a tutu named calla

I have had a busy week! It was so good to have Emily and Lauren with me for most of the week. But I finally have a minute to catch up on a couple things. First, we did several fun Valentine crafts this week. I shared one earlier. Here is another one we did. They were supposed to look like this. They ended up more like this:

Ha! Ok, so not quite perfect...but everyone had a blast doing it...so that's all that matters, right?

So, I keep finding new blogs that I love to read. I need to update my blog list over to the right there! I want to share about two of them. The first one is here:

I found this sweet family through her blog. These two ladies go to the same church out in Kansas. Jess, from The Macs, and her husband Joel, had an adorable little girl named Cora (isn't that a pretty name??). Last January, when Cora was 11 months old, she was diagnosed with cancer and went home to be with Jesus 17 short days later. This past year has been obviously so so hard for Jess and Joel. But they have allowed this terrible situation to draw them closer to each other - and closer to Him. Jess is so brave to keep up her blog and share both the good days and the bad days. Just in the past month, Jess and Joel welcomed a new baby boy named Levi. His name means "joined" and is a reminder that they will be joined again with Cora in heaven one day. To read more of Cora's story, click here:

Even in the midst of mixed emotions - loving every second of baby Levi while still missing sweet Cora every day - Jess is reaching out to help another friend and sister in Christ.

This is Calla and her mommy Julie

Calla was born at 26 weeks and is busy growing in the NICU right now. I know at least one of my readers knows what this is like. :) Calla also has a daddy - and a big brother named Ori (all these cute names!!) :) Having a baby in the NICU is tiring in a lot of ways. It puts a strain on everything - work, home, siblings, gas money, etc. So Jess from the Macs blog had the idea to do a raffle every week until Calla comes home. All the money raised from the raffles will go directly to Calla's family to help with all the extra expenses. And all the items in the raffles are so beautiful! To find out more about how it works, click here: (wow, I'm just full of things to click on today!) :)

Jess asked her blog readers and etsy friends to send anything they could to add to the raffles. It was such a simple thing to do to help someone out. I created a new tutu just for the raffle (it will be in the weekly raffle sometime between now and when Calla goes home.) and have added it to my etsy shop (link on the right side of this blog...). I am calling it the Calla Tutu. Wanna see it?

I just love these colors together. So fun and happy. And even brighter and happier in person. :)

From now until Calla goes home (hopefully sometime in March), I will be sending a portion of the money from each Calla Tutu sold to help out her family.

So click on the links to read about two great families and pray that Calla will grow strong and be home with her family soon - and that Jess and Joel's hearts will continue to heal as they trust in God's perfect plan for their family.