Friend's Baby Shower

I'm pictured here with my good friend Ashley. She is having a little girl and is due 2 weeks before me. We took this picture at her shower; its hard to see my belly because of the dark shirt I was wearing but sizewise her belly is one toilet paper square bigger than me. They played "guess the number of toilet paper squares it will take to wrap around the belly" game so of course we had to measure mine as well just for curiosity sake.


This is the card I made for her...

and this is the banner I made for her. The full view of her name didn't turn out very well, but there are some closeups that look alot better. I used the colors of her nursery and she loved it. I hope she can find a cute place to hang it.
One last note about my friend Ashley...she developed preeclampsia (sp?) and has been put on bed rest for the remainder of her pregnancy. She has to lie down most of the time only sitting upright or standing for about 5 minutes at a time. She has been journaling her pregnancy on a blog, however hasn't updated in a few weeks. You can follow her story here (Ashley's blog). My prayers are with you Ashley as you complete the last 6 weeks of your pregnancy.

Christmas Decor Element Blocks

Here are few more handmade gifts I made using the decor element blocks. This time I also used some Christmas decor elements in Real Red.

I can't decide which set I like better. My goal for this week is to post a total of 3 times to get some more posts in before the holidays. I hope to post again on Wednesday and Friday so stay tuned :)

1st Baby Shower

Warning - Picture Overload!!! I had such a wonderful shower this past Saturday in San Antonio. I had a great turnout despite the miserable weather the day before and the below freezing temperatures early that morning. I received so many awesome gifts and can't wait to put them away in the nursery (which should be complete in the next few days). They are currently scattered amongst other rooms of the house :)

Here is a little picture story from the day...

The baby book given to me for memories, etc - it matches the nursery perfectly!

With my two awesome hostesses - best friend on the left and sister on the right.

An awesome two layered marble cake - it was delicious!

Closeup up of a little fondant elephant; there was also a zebra and monkey.

The diaper cake my best friend made - its so cute I don't want to take it apart.

An extra they had made to match the invitations - candy wrappers.

My little helper and niece, Emma. She is an absolute angel. She kept everyone entertained while helping me open my gifts. Check out her excitement and the expressions on her face with every gift I opened.

Helping move opened gifts to another area - I think it might outweigh her.

Her favorite gift we opened, a stuffed elephant!

This was the dining room table at my brother's where I consolidated all the gifts so they could all come home with me.

And last but not least, the front and rear view of my SUV - loaded to the max!

I am so blessed with wonderful friends and family and overwhelmed by the amount of stuff needed to take care of a baby! I am very much looking forward to my 2nd shower in a little over 4 weeks ;)

Decor Element Blocks

I decided to give alot of handmade Christmas gifts this year - mainly because we are trying to spend less and save more in preparation for our little one's arrival in approximately 10 weeks.

These blocks can be found in the SU! Holiday Mini and will be available in the Occasions Mini in the spring as well. I love them! They are 3" square and super easy to decorate. I bought several sets of these and completed the first set last night. I chose to use the SU! DSP Sweet Always from a previous catalog as I thought it would be perfect for my 2 year old niece. Each block uses the same 4 designs from the DSP assortment as well as chocolate chip cardstock.
I decorated each letter/block with a different element using ribbon on the first letter, the scallop edge punch on the second...

a flower shaped button on the third and both sizes of the corner punch on the last.

I am very pleased with how they turned out. I sure hope she likes them :) Stay tuned for future posts as I continue to make handmade Christmas gifts for friends and family.