Toddler Busy Board

I don't know how long I can keep it up, but I'd like to try to go as long as I can. That is, making the boys their Christmas present.

We have a three-gift rule we follow for the kids. Each kid gets three gifts. Just as the Wise Men brought three gifts for Jesus.

Last year I made the boys a Lego / Train Table. It is a hit! The boys ask to play trains all. the. time. Because Mr. Brigglesworth is so young, we haven't flipped it over to play Legos yet. But, I've got the Lego collection started and am just waiting!!

So, this year I made a Busy Board for the Boys Christmas present.

All I had to buy was the hardware at the home improvement store.

I cut a board from the left over I had when making Little JCrew's twin beds.

I just laid out all my pieces so that I knew how big I needed it.

I then used the paint I used on my front door to paint the piece of wood.

I tried to get a variety of the types of latches.

Ones that used a wide range of motion.

My favorite is the window sash lock.

The cabinet keyed lock is one of Little JCrew's favorites. The only thing I have left to do, is use a ribbon to attach the key to the board. The boys haven't figured out that the key can come out. But once they do, if that key is not attached, we will lose it!

I showed it to the boys to get these pictures.

It's close enough to the holiday, but I'll still keep it in the closet until Christmas Day.

I'm so glad they like it.

My mom says I'm teaching them how to get into things and I will be in trouble soon. Ha! I'm already in trouble with the two of them together, how much more can there be?

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas with their family and friends.

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

I jumped on the train, a little late, but I’m on it!

I saw this idea many years ago and said I would do it when my kids were old enough. I could have done it last year, but I was still a sleep-deprived new momma and had no energy.

It wasn’t that hard. Maybe took me thirty minutes TOTAL!

I bought a yard of green felt in the fabric department and then got felt pieces in the craft department. Although, I just saw at Target last Friday that they have a felt tree in a box already ready to hang. It was $10, but they had a 50% off coupon. 

My fabric was 37 inches wide and I made an executive decision the tree would be four feet tall.

I’m a symmetrical gal and my shapes need to be near perfect. My tree would have four tiers (each 12 inches) and the top tier would be 12 inches wide. I then was looking for how wide the middle two layers needed to be. I wanted them to evenly and gradually get bigger.

I used a Magna Doodle from the toy basket to write my fancy calculations. Mr. JCrew jumped in and our brains work so differently. We both got the same answer, but we went around the pole in opposite directions.

I didn’t mean to, but my edges came out “edgey.” Went perfect with the look of branches on the tree.

I used a puzzle piece to cut out the ornaments, and a plate to get a curved line for the garland.

I then used Commmand Strips of Velcro to get the tree on to the wall. The boys LOVE it.

Little JCrew lined up most of the ornaments. My little organizer, melts my heart.

Mr. Brigglesworth loved it, too. I’m doing a daily count of the ornaments to make sure the little guy doesn’t make off with them and throw them away. (He is so good, too good, at throwing things away.)

Actually, I'm not having to watch Mr. Brigglesworth as much as I'm having to watch Kates! She pulls those ornaments right off. Her favorite are the green candycanes. If it's low, she just goes up to the tree and bites it off.

We already have a little tree the boys can’t touch, but now they have their own that they can mess up all day.

Cookies

My tummy hurts! It’s a good hurt. 

Last weekend was full of cookies and sweets.

I made a Pumpkin Roll and I’m still eating it this week.

I love those things.

It was a normal cookie exchange, but I provided some non-cookie things to balance out the sugar.

I never get to hang with the ladies, and it’s hard to find babysitters, so we made it a playdate. The kids had sooo much fun. There were 15 of them!

We even had crafts to make and my boys have them displayed on our windows.

Haven’t figured out where to put our manger scene.

And while we had the chance, the moms got their picture taken.

You can tell the kids that love their momma’s! Except my children are swapped. Little JCrew is a Daddy’s boy. Mr. Brigglesworth was too busy being busy to notice what we were doing. Little JCrew was interested in the camera.

I love getting the kids together. Any excuse I can come up with, I will. Such a great group of kids. Thanks, Ladies!

Adding Onto My BabyFood Jars

 

I painted the bottoms of 13 babyfood jars to turn them into vases. Then I painted five of them bright colors to use as crayon storage. I didn’t throw away the lids. No, sir. Treasure jars need lids to keep the treasures inside.

I’ve been wanting to find something to paint with chalkboard paint. I’ve had this itch in my hand to do it. I’ve even entertained the idea of painting a sliver of chalkboard in the kitchen, but it makes me nervous, so I back off and look for something else to do.

To satisfy the chalkboard affair, I decided to paint the lids of the babyfood jars.

The JCrew boys can then label their treasure jars with the date it was collected or what is actually in there. Or they can put their name on it.

I’ve had the tops painted for a while, but was on the search for chalk. I didn’t want to make a special trip anywhere for it, but never saw any other than sidewalk chalk.

I got out the chalk and Little JCrew helped me decorate.

He actually stacked the jars to make a tower.

Then they fell.

I love the chalkboard paint. It’s one of those things I love so much that I want to do it everywhere. But I have to remind myself that less is more. I have to put down the brush and stop.

It’s funny that I waited so long to post about this. It was perfect timing actually. Little JCrew already has a treasure jar full of random things my dad put in his pants when he wears pockets over to their house. Last Friday Mr. Brigglesworth wore pants with pockets so he came home with pockets full of treasures!

I did not discover the treasures. Mr. JCrew did. When I got home he said he had to show me what he found in Mr. Brigglesworth’s pockets. He thought my parents were playing a joke on him. I took one look at the random collection and said, “They are his treasures!”

Now both boys have the start to their collection. And don’t worry, they don’t play with their treasures right now. Definitely not age appropriate to play unsupervised.

Baby B's Sewing Project

You may remember with Little JCrew that I made quite a few onesies for him.

 I will be able to reuse those onesies, except for the ones with a "w" on them.

My sister took some great photos while she visited after Little JCrew's birth, and I wanted to have the same outfits for Baby B to take photos in. So, I created some onesies with the letter "b" on them.

I was resourceful and pulled out white onesies I already had from Little JCrew and used the same fabric too. However, I wanted a different color for Baby B's letter. So, I used some left over fabric from my camera strap project and also from the pillowcase project.

I use iron-on adhesive to get the letters on the onesie, then I stitch it on there.

Stitching gives it that final touch.

Oh, and I also created matching shirts for the boys to wear in the hospital. Little JCrew already has one "Big Brother" shirt that he used to make the announcement, but I thought this was cute too. It's a simple iron-on patch from Hobby Lobby.

Now all I have to do is order boxers for Baby B just like Little JCrew's for more pictures.

Bottle Labels

Now that we know what Baby J is, the first thing I did was start ordering personalized things. Most things I had gotten before I knew the baby's gender were generic with “Jenson” written on them. I called Mr. JCrew “Jenson” when we first started dating, but that was because his military buds called him that. Plus, I was fond of the name and wanted to say it more often. :)

So, most burp cloths we have are monogrammed with “Jenson.”

Hey, they’ll work for all my future kids too!

I even bought a cute market tote that can be used for anything (I plan to keep mine in the car) and got “Jenson” put on it.

Then I also bought labels for clothes and other things that just say "Property of the Jenson Family."

But I wanted personalized things with the baby’s actual name. I had spotted these before and then saw them again at Abigail’s party on Emme’s cup.

You can put them on bottles, cups, thermos’s, anything and they help identify your child’s things quickly.

I knew with so many of my friends having babies, that there would be a lot of cups hanging out at any given time, that I needed to quickly be able to tell if my child had the right cup or someone else’s.

In This Post:

Baba minilabels; pack of 5 for $25

Mint Julep Monograms; Burp cloths and Market Tote

TexMark; Clothing Iron-on Tags; 100 for $10

Also available: Inchbug Orbit Labels for bottles; 4 for $12.95