Ava's Closet Giveaway

Hello Lovelies! 

It's been a while since we gave away something on the ole' blog here. Since I'm going to be adding new stuff to Ava's Closet, I decided to giveaway a piece to you my lovely readers here on the blog first! 

Do you remember her? 

Here's the deets:

- child to adult size headband

- 1 prize will be awarded

- will only ship within the USA

- contest runs from now until Friday Oct. 1st 11:59 PM Mountain Time

- will announce the winner Saturday morning Oct. 2nd 

- winner will be chosen by Random.org

Here's how to Enter: 

- Leave a comment and tell me if you'd keep her for yourself or give her to someone special!

Want extra entries? (please leave a separate comment for each)

- Become a public follower of Worley House (sign up with Google to the right)

- Add my blog button to your blog and leave me a comment telling me that you did

- Tweet about this giveaway

- Blog about this giveaway

- Vote for us on Top Mommy Blogs (to the right)

- Vote for Ava's Nursery on Project Nursery (to the right)

- "Like" Ava's Closet on Facebook

- Follow the Ava's Closet Blog (http://shopavascloset.blogspot.com)

Happy Entering, hope you all have a lovely day! 

A Day In September

September 24th, 2010:

6 am wake up call by the babe. I nurse her for a bit and then hand her off to Hubby who is awake. He has the day off and is looking forward to spending his day with his girls. :)

After laying in bed for a bit the 3 of us, I get up around 7:45 am to start making breakfast for my Hubby. As promised it's biscuits & gravy for my Husband today:

 After getting breakfast started I went back to check on Orion & Ava and found this: 

 I decided to let them sleep, while I continued making my breakfast, this stuff is a labor of love not to be rushed, so while it was cooking.....

 I threw in a load of baby clothing, it was laundry day in our home. It's not glamorous by any means and since I only do it about every two weeks for us adults and about 1 time a month for the little one (she's got tons of clothing options)we've got tons to wash & fold on days like these. 

By now, it's about 8:30 am and I'm sitting down checking my email, daily swag and blogs for the morning. 

By 9 am I go to wake up Orion, we leave Ava sleeping for a while longer and the two of us ate breakfast & chatted over coffee that morning. I love when he has his days off like this. They are slow simmering kinda mornings. No rush. 

 Around 10:30 am Orion leaves to go get the oil changed on the car, and make a few other minor repairs while I start on this: 

At 12:30 pm Ava finally wakes up from her morning nap  and sits quietly playing. We nurse for a bit, then read some books, sing silly songs, and I snap just a few pictures of her. 

 While Ava played for a little while longer I started on folding more laundry, this time Ava's. While listening to a podcast or two. Orion called and let me know repairs were going to take longer than expected. So we waited for Daddy to come home. 

 Around 2 pm Ava goes down for her late afternoon nap. 

 A few minutes later, I went in and got her because she was screaming and crying at the top of her lungs. I guess she just needed her Mama. I was happy to oblige. 

 Around 3:30 Orion finally got home and we got ready to hit the road to go to a youth bowling event that afternoon. But, first I made this with my left over coffee from the morning. 

 I'm pretty sure it's been ages since I went to a real bowling alley and actually bowled. But none the less I got my shoes, picked my ball and bowled like I was 16 again. It was fun. 

 Family photo at the bowling alley. 

5:30 pm Orion & I checked our shoes back in and headed to Goodyear, AZ to have dinner with my blog friend Destiny. We were meeting Destiny and her family for the very first time and having dinner at their home. 

I was a little nervous but excited at the same time to meet Destiny and her family, but we had an amazing time with them. The conversation flowed and we laughed and laughed so hard that evening. I'm so glad we finally got to meet. 

By 9 pm, we were headed back down the road back here to Glendale home. We put Ava back to sleep in her crib watched an episode of 'The Office' and then headed to bed. 

By 10:30 pm we were sleeping fools, it had been a long day. We were pooped! 

Linking up to Mrs. B's

A Day in September

Check out all the other ladies

who are linking up and read

about their days in September.

Blog Roll Monday: A Place For Us

I discovered this blog almost a year ago, I immediately fell in love with Destiny's decorating style, her sense of humor and her adorable family! Let me introduce you A Place For Us, if you've never read this blog before get ready because you'll be hooked. 

Over the past year I've been inspired by her many home decor projects, and her baking abilities just to name a few. Once I discovered that she and her family live right here in Arizona I was even more excited that she was local and secretly hoped our blog friendship would blossom and one day we'd meet. Last weekend we finally did, and I can say that she's just as genuine and sweet in person as she comes across on her blog. 

http://aplaceforusfour.blogspot.com

If you haven't heard of her blog or checked it out before, I invite you to take some time to catch up on her blog. And have a pen handy to write down all the inspiration you get from her sweet blog and for all the projects you'll be drooling over and dying to try next! 

Happy Monday Everyone! 

{DIY} Flower Headband

I saw this great tutorial this week on a blog I was reading. I decided to take the same method and do a little tweaking and make this myself. This is a really easy project however very time consuming. But, I knocked it out during one of Ava's nap times and I'm really happy with the way they turned out. I'm planning on making a bunch to put up in my Etsy shop: Ava's Closet. 

Here's what you'll need for this project:

- 1/2 yd. of fabric in two colors or ones that coordinate well together

- Hot glue gun

- Scissors

- two different size circles (for tracing a pattern)

- 1 headband

- jewels, buttons, or anything you want to go in the center of your flower

Ok, now that you've got your supplies let's get crafting:

Isn't she pretty??!!!?

I'm going to call her Madison. She and her friends will be for sale in Ava's Closet very soon! 

Be Creative Challenge

Week #34

Watch Me Grow: 6 Months

Friday, Ava turned six months old! I can hardly believe how fast these last six months have gone by. Orion and I are both trying to treasure each and every day we have with our beautiful daughter as we know this time is flying by so fast. 

She will go to the doctor next Wednesday for her 6th month appointment. I'm excited to see her progress, not excited for shots at all! 

Enjoy this photo! :) 

Meeting Dave

Last week I got a random call from a number I didn't recognize, I almost didn't answer it but I decided to this time. It was a lady on the other end letting me know that I'd won the radio contest for tickets to see Dave Ramsey in Phoenix this coming week. 

Our connection group at church is going through is book, and on a whim I decided to enter this contest. I never thought I'd win. But, I was pleasantly surprised to win VIP tickets, special seating & a meet and greet with Dave! How awesome is that!?!

 (Me & Dave)

I took my friend Jessica. We got there early for the sound check and meet and greet! We ended up winning some really cool prizes and getting a lot of FREE product just for being in the right place at the right time and because we're totally awesome!! 

We had a really great time! I've been reading his book on finances for just a couple weeks now and listening to his pod casts everyday. It was really awesome to see him live and get some questions answered. It really helped wrap my mind around this whole financial things, and how to find true financial freedom. 

It was truly inspiring Thursday night to hear the amazing stories of people who are living debt free and paint of literally thousands of thousands of dollars worth of debt. 

I'd encourage anyone who is interested in finding some practical ways to get out of debt and manage your money better to check out Dave Ramsey's book or click here to go to his website to find out more.

One Lovely Blog Award

Jessica from The Bormann Twins gave this "lovely" award to our little blog here tonight! Jess and her Hubby Keith are parents to twin boys, that are oh so adorable! I went to high school with Keith, they live in Minnesota and I've been following their journey since their twins were born. 

Thanks for the award Jess! Now onto the rules of the award:

*****

1. Accept the award. Post it on your blog with the name of the person who has granted the award and his or her blog link.

2. Pay it forward to 15 other bloggers that you have newly discovered (Not all of these are "newly discovered").

3. Contact those blog owners and let them know they've been chosen.

Here are the 15 blogs I chose:

1.  Honey We're Home

2.  For This Child I Prayed 

3.  The House of Wood

4.  House of Smith's

5.  I've Got the Golden Ticket

6.  IHeart Organizing 

7.  Josiah's Nest

8. Life in the Fun Lane

9. Mama of M's

10. Our Daily Obsessions

11. My Crazy, unpredictable life

12. The McRae's

13. Virginia Living

14. Tart House

15. Meliessa's Blog

I hope you find some great new amazing blogs with some of the winners I've chosen. These ladies inspire me daily! 

Free Tip of the Week: Blog Give Aways

Last week I won some adorable bloomers from Giggles & Grins, this week I won some really cute custom invitations from Party Box Designs. 

How you ask?

I entered a blog giveaway! I've been entering blog giveaways on different blog sites I really for what seems forever, I never win but this week I got lucky I guess! And, I figure why not?!? 

It only takes a few minutes to enter, and there's some really awesome giveaways going on out in blog land these days. Here's just a few of my faves that are going on right now:

Megan from Honey We're Home is giving away a $50 gift card to Target! Who doesn't want that?!!!!!

Jess from Party Box Design is giving away a free blog makeover from 3 Cupcakes. 

Lyndsie always has amazing give aways going on on her blog called Lyndsie Gives Away, check out what she's got going on this week! 

Julie from Joy's Hope is hosting a giveaway from Bel Kai Designs, jump on over and see all the pretty things she has to offer & win! 

Enter them all, or just enter one. But, either way I hope you win something pretty and FREE!! 

Blogtrotting to Arizona

I want to say a BIG hello to all my Blogtrotting friends who are visiting us from all over the place! My husband and I are our adorable baby girl live in sunny and beautiful Glendale, Arizona. I lived up in Northern Arizona for a while but we've been living here in the Valley together for a year now. Living in Arizona is like waking up on vacation every single day, in my humble opinion. 

Sunny almost every single day of the year, with an option of should I or shouldn't I go to the pool today? I can drive North a couple hours and be in the mountains and snow and drive right back into the sun and warm temperatures! That's my kind of living! 

Glendale is home to some pretty amazing sights, sports teams, shopping and resorts in the greater Phoenix area. Today we're going to take a little tour of some of our favorite things to see and do in the Glendale area. 

Keep reading, let's take a tour! 

One of our all time fave & free things to do here is head out to West Gate City center, walk around, shop and eat at one of the local restaurants. There's shopping, tons of places to eat, a really fun fountain for the kids, and home to Jobing.com arena and the University of Phoenix Stadium where the Arizona Cardinals play. There's endless possibilities there for entertainment and fun! We like to grab a coffee or smoothing from Tully's, share it and walk around. It's pretty relax, and it's fun for our little family. 

On the 3rd Saturday of the month I like to head out bright and early to Momma's Organic Market and pick up some fresh and local produce from local farmers. This amazing farmer's market is located at Park West Shopping center in the parking lot. They have tons of local vendors, great produce, a petting zoo for the kids, face painting and more! I love going there and getting out for the morning and seeing what everyone has to offer. It's a great way to spend a Saturday! 

Also throughout the year the city of Glendale is home to some of the most amazing events like Glendale Glitters their annual Holiday celebration downtown, in the Spring the Glendale Chocolate Affair is home to lots and lots of yummy treats think the fair but everything involves chocolate! Check here for all the amazing events Glendale has going on this Fall. 

You can also take a stroll down historic downtown Glendale and eat at one of the local burger joints and do some antique shopping while you're at it. 

I hope you all have a chance to come visit us here in Glendale soon, happy blogtrotting everyone! 

{DIY} Baby Prints

A few months back when Ava was first born a friend gave us this imprint kit for Ava. It's been sitting around in a closet for a while now so this week I decided to get it out and start working on it. 

The frame originally looked this this:

I wasn't really a big fan of the finish, so I took out my little can of white spray paint and went to town covering the entire frame, let dry and did a couple more coats. 

Here's the after:

The kit comes with modeling clay there was some left over so I made both a foot print & hand print. 

I wrote the date, Ava's name and age on the back of these and let them dry completely for 24 hours before I moved along. 

Next, I added a picture to one side of the matting and used the other for the imprint. The kit comes with directions. But, I really think you could find all the supplies you need for these at Michael's or JoAnn's if you wanted to duplicate the same idea here. 

Here's what it looked like before I added the foot print:

And here's a little peek of it hanging on the wall in our hallway:

I decided after I hung this that the foot print needs a little something behind it to make it POP, I'm going to pick up some damask fabric that matches her room and fix that to the back of it. 

What about that hand print? I didn't forget about it, I've got something else up my sleeve that I'm going to use that for. Stay tuned. 

Be Creative Challenge

Week #33

Little Bloomers

I wanted to share with you the adorable little bloomers I won last week from Lyndsie Gives Away! They are from an adorable little Etsy shop called Giggles & Grins. I decided to do the monogram in red instead of pink, she already has so much stuff that's pink. Red reminds me of lady bugs and since we call Ava Jitterbug or Buggy I thought it was fitting for her. 

Plus red is sassy, and she needs some sass in her wardrobe! :)

Thank you Lyndsie for hosting such a great giveaway! Head on over to Lyndsie's blog she's got some great give aways going on right now, as well as some great Silent Auction Items to be sold to profit her and her Husbands adoption fund! 

Coasters

I don't think I ever really showed off our coasters we painted for our anniversary, I mean, REALLY showed them off in all their glory! 

They were super fun to make, and now every time I look at them or use them I'm reminded of such a wonderful day and a fun thing that we did together! 

Here they are:

Orion painted the top two, and I painted the bottom two. 

They look pretty good, and are a really good conversation piece in our home. I love things that tell a story, and these do just that! 

Be Creative Challenge (I'm a little behind in posting my weeks, but I'm catching up soon, stay tuned.)

Week #32

We've Been......

Taking advantage of Daddy's days off. 

Testing out and playing with Mom's new camera Uncle Shawn got her for her birthday.

Snuggling in the mornings. 

Learning to sit up on our own. 

Wearing matching t-shirts and cheering on Mom's favorite team. 

Practicing my cheer leading skills.

Relaxing with Mom and wishing that days didn't go by so fast. 

We hope whatever you've been up to has been as much fun as we've been having here at the Worley House!