Swap Greatness

So as maybe I mentioned on here, I participated in another craft swap found on Melissa Goodsell's blog for a Stationary swap. I swapped with Erin and you can see pictures of what I made her on her blog. Here is most of what she sent me... minus Anastasia's crayon pouch:

I absolutely love the detail of the embroidery on the front, and all the colors she chose:

Here is Anastasia enjoying her little crayon/paper set:
I have been a bit void in posting, not so much because my newborn won't give me time to myself, but because with Nick home all the time, I have competition for the computer! lol. He is going back to work tomorrow, and I am so sad... and wondering what it will be like taking care of 2 all by myself! Yikes! I am inspired by the fact that I am not the only person in the world with more than one child to take care of. In fact, people have been doing this since Adam and Eve had Cain and Abel. It has been nice having back-up this past week and should be interesting to see how everything works out when Nick goes back to work. Hopefully I will be taking/posting more pictures soon!

A Family of Four

Our way home from the hospital and our first evening as a family of four (and dog) was a bit chaotic. We had two screaming girls in the car for a bit until we sang old Mac Donald 50 times. Anastasia was resistant to sleep. Isabel slept fine. But if Isabel woke up crying, it freaked Anastasia out so she started crying.

Since the first night, life has been very peaceful. Anastasia has been up to her normal house-destruction and Isabel has been sleeping mostly. When she wakes and eats, she often enjoys hanging out looking at me, and the light from the windows. And get this, I can actually lay her down in her basket!!! And she will sleep in it for hours!! She doesn't scream at all, just fusses a bit for food and when she needs burping. She just seems SO QUIET and calm. Which makes me seriously glad Anastasia came first... :) I love my spirited child, but she is a lot easier to attend to with a peaceful newborn.

It has been such a blessing to have frozen meals from people and I definately appreciate it more than I could have with just one child. I also am so blessed to have Nick home for a week. He has helped out when Anastasia wants to be held and snuggled while I am feeding the baby. It seems that feeding Isabel makes a great time to read to Anastasia. Hopefully this tactic will be effective for when Nick is no longer here during the day.

I am healing quite well and much faster than with baby #1 and am actually starting to feel a little bored. Anastasia kept me busy for the first ten months of her life (when she started walking) so I am not used to having a baby that can be "put down". So now I am thinking crafting may be in my nearer future than I thought! Another cool thing about Isabel, is she wears her hats! I love baby hats! I guess she needs them more than A. did since Anastasia had a HUGE mop of hair.

Anastasia seems to like her little sister. When I put the basket on her bed, Anastasia likes to put blankets and toys and clothes in there for her. I know she means well, but I had to stop her when she picked up a book. She seems very fascinated by the whole nursing thing. So it has been pretty awesome watching Anastasia with her new little partner-in-crime.

I had a mostly smooth 8 hour labor and delivery (thanks for all your prayers and good thoughts). Fair Oaks Hospital was WAY better than Holy Cross amazingly. The nurses were incredibly nice overall and Dr. Anderson was great too. We were able to leave after 24hours thanks to our (Nick's) persistence. We also enjoyed our stay better since the nurses LEFT US ALONE. What good nurses. And our room actually had a decent flat screen TV with a selection of movies to watch and internet access that was not the best. We enjoyed National Treasure 2 and the Bourne Ultimatum. We also enjoyed visits from my aunts, uncle, cousin, parents and Tara. I wasn't nearly as bored this time. :) I, of course didn't get much sleep because I can't sleep in hospitals but the adrenaline kept me going.

I also have now decided that since men's clothes have a Tall size, women's clothes need a Busty size. Thanks to this round of nursing, all my shirts that fit last winter (even when I was nursing A) are now tube tops. So I guess I have an excuse to do a little shopping. ;) The awesome thing about the first several days post-partum is waking up each morning to a smaller tummy. I have a feeling I don't have too much more of this luxury so I might actually have to work out this time.

Well thats a quick update. Two kids are actually better than one. I now see why people have so many. :)

PS-See our house showcased at our friend Regina's blog: House Art Journal.

Isabel

I am so excited to introduce Isabel Therese born Friday, October 3rd 2008 at 4:38pm. Yay!! Here she is about 10 minutes old: Here she was this morning.

We think she weighed 7lb, 11oz or so but don't really know. She is a very happy, calm baby and seems pretty okay outside of the womb. We love our new little person!! I am nursing so I can't type too much now... more to come!!!

The last duck is in the row.

So I have finished all the big things I had hoped to complete. Today I made Anastasia's halloween costume. I used leftovers from curtains and Nick's Rennaissance cape to make this little dress loosely based on the Simplicity Disney Princess pattern. It is actually a little bit big, but I want her to be able to wear it to the Faire next fall if we get to go! Plus I think it will last a while in her dress up box. I made the crown out of wool felt inspired by the design in Soule's book, The Creative Family. I am so happy with how it turned out.

And for Isabel I have a little pumpkin onesie and a fleece candy-corn cozy. So I am set. I have a cute halloween basket and I am trying to think of what to fill it with for Anastasia. I am thinking some stickers, some dried fruit and goodies from the bulk section at the store, maybe some finger puppets? I want to make a little laminated sticker book for her too. We will see what time allows with our new little arrival coming tomorrow! And can I just say I am SO EXCITED!!!

On the flip side, our dryer seems to not be working. I think it is the "start" button but I am no expert. All I know is that I am SO GLAD that it was sunny and breezy so I dried all my diapers and then a second load in one day which is good. I hate leaving baskets of laundry to come home to. Anyhow... I had best get to making my stew and enjoying our last dinner as a threesome. Hopefully my next blog will be loaded with pictures of our bundle of joy.

eBay saves the day!

About a month ago I went to this consignment shop in Winchester for their "Fill a bag for $10" sale. The ad in the paper basically said you could fill a paper bag of clothes for only $10 or pay $1 per item which is a steal! I assumed that meant any clothes, but I should have known there would be a catch. In fact only items with certain colored tags (mostly summer clothes) were part of the sale and there wasn't much left when I got there at noon (they opened at 10am) so I was terribly dissapointed. Especially because all the regular priced items were outragously priced for a consignment shop. Entire outfits cost between $10-20 which is crazy for used clothes.

Anastasia found a cute ride-on zebra that she fell in love with. The paint was all chipping and it was $9 which wasn't horrible, but not that great either. I was considering buying it just because Anastasia had become so endeared with the thing. Then this lady took it from Anastasia while I wasn't watching and bought it as Anastasia ran across the store to me crying! The lady looked at me and said, "I hope you weren't going to buy it because I need it because I am buying the matching cow and I have twins." I told her I was strongly considering buying it, and she just said, "well I really need it I can't just have one." This is all through Anastasia screaming and giving the lady her most passionate pout. I was seriously mad that the lady took the thing from her and probably should have said something to defend that, but I didn't. I just bought my two $1 items and left, vowing never to go back to that store again. Seriously though, who takes toys away from cute little girls?

Since then, I have been looking everywhere for a wooden ride-on zebra (or other cute animal) and no one seems to have a clue what I am even talking about. And then today I typed "wooden zebra toy" in the eBay search engine and FOUND IT!!! I found hippos, cows and ZEBRAS!!!! I am so happy and think I will have to add this to Anastasia's Christmas list. The best part is, for a brand new zebra with shipping and handling, it is only about $20!!! I am happy to pay the extra money for a brand new, non-chipped zebra!!! That made my day.

Speaking of eBay, some lady bought a house on eBay for $1.75. Wow.

When you are cute and you know it...

...mommy and daddy are in big trouble. Still no baby quite yet but I feel very big. Only 3 days until Friday-- induction day! Hooray! Anastasia has been a bit of a monster the bast couple days... fussing about EVERYTHING and nothing. This is what happens when we go to grandma and grandpa's which is where we went on Sunday. She is so good when we are there but comes home expecting 100% attention. Friday will be quite a wake-up call for my little monster. :)

Anastasia picked out the name "Monny" for my mom a couple weeks ago and finally came up with a name for my dad: "Gawky"!!! lol!! I love it because my dad always made fun of the name we had picked out for her prior to when she was born. He always called her "Anesthesia" and the entire family started calling her that on accident because he had said it so much. My cousin even started calling her "amnesia". Maybe I was just being over-sensative, but I really wasn't happy with him butchering my daughters beautiful name prior to her being born. But now I feel Anastasia has gotten him back... with her new name for him and I secretly hope it sticks. I know I sound so evil and devious... but if you only knew my dad and how he tries to get under everyone's skin... you would understand.

No completed craft projects lately. I am working on embroidering a little fabric house for Anastasia for Christmas. In fact I have a list compiled for what both kiddos will be getting and hope to have most of my Christmas shopping/crafting completed by Thanksgiving. I did dye some pasta using this tutorial at Make and Takes blog. It was super easy and I used Rotini and gave Anastasia a shoelace to lace it. I think it is a little difficult for her but she enjoys playing with the pasta none the less. I may try dyeing rice in the future.

It looks like the sun has come out so I may wash the comforters and sheets on our bed. I have no clue when we last washed the comforters and I want my bed to smell fresh and clean!! ah. I love drying clothes in the sun.

Waiting and sewing and waiting...

Still no baby... but thats okay. I am trying to be patient and use my time wisely as things are a little more difficult with a newborn. I cleaned the house today (even the floors!!!) and finished this little wrap and contents for Anastasia. It is supposed to be a little play pouch for the car but I may wait and give it to her as a little gift when the new baby arrives.

Inside is a little doll, a taggie blanket, a box of gnomes, coloring book, notebook, pencils and 4 felt animal finger puppets. I plan to make more animals, but I was getting bored of making them today.

I love the little gnomes the best I think. Maybe I will post a tutorial sometime. Maybe there is already one out there. All I know is that it it definately a fun little project.

Yesterday I went to the doctor and had really no change since last week. I had figured that might be the case so I wasn't too terribly dissapointed. The doctor told me if I want to come in and have the baby at any time just give them a call. haha. I found that sort of amusing... just make a phone call to have a baby. I chose the more suspensful route. Will she come by the 3rd? Time will only tell. I am guessing she is going to be 7 lb. 2 oz. Nick is still at work and I have laundry to do. I want to make pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting... mmm.