Good grief where did the time go!!

Well as you have probably guessed life has been crazy! Hence the lack of blog posting... However I thought I'd take a quick min to show you some of what we've been up to! 

Blanket for a little princess! (No she is not mine!!)

Minion hat I made and will be making to sell 

My bottomless pit named Eric

Sam being Sam 

Teal'C sleeping in my yarn

Best part of Sundays :)

Third batch of blankets for the hospital :)

Pushy husband...

       So after talking to Matt and finally having something sell I've decided (with more then a little nudging from Matt) to set up a blog/etsy to sell some of the things that I've made. It's not much right now, Matt's going to help me take some better/more pictures. But this is what it looks like so far! http://www.mmcustomcreations.blogspot.com
http://www.etsy.com/shop/MJHLong?ref=pr_shop

I'm waiting to put anything up on the Etsy site until Matt can take some better pictures. But that should hopefully be soon! :)

Just for Eric :)

       So I just realized that I haven't been showing you guys the finished products of everything I've made for our little angel since finding out we're having a boy!! So to play catch up here are some pictures of everything that's finished :)

  

 

 

 

This is for turning napkins into bibs when all the ones I have are either nasty, or I just forgot to pack one :)

 

       This is a close up of his blessing outfit, the symbol on it is a celtic knot for "eternal family and love." Which I thought was very fitting for a blessing outfit :)

 

These onesies were my first attempt at sewing on stretch knit fabric. I'm hoping that the rest of the clothes I'm making him out of knit fabric turn out better...  I'm still just learning how to sew on knits, but I'm really happy with how they turned out!!

       Besides all of this, I have 3 more outfits that I'm currently knitting, a bunting, some sleepers, and several more onesies that I'm going to be sewing for my little prince! I'll post pictures of those once they are finished as well :) Granted those pictures will also probably have a cute little baby to go with them!! :D

30 weeks and counting :)

       I can't believe how fast this pregnancy has gone by!! There are days where it feels like it'll never end, but then I look back on it and there's only 10 weeks left until I'm due!! However, all I care is that he stays in for 8 weeks and 4 days. After that he's free to come whenever he wants because then his daddy will be here to see him make his grand entrance. Since out little getaway to San Diego Eric has been more active then ever. :) I think he liked that I was walking WAY more each day then I normally do when I'm at home. He's still a night owl but he's becoming a morning bird at the same time... I'm hoping that he doesn't keep that up once he's here.

      Other then that, Matt and Eric have been keeping me busy as always. Matt with making new bags for all of his flags, and Eric with finishing up a few last min things before he comes to join out little family. I'm contemplating making Eric a Peek-a-Boo blanket. One of my friends was explaining it to me, it's a solid/small print blanket with flaps and under each flap is an object/animal. That's not a very good description so if I do end up making it I'll post pictures of it once it's all done.

It is Spring right???

       Sun, snow, rain, windy, snow rain, cloudy, freezing. What is wrong with this picture?? Oh yeah IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE SPRING!!!! Where's the warmer weather? The sun? The warm breeze that you want to sit outside in?? After having a few days of warmth a while ago I was all excited for the weather change. But now, it feels like those few days were a sneak peek at what's coming out later this year....

       Okay I'm done whining about the cold now.

       On the brighter side of life, I got the quilt top for Eric sewn, I just have to quilt and bind it then it'll be done. I got one set of curtains done, got some buttons (love buy one get one free sells) for a "Quite Book" for Sundays (or just any day) and I'm almost done planning the activity quilts. So that's pretty much my sewing projects in a nut shell, besides helping my mom make some quilts to donate to a local stake my mom works with (she teaches some of the kids in the Spanish wards piano /organ so that they can have real music at church instead of a CD to sing with).

      As for my knitting, I'm almost done with the blanket Matt picked out for Eric, his one outfit is coming along nicely and I've got a few sets of booties/socks made for him. I'm still waiting on the yarn for his blessing outfit but that should go pretty fast since Matt picked a fairly simple pattern for it (thankfully).  He also has helped me pick out a few more items to make for Eric that I'm actually looking forward to making.

       Oh and can I just say that I love ShopKo baby sales!! I got a $10 off a $40 purchase to ShopKo in the mail and was originally going to just get rid of it. But then when we found out that we were having a boy I ended up saving and using it. So, I kidnapped Matt for a night and we went to ShopKo during their sale and I got about $80 worth of baby clothes for $35. I was so happy!! At first Matt wasn't all that impressed with what we'd gotten, but then I started adding up what we should have paid for everything. He was much happier after knowing how much we'd saved.

       Other then that life has been pretty much the same as always... I've been working extra hours at work, and Matt's been keeping caught up with most of his homework and gets to register for classes tonight... But that's pretty much our life in nutshell for now!!

~Melanie

Playing Catch up...

       Well since finding out that we'll be expecting a little prince in our family I've been playing catch up trying to get everything re-done for him. So far I've been able to make the top of his crib quilt, 3 flannel sheets for the winter and a couple pair of booties. I've got one outfit for him on my knitting needles and two more in the planning phase. Matt has also picked out his blessing outfit for me to knit, so I'll be starting on that pretty quick here too. I've found that in some ways having this change in our lives has been a blessing to me. It's given me something to do to keep busy while Matt studies away with his school, and not feel like I'm just sitting at home waiting for him to get home each night. It's also given me a chance to be extra prepared for future children and to continue to look forward to what the future has in store for us. And if nothing else, it's given me a chance to have even more of an excuse to do some sewing :). Once I finish quilting the crib quilt I'll post pictures of everything that I have gotten done so far for Eric.

       As for Matt, he's got 3 weeks of classes left and then 1 week of finals. He seems to be a lot less stressed about school since finding a tutor that can explain what his teacher fails to do every day in class. He's also been able to work out his schedule to meet with the TA's for some of his other classes and is doing good in all of them. His ROTC classes are going well and he seems to still enjoy them, granted after hearing what some of the cadets have had to say about his last performance at lab I really want to rip some heads off... Thankfully Matt has talked me out of the hormonal psycho-ness for the most part and so now we just ignore it and move on to talking about happier things (i.e. our week vacation to San Diego this May!!)

       Yes it's true. Matt and I are going on our first "real" family vacation since getting married. (I found out when talking to Matt that our Honeymoon and the 3 day getaway to Park City don't count because they were cut short by school and other such reasons...) So this time we are taking a week and just playing in San Diego. I for on am so excited to go. It'll be nice to go and just have fun together someplace warm but not burning. I'm really hoping that it rains one of the days that we're there so we can have a day to just chill and not be running around... Although knowing Matt, we'll probably spend the majority of our time playing at Legoland, Sea World, and the San Diego Zoo. Thankfully he's not pushy when I tell him that I need a break or just time to sit (especially since Eric came into the mix:}). If nothing else, this pregnancy has shown me just how incredibly lucky I am to be married to such a wonderful man. Sometimes I wake up thinking it's all just a dream, until Bray'Tac jumps on Eric and wakes up Matt. Then it all seems so real that I just get overwhelmed with joy that it's all mine and no one can take it from me.

       Now that I'm starting to get all teary eyed (so claiming it's a pregnancy thing right now...) I'm gonna go eat some chocolate cake and start working on sewing some more things for Eric.

Biggest shock of our lives!! (so far)

       Well it turns out that after all the nights of thinking I'm having a little girl, and everyone telling me it's a little girl, we were all very wrong. Turns out that my shy little girl that wouldn't spread her legs for the first ultrasound was really a bashful little boy that let it all hang out during my ultrasound today. At first Matt and I weren't quite sure what to think. We've both been so excited since finding out about our little princess around that we weren't expecting to hear the doctor say, "Uh oh, looks like Samantha turned into Samuel." We were both so shocked that it took him saying, "I'm going to use some very technical terms right now. Right knee, left knee, weenie. So, unless you're having a three-legged girl, I think it's safe to say it's a boy." We were also able to find out that my placenta is the reason I feel him moving so little (which is really good to know because I've been freaking out when I haven't felt him for more then a day, turns out that's normal for where my placenta is, but will end soon enough).

      I was so shocked when I found out, here I'd been making all this stuff for a little princess only to find out that we're having a little prince instead!! So not only do I now have to redo the nursery bedding (thankfully I had gotten all the stuff for a boy nursery while Matt was at basic, so it's just a matter of finishing it), but I also have to start over on all the baby clothes and blankets I've been knitting. Thankfully I had started a baby boy blanket long before I got pregnant, so I can finish that one off for Eric (Matt had picked it out for him early on anyway). But now I have to find the time/coupons to get/make more fabric for sheets (since they are outrageous to buy) and his blessing outfit. Matt has picked out an outfit that I hopefully will be able to finish in time, granted he was nice enough to pick one out that is fairly simple and uses bigger needles then the last one he picked out. But for now I'm just going to worry about the blanket, sheet and outfit that I was able to get stuff for today. I'll post pictures once they are all completed.

        Since daylight savings is throwing me off, I better head to bed so I'm not a zombie in the morning. Night!!

20 weeks and counting

       Well I'm half baked!! (Speaking of which, Ben and Jerry's Half Baked Cookie Dough ice cream sounds amazing right about now...) So it's all down hill from here :)!! Tuesday we'll get to see our precious little girl again and I for one can't wait!! Tuesday really can't come fast enough for me...

       Other then that I've just been working on some dresses for Samantha and trying to decide if I have enough sheets for her crib... I've been told you can't ever have too many of them but at the same time I don't know that I want to be storing tons of sheets either... Same for blankets... As far as those go I've got a few saved just for Samantha that I got from Great-Grandma Lenna, Grandma Hennen and some that I've made just for her... right now though with all the fabric that I have in my stash I've been trying to make scrappy quilts that I'll decide what to do with once they are done. I have to make two Play-Time quilts (one I've started and the other I'm still in the planning stages of) But I'll post pictures of those once I get them done. The first one is just bright and uses up a lot of my scraps, the second one I'm thinking about putting butterflies and flowers on depending on what fabric I find to make it with.

       But since I'm just posting to avoid doing dishes I better cut this one short and post again once I finish cleaning...

~Melanie

Blessing Dress and other news

       We finally agreed on a dress!!! WOOT!!! And it's even the one that I already have made (now I just need to clean a path in the nursery/junk room so I can post some pictures of it!!) I've also thought about making some minor changes to it, like adding a ribbon to by tied around her waist-ish area to hold the dress on better, and to help it not look like she's drowning in it (depending on how big she is as the time of the blessing). I've also thought about adding a flower to it, but I haven't decided about that yet (or what kind of flower I would do if I do choose to put one on). We decided that since she'd only be wearing it for a few hours that my time would be better spent making her an outfit to be worn after the blessing. Because let's be honest the maximum amount of time she'll even spend in the dress is about 3 hours... So with the pattern that Matt has picked out I'm going to crochet her an outfit to wear after the blessing, that will be her special outfit for the day. I'll post a few pictures of the pattern once Matt gets off of his computer so I can scan them in (because taking pictures of pictures never turns out very well...)

       Matt and I also went to Build-A-Bear (because I finally decided what I wanted to do for my birthday) and made Samantha a Daddy Bear. It's similar to a bear that I used to have, but it has army clothes on so that when Matt is gone for drill or whatever else she can still cuddle with him (and yes I am a MAJOR Daddy's girl, so that's where the idea stemmed from). Originally we were thinking about making it a cute bear that had a flowered shirt and camo pants, but when we found the ACU uniform with beret that all changed. Matt's going to see if he can get an extra set of ID tags to put with the bear, so it really will be Daddy (in bear form). I'll have to post pictures of it as soon as I take some :).

       Anyways that's the news for now!! I'll keep you updated on any future changes ie the ultrasound pictures we'll get next month :).

~Melanie

Keeping Busy....

 

 

This is what happens when a girl goes shopping and has a day to herself. 

Above there is a pair of pants, two pairs of booties, 3 sheets, and a dust ruffle for the crib to hide all of Matt's army stuff. I'll post more pictures when I get the crib all made with the bedding Matt picked out for Samantha. :)