She's Crafty

The title is a Beastie Boys reference. I made it because I was trying to be relevant, hip and funny, but then I realized that the song from which I look the line came out in 1995. Oh my...

Now as to actually being crafty, that applies to many members of my family but this time I'm focusing on my sister-in-law, Emily; you can find her blog here. She's moderately addicted to quilting in a similar way to how William S. Burroughs was moderately addicted to smack. From what I understand, quilting is much less destructive.

She is known for her "wonky" quilts, textiles that are a little less symmetrical and a little more on the eccentric side. I like them for that very reason. She also takes the quilts, once they're pieced, to an insanely talented lady at Green Fairy Quilts who freehands intricate quilting details. The results of both of their efforts are below:

The last photo is a close-up of the detail work on the darker quilt. This talented duo produced a wonderful set of quilts and we're very thankful to them.

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By the way... it's almost Friday.

*GULP!*

PRESENTS! I love me some presents!

Who doesn't love gifts, right? We're very thankful for all of them, and they have been numerous. The generosity of our family and friends has been overwhelming. While I'd love to spend the time spotlighting each and every gift we've received, that wouldn't make for a very interesting post. Instead, we'll make sure to honor each gift-giver with thank you notes and use this space to hit a few fun highlights.

First up is a beautiful wall hanging my mother sent along. Every stitch is done by hand and the love and care is quite evident. I'm glad that she used green; that seems to be a dominant color in the nursery right now.

My mother also sent these wonderful memory/baby books. I absolutely adore them and know that the boys will treasure them years from now. Speaking of which, I really ought to put some stuff from the shower in them soon.

Amanda's cousin Mackenzie is an awesome human being with whom we never get to spend sufficient time. She's just as geeky as we are and her handmade blankets illustrate this in fabulous fashion.

The first blanket is a Fibonacci Sequence (I rotated it so that folks could see the detail, but the proper form is seen in the first photo), while the second blanket is a dream game of Tetris. I rarely get the straight pieces when I need them!

She also gave us this super cute "Young Mad Scientist's First Alphabet Blocks" set. Did I mention that she's a working scientist? ;-)

So, as I said before, there were many awesome gifts...a fact illustrated below.

Our car was stuffed to the gills as we drove from Toledo to Athens, OH. People stared at us with bewildered expressions as we filled the car with more and more things. Having moved (and completed long road trips) as many times as we have, Amanda and I have become absolute expert packers. I wager this will become a vital tool in the coming years.

Again, thanks to everyone for their generosity. These boys are far better equipped than we would have been able to make them on our own!

Next post: The Doctor Says...

Ain't No Party Like a Baby Shower Party

This post will be a little light on the words. Here are a few scenes from the recent baby shower, this time focusing on the attendees.

First up is Olivia & Isabelle, daughters of Tami. Amanda has been friends with Tami since they were in their early teens. She has had two beautiful children so far and, since they're so darn cute, I wanted to lead off with them. The last photo above is of Audrey, our niece, holding Miss Isabelle. Aud carried her around for at least two of the three hours of the shower. It was kind of adorable.

Amanda's mother, Elva, did a wonderful job coordinating all of the food and beverages for the event. She (along with the rest of the family and close friends) helped us put on quite a show and we're very grateful to them. The sash is a bit of a lie, obviously, as she's already a grandmother twice over.

Next up, a few random shots of the attendees. I won't name names (I'd probably fail at it, to be honest), but they're all wonderful people and we're happy that they were able to share in this celebration.

I'd like to single out Nick (no doubt texting someone) & Shawn (the curly headed one engaged in conversation) in the above photo. They always help out at any event they attend and this was no exception. They're pretty great people. Thanks, you two!

I'll end this post with the cake:

Super cute, right? You'll note that they reproduced the monkeys from the invitation. Sadly, about half of those who came to the shower never got to see it because we were all so involved with the festivities that we almost forgot about it entirely! Oops!!! It was quite tasty, though, and people can see it here, at least.

Enough for today. Tomorrow, a tour of some gifts!

"I don't understand how we're going to shower the babies"

The title of this post is a quote from our five year old niece while we were setting up for our baby shower on Saturday. It was a wonderful success and our family and friends are due many thanks for all their efforts.

I've had a bit of a problem keeping up on posts lately, so I'm going to squeeze a couple out of this event. We'll start with the decorations. Amanda and I are pretty proud of how the decor turned out; we purchased bits and pieces over time and hoped it would all work together in the end. Happily, it did. Here are a few shots to give a sense of what it looked like.

Here's the poker table. While it looked really nice, not enough folks showed up who wanted to play. Most of our male friends are the type to join in with the regular games. With a different group, this would have worked well. Oh well--the couple guys who sat at the table seemed to have a good time.

The tables themselves turned out quite nice. The pre-assembled banana bread mix which we put together at home (the living room was covered in flour that night) seemed to be a really big hit with folks asking if they could take any extras. We still have 15 or so bags left over, not to mention way too much candy.

I had to keep drawing attention to the table activities (writing advice on the bottoms of diapers and decorating bibs), but folks finally got involved with those activities towards the end of the day.

We also put together a kid's craft table. This was a big hit for much of the event but was abandoned when one kid spilled his or her juice all over the table. Still, keeping a bunch of little ones content for an hour or so while the parents socialized felt like a good accomplishment.

Finally, here are a couple shots of the hall before all the attendees arrived. Pretty cute, no?

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I'll slap up a few more shots from the shower tomorrow and hopefully include a proper update as well. I've been a little negligent lately!