Mama Tip #2

When you are potty training your 2-year-old with a 1-year-old in the house you are bound to run into problems.  My solution is when someone is trying to potty (this can work for you too, I know I never get a moments peace, even in the bathroom) and my 1-year-old appears, entirely fascinated by the whole process, I put him/her in the bathtub.  This worked with Asher and now its working pretty well with Izzy.  They can still see what's going on, but they can't touch anything that will make you gag.  Plus they are very distracted by the idea of being in the tub with their clothes on and no water, sometimes its hard to talk Izzy out of there!  Just a little tip for you Mama's out there who are knocking your baby making time out like I am!

Upcycled T-shirt

This was at one time an XL mans shirt that I got from Goodwill for $1

Here is what I did to it...

I cut it apart at the armpits so I had a large tube of fabric

I used a tank top I like to make the marks for cutting the appropriate space for my armpits (I never realized how yucky that word is :/)

I then sewed a hem large enough for my ties to feed through at the top of my front and back piece

and I used my seam ripper to make a little hole in the hem already at the bottom of the shirt

I fed elastic, cut 1" shorter that my waist measurement, through the bottom hem and sewed it together

Then I fed the tie (that I made the same way I made the belt here except without the button or closure) through the tunnels in the top front and back pieces (much like a pillowcase dress).

DONE

in one nap time

for $1 and some left over fabric from my Easter Skirt :)

** A little note if I make another one I will use a smaller shirt, this one has a LOT of fabric.  In order to achieve a good length I would cut off the sleeves and straight across the shoulders instead of straight under the armpits

Mama Tip #1

Since I had several babies all at once fellow Mama's often ask me how I do things, and the answer is necessity.  They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and that is a fact.  When you need to get something done and you have 3 babies screaming all around you, you just have to work it out! It also helps to pay very close attention to the mothers around you, I am always picking up new tricks.  Anyhow, I thought I would start to put a few tricks down to help me remember what I used to do and maybe help some other mamas out along the way.  This is a tip I got from my friend Janine, and she got it from her friend Kim, who probably got it from her friend (fill in the blank), and so on, that's how we mama's roll.  Any how it's brilliant and share it all the time...
juice box handles!

You would think he would be more excited about getting some juice

Ahh, there we go

You just pull the little triangle box tabs from the side, it helps release the pressure and gives you kids something to squeeze besides the box itself, which when squeezed will send a fountain of (undoubtedly red or purple) juice all over everything.  One of my biggest mom fears, the juice fountain, conquered.  Now if only I can figure out how to conquer the fountain type mess these boys leave in my bathroom...

Have a Happy Juice Box Filled Summer!

21 days of prayer for boys

Today I am starting 21 days of prayer for boys with my friend Mary Chris @ http://mc4him.blogspot.com/
I am so excited to see what God can do with my passionate prayer on behalf of my sons!

My Baby Turned 4

My first born is a 4 year old!!!  How did that happen?!  One minute I am rocking him to sleep and this week I am not aloud to kiss him on the lips any more, I am beside myself!!  How emotional does it make me to have my boy turn 4?  Here is a little taste..
DJ has been asking for exactly one year (since the day after his 3rd birthday party) for a dragon cake "when he turns this many," picture 4 chubby little sticky fingers held high in the air.  The movie "How to Train Your Dragon" came out right around his 3rd birthday last year and it was his first movie that he saw at a movie theater.  J took him for a little treat and DJ was so worried it would be too loud we sent him with a set of earphones, that he put on before the theater was even dimmed and left on the entire movie.  DJ was also too little to keep the seat down on his own, so J had to hold it down, I happen to know my husband and I know he sat through that whole movie, holding DJ's seat down, grinning ear to ear and overflowing with love for this sweet boy...

Long story longer, we HAD to have a how to train your dragon birthday this year.  I got online and found some cute favors and Viking birthday hats, not as much as I usually do for birthdays but I really thought I could find quite a bit at Wal-mart or the dollar store.  The party was Saturday and on Thursday I finally got to go shopping, first dollar store nothing, second dollar store nothing, Wal-mart I head for the bakery and order a "how to train your dragon birthday cake please," NOTHING!!  Let me say as a disclaimer I actually asked a friend to make a cake weeks before this and she was going out of town so I looked at the Wal-mart cake book, saw the dragon cake I wanted, and came prepared to order on Thursday.  APPARENTLY they still had the cake in the book but no longer had the items needed to make it, cue my misty eyes.  The baker (and I use that term loosely) did tell me if I brought her a dragon toy she could make a cake to go with it, so I jaunted on down to the toy isle, NO DRAGON TOYS.  Seriously not one, anywhere, cue the hysterical sobbing.  I managed to take my phone out and call J, who was in fact willing to jump in the car and drive 2 hours to find something, and when I got home he had already pulled several tutorials off of the Internet for me on how to bake one myself.  If you know me, you know baking a cake in a circle is difficult for me, in the shape of a dragon impossible.  Once I pulled myself together I remembered the United grocery store and gave them a call, they saved the day with an awesome cake that not even a jump castle could pull DJ away from.  I tried one last dollar store and found the party favors I needed.  I sat down and painted a "Toothless" shirt for him to wear and set out the new kid camera and donuts that were his birthday morning surprise, and found some peace that even though he probably won't remember this birthday or even this last year I did my job, I did all that I could to make him feel special and celebrated and loved and those feelings will be with him for a lifetime even if the memory of the perfect dragon cake won't.

This year DJ...
Became a Big Brother, again

Graduated from Mother's Day Out

Likes to play with "sets"

Was in his Nini's wedding

Got a new "stuck together" bed

Got his first baseball mitt

Got a Daddy hair cut

He also had his first sleep overs with friends Jake P. and Athen K. (no pics unfortunately).
DJ uses adjectives for items, like a towel is a "dryer" and a gun is a "ka-poom thing"
And is really beginning to learn about and understand what it is to be a Christian.

We are so blessed with such an amazing boy, who loves his family with all of his heart and soul.  DJ is a warrior and a leader and I just know that if I can guide him and teach him in the ways that are good and right then he will be a great great man of God, who will change the world.  We love you handsome boy, Happy Happy Birthday!

the recycled t-shirt dress

So, one day I am shopping at Wal-mart and a woman says to me, "look at you with all your little ducks in a row," and I became obsessed with the idea of making little duck shirts for my babies.  I made the duckling shirts for myself for mother's day and that Saturday I thought, "I have nothing to wear for mother's day", and thus this dress was born.  I used a yellow t-shirt of mine that was too short (why is it after having babies 86% of your shirts become too short?) and a white t-shirt that I stole from my hubby.

Step #1 was to measure myself around where I wanted the white part to start (30") then I measured from that point to about how long I wanted the dress (23")

Step #2 I divided the first number in half and that gave me the measurement for my first rectangle, 15"X23"  and that is my back piece

Step #3 Now because I am trying to hide the fact I have had 3 babies and I HATE doing sit ups I added 3inches to the first number for my second rectangle so 18"X23"

Step #4 with right sides together sew your rectangles along the 23" seam

Step #5 now you have a long tube that will be your skirt, at this point I did a gathering stitch right in the middle of my front piece about 3 inches long and played with the gathers until the skirt fit and the belly was hidden

Step #6 I tried on the yellow shirt and marked where I wanted the skirt to start  and continued that line all the way around my torso.  I pinned my white tube to the top all the way along that line.  Now I had a vision of the raw edge of the knit being visible in the dress so I just sewed the skirt right onto the top, it did not look as awesome as I thought it would so when you connect the two you might want to sew them with the right sides of the fabric together.  Now your dress can be done, but mine wasn't it was lacking a little something.  I grabbed some of the extra t-shirt fabric from Izzy's dress and I made a little belt.

There are probably a million tutorials out there on how to make a belt, here is how I made mine...

Step #1 how long do you want your belt to be?  Add 2inches.  How thick do you want your belt to be? Double that and then add 1/4inch.

Step #2 cut your fabric according to the numbers you got above, now you have one loooong rectangle.

Step #3 fold your fabric in half, hot dog style, and iron (if you have a right side to your fabric make sure it is on the inside of your fold).

Step #4 sew the strip together to give yourself one long tube

Step #5 pin a safety pin to one end of the tube and begin to feed it back into itself turning your tube right side out, and turning your seam in.  Iron your tube flat and so that the seam goes down the middle.

Step #6 fold the raw ends of the tube inward and sew closed.

Step #7 try your belt on and decide how you want to close it, you can make your belt close any way you wish.  Here I added a button/button hole, you could also use Velcro, or snaps, even just tie it, its your belt do what you want!

TADA!  The t-shirt dress, not super original I am positive you could find better instructions out there somewhere.  This is just me, and how I made my first dress for myself using what I had on hand.

Now this little cutie...

is also wearing a dress made from one of Daddy's t-shirts for mother's day (see the little duck ;)) To make this dress I used a tutorial on MADE (I am pretty much in L.O.V.E. with her blog).  I did mess up a bit though, for some reason when I gathered the front of the dress, I didn't realize I should do the same to the back part of the dress.  So the yoke is too big and there is not enough fabric for a proper tie.  Unfortunately I also finished this dress that Saturday night so when I put it on Sunday morning we just had to roll with it.
I used freezer paper to stencil the duck on this little dress and also on her brother's t-shirts.

Trying to get a pic of anybody was like trying to jump over the moon!

There you have it, my crazy mother's day dress making extravaganza!

Bodily Functions

If you are friends with me on FB then you know my week has been chalk FULL of bodily functions!  Asher is coming into a real knowledge of his body and its excrement's, he refuses to leave a diaper on if he has "used" it which means there is a trail of dirty diapers throughout my house.  On occasion there is also a trail left behind from those really really dirty diapers.  I did attempt to start potty training, it was a fail.  The instant that I put some big boy underwear on him, Asher freaked out, "I want my diaper, I want my diaper back!!!!"  And now, because I am tired and J is very busy, I am going to just continue to clean up the trail of diapers and streaks of poop until I can get myself together enough to actually train Asher how to use the potty.  Potty training requires a VERY put together mommy.  Now DJ has been trained for quite awhile, and he does a great job of knowing when to go and washing his hands.  Not so great a job at flushing or closing the lid, which was not a big deal until Iz became mobile.  The other night, while cleaning up after Asher, I heard the toilet lid and the distinct sound of water splashing.  I looked over at DJ changing into his PJ's and recalled that I had just sent him to use that potty and I did NOT hear a flush.  I finished cleaning Asher as fast as humanly possible and ran to the bathroom to find sweet Iz just as happy as can be bent over the potty splashing away, in DJ's pee. 
There are times in life you are never fully prepared for, the craziness of motherhood is one big season of never being prepared and always being amazed at the things your children can and will do.  The thing that blows my mind is that even though I am on baby #3 I am still not prepared, I am still amazed, I am still learning.  Not just with DJ but with each one of my children, they are so different from one another.  I guess that's what makes motherhood so special, what makes God so amazing, the unique beauty in each of my babies; even if it is covered in poo.