Valentines and Sweet Potato Love

From the country...

Pile of homemade Valentines

This year I decided that instead of going to the store (too lazy/busy) and buying the prefab valentines that we would make them. So I collected some clip art and some different fonts, printed them, coloured them, cut them out and pasted them on bristol board. Then I sat down with Lucas where he spent 2.5 minutes with me making them, then quickly found something better to do and I finished all 23 of them by my lonesome. Nate is planning on finishing his tonight- so it looks like I will be making some more later when everyone is sleeping... I think that they are rather sweet looking though and a little less wasteful. Everything (aside from the printing) was found in our art closet.

So in the spirit of Valentine's day I will leave you with these images of 2 sweet potatoes in love...

Sweet potato displaying their love for each other on our front porch...the shame!

mmmmmmm....

The Prettiest Little Girl with a Flower in Her Hair

From the City...

Here's some pics of our pretty little Millie wearing a flower headband that I bought from an uber talented mama-preneur on facebook. Here's a link to her Sweet Pie business page so you can support her by buying some of her adorable creations. I've got my eye on her handmade owl hat for Theo for next winter. Uh-oh, I foresee an expensive hobby in the works.

Aside from that, is this not the prettiest little girl you've ever seen? I just love her to bits.

Sewing for Baby

From the City...

Last week was my first week home on maternity leave and I would have much rather had a baby to cuddle and get to know all week but s/he decided to stay put and cook for a while longer. So therefore I have had to find other things to do to occupy my time. Last week in Toronto was rainy and cold so much of the week was spent nesting and crafting.

I knew I wanted to craft some sort of doll because I have been consumed with thoughts of baby girls lately. If a boy decides to appear though, we'll just have to consider this new doll a gift from one baby cousin to another (here's looking at you Millie Girl).

So here was my inspiration:


This woman's dolls are incredible. They are also super reasonably priced, so if you don't feel like spending the entire day swearing at your sewing machine (the route which I decided to take) support her and buy one.

She's over on etsy, here's her link: Her pics are also much better than mine so if you do decide to make your own, check 'em out.

What you'll need:

• Fun Fabric
• Sewing Machine
• Paper/Marker (for template)
• Cotton Batting
• Sewing Notions

Here are my steps:

1. First I cut out templates in paper.

2. I then cut out the fabric.

3. I then stitched and stuffed the arms and legs.

4. Then I hand stitched the face and then sewed the face to the head and sewed the ears to the back of the head. I initially sewed lips but then decided I didn't like them so I took them off and just hand stitched super simple eyes and a v-shaped mouth.

5. From the left corner, sew the body attaching the arm and then the head and then other arm.

6. Stuff the body.

7. Sew the bottom of the dolls body attaching his or her legs along the way.


I'm pretty happy with how she turned out. Her heads a wee wonky but that's the good thing about hand made stuff. I might even attempt to make another, more gender neutral, doll this week. I also made a really simple rose to put in her hair which was just two different colored four leaf flowers cut out with circles in the middle. This is entirely optional.

Note: the incredible owl stuffed animal that my sister in law Rosey made for me. Isn't he the cutest???