Christmas Gifts for little boys...

I saw this idea linked on One Pretty Thing and thought it would be perfect to add to my 'Handmade Christmas' list. I have two little boys - sons of my bestest friend - on my list. They're 2 and 4. The 'car' one is for the 2 year old and I'm going to attempt a 'train' theme on for the 4 year old.

The tutorial is here - it's very straightforward, though. The pockets at the bottom hold cars, the 'road' flips up for play and down over the cars to be rolled up for travel. Perfect for waits at the Doctor's office, going to Grandma's house, etc. I hope they love them!

Here is it rolled up and tied, It has about 4 cars in it so it's pretty bumpy :-)


And here it is opened up. The road flips up and is perfect for a little playtime with the cars.

Child-sized 'Snuggie' for Paige

Everytime that silly informercial comes on, Paige and Blake both say they want one. Now, both can be cold-natured and love snuggling up with blankets, so they actually might really use it.

However, I fear the 'one size fits all' mentality would be a bit harder to maneuver for a 7 year old. Plus, there's no cool patterns available. So using a variety of sources and patterns I found online, I made this one for Paige:

Here's a closeup of the top. The colors are just her style and it's sized nice and roomy for her.

Fleece doesn't fray, so there's no need to finish all edges, but I ran a small hem around the entire perimeter to give it a more finished look.

This is the fleece I'll be using to make Blake's 'Snuggie'. Lessons learned on the first - I think I'll reduce the space across the chest (between the sleeves) and a little bit of the sleeve length for his.

I hope they like them - and actually use them! Now to put them away to hide until Christmas :-)

Rainbow Cake

Have you seen this? I know it's been all over blogland, but I guess I'm late coming to the party.

Omnomicon's Rainbow Cake




Once I showed it to Paige, she loved the bright colors and was anxious to try it. We used our own cake and frosting recipes, but followed the same 'method'.

Here it is 'in process':



She decided she wanted a Panda Bear cake, so I did the best I could on short notice. It's not near as elaborate as others I've made in the past, but she wasn't having a 'real' party anyway, so we made do. It was actually pretty neat - the plain black and white cake on the outside exploded with color once cut.

Excuse the messy photos - note to self: wipe crumbs and frosting from plate when taking blog photos... oh, and clean clutter off surrounding table...



It was yummy!

Baby Shower Goodies

I went to a lovely Baby Shower yesterday for the mom of one of my Girl Scouts. It was a lot of fun - it's been a while since I've been to a shower.

So, with dear hubby laid off from work, I needed to be as frugal as possible. I found some cute patterns online HERE and HERE and made some bib and bootie sets. The booties would have been cute with a coordinating embellished onesie as well, but the mom-to-be mentioned that she had lots of clothes already.

This first set is made from repurposed 'fabric' I had around the house. The backside of the bib and the outside sole of the booties are denim from old jeans. The khaki fabric was once a pair of cargo maternity pants, and the aqua stripe was a cute button-down shirt my son never wore and has outgrown.

This set was just a cute baby flannel that my momma passed on to me - so soft!

And then this one - it's cute on both sides. The doggy flannel came from my Mom and I had the red flannel from another project. This was my daughter's favorite set.

Oh, and the surprise of the shower... ever seen the relay game involving plungers, toilet paper rolls, and no hands? Way too much fun - I haven't laughed that hard in a long, long time.