So Many Babies, So Little Time!

As the second half of 2012 is almost upon us, I'm frantically trying to finish 6 (!!!) diaper bags for my girlfriends expecting babies in the latter half of this year.  Including 2 sets of twins - yahoo!  Both sets of twins are due in late Sept, but could come a bit earlier, obvi.  Otherwise the timeline for the other babes is: late June, late August, late Sept (x 2 - or 4!), late Oct, and late Dec.  I've got my work cut out for me.  I'm planning to use the same diaper bag pattern and tutorial that I used for our bag.

Goodbye 2011, Hello 2012!

Feeling rather pregnant

Phew!  What a year 2011 has been...  My hubby and I were chatting one night at the end of December about how much has changed in the past year.  We had no idea as we began 2011 that we would:

• find out we were pregnant 
• both lose our jobs 
• lose the baby 
• both find new jobs 
• get pregnant again
• move to the coast  

And all of this happened within the first 4 months of 2011!!!  The past year really has tested us but provided us with so many wonderful things as well.  New friends, new career opportunities, wonderful weddings and special times with family and friends, plus a healthy pregnancy.  Yippee!

Caramia Made - Nursery (Part I)

Second-hand antique bassinette, hand-me-down crib, me-made diaper bag

Well, I'm officially due a month from today!  So in addition to finalizing our short list of names, I've also realized that we better get the nursery finished.  We've slowly been accumulating second-hand items from thrift shops, Craigslist, and friends, but now we need to put it all together.

6 Weeks Left!

Holiday Mocktail Dress & Tutorial

 I'm now 32 weeks preggo (only 8 weeks left - the final stretch!) and with the holiday season fast approaching, I needed a nice bump-friendly dress to wear to office Christmas parties and New Years celebrations.  Taking inspiration from this lovely number by ASOS, I used Simplicity 3835 to make a lacy cocktail dress (well, mocktails in my case).  This turned out to be a relatively simple pattern to modify to become maternity friendly and I've provided some steps below.

UFOs and Minor DIYs

My apologies for my lack of productivity in blog-land!  In all fairness, I've been working quite a lot lately between my two jobs (one contract is finishing at the end of November though - phew!).  We also bought a new (to us) car - a 2007 Honda Fit and sold my old car (a 1996 Honda Accord ; man I love them Hondas).  The Fit is a standard (aka manual transmission), so I've been busy in the evenings learning to drive it.  It took a few weeks, and a lot of tears, but I'm now zipping around Squamish in my new wheels!  I'm still not super confident, and it will probably be awhile before I take it into Vancouver, but that will come I'm sure.  Learning to drive a standard was one of my goals for 2011, so I can now tick that off my list - Yippee!

Ruffled Maternity Skirt

Paired with Sorbetto Maternity Top

I had started to make a skirt for a friend using the (free!) Twinkle by Wenlan A-Plus A-Line skirt available on Burdastyle, but never got around to finishing it.  Don't worry, I never told her I was making it so it's not like she was disappointed, ha ha ha!

It's made of a stretchy polyester fabric and turned out to be just perfect to adapt into a maternity skirt!  I cut up one of N's old t-shirts to make a belly band and added 2 rows of eyelet lace ruffles to the bottom.  I was inspired by kojodesigns great maternity skirt.  It's super comfortable and I wore it to work last week and got tons of compliments on it.

How to Make Your Own Maternity Clothes

Throughout both pregnancies, I have slowly been bookmarking websites that have DIY instructions to make your own maternity clothes.  Mostly this is because I'm very cheap frugal and hate paying full price for something that I will only wear for a short time.  Also, because I live about an hour away from the nearest mall.

Lots of other bloggers have already compiled similar lists, and links that I had already saved on my browser popped up on these lists as well.  Here are a few links that I'm planning on using to make my own maternity wardrobe, as well as some of the "link roundups" that other bloggers have compiled.

Maternity Capris

Summer finally arrived in late August and continued until mid-September here in Sea-to-Sky country.  I was pretty much at a loss for summery bottoms to wear... no skirts, no capris, and only 2 pairs of yoga shorts that fit.  And I can't wear yoga shorts to my office job.

Maternity Sorbetto

I finally got a little bit of time to sew my very first maternity shirt (yay!).  I'm carrying pretty low so most of my pants no longer fit and I've had to make the switch to maternity bottoms.  I can still fit my longer casual t-shirts and tank tops, but am beginning to need some dressier tops for work.

In Desperate Need of Clothing!

Remember when you were in high school and you'd open your closet doors and say "UGH I HAVE NOTHING TO WEAR!!!"????  Well I'm having deja-vu now since I can't fit any of my non-jean bottoms except for one pair of brown dress pants, and my tops are all too short in the body now that my belly is growing out front...

19 weeks

Exciting News!

We are expecting!!!  I'm so happy to announce that I will be working on a Me-Made Maternity for the next few months.