dance party!

Well, this giveaway has been way more fun than I could have imagined. If you're a new reader, Welcome! If you commented on Monday's post and outed yourself as a faithful reader, Thank You! Troy and Sara tweeted about my giveaway which makes me giggle like nothing else. I feel like quite the small fry to have so much new traffic coming my way!

So to celebrate all of this fun, I thought we'd throw a little dance party. Ivar is really into dancing from the knees up. He's not walking yet, so this special shuffle is pretty unique. He kills us.

It's not to late to enter the random music, books and candy giveaway! Click here to throw your name in the hat. I'll pick the lucky winner on Monday.

the big 800 and a big, whoppin' giveaway!

Wowza. Blogger changed its formatting a while back so that it included a running count of the posts you have written. And this, my friends, marks my eight hundredth blog post.

I started blogging 3 1/2 years ago. It began as a travel blog, documenting a road trip Rory and I were taking throughout Canada and the western half of the United States. This was the first image I posted in my very first post. A map of our planned roadtrip:

On that six week roadtrip I began taking photoshop classes through jessicasprague.com which opened up a whole new world of digital art, fonts, online scrapbooking... and so I started posting what I was learning, documenting the important things, like how much I love the Teriyaki restaurants out west.

And classy scrapbook layouts about our cat.

And lovely layouts showcasing the best picnic location we've ever found. (and we've enjoyed a lot of beautiful picnics...)

Once we returned home, we ended up hitting the road again and lived in Nebraska for two years while I worked as a program director at a Bible Camp. The blog morphed into an easy way to stay connected to friends and family back in Minnesota. I also got very crafty while in Nebraska. Sort of found a new passion out there for fabric and paper and ribbons and crop-o-diles.

And then we came back to Minnesota and had baby Ivar. And the blog became an incredible outlet for writing about mamahood, the gift of family and frankly, any thought or rambling under the sun.

It's no secret. I love to blog. I love, love, love it. And I love even more that YOU come to read. I have a very consistent readership and for that I am so, so grateful. I love this space. I love documenting life like this and I love the back and forth that a blog provides whether you comment, drop me a line or pick up the phone. It makes life more full.

So to celebrate, I am going to do my FIRST EVER GIVEAWAY!!! At least, I think it's my first ever. Have I done this before?

I am putting together a smattering of my very favorite things. Including: my two favorite cd's: Andrew Peterson's Counting Stars and Sara Groves' Invisible Empires (or, if you already have this album, which you might because my blog readers tend to be Sara listeners...you can pick from any of her cd's), haribo fruit salad gummies, the Jesus storybook bible, bridge mix, and the greatest little Q and A 5-year-journal a lucky blog reader could hope for. People, all told, this is over a $60 value. And it's stuff you're going to love. Or love to eat. And love to listen to.

Now I'm going to get gimmicky on you. I'm going to do the whole leave a comment to win thing. But I'm also going to go the route of if you tweet about this giveaway and/or mention this in your facebook status and/or your blog you may enter three more times. And finally, if you are a follower or become a follower, you get to enter one more time. Up to five times. Stop me now, people.

Recap of the five ways to enter:
1. Leave a comment telling me your favorite kind of candy (I changed the settings! It's super easy now!!!)
2. Tweet about this giveaway with a link to this post or blog
3. Update your facebook status with a link to this blog
4. Become a follower. If already following leave a comment telling me you already follow
5. Mention this giveaway on your own blog

Now, the small print. This giveaway is open to EVERYONE. Even my mom. Even Rory's mom. In fact, if either of you won, it would be quite handy not having to pay the shipping. Former employees of mine (heh) may also enter. If you were ever my Sunday school teacher, or even better...if I was ever your Sunday school teacher, you had better leave a comment. If you're brand new to this blog you can enter. If you've been here since the beginning you may enter too. If you've been silently following and never commented before I want you to leave a comment the very most. Pretty please!

I will announce the winner next Monday. You've got one week!

So that's that. 800 blog posts. It's a whole lot of words. It's a lot of thoughts, stories and ideas. So, so happy I've kept this thing up. Here's to another 800.

valentine cookies

Today's crafting took the form of baking. And for good reason. We have two guys here working on our bathroom this week. We are getting a new tub, ceiling, window, wall tile, paint color, mirror, light fixture and sink fixture. Basically everything is changing except the existing floor, toilet and sink. I could not be more excited.

All of this excitement means two things: 1) this pregnant girl can't go to the bathroom every seventeen minutes as usual. Today we went to the zoo with friends and that was a good idea for a number or reasons, but largely so I was a bit closer to the facilities. We plan on going again tomorrow. 2) Ivar adores these two men. He stands at the gate and watches them and laughs. And when they use loud tools he chuckles so loud like they're just trying to be funny for his entertainment.

Here, the guy was showing me the options for the wall tile but Ivar kept tossing him a ball over the gate, and he played and played with Ivar until I told him he would never get out of this game if he didn't just walk away.

So I made the workers some cookies this afternoon. I spotted the valentine's m&m's at Target last night and decided they were necessary. Which was a big decision because we are tightening up our budget big time and purchases like this have to later be defended as to why they were necessary. But after making these adorable cookies, I would say it's obvious why they were necessary. (I used this recipe and it's great. Pretty classic for an oatmeal and m&m cookie.)

a work in progress

Today I got out a tiny 3x5 canvas frame and made the background above with tissue paper and modge podge. This picture makes it seem a lot bigger than it is. But it's tiny. I am planning on putting a little song bird on top of it all, but Rory is very concerned I'll ruin it, and would like me to keep it just the way is. Not sure what it has to do with hearts, but it was crafty. 

But if we're talking little hearts, today I did make my next ob appointments and I now have the dates for our next heartbeat appointment and...the ultrasound!

Naturally, I got out some fun paper and made a chain with 49 loops, counting down until the day they goop my belly and we get to see the baby growing inside. Now if that isn't a project fit for hearts-and-crafts week, I don't know what is. Paper loops and staples all marking the time until we see the little life inside of me pumping its own beating heart.

heart wreath

Yesterday was a great start to hearts-and-crafts week. Two things that helped this: I have a bad cold which means we're not doing anything other than laying low at home. And the tv is off. That really helps in the productivity department. Oh, and one more...pinterest. I have ideas unending after a look around the valentine craft ideas on this site. But I am treating pinterest like a new addictive drugs. I can tell if I get to close, I might get sucked in and never come out. So for now, I'm just browsing. Not participating with my own page. But talk about a kid in a candy shop. Wow.

I found this wreath idea through pinterest on this site. Adorable, easy, and would have gotten done a lot more quickly if I didn't have a one-year-old crushing my hearts as I made them. Crafting with Ivar is a whole new experience, but he loves it. Loves the paper cutter, loves the stapler, loves the ribbon. It's all new and he's so interested in my toys. I don't blame him. They're fun toys.