Baby TOMS!

You think I would have learned by now that when I really take my time to do a project right, I am infinitely more pleased with the outcome. For example, the chair I re-upholstered or my diaper bag. For both of those projects, I took my time and made sure every little thing was done right, and guess what? I adore both of them.

Well, here it happened again. I really don't know how to express how excited I am about these little shoes. I love them so much! I was so giddy when I finished them last night. I just kept picking them up and turning them over and just looking at them. Call me crazy, but I love them!

The idea came from Craftiness Is Not Optional, who originally got it from this tutorial. She gives a full tutorial on how to make the shoes, both toddler and baby sizes. She has a pattern you can buy, or if you are a penny pincher like me, you can download the free pattern and scale it to the size you need! 

I saw the shoes and since my little man needed some black shoes anyway, I decided to make them!

Like I said, I followed the tutorial exactly and they turned out just how I wanted. I actually intended for the bottom to be black, with the plaid on the inside, but accidentally did it the wrong way. Lucky for me, I did both of them like that and loved how it turned out!

I finished them after Owen was already asleep, so I had to wait until this morning to try them on him. They are just a little big, but that will be perfect! Room to grow is never a bad thing...especially with this guy. 

Checking them out:

So cute!

Perfect for those roly poly feet! 

I just might make another pair...or ten!

~K.A.N.

Re-purposing: women's shirt into girl's dress

This is one of the easiest and most satisfying projects! I love re-purposing! For this project I took a shirt that I had never worn and decided to turn it into a dress for my friend's little girl. (sorry, I forgot to take any before pictures!)

I borrowed a dress that belonged to my friend's daughter and following this tutorial, I made that shirt of mine into a dress for her!

The front: 

Using the extra fabric I added a cute little flower to the front!

The back: 

The first time she tried it on, it didn't fit over her head. That was my mistake because I forgot to account for this fabric having no stretch! I took it back home and added a cut-out with a button and it worked like a charm. 

Isn't she just adorable? 

~K.A.N.

A new life

So I took 3 months off from blogging. It seems a bit long, but I feel justified in the fact that I had a baby. He will be 3 months old tomorrow! I can't believe how fast it has gone. The first month felt like it lasted so long, then the next 2 months just flew by. Our little man is getting so big and learning so much. 

Baby O on his birthday

Happy Halloween from our little pumpkin ~3 months!!

 We love him so much and are looking forward to the rest of forever with him. 

So along with having a baby, we also moved and the husband started graduate school! It has been a pretty crazy last few months for sure, but I finally feel like we are settled and figuring out life. 

As far as crafting goes, it is definitely different doing projects with baby O around. Things that used to take just a couple of hours seem to take a couple of days. I have done a few projects for around the house and a couple of just-for-fun projects as well. 

My plan now is to start blogging once a week! I'm excited to get making things again and sharing them through blogging!

~K.A.N.

Chair Re-upholstery

This is a project that I have wanted to do for a very long time. I actually finished it several weeks ago, but it was such a huge project with so many pictures that it took me a while to get it all organized in order to blog about it. 

When my husband and I got married, we got two chairs from my family. These chairs were bought new by my grandma, so they have been in my family for some time. And they are rather old.

This is the chair before. It was a light blue velvety fabric and very worn. I have actually tried several times to get rid of the chairs because I just didn't like the look of them, but my husband loves how comfortable they are, so he won and we've kept them. 

When I was deciding on the nursery colors and furniture I realized that one of these chairs would be perfect for in there and decided to do my first re-upholstery project. 

We went to Joann Fabrics and picked out the fabric for the chair. Originally, I wanted a navy blue to go with the nursery, but we couldn't find any fabric we liked in that color, so we went with a gray instead. It would be a great neutral color, just in case we wanted to change it to a different room someday. 

The first thing to do was take pictures from every angle of the chair, especially the little details. This is important so that they can be referenced later. Here are a few of those pictures. 

Next, the original fabric had to come off. This was probably my least favorite part. It took much longer than I thought it was going to!! I used a flat head screw driver and pliers and lots of help from my wonderful husband. I also took pictures as each piece came off. I was careful enough taking things apart that all of the tack strip and foam was able to be reused. 

First to come off was the skirt, then the back:

Next, the sides and piping. This piping went up one side, around the back, and down the other side. 

The front of the arms then came off. I took a lot of pictures of this because of the way the piping laid. 

I then took the front pillow off. When this piece came off, I realized this project was going to be much more work than I expected. It was several pieces all sewn together and came off in one chunk. This piece was taken completely apart and the individual pieces were used as a pattern for the new piece. 

The last pieces to come off were the arms and front. 

This left me with a chair that was completely naked. 

As I said above, all the foam, stuffing, tack strips, and cardboard were in good enough condition to be reused. I vacuumed all parts of the chair and pieces of foam, then fabreezed it all to get it nice and fresh. 

The pieces taken off were used as pattern pieces for the new fabric. With the new pieces, I worked backwards from how I took everything off to put the chair back together. 

1. Front

2. Arms

3. Front cushion - cover buttons were used for the new buttons

4. Sides

5. Back

6. Skirt

7. Seat Cushion 

This was my first re-upholstery project as well as my first time using cover buttons and first time making piping. I love love love how this chair turned out and expect it to be used for a very long time. 

We also decided that we love this chair so much it will be going in the living room rather than the nursery!

The last thing I learned from this project was to never again try re-upholstery 8 months pregnant. It was not only difficult working around my belly, but my emotions. Even so, I'm very happy with the chair and love showing it off when people come to visit!

~K.A.N.

Mattoon Family

Let me introduce you to some of our very best friends: The Mattoons. Courtney and I hit it off with our mutual love for crafting. The best part about it is that our husbands don't mind hanging out either. :) 

Courtney has wanted to get some family pictures taken in the wheat fields, so I told her I would do some. Luckily, our baby decided he wouldn't come just yet, so the wheat had time to change and I was able to take their pictures last night. The sky was so clear and even at 7:15 pm it was still pretty bright, but we did our best and got some good shots of this adorable family. 

This is my handsome hubby who so graciously came to help. He agreed that it was a bit bright out. 

The family of 3: 

The men of the house:

Mom and Mason:

We also had help from our other great friend Nikki. She did awesome helping with the dogs and Mason, so a big thanks to her! Here is a shot of the whole family:

~K.A.N.

Mason

This morning I took some pictures for my friend whose little guy is now 18 months. It was lots of fun, but boy does he have his own idea about pictures...he was done when he was done. 

Even still we were able to get some really stinkin' cute pictures, and I wanted to share a few of my favorites. 

And although it wasn't easy, we were able to get a picture with mom. 

I'm going to miss these guys like crazy when we move! Thanks for letting me capture some sweet little moments with you today!

~K.A.N.

Independence Day

This year for the 4th, I decided that I wanted to fill our day with all kinds of awesome activities. We had a whole day planned, which about 75% worked out. 

We first went to a breakfast held by our church. We invited our friends to come and had fun with them, as well as with other friends and family. There was food, pony rides, and even a bounce castle. 

On our way home, I got a bit sick, so we had to cancel our trip to the river. I was a bit bummed out, but we were still able to hang out with friends and do a barbecue lunch at their house. We relaxed and talked and watched some tv. 

Around 4 we came back home and took a nap because we knew we were going to be up later to watch some fireworks. We woke up, waited just a bit, then drove out to a small town with a big firework show. We had so much fun watching the fireworks and hanging out with even more friends. 

~K.A.N.

Lamp

For the baby's nursery, I decided that rather than pick a theme, I wanted to just pick colors. I picked navy blue and white for the main colors with green as an accent. We are still in a one-bedroom, but I can finally see everything coming together. 

One of the things I wanted was a little side table with a lamp. My mother-in-law gave me a lamp that was the perfect size, so all I had to do was make it match the nursery!

On the left is the stand all taped up and ready to paint. It started as a dark green, so I decided the easiest way to go was navy blue. The lamp shade is on the right; just a plain off-white color. 

For the shade, I laid out my fabric and used the actual shade as a "pattern" by rolling the shade on the fabric and tracing where the edges were. I added about an inch to the top and bottom as well as to the sides, which gave me this shape: 

I then used hot glue to put the fabric on the original shade. I tucked in the ends to give it a nice finished look. The stand was all dry by this point, so I took the tape off, added the newly re-covered lamp shade and now I have a lamp that matches the nursery perfectly!

~K.A.N.

Painted Blocks

One of my best friends has a little boy who is now 18 months old! He is just the cutest and the best part is that I get to have his adorable hand-me-downs. He just recently grew out of his 12 month clothes, so I went through them and took a whole bag home for my little guy. She also gives me the toys that he doesn't play with anymore. 

One of the things that I got with the 12 month clothes were some blocks. I got 6 total. Each block had 2 letters and 4 random pictures. I wanted the blocks to just have letters, so I decided to paint them! 

I first painted all of the blocks completely white. I then wrote out the letters that were already on each block and figured out what other letters to put on the blocks in order to spell certain words and have at least one of each letter of the alphabet. 

For the sides that were pictures, I drew the letters on with a pencil. I then painted the letters and edges navy blue. 

As I said, each of the letters of the alphabet are included at least once and there are a few words that I made sure the blocks could spell. The blocks can spell BABY, NASH, and our top 3 names: LOGAN, OWEN, and ISAAC. 

Now we will be all set for whichever name we pick! I can't wait for him to come. 

~K.A.N.

Diaper Bag

I can hardly believe that I only have about 8 weeks until my due date! I am so excited to meet this little guy. I have now completed my undergraduate degree and am officially a stay-at-home wife (and almost mom). 

It has been so nice to relax and just enjoy the free time I have. I have been filling it with all sorts of things including cleaning, cooking, organizing, and of course crafting! 

I still have lots on my to-do list to be ready for the arrival of our baby boy, but I have now officially completed the diaper bag! I love it even more than I thought!

This was my first time using a real pattern, but I still did not completely stick to it. The pattern was the birdie sling by Amy Butler which I borrowed from a friend. 

I initially planned on following the pattern, but as I started the project, there were some things that I knew I would like better if I changed. I still liked the general pattern, so I thought it would be a good starting point. 

Things I changed: 

1. I made the bag less deep. My mom told me that with a diaper bag that is too deep, things will just get lost, so I cut a couple of inches off the bottom of the pattern. This was a simple change that didn't have any effect on how the bag would come together other than making it less deep. 

2. The pockets on the inside. The pattern makes a panel for each side which you are told to sew down the center to divide the pocket in half. Essentially you would end up with 4 simple pockets. With this being a diaper bag, I wanted a little more versatility with my pockets. On one side, I kept the smaller panel pocket, but did not sew down the center. For the other side, I made two pockets of different sizes which are pleated at the bottom and have elastic at the top. These pockets will be perfect for bottles, but can be used for pretty much anything.

3. The gussets at the base of the bag. Rather than having rounded gussets, I made mine straight. I preferred this because the bag then has a rectangular base that will be better for holding things as well as setting the bag down. 

4. The pleats on the exterior of the bag. Instead of using several small pleats, I used four larger pleats on each side. This was another simple change that I love the look of.

5. The handle. This was a pretty big change. I cut the fabric piece for the handle in the pattern and realized it was not at all what I wanted, so I decided to just make a straight handle. I then found a picture of a different bag that I loved and saw that it had an adjustable handle. This seemed perfect for a diaper bag, so I decided to do it. I found a bag at a thrift store for $2.15 with the metal pieces I needed (score!) and was able to make the handle following the picture of the other bag. 

6. The last thing I added was a magnetic snap closure. This was actually an afterthought, but after talking to my husband, he helped me figure out how to add it in without too much re-construction. 

I'm so happy with this diaper bag and I am so glad that I took my time to make it exactly how I wanted it. It is perfect and I can't wait until I can get some good use out of it!!

Finished dimensions: 12" x 16" x 5"

Strap adjustable from total length of 32" to 54" 

~K.A.N.