Tuesday, November 30, 2010

What I Wore

I knew it would happen
eventually.
A week (or 2) of forgetting to take pictures
or forgetting to post What I Wore at all
(I blame it on being pregnant... at least that's my excuse for the next 5 months).
Anyways, here is my recap of outfits from the past 2 weeks.

cropped jacket: Macy's
brown tank underneath: local boutique
skinny jeans: Levi's
brown flats: Payless
necklace: Old Navy

v neck t shirt: Target
cardigan: Target
skinny jeans: Levi's
black Flats: Naturalizer

top: H&M
skinny jeans: Levi's
black flats: Naturalizer
sweater: Nordstroms
tank underneath: Banana Republic
maternity jeans: H&M
flats: Naturalizer

Outside Cracker Barrel in Florida!!!
shirt: Gap
cardigan: vintage
jeans: Citizens of Humanity
flats: Naturalizer
ruffle top: Target (recent)
jeans: H&M maternity (recent)
belt: vintage
necklace: Nordstroms

shirt dress: Macy's
leggings: Forever 21
boots: Emu's

long sleeve shirt: Target
jacket: Macy's
maternity jeans: Old Navy
boots: Fake Uggs from Costco

white top: Hand me down from friend
blue cardigan: vintage
skinny jeans: Levi's
black flats: Payless

Princess Birthday Party Invitations

On Friday my baby girl turns 3!
And I don't think I've ever met a kid as excited about their birthday as Mackenzie is.
She's been waiting for December to finally come for months, practicing holding up her 3 fingers to show off her soon to be new age,
and talking about her party non stop for a long time.
And as long as she's been excited about her birthday she has been excited to have a princess birthday party.
A pink, girly, glittery, princess party for my very girly little girl.

And since no store bought card would do
I whipped up some special (but super easy) ones for my girl.

This year I went the super easy route.
I made one master copy of the invitation and then made color copies for the rest.
I don't know why I haven't done this in the past.
It saved so much time and still turned out really cute!

Here's how I made them...
I found an adorable princess themed piece of scrapbook paper at Michaels a few months ago I knew I wanted to use for her party.
Since the entire piece of paper would have been too big, I cut out a smaller section that included the elements I wanted to have.

Then I taped the scrapbook paper to a piece of card stock to make it more sturdy while I assembled the rest of the invitation and also so it would be easy to copy.

Next, I printed the party info on blank paper and cut it out so I'd have an idea how I wanted to lay things out and the font size I needed before I printed on my good paper. I also cut out a crown and a star from paper and a picture of Mackenzie I wanted to include.

Then I printed the party info on a pretty polka dot paper, cut the star and crown out of scrapbook paper, added some ribbon for the base of the wand, and used some scrapbook stickers for Mackenzie's name. Then when everything was perfect (or perfect enough) I printed off the color copies and then cut them out to the correct size.
Easy peasy!

The only bummer was that I made my invitations an odd size and I couldn't find envelopes to fit them.
So I had to make my own.
They ended up being simple but a little time consuming.
Here's how I did it.

Step 1:
Cut out a piece of large paper (I used wrapping paper) a little wider and almost 3 times longer than your invitation.
Lay your invitation on the paper to use as a guide. You want to make sure the bottom fold
almost covers the top of the invitation.

Step 2:
Fold in and tape the sides so they are a little wider than your invitations.

Step 3:
Fold up the bottom of the invitation until it reaches the top of the invitation and tape the sides closed.

Step 4:
Fold down the top of the invitation and tape closed.

Slip in your invitation, address the front and your good to go!

More princess party details and the favors I made to come soon!

Monday, November 29, 2010

I'm guest blogging at Joy's Hope!

When Julie asked me to be a guest blogger on her blog I pretty much freaked out.
I big puffy heart her and her blog.
Come on over here and check it out.

Saturday, November 27, 2010

M.I.A. in Florida

Hey Guys!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Sorry I have been M.I.A. for a while.
The day after my weekend of boutiques we left for a week in Florida.

We stopped at Disney's Animal Kingdom for a day
because you can't go all the way to Florida and not visit Disney.
It's against the rules or something.

And it was awesome.
Especially the Finding Nemo musical.

Then we drove from Orlando to Tallahassee where we have been spending the week
visiting my hubby's family,
eating lots of yummy food
(Cracker Barrel how we love you),
shopping,
and watching lots of football.

I promise I had all the intentions of writing some posts before I left for your viewing pleasure but as you can see that didn't happen.
Too much craziness with the boutique, trying to pack and get ready for Mackenzie's birthday party that happens right when we get home.

Anyways, we fly home on Monday so hopefully I'll be back into the normal swing of things by Tuesday or so because I have lots of fun stuff to share with you!

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Attention locals!

I'm doing a boutique today and tomorrow
(Sat. the 2oth and Sun. the 21st)
at the Sun and Sail Club in Lake Forest!

24752 Toledo Way
Lake Forest, CA 92630
(Corner Lake Forest Drive and Toledo Way)

I'd love for you to stop by and say hi!
This is my last boutique of the year so if you have been eyeing something make sure you come by and get it before it's gone!

Friday, November 19, 2010

Advent Calendar

I love advent calendar's!
The anticipation of counting down each day until a holiday arrives is so much fun.
Plus it's fun to take a couple minutes each day to talk about why we actually celebrate the holiday at hand
and in the case of Christmas
we are celebrating such an awesome and monumental event
The Birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus!
Definitely an event worth looking forward to and talking about with our kids...a lot!

Last year I made this advent calendar for our family.
I still like it but...

when I saw this one I fell in love.
So so adorable!

Check out the details over at Mod Podge Rocks.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Handmade Birthday Cards (made by your kids!)

Is it just me or does it feel like your kids have a friend's birthday party every other week?
Tired of spending (or wasting) money on cheesy birthday cards?
Once you realize how cute and easy it is to make your own (or rather help your kids to make their own) you'll never go back to the lame store bought version again.
Promise.

All you need is:
-a piece of cardstock (you can buy a stack at Walmart for cheap)
-a Sharpie marker
-crayons
-watercolors

Step 1:
Fold the piece of cardstock in half to make a card.

Step 2:
Draw a picture of your choosing. I like to draw something that coordinates with the theme of the party we are going to. Can you guess what this party was about?

*I just searched Google images for the word "train" and then copied an image I liked.

Step 3:
Since Mackenzie is only 2 (almost 3)
I usually to outline the big main images in crayon so Mackenzie knows where to paint. It also helps keep everything in the lines (a little bit at least).

Step 4:
Let your little one paint away with water colors.

Step 5:
Write a little message on the inside and you have your unique, cute and free birthday card!

Since I didn't have any large envelopes on hand, I decided to whip up one of my own.
I just took a piece of scrapbook paper I had
folded each end over a tiny bit,
folded the paper over the card and sewed down the sides to make a pocket.
Then I taped the top down with scrapbook squares.

Then to spice up the front I drew another picture of the train, cut it out of scrapbook paper and then glued it on.

Easy peasy!

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

What I Wore

This past week has felt like a month.
Probably because of Mackenzie's thumb crisis
but at any rate it's Wednesday again and you know what that means....
another dose of What I Wore.
Enjoy!

sweater: Nordstroms
tank underneath: Banana Republic
my first pair of maternity jeans (this time around anyways): Old Navy
black flats: Naturalizer

a word about my shoes...
I'm not a big shoe person.
I never have been.
Therefore I hate spending a lot of money on something I don't really care much about.
I would much rather throw down some cash on something I love and wear everyday like a good pair of jeans.
With that said, I usually buy my shoes at Payless.
Some Payless stores have a better selection than others but I can usually find whatever I need.

Oh and I should also mention that all I wear is flats.
Seriously.
I'm tall (5'9) and I already tower over most people so I stick to flats.
Plus they are comfy and I'm pretty clumsy.
I would hate to see me in a heel.
It would be a d.i.s.a.s.t.e.r.

Also...since my bunion surgery my shoe selection has been more limited.
Not everything fits comfortably like they used to.
I think my feet are still just really sensitive.
My shoes need to be really broken in for them not to hurt.
Therefore I pretty much wear the same pairs of shoes every day.

Lately I've been trying to slowly break in a few new pairs I've had in my closet.
The one's above are a pair I've been working on.

shirt: H & M
sweater/cardigan thing: Macy's
jeans: Express
flats: Naturalizer

sweater top: Macy's
skinny jeans: Levis
flats: Naturalizer

I had intentions of taking pictures of all of our outfits for this What I wore post but with the thumb incident it didn't happen.
It's kind of hard to tell in this picture but I wore a
black ruffle top: Target
New maternity jeans: H & M
(did you know H & M had a maternity section?! So much cute stuff!)
necklace: Nordstroms
earrings: Charlotte Russe (forever ago)

sweater top: Gap
jeans: Citizens of Humanity
flats: Naturalizer

navy top: Gap
sweater: vintage
jeans: Express
flats: Payless

top: Old Navy
jeans: Express
flats: Payless

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

A T shirt dress for Mackenzie

Remember this post last week?
I managed to squeeze in some extra time in between boutiques to whip up a recycled T shirt dress for Mackenzie.
It ended up being super easy to make and the best part
Mackenzie loves it!
And I love that it's cozy, warm and wrinkle free.

After I took the first batch of pictures (the ones with Mackenzie modeling the dress) I realized the sleeves on her old shirt I used for the top were a little too small
so I added some extra fabric to the cuffs
and it was perfect.
Plus I think I like the look of it even better.
It kind of tied everything all together.







Want to make a t shirt dress of your very own?
Head over here for the directions :)

Monday, November 15, 2010

Family Pictures and A trip the ER

Saturday was an interesting day.
It was a day I had been looking forward to for months.
We were finally getting some new family pictures taken.
We spent the morning getting all prettied up,
got to our picture location and started shooting away with our awesome photographer
Then, maybe 15 minutes into the shoot, something awful happened.
Mackenzie's thumb got stuck in the door of an old antique photo booth.
Aaron was right next to her when it happened.
He instantly knew it was bad.
He yelled to me that we needed to go straight to the ER.
Luckily I had some tissues in my pocket so I threw it over her thumb to stop the bleeding and we frantically jumped in the car leaving our sweet photographer behind.
The ride to the ER was something out of the movies.
We had never been in such a hurry to get anywhere.
Mackenzie was frantic and in so much pain.
She was sitting on my lap in the front seat while I put pressure on her thumb.
I had gotten a couple glimpses of her mangled little thumb and I knew it was really bad.
I was trying not to freak out.
There was lots of praying and crying out to Jesus for help.
We called our good friends on the way to the hospital and asked if they could come and get Wesley.
They did.
We got to the ER and they took Mackenzie back almost right away.
Our baby girl ended up hurting her little thumb pretty bad.
She ripped off the entire nail and had a deep cut all the way across her nail bed and around the back of her thumb.
It took 8 stitches and 5 hours in the ER to put it all back together again.



But praise God 2 days later she is doing great!
The doctor said she shouldn't have any permanent damage (mobility wise) and hopefully within 6 months to a year her nail will grow back.

Man...it was a scary day.
It's so hard to see something like that happen to your kids.
We are so thankful she is ok and we are praising God for his protection and grace over our baby girl.
She was so brave and such a trooper.

We are so proud of our big girl!

Good thing her bandage didn't get in the way of her sucking fingers.
Then we would really be in trouble :)

Below are some pictures from our 10 minute photo shoot with Ally.
Seriously she is the most awesome photographer ever!
If you are in the area you must look her up and try her out.
You won't be disappointed.
I promise :)