The Bali Break Tunic: Little Girls Shirt tutorial

I know we just got back from a vacation but I am already looking forward to Thanksgiving in Bali! Since it is blazing hot here I am missing all the gorgeous fall foliage and cool breezes. I didn't want to miss out on the amazing colors in fashion though and tried to come up with a compromise, something Evie could wear in Bali and not die of heat but still let me pretend it is fall ha! I came up with her Bali Break Tunic.

The pattern for her tunic can be found HERE and if you would like to see how to make the awesome little belt around her waist you can check it out at I Am Momma Hear Me Roar. I LOVED that tutorial. I mixed it up a tiny bit by making a flower two colors and really liked how it turned out. This is a super easy little shirt and I think it would look great in rich fall colors (I just don't have any in stock ha!) I also think I will pair it with her little denim vest from our family pictures to make it look more casual. How ever you wear it here is how you make it!

Tin Can Luminaries

I LOVE luminaries. I do not how ever really love the idea of fire in a paper bag. It always seemed a little wrong to me. I was mentioning this juxtaposition of feelings to one of my friends from London and she told me about the tin can luminaries she made while growing up. I thought this sounded like the cutest thing EVER! I made her give me all the details and am so excited to share it with you. I am very sad I couldn't do a better job with the pictures. After SCOURING the house I couldn't find my tripod anywhere grrrrrrrrrr. So, as I warned my night photography stinks, they are soooo cute and my pictures do not do them justice, try them, I swear you will love it!

What you will need:

An empty metal can (my boys eat Olives like there is NO tomorrow so I have lots of those lying around, but ANY can will do and I think it would be super cute to do them in lots of odd sizes. I am totally doing tuna cans for halloween with just polka dot holes... wow this was a long aside)

A small nail

A large nail

A hammer

A freezer

A printed template or drawing of Halloween items (I found mine on Martha Stewart.com)

Cello tape

Play "It's the Great Pumpkin" Charlie Brown special to occupy cuties and get you in the spirit

Let us begin:

Waiting for the night

Is that a song? I swear it is. Anyhoo I am waiting to do some night photography for my olive can make over tutorial... getting warmer at a guess yet? But the kiddos are sleeping or at school and I was finally able to try and find some labels etc. for our christmas cards and I stumbled on a website and HAD to share it, Paperwink

I love how classic and clean their website is and their prices are FABULOUS! I have always wanted my own return label stamp but could never justify the outrageous prices, combined with the fact that we move every few years but this is TOTALLY worth not dooming my hand to arthritis. I think I am going to go with this one:

I originally wanted a more expensive one but then I saw their personalized notebooks and thought if I got a stamp on sale maybe I could sneak in the 3 pack of personalized notebooks.

I am ordering our cards this weekend and very happy that I won't be hand addressing them again. Now I can save my hand for hand written notes! Wish me luck with the night photography as I am AWFUL at it.

Cheers!

Kelly

Um, is it really 11?

I had such good intentions for our first day in Timor. I have tons of things I am dying to sew (Italy is an inspiring place) and I have one HUGE project coming up (think wood, saws, nails, lace, silk etc ha!!) When I went to bed last night my head was swimming and I couldn't wait to get up in the morning. Well Evie couldn't wait to get up at 2-4:30am and the boys felt the same way from 3-4am. This morning I rolled out of bed and opened my door to see bright sunlight on the water, uh oh. It was 11 in the afternoon!!!! All 3 of the cuties and I had slept in until 11!!! Finn had totally missed school and Sawyer was about to if I didn't get my bum in gear. I had to shake everyone awake and make a made dash lunch. After grocery shopping in the pitch dark (darn power cuts), throwing away the expensive food in our freezer we had airfreighted in from Aus due to a 9 hour power cut while we were gone and rounding all the cuties up again I didn't get a chance to get to anything, boo. And I was totally going to do a tutorial on how to make your hubby's these smashing outfits:

Ha! Okay I am totally kidding, those were two of the vatican guards. Da Vinci designed their uniforms, how cool is that? You are wearing art! I wonder if he would be a clothes designer if he were born today, seems like there is more money in that these days. With clothes like these:

I am sure Lady Gaga would be his number one client! Okay anyway sorry I just had you show you those :) And this one will help you get to know me a little better:

That is me climbing up the TINY staircase to the top of St. Peters Basilica. So tiny you need to haul your bum up a rope! I was dying laughing. The last time I did something like that I was 7 months preggers with Finn and carried Sawyer up the rope to the top of Blarney Castle. Aw man can you tell I am jet lagged I am totally babbling! Needless to say I have made everyone stay up super late tonight so that we are righted by tomorrow. Combine that with another rousing game of Hopscotch

I am telling you it was intense

AND turned into a brotherly brawl

and required a good scrubbing of the feet that nights

and possibly another hot chocolate tea party (smattered with my sarcastic comments about drinking hot chocolate in 90 degree heat) and I think it will be a fun day! Plus I have my first halloween tutorial to share with you, here is a totally obscure hint:

Cheers!

Kelly

The {Free} Tulip Pants Tutorial from Heather

Heather from Featherty Sews , found HERE. Was kind enough to work super hard on the following tutorial, complete with a pattern whoot whoot! (Even when her desktop was working against her) Totally brief aside, when I get home I am planning on offering a tutorial on how to make your own digital patterns using only Photoshop, no expensive programs. Good idea or lame idea is my query? You just have to promise to still think I am at least a little cool after you see how easy it actually is and promise to still read my blog every now and then when everyone else catches on to the easiness ha! Thank you Heather for overcoming the death of your desktop to bring us these A-dor-able pants!

Welcome to the official tutorial for the Tulip Pants pattern that you can download for free HERE. This post includes the details on materials needed and the step-by-step instructions, but I wanted to show pictures for those of you who learn better that way.

Princess and the Pea: A softie toy tutorial

I love love love this little softy. I think it is just so cute.

It is sitting on Evie's changing table right now and she loves playing with it while I change her which is heaven compared to the leg wrestling I usually have to do :) And the great part is that it is so fast and easy to make! Detailed instructions and the pattern I used can be found in"More Softies" (hyper linked) one of the fab books I talked about in THIS post. A friend promised to bring me back one from Aus next month and I am thinking of maybe doing a giveaway because it had such cute stuff in it! You can purchase the American edition HERE for a steal of a deal. All right lets get hoppin!

Still Going Strong!

Hi guys! We have been keeping busy busy busy here. I thought I would give a super quick update about what we have been up to. I tried to do family pics this last week so I can get the Christmas card goin' I thought I would share a sneak peak:

My fav of Sawyer:

Finn was a DOLL and there are to many that I love:

Although this one is hilarious because it is totally his personality

Evie was so excited to be wandering around and taking it all in.

I really wanted a good one of her smiling so Daddy gave her some tickels

I love the look of anticipation on her face:

I have THE worst luck when it comes to our own family pictures. Nothing ever seems to go smoothly. As soon as we got in the car it started lashing rain. We drove all the way into downtown Rome and sat in the car saying we would give it ten minutes to stop. Thank heavens it lightened up enough to run out to the bridge. The boys LOVED playing with umbrellas

We were quiet the spectacle and had a bit of a crowd watching the boys spin around (and I was probably pretty entertaining trying to run around in my dress trying to get pictures of all of them)

This was the only family picture that really turned out okay. It was just to busy (totally thought the rain would drive people away) and the kiddos had been cooped up for too long in the car, but it looks okay :)

Today we headed out and did this:

Crazy and fun but really hard being away from all 3 cuties. No one ever talks about how gut wrenchingly hard it is to be away from your children for the first time. I was crying in the airport, such a baby. It is only for a few days and there is really no way they could have come to Cairo with us and I know they are having a blast with Grandma and Grandpa but still, its hard. Am I crazy? I am also so so so excited to share this tutorial with you:

I have everything ready to go but won't have internet access again until wednesday so check back for the fun pattern and directions. Oh it is so cute!

I LOVE it, definitely my favorite softy yet. Thanks for letting me take a little break and gush photographically about the cuties!

Cheers!

Kelly