Service Sunday : Art For Molly

This sweet baby is Molly Campbell. On Christmas Eve, she was running a fever, so her mom took her to the ER. Several hours later, after many tests, her family's world was turned upside down when she was diagnosed with leukemia - at only 28 days old. To receive the best care possible, Molly was transferred to a better hospital in a city far away from their home. They made the difficult decision to move their family to where Molly is so that they could be together as much as possible, but since Molly has four siblings under the age of seven, they aren't able to live at the Ronald McDonald house. Housing costs and medical bills have become astronomical. In an effort to help offset some of these costs, friends and family have set up a trust fund for Molly. You can read more about her story and donate HERE. They have also opened an etsy shop to benefit Molly that you can visit HERE. If you want to donate something to sell in the shop, instruction can be found HERE.
I can't even imagine what this family must be going through. Worrying about the health of your baby would be difficult enough, but worrying about the financial burden makes it even more crushing.
I've donated one of my "Counting Robots" prints to her shop. Even if you can only do a little to help, I urge you to do so :)

Happy Sunday!

Some New Prints

Some fun new prints have been added to my shop, and I made my first sale this week. Yay!!

Knott's Berry Farm

At the Beach

The Land of Sun and Surf

We're off to sunny California for a few days to reconnect with family and soak up some sun. See you next week!

Natalie's Room Inspiration Board

Picking out pretty things to create a room is really, really fun. And someday, maybe Natalie's room will look a little something like her inspiration board :)

For girls, I love white rooms with white beds, bedding, and window treatments. I think it looks, airy, crisp, and fresh. With a blank canvas, it's fun and easy to add vibrant pops of color with accessories and decorations.

I love the bright, cheerful fabric. I would use it to make colorful throw pillows, and a patchwork quilt - it would look great folded and place over the coverlet at the foot of the bed.

To keep the room from looking too grown up, Natalie has a collection of stuffed animals and dolls, and I plan on turning her apple green crib into a funky reading bench.

It's a room that I think can work for a little girl, but grow with her as well.

Shopping info starting with top left:

Curtains: alvine rund - ikea
Pendant Lamp: maskros - ikea
Quilted White Coverlet and Shams: matelasse coventry - Bed, Bath, and Beyond
White Iron Bed: allie iron bed - pottery barn kids
Fabric swatches (all can be found at Quilt Home - my favorite online fabric store):

• persimmon - ty pennington impressions
• sanctuary - patty young
• trees - marshmallow pistachio - momo
• egg dots - raspberry - momo
• coral rose - fig tree quilts
• bijoux - heather bailey
• gypsy bandana - pillow and maxfield

"Monet's Poppy Field" - Jan Blencowe
"Lehi's Dream-House of the World" - Minerva Teichert
I Am a Child of God Print - Lemon Dropp
Salt Lake Temple Back Door - nlaytonphotography (etsy)

New Prints

I have three-ish new prints up in my shop (two of them are the same print, just a slight variation on color...hence the "three-ish").

I promise that this blog won't turn into one advertisement after another for my shop :) I am working on some fun projects - baby shoes for a friend and my sister who are both expecting little girls. And on Friday, I'm going to share some fun ideas for children's rooms. As always, thanks for stopping by!

New Prints - Family Rocks and Counting Robots

I finished some more prints. They're now for sale in my shop.

Favorite Things: I heart Coconut Edition

It took me awhile to notice it, but I LOVE coconut. Sometime last year, I started thinking about some of the products and foods that I love, and a lot of them have one thing in common: coconut. I think part of it may be that coconut reminds me of the summer we spent in Laie :)
Here's my list of coconut inspired favorites:

1) Coconut Shrimp

Image found HERE

I have loved shrimp since the first time I had it as a little girl. My mom and my aunt took me out for a fun dinner in San Francisco when I was about five. While trying to decide what to order, I saw a waiter carrying a plate of what looked like tiny fried drumsticks. I pointed to it, and told my mom I wanted the "tiny fried chickens". She explained that it was really shrimp, but let me order it anyways. I took one bite, and I've been a sucker for shrimp ever since. I love shrimp in all it's forms, but coconut shrimp is my favorite. Try the recipe HERE. You can substitute club soda or coconut milk for the beer. Also, you can add seasonings to the flour such as salt, garlic powder, red pepper flakes, pepper, etc.

2) Hawaiian Tropic Sunscreen

Effective, and smells good enough to eat. Not gonna lie, been tempted to use it as perfume :)

3) Choxie Coconut Truffle Bar

Image found HERE

Dark chocolate coating with a smooth white chocolate, coconut, and almond filling. Really, really indulgent, but so good. You can find it at Target.


4) Coconut Oil

My dry winter Utah skin loves coconut oil. I slather it on after I shower, and my parched skin drinks it up. It smells wonderful, and my skin loves it. You can buy a tub of it at the health food store for about $6.

5) Pina Colada (non-alcoholic)

Image found HERE

I love the flavors so much, I developed my own recipe last winter. Here it is:

Pineapple Sherbet
Pineapple Juice - 1 large can
Coconut Milk - 1 can
Coconut Extract
Maraschino Cherry
Whipped Cream

A few hours before making, or the day before, freeze a tray of pineapple juice cubes in the freezer.
In a blender, combine the tray of frozen pineapple cubes, two large scoops of pineapple sherbet, 1 can of coconut milk, and 2 tsp. of coconut extract. Blend in the blender until blended (hehe, that's a funny sentence). Top with whipped cream and a maraschino cherry.

Sometimes, if I want it really coconutty, I'll add more extract. Just play around with it, and see what works for you.

Enjoy!!

This Tutorial Has Me Very Excited!!

Image via Kojodesigns

I have been eyeing the rosette quilt from Antrhopologie for some time now...knowing that I could probably figure out a way to do it for cheaper, but wondering if the hassle of figuring it all out would really be worth it. I had pretty much decided that once we have money coming in again, one of my first splurges would be the quilt. That is, until I came across this awesome tutorial from Kojodesigns. This heaven-sent tutorial means that I can make the quilt, without the headache, and save a ton of cash. Yes!!! You can find tutorials part one and two HERE and HERE.
Sometimes I think I'm in love with the internet :)

Lemon Dropp, The Shop

I've been toying with the idea of making art prints for over a year now - inspirational quotes, scriptures, and fun art for children - and I've finally decided to just do it. I've finished a few pieces, and listed them in my shop. I have several more pieces in the works, and I'll post them here as I get them done. Over time, my shop will probably grow to include some of my photography, and maybe even some of my handmade items. But for now, I'm starting small, and we'll see where this goes :)






FYI - I know that "lemon dropp" should really only have one 'p', but every variation of "lemon drop" has already been used, and besides, from a design standpoint, I like the look of two 'p's :)

Whew!!

Oh, my poor neglected blog. I think I may have (read: totally and completely without a doubt) bitten off more than I could handle in the way of handmade projects for Christmas...hence the poor neglected blog :)

But, ignoring the blog was not in vain. I actually got my projects done on time, and I'm rather proud of how they all turned out (if I do say so myself).

Felt food: I have a new obsession. Felt food is awesome! I love everything about it: felt is cheap, felt is easy to work with, and it satisfies a lot of my creative needs. I love how easy it is to make (though can be time consuming). I love all the little details and the embroidery. I love how I can pick it up and put it down easily every night and work on it while James and I work our way through Monk on Netflix. Behold Natalie's basket of food:

I found the grocery basket and the forks, spoons, and plastic bowls in the dollar section of Target. Can you believe that I have never perused that section until a couple of months ago? There's actually a lot of good stuff to be found in there :)

I used tutorials for some of the foods (google "felt food tutorials"), I worked off of pictures I found for others, and then for the grapes, I just did my own thing. I have tons of felt leftover, so I predict the collection will grow in the coming months :)

This is the doll that I made for Natalie. I love how she turned out, and I love how Natalie likes to hug her really, really tight :)


I wanted to make something for my boys, too, but I was kind of drawing a blank. Then I remembered how much they love stuffed toys...and monsters. So, these silly little guys were born. My boys like to be tucked in with them, which makes my little heart proud :)


And last, but not least, I finished up the five baby quilts for Lua Nova. The quilts are what took up most of my holiday creating time, but it was well worth it. I wanted to get pictures of all the finished quilts, but my camera battery was dying, and I had to pack them up and send them off right then...so...these are the only two shots I got. I machine quilted all of the quilts, and they each have a thin cotton batting in the middle. Two are made of all cotton fabrics, top and bottom. Two of them have a quilted cotton top and a minky bottom (JoAnn's had their minky on sale for 50% off!!...and I used the leftovers on the little plush monsters). The last one is made of all cotton flannel, top and bottom. This is one of the all cotton quilts:

And here they are all ready to ship, along with the burp cloths and crocheted baby shoes that Candida made.


Whew! You're amazing if you stuck with it to the end of this post :) I'm excited to get going on this blog again. I've missed posting on it.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and here's to the best year ever!