DIY birthday shirts!!!

Every year around my kids birthdays m, I walk past all of those cute birthday shirts in he store and think about buying them, but it has always seemed like kind of a waste to me for a shirt they are only going to wear a few times (at most).  So this year I decided to try a new adventure, making my own birthday shirts for the kids!? I saw the initial technique on YouTube and it seemed easy enough..so I went to Walmart and gathered my supplies

This is what I came home with the first time 

I got two shirts, one for each kid I was doing a shirt for, felt, glitter, tape, fabric glue, and fabric markers....

After I had all of my supplies arranged I started our.... My son Cole had requested a dinosaurs shirt so I found a picture in one of his coloring books and cut it out.... Ended up with this

I wound up also cutting out his head and eyes to make sure I got the correct placement....

It was at about this point that I really started to worry about putting the felt on the shirts, I talked to my mom, who is a avid sewer and she said it would probably shrink when washed.... Since I am hoping for them to wear these shirts more of hen once I decided to change my tactic......

Back to Walmart I went 

I also printed off a temp let for my daughter Caroline's shirt while I was at it....

I took the same templet.....

Glued on felt eye....

And came up with....

This..

Also my son requested a little bit of glitter on his shirt.... (He had seen the ton I brought home for Caroline's shirt)

After I put the glitter in the eyes and colored in the body it looked like this.

I added a number 5 and his bane and we were done!!!

After I finished Cole's shirt I moved on to Caroline's...

The process was pretty much the same. Here are some pictures....

Here are both of them finished....

I added some glittery felt to the pony and a to of glitter to the 2....

They turned out pretty well but they were not perfect..the young man I mentor saw a pixie of them and said.... Those look professional.... Almost (haha) ..oh well hopefully they enjoy them...and I can keep them as a keep sake long after they grow out of them!!

Peace and love!!!

Easter Egg Wreath

CRAZY TIMES and UPDATE!!!!

Yeah, so I started this blog in October and pretty much didn't come back to it for 3 months...I am really planning to stay around this time I promise...We have had a crazy few months.
At the end of October we decided that we would take a step in the direction of Foster Care and Adoption.  We started the classes with the same agency when Caroline was about 6 months old and changed our minds because it really wasn't the right time to work towards anything other then being the best parents we could to the 3 children we had.  But this October seemed like a good time.We were able to pick up where we left off with the same instructor! All seemed to be going well except dealing with some illness in the family and having to cancel a few times.  Then, at the end of November, I read in the paper that our instructor had been arrested in conjunction with child abuse charges (!!)  Crazy I know......Anyway, we promptly decided that this is not the agency to be working with.
 Honestly at this point we are probably going to go after the idea of international adoption of a special needs child or children....I know there is a lot of controversy on this subject, I have heard it from a lot of people, including my best friend who is in the process of adopting a child from the foster care system, don't get me wrong I know there are tons of kids here in the states that need loving families. I am mentoring 2 former foster children right now. (Both of which I feel very close to and love dearly.)
But honestly there are kids all over the world who need homes, I'm not saying that at some point we won't go back to the US system but right now we are looking in the international direction.
So to that end....we are SAVING....both of us are donating plasma to help us raise money, we don't know what country we are after yet but we are waiting on God to lead us.
In other news....Caroline, poor thing, is on her EIGHTH ear infection this year! We saw the ENT Dr over the summer and he was hopeful at the tine that the tubes in her ears might grow enough that she would come out of this without having to have surgery (tubes placed).  No such luck....we have had 2 this fall already.....So I am going to call the ENT on Monday and try to get her in.
Had Liam's IEP meeting at the beginning of December, and they were very helpful, although we still struggle with eye issues with him, The school luckily is doing their best to help him succeed!!
Stay tuned.....

Flipagram - 2 years of Caroline Alexa