Bridesmaid Dress Bunny

This is one of those rare times where I saw something on Pinterest, was inspired, and ACTUALLY DID IT. Seriously folks, mark this day down or something. So here's the story.

My best friend, Mary (who also happens to blog!), is pregnant with her second little one. Her first, Parker just turned two this summer and will be getting a little sister in just a few weeks! For Parker's shower, I put together a neat basket of all of the medication, first aid, and health things that Mary and Rob would need for Parker's first year or two. Being second time parents, however, they've got all of that under control this time around. I really wanted to find something special for baby girl; something they didn't already have. 

In comes Pinterest. I saw a pin about turning a bridesmaid dress into a baby blanket for the bride when they had their first child. That's cool and all, but babies end up with A LOT of blankets and most of them sit in a drawer. What else could I do?

When I was in 2nd grade and did my First Holy Communion, my Aunt Pat made me a beautiful stuffed bunny with an eyelet dress and pearls - all dressed up like my Communion dress. I loved it! I recently got that bunny back from my Dad's house and it all clicked; turn the bridesmaid dress from Mary and Rob's wedding into a doll. 

I'll be honest, I loved this dress and thought it was completely a "you could wear this again!" sort of deal. The problem is that I live in an apartment, am therefore limited on space, and had nowhere to wear it again in the foreseeable future. It will live a much more productive life as a bunny, trust me. 

Excuse the wrinkles; it has been in my closet for a few years! I broke out my Ginghers and seam ripper and went to town. Within the first 30 seconds I realized that this dress was made much, much better than I had anticipated. It took a LOT of seam ripping, tearing, and cutting. 

When all was said and done, I had a nice little pile of fabric to work with. Being a shorter dress, I could only hope it was enough to fit the bunny pattern. It ended up being just perfect, with some pieces left over.

I used the dress lining as the lining to the bunny ears since it was a slightly different shade and texture. With no filling, the ears were nice and floppy - perfect for a bunny!

For this project, I ended up buying a Simplicity pattern (#9524) on sale at JoAnn's after searching the internet for a free one. It ended up being a super simple pattern with a lot less pieces than I was anticipating. Coupled with locking eye and nose pieces for safety, the bunny came together in under 2 hours. 

I am so happy with this sweet pink bunny. I've had it made for a few weeks now, just waiting for our next visit so I can give it to Mary. Thankfully, we got together this weekend, so I can finally post about it! Plus, my kids can stop asking me if its for them as it sits on the bookshelf. Guess I'm making some stuffies for Ginny and Charlie next!

DIY Cloth Diaper Safe Butt Balm

One of the more difficult parts about cloth diapering is when baby has a rash and you need to break into the diaper rash cream. Regular rash cream is bad for cloth diapers - it gets into the fibers and makes them repeal water instead of absorb it (like it would do on baby's skin). Its really tough to get out, but not impossible. I'll include some ways to get diaper rash cream out of your CDs at the bottom of this post.

There are, however, brands of balm and cream that are cloth diaper safe. They include ingredients such as beeswax, coconut oil, and essential oils instead of zinc oxide. Now, there is nothing wrong with a zinc based rash cream (and sometimes you need to break into the big guns like Butt Paste or Triple Paste for a particularly stubborn rash), but you'll need a barrier to protect your diapers or temporarily use disposables.

I adapted this recipe from my friend Loni who made us a stick of it a few months ago. It works so well I'm making a stick of it to send to daycare. We don't just use it for rashes - we use it as preventative as well. The ingredients are good for your skin, rash or not, so it even goes on dry skin spots. With winter on full blast, its good to have in our diapering arsenal.

My kitchen helper

Ginny's Cloth Diaper Butt Balm

Ingredients:

1 ounce Beeswax (about 3 tablespoons when chopped)
1 tbsp Shea Butter Cream
2 tbsp Coconut Oil
1/4 tsp Vitamin E Oil
10 drops Lavender Oil
4 drops Tea Tree Oil

All of the ingredients I purchased were organic and easily found on Amazon.com. Overall, it cost about $35, but you can make quite a bit of balm, plus use all of the ingredients for other health and beauty related purposes.

Directions:

A lot of the recipes I've seen ask for a double boiler, but I don't have one and a mason jar just seemed easier to pour from. Stick a mason jar in the middle of a pot of water and bring to a boil.

As its boiling, chop your beeswax if it doesn't already come in pellets or shreds. Mine came in 1 ounce bars, so I needed to chop chop chop. Put the beeswax in the mason jar and let it melt.

Once its melted, add the shea butter, coconut oil, and vitamin E oil. Let it all melt. I used a wooden shish kabob skewer to stir it a little and break up clumps of the shea butter. That way, I could just throw the stick away when I was done. This stuff can be tough to get off utensils and what not.

Also, shea butter kinda feels like play doh and scoops like ice cream.

Once everything has melted, take it off the heat and add in the lavender and tea tree oils. You can use any scented oil you'd like, I happened to have lavender. The tea tree oil is a good antimicrobial/antibacterial oil to have on hand. Don't use too much though - too much can irritate the skin. Plus, it kind of stinks.

This batch filled the 2 ounce twist up tubes I had perfectly. I ordered these tubes off Amazon in a set of 6 for about $15. They're currently not available for some reason, but you can use any twist up container - even an empty deodorant container that you've used up and cleaned out.

I popped it in the fridge for about 20 minutes to set and it was good to go!

I made a few tubes and one of them had a tad bit extra after filling the larger tube. I used an empty lip balm tube to make a travel sized butt balm. Just do yourself a favor....and label it clearly.

These ingredients have natural healing properties. They are antibiotic, anti-fungal, antiviral, antioxidant, antibacterial, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory...all that good stuff!

This recipe can (and should) be tweaked to reach the consistency you want. If you're putting it in a jar, you may want it to be a bit more like a cream, but in a stick it should be a little more firm. Adding or subtracting different ingredients will change the consistency. Beeswax will firm things up because it has a higher melting point, but coconut oil and shea butter melt at room temperature and will create more of a creamy texture.


Want to win a stick of Ginny's butt balm? Fill out the Rafflecopter below to be entered! One lucky CDing Mom will win a stick of butt balm!

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Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links through Amazon.com. I may receive funds through purchases via these links, but it doesn't change the purchase for the customer. 

Wordless....Thursday?

Hey, I missed my chance to post cute baby pictures yesterday!

Being a baby is hard work...

WW: It's Getting Chilly!

I Hate This Part

With a newborn, you can pretty much be assured that when they cry they need something - diaper change, to be fed, rocked to sleep, etc. Now, it's not to say that older infants don't need to be held, but there comes a point where they......figure out the game.

It's bed time. I go through the whole routine, put her down, turn out the lights, and pray for silence. Nope, nope, nope - crying. She's changed, fed, and should otherwise be happy, but nope.

The internal debate begins.

What do I do? Do I give her a few minutes to figure her life out? Do I run in there? What if she's hurt? What if she's scared? What if she managed to squirm out of her sleeper and wrap it around her face in the 30 seconds since I left the room?!?!

Then I walk in there, she's all, "Oh hey, fancy meeting you here. Wanna play?"

Tricked again.

Ginny is at the crossroads of attachment anxiety and teething, with a dash of "even I don't know why I'm crying!" It's a barrel of fun. Don't get me wrong - when my baby cries, I go to her. I would love, however, for her to learn to put herself back to sleep a little better. We've started reading up on sleep training, but can't seem to take the plunge on anything because her teeth are coming in so rapid fire and she's almost always in pain. She cut her first tooth about 6 weeks ago and has since cut a total of 5 - including both big top teeth. Ouch.

Last night, J was up rocking her for longer than he actually slept. The night before last, I was up with her for a while, then finally just nursed her in bed - leading to me getting punched in the face every 30 seconds while she ate. It's been a little rough around here.

For now, it is just easier to rock her back to sleep or nurse her to sleep than to help her learn to sleep better - especially when we don't know whether the crying is from teething or just being stubborn. It'll come - it has to, but in the meantime....::yawn::

Jake & Tinkerbell Costumes

The Halloween costumes are finally in the works! No better way to celebrate Halloween season in Disney World than by dressing up....all week long! With our trip rapidly approaching, I have finally gotten the motivation to start working on our costumes. The first ones to get one were Jake and Tinkerbell!

For Charlie's Jake costume, I bought 1/2 yard of navy blue suiting fabric and yellow double fold bias tape for the vest, then used a white under shirt and blue pants for the rest of the outfit. I had red fabric and yellow felt from another project for the bandana and vest buttons.

I used this tutorial to help me figure out the vest, which after a little trial and error, wasn't too tough. The yellow bias tape finished off all the outer edges and then I took a lighter and (carefully!!) burned the edges of the arm holes. Suiting fabric is synthetic, so the edge melts to a nice, no sew finish.

I wish I had a picture of Charlie in his costume, but he didn't nap today and threw a royal hissy fit when I tried to put it on him. You get the idea.

All together, with coupons, it came to about $4. Not too shabby for a costume that is $20-$25 in the store!

Ginny's Tinkerbell costume was a little bit more complicated, but it was worth it. I based the look off of this tutorial, but mostly winged it (pardon the fairy humor). For this costume, I purchased 1/4" yard bright green sparkly costume satin, 1/4" yard olive green sparkly costume satin, 1 1/2 yards of green tulle, and 1 1/2 yards of white tulle. I love how tiny costumes need such little fabric!

I'm still not sure about the straps. She's going to wear this over a white onesie (long sleeve or short sleeve, depending on the weather), so I don't know if she needs straps. We'll see. Its fairly plain on the front, but I was afraid that if I added too much, she'd try to eat it. She goes after the tulle skirt enough as it is!

This costume cost about $8 to make thanks to coupons and sales. Can't beat it! And here is my tiny Tink trying on her costume.

Still to go are Luke and Leia costumes (including bun ear muffs!) for the kids and Disney marathon inspired princess dresses for me. I can't wait!

Four Months

Stats: 13 lbs. 6 oz. and 24 1/2" long

Firsts this month: Laughing, recognizing family members, finding her feet, rolling over

Clothes: Rockin' all of her adorable 6 month size summer dresses.

Sleeping: Like. a. champ. and I am a VERY happy Mommy. I know full well that it could end at any time without notice (hello, teething...), but until then, I'm enjoying it thoroughly.

Eating: Breastfeeding is going amazing and my supply has finally stabilized to where I can sleep through the night without being engorged. So far, pumping at work is going well and I have been able to bring home more than she's drinking while I'm gone. I'm so grateful for this buffer time between me going back to work and her going to daycare. Being able to nurse her during lunch has made the transition so much easier.

New Tricks: She absolutely loves hearing her own voice. She squeals and shrieks, then laughs at herself. What a ham already. She's also grabbing at things with better accuracy and playing with toys dangled in front of her or put in her hands. Her latest thing is arching her back or trying to pull forward to get away from wherever she is - always on the move!

Parenting Reading List

This is kind of a cop out of a blog post, so I apologize. My late night surf the web breast feeding sessions have yielded quite a lot of great articles about parenting; many that sum up parenting perfectly. There's nothing like reading something that validates the crazy, frustrating, joyful, chaos that is parenting and makes you feel normal. If you're looking for some good reads, here you go!

Articles & Videos

Don't Carpe Diem by Glennon Melton

Stress-Less Parenting: Don't Sweat the Small Stuff by Scary Mommy

To the Parents of Small Children by Steve Wiens

How to Talk to Little Girls by Lisa Bloom

Understanding Your Child's Temperament by Elizabeth Pantley

Have American Parents Got it all Backward? by Christine Gross-Loh

Are You Ready to Have Kids? A Test

Dunstan Baby Language by Priscilla Dunstan

20 Things Every Parent Should Hear by Beth Woolsey

Six Words You Should Say Today by Hands Free Mama


Just Plain Funny Stuff

Reasons My Son is Crying

Message with a Bottle

Conversations with My 2 Year Old

Parenting Pinterest Board

26 Reasons Kids are Pretty Much Just Tiny Drunk Adults

3 AM Routine

It's 3am and the monitor lights up. She's awake. G sleeps very well in my book and I can't really complain, especially because C was a hot mess and I know how lucky we are this time around. Regardless, every night around 3am, she wakes up to eat.

Fortunately, when G wakes up she stirs, grunts, and lets out a little groan. It's only if we don't hear her that she starts wailing. This is appreciated by everyone in the house. Since I'm breastfeeding her, I pull night duty. Woo. You know when you are woken up in the middle of a deep sleep and you literally can't open your eyes? And when you do it feels like your eyelids are sandpaper? Yeah...I'm a mess when I'm woken up at this hour. My saving grace is that when you breastfeed, food is always ready! Who knows what would happen if I needed to do math and make a bottle in that state of being.

After picking her up (and forgetting to turn off the Angel Care monitor half the time), I change her diaper, and we settle into the glider for a midnight snack. The hard part? Staying awake. If you didn't know, breastfeeding and the hormones it releases creates a nice calming effect for Mom and baby. This makes staying awake at 3am especially hard.

All I have to say is thank goodness for my iPad. When C was an infant, I had an iPod Touch, which worked the same, but if you're going to be up late nursing a baby I highly recommend some kind of back lit entertainment device. You don't want any other lights on in the room, so reading a book isn't really possible and watching TV can be too stimulating. A Kindle, Nook, iPad, smart phone, however? Perfect.

I read baby related articles, peruse The Bump, play Candy Crush, check various Tumblr sites, read my favorite blogs, surf Pinterest, and the occasional list on Buzz Feed. To help G settle back into sleep, I play the Lullaby Theme station on Pandora as I look at other things. Love that multi-app capability! It can take between 20 and 60 minutes to get G fed and back to bed, depending on how cooperative she is feeling.

So far, I've been successful at staying awake while I feed her - its safer for her and insures that I am awake when she falls asleep so I can get back in my comfy bed ASAP!


What do/did you do to stay awake for night feedings?

Modular Diaper Bag

Two kids means twice the amount of stuff to bring with you when you go out. Let's be honest about diaper bags - the bigger the diaper bag, the more stuff you cram into it. Extra space is taken up by forgotten things, extra things, and "maybe we'll need this one day" things. Yes, over preparation is always the best plan when you have small children, but there comes a point when you're carrying around everything but the kitchen sink and feel like a pack mule.

Recently, I scored a Ju-Ju-Be Be All diaper bag on Baby Steals for about 50% off retail price. This thing is awesome! It has pockets after pockets, a memory foam changing pad and strap pad, zipper areas for your cell phone and wallet, plus the entire thing is stain and water proof and comes in amazing prints and colors. Having it now, I would have paid full price for it if need be!

Though Ju Ju Be makes diaper bags of all sizes, this one isn't tremendous and that's okay. Again, the bigger the bag, the more crap ends up inside. I took stock of all the things I'd need to tote around and thought I'd made a mistake. Diapers, wipes, clothes, snacks, toys, first aid, burp clothes...the list goes on. The problem was that I didn't need everything for every time I left the house.

Grab a snack for the park, remember a bib for the restaurant this time, and don't forget something to keep him entertained at the doctor's office! Ever do that? You're trying your hardest to get out the door and keep realizing you need things for where you're going? Yeah, every time I leave the house. I don't want to carry EVERYTHING, so I'm left gathering up individual pieces. Not anymore! I saw something on Pinterest that showed diaper bag things divided up into clear make up bags. The intention of the post was  to organize a full diaper bag, but I took it further - a modular diaper bag. I divided up our supplies by trips and activities so I could easily grab what I needed and leave what I wouldn't.

Yes, surprises happen, but for the most part if you have a diaper, some wipes, and a first aid kit, you will survive. Otherwise, you can generally account for what you will be doing when you leave the house. Heading to a restaurant? Then I should bring the toddler feeding pouch and activity pouch. Going somewhere with just G and not C? Why not leave C's extra clothes and diapers at home then? Going to the doctor's office and then running some errands? Might want to bring some activities and snacks. Customizing what you'll need is as easy as putting the right pouches and a few diapers in the diaper bag.

I got these pouches at the dollar store and WalMart, so each only cost a dollar. The larger ones are pencil cases and the smaller ones are make up bags. You can use any kind of pouches/bags or even make your own. The pouches I made up are:

Toddler Feeding - food scissors, bib, toddler size utensils
Baby Feeding - burp cloth, bib, nursing pads, lanolin (sample size packs)
Activities - flash cards, cars, crayons, a small book, paper scraps, a tiny bottle of bubbles
Extra Cloth Diapering - cover, Snappi
First Aid - Bandaids, Tylenol, tweezers, thermometer strips, Neosporin, Pedialyte to Go
Extra Clothes - one outfit for C, one outfit for G
Snacks

These pouches won't stay the same forever. Outfits change with seasons, feeding supplies and activities, change with age, I won't always need nursing stuff, etc. I can change out what is in the pouches very easily though, adding or subtracting as we go. There are some things that I always keep in the diaper bag (first aid kit, hand sanitizer, sunblock in the summer, wipes, and wet bag), but everything else can be changed out as needed.

To make things extra easy, I keep all of the pouches right near the front door where we also keep the stroller and diaper bag. A quick change of pouches, a few diapers, and we're ready to go.

As long as I restock the pouches in between trips this system will get us out the door in record time. At least that's the plan. ;-)

Temporary Stay at Home Mom

There is a lot of hullabaloo about whether being a stay at home Mom or being a working Mom is best. Truth be told, I think both have their ups and downs, but the most important thing is to choose the one that works best for you. Granted, not everyone has a choice, but if you do, choosing one over the other because of public opinion and not based on your own thoughts is a recipe for misery.

In our family, I don't have a choice. If J or I needed to stay home, it would need to be J because I carry our benefits and most of our income. Honestly? That's okay with me. I love my family more than life its self, but I also love working and providing for them.

That being said, it has been nice being a temporary stay at home Mom. Though the last six weeks have been a vacation in "newborn land" and comprised of a lot of couch time, the last six weeks of my maternity leave are going to be slightly different. Starting tomorrow, we're pulling C from daycare and I'll have both kids home with me. Why? Being off for this 12 week stretch is a unique opportunity. We won't even entertain the idea of a third kid until C is in kindergarten and even then, when I'm on maternity leave for that kid, C will be at school and not home with me. This really is my only opportunity to stay home with him, even if for just a few weeks. Plus, it'll save us something like $800 in daycare costs, which is a sweet bonus.

And yes, I'm kind of terrified.

I know people do it all the time with varying numbers of kids of varying ages, but I'm still concerned/curious as to how this will go. My biggest concern is that I won't have enough time to entertain him. G is a good napper, but she's also a good eater, leaving me stuck to the couch for a lot of the day. C is a very easy going kid, but he'll also chill and watch TV all. day. long. if I let him. Not exactly the quality time I was striving for. Now, I'm not concerned with having over the top developmental activities or what not everyday, but I want to make sure we play, go outside, and do fun things. Will there be fun days where we get a ton of cool stuff done? Hopefully. Will there be days where we sit in our PJs all day long, munch on dry cereal, and do absolutely nothing? Probably. And that's okay too. Maybe we'll temporarily get involved in a play group? Maybe we'll just entertain ourselves. Who knows.

Also, because I'm certifiably insane, we're going to be starting..........potty training. ::gulp:: Since I'm off until the middle of June and J is off from June until August, it's really a perfect time to do it. I really hope to have C completely potty trained by the time he goes back to school full time in August. I think its an attainable goal, but more experienced parents out there may be laughing at me. Sometime this week, we'll be heading to Target for some underpants and M&Ms because well, no good potty training goes without bribery.

So here's goes nothing. My best attempt at being the stay at home Mom of a toddler and a newborn. I feel like I need a helmet and lots of coffee for this endeavor, but we'll see.

Weight Check #3

At birth, G weighed 7lbs 6oz. When she left the hospital, she was 6lbs 12oz. Totally normal to lose a bit of weight at first - no big deal. At her first weight check 8 days later, however, she had only gained back 3oz. Typically, its ideal for newborns to gain back an ounce a day after leaving the hospital.

Charlie at 7 months and 13lbs.

I didn't get it. She had been latching and nursing like a natural since birth - why wasn't she gaining weight? Another weight check was scheduled for the following Monday. In three days, she gained another 3oz. Finally, on the right track! Today, was a final weight check before moving onto the normal check up schedule and she gained another 5 ounces for a total weight of 7lbs. 7oz. Above birth weight!

Despite her gaining semi-steadily, I'm nervous. C was such a slow grower and yes, it could be attributed to his prematurity, but I can't help but worry the same will happen with G. His slow growth led to low muscle tone and delayed physical development landing him in physical therapy for a year. He didn't make an appearance on the growth chart until 11 months old when he jumped from >5% to 10%.

The thing that makes me laugh now is that when people ask how old he is they are shocked that he is only 2 1/2. "Oooh, big boy!" is the common response. How things change.

If G does follow in her brother's scrawny footsteps, there really isn't anything we can do about it. Some kids are just petite and who knows, she could hit her first growth spurt and blow the curve. Only time will tell. All I know thus far is that she's eating well, she's happy, and gaining. Keep it up, G!