Jump starting the kids summer wardrobe

I am slightly obsessed with dressing my kids. I rotate between cotton Target dresses, Nike tennis dresses and skirts scored from Marshall's and Anne Taylor loft pieces purchased with Christmas gift cards for myself. My children, on the other hand, wear clothes more expensive than my own. I know I'm insane but I've learned to be pretty savvy about purchasing their high end, name brand clothes at consignment stores, Facebook sales like smockadot and Lolly wolly doodle, eBay or making my own "knock offs."

I'm a sucker for Kelly's kids. If I were a millionaire, I'd just have them send me the whole boys line in 2t/3t and girls line in 12 months. Love them! I did purchase a few pieces last week out of the catalog but I've also found copy cat appliqués to whip up my own! Im off to a good start!

I'm loving all things nautical: Whales, anchors, surf boards, crabs, beach pails, sailboats.... Love it all! Here's a quick sneak peak of what I've been working on:

I appliquéd a sand pail on this pink gingham blank dress I bought off eBay. The navy and white dress is an Old Navy find for $6 that I added Avery's name to and an anchor. A lucky birthday girl is also getting this dress with a hot pink monogram tomorrow. This dress was inspired by the navy and red nautical stripe Kelly's kids line currently on their website. $6 vs $48! Heck yeah!

I also monogrammed a sun hat for Avery found at buybuybaby (target has them too) and a tutu onesie purchased at the end of season last year from I figured these are good "park clothes."

For Parker, I try to do shirts that match multiple pairs of shorts. You can dress them down with cotton gym shorts or dress then up with khaki or gingham shorts. So far, I've done a sailboat that I love, an anchor to coordinate with Avery's dress and matching bunny Easter shirts. I just purchased various colored shirts from belk this week to continue my "it looks like I spent $45 from Kelly's kids but really spent $8" scheme! :)

In not sure why some of the pictures are coming up sideways but you get the picture. More to come as I get more time! It's SO time consuming but SO worth the sense of pride I feel when my kids are dressed so cute in things I've made them!

Where do you like to shop? Any good appliqué ideas?

Parker is 3!

Parker Wise, you are 3 years old! On your actual birthday, Wednesday, we let you play hooky from school and we all went to the zoo. It was a beautiful day and as usual, the meerkats were your favorite. It was bright out and you accidentally broke your sunglasses so you took Avery's and refused to take them off. Thus, the pink giraffe sunglasses ;)

On Friday, your dad and I took you to your 3 year check up. You're in the 60th% for weight and 50% for height. Other than not being potty trained yet and your excema, you're 100% wonderful! Potty training starts Wednesday afternoon... get excited! (PRAY FOR ME! US!)

Saturday was the BIG day! Your Splash Planet birthday party! We had chicken tenders, fruit, pretzels, goldfish, fish sandwiches and turtle and fish cupcakes. Despite saying I'd never do it again after last year, I DID applique and monogram towels for all of the kiddos. After all is said and done, they looked great and were a big hit!

Your friends: Zury, Logan, Lily, Jayden, Jett, Ana, Max, Charley, Jakob and all their younger siblings joined us to celebrate your birthday. You got lots of great presents that you really enjoyed opening. Mimi and Poppop, grandma, nana, poppi and aunt Kelly also celebrated with us. 

You sang happy birthday to yourself which was precious and really enjoyed riding the lazy river. Overall, it was a fun birthday party that most everyone enjoyed. Avery may have actually had more fun than you did!

I can't believe you're 3! Well.... maybe I can.... you're experiencing the terrible 2 1/2 - TBD (SOON TO BE ENDED I HOPE!) phase. You were pretty good up until 2 1/2 and the closer you got to 3, the more we've realized that the 3's may be MORE challenging. You're becoming more strong willed, opinionated and can communicate more. You speak in pretty good sentences now and with sweet sentences have also come some defiant ones! 90% of the time you are PRECIOUS and the other 10%, I want to pretend like I'm your nanny. We call you "passionate" and just know you're going to do big things with that strong will of yours!

We love you more than you could ever imagine and are SO blessed to be your parents. Happy 3rd Birthday, sweet boy!

Cell phone dump!

I cannot for the life of me get my pictures from my iPhone to stay under my photo explanation so this will be an interpret the photos your own way post.

We've been in spring fever, Parker's birthday, landscaping the house, building a swing set mode here in the wise household so please excuse my brief absence. I'll be back soon with a 3rd birthday post!

We now have a stair climber, stander. 2-3 step taker, sugar cookie eating sweetie!

Mr Parker continues to be the sweetest brother, slightly "passionate," mountain climbing and nap fighting love bug.

Love these babies

Sketchy Mexican, acapella and babies

WHOOPS! I forgot to post this one!

This past weekend Miss Avery and I road tripped it to Clemson for a mini reunion with 4 of the 7 Clemson besties. We spent Saturday morning helping Erin navigate the scary but awesome world of babiesrus! I'm proud to say that she made it through without needing oxygen or an anti anxiety pill and I made it through with only a tiny purchase (baby food in a pouch.... So basically I did great!)

Next we met up with Whitney and amber at our favorite local Mexican joint for cheese dip, margaritas (for those of us who aren't prego!) and some sketchy looking tacos. We felt so old because we didn't remember our favorite restaurant being "this" shady! Good news... We all survived without contracting salmonella.

After dinner we went to the Tiger Roar concert benefitting the march of dimes which is an organization dear to my heart since Parker was a preemie and my good friend Erin works for MOD. Tiger roar is Clemson's all male acapella group and girls swooned for them (and their orange blazers) when I was in college there! They were amazing! As were these guys:

The Spartones from UNCG. They played with Avery before the show and dedicated a song to her... Albeit an inappropriate sexual one but nonetheless it was precious and Avery loved it! Every time people clapped or cheered and would clap and squeal. She had a blast and I think the students had a good time with her too. How cute are those boys in their matching shirts. They actually fought over who would hold Avery for the picture!

Avie, whitney and I spent the night at Erin's and enjoyed some late night coffee ice cream and "remember when's." Avery tested zeke's exersaucer and has approved it. :)

Sunday afternoon, we headed to Piedmont for amber's baby shower. It was so fun to gift her lots of cute things for baby Addison! She sure has been the desire of her mama's heart for a long time and I'm so glad I get to share the joys if motherhood with her very soon!

I had a great time but nothing beats coming home to this sweet boy! He punished me for about an hour for leaving him for a day and a half but quickly came around! Pictures like these make my heart happy!