Thanks for your patience.

Well our little bun in the oven was diagnosed with a Congenital Heart Defect when I was 20 weeks. He has HLHS (Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome). This means he was born with half a heart. He needs 3 open heart surgeries to survive. The first was 4 days after birth. The second was at 6 months of age. So he is now nearly 8 months old and has successfully made it through the first 2 surgeries with few complications. 

We made this short video of his life for CHD awareness week shortly before his second surgery. CHD Awareness Week- Lucas- HLHS 

You are welcome to follow our other blog: Consider it Pure Joy to get updates of how he is doing and what I am up to on the mommy front.

I am excited to finally have things a little more settled in my life. I hope to soon post a few blogs of the DIY projects that we used to make Lucas' amazing nursery. 
 
Including the finished Owl Mobile of course!

Owls

We are starting to work on the nursery for our new addition. Since, I can't paint or sand his "new to us" dresser, etc. I have to keep myself occupied in other ways. So I decided to make a mobile. My mom started making me a quilt a long time ago. She picked out every piece of fabric to represent my favorite things about this world. Everything from the ocean, dragon flies, fish, to polka dots representing sand and other fabrics representing the woods, lakes and streams I love so much. She pulled it out again just around the time I found out I was pregnant. I convinced her to finish it for the baby. I loved the gender neutral colors of greens, blues, teals, purples, yellows, and browns. The colors are so brilliant and graphic that they will be perfect for the little one on the way. So that was the original inspiration for the room. Then I found these.

These amazing little owl prints were so perfect. They are unique, spunky, and gender neutral.

So this inspired me to make my owl mobile.

First I gathered some inspirations. These little guys were a great start, but I felt like they looked a little too much like penguins. So I made my own little pattern:

I grabbed some thinner fleece fabric, some felts, and some chenille for his back and wings.

Here are 3 more of his friends who are in the works.

When I finish them up I'll be sure to make the pattern available.

First time Watercolor project

For my second project at Place of Promise I chose to do a watercolor tutorial. This simple technique takes the "drawing" out of painting making it a much less daunting experience for a first time artist. The girls had trouble letting go as they maticulously taped off all the corners, but in the end they created an image they were truly proud of by just using simple clip art photos, artist tape, watercolor paper, and paints.

I was so impressed with their work. They all did a fantastic job.

Incredibly Easy "Screen Printing"

I have been teaching Art classes once a month at Place of Promise. The Place of Promise is a Christian non-profit organization that has a residential program designed to help those who are hurting, lost, and broken to choose and find Life. In many ways I believe working with these women has been more of a blessing to me than it has been to them. So far we have done 2 classes together that they have found challenging, relaxing, and rewarding.

The first week we used this tutorial.

I was able to work along side the girls. They really couldn't picture what I was doing in my little corner of the table so when I finally pulled off the freezer paper. They absolutely loved my creation for our son who is due in October.

I highly recommend giving this fun little project a whirl. I plan to make a few more robot onesies for our little Lucas due in October.

I'm back in Action!

Thanks to Ikea and my talented husband I have an amazing new work space! 

You can see where we started from here.

For the first week. That comfy chair got the most work out. We found that the afternoon light floods into these windows, which quickly became a prime napping local for myself and our two cats.

I still have to hang my inspirations and magnetic boards up and sew the curtains, but that will come in time. Right now I'm doing the most important thing... sewing. I have 6 purses in progress. 5 will be for sale on Etsy and 1 will be given as a free give-a-way! I showed a sneak peak of the fabrics here.

And you can see the look of the bags on this post.

My Etsy account is also getting an overhaul. I'm switching everything to www.makeitsing.etsy.com which will hopefully be more convenient and once everything is up I'll be having a sale. So keep posted.

I love my new work desk and the sewing table is absolutely perfect. I've been photographing birds all winter and spring and have some great reference photos accumulated for some new watercolors. The now blooming flowers are always inspirations, as well! So I can't wait to paint at my new desk, but one thing at a time.

 

 I have great storage and we painted the doors with chalk board paint which has already been great fun for my husband and I, currently they are covered with little ridiculous drawings and inside jokes. Hope you enjoy this peak into my new world!

Where have I been!

I never expected to be gone so long and truly have no excuse. We found out we were pregnant with our first child in January. The shock and excitement of this was indescribable. I then was forced to do something I have never done before: Keep a Secret! The easiest thing to do it was to lay low. I also was battling  a huge drop in energy as well as lack of a studio. So not much got done artistically other than the fun little announcement shown above. So, I am now 14 weeks. We are due October 6th. Also the studio was completed yesterday. I love it so much. I hope to have it all set up and ready to go ASAP. I can't wait to begin sewing and painting again. 

Thanks for your patience with me on my hiatus.

I get to hear the baby's heart beat on Thursday and next month we get to find out the sex!

Here is our little Bun at 11 weeks you can really see her/his little leg!

It's Thursday- Let's make Owl Cupcakes!

Dairy Free Fun Owl Cupcakes

I've been day dreaming about cupcakes for 2 days. So when I saw these little guys I thought it would make the perfect activity for a Thursday night with my husband.
I made Wacky Chocolate Cake cupcakes. This is an old family recipe that I was thrilled to find doesn't have any dairy products in it, as sadly my body does not like anything remotely dairy.

If you haven't tried this recipe before it will become your biggest life savor. If you forgot the eggs and ran out of milk. You can still make the cupcakes for Johnny's preschool class without leaving the house.

Then you will need Oreos which are also DAIRY FREE! We used Double Stuff.

Then you can really use anything for the nose and eyes. We used Skittles and stuck them on with extra frosting.

If you do have dairy allergies in the family Pillsbury frosting will become your new best friend. That's right. No dairy products in their chocolate frosting. mmm..

The eye brows are frosted pieces of the oreo cookie tops.

Bill made some Sleepless Night Owls.

We couldn't bare to eat any of them. So I think we'll both take some to work tomorrow.