Whew...

So now that the gifting (that really started back in July for me) has ended...I can finally post pictures of the secret projects I've been working on all year!!! Aprons and crayon bags!!!

This first apron was for my sister in law Lisa
My mom knew I was planning on making these aprons for Christmas presents way back in June or July so I harrassed her to tell me who out of my family we'd have for Christmas (there are too many of us (9) to do individual presents so forever we've just picked a name and got a gift for that person and now that we're having families, we stick to that system still!!!) and lo and behold...we ended up having my mom for Christmas!!! Surprise!!! So this is hers!

For my other sister in law Whitney

My mother in law Jill

This was the original gift apron to another sister in las Joanna...she married my brother back in July and I had the awesome idea to get the kitchen linens they registered for and make a matching apron...

This is my apron...the first one I made and to tell the truth, I got the fabric and apron pattern book like 5 years ago at a quilt show I went to and have just now gotten around to making them!!!

Here's a little dress I made for a niece for part of her Christmas present

And here's one of the 3 crayon book bags I made also. This one is for the same niece and somehow, I managed not to take pictures of the two bags I made for my nephews on that same side of the family...shame because they were super cute!

This one was for a good friend of mine

And this one was for another sister in law Rebecca who married a different brother of mine also in July! I did the same buy the kitchen linens, make a matching apron thing

So there...those are the secret projects I've been working on! I also finished those letter blocks I mentioned way back in the summer some time also. Not sure how much Lowe likes those though since we haven't had much time to play with them since he got them at Christmas. We were in Idaho at grandma and grandpas and I didn't want to lose any after all that work so they didn't get to come out of their box! So there'll be another post soon about our fun trip to Idaho! Yeah to the holidays and yeah to them being over!!!

PS: I got a new sewing machine for Christmas and CANNOT WAIT!!!! to try it out!!!!!! What to make? What to make?!?!?!?!?!?!?

It's The Most Wonderful Time of The Year!!!

Whew it's been a really really long time!!! But tons of things have happened since I last posted! We moved to Mesa, both have different jobs, Lowe's getting bigger than ever, found out we've got another niece/nephew on the way and it's already 5 days into December!!! Craziness!!!

Tyler got a different job within Wells Fargo up here in Tempe so I quit my job in Tucson (miss all my old co-workers!!!), we rented out our house in Tucson, found a nice 4 bedroom with a big backyard here in Mesa, I got a new job in a Level II NICU and we're now all settled in and life's moving on!

The ward we moved into has been absolutely awesome! We had like 8 or 9 guys from the Elder's Quorum show up to help us move all our stuff into the house so it only took about 45 minutes to do so. Than the Bishop and the Elder's Quorum president both showed up (at different times) later in the day to make sure we had gotten help and moved in alright. Than the next day at church, we had more people come and introduce themselves and welcome us to the area/ward than any other ward. It was pretty different than any other move we've had and it's been great. We also got to speak in this new ward already...it's been 7 years and I think 5 or 6 ward changes for me since I've had to speak last! Guess my luck ran out!

Our amazing friend Beka, (lowephotos.info), did some more amazing pictures for us! Here are a few of my favorite from our family shoot. Lowe is getting so big and is always so active that he didn't sit still for many of the pictures but we still got plenty of awesome pictures!

We took some re-wedding ones later that same day...it's a term I made up but since so many people have gotten married between when Tyler and I did (6 years ago!!!) I decided that I wanted some awesome wedding pictures too. The ones we got were alright but I was getting more and more jealous of everyone elses so I stuffed myself back into my wedding dress...yes, 6 years and 1 baby later it still fit...got Tyler back into a tux and we went and took pictures around the Mesa Temple all over again. Once we get those back, I will definitly be posting a few of those :)

Tyler and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary on the 11th of November. Love you just as much as when we got married little you!

Over the Thanksgiving weekend, my good friend Angela was down from Flagstaff so we had a little GNO...Macaroni Grill and than off to the theaters to see Harry Potter 7, Part 1. It was really really really good. So good in fact, that it made me want to re-read all the books again (for like the 3rd or 4th or 5th time all over again I think...maybe more than that I'm sure!). Funny thing is, that's the latest I've been out in who knows how long! We didn't get home until around midnight...ahh, GNO...must plan more of you!!!

Christmas is my absolute favorite time of the year and I just can't wait to go play in the snow in Idaho this year. We're wondering how Lowe's going to react to it...hopefully he'll have loads of fun! And I am going to be making my ridiculous loads of Christmas goodies starting this week...a few tried and true recipes along with some new and exciting ones! Too bad Wonka Vision isn't real or everyone could have some of the goodies...I guess pictures and a vivid imagination are going to have to do for some! Sorry!!!

Silly Lowe...

Lowe is getting such a little personality! Tonight while I was trying to wind him down by reading to him while he was jumping on his crib mattress (which was out of his crib and on the ground) he suddenly put his little lips together and stuck his face in mine and made a kissing sound!!! He continued to try to kiss me on the lips 3 or 4 more times. I was laughing so hard that of course it made him try even harder. Where he gets these things I'll never know.

I tried for about 45 minutes tonight to get him to sleep on his mattress with it outside of his crib too. He kept pretending to sleep for a minute or two and than would proceed to roll of the mattress and onto me where he then would continue to steam roll me until I moved out of the way. I would either put him back on the mattress and tell him it was still sleepy time or ask him to get back on his bed since it was time to sleep. He'd lay there where I put him or crawl back over to the mattress and stay still for about another minutes before calling out for me. If I responded...he's do something silly like come squash me by laying down on me with all his 26.5 pounds. If I didn't respond, he'd come rolling off his mattress to come and get me!

I kept trying to use one of his stuffed animals as a pillow seeing as how I was laying on the ground next to the mattress and he was on the mattress along with the pillow but Lowe would roll over, snatch whatever animal I was resting on, roll back over and snicker. He thought this was a fun game so I stopped trying to have an animal pillow. Finally I told Lowe it was past his bedtime and that he needed to either lay down and sleep on his bed like a big boy or that he could go back in to his crib. He just smiled at me and pretended to sleep on the mattress. So I asked him if he wanted to sleep in his crib and he said Yes. So I asked him again just to be sure and he said yes again. So we put his mattress back in the crib and he tried to put a few animals in there too (he's a little too short to put things in his crib so he tries). I lay him down in his crib with his blanket and a few of his animals and he's quiet as I leave and hasn't made a peep since. I even went and checked on him and he's sound asleep.

Silly little Lowe! He probably just thinks that it's play time anytime he's not in the crib. So I'm thinking he might be ready to have the crib front changed to the toddler rail...we'll have to see though...probably something we can consider after we move...hmmm.

Where Has The Year Gone?

Whew...I can't believe that it's already October...my bad!!! September was obviously full of work and stuff and not much happened since I didn't blog about anything!!! But here's a cute picture of Lowe playing in some bubbles!

We finally made it to the pumpkin patch out in Willcox, Arizona today. Tyler had the day off and the weather was way nice. Lowe had a good time running around like little boys do. We had several people comment on how he doesn't seem to ever stop moving...and let me tell you...he really doesn't ever stop moving!!! Even when he's sitting down, he'll move his little feet or swing his legs if he can. He really like the pumpkins they had on display and kept trying to pick them up...this one weighed a whole lot more than he did I'm sure.

They had random vats of corn...not sure if it was going to be used for feed or if it was just there to have tons of tiny little hands plunged into it but Low e liked it a lot. We kept having to grab his hand away from his mouth because he kept trying to eat it! He liked playing on the hay bales also. Note his naughty little face...we're sure he's thinking of jumping!

We got to walk over to the pumpkin patch and pick our own pumpkin. Lowe really liked the dirt and kept sitting down in it, completely ignoring the pumpkins, and scooping up the dirt while telling us "Dirt! Dirt!" Once again...such a little boy! But here he is helping daddy get the perfect Lowe sized pumpkin out of the patch.

And here he is hefting the thing! I can't say enough how adorable he is in the picture: belly sticking out and tongue sticking out...definitely working hard to hold that little pumpkin!

Well, nothing much else is going on here in the Goodrich household! I am uber excited for it to be october though because I love the holiday season and the fall...woo hoo to autumn, winter and holidays!!!

Envy My Cooking Giveaway!!!

My awesome friend is having a giveaway on her blog!!! Check it out!

http://envymycooking.blogspot.com/2010/09/pursenickety-giveaway.html

Even if you don't want to enter for a purse...check out her website anyways!!!

August...

Once again I'm such a bad blogger!!! But August was a busy month for us even though neither of us started school!!! Tyler went on a mountain biking adventure with his brother Preston and their dad. It went from Durango, Colorado to Moab, Utah in 7 days. Lots of climbing and descending! But they had fun and no one got too injured...just cuts and scrapes here and there.
The mighty mountain bikers!!!

While they were off doing that, Lowe and I flew to Virginia to visit Preston's wife, Lisa and their 7 week old baby, Evelynn. Lowe absolutely loved Evelynn...he kept asking for the baby and would get sooo excited to be around her. He'd pet her on the head, want to hug and hold her, give her kisses and just wanted to be near her. She on the other hand, didn't think too highly of Lowe...especially after he tried to poke her in the eyes a few times. If she were sleeping, her eyes would shoot open and she'd cringe away from him when he came near! Silly babies!!!

Look at what a happy, careful, loving cousin Lowe is!!! And yes...he's sitting in Tonka's toy bucket holding Evelynn. Lowe also loved Tonka, Lisa and Preston's golden retriever. So much so, that the first morning we were back home in Tucson, Tonka was the first person he asked for when he woke up!

So that's what's been going on here in the Goodrich household! We'll have to see what exciting things September has to bring.

Why I Can't Leave The Two Of Them Alone...

Here's a text that I got from Tyler today while I was at work:

"Sneaky Lowe just took off his own diaper and then started holding it up and saying garbage and ran to put it in the trash."

Already August!!!

This week in the Goodrich household has once again been the same old same old stuff. Tyler and I are still bringing home the bacon. I got a terrible migraine on friday afternoon that put me out of service for about 24 hours...ugh to headaches that won't go away!!! But other than that, things are going great.

I've been crafting, as usual, and have gotten around to making letter blocks for Lowe. This required me to cut out 156 little squares. I ended up having more than enough different kinds of fabric to only cut out two sqaures from each fabric. (Thanks mom for the donation of 5 fabrics). Here's a picture of all the different fabrics in no specific order.

And here's the super scientific way I figured out which 6 squares would go together on each block...I threw them all in a bag and blindly picked out six squares!!! It didn't take me as long as I thought it would to do this step which is good. I'm just glad I'm not as picky as I used to be...had I done this project when I first started sewing, I would have had to pick out each block's configuration by looking at all the fabrics and deciding which ones looked best with each other, etc....and it would have taken forever!!! Good thing I'm not that crazy anymore!!

And here are the A and B blocks that I've gotten sewn together already! They don't have the stuffing in them yet seeing as how I don't have any! Joanns trip planned for tomorrow...I got the C block done today also. They don't take more than about 10-15 minutes to sew together, I just get slightly bored doing the same thing over and over and over again so I take breaks and work on other things or go read inbetween making blocks. But it's ok because I'm planning on making these a Christmas present for Lowe.

Speaking of Christmas presents...I really wish I could post some pictures of the other awesome items I've been completing but that would ruin some surprises for Christmas...so those'll have to all be posted about shortly after Christmas! So practice some patience!!!

Lowe absolutely loves pasta. I made a pasta bake for dinner today and here he is enjoying it. Please notice how he's dyed his hair with the sauce!!!

And this is something Tyler can't get over...how much Lowe loves books. If you let him, Lowe'll just bring you book after book after book, sit in your lap each time, put his little hands in his lap and wait for you to read to him. He knows a ton of words too so he'll point at a lot of the pictures and say what he's looking at. It's super cute. He'll go searching through his bookshelves too until he finds his favorite books as well. At least he got something else from me along with the blonde hair: He loves to read!!!

Update on Tyler's sunburn: He went to a minute clinic and got some burn cream for it from the Nurse Practitioner. Thank goodness too because it was peeling really bad and all raw under the blisters that had popped!!! Second degree burns in places with the possibility of scaring! Whew! Maybe next time he'll listen to the counsil of his loving wife and Put On Some Sunscreen!!!!! Having had a burn that was worse than a second degree but not quite a third degree burn on my leg, I know what kind of pain he's been having so I'm glad he got some relief in that cream!

PS: Happy Birthday Grandma Jill!!! We love you, miss you all the time and can't wait to see you in November!!!

This Last Week

We didn't get any new pictures this week!!! I'm an awful mom for not taking any pictures of my baby this week...I'll do better this week.



So it was the same old same old for us this week, Tyler and I had work, I took Lowe to swim lessons on my day off. Yesterday, Tyler and I went Salt River Tubing my my brother Nathan and his friend Kapri. It was all overcast and breezy to start the day out, Nathan and I were actually shivering!!! But then the sun came and out we all felt it...bad!!! We all got sunburned pretty badly...ouch!!! We all had sunscreen on too, even re-applied it about halfway through our float. Oh well I guess. Here's a picture of Tyler's sunburn...ouch!!!





I'm in the process of cutting out 156 3 inch by 3 inch squares to make letter cubes for Lowe. So each cube will have one letter of the alphabet on it (thank you iron on letters!!!). I figure yeah, it's a lot of work, but at least when he throws these around, it won't hurt like getting hit by those evil little wooden letter blocks!!! So I picked out 78 (yes, I have more than this number) different fabrics from my stash and have cut out 30 different patterns so far. I figure this way, with only 2 of each fabric, there's no way any block with be close to being the same!!! I'll post some pictures once I get going a little further on the project.

We also went to one of Tyler's friend's wedding last night at a place called the Z Mansion here in Tucson. It was really nice even though it was outside. The place is really old and the family still actually lives there. Weird but cool. I would have to have a house with the architecture of that place...all old school and awesome! Some day when Tyler and I are really well off Dave can help us build my dream house ;) Yeah Dave!!!

So, can't really think of anything else that's been going on. TTFN.

Water Baby

Lowe really likes water, he'll run into the kitchen or bathroom if he hears the sink. Tyler and Lowe went to Target yesterday and got Lowe a little inflateable pool. Lowe likes to help fill up the pool and help water the tree (and himself!)
Here are some super cute pictures from their fun afternoon yesterday.

Nothing too exciting had happened around here. Tyler and I did watch the movie The Bounty Hunter last night after Lowe went to bed and it was actually pretty funny. Hopefully Tyler and I can start trading babysitting with friends so we can start to have a monthly (at least) date night where we actually are sans baby! We'll see...

Lately...

Here are some pictures of a few things I've been sewing lately. The bag and it's accessories are from this make a bag sew along I found. It's been really fun and all the instructions are on kellyrachel.com/blog if you're interested!!! The pink and brown sleep mask and make up roll are prizes that I made for this wellness challenge I'm participating in...sorry Sara that I've spoiled the surprise a few days ahead of time for those participating!!!


And here's just a super cute picture of Lowe from Abram's wedding reception. It's so hard to get any pictures of this boy because he never stops moving...ever! And whenever I get the camera out, he stops doing whatever cute thing he was doing because he wants to mess with the camera! Silly baby!

A Tale of Two Weddings

Whew!!! The last week or so has been really really busy for us Goodrichs! And I can't even say in our house since most of the business occured outside out house!

First off, my older brother Ben got married on July 3rd in St Paul Minnesota. My parents and two of my other older brothers and I were all able to fly out there to attend. It was a beautiful ceremony and I'm so excited to get to know Joanna better. Yeah to another sister!

So, a quick story about getting to Ben's wedding...Dave and I were driving up to Phoenix from Tucson on Thursday night in my little Mazda 3. We're going about 75 mph just south of Picacho Peak when this hugemongous semi truck tire flips up in the middle of the road right infront of us. The big pickup in front of us doesn't show any sign that this thing was in the road and with cars on either side of us and one riding my bumper, we can't avoid hitting the thing. So then my car's making all sorts of noise, Dave and I thought we had a flat tire. So we pulled off the side of the I-10, got out, assessed the damage (dented front passenger side bumper and plastic covering on the undercarriage of the car ripped off and hanging almost to the ground). Ok, not that bad we think until we get back in the car and IT WON'T START!!!! So...an hour and a half later after talking to my insurance and waiting for the tow truck guy, my little car gets towed back to Tucson and Nathan (another older brother) rescues me and Dave. Mind you, this whole time Dave and I are sitting in the car whose lights are slowly fading due to some unknown reason and whose gages keep twitching like the car is seizing!!!) Turns out the suspension is shot, the ac compressor is ruined and the battery was jolted so that it refused to hold a charge!!! Poor little car...needless to say, we're still waiting for it to be fixed!!!

But anyways, onto the other wedding! My younger brother Abram got married on the 8th of July to longtime sweetheart Rebecca. They met before his mission, knew they were going to get married before he left, she waited, he served faithfully, he got home, they're now married!!! And no, you don't need to adjust your computer screen...she really is just that much shorter than he is (even with the 3/5-4 inch wedges I found for her that she's wearing!!!)


I couldn't help but put this picture up on the internet...my dorky brothers from left to right: Mike, Ben, and Dave.

Lowe is getting so big and wants to help out with everthing we do. A while back, I was actually doing well of keeping some flowers alive in the planters outside of my front door...than we went on vacation in May and they died. I've been way too busy with other things to fix this. Lowe must have remembered seeing me water them months ago though because the other day, we got out the watering can from out closet and went to the front door. Tyler and I let him out and this is what he did:

Silly baby!!!

And thanks to this challenge I'm doing (Thanks Sara!!!) I was actually able to finally finish The Watermelon Quilt. Why do you ask is it capitalized? Well, I've been trying to quilt this thing for over 3 years now...3 YEARS!!! But I finally put my mind to it and wah la!!! Finished quilt!!!

Well...those are about the most exciting things to happen around here in the last few weeks so until next time!!!

And The Winner Is...

Lindsey Joslin!!! I used the random number generator off of random.org and it picked #5. I numbered the comments date wise from who commented first being #1 down to who commented last, etc. So just email me Lindz with what you want on the back of the flowers, if anything, and we'll figure out a way to get them to you.

Keep checking back, I'm thinking of something else I can do for a giveaway soon!

Giveaway!!!

So...I decided (for at least one time), I'll be jumping on the giveaway band wagon.

For this giveaway, there is one handmade black and white pleated pouch with red accent zipper and 6 handmade tattered flower embellishments.

If you want to enter, just leave me a comment below. The lucky winner will get to decide whether they want hair ties, bobby pins, safety pins, nothing or any combination attached to the back of the flowers so they can be used in a variety of ways. Good luck!!! Oh, the giveaway will be open until Sunday night when I will randomly select a winner who I'll post next Monday for contacting purposes.

Flowers

Here's a little flower I made the other night. I got some new polo shirts to wear to work (we order them on the unit so they say NICU on them) and I wanted to have a flower to wear in my hair...I don't have any store bought ones but I found some instructions on how to make these:

I sewed a bobby pin onto the back of this one but you can put whatever you want to on the back, like a safety pin, etc. Super cute and super easy to make!!!

Reason #1

The top reason why I normally don't make things for other people is: I just end up liking everything I make so much that I don't want to give it away.

Selfish, I know...but I can't keep most of what I'm making...guess this is a self induced lesson on being unselfish!

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful husband, Tyler. He is the best hubby and dad anyone could ever ask for. Lowe just adores him and so do I. Happy Father's Day to my dad too. Yeah to awesome fathers!!!

Lowe loves being outside so here are some cute pictures of us playing outside.

Tyler was so nice as to share his oreos with Lowe this afternoon.

This next picture reminded me of one of my favorite parts in one of my favorite musicals: The Music Man...

Once Greecian Urn:

Ahahahahahaha!!! Oh, my sides hurt from laughing so much!!!

Advice needed: From all my blog surfing over the last few weeks, I've noticed that quite a few blog people do giveaways...some of my friend included...I was pondering the idea of doing my own giveaways...not all too often, maybe once a month, maybe once every other month but wasn't sure how many people actually would participate! So...if you read my blog and thing it would be fun, leave me a comment...oh, it would be a giveaway of something interesting I've found lately and made!

Baby Quilt

So this post has been months in waiting...Tyler's brother Preston and his wife Lisa are expecting a little baby girl (due date around July 4th I think...correct me if I'm wrong Lisa). I decided way back when we first found out they were pregnant that I was going to make them a baby quilt. So I raided my mom's supply of quilting magazines looking for the cutest baby quilts. I picked one out for if they had a boy and than found this super adorable one for a girl. So I started hoping that they were going to have a girl!

And turns out...they were going to have a girl. Just to preface the quilt, when it comes to making quilts, I have only once made a quilt with the color suggestions from the pattern...only once. The thing, for me, that takes the longest is figuring out the color scheme on the quilt that I'm making and once I've figured that out, the actual arrangement of the colors is even worse!!! But when I saw this quilt pattern, I knew it was perfect and so the search began: I had to find the exact same fabrics that the designer used in the magazine...internet searches and phone calls later, I found what I needed and once the fabric came, the sewing began.

The quilt was a simple little 9 block, 1 border piece with applique. That first picture is of Lowe helping me arrange the pieces on the floor. Everything was going really smooth until I realized that I didn't have the stich required for securing the applique on my little sewing machine. So I borrowed my mom's second fancy machine (she's got three...the original yellow Singer (I believe) that made tons of things for me and my brothers growing up, the second fancy one I borrowed and than this uber awesome one that sits in her sewing room now on it's own little sewing table throne...not that I'm jealous or anything!!!).

Each of the nine blocks got an adorable little sun dress on it. Here's a close up of my favorite one! I used the floor in our office to place out the quilt as I got it closer and closer to being done.

I machine quilted this quilt...which I normally don't do but it seemed like it would be quicker, easier and prettier in the long run which it was.

Unfortunately, I realized while I was picking pictures for this post that I failed to actually get a picture of the completed quilt!!! That last picture doesn't have the binding on!!! Oh well, I guess Lisa will have to post a picture or send me one so I can post it...but this was the first quilt I did real binding on in the 6 years I've been quilting. I was always scared of it because binding never made sense to me but once my mom explained it for the billionth time and I read and re-read instructions in the quilting magazines, I got over my irrational fear and just did it and the results were impressively amazing!!!

So at last I got to post about one of the secret projects I've been working on so far this year. Yeah to babies!!! Congrats again Preston and Lisa!!! Can't wait to meet her when she comes!!!

PS: this is my 100th post!!! Woo hoo!!!