birthdays, 1st communion, ballet exams + a wedding

So the past few months have been jam packed with activity here at the Little Papercuts home. Besides planning for a new baby, we've also seen my son's 5th birthday, my daughter's 1st communion and ballet exam, not to mention that I was matron-of-honour for a friend's wedding just recently. We were hoping for a relaxing summer, but with the 'mini papercut' arriving in mid-October, things are in full swing around here!

























My son turned 5 at the end of January and we threw him a big WALL-E themed birthday party, complete with a life-sized WALL-E I made from a few cardboard boxes. Needless to say, my little one loved it, as did the other kids and their parents! It really does go to show that no matter how many toys you have, kids will inevitabley want to play with a cardboard box:)























My daughter also celebrated her 1st communion and participated in her very first ballet exam. We are extremely proud of her, as she is with herself, and we're happy to report that she received a PERFECT grade on her ballet exam!!!!























Because this was her first year in a real ballet class, we weren't sure as to how she would fare, and to be completely honest we would have been happy had she just passed...but she showed us! We're taking a break right now from the summer ballet session, but she's looking forward to starting up again in the fall.























As for the wedding, I won't be posting any pics from it, due in part to the fact that I was almost 6 months pregnant, it was raining and I was extremely hungry when a good portion of the pics were taken. That's not to say that the wedding was not beautiful and a really wonderful event...I just won't be posting any pics:)

so much to catch up on

So yes, it's been about 5 months since I've spent any time to blog, and while I feel terribly about it, I do have a few valid reasons. The biggest of them all being that I am currently in my 6th month of pregnancy:) When I first found out back in February, I was immediately thrown into a whirlwind of project completion, not to mention HORRIBLE morning/all-day sickness. Honestly, I wasn't sure the the nausea would ever subside, but I'm happy to report that those days are gone! But between trying to tie up loose ends with work and trying to function while sick with 2 other kids to tend to, my blog has been neglected.

I've had my ups and downs so far with this pregnancy, but so far so good! Unfortunately this has also meant that all Little Papercuts artwork is being put on the back burner. Thankfully I was able to complete all the orders that came in right before the morning sickness kicked in, but it also meant that I have had to cease taking any new orders for the time being. While this has made me very sad, I'm happy to say that I do look forward to being able to do artwork again once the baby is born and into a bit of a routine. So to those of you who are willing to wait, 'thank-you'.

Having said that I will be posting pics of artwork that was completed prior to my 'hiatus', as well as my new project...the nursery! I am very excited about my new baby nursery, partially because I LOVE kids' spaces, but mostly because it means I will finally be able to renovate my bedroom...which I hate!!! So stay tuned, there'll be lots of stuff to write about:)

babies, babies + more babies

For those of you who have been following my blog, I had mentioned some time ago a nursery I had decorated for a girlfriend of mine who was having her first baby, a little girl named Sydney. While her husband had posted a very blurry pic of said room on his Facebook account, and received numerous compliments on it :) , I have yet to post any pics myself. So for those of you who've been waiting, I thank you!























This is the first nursery I've designed, that didn't belong to my own kids, but I've been busy with my sister-in-law's nursery recently...she's expecting twins within the next 2 weeks, a boy and a girl (incidentally the palette is very similar to Sydney's because my sister-in-law loved this nursery so much). I'm also giving a hand to my sister muffintopdesigns who has her own mini-muffin due at the end of April. Pics of the twins nursery as well as the mini-muffin's pad will follow shortly, but for now hope you enjoy Sydney's nursery!



















Sydney's room was quite a challenge seeing as the room itself is only about 10'x10' and three of the four walls are comprised of sliding french doors or sliding glass doors that lead out to the balcony of her parents' condo. Oh, and did I mention the room is really a den, which means there are NO closets! Needless to say storage was an issue in this room, but we were able to create a clean uncluttered appearance by choosing pieces that utilized not only the horizontal space, but took advantage of the vertical space as well.























By incorporating a long low dresser that does double duty as a change table and clothing storage, and placing tall bookcases on either side, we created the look of a built-in piece, but all of the individual pieces can easily be used once the family moves into a larger home, whether it be in Sydney's new room or else where around the house. We were also able to find great storage boxes at Loblaws ( a grocery store, for those of you outside of Canada) that house extra diapers, blankets and clothing that need to be grown into, all of which are hidden neatly under the crib.




















The colour palette of the room adds to the modern grown-up feel of the space, while the over sized flower that graces the wall above the crib adds a touch of whimsy that every little girl deserves. I've always felt that while kids'rooms need to be fun and playful, they needn't be filled with cartoon characters that most kids quickly outgrow. For me, a child's room should have as much detail and attention paid to it as any other room in the house, if not more. Originally Sydney's mom had said that the doors that led into the living room would be closed off once the baby arrived, but after completing the nursery she chose to keep the doors open because she loved the room so much! Now if that's not a compliment, I don't know what is:)

BUSY, BUSY, BUSY!!!!

Life has been so hectic and so busy in my neck of the woods, I've had absolutely no time to update my blog. I'm so ashamed, but glad to report that my absence has been due to the loads of work I've been doing! Orders have been steady even though my website is STILL not finished, so I have no complaints. I am really hopeful that it will finally be completed sometime within the next couple of months, but I will have to find some free time to focus on it.

So, the last few months have been crazy, to put it mildly. It's like this every year for us, beginning in November and finally coming to a halt in February. And this year it's been no different. My daughter celebrated her 7th birthday in November, followed by Christmas, Christmas concerts, new ballet classes, New Year's and a January filled with 8 birthdays and Chinese New Year. Not to mention that within the next couple weeks, our family will be welcoming twins! My sister-in-law is having twins, a boy and a girl, and we've been preparing the nursery...sorry no pics yet, but they'll be coming soon.

I'll be updating everyone within the next few days with lots of pictures of orders that were completed and new projects I've been working on. And as promised, there will be pictures of the nursery I completed almost a year ago, as well as the nursery for the twins.

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season! I know we did, and our new year is already off to a great start:)

happy halloween

I know, I know...the last time I posted I had said that I would be blogging more often. This was probably more a promise to myself more than anyone else, but again I have lapsed in this area.
However, something incredibly exciting happened to me today and I have to write about it.

Last week, by chance, I was looking on the HGTV website for inspiration for my bedroom...hubby and I are planning on redecorating our room, but that's another story, and I clicked on their blog. There was a photo challenge for great kid's spaces, so I decided to enter my son's room and a girlfriend's nursery (yes I know I still haven't posted pics of that one, but I will soon). Well I only had time to upload the pics of my son Alex's room, so I sent it off the HGTV with the intention of uploading the nursery pics sometime today...October 31st was the deadline. Soooo, I log into my e-mail to send HGTV another e-mail when what do I see in my inbox...a message from HGTV saying I WON!!!! I could not believe it! I've never entered anything like this before, nevermind won anything. I am over the moon!

And what did I win, you might ask, I won a kid's docking station for their ipods, cell phones, etc.., but more importantly HGTV is going to put the pictures of Alex's room up on their website! This is all so exciting that I had to share!

Anyway, besides all of this excitement, we are getting the kids ready for trick-or-treating tonight. Thankfully the weather is co-operating and it doesn't look like it's gonna be as cold as it's been the past few nights. Gotta go get everyone's costumes ready...so have a very HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

wow...it's been awhile

Well, it's been almost 3 months since I've posted anything. Summer was so much fun that there was no time to blog! But I am grateful that the kids have gone back to school...it was next to impossible to get any work done while they were home! So there's a lot to catch up on and I've got a ton of pics to post, I don't think I can do it all in one entry but here goes.























Our summer was filled with tons of fun, and a few scares too! We tried to keep busy doing stuff outside, and we were lucky there was an abundance of activities to do! While we spent most of our time at the splash park by our house, the kids also got to do a lot of bike riding, and we did our share of exploring around our neighborhood! We were also lucky enough to visit a farm, which the kids LOVED!!! We were there for a birthday party, but we promised ourselves to go back again. We also went to Paramount Canada's Wonderland, an amusement park close to our house...again a big hit with the kids. Hopefully we'll be able to get there again before they close in November, but we'll see how everything works out. We did still manage to get in some shopping, and a quick trip to Buffalo, NY to look for some great deals. All I really remember about that day was that everyone was kinda cranky and it was very HOT!!!























But we also had some mishaps...my youngest had one allergy scare when we were at a relatives house (I'm not even gonna go into it because it still makes me really angry!), and then last month he had a horrible infection that had us visiting the ER. But everything was OK in the end, and all the fun far outweighed any of the drama. But with school starting up again, and hope for me that I'd finally get some work done, September started off fast and crazy for us! My daughter started Grade 2, and my son began JK. It was a very exciting, and scary, time for us...not to mention that we haven't had a break since it started! We've been bombarded with birthdays, play dates, dentist appointments, fender benders, eye appointments and classes for first communion.























AND to top it off this weekend is just as busy as the last few! We have an outing with Grandma tomorrow (the kids have a PA day), 2 birthday parties on Saturday and we're going apple picking on Sunday. Not to mention all the work I need to finish! I'll post later about all of the work that I didn't do over the summer, and all the work I've had to do this month to catch up!!!

happy canada day

Happy Canada Day!! So school is out and the summer activities begin...so to speak. I have a ton of work to do, and I'm finding it really hard to get into the swing of things. With the kids running around the house, and toys all over the place, it's hard to get motivated to do art! Plus we just got the kids new bikes, and the weather's been beautiful so we haven't really been inside all that much. School finished last Wednesday and since then we've spent almost every day out! In the past 5 days we've been to the water park, biking riding every day and to the mall a couple times. Today it's sooo sunny outside ( and Canada Day too!) and of course the kids want to go biking AGAIN! I'm not sure how much work I'm gonna get done this summer, but I've got 4 orders that need to be finished by the end of July, 2 kids rooms to decorate and I'd like to repaint our master bedroom. I'm hoping that by blogging about this it might motivate me to work...or at least guilt myself into doing so:) I hope you all have a great Canada Day, even if you're not in Canada!! I think I have to work now:(