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Unplugged

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

No Internet, no tablet, no smartphone...

For the first time in years I have just spent 5 days completely unplugged. At first I felt like I was missing an appendage without my smartphone in hand. I have been without it since last Wednesday and I definitely went through withdrawal symptoms. It felt odd not to be posting pictures and tweeting our adventure.

We spent our vacation on the beach. Ozzy loved every moment, G turned a little red and Miss A screamed the moment her feet touched the sand. She spent most of her time at the beach like this:


Beach time did happen to correspond with nap time so curled up in the shade is where she spent most of her time. She did love the playground and the campfire.
Thumbs up for s'mores!

Ozzy, on the other hand, had a blast playing in the sand.

He was also a mermaid...
They build sand villages, searched for creatures, swam in the ocean and played. Every night when we crawled into the tent, little man was out within three seconds. Amelia bounced from air mattress to air mattress until finally settling down.

We took a trip into Charlottetown for a tour of the ice cream factory and new shoes. before heading back to the campground.


Saturday night we watched the lightning in the clouds over the ocean. I have to say it was pretty amazing.

I wish we could have stayed longer. Austin keeps asking if we can go back to the island and I don't blame him one bit! What's not to love about sand, sun, good friends and ice cream? :)




Kids Clothes Week Day 4

Friday, July 19, 2013

My serger went on the fritz last night so I'm posting the Rootin' Tootin' Dress for Day 4.


See the post HERE

I'm off to Walmart to get what I need to fix it so hopefully I'll have something to post before my family and I head away for a couple of beach days together.

Thanks for sticking through this week with me!

Kids Clothes Week Day 3

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Hello Sunshine!


I am in love with a little green sundress that Miss Amelia had passed down to her from a friend. Problem is that it is getting too small. I put it on my little after she got out of the pool and realized that I might only a few more weeks out of it. I love the shirring on the back and how the skirt twirls. Then I remembered that I had pinned a tutorial awhile back and so the next day's sewing item was decided on!

I used the dress as a pattern and increased the size. As usual, I made the dress a little big. It's more a size 3 than a 2 but I want her to get as much wear out of these dresses as possible.


The top part of the dress is a lined front and a shirred back with halter straps. When I attached the skirt, I added some jumbo ric rac for a little pop of colour. I wish I had had enough to go around the bottom of the dress as well.  


Christine's tutorial over on her blog From an Igloo really helped me with the shirred back. I'm thrilled with how it turned out! The fabric is a mix of Shore Thing by Micheal Miller and a Dear Stella fabric that I cannot seem to find again anywhere! I bought it last year and now I wish I had more. This combination just screams Americana to me. A little ode to Aunt RyLee and Uncle Clay who live in Nashville and are celebrating their birthdays today (same day, same year...kinda weird but also cool). Happy birthday you guys!

I need to make more of these dresses. I just loved how it turned out!


Kids Clothes Week Day 2

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

My little man desperately wanted Batman shorts...and mama couldn't find them! I (thanks to my ridiculous shopping addiction for fabric) manage to locate some fun Batman fabric at Walmart so I made him a pair.

Oh and a bucket hat and tshirt too...

My friend had her little guy over to our house on Sunday and was lamenting about how difficult it was to find pants to fit him. His nickname is bean for a reason! So I made him a quick pair or shirts using the tutorial on MADE. Problem was they were way too short in the waist. So I added two inches and made him another pair. Then last night I made him three more pairs!


I need to add the elastic in the waist and a few finishing details (banana pocket for the monkey shorts maybe) so another 20 minutes later today and KCW project #2 will be done!




Kids Clothes Week

Monday, July 15, 2013


I decided to join in the Kids Clothes Week sewing challenge this summer. I found out about  it while searching for a pattern for shorts. I've been sewing a lot lately. It keeps my hands busy and gives me a creative out let.

Oh and I'm giving one away! Enter here

I created this lovely Lazy Lemon skirt by modifying the Lazy Days Skirt pattern from Oliver +S. They have graciously offered a bunch of great patterns for free on their site. I love free! I added a 3inch coordinating band around the bottom. Amelia is in love with any skirt or dress these days that let's her twirl like "Ellerella" ( I'm going to be so sad when she can actually say Cinderella ).

This project only took about 20 minutes from start to finish. There will be more of these skirts to come!

Happy Sewing!


When Life Gives You Lemons GIVEAWAY

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

I had the privilege of writing a guest post for East Coast Momma Collective today and I created this Lazy Lemon skirt to go with it! This vintage inspired fabric by Jana Nielson for Henry Glass & Co. makes me happy and I hope it will make you happy too.


Would it make you happy to win it?

Winner will receive one Lazy Lemon skirt in their choice of size and can choose between a yellow or pink accent fabric. Giveaway ends July 17 at midnight EST.

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Good luck!

Working for the weekend.

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

I still find it a little hard to believe that we've been in our house 6 years already. I don't know what it was but despite the wallpaper, pink and avocado green bathrooms and the dated kitchen I fell in love. I think it was the massive fenced in back yard. Our yard is just a great place for our kids to run and have fun. I always envisioned a wooden play structure and we finally have one! 

The day after G picked it up it rained for 5 days straight. So after a day of sunshine to dry out the ground, Gordon got to work getting the playground put together.




It was hot! 40 something with the humidex, I'm happy the swing set will be in the shade. The kids needed to cool off so we set up some water cool down fun.

Dancing at the ball...


Snack time and the watermelon was heating up. We packed it in ice to keep it cool and the kids played with the ice cubes for some additional chill out fun.



Ian joined us to beat the heat at the water table.
Daddy worked hard and the play ground is almost done!!



Thanks Daddy!!! Looking forward to some more nice weather so that we can get this project finished and the kids can start to enjoy it.


A Rootin' Tootin' Nice Dress!

Thursday, July 4, 2013

A while back I found an imagine on Pinterest of a shirred sundress using western prints. I LOVED the fabric combinations. Naturally I searched high and low and could not find the fabrics that were in the original dress, however I think I found something better! I love a nice vintage inspired print. Micheal Miller's Lil' Cowgirl Blue was too cute to resist. I found two prints to coordinate (Seriously...cow print is just adorable!) and the fabric has been sitting in my stash for a few months.

A vintage filter just adds a little something to this!
I couldn't decide what type of dress to make. I stay away from shirring because my first couple of attempts just didn't turn out well. I ended up taking a few of my favorite dresses and come up with my own pattern (I'm sure there is something out there just like this if you wanted to look). I will post a tutorial as soon as I have more pictures of the process. But for now..here is my dress!

Dancing at the ball
I made a size 3 so it is a little big for her at the moment but I like to get as much wear out of outfits I make as possible. It fits now (with a little room) but it will fit perfectly in the next few months. This will be beyond cute in the fall with a little shirt under it. Oh Aunt Rylee!! We need cowboy boots!  Hook us up from Nashville :)


Yes, that is a Jessie (Toy Story) clip! You can got one of your own from Grasshopper Kids Creations (you can also buy the dress there too *wink,  wink*)

Enough Mom! (Two seconds later she was saying CHEESE!)


Suburban Farm Girl- Guest post by Emily Thomas

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Today's post is brought to you by my friend Emily. Emily is doing some pretty awesome things just a few streets over from me and I've asked her to write about them for me to share with you. I'm eventually going to get some great DIY tutorials to pass along to you out of her. Here's her first post!:

Suburban Farm Girl

I live in suburbia hell.

You know the place, you look left, you look right, and you see the exact same house lining the streets. One of those neighborhoods where if you went out for a night on the town and had a bit too much bubbly, you could potentially end up walking into the wrong house. Yup that's where I live! Right smack dab in the middle of suburbia! Now don't get me wrong, it's not that there's any real problem with living in the burbs, heck, I'd be lying if I said there weren't some perks, like being able to walk to a store, a playground, a Timmy's ( you never know when you might need a coffee fix). Its just that if you've always dreamt of riding a horse through an open field, picking apples off your own trees, sending your kids out to fetch the eggs and feed the pig that would soon be magically turned into bacon, suburbia looks pretty......limiting.

So how did I get here you might ask, well the story goes something like this. Girl meets boy, boy likes girls best friend, girls best friend isn't so sure she likes boy (are you following ok?, I never said this was going to be a typical love story!). Girl and boy end up dating for many years, boy proposes, girl says "yes!", girl and boy get jobs, get married, girl and boy buy boy's family home (in the burbs), have two kids, girl becomes a stay at home mom and the dream is dead.......almost! Girl convinces boy he "wants" to live the country life by performing some pretty wild maneuvers and making some very special promises (something about leather chaps I think) and girl and boy try to sell their house TWICE, but it just doesn't work out.

So here we are, girl and boy, making the best of the suburban life and growing veggies and fruit in our front yard and on our back deck and hatching chickens in the dining room.


I convinced boy, who just happens to be a banker not a carpenter or a cowboy (too bad), to build me some lovely cedar garden boxes because we lack the space for traditional gardens. For Mother's Day, Mr. Wallstreet gave me a lovely book about square foot gardening, I followed their approach to soil (1/3 compost, from 5 different sources, 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 vermiculite.). This makes a nice light but rich combo just perfect for gardening in small spaces.


We planted rainbow chard, leaf lettuce, peas and beans. Potatoes, corn, carrots and peppers. I put in 25 strawberry plants and raspberry plants as well. These are all additions to the cherry tree, apple trees, high bush blueberries and plum tree from last year.


So are we having any success? That all depends on your perspective. Just last night we made salad from our leaf lettuce, and we have a ton of strawberries on our plants so far, the chard is beautiful and everything else is coming slowly (this Maritime weather is not helping, my God, I swear we had to put another quilt on the bed last week!)

So will we be making apple pie from our very own apples this fall? Probably not, maybe someday. If you're interested in growing a garden and don't have much space, I would recommend checking out the book "All New Square Foot Gardening: How to grow more in less space" by Mel Bartholomew. A great guide and an easy read.

As for the chickens, the ones we hatched as part of our home school project, the ones we haven't sent back to the farm yet, the ones that we are keeping illegally on our property (well not exactly illegally but we are breaking some pretty strict bylaws, I'm such a bad ass) the chickens are a story for another day.


Happy farming wherever you are and don't let small spaces cramp your style!


Happy Canada Day!

Monday, July 1, 2013

Happy Canada Day!

It's been a fairly uneventful weekend given that most of the activities we had planned on taking in were cancelled due to the torrential downpours that have been steady since Friday. So we've been doing some renos, I've been sewing up a few things and we took the kids to an indoor play ground before they went completely shack wacky.

And since we don't have a party planned this year, a photo of us taking in the day with friends, drinks and sun from last year will have to do.


Whatever your plans, enjoy your day!


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