Baby Sprinkle

Once upon a time I got engaged, realized I had no idea how to plan a wedding, and descended upon The Knot.

For those of you who have never heard of it, The Knot is like the end all, be all websites for brides-to-be. It has pretty much everything you could ever want to help you plan for your big day, including message boards for every subject matter possible.  I hung out on the Philadelphia boards and got to know a really great group of girls, and managed to become friendly with them off the boards.  We've since abandoned the message boards, but continue to be friends.  It was especially nice for me because it was right after I moved to Norristown, and a lot of the girls were from the surrounding area.  Even though I had only moved 35 minutes away from my home town with my friends, it was just far enough to make the drive a pain in the ass, so to be able to make friends in the area was an added bonus.  

So yeah.. The Knot was kind of like Match.com for making friends.  I'm not even ashamed to say I met friends through the internet.  I didn't even have to pay them.    

One of these lovely ladies names is Amy, and when she announced she was pregnant with her first child, I was supercrazy excited for her!  When she said her mom was hosting her baby shower in her home town of Pittsburgh I was not supercrazy excited.  

It has been my experience that a lot of the small things you really need are left unfilled on your baby registry- people are more anxious to buy you cute outfits rather then nail clippers.  But you really need those nail clippers! So I decided to plan a 'sprinkle' for Amy after her shower.  Our friend Cara hosted at her house, and we invited the area Knottie friends, and filled in the little extra things she needed-- along with some cute clothes too.

To begin with, I based the decor off the invitations I found on etsy:

 I snagged a butt load of paint chips from Lowe's and cut them into circles.  Using a wooden dowl we had around the house, I glued the circles onto white thread and hung them as a back drop behind the refreshment table. 

the damn green got tangled up!

We kept the food light with cocktail meatballs, spinach dip and baked brie.  There was water and soda to drink as well as a punch bowl of my famous sangria. 

For dessert we did a small platter of brownie bites and angel food cupcakes.  Each item was labeled with coordinating place cards

The polka dot theme continued onto Wishes for Baby cards for each guest to fill out.  

..and finally we gave out small favors of pink and yellow jelly beans with matching tags.

As the guest of honor and others arrived, we mingled and munch on refreshments..

I have to say, my plan slightly back fired as her registry was cleaned.  OUT.  by the time I hosted my shower.  But we still managed to sprinkle her with gifts!

One thing about this group of girls is we are crafty--  there are bound to be some great homemade gifts.  One of the girls- whom we lovely call by her initials, JJK- quilted the most beautiful baby blanket.  

Another mom-of-three, Tiana, put together the cutest gift of diaper changes in a bag;  she made a bunch of little bags, and in each one she put in a small disposable changing pad, a diaper, a wet one, and a plastic bag to dispose of the dirty diaper.  That ish is Pinterest worthy right there.  

Of course you are going to have a couple adorable outfits too.  Like a pink Puma track suit.  

If nothing else, it was great to spend a Sunday afternoon with these lovely ladies

...aaaand on December 8, 2012 McKayla Lynn was born at 11:41 pm weighing 7lbs 8 oz!

Congrats to Amy and her husband Tim!  Your little girl is so beautiful and we are so happy for you!

Always & Forever,
  ME

Coming out of Hibernation

Instagram: lizzieinprogress

I took the day off work yesterday.  No big plans, nothing had to be done;  I just wanted the day off.  JEGs and I realized with the work we wanted to do on the house and the few weddings we had this summer we weren't going on a vacation, so I've decided to use up my six days of PTO sporadically through out the summer with three day weekends (something I never get with my job).

Anyway, JEGs took off too, dropped Hunter off at daycare at 7 am and snuggled back into bed until 9:30 am.  I had a massage scheduled for 10:15 and afterwards we drove to Coyote Crossing in Conshohoken for lunch.  JEGs had a monster sized burrito (as you can see above) and I ordered the mango and duck quesadillas -- or what I now refer to as "quackadillas".   We came home, sat on the porch, contemplated a few house projects and snuggled and smooched on the couch like we were still dating.  It was a wonderful way to remind myself what I used to be like before the stresses of being a wife/homeowner/mother came.

After a particularly difficult winter (depression/ sickness/ family traumas) I am really looking forward to the spring.  The weather in Philadelphia has been beautiful the past couple of days and I can feel my spirits lifting.  I can feel my creativity coming out of hibernation, and  hope that means a resurgence on the blog.  I miss blogging.  I have a couple small projects that we did over the winter months that I'd like to catch up on, and hopefully JEGs and I can pull together the funds to do some bigger projects (that's right guestroom/man cave/ playroom.  I'm looking at you and your Buzz Blaster Blue walls).

How about you- does your creativity go into hibernation when the weather gets colder?

Always & forever,
  ME