Ornament Stories

Thanksgiving was great this year.  We spent time with both of our families and had a lot of fun.  Once Thanksgiving was over, we started our decorating for Christmas.  I purchased a 4' fake Christmas tree so it doesn't take up much room and there isn't much upkeep (I think we have our hands full with the baby and puppy).  Last year, I got some ornaments from my grandparent's collection and have a couple of my own that I hung up.

When I was younger, my siblings and I would spend an evening at my Grandparent's house helping them decorate their tree.  My grandma would unwrap each ornament and tell us a story of how that ornament came to be in her collection.  She knew exactly who gave her what ornament and we enjoyed hearing all of the stories even if it took us forever to decorate the tree.  After she passed away, we all wished we could remember all of the stories.  That leads me to wanting to document where I got some of mine so I will remember years from now.  Below are a couple of ornaments from my grandparent's collection that I don't remember a story for (or they don't really have one):

This ornament was made by my Godmother.  I think there is more to the story so I'll have to ask her. This was always one of my favorites to hang up so I'm glad I will get to look at it for many years to come.

I believe this bird clip ornament was one of my great grandmother's, but I may be mistaken... I'll have to follow up with one of my aunts on that one too.

My Godmother gave me a couple of these small ornaments last year to help me build my collection.

I bought these ornaments in a pack with glittery ornaments, plain ones, and ornaments that look like disco balls.   I doodled on the plain ornaments to give them a little something special.

I got this dala horse because I'm part Swedish.  I purchased it in Louisville so it also makes me think of our little day trip to go visit Margaret.

I plan on making a couple salt dough ornaments and another one of my DIY Ultrasound Ornaments with Cora's ultrasound since I never made one for our tree.  I will also be crafting some kind of angel or star topper for the tree.

Life With Cora :: 6 Months

How the heck is my sweet Cora already 6 months old?!  This 6 month 'milestone' is something that I was excited to reach (6 month old babies are the perfect age), but couldn't really picture getting there.  This past month, Cora has started having tastes of food (avacado & zuchini so far), become obsessed with paddling around during bathtime, mastered the highchair, and had her first cold.

We have been going out on a lot of adventures enjoying the last of the nice weather.  Cora loves when we go on walks where she can look around the neighborhood and watch the dog walk along beside us.  We've also had multiple zoo adventures in the last month.

As seen in the pictures, Cora has been sitting up with very few toppling instances.  She is also working on her 'crawling'... or what looks more like inch worming.  She still has the old-man-wheezing laugh, and is finding more and more to laugh at every day.

I'm not sure how I got such a smiley & happy baby (even when she was sick).  My heart is full.

DIY No Sew Baby Headband

Needed:
+fabric 
       +rectangle about 3" x 6"
       +a bunch of small triangles with sides about 1/2"-2" (does not have to be precise)
+hot glue gun
+elastic (I purchased mine from this Etsy shop)

1. Pinch triangle so the midpoint of the triangle comes to a point
2. Hot glue the point to the rectangle
3.Cover one third of the rectangle (covered area should be about 3" x 2"
4. Determine the length of elastic needed and hot glue ends together
5. Covering the glued ends, start gluing the non-covered end of the rectangle while wrapping it around the elastic.  You should end with the spiky part on the outside overlapping where you started gluing the rectangle.

This is so easy to do, and looks better when you are a little 'messier' with it.  No need to make perfect cuts.  This takes about 15 minutes overall.

I added these to my Etsy shop if you're interested in purchasing a headband with this fabric.