have preferred the drop waist to be not quite so dropped with the skirt length making up the difference (right now the proportions feel a little off to me), but I just didn't have enough fabric for that. I like it even if it isn't destined to be my new favorite wardrobe item.

I made the girls these purple floral dresses. I love this dusty rose fabric from Girl Charlee and think these dresses turned out great! Comfy and cute, what more could I hope for?

I made a maternity dress that I suppose I could model for you, but it wouldn't quite look right. lol

I made this wonderful diagonally striped maxi dress! I think it is so flattering! I will do another post later with more info on my design and pattern-creation process for this one.

And guess what? 

Now I can close those fabric tupperwares!!!!!

Drawstring Bags--- Woohoo! Project completed!

 My mom commissioned me to make drawstring bags for all the nieces and nephews (and for grandma and grandpa!) for our upcoming summer family reunion. I intended to have them finished for Christmas... but they weren't ready. My (lame) gift was a WIP picture, lol!

But they are finished now! I love each and every one of these little jewels and hope their recipients love them! 

 My FAVORITE part of this project was creating fabric pairings for each applique theme. 

 I loved this cherry fabric and new it would be adorable for the lining. Finding the sweet polka dot fabric with mini cherries for the front was serendipitous!

 For the boys I got to delve into fun 'manly' fabrics! I LOVED the dino fossil lining and ultimately decided the brown and gold batik would complement it and allow the skull to have center stage. 

Another batik for the lining of this dino bag. 

  Two boys are into trucks and vehicles, so they have similar bags. At least, I used the same fabric for the outside and the lining. This made it more economical!

 Two of the gals like horse-y critters-- but one is into unicorns...

and the other prefers the non-mythical horse. (I LOVED the vintage-y horse fabric that I used for the lining. I would have used it for the outside, but it was too busy to provide adequate contrast to the applique. Plus it is pretty light and I figure that would show dirt and love too easily)

This adorable cat fabric is on a pale aqua, though the pics don't really show it. And the kitten fabric inside just won my heart! Oh, and you wouldn't believe how hard it is to find teal/aqua/turquoise rope for the drawstring! Seriously, I guess it just isn't fashionable right now or something because NOBODY carried it and I looked for months!

  

And one boy is all over the Star Wars thing, so this was a given. Actually, It was challenging to find TWO blue-hued fabrics with the classic Star Wars images. Most fabrics have oranges and blacks and draw more from the new Force Awakens images.  

while pairing fabrics was the most fun, completing the appliques was the most challenging and time-consuming. I don't have fancy anything to help with this process (no cricut/silhouette/embroidery machine), so I found the images I wanted online, edited them to size in Word, printed them out, cut them out, used them as a stencil to trace the pattern on fabric, cut the fabric out, ironed the applique onto the bag, and then machine-stitched a zig zag all the way around the design. Some were pretty intricate, so this process took FOR.E.VER. 

Anyway, I'm just so tickled to be finished! I hope my folks like them! And I hope my cute nieces and nephews LOVE their custom bags!