Awesomemest Cupcakes Ever

Lee and I have been talking about doing a cake decorating project and we finally did!   We decided to make a cupcake display that looks like a Pac Man game board.  We used fondant for the tops and decorations.  We filled each cupcake with either peanut butter or chocolate filling and stuck everything together with chocolate frosting.  It took a while but it was SO fun!   What could be better than baking + girl time + surprising your hubby at work with chocolate cupcakes?  Not much, especially since Jake like the surprise ;)

Flirty Apron :)

I finally made an apron!  I've been wanting to make a cute/colorful one for a while.  I turned out pretty good I think and was quite a learning experience!    It is 2-sided which is fun and I only had to undo part of a seam before I realized the ties and ruffle were going to end up on the inside.

March updates Galore

There's been so much fun going on in our lives that I have to share.  Let's see... where to start?  Cooking of course!   Here's a yummy dish I made that started out as 7-layer bean dip and ended up more like a cafe rio salad :)  One of my new favorite meals and SO easy - just layers of goodness.  It wound up being more like 12 layers i think.

Bed Skirt

So here is another part of the bedding set.  It matches fabric from the quilt and I'm proud to say it turned out pretty good.  I did my very first ruffle - gather stitch and it was fun.  The picture looks a bit odd because it's just sitting across a bench with the wrapped mattress on top but you get the idea.  And yes I used black instead of the traditional white because I had a big piece of black cloth I wasn't using for anything.

27 weeks - getting huge in every direction.

Yes, I'm wearing the same shirt as the last picture on purpose.  Jake had this idea to always wear the same outfit and it would be easier to tell the difference from picture to picture.  The only problem is I probably won't be wearing this shirt much longer or else I will stretch it out too much.  It's pretty exciting though!

CHAYLA

Finally done!    I bought big letters and paper to modge podge for Chayla's name since we don't want to paint or put up wallpaper etc.  But I wanted something cute and colorful on the wall.  So this is what I made.  Each letter was an adventure.  Even Jake likes it - which means it turned out very good

 

 

 

 

Over due ultrasound pix

          So this ultrasound was taken on Dec 22, 2009.  A few months ago I know!   It was our 2nd anniversary actually and right before Christmas and so fun to see our little baby girl.  She's not so little anymore and I'm starting to feel huge.  She's been kicking a lot more lately which is soooo fun.  The best part about being preggo in my opinion.  So here's some shots from 19.5 weeks.

Baby clothes from my Idaho trip with Lee

One more - unfinished project

I also made a Boppy pillow case today.  I made my own pattern and everything!  It still needs a zipper but I LOVE it!  because I love the fabric mostly.

The belly pictures BEGIN! * 24 weeks *

Some great and one not-so-great experiments

I told Jake I would make him pajamas for Christmas, and now a month later they are done!  They were pretty simple actually and turned out great.  They are a little too big but thank goodness for elastic and comfy pj pants.  This is my very first item of clothing that I have sewn from scratch! 
                   

  Lee and I got fabric to make our own Moby wraps - its a baby carrier.  It's just 5-6 yards of stretchy knit.  She saw an idea to put a square of cotton in the middle for extra support, to help find the middle, and because its cute!   So here is my first moby wrap with the panel sewn on.  

My next project was to try making a collapsible basket.  They look so cute and handy.  I planned on making a bunch - for baby clothes, diapers, mail to look at etc....   But after several hours of frustration I'm giving up the basket business.   The corners are just too hard.   It looks cute from pictures but it has a LOT of character :)
Attaching the bottom was the hardest part and it just went downhill from there.   Maybe Lee can figure out a better way to do this, because they are pretty cool.

My latest sewing projects

a reversible nursing cover.  It took me about 3 1/2 hours but it turned out very nice!

Chayla's baby quilt.  It's not finished yet but I added the outside maroon border to a panel and started quilting!  It's going to be beautiful.

Back of the quilt.

Chayla Fairy Palace

Chayla Fairy Palace

November 23 - Hello Chayla!

D-day

Today could be the day.  The day that we find out what our baby's gender is!!!   We're so excited! 

Just had to say it...

Okay so there's only 2 more days of school until Thanksgiving break!   Not that I'm counting down or excited or anything....  Okay so Mashed potato day (forget the turkey) is going to be fun with family down in Hurricane!  And that means December is around the corner. Wow.  We already have some decorations up for Christmas.  And we got the piano on Monday.  We spent about 3 hours last night and Monday night playing duets. I love it!

It's November already!

Ok. Shame on me, I haven't updated in quite a while. We've been having lots of fun adventures lately. Of course, back in October there was Halloween. Our ward party went great. I helped serve soup and refill water pitchers. There were about 300 people which was twice as many as expected but it was great. Jake stayed home b/c he just had some dental work done and was feeling icky. Thankfully, we are done with the dentist for a while (knock on wood).

I am officially in the 2nd trimester now at 14 weeks today!!! I am definitely feeling better and have more energy. I even exercised yesterday! For the past 4-5 weeks the nausea has been letting up but I've also been taking Zofran which has saved me the ordeal of being sick at school.

We've had family around quite a bit which has been fun. My brothers, Roman and Remington came up for a swim meet and stayed with us then my mom came up the next day with a friend and stayed with us. It was lots of fun. And last night we had Jake's dad and sister over for dinner.

Which reminds me, we've been trying some fun new recipes. I made parmesan chicken a couple of weeks ago and it was delicious. I even made my own bread crumbs for the batter. Yesterday we tried a Jam-filled almond muffin recipe (I Highly reccommend it) and and Slow-cooker Salsa Chicken (also very good). The muffins are delicious. We made them from scratch - some with strawberry jam and some with blackberry. You put the jam in the middle then sprinkle almonds and sugar on top :)
The chicken was way easy. Put chicken in the crockpot with taco seasoning, cream of chicken soup and salsa and cook. Then serve over rice or baked potato with sour cream. Or eat in a burrito.

So life is good. It's getting cold - snowed all weekend but that means Christmas is close! Speaking of Christmas, we are getting a piano today. Jake's mom is giving us her piano since they don't play it. We are very excited and grateful. It's going to be nice to have piano music in our house :)

3 days Down, 31 weeks to go!

Good news! I discovered haw to not feel sick. I just take my pre-natals with dinner instead of breakfast and eat pretzels before even getting out of bed. No wonder pregnant women gain weight, I feel like I eat all the time - and craving salty things mostly, like pickles and chips. But I haven't thrown up for 3 1/2 days now and I'm LOVING it!

I went to a math conference today and I have to say that I miss teaching math. It was one of my toughest subjects last year but I loved it. I've been looking into some different masters programs and BYU has one opening up this fall. It's called STEM - Science Technology Engineering Mathematics. It sounds amazing! We'll have to see how things go. The baby would only be about 3 months old but classes are one night a week so not too bad.

Trick or Treat?

TWINS!!!!


Just Kidding. You've been tricked!

Peanut Hutchings

Haha, sorry, I just had too. So we went to the doctor today for our first 8 week appointment and all went well. I had the fun girly checkups and we talked about diet, exercise, prenatal vitamins and all of that good stuff. One thing I learned is that your body can only absorb 500mg of calcium at one time. Interesting. At the end of the appointment I mentioned that I had noticed a little bit of spotting (blood) so the doctor decided it would be a good idea to have an ultrasound and make sure all was well with baby.

We had our appointment about an hour ago and it was AMAZING! To say the least. We got to see the tiny 1.43 cm blob against a black section ( my too full bladder). Right away we could see a little twinkle that is the heart. It twinkles b/c it is pumping blood at 150+ beats per minute. We even got to hear it! Oh, it was so special. I can't believe that is inside of me - and going to get much bigger soon. We learned that the baby gets its nutrients right now from the yolk sac (the lunch box). Then he checked to see if my ovaries are healthy -they are and we were done. I hope none of this grossed you out but it was so amazing to me. Our bodies are incredible. Men are totally missing out on the ultra-sound experience.

So, in truth, there is only one baby. I think that's all I could handle anyways!

Love, Jake and Char