The birth and delivery of a monkey hooded baby towel for Baby Ru

I found out my brother and his wife were expecting a baby recently and I wanted to get baby "Ru" (Short/nickname for Ruark...not the actual name that is picked out) a gift.  I often go to www.thinkgeek.com for gifts because they are right up my alley.  There, I found these:

The shark and monster blew me away with cuteness, but then I nearly died at the $39.99 price tag (plus shipping, I'm sure).  Very soon after this, I remembered that I have rudimentary sewing skills and this would basically be a towel to a hood and decorate.  I could totally do that!  Then came the text messages to my bro about what to possible make.  We decided monkey, elephant, or cow would all be pretty good and fun.  Then came my research.



This pattern sold me on the "baby as the face" concept.  And this particular baby is cute as a button, so I was pretty excited about monkey at this point.

AND THEN I stumbled upon this pattern and decided that I must include hands and feet of whatever animal I choose.  This also further solidified my "no double face" theory.

Mr. Elephant was really at the top of the list of all of the styles I found, but the only way to make it an elephant was to put a trunk on the top of the head.  And then you'd also have to put eyes on it.  So, I am keeping this one in mind, but it turned out to be too complicated for my first attempt.

I was crazy about this guy because he was so different.  But, when it came time to pick a color, I had no idea what color octopi/octopuses/octopodes are (purple works, but I don't know the gender of Baby Ru and thought purple might not go over so well for a boy).  Nor did I know how to make that head.  Maybe next time, though.

This was about the only cow pattern I could find and I'm not crazy about. it.  I did realize that I could do a lot with it and it still be recognizable as a cow, but I couldn't think of a good way to do the black and white pattern on the body and head.  Perhaps in the future, if I can find a "cow patterned" towel, this can become a reality.

I found this to be super cute, but there's no way to do an owl without the face on top.

This is a moose and I only added it to my thoughts because it would be distinct with the antlers.

After I was inspired, I had to find something to tell me how to make a hood and possibly more.  I found this Pinterest board to be useful and this website in particular.

And then, I skip the whole "process of" set of pictures and get to the finished set!


Here are my models Phaux and Lyka (people seem to think these are both shots of Phaux) showing that the ears ARE in an acceptable place!  At least for dogs...

 

Here we are all layed out so you can see everything, but you're missing the cuteness.

 

And there it is!  Maximum cuteness minus one.  Will achieve maximum cuteness with a Ru Baby in its belly.

And there she blows!  The birth and delivery of a Tabitha idea.

Winter Break for me

I was away from work from December 20th through January 1st.  I thought today would be really hard, but it really hasn't been.  Highlights with pictures...because everybody loves a multi-picture post, right?  Amiright?

This may not have been during break, but it cracks me up.  Lyka stole "his" spot and he didn't know what to do with himself.

Pajama pants were made after my only 2 pairs of pajama pants died.  I salvaged the waistband, pocket, and cuffs off of both pairs, but a strange size difference kept me from adding the cuffs to this one.

I was able to put the cuffs on this pair.  Oddly enough, I wasn't feeling this pair as much and it took me longer to get motivated to finish them.  It was like they were not playing nice with me.

So, of course, they split the day after I make them.  They are currently in my "think" pile.  Angrily.

Completely unrelated, this is Lyka's "worried" face.  She is the most sensitive dog on the planet.  You can see how Phaux is affected by things.

"Worried about what?"

I don't mean to end this abruptly, but...well...that's it!  More pictures to come! Office project in separate post.

Picture Explosion!

Thank goodness I'm a photo-taking-fiend or else I would not know what I have done in the past few weeks!  Or maybe I would, but it wouldn't be as entertaining.  My world:

New bath towels and hand towels happened sometime in November.

Memories of the sickness...round 2 for this season.

Barefoot in mid-November...no big deal...

Someone has the middle initial pi.  SO JEALOUS.

One of my brilliant ideas.  Works like a charm!  (And it's festive...double win.)

Pink garbage truck!

Tackled these bad boys on the 1st of December!  But now they're back...le sigh.

Okay, I guess those were mums behind the garage.

December has been and will be pretty wild.  This is just my work calendar.  (Family/friends birthdays not listed...)

Pie my coworkers and I won for winning the Halloween Costume Contest.  It was pretty good!

Same coworkers plus more decided to decorate for a decoration contest.  These are "post-it" sized squares that we taped to our windows.  I designed the Kwanzaa candles, penguin, and dreidel.  And I actually put up most of the penguin and half of the dreidel.  Festive to the max!

Oops, I lied...NOW it's festive to the max!  My "ugly/tacky Christmas sweater" submission.  It lost.  :-(  Ah well, I still got lots of remarks on it and showed it off around campus as our company broke into groups and did a campus-wide scavenger hunt....which my group won!!!!!  (Yay, $5 Starbucks gift card!)  PS, I sewed this after designing it.  I literally searched Google for visual ideas after thinking that this is what I wanted to do and I found zero.  None.  That is very rare for Google.  I think this was a true original!

Alright!  Seeing as the costume thing just happened today, I think I'm caught up!  See you next time!

New "job" and everything else lately I missed in the past 2 posts...

Man, it wasn't even a month ago that I posted last and I already am on my 3rd post today to get everything out!  Okay, let's try to cover everything...

My job under the contract RHYTTAC ended with September, although we didn't find this out for sure until Monday, October 1st.  We then had to get all of our stuff prepared to transfer over to the new contract holder and figure out what stuff couldn't be transferred.  That's what was happening for that week.  Then, on Sunday, October 7th, I came down with a stomach bug.  This lasted for way too long, turned into a cold, and I missed work on Monday, October 8th and Tuesday, October 9th.  Even though I was still kinda sick, I came to work on Wednesday, October 10th and in the afternoon moved my stuff to my new desk in my new department [Resource Family Training (RFT)].

RHYTTAC desk

New RFT desk (very similar to the old desk...but with plants...:^))

Went back to the RHY area a few days later to raid all of the leftover boxes.

I began really working in RFT on October 11th and have been hard at it since then.  The department was down several people for awhile, so we're still not caught up.  It's a very different environment than what I was used to, but I think I've getting used to it and they're getting used to me.  After I got access to the DHS database that we use (and a DHS e-mail address...randomly...), it was pretty smooth sailing.  Well, as in, I knew what I was doing.  I'm still not super fast at the process and keep double-guessing myself, so I'm behind.  :^(  I hate being behind.  Anyway, this is the bulk of what I've been doing in the past month.

We've also done some home renovations/decorations:

I decided we needed a fall wreath for the front door.



Remember these guys?  They finally got sealed!  Now they're ready to be hung!



We finally decided on new silverware that we both like.  (Yet had to take them back after they rusted after the first wash!  :-(  The hunt is back on...)

Trimmed back branches from scraping our roof.

The dogs enjoyed the branches.

Jon began phase 1 on popcorning the office ceiling.

We bought a new ceiling fan for the office.

Jon had to change a door knob and deadbolt because the old one started locking when it wasn't supposed to.

The season of fall had some surprises up its sleeve:

Random bloom in October

I guess we have mums.  I also guess they don't bloom in spring - only in fall.

Our yucca plants are back again.

Jon became Dad to another musical instrument sometime in the past couple of weeks:

Playing it a lullaby...on...itself.........okay, so the dad/kid metaphor doesn't work...

I participated in Halloween at work this year and our group won for most creative!

Rock Paper Scissors...me, previous boss Danielle, and our bestie Merritt

Look how many people dressed up at work!  We're a fun group.  Yay.

I also found out that the health insurance I had selected will no longer be an option for OU employees next year, so just today I researched which one I needed to choose and enrolled.

Now we have Election Day coming up Tuesday and I have printed out our sample ballot, but I've yet to research everybody and everything.  I'm most worried about the state questions.  I don't feel like I really know what they are saying.  They also have a question about "abolishing" DHS and I kinda work for them and have a sister-in-law that works for them and the term "abolish" is pretty much terrifying me.

So, there you go.  There's everything.  Or at least as much as I can remember right now.  Big Gulp, huh?  Welp, see you later!

Ramdom added cuteness that describes how I feel.

So, I Sew Now

I've never been afraid to mend things by hand, and I've seen plenty of sewing machines in action, but I had never actually sewed on one.  Until last weekend (not including all of my practice runs to get tension right...OH THE TENSION ISSUES).  Anyway, I only sew out of necessity.  It's not overly therapeutic for me, even though I am rather proud to see my work after finished.  Alright, done rambling.  Here's what I've done:

10/28/12 - my first attempt by machine.  I had an old undershirt whose elastic was dying at the top, so I bought a new one, but it was too short.  Solution:  SEW THEM TOGETHER!

10/30/12 by hand.  I agreed to be the rock of "rock paper scissors" for Halloween at work and waited until the night before to make the costume.  The uneven edges of my moss bib are actually sewn by hand to a straight edge.  If I had more skills, I could have just cut this all as one piece, but that didn't dawn on me until after I started sewing pieces on.

11/1/12 by machine.  My husband and I somehow manage to wear holes into sheets where our feet go.  The grey set was our newest set to fall victim to us and I had kept our green sheet that previously got "holed."  Solution?  SEW THEM TOGETHER!  Probably a dumb a idea in general because of all of the trouble this was to get lined up and it still looks poor.  Definitely a dumb idea for your second sewing machine project ever.



11/10/12 by machine.  The left one is a longtime favorite nightgown that I've had that is getting very tattered.  The right one was created from it!  I had help...quite a bit of help...

12/9/12 by machine and embezzlements by hand.  I cut the fabric by eye (no pattern) and sewed the sides, bottom of the "toe," and the white to the top.  I then safety-pinned the stocking to the sweater so it would be a sweater.  The toe is stuffed with scrap fabric, the name is beads with a couple of jingle bells sewn by hand.  Well, then the bells were safety-pinned.  The ribbon was safety-pinned only because I added it after I put my machine away (and after I started the beads and that made me ready to finish the project ASAP).  UPDATE:  The ribbon is now sewn!  You may all sleep more sound tonight.

12/26/12 by machine.  Needed new pj pants after my only 2 pair(s?) ripped down the middle.

12/30/12 by machine.

4/6/13 by machine.  My first major adjustment to a store-bought shirt.

 

4/6/13 by machine.  Found a generic "how to" online and tweaked it.  More info here.