Cameron Joy six months old

Today was a very bittersweet day.  Cameron slept through the night for the first time.  For the first time in almost 8 months I slept through the night as well!  I barely slept through the last 6 weeks of my pregnancy with her because I was in pain, and I was so large :)  And here we are, Cameron is almost 7 months old.  It was wonderful to sleep all night without interruption, but it makes me sad as well.  Just another milestone for Cameron, please stop getting bigger baby girl!  I know Paul & I are planning on having more babies (hopefully two more!) but with Cameron it feels different.  Paul & I tried for over a year to get pregnant with her.  Every month I would dread my "time", and hope I was finally pregnant.  And each time I would be devastated.  I didn't help that at the time many women in our church were pregnant, and all I was hearing about was babies. And seeing new babies, yet I couldn't seem to get pregnant.  As I think back on all of this now, I realize how crazy it would have been IF I had gotten pregnant when I had wanted to be.  I would have ended up having the baby while Paul & I were living with his parents.  And we would have been so super squished!  I mean it would have been wonderful to have mom around all the time, (man do I miss all of your help mom!) but I feel like it would have been more hectic.  God in His perfect timing answered my prayer for a baby - when He knew I would be ready.  I found out I was pregnant with Cameron FIVE days after we bought our house.  And I only took the pregnancy test to make sure I WASN'T pregnant.  With just buying the house I had been scraping and inhaling powder for our lath & plaster walls.  And I wanted to make sure I wouldn't be putting a baby in danger by inhaling things I shouldn't while pregnant.  It came as quite a shock to me when the test was positive!  I had begun to think I wasn't going to ever get pregnant again.  Within hours my dad had weaseled the news out of me and has immediately proclaimed it was a grand-daughter.  I have no idea how some women try for years to have babies.  Just one year of waiting was hard.  My sympathies go out to you.  What you go through is heart-wrenching. I believe we as women are hardwired to want babies.  We are nurturers, we are givers.  Being a mother is so much work, but it is the most rewarding job you will EVER have.  I love being a mom, but watching my children grow up is so very hard.  I want them to stay little forever. 

Isaiah 40:31 says, "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

I need to learn to be more patient, I always feel like I need to be in a hurry.  And time slips away from us so fast.  Lord help me to slow down and enjoy every moment with the children you have given me.  

Cameron newborn to six months:

Homemade Laundry Detergent

Laundry detergent has to be one of the most difficult expenses for me.  I hardly ever can find any deals on it, because not many coupons are put out.  And the coupons that are put out are miniscule amounts off at best - I mean really tide - .50 cents off of a bottle?  So after much searching of pinterest + google I found the following recipe:

1 Box of Borax 4lbs 12oz
1 Box of Super washing soda 4lbs
1 Box pure baking soda
3 Bars Fels-Naptha 5.5 oz
1 Oxy clean container 1.3Lb
2 Containers of downy unstoppables

I used my food processor to grate and grind the fels-naptha bars and the downy unstoppables.
Then I mixed all the ingredients together in a tote and this is what it looks like.

Now I am completely skeptical as to if this concoction will work or not.  But the recipe touted a total load yield of 504 loads! Because you are only supposed to used 1-2 Tablespoons per load. (I am using my oxy clean scoop!) I figured I would give it a go because it is cheaper than buying my normal Purex detergent.

Here is the cost breakdown:
Borax - 3.38
Super washing soda - 3.24
Pure baking soda - 2.24
Fels-Naptha - 0.97  X3 = 2.91
Oxy clean - 3.86
Downy unstoppables 6.97 X2 = 13.94
Grand total:  29.57

Now I usually buy 100 load purex bottles for 7.97.  Five bottles to get to 500 loads is 39.85.
So really not saving all that much, BUT, I NEVER get 100 loads from those purex bottles!  And if I use the correct amount of the homemade stuff, it should last me for 504 loads!  I also next time will probably omit the downy unstoppables.  It was kinda expensive, and of course I didn't have any coupons for it! So omitting the unstoppables brings the total to 15.63.  That is a savings of almost $25!  So I really hope this stuff works for me!  It is definitely cheaper!

New Blog :D

So… I have totally had a blog before, but have always gotten bored with it quickly.  I guess I am trying again because I do like to write my thoughts out.  And I can keep track of special things.  Which is a total plus because I never remember anything anymore.  I love to make things and my weekend has been full of craftiness :)  Today was a special photo shoot for my little princess Cameron.  I am so beyond excited to have a girl now and be able to dress her in girly things! But picking things out is super hard, because there are so many super cute things for girls out there!!  And most of them are also super expensive :/ So me being the frugal, hey I could just make that! kinda person came up with the things I wanted to have for the photo shoot.  First thing I needed was simple, I wanted to dress Cam up as a fairy! - Ok maybe not so easy!  Enter tutu dress with matching headband;



Way poofy = Way cute!

 I used this video as a general guideline.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnxqYLKVJH0 
I kinda already had an idea how it worked, but this helped a little.  Now the hard part - the wings.  I started out with this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB5iZ5B1Mhg
Totally not what I wanted, I wanted something “real looking”, I just happened to find this video, and it was what I wanted!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTAqSAqZjY4
I must say, the process of making these was very difficult, I mean not overly so, but still a bit daunting.  And I didn’t exactly get it right.  This is how mine turned out -



I am happy with them though, they are probably a tad too fragile for my liking however.  And I have no idea what kinda of cellophane the woman in the video used because the only stuff I had melted the instant I put an iron on it.  So I improvised by just gluing the cellophane together.  I also needed something to complete Cameron’s little sister onesie.  I am kinda over shabby flower headbands - they get wrecked WAY too easily :/ I had seen something called “korker” bows before and wanted to make them.  But I had no idea what I needed to do.  I happened to have some ribbon on hand, so my first attempt invovled me trying to curl the ribbon with scissors - like you do with gift ribbon - yah it totally didn’t work… Enter google :) http://www.instructables.com/id/Curlykorker-Hair-Bows/
I was totally skeptical at first, but it worked!  And here is my result: (don’t mind the ugly couch, it needs the slipcover put back on!)





I am completely thrilled with the results :D And will definitely be making more soon!  You also call see my other project pictured here, baby leg warmers!  I love, LOVE the idea of these neato things.  But I really didn’t want to spend $15 a pop.  So enter tutorial #4:
http://www.u-createcrafts.com/2013/01/make-baby-leg-warmers-from-knee-highs-2.html
There are many, many how-to’s for these out there, but this one was my favorite - because it had a specific set of instructions for infant size :) So I totally made four pairs and will most definitely be making more, as I find some more awesome socks!  My creations for now,




I really would love to find some chevron socks, I am really loving that print right now.
That was my weekend! Thanks to Kara Abbey for taking lovely photos of my angels! Can’t wait to see them :)
I also made homemade laundry detergent, baby food, and got some sweet couponing deals, but I should go to bed now :D