Backpack embroidery

It took me a few tries 20 minutes later, but I got the hoop on strait and put "BCM" for Brycen Conner McArdle or Bailey Carson McArdle...whichever we use it for. Bailey still has her backpack from last year in fabulous condition since it was basically used to hold an extra outfit and a folder...now her lunch box from last year...that was thrown away. So this will be Brycen's over night bag or maybe his diaper bag?!? I don't know yet. I made him a burp cloth with the new little elephant I ordered...he is so cute...or she if it was in pink ;) And lastly I made a reversible Long Jon-Jon to sell! It is super cute, but Blake is not for the Jon-Jon look on little boys...oh well! I had a feeling but wanted to make it anyway. Now I have my first item to put on sale in an etsy store! whoop whoop! I will wait until I stockpile a few more things before making the site...plus I need a good name for it.

I stayed up way too late last night working on the above mentioned as well as other projects. I hate bringing out both machines now that my craft room is a nursery so the kitchen table = disaster zone with two machines, sewing box, bags of scraps for appliques, the laptop hooked up, projects lying in their special piles... I repaired a giant hole in Blake's jeans back together (they are his favorite's) and I shortened straps on Bailey's mickey mouse dress that we bought at Disney World...yeah a few projects that needed to be done back in APRIL. Procrastinate much?!?

New items are in the mail!

I just met up with a friend and we ordered so many cute things from www.embroiderthis.com. I'm so excited to put names on bloomers and bibs for baby gifts and newly married couples initials on towels. I also ordered a large spool of orange embroidery thread for $3.10! What an incredible deal! I love love love finding good deals! Can't wait to put Sweet Little Brycen's initials on the bibs as well as all the other babies being born this year. I have 3 little girl birthday parties to attend over the next two weekends so the bloomers will be great gifts for them. I can't wait to show pictures of everything that I will be working on...we are getting a new faster laptop next week during "no tax" weekend so I will be able to work on more projects and open a website! I may start with just an etsy store at first and then branch off...we are looking into options right now. Any tips on starting a website retail business is appreciated! I am starting with embroidery, sewing and cookies - I have everything for those three hobbies without having to invest anything more. So who knows I may branch off into vinyl stuff but that will have to wait until I get a handle on these three first. The next few weeks will be busy but I'm ready for a new challenge.

Rambling about time

Today I found myself looking at things to purchase for the future and almost went crazy. The list kept getting longer and longer (new this, new that, upgrade this...ooh! I need one of those too). After looking at a few items I realized I needed to stop getting too carried away. I have these goals and when I haven't checked off one or two in a while I get very frustrated with myself for letting time slip by. I am suppose to have a business plan done this summer along with 10 perfect cupcakes. So far 3 out of the 4 were fabulous. So I still need 7 perfect cupcakes by the end of August. Where has the summer gone?! Time...it still feels like I just graduated from college and it has been 3 1/2 years! 3 1/2 years - I could have completed my masters by now (on a very slow pace) or I don't know...opening a cupcake shop?!? Brycen will be here in 14 weeks...I feel like I just found out and 26 weeks have already past.

Two cupcakes coming this weekend (hopefully they will be perfect...then I will be halfway there): Chocolate Chocolate Cheesecake & Mint Chocolate Chip

Although the summer is passing by, "Bailey's Summer Checklist" is almost complete! We completed a few more this past weekend: Water Park and Travel for the Weekend (Panama City Beach).

What's left on "Bailey's Summer Checklist":

• Golf Range with Daddy
• Splash Pad
• Putt-Putt Outing
• Go Bowling
• Ride a bike with training wheels without help
• Make Smoothies
• Go to a baseball game - Biscuits
• Play with play dough

Some of these are small but we haven't found time to do them yet. Bailey's last week of daycare is this week and then Blake will be keeping her while he is off orders so they should be able to get some or most of these done before school starts in 4 weeks. I think Making Smoothies might get checked off tonight :)

2 more onesies

I did these onesies a few weeks ago for a baby girl gift. I finally saw the mom-to-be yesterday to give them to her. I love the purple flower! Her name is precious, Rileigh Ann. I also made some size tags for her closet for organization but I forgot to take a picture. Sorry for the horrible quality in these pictures - I used my cell phone.

Summer of Cupcakes #4

Today I am hosting the second "Zeta Crew" luncheon of the summer and I will be bringing these delicious cupcakes: Chocolate Peanut Butter with Chocolate Drizzle and a Reeses on top! I think these will go over well with the Zeta Lunch Crew Ladies. I did however cheat this time! I could not find a few of the ingredients to make the chocolate cake and the items were a bit on the expensive side...I need to go to a bakery shop and find these fine ingredients. So I made Dunkin Hines and it tastes amazing...love cake in the box. I have been trying to do everything homeade this summer but I couldn't this time. The icing is 100% homemade and Oh So Good!! The recipe was a lot! I packed on probably twice as much icing on each cupcake and still had leftovers...so I put it in a a Tupperware dish and will save it for dipping apple slices in later :) yum! Also...take notice in the quality of the picture because I got a new camera!! I'm so excited to be able to post quality pictures now! I needed a new camera before Baby #2 arrived so I am practicing with it on my cupcakes.

Lingerie Shower

For the past two weeks I have been busy getting ready for a fabulous Lingerie Shower with a Fiesta theme. Blake just happened to be in Puerto Rico a few weeks ago so we scored on getting good tequila for a great price. Every night for the past week and a half I have dedicated 1-3 hours to doing something: cookie dough, cookie icing, 3 layers on the pinata, spray painting the pinata, tissue paper covering the pinata, bagging the cookies, making the cookies, decorating the cookies and my love/hate relationship on printing out the invitations ;) Here are pictures of the fabulous shower. We had such a fun time even if the weather was bad. Three of us hosted and two of us are pregnant...so more margaritas for everyone else ;) I forgot to take a picture of the margarita shaped cookies and lingerie cookies...hopefully someone else did on their camera.

The hostesses with the bride-to-be in front of the lingerie pinata!

Summer of Cupcakes #3

Key Lime Pie Cupcakes! I am not one to love white cake but this white cake was Delicious! Although not as good the next day... I need to find a better way to store them. Anyway, it called for almond extract in the cake but I wish I would have used key lime extract or juice because almond and key lime do not exactly go together. Sorry I forgot to take a picture!! It was a white cake with the center removed and filled with Key Lime "stuff" and a homemade whipped topping. The batch made 24 big ones! So I took them to two different events that were back-to-back. For the second event I realized I did not have enough whipped topping and I had a lot of the Key Lime "stuff" left over so I combined them and Blake said they were much better that way and tasted more "key limish". He even said he would pay $2 a cupcake for them which is saying a lot. So another cupcake scratched off the list for The Summer of Cupcakes! Next up: Chocolate-Chocolate Cheesecake Cupcakes!

Bed Rest on July 4th Weekend

I had the worst feeling this past Thursday while watching Transformers 3 at the movies with Blake but thought it was just pains from being uncomfortable. The last hour of the movie (3 hours with commercials) I was having contractions. I knew the pains were long and sharp but they went away. After the movie was over I went to stand up and realized quickly that I couldn't. I couldn't because my stomach felt like it would burst and my body felt cinched together - there was no way to stand up. So I sat there and tried to breath and relax - I tried to recline in the chair as far back as I could go and after 5 minutes or so I was able to slowly stand up. It hurt so bad, but I tried not to panic. I went to the bathroom to make sure everything was okay and it was so we went home and read about contractions at 23 weeks. It is not uncommon and that dehydration is the main reason...light bulb! I had been sick most of Wednesday and Thursday and was not able to keep anything down besides my trusty staple: dr. pepper. So the rest of my four day weekend was spent on bed rest. We did leave the house a few times but other than that I stayed off my feet and rested. Cramping lasted for a few more days but no more sharp pains/contractions after Thursday. Thank the Lord. I drank as much water as I could over the weekend and had my regular appointment on Tuesday - everything is doing good and he is measuring right on time.

I realize after this happened that I do too much that week, but it's not because of procrastinating - everything I have to do always seems to be on the same day or back-to-back. I don't schedule it to be insane...it just happens. This week I have done my best to do one thing after work to prepare for the chaos this weekend :) I'd mention all the things but if my mother reads this she would flip out that I've over scheduled myself AGAIN.