Help me decide - GIVEAWAY!

VOTING HAS BEEN CLOSED! THANK YOU TO ALL WHO PARTICIPATED!

Etsy is having a Handmade Kids Challenge. Basically, they are going to choose 3 winners from 7 different categories. Obviously, the only category I really fit into is Toys. But, I can only enter one item. I want to use one of my new "faces" designs, but I'm having hard time deciding which one.

SO, I thought it would be fun to have a little contest myself.

Here's the deal:
Leave a comment to vote for your favorite - OR suggest a different idea that you think would be really cool. (Please be practical though -- I can only do so much!)
Be sure to leave contact information (email address) so that I can get in touch with you if you win.
Easy Peasy!

The winner will receive their choice of ZadyMINI ($10 value). Yippee!

Here are the current choices:

Hoots the Owl	Marvin The Spider	Robbie the Robot Monster
BABY Hoots the Owl	Fetch the Dog	Oliver the Orange Cat

Voting will close August 9th at 12:00 noon (Arizona time).

Pregnancy Update

I'm sure that you've all been dying to know how the pregnancy is progressing, right? (ha ha ha)
I am now about 14 weeks along, and I think that the worst of the morning sickness (all day in my case) has passed. I can finally eat chocolate again without running to the bathroom. And I've gotten at least some of my energy back.

But, I'm still having terrible headaches. I remember having headaches with my other pregnancies, but I don't remember them being this bad. And I could usually get rid of them. The ones I'm having now are usually not helped at all by Tylenol, and I can't "sleep them off". If I go to bed with a headache, I usually wake up with the same one.
I've tried a few things that seem to have worked a little bit. I've started carrying around a little bag full of Almonds (whole natural). If I feel a headache coming on, sometimes if I snack on a handful of almonds, it will go away. Not always, but sometimes. I've also noticed that if I drink water practically all the time and that sometimes helps. I end up spending most of the day on the toilet, but at least my head isn't hurting as bad.
I'm hoping that I'll start getting better in a few weeks. I'm keeping my fingers crossed anyway.

I decided to keep track of my "belly progress" with this pregnancy. I never did with the others, so I thought it might be fun. (although I feel a little weird putting my belly out there for the world to see. please don't laugh at me...)
So, here we go:
BEFORE - Taken in April 2008 (about a month before I found out I was pregnant)

AT 14 WEEKS:

So, showing? A little bit, I think...

I have to brag a little

I guess I've stumbled across something really good. I came up with my little owl as kind of a secondary thought after I made a monster for a special order. I found the owl fabric and thought "well, that might be cute." And I made the owl. I first posted in on my shop 5 days ago, on Thursday. And, as of this morning, I've sold FIVE! WOW! So, I guess I need to keep making owls!


















On of the moms who bought an owl wrote a sweet article on her blog about my shop. Check it out here: Woolly Mom

And for MORE bragging, another of my new creations made it to the front page of Etsy! For those of you who aren't Etsy-addicts like me, this is a BIG DEAL! I've only had one other item land there and that was clear back before Christmas! I've already had tons of views because of it! I'm doing a happy dance!!


(see the spider? that's mine!!)
A couple of my EtsyBABY friends are there too! The penguin (upper left corner) is from Tadpolecreations, and the cute little diaper cover is from RaeGun. They both have great shops - check them out!

EtsyBABY is featured in the Storque!

I love being a part of the EtsyBABY team on Etsy! It's a great group of gals that all share one thing in common - we make stuff for babies!
Jen of GoldtoneDesigns and Annie from myminimocs are our wonderful team leaders. They work SO hard at getting our team out there and noticed by as many people as possible. Today, they put together an article for the Storque (the Etsy newsletter) and it is just awesome! Be sure to check it out!



And, if you're shopping for baby stuff, right now is the perfect time because The EtsyBABY© Street Team is having a SUPER SUMMER SALE! Stock up on those baby essentials now, while you have the chance!
Be sure to visit, http://ShopEtsyBABY.com/customer to see the 32 participating EtsyBABY© boutique's and the specials each shop is offering! (I'm offering 15% off - just mention EtsyBABY when you are checking out! ;)

Imaginary Friend

Several months ago, Zander came to me and said, "I have a new friend."
"Oh really?" I said, "What's his name?"
"Ted."
"Where'd you meet him?"
"Daddy took me to his house."
At this point I was racking my brain, trying to think of anyone we know named Ted.
"What does he look like?"
"He's a kid like me. And he's a bear."
OH! I finally realized that this is an imaginary friend.
He went on to describe in great detail exactly what Ted looked like, where he lived, what is family is like and on and on.

Ted has been with us for quite a while now. He's become part of the family. When we play games, Ted plays too. Sometimes Ted's sister, and mommy and daddy join in. (They are all named Ted as well.)
Last week, Zander and Ted had a fight while we were in the car. Zander said, "Mommy! Ted keeps hitting me!"
I said, "You tell Ted that he needs to stop it, or we'll throw him out the window."
Ted didn't stop, so we threw him out the window.
But, he caught up to us later and told Zander he was sorry for hitting him. So they are friends again now.

I asked Zander to draw a picture of Ted, and this is what he came up with. "The brown stuff is his fur."



Oh what an active imagination my son has!

RAIN!

We live in Phoenix, so we don't get rain very often. Yesterday it POURED for at least half an hour. Brandon, being the fun daddy that he is, told the kids to put on rain boots and go play in the rain.

They got soaking wet, but had lots of fun!

(Oh and I should mention that the pirate pants that Zander is wearing came from mamaziel. YES I'm an Etsy addict!)

Potty Training - and other yucky stuff

We have made a goal to have Ady completely potty trained before the new baby comes. I think we may do it, but it is such a long, and disgusting process!
She is genuinely interested, and we've had lots of success, especially in the last few days. I've decided that timing is everything. For a long time, she would tell me she had to go potty, and then go sit on the potty for 2 seconds, then get up and say "All done." She'd usually have a messy diaper within 10 minutes. Very frustrating.
But, a few days ago, I put her on the potty right after she got up from her nap because I realized that her diaper was still dry. And she went! It was so exciting! And then she went an hour or so later. And even went #2! Yippee! (Although cleaning out the potty seat after she is done is not a pleasant experience).
I've started letting her wear panties at home, and she's done pretty good with them. Her favorites are her "Ooh ooh Aah Aah" panties. (Curious George)


She's had just a few accidents. I can deal with the wet accidents. But poop in panties is NO fun. I threw up after a cleaned up that one...
Speaking of throw up, I didn't even try to use the potty yesterday because she woke up screaming and covered in throw up. So I had enough of a mess to deal with. She threw up a few more times that morning, but by noon she seemed to be feeling much better. I just hope that the rest of us don't end up with whatever bug she had.
Today, she told me she had to potty, and went #2. So, I think we are still making progress!

In other news - Brandon's surgery has FINALLY been scheduled. Next Wednesday morning. I think it's crazy that he has to wait 2 1/2 weeks from when he first went to the hospital. But at least he'll finally be able to get it taken care of!

My Weekend of Custom Orders

I had a really busy weekend in my shop! I was working on 3 custom orders!
I love getting custom requests because it forces me to get creative and think outside the box a little bit.

Custom order #1 - ZadySpider
This one is for a special little guy with Down's syndrome. His parents wanted to give him something to wear around his neck so that he always has something acceptable to chew on. It was a little tricky to get it the right size, but I think it turned out great!


Custom order #2 - Chic Pink and Brown Butterfly
This one was a request for the ever popular color combo of pink and brown. I had to search a little bit to find this fun fabric, but I think it turned out really great!


Custom order #3 - ZadyMonster
This one was really fun! The buyer's 3-year old son picked out the "Retro Robots" Zadyball in my shop, but started calling it a "ZadyMonster". She sent me a note and asked if It would be possible to put a monster face on the Zadyball. I thought it sounded like a fun idea, so I went for it! I think that this could really take off!


I just LOVE getting creative ideas for those that will actually be using my creations!

Vacation, Kidney Stones, and other stuff

We got home from vacation late Thursday night. It was SO nice to get away.
We went to Preston, Idaho (yes, home of Napoleon Dynamite) to visit my family. It was a LOOONNNNGGG drive! We decided to go the entire way in ONE day. We left our house at about 4:30am and didn't get there until nearly 11:00pm. With two kids, I was expecting the worst. But they were actually very well behaved. Thank goodness for portable DVD players!
But, I was sure that the kids would sleep for a lot of the trip. But they didn't. In fact, each of them only slept for about an hour the entire way! At different times, of course - to make my life a little more difficult.
I managed to catch a picture of Zander during his nap, using his AWESOME travel pillow I got from GoldToneDesigns. I got one for Ady too, but never managed to catch a picture of her using it.

Zander used to always wake up with a kink in his neck when he fell asleep in the car. He doesn't get that with this pillow! I like them so much, I might have to get one for myself!

Anyway, it was so much fun to spend time with family.
The kids with Grandma and Grandpa
Playing in the sand with some cousins (and other kids) at a church party



















And, I went to my 10 year high school reunion. It's amazing how much some people have changed.... And others, haven't.

---

It was VERY hard to come back home to the heat. I was worried that I'd have terrible morning sickness with traveling. Thankfully, I didn't! But, as soon as we got back to Phoenix, and I stepped out into the heat - ICK! It is NO fun to be pregnant when it's 115°.

Then, after we'd been home a couple days, and when we thought things were getting back to normal... My husband started having a terrible pain in his side. He has Crohn's Disease, and he's had kidney stones before, but he said this didn't feel anything like that. And his urine had turned an unnatural, deep red. So, I rushed him to the Emergency Room. (I'm so thankful for wonderful friends who were willing to take care of my children for me so I could go without worrying about them!)
After a few tests, it was determined that Brandon did in fact have a kidney stone. But, unlike the one's he'd had in the past, this one was 9mm (HUGE), and not going anywhere. There was nothing more they could do for us in the ER, so he was sent home with lots of pain killers and told to call a urologist.
He went to the urologist this morning, and found out that he will have to have surgery sometime next week to have it removed. Yippee. In the meantime, he is living on Vicoden and just trying to survive.