Yay for Boy Month!

So many of the blogs I follow are abounding in great ideas kids...most of them for little girls. There are a few that do focus on the occasional boyish craft, but honestly girl stuff is just easier to do.

However, I am super excited...and thought I would pass it on to all of my mommy friends out there with little boys...that two blogs I follow,
Made & Made by Rae
are having a...



MONTH!!!!!

Yup that is right...not just one post, not just a week, but an entire month of all things BOY!

So go check out all of the great post and tutorials they will be sharing and make something special for that special little guy(s) in you life!

I will definitely be trying some of their ideas and will try to share what I have done here with you as well!

This little guy deserves celebrating don't you think?!

No Pink for me...

So as many, but not all of you know now...our little girl...

is not a girl but a BOY!!!

Glad we got a second ultrasound done!



Say hello to Luke Israel Kearbey :-)

DIY Wedding Shower Invites

It is crazy hard for me to believe that my little sister will be getting married this summer!!! Even though she is only two years younger than I am, it is still hard to believe she is old enough to be getting married!

Growing up, we were always BEST friends!



...and still are!

So to just brag on my lil sis for a second...








yah... crazy talented...gorgeous... has a huge servants heart and a passion for missions!


umm...Matt...you are pretty much the luckiest man EVER!




I am so excited for the both of them though! And to be finally gaining a brother :-)

okay bragging done....

So naturally I am super excited to be doing my sister's wedding shower! The creative wheels have been turning in my head!!

First things first though...Invitations!

I wanted to be a bit more creative with the invitations and do more than just pick out some invites at a party store.

Here is what I came up with...



To create these invites I simply took used one of my sister's engagement pictures for the background. My sister and her fiance were lucky enough to have a friend who did their engagement pictures for them and gave them permission to print as many pictures and use them in any way they wish. (Note: Credit for original photo to- Angie Rushing.) Double check before using a photo that you do have permission to use it!

So I thought it would make their invitations even more special to use one of their pictures. I simply uploaded the picture to Picnik and added the wording to the picture! It was literally that simple! I used yellow and white for the font colors and two different fonts to add some variety.
I also looked up different ways to word wedding shower invitations and mixed and matched some of the wording from a couple different ones.

To print them off you can go one of two ways...

1. Send them to your local photo printing shop and print them off as a picture.
This is the option I chose since I could get 25 prints for free from CVS :-)

or

2. You can print them off on card stock.
This is the route I wish I could have taken but we do not currently have a printer at home and it would take up way too much ink to ask to borrow a friends printer.




I LOVE LOVE LOVE the way they turned out!
(Some sensitive details are blacked out on the pics...didn't want to share my phone number and parents address with the entire world ;-) hehehe)

Homemade Personal / Business Cards

I have been very blessed to be sewing for other people lately doing odd jobs like alterations, curtains for a classroom at our church and even making a few skirts for a friend.

I received a phone call about two weeks ago from a friends friend telling me that her friend gave her my number and told her that I made curtains.

Now I do make curtains. But they have always been for myself or some one close to me. Never for some one I have never met before. The idea was exciting and intimidating all at the same time. To make a long story short I took on the challenge and am enjoying the process of making custom curtains.

The other day when I brought some of the curtains to the woman's house to fit them she mentioned to me that she has a few other friends interested in having me make curtains for them as well!! She asked if I had a business card I could give her to pass on to them....I didn't.

So I decided when I got home that I would make my own personal/business cards.

Now I don't have my own "business" so I got a little creative with my cards.

...and here they are!

I am really happy with how they turned out!

I included my name, email address, phone number, blog address and etsy address.
The name of my blog and etsy are different so I didn't want to necessarily give myself a "business" name, so I simply put my name at the top instead.



To make these I simply used the Pages application on my husbands Mac - they have templates for business cards. I typed in the info I wanted and played with the size and font just a bit till I was happy with it.

Next I made a trip to Hobby Lobby and picked up some textured card stock. I went with blue and yellow as you can see. I love how bright the colors are!

While walking every aisle in the store (seriously is it even possible to go into hobby lobby and not look at just about everything!!! Not for me!), I came across their stamp sets. I thought a stamp would add a really nice and unique hand made touch to the cards.

They had several really cute stamps. Some with basic scollish (is that a word? I don't think so...) designs, some with cute owls on them, pretty much any design you could want.

Finally I spotted this stamp...

And I instantly LOVED it! It is simple but very pretty and even gets across the basic "message" I wanted my cards to send!

I think this stamp was only like $4 or something like that...not bad at all!

So I went home, printed off my cards, cut them apart, and stamped them all.

I LOVE the way they turned out! They are simple, provide all the info I would want some one to have, and even have that special homemade feel to them :-)

The best part is that it only cost me $8 to make 40 of them!

What We Did Today

Today was a Snow Day!
We slept in, ate some home made pancakes, stayed in our pajamas and watched Caillou most of the morning.
It was wonderfully relaxing!

This is what it looked like today where we live...






Looks lovely right?

Wonderful deep, powdery snow...perfect to spend the day playing in and building a snow man!





yah...not so much!!!
While the picture looks like it is a perfect day to play in the snow, the reality of it is much different! The high today was right around 8 degrees! And the wind chill made it feel about -17! In addition to the freezing temps, the wind just about knocks you right over when you try to go outside.

We attempted to play outside this morning. We got all bundled up with heavy coats, hats and boots. We even made it out to the front of the apartments when Jack fell face first into the snow and started crying. It was so incredibly sad!
The snow was way too deep for him to play in, let alone even walk in. His face was beat red from the freezing temps, and the wind made it hard to see.

We immediately went back inside!

Jack was very happy to be back inside, but very sad that he couldn't play in the snow.

Our solution...

We brought the snow inside to us!!

We played in it with our bare hands at first, and talked about how snow is cold and wet.



Jack liked the cold and wet feeling for just a bit...

But he soon wanted gloves!



Then we made some snow balls. You can tell from the pictures he is concentrating very hard...hehehe



He loved playing with the snow!



After playing with the snow for quite awhile, we put the bowl in the sink and I showed Jack how the snow "disappears" when you put water over it.

This was such a fun activity, and a great alternative for those days that aren't very good snow days!

What did you do today?