I-Spy - A Rainbow of Circles

Today we received our "order" of donut beads (we get them from a store that is near where my parents live so they send me a few bags now and then to replenish my stash). These big bags of beads prompted a play session with buttons and beads.

The kids made an I-Spy to share... they have hidden, a lion, three zebras, three aliens and a round blue bead. Just something fun to finish off our day!

Also in the box was a bunch of Super Hero masks as my mom is now helping me stock up for the upcoming craft shows. She has some great fabrics that she used for them so I'm hoping to post at least a few of them in the shop.

Just 3 more days and counting until my mother-in-law gets here to help out a little. It'll be nice to just have some company. I think so far (knock on wood), I've managed decently this week. I have rearranged and broken up our normal routine a bit and the kids have responded well... making lunch time an "event" has helped us I think. I hope to share our picnic from today with you tomorrow. We are expecting nice weather again tomorrow - so we'll see if I get the time.

Read more...

Tea Time Thursday - Movie Night

While my husband is working his insane hours, I've readjusted our schedule to ease the stress on me. One of the changes was to move our tea parties to Tuesday, giving me two days to post it it for Thursday. While this week's tea party was not as "pretty" as our others... this one was tons of fun.

My husband normally does bedtime... and to extend the hours that he could work before coming home to do bedtime, I gave the kids a special movie night Tuesday night. To top it off, we made it a tea party and I allowed them to eat in the living room in front of the tv (I have decided this is a one time thing as it proved to be a bit stressful for me).

Here's what we enjoyed for our Movie Time Tea Party! Stove top popcorn, mini hotdogs, mini pizzas and green bean fries. They washed it all down with milk tea.

They chose to watch Ice Age which is one of their all time favorite movies. I was hoping for Mama Mia, but couldn't find the disk. Ice Age proved to be a little silly for a tea party in the living room. Live and learn.

But Robbie loved it all and filled his plate many times over. Lyssie didn't really eat much aside from the hot dogs and popcorn. Funny, I put all the food on the table, took a picture and told them to go ahead and start. I returned after getting napkins and Lyssie had eaten the hot dogs out of about 4 buns. I had to stop her before she ate all of them, leaving the bread for her brother!

To make the mini hotdogs, I cut a hotdog into 8 pieces (half once, then each half into 4 long pieces) and fried them up on the stove. I cut two hot dog buns into halves and separated each half. I then cut out a triangle of bread from the center so that the hot dog could sit in the middle. I think they came out really cute. My kids like their hotdogs dry - but I thought they would have been really cute with all the fixings.

The mini pizzas are just English muffins covered in sauce, cheese and pepperoni - then cooked in our toaster oven.

The green bean fries were the easiest - they came from Costco! They are the TGIF Green Bean Fries. I love these things and I found that if you leave them in about 4-5 minutes longer than the time they recommend, they taste almost identical to the ones you get at the restaurant. This was our token veggie - not very healthy... but I felt better including something.

All in all, a really fun night and a great twist on our weekly tea parties!

Read more...

Peanut Butter Apple Sushi Tutorial

This makes a great snack. I'm not a huge fan of apples - but I think I could handle eating them this way. I might be making these for my own snacks when hunger strikes. I put together a quick tutorial so you can give it a try too! Sorry about the shadows, I guess didn't notice that the sun came out in the middle of making the tutorial :)

Ingredients:

Bread

Peanut Butter

Apple (sliced into thin slices)

Step 1: Cut crusts off a slice of bread (this is necessary to make it easier to roll. You could always leave one side on and use that the side you start your roll).

Step 2: With a rolling pin, flatten the bread. If you don't have a rolling pin, the bottom of a pan or even your hands will work). I roll along the short side to make the bread slightly longer.

Step 3: Spread peanut butter over entire piece of bread. Be sure to get the edges as this is what will keep the roll closed.

Step 4: In a line along the long side of the bread (closer to one edge), place your apple strips. You will need to experiment with the amount of apple slices as it depends on the size of your bread (and too many can vary the taste of the entire roll).

Step 5: From the bottom edge, tightly roll the bread around the apples. Press the edge tightly against the roll to seal.

Step 6: Cut your roll into slices (about 3/4 of inch seems to be a nice size).

This would be a great "cooking" project for kids. Simple steps and lots of fine motor skills needed.

Read more...

Tackle it Tuesday - Just a glimpse

This tackle it Tuesday will be spent finishing up (I hope) my workspace. I thought I'd share a small glimpse of it and what I've done so far. Okay, really you can only see the outside of the space because the inside is still not presentable.


The door at the end of the picture is our front door. So my workspace is the first thing you see when you walk in (not good when you aren't very unorganized). Now, when you walk in the front door... you just see a wall of fabric. Which is so much nicer, in my opinion.

I've mixed all my costume fabrics, fleece and tshirts together to make a colorful display. I need about nine more spaces to put all my fabric out. The worst thing about this reorganizing is that I've come to the realization that I can't fit everything into my workspace and still have room to work. What to do, what to do. For now, they'll go into boxes and sit either in the hallway or in the spare room. Sad.

I worked all day yesterday to get the area to a point where I can sew if I need to. I still have boxes everywhere and most surfaces full... but should the itch to sew consume me... I can do it.

I look forward to completing it and sharing my before and after photos. I've also been taking pictures of the process... hopefully those come out too.

Read more...

Why do you blog?

I started blogging many years ago on a personal blog. I had initially started it as practice for a blog I was participating in at work. But the blog became a way for me to share what the kids were up to, with our family and friends since we don't live near any of them. But I saw the benefit of the blog in business from the one that the credit union had. It was a way for them to connect with their members... and the members seemed to really embrace the new line of communication.

So, it was a natural decision to start one to help promote my stores. However, my blog kind of took on a life of it's own. While I still use it occasionally to talk about things I'm doing for the store... more often, I'm just sharing anything that comes up that I feel someone else might want to hear. Mostly things I do with the kids. After all, as a mom of two, this is what I like to read about on other mom blogs. I enjoy new ideas - or different spins on old ideas. I enjoy hearing what other children the same age as mine are up to. I also enjoy reading about creative processes that others go through.

The things that I enjoy reading about are the things that I write about. The things that I enjoy doing are the things that I write about. So often I come across blogs where it feels like it's a chore for them to keep regular postings. It is my opinion that a blog isn't serving it's purpose if it's too hard to find the time to write it. Thoughts should flow - not be forced. And if this means that they flow just once a month - that's fine too.

I am, by no means, and expert on blogs. But here's my advice if you are starting a blog to further your business;

• Be real - if someone is reading the blog, it's because they want to know more about you.
• Don't force it - if you have nothing to really say, then don't. I think it might actually be worse forcing a post. The idea is to get the reader to return to your blog - a forced blog entry most likely won't bring them back.
• Share details - with pictures is the best. Especially for an online handmade arts business, using pictures is important. You are trying to entice people into loving your work as much as you do. This is difficult with words, but easier with pictures.

That's all I have for now as the kids have now distracted me and my thoughts :) While I'm not sure that a lot of people read my blog... I know the right people do. I seem to have met a supportive group of people, many of my customers have mentioned that they enjoy reading about what I'm up to and I have received sales as a direct result of the blog - thanks to my wonderful customers who have shared with me how they have found me.

I love reading new blogs and I encourage everyone to have a blog. It's a great outlet. But it may not be for everyone. And if it's not for you, that's fine. There are other ways of promoting yourself. Stop beating yourself over not having the time to do it and focus your energy on something you enjoy doing... because that's bound to be more successful than something that is a chore.

Read more...

Muffin Tin Monday - Under the Sea

I cheated a bit this week - we did our muffin tin yesterday. With the change in my husband's work schedule... I'm going to be shifting our schedule at home to make it a little easier on myself. Having Muffin Tin Monday done and out of the way is my first change.

This week's theme was Under the Sea. This was a great theme for us as my kids LOVE seafood. I also let them eat it outside as it was actually decent and I'm not sure how often they'll get that chance! Also - changing environments seems to help all of us.

Contents: Goldfish crackers, Crab and Shrimp sushi from Central Market, Imitation crab, shrimp, shrimp chips and Nori Maki crackers (I mistakenly purchased the wasabi one... so these didn't go over well - but both kids tried it. I agree, wasabi ones are not as good but it still counted as sea weed).

Lyssie is sick today with a cold and a horrible cough. I'm washing my hands a lot in the hopes that I don't catch it too. Getting sick on top of everything else going on is not my idea of fun.

I've been working on cleaning, organizing and rearranging my work space, so I look forward to sharing it as soon as I have it done (my goal is by the end of the week). Hope everyone has a great week!

Read more...

Weekend Bento

Yesterday, Robbie endured an entire day at his daddy's office. So - he asked for a bento again. I haven't been to the grocery store in a long time, so it wasn't very exciting (in my opinion). Luckily, bento lunches are still a novelty to the kids.

I mixed the snack bento with the lunch bento thinking that my son would save a little for later. I think I was wrong - all it did is keep him from eating his sandwich as he went for everything else first.

Contents of first bento: Wheat crackers, string cheese circles and peanuts. Grapes and pretzels.

Contents of second bento: carrots, raisins, jelly sandwich on top of veggie sticks. An egg for dessert with M&Ms in it.

Have I mentioned before that I really need to get bigger bentos for the kids. Of course, I don't think they mind my using several bentos - this way they get more than one "reveal".

Today my husband is taking this Sunday to spend with the family before he starts working everyday, long hours. We aren't sure what we are going to do. I have a feeling it will be a day of running errands.


Thank you to everyone for their emails and comments of support. While I'm still overwhelmed, I'm feeling a little better about my chances of making it until my mother-in-law gets hereto help me out.

Read more...

I will survive

I need to chant that over and over. I'm not sure how things will play out - but last night, I was just informed that my husband will be going from working 6 days a week (with long days) to 7 days a week (with long days). This means that I'm on my own with the two kids. These long hours have already lasted months... long enough that I'm noticing significant differences in the kids and the way we relate to them. I am concerned.

Top that off with my ever increasing Fibromyalgia symptoms and I'm worried that I'll be unable to pull through this without completely losing it.

Okay, sorry about that - I didn't mean to dwell on negative. My point is that I'm finding myself needing more fresh air just to keep my mind focused. Today after running a few errands, I walked the kids down to the river that runs through Redmond. It's a peaceful river and there were geese and ducks swimming around. While I can't say that it relaxed me... it was nice to have a change of environment even for a brief moment.

Thankfully, my mother-in-law will be coming to try to help out for a few weeks. I just need to make it a week and a half until she gets here. I'm thankful to have this blog as a place for me to record the things I've been doing. Looking back on previous posts helps me remember that I am doing okay.

Today I sat outside in the backyard while I worked on finishing up several tack sets that I've had in the works for weeks now. Of course, I was outside while my kids played inside. I just couldn't seem to motivate them to spend a little time with me out in the sun. Perhaps they don't realize what a rarity it is to have sunshine and warmer temperatures right now. I figure - some sunshine, fresh air and a bottle of wine and I should be able to survive this big push toward the deadline that my husband has been working toward.

Read more...

Earth Day Celebration

Well, today we were supposed to have a tea party... but I just wasn't up to it. Hopefully next week. I might need to rethink my schedule - perhaps Tuesday would be a better day as Thursdays are at the end of the week and I quickly lose steam after Wednesday.

This particular Wednesday was a big day though as we celebrated Earth Day (did I mention that everyday should be Earth Day?). So, instead of a tea party post today, I'm filling in with a post about our Earth Day "celebration".

We started off by making flowers from recycled papers. They were easy to make and both children were able to do it. Of course, Lyssie preferred to do the paper crumbling over actually making the flowers.

Here's a quick run down of how to make them:

Materials: recycled papers (magazine pages, newspaper ads, etc. The more colorful, the better in by opinion... although black and white would still look cool), pipe cleaners (we used green) and beads (we used foam beads from the dollar store).

Cut various sized circles from the recycled papers. I did about 2 - 3 inches in diameter. Crumble the circles to give them a little texture. Then just string a few onto the end of a pipe cleaner and put a bead on the top. Bend the pipe cleaner around the bead so that it doesn't come off... and you are done!

We made a whole bouquet for Robbie to take to his teachers. Of course, he forgot them today, so they'll have to go tomorrow.

After making flowers, we moved right into planting seeds. The challenge for me is to find activities or way of adapting them so that both my children (3 year age spread) can participate. I also like to have some element of learning.

So, I labeled a muffin tin with the seed names and gave the packets for Robbie to empty requiring him to read (I put the common name, he had to read the packets to figure out each one). While Robbie was doing this, I had Lyssie filling the cups with dirt. This was a great exercise for her to perfect her fine motor skills.


I made the plant signs with colored popsicle sticks (from the dollar store) and the seed packet pictures. We planted three containers of each variety - a flowering vine, sweet peas, carrots, zucchini, basil and peppers (these seeds were from a pepper that Robbie grew last year). We used various recycled containers for our planters (water bottles, milk bottles, berry containers, etc) and we varied the way we planted them (some of them covered with no air, some of them covered with in open top, etc. This exercise was really more for experimentation than for actual producing plants... although, we'll be thrilled if any of them make it that far.

Honestly, I don't know if these will come up... but more because we don't really have a place near a window to put them. We'll see what happens. Regardless, we should learn plenty and we had fun doing it!

** I also forgot to mention that my son has blogged about this on his blog as well. Please stop by! He loves to get comments (he calls them compliments :)).

Read more...

Once Again!

Yay! My On A Whimm shop made it onto the front page again! This time I am in great company with other members of my EtsyRAIN team! Sorry it's so small again... hopefully it'll be clickable! Thanks to FlandersField of including me in her treasury and to Marin for letting me know it's on the front page!

Read more...

Work in Progress Wednesday

This time, I just took a picture of my workspace (at least the part that is clear enough to work). I have owls currently sitting out waiting to be "decorated" as my daughter says. There is also one more monster in the works. No designated home for this guy, so he might end up in the store. We'll see.

I am currently not very focused and not really sure what to work on. This is normal for me after completing a custom order that I am focused on for so long. I hope my mind clears soon and I can get back on track.

I've also been working a little each day on cleaning my work area. Slow and steady. Hopefully by not burning myself out, I'll have a better chance of getting it done. So far, each day this week (I know it's only Wednesday), I have managed to set time aside for cleaning my work area and a little in the garage. I hope to maintain this pace long enough to get both the garage and the workspace functional. That way, the garage (which doubles as a playroom) will occupy the kids while I concentrate on making inventory for upcoming shows.

I will also be taking a little time out today to plant seeds with the kids for Earth Day (which really should be everyday) and I'll have to plan our tea party for tomorrow. It seems like Wednesdays are always busy days.

Read more...

Wordless Wednesday

Read more...

Sidewalk Chalk

It isn't until you have a nice day that you remember all the fun things you can do when the sun is shining. Today, while I was going through things in the garage/playroom - the kids played out front. I'll be honest, it isn't often that they play out there. It is usually cold for me to sit out there and watch them (we get shade out there most of the day) and I am not one that is ready to let them play out there unsupervised.

So when we saw that the sidewalk was actually sunny - we pulled out their sidewalk chalk! My son made a hopscotch and attempted to teach his sister. I'm not even sure how he learned... I'm assuming it was at school.

There is something about seeing chalk drawings on the sidewalk in front of my house, that makes me happy. Perhaps my neighbors would have a different reaction. I think chalk drawings on the sidewalk in front of a house is declaring that some happy children live there. We have train drawings, the name "Molly" (a Thomas engine), a few math problems, a tic-tac-toe game and a hop scotch in addition to a few random doodles now decorating our yard.

It's supposed to rain tomorrow - which is great because they can do it all again on the next sunny day.

Read more...

Muffin Tin Monday - At the Park

Today, we took our Muffin Tins to the park for a little picnic. I had debated on several ways of doing this... bringing each item in their own container, putting them in individual bags and telling them to pretend they are muffin tins :) - finally I decided to use our shallow muffin tins as covers. It worked perfectly and it kept their contents a surprise since I made them before Robbie got home from school. I used two rubber bands to secure them - it even withstood Lyssie shaking it to try to guess what was inside (she did this when I had turned my back - little stinker).

Contents: Pretzels, M&Ms in an Easter Egg for a treat, grapes, peanuts, string cheese slices, and carrots.

It was so nice out today that we actually chose to sit in the shade because the sun was pretty warm. It was a good decision as it was still a little warm in the shade. It's amazing how the weather can change so quickly. The grass was still mushy in places from excess rain.

I realized just as we were leaving the house that I didn't pack anything for myself to eat for lunch. So I quickly put some carrots into a bag and some peanuts into a bag and grabbed a bottle of water. Probably ended up being a lot healthier than if I had been home with all the other options. I had told myself this weekend that starting today, I was going to make a genuine effort to eat healthier - this just happened to be on accident though :)

Happy Monday! and stop over at Her Cup Overfloweth for more traveling muffin tins! Here's a link to our other traveling tin from vacation last year.

Read more...

It's finally complete!

I just wanted to post a quick blog about the completed Magnolia costume that I've been working on. It's finally done (except for my tag). I posted pictures of Lyssie in it on Flickr. She loves this costume so I might have to make more.

I really enjoyed making this costume. It reminded me of why I began doing all this in the first place. I hope to get back to making more fun costumes for the shop soon. I'm getting better at balancing my time between the kids and the business. With that said...

We are off to enjoy this nice sunny day at the park. The kids have a play date there so we'll be taking Muffin Tin Monday on the road. This means that I'll be posting pictures later tonight. In the meantime, you can always check out other Muffin Tins at Her Cup Overfloweth.

Read more...

Bento for Lyssie

It was Lyssie's turn to go into the office with her daddy this weekend. I normally make bento lunches for the kids when they go in to that my husband doesn't have to worry about their lunch and because bentos seem to occupy the kids for a good block of time.

I was excited to use one of their new flower muffin tins in the box. I had to smash it in there - but it still worked.

Contents: Bunny rice (made from a new mold Marlo bought them) and grapes were in the first box. Sliced turkey meat, cooked hot dog pieces and there are carrots under the sliced turkey. I also included a little treat of M&Ms left over from Easter. I have found that the tiny plastic eggs work perfectly for concealing a little treat... and the kids know that they have to save it for the end. I'll be putting a few of these little eggs in my bento supply boxes once we get all the plastic eggs put away (I'm still finding eggs throughout the house where the kids have been hiding them).

Apparently this bento was a success - and probably my simplest bento yet (not that my others were very complicated).

Robbie and I enjoyed our day together. We went and had sushi for lunch. I think Blue C Sushi is my new favorite place for sushi when I have the kids. They love to watch the sushi go around and Robbie loves to be able to pick his own food. I love to see my boy happy - especially when it's because he's eating sushi. I didn't necessarily eat a lot of sushi as a kid... but I was certainly exposed to it... and it reminds me of my family. It made me think about my grandmother who is currently in the hospital. I hope she is released soon and allowed to go back home. It's hard being so far from family - especially during times such as these.

Anyhow, it was a nice day. I think even after my husband stops working these ridiculously long hours, we'll still continue to split one day (at least for a few hours) where we each spend time with just one child. The kids love it and it's nice to focus our attention and connect with our kids.

Read more...

Looking forward

Well, at least to the weekend. Wouldn't want to plan too far ahead :) We are hoping for a nice weekend - wonder if it'll be nice enough to get some garage sales in? That's one thing that I miss in the wintertime. My husband and I love to drag the kids whining to as many garage sales as we can fit in an hour. Good times :)

I've been working on cleaning my work area... which reminds me, as embarrassing as it is, I should take a before picture. Maybe that will keep me motivated so that I can show fantastic pictures of it completed. The pictures of my workspace from last year were without all my supplies (those were still in the room I had previously occupied), so keeping up that clean workspace was impossible for me. And now, I have so many things in the space - that there just isn't anywhere for me to work. We'll be moving in a few more solutions for storage and hopefully utilizing the space a little better. We'll see. I'm estimating it to take several months (yep, it's that bad!).

If I didn't warn you in the beginning of this post... it's going to be a rambling one as I don't have anything specific to write about - just random thoughts.

Have I mention that we bought a Yudu for my NueToMe line (that I haven't had time to work on)? It currently resides in California because my parents - who are the other half of my business - will work on printing the pieces. I hope to screen print some of my drawings on to the dresses, skirts and pants that I make. Maybe even the capes and bibs!

I've been doing quite a bit of drawing lately. Mostly of the owls that I've been sewing. It seems all the things that I do are somehow connected to each other... even if I'm the only one that gets it. I drew a few ACEOs and I'm thinking about listing them in my store (OnAWhimm). I'm just not sure what to charge for an original piece of art. Each one did take me a good chunk of time. Do I figure the cost by my time? I am really enjoying drawing the owls and I'm considering making one of the drawings into a mirror.

And that reminds me that I really need to make cases for my mirrors. I have some showroom samples that I've been wanting to make cases with... just haven't found the time. Again, I'm hoping an organized workspace will help with my time issues, hopefully , I'll become more efficient.

Sorry, I could ramble like this all night. I'm going to stop now though and try to get my kids inside... I can feel that it's getting chilly out there. A shame that the sun can be out and the weather can be soooo cold!

Have a great weekend!

Read more...

Tea Time Thursday - Ladybugs (with Strawberry Ladybug Tutorial)

It was my son's idea to make the theme of this Thursday's tea party, ladybugs. Thanks to my husband for getting a few essentials at the grocery store late last night, we were able to pull off (what I think) is a pretty good showing for ladybugs.


I did not take part in this tea party as the table is kid size and not big enough for three people - besides, I'm not a huge fan of strawberries (I know, hard to believe). Today's tea party included lemonade for tea (must remember Lyssie does not drink lemonade), ladybug shaped strawberry open-faced jelly sandwiches with raisin polka dots, green grapes for extra color, sauteed hotdogs, sauteed carrots, bananas... and for dessert, I made strawberry ladybugs (tutorial to follow).

I also found some red gingham fabric - so made them each a napkin figuring Lyssie could use them in her play kitchen. I would have preferred to have made a table cloth, however, I only had a small piece of this fabric in my stash. A reminder that I really need to keep more gingham in my stash... and while I'm at it, I should include ric rak because I would have loved to have added that to the edges of the napkins.

The kids were happy to be able to enjoy this tea party outside like they did the first one. It was a bit breezy - but Lyssie braved it in her ladybug dress that I made her a few weeks back. Hard to believe this our fourth tea party.

We are really enjoying these tea parties and will continue to do them each week. They really break up the monotony of lunches and give the kids something to look forward to each week. Robbie has also had fun thinking of ideas for the food to fit the themes. The sandwiches this week were his idea... and he ate them up!

Apparently the first few years that Lyssie was not allowed to have strawberries has translated into her believing that she doesn't like them. I really don't know if she still has an intolerance and probably won't know for a while since I couldn't even get her to try them when they were dipped in chocolate. So her dessert for this tea party was a big glass of milk. She was a happy little girl.

To top off the tea party, we had a little visitor. Robbie had caught about 10 ladybugs yesterday and he opened the box this afternoon to let them go. One stuck around and shared the moment with the kids.

Strawberry Ladybug Tutorial

Ingredients:

• Chocolate (I used a huge Hershey Kiss that the kids were given for Christmas - just melted it down. The same would work with a chocolate bunny from Easter!)
• Strawberries
  

Step 1: Melt the chocolate. I used the stove - putting a little water in the bottom of a small pan and placing a glass bowl on top. I did this on medium heat and added the chocolate to the glass bowl. It worked great.

Step 2: While the chocolate is melting, cut your strawberries. I cut the end off and then cut the strawberry in half making a teardrop like shape.

Step 3: Dip the tip of the strawberry into the chocolate. I used a chopstick to catch the chocolate drips. Place on waxed paper (I didn't have any handy - so I just put them on the cutting board I had used for cutting the strawberries.

Step 4: To make dots, I used the chopstick. I dipped the end of the chopstick into the chocolate and made little dots on the back of the ladybug. (Sorry the picture is turned - blogger - and the qualities of photos is lacking - I was in a bit of a hurry as I had to pick my son up at the bus.)

Step 5: Place ladybugs in the refrigerator so the chocolate can harden. Lots of fun and super easy!

Read more...

Work in Progress Wednesday

This week I have a lot of things in progress. Not only am I working on the inventory for this summer's craft shows (yesterday I made 10 Super Hero Masks- yay!), but I also have a custom costume order and some pincushions in the works. This is a snap shot of a small portion of my workspace (the rest is way too embarrassing to share).

The custom costume is Magnolia from George of the Jungle (she's the red head on the bottom). Making a jungle girl costume has been lots of fun. I really like how it's coming out... I might have to make one for the store. Lyssie has been my model for the costume since it's for a 2 year old to wear to her birthday party. Lyssie LOVES the costume so far... she likes to dance around in it. I think it's because of the fabric I'm using for the top... it's a super soft velour with a tiger print (you can see it in the top left corner of the picture). I was thrilled that I had this fabric in my stash since finding specialty fabrics like this one when it's not near Halloween can be impossible.

I'm working on the skirt right now. I've made the leaves for the skirt two sided... with sparkle on the other side. I don't think I can make a costume without a little fun sparkle as it makes it extra special for the kids.

The pincushions are for the On A Whimm shop. My lid stash is starting to build up, so I figured it's time to do something about it. I am considering a tutorial on making these little cushions... what do you think? I'm imagining making a pin with a FIMO worm on top to stick into this cushion. Ambitious thought since I really don't have the time.

It's a fun week in regards to working. Too bad I've been feeling a bit worse lately with nausea, dizziness and lots of back pain. Luckily, I'm used to just working through it. It's a little easier when I have fun projects like these to work on.

We are looking forward to our tea party tomorrow... Robbie has decided that it'll have a Ladybug theme. Hope I can pull it off! Robbie's been in to ladybugs lately.

Read more...

Wordless Wednesday - Daddy's Bird

Read more...

We Built This City

Robbie was off of school all last week - so I had to come up with a big project that could span several days. Of course, an unexpected house guest helped in occupying him - but we also build a city! I had been hoarding boxes for weeks now to make this happen. I wrapped each box in butcher paper (I have a huge roll bought from Creation Station) and the kids decorated them for buildings... and sometimes stacking them to make sky scrapers. The best part is that the buildings could be moved around.

We used Her Cup Overfloweth's idea for streets... but I put the whole thing on a folding table so it could be moved out of the way when not in play. We taped down a few sheets of green and blue for parks and water.

Finally, we finished the city of with a little green. Using the grass from Easter, we made little trees. We also used plastic egg halves for bushes. Here's a quick tutorial for the trees - Robbie loved this little project because we recycled.

Materials;
Paper Bag
Scissors
Tape
Green Easter Grass (you could also use tissue paper)

Step 1: Cut the bottom off the paper bag. We used a grocery bag from Trader Joes.

Step 2: Once the bottom has been cut off, I folded the rest of the bag flat and cut it in half leaving me a rectangular piece of paper that was folded in half (sorry if that doesn't make sense). From this piece, I cut out a circle... and then I cut the circles into quarters. Each half bag gave us 8 trees.

Step 3: Line up several pieces of the Easter grass. Pinch them in the middle and twist.

Step 4: Tape the middle of the grass to the top of the wrong (printed) side of a quartered circle.

Step 5: Place a piece of tape along one of the long edges of the quartered circle and roll it to make a cone using the tape to secure it.

Step 6: Spread the green out a bit to make it look more like the top of a tree.

This project also allowed my son to use his own creativity. He made street signs by using corks and people with wooden spools. Then we pulled out the Hot Wheels and the kids put their city into action!

** My son also blogged about the city - please stop by and tell him "hi" - Thanks!

Read more...