What Is This???!!!

Help! I found this next to my baby, on his blanket to be exact. I don't know if it bit him or not, but I'm having a lot of trouble identifying it. The pictures are about as close as I'm going to get, so I'll add a description. Any help in identifying this thing would be great.




My best description of this thing is that it's body is a gray color with a little dark stripe down the middle of the back, the head looks pretty much black to me (and I'm not about to get closer to find out), and the legs are darker red in the front, and as they go back they get a bit lighter.

Retro Giveaway!

Over at 5 Minutes For Mom! They are giving away a choice of a really great retro gift. Go check it out! Check out the Pedal Cars and Retro Collectibles and the contest link right here!

Giveaway!

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Wow, that went quick! It's already time for the Rocks In My Dryer Bloggy Giveaway!

So here it is, my prize for the giveaway. I have been going purse crazy the last week, and I have a few really cute ones. The trouble of course, is deciding which one to give away.

So with the decision finally made, here is my offering for the giveaway:

As usual, the picture doesn't do it justice. It's a cute little shoulder bag. The fabric on the outside is a green with brown flowers, and the fabric on the inside is a reddish brown that also has some flowers. There is a pocket on the inside, and a cute little wooden button holding the top closed.

Good luck everyone! Don't forget to make it possible for me to contact you when you win!.

Quick Edit! Open to U.S. residents only!

It's Fall, Y'all!

Yes, it's another Giveaway Carnival hosted by Rocks In My Dryer on her Bloggy Giveaway site!

I know exactly what I will be giving away, and it is going to be so much fun! You know all those purses I've been making like it's the last thing I'll ever do? Well, I'm going to give away one of those little beauts! I will look for more fabric options since I have plenty of time. Maybe I'll even do a Fall or Winter theme, since we're into those seasons (or will be). Sound good? Great!

I'll get some more pictures of the rest of the purses I made last night, and the ones I'm going to make in just a little while. I still can't get over how easy these little things are :)

More Purses To Come!

I found some great fabric and buttons today at JoAnn's, and I had a blast matching them up.

I did my best on adjusting the colors of the pictures, but as usual my camera does not do them justice.


First up, is probably the one that will be my favorite. I found a nice tan embroidered linen remnant, and then a black fabric with white/tan flowers. They really look great together. I then found a nice little slivery button with black accents.



Second up is a nice little ticking, also from the remnant section. It is pink, gold, green and cream. I found a bright red floral with little flowers on it that pick up some of the other colors in the ticking, and a cute little fantasy style button of a lady's head.





This one was a little trickier to match. It is a muted rose color, with diamonds and flowers. I didn't notice it at first, but it also has a lot of very light areas that were woven into the fabric. I'm not sure if I like it or not, but we'll see how it turns out. My kids helped me with the inside fabric on this one, and they went for a dark red floral. I also used the little button lady on this one as well.



The last one was another tricky one. I liked the green/brown floral print, but was having trouble finding a good lining. I found a reddish brown floral print that seems to work well with it, along with a nice dark brown wooden button. I think it will look fine once I actually get it together.



I am quite excited to get started. I should be able to finish these all tomorrow. I have to check on my thread supplies, but I think I've got what I need.

Tasty Thursday: Crock-Pot Pizza

Crock-Pot Pizza

1 package (12 ounces) wide egg noodles

1 ½ pounds ground beef or turkey

¼ cup chopped onion

1 jar (28 ounces) spaghetti sauce

1 jar (4 ½ ounces) sliced mushrooms, drained

1 ½ teaspoons Italian seasoning

1 package (3 ½ ounces) sliced pepperoni, halved

3 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

3 cups (12 ounces) shredded cheddar cheese

Cook noodles according to package directions. Meanwhile, in a large skillet, cook beef and onion over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Stir in spaghetti sauce, mushrooms and Italian seasoning. Drain noodles. In a 5 qt. slow cooker coated with non-stick cooking spray, spread a third of the meat sauce. Cover with a third of the noodles and pepperoni. Sprinkle with a third of the cheeses. Repeat layers twice. Cover and cook on low for three to four hours or until heated through and cheese is melted.

Yield: 6 to 8 servings

This is one that my husband really loves. I did find that I only needed about half of the egg noodles called for. It makes a lot, too.

Don't forget to visit the Pumkin Patch for more Tasty Thursday recipes!

A Little Whiskey In Your Formula, Madamoiselle?

While this isn't exactly funny, for either the mom or the baby, I do have to laugh just a tiny bit. The mom put some whiskey in her baby's bottle, in an attempt to help her calm down from a nasty teething episode. Now, as a mom, as tempting as it might be to do almost anything to get a screaming child quiet, I would never have thought of actually putting alcohol into a bottle. As a child, my mom used to put whiskey on my gums to soothe my teething, because I was allergic to the num-gums stuff they had back then. I didn't suffer any ill effects from it, other than perhaps it led to my dislike of all things alcoholic. (I still have never been drunk, and have never been able to handle more than an ounce or two of anything with even the slightest taste of alcohol in it.). Maybe that's not such a bad thing though ;)

As for the mom, I'm not sure that charging her and taking away her baby is the best solution. My guess is that she's probably learned her lesson on this one, and will not ever consider doing anything like this again. While obviously not the brightest idea the woman ever had, hopefully this is doing enough to scare her into thinking a little more thoroughly through her future actions.

Tiny Happy Purses

I found this pattern yesterday, and I knew I had to try it right away. I found a really cute home decor remnant at JoAnn's, which was also on sale for 75% off the original price. It is a really cute cream colored, with a diamond pattern woven in, and little dots of green, pink and purple in the middle of the diamonds. As usual, my camera does not do it justice. I then found a really cute farm print for the inside, complete with barns and chickens. Somehow they just seemed right together. Now I just have to decide whether to sell it, keep it, or give it away! I'm definitely going back for more fabric though.

Just a quick note, I did change the pattern for myself. The remnant I bought wasn't quite wide enough, so I made the straps and the purse body separately. I reinforced the straps with a good couple of passes with a zig zag stitch, which worked nicely. I also made a covered button with fabric from the lining. And while you can't see it (because of course, I forgot to take a picture), there is a pocket on the inside that is made from the outer fabric.

H/T to Thought and Thimble for linking to the pattern in the first place :)

Quilting Projects

I thought I'd share some of my past projects that I've completed, since I haven't been blogging as much lately.

This is the envelope quilt that I made for a great charity last year. The Delafield Walmart here does a quilt drive and contest every year for the Waukesha Memorial Hospital NICU. Last year they took in the most quilts ever, with well over 100 quilts. I don't remember the exact number, but there were tons, and they were all displayed from the fabric department all the way to the children's clothing department. All quilts must be 36"x36", and the judges check for how well made it is, and if everything is just right (however that works, I'm still a bit new to this). While they loved my quilt, (they really liked the envelopes), I wasn't quite good enough to win anything. But there was sooooo much competition, that I don't think I stood a chance against some of those ladies. I'm working on another one for the next contest, but I haven't started taking pictures yet. I'll get those up soon.




This next quilt is a little thing I did, which started out being for the contest previously mentioned, but I had a little trouble getting the size just right. So I ended up making it much smaller, and giving it to a little girl from our church who was just getting out of the hospital by the time I finished it. She thought it was great. It has the cutest little ballerinas on the fabric, and I would have spent time highlighting those, but I didn't have enough time for that.


This is about it for my quilting projects. I have one more that I have to take some good pictures of, because it really turned out great. I did a small crazy quilt for my mom, complete with hand embroidery, and she brought it up here on her visit so I could take pictures of it in the frame she found. It turned out great, they managed to find the perfect frame for it. I'll hopefully get those up this week.

Would A Muzzle Be Too Much? Or Should I Just Find A Big Hole To Crawl In?

I love my 4 year old. He has a grasp on verbal skills that none of his older or younger siblings will probably ever quite be able to match. However, this can cause so many issues, for instance like yesterday. I wanted to crawl under a big rock so bad, but I couldn't.

This past spring, as some of you know, we lost a baby through miscarriage. We never really got around to explaining it to the kids, because we just didn't know how, and they didn't really ask what was going on, so we just left it. Good or bad, who knows. But back to yesterday, the hospital where they did the d&c allows mothers the options of burying the remains (as much as they're able to save), and then having a once a year memorial service for all the lost little ones. It was on the way there that I decided to explain what was going on that day. I told the kids that I had had a baby that died in my tummy (they're all pretty young, so I have to choose my words carefully), and that we were going to have a special church service. I allowed them to get all their questions out of the way before the service so that they would hopefully be quiet during the service.

We arrived at the chapel (a very small room, maybe 15 or 20 chairs, maybe half of which were filled when we arrived), and almost right away, my 4 year old boy starts announcing why we're there. Loudly. "My mommy has a baby in her tummy that died! It's right in there (pointing to my tummy). It died and we're here for a special church service!" At this point, I'm trying to quiet him down, and explain that the baby already came out, and there was a new baby in my tummy that was alive. Bad idea. "My mommy has a live baby! Where is the baby mommy? (I point to my belly, sinking even lower into my seat) Right there! There's a baby in there!"

I have never felt so horrid, since I knew there were a few families in there who had lost little ones as well, and don't have my ability to get pregnant at the drop of a hat. I didn't know what to do other than to just keep trying to get him to quiet down. Eventually he gave up trying to announce my situation to the world, but then started up on complete strangers on the way out of the hospital. Oh my. Whatever will I do with that boy?

By the way, the service was beautiful. We took the tiny coffin to the grave site, and now we have a beautiful place to visit our lost little ones. I had never heard of anyone doing this before, but it was really beautiful, and a wonderful idea. And while the kids probably were still too young to understand what was going on, eventually they will understand, and will be as excited to meet that little one in heaven some day as I am.