Maternity Photo Shoot

Over our Christmas break in Florida, my family organized a photo shoot for Jeff and me. Jason Angelini is a very talented photographer in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area. He photographed my sister, Rachel's wedding and did two photo shoots of my nephew Jax. I was excited to document this pregnancy and to have some nice professional pictures done of Jeff and me.

We spent the morning at Fort De Soto Park near St. Petersburg and took photos in three different locations. Fort De Soto is Jeff and my favorite beach in Florida because it is the most natural beach that we can find. It isn't crowded with hotels and tourists and you can just relax in a peaceful environment. These are just a sampling of the photos that Jason put on his blog. We have a DVD of the complete photo shoot and plan on framing some of our favorites soon.

Our first location was at the fort. Of course, we incorporated Jeff's resonator into some of the pictures.




We then headed to a grassy sand dune that was between the fort and the beach.

Just before this picture was taken, I was poked by a sand spur that was stuck to Jeff's back.

We finished off the morning at the beach. I think these might be my favorites from the day.

This is my "I am woman, hear me roar" shot.

We had a great time with our photo shoot and now have these pictures of this amazing time in our lives. I look forward to Jason photographing our little boy the next time we are in Florida!

Baby Blankets

I have a little over a month before our baby is here! I have been organizing the house like crazy and getting rid of tons of stuff. So, I have many craft ideas in my head, but haven't had a lot of time to make any. I have a quilt that I need to finish; it just needs the back put on. So, hopefully I can get that done before the big day! While that is still in progress, I will post some baby blankets that I made in the past. These all were gifts for family and friends.

Here is an "Around-the-World" quilt that I made for Jeff's nephew, Jacob. We didn't know if he was going to be a boy or girl, so I thought yellow and green were very gender neutral colors. I tried to arrange the colors in a way that made sort of an optical illusion. If you squint at it, it looks almost like you are looking down on a pyramid.


There is a really easy shortcut to making this pattern, that I will blog about in the future. So, don't be fooled by all the little squares. I didn't cut those out and sew those individually. :)


This is a quick fleece blanket that I made for a friend. I didn't have the time to commit to an actual quilt, so I thought just a soft cozy blanket was good enough. This blanket only took one evening to make. It was just one piece of mint green fleece with ivory fleece appliqued on top.



Then I used silky ivory blanket edging to finish it off.


This duck taggy blanket was also really quick to make. It took me about 2 hours. There are two layers of duck fleece fabric with loops of yellow polka dot ribbon on the edges. My sister just blogged about some taggies that she has been making here. This taggy is only about the size of a hand towel and is supposed to be more of a toy than a blanket.

Anatomy in Clay

Last May I went to a workshop for Life Science/Biology teachers. I admit that the main reason I went was because it sounded artistic. (In 7th grade, students don't learn a lot of Anatomy, so I wouldn't be able to apply much from the class to my actual teaching.) So, my reasons were totally selfish and I got two days off from work for it. :)

Basically, there is a whole curriculum that is all about constructing an anatomical model of the human body using clay. So, I spent two days learning a bunch of clay construction techniques....as well as refreshing my memory on Anatomy. There was a plastic skeleton that all the muscles, veins, arteries, etc. were affixed to. Maybe if I end up teaching high school Anatomy and Physiology, I'll use what I learned in the class. Until then, it was fun playing with clay and making a cool man-with-no-skin! Here was the final product!


You can see some of his internal organs in this one.


I gave him a hat and some turquoise dreadlocks with my extra arteries, veins and lymphatic system.

Used Book Wall Art for Baby's Room

We are in the midst of converting our second bedroom into a baby room. Most of the major work is being done by Jeff, so I've been focusing more on the decorating side of things. I have been trying to find decor that can grow with our boy. We didn't want anything too babyish, so I am always looking at things through a four-year-old's eyes. After considering several decor themes (music, jungle, etc.), we decided on woodland animals. I liked the idea of decorating with creatures we see in Minnesota.

At a used book store in St. Paul, I found the perfect wall art that matched our theme. I found this classic Little Golden Book for 50 cents.


There are several stories in the book that are all about going to bed. I loved the illustrations of all the sleepy animals! So, I got some pliers and pried open the binding.


I then cut out my two favorite illustrated pages.


I picked out two 8 x 10 frames at Menards for $2 each. Since the pictures were not standard photo size, I went to Michael's and got some custom mats cut. This was the most costly part of the project; about $12 total. Here's the finished product!



I love the way these turned out! I especially love the raccoon in his hammock! The pictures are currently sitting on the dresser waiting to find a home on the wall. I haven't committed to which wall I will hang them, so I'll post an update of their final location once I have decided.

Neighborhood Holiday Cookie Exchange

Our living room ready for our holiday party.

When Jeff and I were looking for neighborhoods to buy a house, we had a vision of what type of community we wanted. We wanted a place where neighbors knew each other, kids were free to play outside, we could walk to stores and cafes, the trees were old, and the houses had some architectural character. Sometimes we thought it was too Norman Rockwell of a dream, but we think we actually found it in Highland Park in Saint Paul.

Our first summer here, our next door neighbors organized a block party. We met a lot of neighbors there and continued to meet more while they walked their dogs past our house while we worked on outside projects. But once the weather got cold, we realized how isolated we all became. So we came up with an idea to get the block together during the winter. And so was born the Neighborhood Holiday Cookie Exchange! Last year's party was so successful that we did it again this year!

Our "cookie" contribution this year. (I was a little short on time, so I couldn't make actual cookies this time around.)

Here's how it works:

• Each guest makes a batch of cookies to bring to the party.
  
• At the party, all of the cookies are put on a table. People can sample them along with other hors d'oeuvres during the party.
• Before guests leave, they fill a platter/plate/tin/ziploc bag with a variety of cookies from the table.
• The idea is that they leave with as many cookies as they came with, just more of a variety.
  
• Then they will have lots of cookies for the holiday season without having to spend tons of time baking.

Hors d'oeuvres for the party guests. There was also a drink table in the kitchen.

I also made candy cane reindeer for the kids that came to the party. They were a hit!

I set up this small craft table to keep kids busy. They made silly glasses.

Both years that we have done this, we ended up with two extra platters of cookies. (I guess that is one of the perks of hosting the party.) We have brought them to work and to family gatherings, so that we don't end up eating all of them ourselves.

The Holiday Cookie Exchange is quickly becoming a tradition in our neighborhood! Many neighbors have thanked us for starting this. It is a great excuse to get out of the house in the cold winter and get to know the people around us. Several families have also offered to host the party in the future. I think next year we will begin to pass the torch and have other people host. I'm glad that we contributed to making our neighborhood more of a community!

Our Backyard Garden

Happy New Year!!

This morning I woke up and it was -19 degrees outside! It was so cold that there was ice on the inside of the windows, the dishes in the cabinet felt like they came out of the refrigerator and our mail slot was covered in frost. With these subzero temperatures I thought I would blog about something from a warmer time of year.

When we moved into our house 2 years ago, the backyard was a blank canvas. The lady who previously lived here had no landscaping and the entire yard was just grass to mow. One of the things we were looking forward to with home-ownership was having a vegetable garden. Jeff had a garden growing up and we had tried planter gardens in our previous apartments with little success. So Jeff got right to work on a real garden when the weather warmed up.

The first step to the project was to remove the iron clothesline from the middle of the yard. After digging for a few feet we found that this was a more difficult task than we had thought. In all of our projects we have noticed that the previous owner was very thorough and tended to overbuild things. Which is great for making things last, but when you want to change something, it becomes quite a chore.


Jeff dug until he finally reached the bottom of the pole. It was encased in three feet of concrete! We tried lifting it out of the hole, we tried hanging on the top of the pole to tilt it out, but together we weighed less than the concrete. Jeff decided to call some people for backup, but everybody was busy.



Finally we managed to shimmy it out using wood boards and ropes. Once the pole was out, we were able to sledgehammer the concrete so we could move it out of the yard. After filling the hole with dirt, Jeff got working on digging the plot for the garden. Gnome wanted to help out.


Jeff used reclaimed wood from a fence to build a border to the garden. He then reused the sod to fill in the garden by laying it grass side down. Then he covered it with newspaper and wet it down to act as a barrier to prevent the grass from growing through. Then a layer of top soil and manure finished it off so it was ready for seeds.


It took just about a month for the garden to become amazingly productive! For the entire summer we were able to eat from it. We supplemented any produce that we needed with vegetables from the farmers' market. It was the best food I've ever had and it was so cheap! I think we spent about $15 on seeds at the beginning of the season.


I can't wait for the ground to thaw so we can start growing some fresh organic vegetables again!

My Long Hiatus

I have been so busy that I haven't been able to update this blog for almost a year!! I am finally starting to organize my photos and getting some blog posts ready. Hopefully I'll get caught up soon so these will start to be more chronological. Thanks for your patience and thanks for reading!