Baby Shower! :-)

Ben and Nathanael leaving before all the ladies arrive. Haha

Some shots of the adorable decorations. :-)

My dear friend, Melissa's, profile. I hope she doesn't mind too much that I included this pic, but I wanted to have one of her, since she put so much hard work into making the shower lovely. :-)

Jesse, who also helped make the shower a success. :-)

Julia Korda, me and Tanya ( Julia's sister in law)

Jesse's cheesecake was SO good!

All the lovely guests, except Melissa, who was taking the photo.

Opening the thoughtful presents. :-)

My friends, Melissa and Jesse, gave me a beautiful baby shower last Saturday morning. It was held at a local cafe/gift shop. Melissa did a wonderful job on the decorating and invitations, and Jesse's cheesecake was simply divine. :-) We also played 3 cute shower games, which everyone enjoyed. Lots of laughs. Haha And, of course, opening the gifts was very fun. :-)

I am so thankful for all the time and work that went into making the shower such a special time.

Decorating the hallway with my latest "finds".

This table and mirror came from a discount home wares store ( Home Art). It is the perfect size for the wider area at the start of our hallway. And it camouflages the outlet for our ducted vacuum system. :-)

I just found this beautiful lace at a local coffee/cafe and gift shop. I love it because it has an antique look to it, and is so soft and drapey.

My friend, Melissa, spotted this pitcher and bowl set in a thrift shop window for only $5! Of course, I went in and bought it. :-) The doily was also a thrift shop find about a year ago.

A close up of the lace detailing.

Peter Rabbit baby quilt- finished!

The Peter Rabbit/ Beatrix Potter quilt I have been working on for our new baby boy is now finished. :-) I hand quilted all the blocks in the main part of the quilt and part of the borders, then machine quilted the corner blocks and the other parts of the borders that needed more quilting. I was planning to hand quilt all of it, but I wanted to save time since I still have the crib bumper pads to make. They will be made of the same fabric as the border on the quilt. :-)
I am now 31 weeks or 7 months along in this pregnancy. So, not that much time left! Especially considering that it's very likely that the baby will be born at least a couple weeks early. Nathanael was born 3 1/2 weeks before his due date, and he was already over 7 pounds and didn't seem like a "preemie" at all. It's exciting that the time is drawing near for the new baby to be born, but I do have quite a few things I want to get done first. Ben thinks it is taking forever, but I think the time goes by fairly fast. Haha

Christmas Day :-)

Just before Christmas dinner- you can see that the new baby is growing very big inside me. Haha :-)

Nathanael loves his new Benjamin Bunny. I was so pleased to have found this one for him. I couldn't find any on the internet, and this was the last one at The Teddy Bear Shoppe.

He loves Jelly Belly jelly beans- takes after his mother. :-)

Although it was a fairly warm day for Winter, at least it wasn't Summer weather. No snow, though. :-( Oh, well. I guess that would be expecting too much. Haha

We ended up with way too much food for just us. So lots of leftovers, as usual. It is hard to cook Christmas dinner for just 2 adults and a 2 almost 3 year old, I think.

Ben is very busy getting ready for a business trip, so it wasn't quite the Christmas Day I had hoped for, but still nice. I think Nathanael had a lot of fun.

Our Christmas In June :-)

I decided I wanted to have a cozy Christmas this year. The only way to achieve that, I think, is to have Christmas in Winter. So, we are having Christmas Day on June 27th, which is the closest I could get to December 25th, season-wise, in the Southern Hemisphere. (We have to have it on Saturday, since Christmas in June is not a public holiday. Haha)

Our formal living room is decorated with my traditional Christmas tree and decorations. We have a flatscreen TV playing a fireplace DVD in the fireplace mantle/surround. So that gives a very cozy effect. I just love this room all decked out for Christmas. :-)

When I was in Idaho last Christmas, I bought several Christmas candles and melts, so the house smells like pine trees, cinnamon, etc. Too bad I can't add the scents to my blog. :-)

Nathanael loves all the Christmas decor! :-)

In my more "shabby chic style" family room, I have my white tree, which includes some vintage pink balls among other very sweet, pink ornaments.

The pictures of our trees didn't turn out that well, because they don't show the lights. I can't figure out how to turn the flash off, though. :-/

If you read this blog, I would love to hear from you and have you wish us a Merry Christmas, via the "comments box". :-)

Diaper Bag :-)

I just finished the Beatrix Potter diaper bag for the new baby. I think it turned out really cute, although the directions I had were flawed and hard to understand. It was easy compared to the bag I made when I was pregnant with Nathanael, though. So that was good. :-)

Nathanael loves all these Peter Rabbit projects I've been working on- I think he thinks they are for him. He can help by carrying the bag for me when the baby arrives, so he will probably be happy with that. :-) He might want to play with the sling, too, when it's not in use.

The baby quilt is next on my agenda, also Beatrix Potter, of course. Haha I'm sure it will be a couple months at least before I'll be putting the finished quilt pictures on this blog. The quilt doesn't look the easiest, and I plan to hand quilt it. So who knows how long that will take! It will be adorable, though, I'm sure. I love all these cute prints. :-)

Peter Rabbit Baby Sling :-)

I recently sewed a baby sling for our new baby boy out of some cute Beatrix Potter fabric I ordered online. It was really fast and easy. Hopefully it will be better to use than some baby carriers I have tried. I got tired of all the all the fastenings, etc. to get the baby in and out. This sling is all one piece. I think it would have been better with a slightly stretchy fabric, but I really wanted a Peter Rabbit print. :-)

Nathanael had fun modeling the sling using his baby doll. :-) Of course, it is much shorter on me. Haha