Little miss quilt

August means only one thing for me. It means birthday planning for our little girl and then the actual event in the end of the month. So that is what I have been up to for the last month. My friends say I go far and beyond over her birthdays, but I don't care. I really had fun this year planning Emma's party.

But I'm not going to share anything to do with this years party yet. No, first we have to go back to last years celebration! Do you remember what we did last year? We had a little miss theme that you can read more about HERE. And as I was thinking of ideas for this year, I realised that I haven't shown you guys the most exciting thing we did on her birthday last year. The quilt!

I wanted Emma to have some sort of memory of her first birthday and for some reason a quilt came into my mind. So I made these squares and printed different little miss characters on them. I made my own stencils and wrote the name of the character underneath the little miss. Then I took a few with me to Finland when we went for a visit in July 2011. That way my family and some friends got to also write a little message for Emma.

On the actual day all the guests got to write little something for her. Then it was pretty simple, I just sewed them together and finished the quilt. On the other side I just printed one row of little miss sunshines. This is my first ever quilt and I realised that binding is not my thing. Or I don't have any idea of how to do it. Next time I might look for some instructions. But hopefully after many years Emma will read these messages and feel the love out of them (and won't mind about the binding).

Above some of my favorite squares. Emma's aunty Suvi and uncle Lassi got super creative and made a song for her. Her grandpa in Finland made a nice poem for her and then her two cousins on different continents drew very nice pictures. Warms my heart when ever I see this quilt.

Disney nostalgia

I'm not too into any of this character stuff that is going around in the stores, but we do have couple of lovely little girls in our lives who love Minnie Mouse. The other one of them just turned 3 and I had to make something Minnie for her. And the other little girl will get her bag a bit later.

Truth is, I was only going to make one bag, but I wasn't happy with the first one, so I made another one. Works great as I now have one present made in advance, and that never happens. I also bought some books to put inside as I thought these bags would work great as library bags.

You can find the stencil HERE. I just drew the image on a clear sheet and cut it out with nail scissors. I made two different sizes.

Then on the morning of the birthday, I went to our local small op shop. Looking for something totally different, I came across with this old memory game. It was in such a good condition, had all the pieces, and lets face it, it just went so well with the bag, don't you agree! $2 later I was on my way home with a big victory smile on my face. I gave it a good clean and wrapped it. Oh I do have to admit that before wrapping, we did have a game with Emma. Oh the flow of nostalgia, all these images from my childhood. It ended up being a bit hard to let it go and give it away.

Huffed and puffed

Our whole family is huffing and puffing.

Me for many reasons.. because I can't keep up with this little tornado, because I want things done my way (or it's the high way for the rest of the family) and because I am in pain at times and feel like I've run a marathon

Hubby, because he has to deal with my moods. No, I wanted the carrots cut differently! No, that's not how you cook sushi rise! No, I didn't want the egg in heart shape, I just wanted it normal and flat. I do feel for him and apologize after I've gotten over my issue. And he tries so hard, poor thing. 

Daugther, because she would want to do everything that is not allowed.

So we're going slow, taking each day as it comes, stay in our pj's until lunch time (that's for me and Em) and try to giggle and be happy as much as we can. Just being. No point stressing.

Swimming bag

Teddy bears riding on turtles, sharks swimming fast and friendly wales waving... All these things are found in our new swimming bag. 

It was another material find from an op shop. This one used to be a curtain, now it is our new swimming bag. We love swimming and go to the pool once a week. So we really needed an extra funky bag, I thought. It ended up being a bit too big, but I'm sure we'll need all that room after we get this next baby along.

Love our special times at the pool with my very talented swimming girl. Oh and to wrap things up, a song that we watch and dance to almost every day at the moment. It fits into the theme plus it's our favorite and so catchy.

Messages on the windscreen

Too often people think that it's always hot and sunny in Australia. Not the case, not at least where we live. We have had few -2 degrees nights and when there is no insulation in the house, it is freezing!

So I thought to cheer up hubby by writing some lovely notes on his car's windscreen. That's all I could do, then I had to run back inside to defrost my fingers and toes.

Cardboard plane

True cardboard fun! We got a load of cardboard (which we needed for a future project) and with the left overs daddy made this airplane for Emma. I'd say they are both a bit fanatic over planes, quite cute. It must run in the genes. But shows you again that you don't need much to keep one toddler occupied and happy. Thanks daddy!

Wishing you all a great weekend!

Birds and bunnies

Remember the rainy trip we did to Albany? Well we didn't just do sight seeing. I managed to get some shopping time too and my favorite places to shop at the moment are the op shops. So when I saw these two old sheets (below), I couldn't resist.

They yellow one's pictures are a bit bigger, but I loved the blue one too. So I got them both and today I managed to get something done out of them. I would have made heaps of these little pouches, but I didn't have any more zips. Plus I have no idea what I'm going to use these for. I put Emma's hair clips in the other, but the other one might just go out as a present for someone.

I think I will make a pencil case using these sheets too, we really need one. After that I have to start thinking of something else to make out of them. But aren't they adorably cute?!