Monday, July 25, 2011

Mama Gets Busy




Gracie learned to nap (sort of)! And started going to bed like a sweet baby, at 7pm! Everyone knows what that means... time to sew! And knit! And cook! It's fabulous. The best part is she's happier overall too because she's well rested.



That's my good girl :) Never too early to love books.


So I've been enjoying getting back to a little me-time, which allows me to be creative. I've missed making things. The first thing I made for Gracie was this sweet denim jumper, made from scraps of my absolute favorite skirt. I very loosely based it off a dress we got as a gift, but it's mostly pattern-less. I hate onesies on their own and pants look silly over cloth diapers, so we got a lot of wear out of this... in the 3 weeks it fit. My chunker is already in 9 MONTH CLOTHING! She's 14.5 lb or more by now... at 11 weeks.




Speaking of cloth diapering, the most annoying thing in our first couple weeks was that we only had disposable wipes. I'm not even going to tell you how many went through the wash, and how much of a pain it is to pull disintegrated wipe bits out of velcro. But I don't have to worry about that anymore! Voila, 2-sided flannel wipes. One side has polka dots... the other says "I love Mommy" and "I love Daddy." A much needed reminder when she's screaming through a diaper change! I made 30 for less than $5 AND got to learn my new-to-me serger. Good times.




Number 3 has to be my favorite project so far. I adore this little dress! I made it out of scraps, too, from my second favorite skirt. I wrote about it 2 years ago. Yes... Gracie and I totally matched the first time she wore this to church. I wish I'd gotten a picture, except maybe not: my skirt has been well worn over 2 years, while the scraps were stored and are still bright and crisp. Oh well. I LOVE this pattern (Simplicity 4243), but next time I have to make the neck bigger. Remember that 14.5lb baby? Yeah... she's already outgrown this one, too.




Maybe one of these days she'll slow down enough to wear a special dress more than once! In the meantime, I have a good friend due in about 3 weeks, so all these tinies are taking a vacation to the other side of town. Then back to me, for next time! It's so good to be back to "normal."

5 comments:

Gillian said...

The little dresses are so cute! And my goodness, she is a chunk! The baby I nanny is almost 5 months old and only weights about 16 lbs (and he's a pretty good size!)

I keep seeing people who make their own wipes - do you use any solution on them, or just use them dry? I'm intrigued... (And though I'm sure it'll be awhile until I have my own babies, I'm storing up ideas already!)

Emily said...

It's good to hear from you, Jenny! Gracie is getting enormous. She looks wonderful. Maria weighed 18 lbs at 4 months old. Her neck hardly every fit in stuff-I always had to leave a button open- and no sooner would we get some adorable outfit and she'd wear it once, but she'd outgrow it. It was crazy. I predict Gracie's crazy growth will slow down a bit around 6 months, and she might even loose a little weight when she starts to crawl and walk.
Henry, of course, grew slower, but being a boy didn't have a ton of cute stuff to wear. Hopefully the next girl will be able to wear some of those cute things more than once.
Your wipes are super cute. I just use about three dozen baby washcloths and a spray bottle.
I have a new-to-me serger too, that I have had for about a year now. I tried to use it twice, and it came unthreaded, and I could NOT get it to rethread. Of course the instructional video is a VHS that I have no way to play, and the user manual is useless. I am sorry I bought it. Good for you figuring out how to use yours!

Chelsea said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Chelsea said...

Hi Jenny, just visiting from the S&S forum!
Thought I would share another idea for cloth wipes. We bought the "hotel" pack of washcloths from Costco, some of them got serged in half and some in quarters. They work great (we just wet them with tap water before using) and just go through the wash with the diapers. Also we use the half size (2 of them) as extra layers in the night diapers.
I'll have to give the flannel ones a try!

*Edited for fat fingers spelling mistake*

Anonymous said...

It's me, silly Blogger still won't let me sign in.

Gillian, I use a blend of water, baby oil, and a little baby wash to hold it all together. It's mostly water tho. Gracie's got dry skin so she needs the oils.

Emily, I'm afraid of Gracie's 4m. I'm pretty darn certain she'll have jumped off the charts. As for your serger, have you tried Youtube? Threading is the trickiest part of using a serger. I know mine has color-coded pictures on the front and even still I get confused. But it's worth it to figure out!

Hi Chelsea! I'm glad you came to visit! I love the flannel wipes because they're soft enough for my girly -- I had used washcloths before and they seemed a little rought. I'll have to keep that in mind tho as she grows for an extra diaper layer! She's already using both inserts the bumgenius came with.