and if I can't finish the first one, what hope is there for the next?

baby books.

I have a love/hate relationship with them. I had great aspirations of documenting each pregnancy/ first year of my children's lives with great detail & photos.

I have a belly book that is almost finished (from Lucy's pregnancy, no less) & her baby book has about 1/4 of the pages written on. I couldn't tell you exactly the date she rolled over (though that's on video), sat up, started crawling, walking, got her first tooth, etc.... I have approximate time frames, but for the life of me, I'm not one of those moms.

Enter Plan B.

I cheated. I totally just assembled photos of Lucy's first year into a photo book. I'm hoping to write out little notes about each month and attach at a later date....but if that never happens, at least I have a photo book documenting her first year.

With Baby #2 we're going to try hanging a calendar in the nursery and documenting milestones there--then I can have it all ready to go when I order a photo book documenting their first year.

DIY Decor.

If you keep up here at all, you'll recognize we run a pretty slim budget...and decor is never really a part of it :)

However, during our move this summer it seems that several of our holiday decorations were ruined do to breakage or mildew/mold damage as a result of a garage that frequently flooded.

Armed with this knowledge, I purchased a few items to try and spruce up our home this holiday season ( & beyond.)

The first project was inspired by the Michaels Black Friday ad. I purchased the holiday colored chargers at 2/$3, my husband found some plate hangers for $1.50 at Wal-mart, and I dug out some white paint and brushes.

The second project I've seen on various websites, all of varying types. (Sorry if that's not proper credit to the original idea---but I'm not sure who actually had the original idea!) On Black Friday, Jo-Ann's craft store was selling flannel fabric for $1.29/yd. Not quite what I had in mind--but it fit well with our small budget. I purchased a pack of 10 8x10 art canvasses & a pack of 5 7x14 for $10 a piece at Michaels. A little more than I wanted to spend, but these can be re-used...and I have several leftover for an additional project for baby #2. Cut the fabric so that you will have enough excess to wrap around the back of your canvas and staple with a staple gun. Seriously...it's that easy. :) The solid green ones ended up a little too plain, so I added some mirror snowflakes. The brown damask print ones hang above our bed & the butterfly print is also jazzing up our bedroom decor.

"make" your own maternity wear!

Baby #2 is on their way and that means maternity clothes are slowly replacing my "normal wear" in my closet. With my daughter, my wardrobe was a lot of business maternity wear...which is cute and professional, but not really practical when I'm chasing her down and grabbing her hand before her finger officially goes into the electical outlet. :)

However, I am a sucker for comfy AND dressy attire. I love skirts paired with t-shirts and they are easy to stick a pair of leggings under in the winter time.

I had a few old dresses that didn't quite fit right in the chest after my first pregnancy and were in the "must sale" bag due to their immodest new nature.

But then I remembered stumbling on a blog that had converted a sundress into a maternity skirt (can't remember where now--but this was totally their idea!) Anyways, I took that idea and added my own spin to it!

I wish I had more photos of the progress, but this is what I've got.

I took sundresses and either cut (or used a seam ripper) to remove the zipper from the dress. I also took old stretchy tank tops that were too short and cut off the neck and arms. I pinned the shirt onto the skirt, right sides together. I sewed them together at the waist pulled the shirt right side out and voila! a skirt with a roll-top maternity panel!

Works for Me Wednesday...

I really love to be organized. In fact, I strive to be---but I fall short.....a LOT.

One of my favorite things to do is make new uses for old things or create my own items.

Today's item was a simple fix to an annoying problem in our household.

My precious daughter has hair now and we like to clip bows, ponytail holders, or good ol' fashioned headbands into it.

I had seen your typical hair-bow organizers online, but frankly wasn't interested in the cost.

So, I improvised. I took a piece of ribbon that used to hold photos on my college dorm room walls and I pinned it to the wall. I made a loop on the other end to tuck those loose headbands into.

presto....

My own hair organizer and we no longer have hairbows all over the sink, floor, car cupholder, etc..... Sure, it's not glamorous, but it works...for now!

Find out what works for others here

Works for Me Wednesday: Homeade Wipes

Woo-hoo! I'm finally updating AND participating in a Blog Carnival.




So what works for me?



Well, my new homeade wipes are working wonders around here!

As my now 13 month old daughter has gotten very interested in feeding herself lately we quickly noticed that we were using up an extraordinary amount of paper towels and/or disposable wipes each meal.



The solution was to whip up a handful of homeade wipes with some left over flannel from some homeade burp clothes I made before Miss Lucy was born. I cut the flannel in squares the size of a medium board book (nope, sure didn't measure!) Most of the squares I sewed flannel to flannel--but I also had a small amount of terry cloth material I had picked up from a remnant bin, so a few of the wipes are flannel with terry cloth lining.





am seriously the least talented person when it comes to operating my sewing machine, but these were so stinkin' easy! Whip yourself up a few!