There's no place like homemade

A friendly reminder...

2011-10-30T14:33:00.000-07:00

to come on over to the new site!

If you scroll down on the right side of the theresnoplacelikehomemade.com, you can sign up to follow the blog via e-mail, or you can "like" me on Facebook. Liking the Facebook page will put a link to each of my new posts in your Facebook feed.

Thanks for reading!

There's no place like the right place...

2011-09-22T19:47:00.000-07:00

...like a web address that matches my blog title.

I'm moving to theresnoplacelikehomemade.com. Come join me!

A knooked hippie hat

2011-09-21T11:42:00.000-07:00

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We went on vacation last week to New Orleans and to Orange Beach, Alabama. It was such good fun that it was even worth the total wreck it has now made of my house. I'm not sure how it is that returning from travel can destroy a house so quickly, but it can. Something about the laundry and the picnic supplies and the tired. I'll catch up sometime. (When I'm dead? I hope not.) I'll post photos after I have a minute to sit down and comb through all, um, 825 shots that I took on the trip. (I'm afraid that's no typo.)

In addition to all the sightseeing, swimming, and keeping my kids from drowning that I did on vacation I also finished my next knooking project. I used this pattern but in a funky rainbow print. It's going to be my cure for second-day hair this winter. The final project is more hippie than my mental image of it was, but it's kind of fun. I'd hate to get stodgy anyway. :) The Knit Picks Chroma yarn is deliciously soft and comes in other colorways--I'm tempted to come up with a project just to use more of this yarn. The pattern translated easily from knitting to knooking, so now I'm really gaining confidence. I ordered a set of knooking hooks from eBay, but they have to ship from China so who knows when they'll get here. I purchased the crappy set that Wal-Mart sells, but the hooks are so rough that they must be sanded before they can be used, and the shape of the hook makes me unhappy--it is difficult to use. I'm hoping a good retailer picks up on the need for good knooking hooks soon and makes more metal ones. The locker hook I posted about earlier is the easy to use but only comes in one size.

Pressed flowers and crocheted socks

2011-09-11T14:42:00.000-07:00

Dorothy and I pressed flowers as a school craft. I don't think I'd pressed flowers since I was in high school. It's one of those things, I think, where I've seen supplies at crafty places and gotten suckered into the idea that it's just a craft for people who have the right gear, which is just silly. Pressing flowers requires only a stack of heavy objects. We have those. We used cardboard to lay out the petals and another piece to lay over them.

After two weeks under the heavy objects (books, in our case) we had beautiful pressed blossoms, which we adhered to cards using rubber cement. This was a pretty and satisfying craft for both of us, and it was fun to count down the days until the flowers were done.

I also finally finished my second pair of crocheted socks. I made socks from this pattern right before Worth was born and loved them so much I knew I needed more. Then Rob got me yarn for our seventh wedding anniversary, from which I made a hat and started socks. But since I have other things to do (ahem) and have not been too inspired to make wooly socks during the warmer months it took me a long time to finish these. The recent chill has me crocheting again so I finally pulled this project out and finished it up.

I have every reason to think I'm going to love these socks as much as the first ones. This is a great pattern--the small size fits me perfectly, and they are so warm and comfortable. The other pair is my go-to comfort strategy when I come inside on cold or wet days. After we moved to this house with the fireplace I'd put on these socks and sit in front of the fire--domestic heaven! Now I'm prepared for winter weather with this cheerful new pink pair.

Knooking and Bear Feet

2011-09-08T20:03:00.000-07:00

Something kind of major happened to me this past week. I finally learned to knit! I already "knew" how, technically, but I hated it. It just didn't work for me. Crochet has always felt good in my hands but I just never could get comfortable with knitting needles. Every few months for a couple years I'd pick up a project and try again, but I've never made more than a dish towel and I've never enjoyed it even for a second. I'd get tensed up instead of calmed. Then I discovered knooking! At the risk of sounding totally dorky, knooking is like a dream come true for me. I've actually day-dreamed that knitting could feel like crochet for me, and that I could make knitted patterns without dealing with knitting needles, and--ta da!--it has happened! Knooking is making knitted fabric (interlacing yarn in the way known as "knitting") but by using a crochet needle attached to a cord. It turns out the exact same product but feels like crocheting instead of knitting. Which, if you're me, is totally fantastic. I used this blog, this blog, and this Ravelry group as references and used a locker hook as my first knooking hook. I knooked this hat for Worth by reading the tips at those links and holding the new hat up to a hat he already had for sizing. I'm ridiculously pleased with it and don't you make fun of me, dangit, because it's not every day that dreams come true.

Today I put down my next knooking project long enough to have a great day at an outlet mall with an old friend. She lives in Indianapolis so we met in between her city and mine for a fun day of catching up and fall shopping. I purchased what I thought were matching pajamas for my kids, who spent the day with their grandparents. Back at home, Worth wanted to put on his new pajamas right away. We allowed him to change and he immediately started stomping around, acting like a Big Scary Bear (this is a favorite Worth game already, which inspired the purchase of these pajamas) and admiring the bear faces sewn onto the feet of his new pajamas. Dorothy decided to put her matching pajamas on as well and join the fun. Sadly, however, she returned crying, having discovered that Carters unwisely manufactured pajamas that were almost identical in both sizes, but which lacked the novelty of bear face feet in the larger size. Curse you, Carters!

So I rallied my inner good mother (though she was a bit tired!) and rounded up some felt and sewed my own version of bear faces onto the feet of Dorothy's pajamas.

Now all the Big Scary Bears in my "den" are happy again.

A lemonade stand

2011-08-30T15:16:00.000-07:00

I'm afraid I haven't done a single thing crafty or blog-worthy (with the possible exception of some newly invented cookies, but I forgot to photograph them so what's the point?), but I'm posting anyway because Worth doesn't feel well and won't get off my lap, and if I'm going to sit here captive I may as well do something. So here is a random post about things that have been going on! The neighborhood kids had lemonade stand in my front yard. Unfortunately their accounting was almost as bad as their spelling, so it is unclear if the enterprise earned money or just annoyed the neighbors.

Worth got his first favorite pair of shoes. He tried these on at an outlet mall on the way home from an out-of-town wedding last weekend and we couldn't even pry them off his feet to pay for them so we just snipped off the tags and he wore them home. He kept cooing over them and touching them and giggling in his car seat. Hilarious and cute. I love that we finally found shoes he'll actually keep on, plus they are mercifully easy to clean. The adorable t-shirt was a gift and I love it like he loves his shoes.

This was a picture that appeared on my blog back in June of Belle on her homemade dog bed...

and an updated snapshot, two months later. I'm glad kids don't grow that fast! (And a disclaimer, Belle is not allowed to play with the kids' toys ordinarily, but she has a deep and abiding fondness for this little knitted animal. She doesn't eat it--she just plays with it and loves on it and since it seems to be no worse for wear as a shared toy I allow it. She's just a baby too, after all, even though she's more than doubled in size!)

May the Force be with Baby: A Star Wars Quilt

2011-08-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

We've had a good first week of school! This is Dorothy getting ready to blow out our circle time candle on the first day. I've learned that a) homeschooling takes a lot more of my day than I had been able to comprehend (although I'd been warned about that) and b) I need to make some curriculum adjustments or we'll both get bored in a hurry. I've purchased a ready-made kindergarten curriculum and I love many things about it but it's a little soft on some skills we're ready to march on into. That's a great thing about homeschool, I have to say, because I can easily make these adjustments to suit my specific child.

And late last night after my wee padawans were snug in their beds I snuck back down to the sewing machine and made a baby quilt to gift to a friend. This is for the first baby of an old college pal. This friend is the only person with whom I've attended a midnight movie showing (he was in costume) and the only person I know who owns (or owned? It's been a while...) red contact lenses. When he told me he and his wife were expecting a boy I knew I had to make him something cool and nothing light blue or fluffy.

I bought one fat quarter of Star Wars fabric on Etsy, then found coordinating prints on Fabric.com. I used the licensed fabric to make homemade patches and then made strips of the rest. I'm not much of a quilter but I like the cutely haphazard look of strip blankets. I machine stitched it all and didn't use batting because I wanted it to be thin and flexible enough to actually wrap the baby in. The finished size is 34 by 38 inches and the back is a soft black flannel. It felt funny to have the sewing machine threaded in black to make a baby gift, but I think this one will be appreciated by the baby's father, at least.

Our homeschool "classroom"

2011-08-13T14:10:00.000-07:00

We start school Monday! I loved this house before we purchased it party for this cozy, cabinlike room tucked down in the basement. Touring houses almost two years ago I kept my eye out for the perfect space the kids and I could dedicate to our creative endeavors--a parent/child studio. I'm kind of joking when I now call it our homeschool classroom; we'll learn here, as we'll learn everywhere. We do have a table and chairs set aside in this room for our morning circle and lessons. I've not gotten much use out of this room up to this point because it is, ahem, rather afflicted by water. Like the kind that is supposed to stay outside in heavy rains. Yuck. But we've made some changes to our gutters and are hoping to have some professional work done soon. Meanwhile, I've ditched the rug and repainted the floor and I'm hopeful that even with a little water we should be able to clean up and move on.

Since we're going with painted concrete floors until the water problems are completely solved I thought I might as well have fun with the concept. I used exterior paint to make a big sun on the floor in front of our awesomely cozy (and functional) fireplace. On some wicked winter morning in a few months I will laugh at the snow and the cold outside, give thanks that I do not have to take my car on icy roads to participate in any kind of carpool, and will head down to our quilt-laden futon by the fire with a huge stack of good books, a mug of coffee, my kids and be happy.

New beeswax crayons.

Paintings move from the easel to our art line.

A thrift-store mirror and some hooks turn our dress-up box into a full station.

Tools of the trade...

And one snapshot of my garden, to represent that our "classroom" is actually much bigger than our basement studio. This is going to be an adventure! Hopefully one that is fun. I'm excited.
Wishing you and yours a happy start to the school year as well!

Our entryway and a perpetual calendar

2011-08-07T13:51:00.000-07:00

I sometimes enjoy reading other blogs and often get inspired by them. There are only so many ways certain tasks or projects can be done, so there will often be some overlap between the creative projects of different crafty bloggers. There is a difference between inspiration, intentional knock-offs, and flat out copycatting, right? Last winter I bought yellow paint to makeover my family room, the exact same color I've used in my living spaces in my last two houses. I tried to think of ways to make a user-friendly entryway spot to keep my family's accoutrements tidy near our main (side) entrance. I purchased a row of hooks, a little step stool from IKEA, and a big basket to keep everyone's shoes in. I decided to blog about it after I painted the wall behind them. The very next week Soule Mama blogged about a very similar project and I had to laugh--maybe great minds think alike? Then I realized she actually did it a bit better than me because she included a row of hooks for the children, not requiring them to use the step stool like I was. So, inspired by her execution of a project that exists in many homes' entryways, I added a row of bottom hooks myself after our recent paint job. The space now functions better. Isn't sharing ideas great?

I'd like to make the point that while taking inspiration from the beautiful marketplace of the mama blogosphere is acceptable and even lovely, actually taking someone's intellectual property and passing it off as your own is not okay. It is hurtful, wrong, and fundamentally uncreative to take something that belongs to someone else and present it to the world as if you own it. Inspiration is lovely. Following tutorials, giving credit and back-linking is grand. Passing another person's intellectual property off as your own, especially in a way that diverts search engine traffic from the blog for which it is intended, is stealing. (Um, yeah, sorry I had to get all preachy, right? But I wouldn't say it unless I felt like I needed to...)

Moving on, Dorothy has been asking me every day for a week how many days are left until we start school. Although homeschooling kindergarten at my house is actually going to be a pretty informal and fluid event, I have decided to follow the school schedule of our local public schools so that Dorothy and her public-schooling BFF next door will always have their days off together. It seemed high time for me to finish the perpetual calendar we will be referencing every morning and to let her see for herself how many days we have until we officially begin. I sewed rows of clear vinyl pockets over fabric that matches my new kitchen curtains. I printed off little cards with the days and numbers on them and inserted them into the pockets. I will task Dorothy will decorating/labeling the special days on our calendar (like the first day of school!) and she'll add a sticker indicating the morning's weather to each card as we go. Who knows, maybe the whole family will be better organized now that we have a pretty, easy-to-update calendar right there in the kitchen. (Yeah, right.)

My new old kitchen

2011-08-06T16:26:00.000-07:00

I didn't even clean off my counters for this new picture, but that would have been too staged anyway. Before and after--new appliances but same everything else, plus paint and silver hardware. I finished the curtains at 2 a.m!

It's 100 degrees and I crocheted a sweater

2011-08-05T20:09:00.000-07:00

The title pretty much sums it up. I made a baby doll-style sweater as a birthday gift for Dorothy's friend. I used this pattern, which I think you must register to access, but if you knit or crochet you should be registered at Ravelry anyway. The sweater worked up nicely and I thought the skirted style was cute. I added the flower because I thought it needed it. The little birthday girl (and perhaps more importantly, her mother) seemed to like it.

I painted my family room this week! The family room is the large multipurpose room in the back of our house, which I photographed when we first moved in. My computer and my sewing table is in here, as are many of our toys and books. It's my favorite room of the house and the biggest, so painting it has been a big task. I need to get stitching now because I want to photograph this room and the kitchen, but I don't want to do it until I get the curtains done. It's so exciting to be getting these rooms done though!

Some summer accessories

2011-07-28T21:01:00.000-07:00

For the last couple years I have been sewing this pattern when I feel like I need a new wallet. I've made it at least a half dozen times. It's an awesome wallet because it has the right compartments for all my necessities, is a perfect size, and is straightforward and simple to make. I usually prefer the look of a snap closure to the velcro but this time I was sewing in the middle of the night (yes, that is reality with kids; sometimes a girl just needs a new wallet, and sometimes she's already been rudely awakened in the middle of the the night...) and I didn't want to wake anyone else up by my hammering in snaps. I sewed a decorative button on the front to make up for the velcro.

The fabric is scraps from my living room. I have no idea where I got the fusible fabric stiffener I used but it was awful. It didn't provide much structure and it wrinkled the fabric. I'm tossing it out and hoping to not accidentally buy that brand again--who knew there was so much difference? I should keep better track of where I get stuff like that so I know not to waste money on it again. Still, I like my punchy new wallet.

(Aside: notice there is no wallpaper on the wall behind me? The family room is the last wallpaper-removal frontier! It will hopefully be painted yellow this time next week.)
In a break from this most recent home renovation push I stitched up a new skirt and matching headband. I've sewn this same skirt pattern over and over and over and over, but it's so great. It's just the skirt and waistband pieces from Simplicity 2758. I sew it in knits and leave out the zipper, making it super fast and comfortable. I've sewn it in varying lengths and with various embellishments around the hem so it doesn't feel like I have six or so of the same skirt. This time I made it long, in a swishy and slightly shiny polyester knit.

I used scraps from the bottom ruffle to make little rosettes, which I glued onto a plain black headband. Of course now Dorothy wants one too. Rob took me to some sort of business dinner tonight that we interpreted as more of a social event (hence the long swishy skirt and floral headband, and we dropped off the kids with their grandparents) but it turned out to be more of a business event where exactly zero other participants brought a spouse, and everyone was dressed as if they'd come straight from work. Oops! I felt like some sort of chubby trophy wife. But actually the event turned out to be rather fun, with an interesting speaker and yummy food.

And finally, some happy news regarding my car-related teeny tiny sorry ass first world problem. It's over! I turned back in my unlovable rental and was reunited with my family car today. I managed not to make out with it in the parking lot but it was tough. (LOL, please.)

The house projects continue

2011-07-25T08:19:00.000-07:00

We took a trip to Columbus, Ohio. Our puppy traveled well but we did feel like a traveling circus (a circus in a gas-guzzling rental car, since mine is still in the shop) barreling across Kentucky and Ohio with our collection of children and dog, ready to descend on the usually calm and tidy home of my sister-in-law. She's good-natured, though, and seems fond of us anyway! I took this photo of some baby birds in the tree outside her home. The monks who wrote the beautiful puppy book I blogged about earlier suggested that dog ownership would make me see the world in new ways and they are right. As I get to know Belle better, I also notice that I have a more keen awareness of all the animal drama playing out around me. From other dogs on the street to the screechings of the poor mama bird as I photographed her children, I'm grateful for the new dimension puppy companionship has added to my life.

We visted the Santa Maria replica on a hot afternoon. Worth has developed a fascination with boats lately that unfortunately did not seem to extend to this one. I think it was too large for him to realize he was in a vessel rather than on the shore. We at least managed to keep him from going overboard, and the rest of us enjoyed the tour.

When we got home from Ohio my mother and I embarked on our biggest interior painting project yet--the kitchen cabinets. Is my salt shaker rolling his eyes at us? Perhaps, since there is a great chaos in the kitchen. But I think (hope!) that it's going to look great when we're done.

Painting cabinets is not for the faint of heart. I did it once before, when we lived in Oak Park, Illinois, and it was a big project then without kids or pups. Still, it's now nearing completion and I'm excited to share before and after pictures soon!

Hazy but never lazy summer

2011-07-15T13:48:00.000-07:00

Where does the time go? I'm offended that Target has back-to-school things out. In the meantime, we're enjoying the heck out of our summer, in and out of the pool, playing with the dog, partying in the back yard, getting sunburned in spite of best intentions, still removing wallpaper occasionally but not doing too much crafting. There will be time for cozy indoor creativity later. Dorothy and I have been churning out cookie bouquets in the kitchen, however, since we all need to be in the air conditioning sometimes. I let her color on old CD adhesive labels, which we then stick to the plastic-wrapped cookies. That seems to be a good way to use those labels up as well as artfully decorate our goodies. Empty cans that used to house bottled coffee drinks make perfect small vases, and the link to cookie recipe we use is here. This bouquet went to a four-year-old friend with a birthday this week.

Vintage linens on the kid table, with flowers picked from the garden in a mason jar, all ready for a group of happy friends--does summer get any better than this?

And Miss Belle, who I think may actually have doubled her size since we adopted her, sporting her new Etsy collar with flower. She is growing strong on food from dishes sold by this store, and her sweet engraved tag came from here. These dog goodies were beyond my homemade ken, but I love being able to buy someone else's creative works instead of the same old stuff from the big box stores.

I also have a happy update on my car woes. It seems that my car is fixable! I may only be in my ugly, gas-guzzling rental for one more week. I'm going to have to do something nice for my car when I get it back. Maybe a homemade trash can? Or new cover-up rugs for the floorboards? I'm so excited. There's nothing to make you appreciate the status quo like having it temporarily compromised.

The garage door and an accidental nightie

2011-07-05T08:32:00.000-07:00

Hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend! We took the puppy to the celebration at Crescent Hill. We thought the pet-friendly event would be nice socialization for her and that if she got too sidetracked by the sights and the smells I could just carry her. That plan worked okay except I failed to anticipate the mobs of children and old men who would want to stop and pet the puppy. So we made our way slowly through the celebration and really that was just about perfect. There was enough time and puppy love to go around! My kids were also looking pretty cute in their patriotic hand-me-downs. (I [heart] generous friends with older children!)

I realized on the morning of the 4th that I didn't really have anything red, white or blue I felt like wearing. I thought of some cute cherry fabric in my stash and I had just enough time before we were to meet friends at the celebration to whip up a new tank top. Unfortunately, even though I altered the pattern I'd used to make pajamas recently the tank was still too loose and poofy for me to want to wear it out in public. I made do with a plain white t-shirt instead and will sew sleep shorts to match this tank, now an accidental nightie instead of day-wear. Oh well, new pajamas are nice too, and I doubt I would have wanted to wear cherries on many days besides the 4th anyway.

This project is one Rob and I have worked on together over several weekends. Our detached garage was looking decrepit, with peeling paint on the door and a rusty old light. Rob sanded the door and we painted it in white with the gold in the grid to match our front and side entrance doors. Then Rob sanded and sprayed the light fixture red and that really perked it up, making it look like a garage that really belongs to us and our house instead of an afterthought stuck in the back yard. I think I'll use red on some shutters on the side of the garage as well. The colors are consistent with what we've been doing on the side and front porches. I actually need to finish up that front porch and blog about it--the UPS woman made my day recently by asking where I'd purchased my (homemade) chair cushions in the front! I love giving this old house new life.

One unhappy event and a dog bed

2011-06-30T10:57:00.000-07:00

A nostalgia photo: me with the keys to the only car I've ever chosen for myself, March 2008.

It's been an eventful week. Dorothy's at a drama day camp, we had a nice visit from Aunt Stephanie, and, unfortunately, we had a car accident. Belle seems to like riding in the car so I'd taken her with me to pick Dorothy up from camp. We were almost home when the light turned green for me at an intersection and I drove forward. Unfortunately, Mr. Wears-the-Same-Color-as-His-Sports-Car-With-Vanity-Plates thought that his red stoplight did not apply to him and he zoomed through it--and right into my car. I honked/swerved/braked and all of that, but the impact (to my front passenger side) was still pretty fierce. My back got quite a jolt and the pup hit the floor. Thankfully, the kids seem to have come through the crash just fine, safely secured in their correctly-installed car seats and Worth still rear-facing. The pup picked herself back up with no ill effects, and I'm hoping my sore back is a temporary issue. My car, however, is not so fine. The impact sent us on a little half-spin that seems to have made one of my rear wheels tilt toward the center. Not good. I drove the vehicle the remaining blocks to my house at about 5 mph, with my father-in-law carefully following behind, but the conditions deteriorated such over the course of the short drive home that I'm quite worried about what's going to happen to my beloved car. It shakes and trembles, screeches and takes jolty little nose-dives to the left without any input from the driver. I'm trying to remember how grateful I am that all my humans (and one canine) are still in one piece, but I'm also pretty upset about the car.
My mother has been sweet to loan me hers until we can come up with a better interim solution, but it's a lousy feeling to be without my wheels. My car has the hitch, so there will be no camper-towing for a while. I'm also almost ridiculously fond of my car (I get gently made fun of for this sometimes) and it makes me sad to be without it. My car is just such a great fit for my life--there is a perfect spot or feature for all of my little people, gadgets, or travel-related needs. It's not too big and not too small. Up off the ground but not towering. I spent many hours researching and reviewing cars after my old Civic was crashed (along with, unfortunately, my right arm) back in Dorothy's infancy, and I've always felt that though nothing can make up for a right arm that never got back full range of motion and always knows when it rains, getting to pick just the right vehicle for me while my husband was still in law school was a nice consolation prize. My fingers are crossed that the damage isn't as bad as it seems, and that maybe I'll be back on my own wheels soon.

Ok, enough of my whining. Belle needed a special comfy place and I've made her a dog bed. I used two standard-size pillows that I hooked together with snaps along one long side of each. This way the pillows can be detached for easy machine-washing. Otherwise I think a well-padded dog bed for a pooch the size that Belle will be would not fit in the washing machine. The bed is located in the hallway right outside the bedrooms of our human family members. I used leftover bird fabric from the curtains in my bedroom, machine basted to an old flannel sheet for added body and sturdiness. The bottom is just cut from a thrifted sheet, with overlapping edges for easy removal. Belle seemed to know exactly who the bed was for and plopped right down. I'll have to take regular photos of her on it as she grows, to record her growth as her puppyhood speeds by. She's a sweet little dog.

I've been reading up on puppy training since we're such dog novices. I love this book, written by a group of Eastern Orthodox monks who raise and train dogs to support their community. I hadn't expected to enjoy reading about puppy training, but was pleasantly surprised when I fell quite engrossed by this bit of puppy prose. They take their dogs very seriously--I sometimes wonder if some of their very serious anecdotes and advice are a bit tongue-in-cheek?--and present all of their information and recommendations thoughtfully and thoroughly. I recommend it to anyone sharing a home with a puppy.

A top ten

2011-06-22T13:19:00.000-07:00

Well, we've had some puppy-related drama since my last post. Poor pup got pathetically sick and I took her in for care on Sunday morning. She was admitted to the animal hospital for IV fluids and medication, where she stayed for two days. She's recovering nicely and seems fine now, but our finances might not be. Let's just say I could have purchased several new sewing machines for the amount we've now spent on this Humane Society animal. I hope she gets how lucky she is.

Other than the vet bill, however, we're enjoying this furry little addition to our family. I've made some observations about how much she has in common with Worth:

The top ten things my toddler and puppy have in common

   10. They can climb stairs but have trouble with the descent
       9. They would like to play in the toilet
       8. Neither is house-trained, in spite of toilet fascination
       7. They make the cat roll his eyes
       6. They stay at my heels constantly
       5. They put everything in their mouths
       4. They are both just the right size for the new kennel (hmmmm...)
       3. They both bite (a little)
       2. They respond only to simple commands
      1. They whine when they don't get their way

I have plans for some crafting (hello dog bed!) but haven't gotten much done. I did find enough time last week before the puppy health problems started to make soap. I use the cold process method to make lye soap, instructions for which can be found online. I made one unscented batch for my brother and another for myself, half with a "clean linen" scent and the other half with coconut scent. It's so satisfying to see the newly-cut bars sitting out to cure--such a nice feeling of actually having accomplished something in spite of vet visits and one grumpy, teething toddler

A bird in the hand

2011-06-15T21:32:00.000-07:00

Before the puppy madness began I was spending some time working on our outside spaces. This is our side porch, and since we park in the back it the entrance we use primarily. I'd post a before picture but it would be too embarrassing to show you the messy jumble of miscellaneous junk I'd allowed to accumulate there as we were moving in. Sometimes it was easier to dump stuff on the porch than to find a better home for it. Anyway, I cleared off the junk and set up the grill. There isn't room for chairs on this little porch but it needed something else on it so I potted some herbs in pots I painted, then let Dorothy and her friend next door paint our old, recently-replaced front porch mailbox a bright yellow color and set it out to use as an exchange spot for messages to each other. The girls loved this project. Then something was still missing--I thought the window looked like it needed curtains, but curtains on an exterior window seemed a bit odd so I thought of pennants instead. I made the little string of flags out of scraps from Aunt Stephanie's room and I think they look very fresh and cheerful there. They tie in the colors of the pots, the little girls' mailbox, and the mustardy-gold I painted on the exterior door. Why not?

We traveled over the weekend. We had campground reservations at Rough River State Park but they were cancelled by the park several days before our trip due to flooding. With a weekend already blocked off for travel but the weather unappealingly hot for camping we decided to move forward some travel plans we'd intended for later in the summer. Saturday we visited Kentucky Down Under where Dorothy got to pet an emu, a kangaroo, and encounter this beautiful bird. The park had the feeling of a place that is still up and coming but we enjoyed the several hours we spent there. If I had it to do over I'd have packed a picnic as the cafe food was not very good--let that be my tip if you go. After the park we drove on into Bowling Green where we dined at the surprisingly good 440 Main on the charming town square and stayed the night at a hotel. The next day we visited the National Corvette Museum which I think has my husband vowing to work harder and earn more money...for a Corvette. Oy. It was a fun weekend getaway just a car nap's drive from home. On the way home we shared our favorite memories: Rob liked the Corvettes (go figure), Dorothy enjoyed the hotel pool more than either paid attraction, and I most enjoyed our dinner at the nice restaurant. What can I say?

Our puppy may now have a name. I really think she's a Pippa, but Dorothy seemed wedded to her suggestion of Isabelle. I pulled some Mommy magic today and had her convinced that naming the dog Pippa was her idea. She'd totally embraced it, started calling her that, and even proudly introduced the dog as Pippa to the next-door friend, but then Rob came home surprised by her change of heart and totally foiled my plan. "Is that really what you want to name her? I thought you were naming her Isabelle?" not realizing I'd already carefully achieved buy-in and was not pressuring her to pick a name I preferred. Then I think Dorothy got the impression that her father actually preferred Isabelle and has firmly switched back to that. Sigh...
Bella, which would be my top choice for a nickname if the dog must be named Isabelle, is the most common dog name , according to this web site. No fewer than three people have told me that they know other dogs named Bella. This will drive my crazy. I don't like to do things like other people. No amount of channeling good memories of the trip I once took to Italy will stop me from writhing at the idea that people will think I chose to name my dog the single most popular dog name currently in existence. Rob and I carefully chose names for our children that didn't even make the top 1000 baby names the years they were born. That was not an accident. I think we'll call her Belle for short as opposed to Bella, with the one letter's difference (and nod toward France instead of Italy) at least making the name slightly more "beautiful" (pun intended) to me. And if I show up at the dog park and can't get my dog's attention since all the other doggie owners are calling their pups by the same basic name, well, I guess I'll just have to remember that allowing my 5-year-old to choose the name and venting my frustrations on the blog instead of in her earshot was the right thing to do. Belle it is.

She needs a name

2011-06-14T16:15:00.000-07:00

My gorgeous nieces appear courtesy of Life on the Farm. :)
We're growing attached to this pup but haven't settled on a name. I created a poll. Want to help?

Click here to take survey

And then we got a puppy

2011-06-13T20:30:00.000-07:00

We've been over-thinking this for months. Decided not to, absolutely not, and if we did get one it would be a grown dog, but then somehow we ended up with this. A puppy! She's two months old, and is, as the Humane Society put it, a "mix." She's adorable. I've never raised a dog before...wish me luck!

Spring fun

2011-06-10T08:41:00.000-07:00

We've been running around like crazy in this heat. If the rest of the summer's schedule looks like this I'm going to have to figure out a way to "quit" and homeschool summer too. We're always on the run! Splash parks, playgrounds, pools, berry patches and playdates--we need to slow down before we break down. Individually it's all fun, but it adds up to a wee bit much. Here's a photo of my little guy trying to swipe strawberries after our recent berry-picking excursion. I made the mistake of letting Dorothy use her own tray, and I had no idea how many she'd pick. I ended up with two gallons of strawberries--about twice as many as I'd planned on. I made strawberry-mango jam, cooked strawberry pie, uncooked strawberry pie, pie filling for the freezer, strawberry ice cream, strawberry daiquiris, daiquiris for the freezer, strawberry bread, bread for the freezer, and we ate huge amounts of strawberries and cream. Enough! Enough! Like our recent schedule of fun, the berries were wonderful but too abundant.

Somewhere in there (I think it was before the advent of the strawberries) I also invented a new cookie I'm pleased to share. I'm not sure what to call it--a Derby Pie Cookie? Is that trademarked too? A Kentucky Cookie? A chocolate walnut cookie with thoughts of thoroughbreds? Anyway, it's sort of like Derby Pie (I mean NOT Derby pie, since the original of course is famously trademarked) but a cookie. Here's what I did:

1 cup plus 2 TB all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 stick (8 TB) softened unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla
2 TB bourbon
1 1/2 cup chocolate chips (I used semi-sweet, but I think next time I'd use dark)
1 cup chopped, toasted walnuts (toast for 10 minutes at 350)

Stir flour with soda and salt together with a fork. Set aside.
Cream butter and sugar in a mixer bowl, then add egg, vanilla and bourbon.
Add flour mixture and stir until smooth. Stir in chocolate and walnuts.
Drop onto parchment-lined cookie sheets and bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes or until done. Leave ample space between cookies because they spread a lot.

Our nest

2011-06-07T08:41:00.000-07:00

I finally took some photos of our nearly-completed bedroom. The only work left in here is to paint the ceiling and trim. The photo above is the master bedroom before we moved in. Those dusty old valances are making me itch just looking at the photo! We had intended to paint this room a sort of soothing neutral color, but when we stripped away the wallpaper we found a wall that had been a light turquoise. We liked it so well we ended up changing our color plans and painting the walls a deep turquoise instead, inspired by the color that had been on the wall in some previous incarnation.

I used fabric from Joann for the curtains and pillows in here, Legacy Studio's Nestled in Branches. I fell in love with this fabric when we were house-hunting, and once it finally came time to work on our new bedroom I was relieved that they still carried the prints. I bought the whole bolt of the curtain fabric! I still have some left and will probably do a small lap-quilt down the road. I did the pillow shams (as well as a slightly different alternate set so one can be in the laundry, not pictured) in strips of the bird fabrics with some solids as accents. I used a decorative stitch along each seam and binding along the edges. Once they were done I felt like I'd taken what could have been a very simple project (shams made of two pieces of fabric stitched along three sides) and made it needlessly complicated, but I really do like the final product. I also shouldn't discount the enjoyment I got out of stitching the strips! Life's about the journey, right?

The whimsical bird print against my new white blinds and the new black curtain hardware makes me happy. Those windows wanted to be free of the dusty, stuffy old curtains that must have looked fresh and pretty when they were new, but had long since outlived their moment. Waking up in this room is wonderful!

I needed something on top of our wardrobe, so I combined a metal basket from my mother-in-law's yard sale with a bird intended as yard art to complete our free bird (ha ha) theme in this room.

And this wasn't really intentional, but seemed serendipitous. My grandmother's lamp looked great in the living room of my old house but was having trouble fitting in to any of the spaces we were creating here. Now that everything is put together it looks like I actually created a room just for this lamp. I don't get much into emotional attachment to objects, but it is nice when an object I love in its own right, like this lamp, also shares with me the memory of my grandparents' living room where it shed light on many family moments over many years. My paternal grandparents died during my two pregnancies (Grandpa during Dorothy's, Grandma during Worth's), and now their lamp shines on the baptism portraits of my beautiful kids. I think they would have liked that.

Gifts and summer pajamas

2011-05-28T11:28:00.000-07:00

I put the home related sewing aside this week to make myself a pair of summer pj's. Sleeping in old t-shirts and well-worn pajamas pants is comfortable, but sometimes I just want to feel a little cuter at night, even if the only person to notice might be my still-won't-sleep-through-the-night toddler. I used a free pattern I found online for the tank, but I'm not going to link to it because I really didn't care for it. I had to make many alterations and it still is a bit big, even though the pattern involved taking my own measurements before starting. It'll work fine for sleeping though. I made bermuda-length sleep shorts to match by cutting around pants I already own and they fit perfectly. The pajamas are made from super-soft thrift store sheets in 100% cotton. I love the pretty print, and that new fabric could never be so wonderfully soft. (Aside: Wondering about that beautiful turquoise wall behind the pajamas? That's my bedroom! It used to be covered in "tropical" wallpaper. More on that project is forthcoming!)

This was a Mother's Day project I'd almost forgotten to blog about. I bought some little silver charms at Joann that are intended to hold tiny photographs. Then I printed out a whole page of empty squares just the right size on cardstock and let Dorothy draw mini pictures in each one with pen and colored pencil. We chose our favorites and I glued them onto the charms, then we covered them with several coats of brush-on gloss glaze. The flower charm was a gift to my mother and the bird is now mine. We strung them on silver chains.

Dorothy had a major milestone this past week--she finished preschool! As much as I'm looking forward to having her home next year it was emotional and a little rough to watch all her treasures come home from school. It was like watching the sweet and nurturing space they'd created for her there being dismantled. She has laid her beloved resting rug on her bed here at home and has been sleeping on it, and we put together a small bag to hold her other treasures such a her photo album and name card. To honor the lovely women who have given her the treasure of such a warm and lovely year of preschool we made homemade shopping bags. Dorothy chose the fabric (from the same sheet as the pajamas) and helped me sew the seams on her little sewing machine.

Her confidence is a wee bit ahead of her ability, but the slightly off-kilter seams don't show unless you're looking, and they prove that the love and work of a five-year-old went into the construction. I made small drawstring bags so the teachers can easily stash their shopping totes into their purses or glove compartments.

More Aunt Stephanie's Room

2011-05-27T13:24:00.000-07:00

The guest room is officially done! The neighbor girl who plays with Dorothy walked in, not having been in the room since we were using it for post-move storage, and gasped. It was so gratifying. And then she was so impressed that we had a whole room just for guests that it made me remember Anne of Green Gables and Aunt Josephine and I secretly vowed to invite her over to sleep in it sometime. It does feel sort of indulgent to have a guest room after we seemed so cramped with the four of us in our two-bedroom six months ago. I made up the bed with clean sheets today and am feeling that much more settled here. Ignore that the brass bed really needs to be polished. I augmented store-bought bedding (Target and IKEA) with homemade toss pillows and I sewed homemade bias tape along the bottom of a plain store-bought bed skirt.

In such a bright room I wanted bright photographs too. I painted old gold picture frames black, then snapped photos of the kids posing against a backdrop of the (uncut) curtain fabric. It's not like you'd walk in and notice that the photo backdrop matches the curtains, which is just as well, but the overall effect does help tie everything together in this bright and colorful room.

I wanted to bring some of the room's black accents onto the bed so I made one pillow using this terrific owl fabric I found online. It didn't quite work, though. You remember that Sesame Street game from when we were kids? Which of these things doesn't belong? It was totally this pillow. I thought that if just one owl could be orange then it would really make everything look harmonious, so I grabbed an orange Sharpie marker and colored one owl in. Let's hope the cat doesn't puke on this pillow because I have no idea how orange Sharpie would wash, but I love the way it turned out. Now the pillow looks like it belongs perfectly.

I also embellished the white pillowcases that go with the plain white sheets on this bed. I used more of the homemade bias tape (do I need a support group for my recent bias tape problem?) and some of the decorative stitching on my new machine.

My success in painting the hokey flowers on the thrift store rocking chair inspired me to try something similar on an old milk can. I bought this jug at a yard sale when we lived in Oak Park and kept it on our front porch at our last two houses. It was already black but was starting to look sort of pathetic and rusty, so I sprayed on some new black and painted on the flowers and our name. I may get tired of looking at my own unprofessional art work every time I enter my front door, but it shouldn't be hard to spray on over the decoration when that time comes.

Aunt Stephanie's Room

2011-05-19T15:41:00.000-07:00

I've been working on the guest room, otherwise known as Aunt Stephanie's room. (Stephanie was my college roommate, is honorary and beloved "aunt" to my kids and is my favorite and most frequent houseguest, hence the room is named for her.) The walls are a creamy yellow that look more or less intense depending on the light. I hung simple white shades in the window for nighttime privacy, then made slim curtains with tie-backs so they don't obscure the view. I love the crazy orange bird print, which is Pretty Bird Spice by Michael Miller.

The rocking chair was a thrift store find, $12.00, and it was your basic old wooden rocker with an awful, dusty cushion. I ditched the cushion, painted the rocker black to tie in the picture frames and curtain rods, and free-handed some orange flowers on the top. I love the way it now looks like it was made for the room.

For most of the rooms in the house I've chosen a group of favorite fabrics as a starting point and this room was no different. The Michale Miller Pretty Bird fabrics appear on the lamp shade, the pillows (here and more to come), the bedding (stay tuned), and the curtains. Gluing homemade bias tape on lamp shades is slightly addictive because it's so fast and it looks good. Now I've got my mother doing it too. The funky candy dish was a vintage eBay piece because I just had to--how could I do a room in orange but not have something made out of that crazy fiery retro glass? Other bits of this room are still in progress and will be done soon--so if you're thinking of visiting me and staying in my guest room, pick a date!

Locked in the basement

2011-05-16T12:24:00.000-07:00

First a finished project. I made a super-comfy skirt out of a thrifted jersey sheet. It's soft like pajamas! It's casual but cute--a skirt to wear with flip-flops. I love wearing skirts in the summer because they are cooler than capris and don't have all the thigh-rubbing (sorry, I'm just shaped like that) and burning-legs-on-leather-car-upholstery issues of shorts. I think this one will become a summer favorite.

Next a funny story. Dorothy has been a little high-strung lately, perhaps due to all the talk at school about final days and transitions. She was passive-aggressively "waving" a doll apron at her brother, in a way that just happened to involve whipping him with apron strings. I asked her not to, she told me she was just fanning him and continued to do it. I asked her to go to her room and settle down. She stomped off to her second-floor bedroom angrily. Then I noted that the baby seemed to be happy tormenting the cat (whipping him with apron strings, perhaps?) so this seemed like a good moment for me to run some Costco purchases downstairs to our chest freezer. When I came up the basement stairs I found that the baby had tired of tormenting the cat and had moved on to fiddling with the basement door--in a way that involved locking me in the basement. As I stood there on the steps he opened the tiny cat door and waved at me pleasantly, thinking it was some kind of game that I was staying on the other side of it. It had been on my mind that I should get a screwdriver and remove those old locks before something just like this happened, but of course I hadn't had the sense to do it yet. So I had to stand there on the basement stairs, frozen turkey bacon in hand, and yell for my exiled daughter over the sound of Pandora on the Old Crow Medicine Show station. She finally heard me and came down, sort of puzzled by the very short amount of time she was required to spend in her room. I explained the situation as calmly as possible and gave thanks that she's still young enough that she just laughed at what her brother had done and let me out without further torment. Shew! Now I really will take off those old locks before she gets old enough to be vengeful, or is waiting to be picked up at preschool next time I get locked in the basement.

Finally, I just joined Twitter but I don't know anything about it. What do I do next? I'm RenataHomemade.

May camping

2011-05-15T14:37:00.000-07:00

I have somewhere around five sewing or house projects right now that are almost done, so watch out for a torrent of upcoming blogging. You've been warned! In the meantime my family and I took a quick getaway in Little Red this weekend. We drove out to Blue Licks Battlefield State Park, which is between Lexington and Cincinnati. We drove through some gorgeous horse farm country and charming Paris, Kentucky. (Says Dorothy, "Do they have an Eiffel Tower?" Excellent question, but seems not.)

The campsite was damp but pretty. This campground had two features we really liked. First, the playground is centrally located and visible from almost every campsite, so frisky five-year-olds can run and play without waiting for the slow-poke grown-ups to catch up. Second, the heads to several trails are located right by or in the campground so families like ours don't have to schlep children by car or long and winding road just to start a family hike through the woods.

We realized just a bit too late that the park had a Pioneer Museum, which would have been so fun to visit since we only last week finished reading the Little House on the Prairie series. We did get to check out a trail, the battlefield and monument, and we'd just driven down to the boat dock to explore the creek when we ran into a handful of half-naked teenagers covered from head to toe in mud and decided maybe we should go back to the campsite instead. At first I thought they were actually completely naked teenagers covered in mud and memories of our adventures in Mercer County ran through my head, but at second glance there did seem to be bikinis and trunks somewhere under all the muck. I have no idea what they were up to, but Dorothy only commented that they sure could use a shower (yup!) and rear-facing Worth didn't see them at all. I heard the girls in the campground shower later talking about fall classes (anatomy! advanced chemistry!) and I'm sure they were actually, ahem, very nice girls. There may or may not have ever been muddy bikini-wearing in my past. I'm not saying. I definitely didn't take advanced chemistry.

Back at camp we had dinner and a campfire. It was damp but not raining and Rob had a rough time getting the fire started. We'd almost given up on the campfire cooking to use our little red camper microwave instead (we're talking about warming pre-cooked chicken sausages and foil packets of potatoes I'd pre-roasted here, not putting a whole pig on a spit or anything) when the fire finally took off quite zippily. We'd just begun to nosh on our smoky hot food when it did actually start raining hard and we fled for the comfort of our tiny camper. We've never been so glad to have graduated from tent-camping as this trip. It rained the rest of the time but we were cozy inside with our art supplies, Rob's newspaper, my camper journal (above), matching pirate pajamas for the small set (below) and the pleasant sound of rain on our roof.

We headed home first thing this morning since hiking in the rain with children isn't really our thing. The trip was short but sweet!

Bins for sewing projects

2011-05-09T14:04:00.000-07:00

Now that my new sewing machines are in I've been inspired to organize my sewing supplies and make room for the extra machine. When we moved in to this house I just plopped my sewing stuff into a corner in approximately the same configuration I'd had it all in our last house but that wasn't really working here. One of the things I need is child-proof storage for projects I'm working on currently. I sew in our family room but store my fabric downstairs, so there has been some needless schlepping and pile-making without a good system in place for dealing with this. I'm hoping these buckets do the trick. I covered the labels on some old kitty litter totes with scrapbook paper and fabric swatches I've printed off the internet. I laminated and attached them with Xyron adhesive, but glue and clear contact paper would work too. I love these buckets and have used them for many purposes (and blogged about it once before) and I think this should help keep me operating smoothly and with reasonable tidiness.

I also made similar labels for some empty plastic pretzel jars. The jars are just the right size for holding trim, and they look kind of pretty with their new labels.

A new machine

2011-05-06T06:47:00.000-07:00

This is what I was working on when my sewing machine died--toss pillows for the guest room bed. The room is now painted and cleaned out but I'm still working on the details.

This is an upcycled vase for the guest room. I found it at a thrift store, classic in earth tones but with a chip that I'm sure is what landed it in someone's donation pile. I painted it, using a contrasting color for the raised pattern. I'm not much of a painter, but I don't think this kind of project requires a look of perfection. Now it matches the colors I'm trying to tie together in the scheme for this room. I clear-coated it in Triple Thick Gloss Glaze to make it shiny. This stuff is kind of addictive. The first time I'd used it was on our eggs. It brushes on so beautifully and it dries hard and it seems to be durable. It's much thicker and less messy than spray versions I've used in the past. Any kid art project (or goofy vase paint job) will look more professional with a coat of gloss-glaze, right?

Last but not least, I've moved on the sewing machine issue. I did two days of obsessive internet research and decided that I actually needed to replace my broken machine with two inexpensive machines. Buying a new machine that would sew over thick materials and provide lots of stitch options was cost-prohibitive, but I got the best of both worlds with much less expense. I ordered an inexpensive computerized machine that does lots of decorative stitches and a vintage machine from eBay that offers few options but will sew over anything. The two machines together cost less than one really good machine, and if one of them meets a terrible Worth-related accident (or any other malfunction) it won't leave me without a machine at all.

The eBay dealer who listed the vintage machine actually posted video of this sewing machine stitching over crushed aluminum cans. Wow! I'm not sure I'll use it for that (ha ha), but hopefully this machine's decades of stalwart performance won't be destroyed by a project like pillows with thick cording, which I suspect is what did in my last machine. The vintage machine should arrive today; the computerized machine came in earlier in the week. It's...computerized. Sewing with it feels like driving an automatic when you are used to a manual transmission. Some bond between the operator and the machine is missing. Hopefully I'll learn to like it better. The stitches, at least, are nice. It has many more options than I've had before. I tried it out (above) by stitching this little vine pattern onto a plain white drawstring bag that new sheets came in.

An impromptu crafty yard sale

2011-04-29T15:05:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is not normally what I do on this blog, but today something sad happened. My sewing machine died! I bravely took my screw driver and tried to investigate the problem, but (not being a sewing machine repair person) I really can't tell. It's an inexpensive machine so it's likely not worth fixing though I may try. Right now the needle is still sunk into a tote bag I was working on so I'm going to have to figure out how to get that out in any case. In the meantime, I'm going to use this opportunity to sell some stuff I don't really need and see if I can get money to just buy a better machine.

If you want to buy something just message me. I can ship for the cost of shipping if you'd like or if you're local we can work something out.

First, I will sell the jewelry I made two weeks ago and just make more for myself. $15.00 for the green pendant necklace and matching earrings, $20.00 for the red and amber set, and I think I'd have to charge $40.00 for the blue because those are really expensive beads (I bought them when we were DINKs, and I think they actually may have been that price for just the beads!).

This is a needle-felted flower. It's 4.5 inches from leaf tip to leaf tip. I will glue it to a headband or attach a pin clasp at no additional cost, or you can use it for something else as it is. I safety-pinned it to my gray wool coat once and loved it, then forgot all about it. $7.00.

Cotton batik purse. 12 inches at widest point. Fully lined, velcro closure. Never used. $15.00.

Tote bag. Made from cotton upcycled from a never-used body pillow cover. Velcro closure. 15 inches wide, which is just the right size for carrying a standard-size notebook or a small load of groceries. $7.00.

Baby hat. 7 inches wide, I think it would fit about a 6 month old. (It is too small for Worth, though he has a particularly large head.) It is made from yarn that was gifted to me, but I would guess it to be a wool blend, though it could just be a better-quality acrylic. $5.00.

Last but not least, this is a fall-colors scarf. It's really pretty and I should go outside and take a better picture of it but I'm too lazy. I paid $25 for the really yummy wool, so I'm asking $40.00 for the scarf. It's not been blocked yet but I'll block it if you buy it!

Painting again

2011-04-25T18:16:00.000-07:00

Watch out! My mom and I are wielding paintbrushes again. The guest room here has been acting as a great big closet and dumping ground since move-in and now I'm finally getting it into shape. Rob took down the wallpaper; I dragged boxes to their proper locations and put stuff away that was collecting in piles. Mom came to help and we puttied holes, sanded, and got the whole room primed. Hooray! Next up: buttery yellow walls. Watching the transformation from the old, unpainted walls to the fresh clean look of primer is amazing. Now I'm excited for the paint!

I feel like my son has been getting the short end of this blog lately. He's always the little person in the way, and to be honest, that is often is role in blog-making projects. But in the rest of life he's dear, and today's remaining photos today are in celebration of his cute little ways.

Worth:

...sometimes sleeps with his bottom up in the air.

...likes to play in mud but not the taste of it.

...uses nonverbal communication to make demands, looking ridiculously like a Baroque cherub painting. And

...cleans up pretty well.

Matching Easter dresses

2011-04-24T15:15:00.000-07:00

Dorothy was in her ballet recital this weekend. The cuteness of a dozen girls in fluffy tutus under bright lights really can't be exaggerated--it's priceless. We love the low-stakes casualness of the recital our studio puts on. The girls have every reason to feel good and no reasons to feel anxious. I took Dorothy to the park near our house last week to take some informal pictures in her recital costume. This one is my favorite. Such a free-spirited dancer!

I finished our Easter dresses yesterday, just in the nick of time. Dorothy's is Simplicity 2237 and mine is Butterick B4443. I lined both of them fully in a lighter lavender. I made hers in a size 5 but it is a bit wide for her. It's still cute and I'll use the pattern again but next time I'll cut it to be more narrow. I made mine in a size 14 even though I'm usually a size 10 because the pattern measurements suggested that's what I'd require, but it was wrong. The dress is too big all over, especially the armholes. I felt discouraged when I looked at our pictures because after going to the trouble of making us matching dresses I wanted to like the way I looked! It is never flattering to wear clothes that don't fit. Now I've ripped up much of the bodice and taken in the seams, so next time I wear the dress it should look better. I will probably make this pattern again because I still like the overall style, simpleness of construction, and that it doesn't take much fabric, but next time I'll make it in my usual size.

I used inexpensive cottons for our dresses so they are both comfortable and washable. The contrasting bands around the waist are of a pretty batik. I glued fabric and ribbon flowers onto plain white headbands so we could match in accessories too. I suggested that Dorothy make a practical footwear choice like me but she'd have none of it! As it turned out the rain stopped, so I could have worn my (planned) white sandals after all.

The little imp edging in our picture here is my niece Lila. She doesn't need a purple dress to look like me, does she? Don't tell her that, though--it makes her furious!

Wooden Easter eggs

2011-04-21T13:54:00.000-07:00

I bought these gorgeous eggs before my first married Easter. We were still setting up our little household and I wanted some non-hokey holiday decorations. I had previously seen Pysanky eggs at a display somewhere and I found that I could order a whole box of similar ones on eBay to be delivered right to me from some enterprising woman in the Ukraine. They were spendier than plastic ones, but they've been worth every penny. I don't think they are considered true Pysanky eggs because they are wooden and appear to be painted rather than done by wax-relief, but they're so beautiful and I love getting them out every year. I keep them in a glass bowl on my dining table.

This year I decided to use my Ukrainian eggs as inspiration for an Easter project with Dorothy. I showed her the eggs and told her a bit about them, then we made our own. Like the inspiration eggs, ours are made of wood. I first painted them a solid color, some with acrylics and some with the latex paint sample jars I've been collecting during our home renovations. Then we used permanent markers and acrylic paints to put on our designs. Ours are not as intricate as the Ukrainian eggs, but maybe the Ukrainian artists weren't trying to paint just beyond the reach of an impatient toddler! Once the designs were finished and dry I sealed them with a high-gloss glaze. That made them look shiny like our Ukrainian eggs and it seems to have made them more durable, seeing as how they've hit the wooden floor any number of times thus far but don't seem worse for wear. We only painted some of the wooden eggs I bought; it's my hope to do this project for several years in a row and see how our skill progresses.

I'm also hoping this project excuses me from dying hard-boiled eggs this year because I secretly dislike that project. I think hard-boiled eggs taste and smell nasty and the project is so messy. Dying shirts is worth the mess because after the project is over you get a shirt. After you dye eggs you just have colored hard-boiled eggs which taste just as bad as the originals! Plus Dorothy already dyed some at school and at Grandma's. Now I'm just justifying, because clearly I'm a bad mom who is trying to get out of dying Easter eggs. :)

Spring jewelry

2011-04-17T12:58:00.000-07:00

Lately I'm really taken by the Groupon-like website Heartsy, which offers deals from Etsy sellers. The beautiful jewelry in the offers (some of which I've also purchased) has inspired me to get my jewelry-making supplies out. I've been taking apart jewelry that I made in the past and using the pieces to make "new" items that are more in tune with my current style and clothing selections.

I did purchase a few update supplies, such as 100 inches of this black chain and some matching black findings (the clasps, etc.).

The colors in this red and amber set were inspired by a necklace I wanted from a Heartsy offer. I would have bought it but the deal sold out too fast. I may still ask for the inspiration piece for Mothers' Day or something, since mine really only resembles it in color. The other had pretty handmade clay beads that I do not have the tools to make, plus I wouldn't want to just flat out copy another design. I do like my set in the same colors in the meantime.

I also put together some earrings to match.

April camping

2011-04-10T12:06:00.000-07:00

We made our first 2011 trip in the little camper! The trip was the perfect mix of length of travel (not long), length of stay (not long), and low-key activities. We visited General Butler State Park, which is only about an hour from home. Last fall when we started camper camping I noticed that all the big outfits had family name signs they put out in front of their campsites, kind of like campground calling cards or announcements. I liked the friendly idea but didn't think one of the large, imposing wooden signs would go very well with our streamlined setup so I designed and ordered this little lightweight yard sign. It says "It's all right to be little bitty." Now we've really got it all! (wink)

We toured the historic home on the premises, we hiked, played dominoes, and checked out no fewer than three playgrounds. We ate a dinner of pasta that I'd prepared at home. Dorothy made friends with the girl at the camper next door and created beautiful art at our picnic table.

Worth developed what I'm afraid may be an abiding love of mud puddles. If you think this brownie-streaked face and pea-smeared hair looks bad, well, you should see his mud-stained bottom.

At home I've been working on setting up a square-foot garden in our new yard. I recently used colored yarn to mark off the squares. I brought the rest of the yarn I used for the squares (it's all acrylic) to our campsite and taught Dorothy how to make God's Eye weavings. I love that she's now old enough to do some projects that are fun for Mom too. We sat cozily in our camper before bed and wound our yarn around sticks we'd found at our site. The simple weavings looked pretty on our camper wall last night (photographed), and now they look great hanging on the trellis of our garden bed.

I think one-night camping excursions are just right for where our family is at right now. We all had a good, relaxing time, got to spend quality time without the distractions of home, were able to fully take notice of the changes spring was bringing to the outdoors, but were able to tote home dirty dishes for our dishwasher and skip the icky camp showers. Perfect!

Pillows and a lamp shade

2011-04-03T17:03:00.000-07:00

I finally found time this weekend to finish the throw pillows I'd been working on for the sofa. I used a really thick cording around the edges which looks nice but is such a pain to do that I may never do it again. I broke four needles in the process and am making a mental note to use thinner cording in the future (if at all--what a pain). The pillows look pretty good but I don't think I needed to put as much work into them as I did. With such punchy fabric I could have just sewn very plain pillowcases and they'd have looked great. Now they are done, though, and I like them. They are really comfy, too, because I sprang for nice, down-filled pillow forms.

I also worked up a lamp shade for the living room. I couldn't find one that was just the right color so I bought a white one and painted it myself. I mixed the blue paint from the dining room with the living room's green shade to get just the right color. The edging is more of the Pop Garden fabric I've used in the curtains and pillows. I don't know what I did before I owned a bias tape maker. Who new that such a small, inexpensive item could be so handy?

New life for old towels

2011-03-31T13:12:00.000-07:00

I debated whether or not I should do this project. Having to keep track of specific hand towels for a specific bathroom seemed like a bit of a hassle. But after living here for a few months and establishing a routine I realized that the downstairs bathroom towels already get thrown in with the kitchen laundry and returned to the same bathroom so there was no reason not to spruce them up a bit if I wished. I took three basic hand towels and bleached them to freshen them up and remove stains. Sorry, I know bleach is not the most environmentally friendly thing but neither is buying all new towels, and using a bit of bleach now and then seems way better than resorting to something like those horrifying new Kleenex hand towels, the existence of which makes me wonder how it is that some people have a) money to burn, b) no concern for the amount of resources they are using and waste they are producing, and c) never apparently heard of their washing machine, which is generally an excellent tool for keeping hand towels clean. Anyway....sorry for the rant.

Back to my bleached towels. I ironed scraps of coordinating fabric from my bathroom curtain project (same bathroom) to make long, turned-under strips, then sewed them over the decorative strip on the towel. The ironing and sewing took only minutes but the towels now seem to make my bathroom look really pulled-together. The towels themselves don't match each other but since I only use one at a time it doesn't matter. I'll definitely do this for my other bathroom too once I get around to painting it.

Yesterday's other project was not nearly as satisfying. I started painting the living room ceiling and it's falling apart! Eek! The textured finish on the ceiling is crumbling down on my head as I try to roll on paint. I would just scrape down the whole textured layer, but it seems to be stuck on quite tight in other parts of the room, and my bad elbow doesn't really like doing lots of work like that over my head. My current plan is use glue and wallboard compound to try to rebuild some of the textured ceiling in this part of the room, but I know I can't get the swirly pattern to match the rest of the room, and again about the bum elbow. Oy. The wallpaper was at least a known problem--this one was an unpleasant surprise.

A gift for the classroom

2011-03-29T19:54:00.000-07:00

It is a tradition in Dorothy's school to buy a book for a child's classroom on his or her birthday. The book is brought in all wrapped up and the birthday child gets to unwrap it, then the whole class listens while one of the parents of the birthday child reads the book to the class. I thought it would be fun to make a book for Dorothy's class on the subject of their class pet, a guinea pig. I took photographs of the animal while he was staying with us last fall (each family gets the "privilege" of weekend sitting for the pet a couple times during the year) and used Wikipedia to fill in some bits about the animal that were not obvious to me. I had almost finished the book the week after our guinea-pig-sitting several months ago. Then we sold the house and my efforts at childrens' literature and most everything else went all to h$%!, so by the time I remembered again that we were expected to gift a book to Dorothy's class on her birthday it was already last week. I considered ditching the effort and just buying some book but decided I'd gone that far, I may as well finish it. Typing up the last couple pages didn't take long but unfortunately shipping the thing from Blurb.com (on the West coast) to Kentucky did, and I was too cheap to spring for quicker shipping. I still went in to read to Dorothy's class on her birthday, but I just read a book she'd selected from her own collection. Now that the gift book is here I'll take it in tomorrow all wrapped up to read and Dorothy will get to play the birthday girl one last time. I ordered a copy of the book for Dorothy too and she seems to like it.

I really wanted to work on throw pillows for the living room today but it just didn't happen. The baby is fussy over teeth or a cough or something and he is refusing to sleep unless I'm holding him, which means a) he's not getting enough sleep, and b) the rest of the time he's a Grumpus McGurkus, which is our household name for someone who is in a very foul mood (inspired by a favorite book of Dorothy's). I did catch just a few minutes at the machine, however, and made a padded sleeve for my little camera. I know you're thinking, "doesn't she have a big camera? I'm pretty sure I've seen her at soccer practice, one of those moms who thinks she's the press corps?" Yes, I do, but jokes have been deservedly made about how much I like to photograph my children and my big camera isn't something I can just toss in my purse and always have on hand. Thus I still have and use my little camera and I recently had to replace it, possibly because the inside of my purse is not a very safe place to be even if you are the small unfussy camera. I used scraps from Dorothy's birthday dress to make a very simple little Velcro pouch. I lined it with polyester quilt batting to make it nice and soft, and hopefully the polyester will repel rather than soak in liquids in the event of a spill. (Liquid spilled inside my purse? Well, have you ever dined out with my children?)

The living room

2011-03-28T08:00:00.000-07:00

More house progress! Removing the living room wallpaper was a serious pain in the ass. My mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, daughter and husband all worked with me (and in the case of my mother, much more than me) to get the wallpaper off this wall. There was a thin liner underneath the regular wallpaper that had to be steamed and scraped away shreds at a time. Ouch. But now it's off! Mom and I primed the newly-bare walls, which had never been painted in their 71 years, then painted them a perky green called spring cactus. I made the curtains from fabric I found online and posted about previously, from Heather Bailey's Pop Garden collection. This is a room we needed some furniture for when we moved into this house. I fell in love with the Eames-inspired tulip chair from an online discount store, and we bought the light fixture and white sofa (below) from IKEA. This room is meant to house my collection of hobnail milk glass, and the bumpy white lamp and chair are really just accessories to my beloved dishes. I have a less-is-more attitude toward some things, but dishes are just not one of them. I love dishes. I have way too many. But hey, better dishes than drugs and booze, right?

After I hung the new curtains this weekend Dorothy came into the room. She immediately noticed the curtains and rushed over to the windows to admire. "Wow! These new curtains are so pretty! They are going to look beautiful at my birthday party." My husband came home an hour or so later and his reaction was not as satisfying. I had to drag him into the room to see the curtains, which I doubt he'd have noticed on his own. He glanced and said, "oh, those look nice." He might have said the same thing if I'd hung paper bags in the window. If I hadn't prompted him he might never have noticed they were there. This is why I'm so grateful to have a daughter. :)

My over-the-sofa art is going to be supplied by my children. I purchased artists canvases at a craft store and covered them with more of the Pop Garden fabric using a staple gun. I have a can of low-tack spray adhesive that I'm going to use to adhere a rotating collection of the kids' art to the screens. This felt like a formal but fun way to honor their artwork. I have admired framed child art in other people's homes, but I'm thinking this will be easier to peel off or stick up art as their talents and interests change.

Now all I have to do to finish this room is patch and paint the ceiling, paint all the trim, mop off the bits of wallpaper that seem to have stuck to the floor, buy a coffee table, sew throw-pillows, buy a coordinating shade for the milk glass lamp (not shown), sew a Pop Garden scarf for the piano, find or make an entry-way rug, paint or replace the plant stand that doesn't seem to match, and find the rest of my milk glass in a box downstairs. It's a good thing my baby sleeps through the night and I have nothing else to do all day, right? Oh wait...

And today is my daughter's actual birthday. She gets to bring a treat to school to share with her classmates, so we made cupcakes with lavender icing at her request. I love this recipe for vanilla cupcakes and have made it several times, even though the method of adding the butter to the batter seems rather unorthodox. The cupcakes don't turn golden-brown until they are over baked--you have to do the toothpick test to get them out in time--but they come out really moist and they hold their shape nicely so you can eat them without having most of your cupcake dissolve into crumbs all over your lap. According to Dorothy's birthday wish the cupcakes needed to have her classmates names on them, so we did that too. I printed the names onto a sheet of card stock and we just cut, glued and folded the little tags onto toothpicks. Hopefully the birthday girl will feel like she got all her birthday wishes granted today. She woke up pretty excited!

Fifth Birthday

2011-03-26T17:47:00.000-07:00

Another birthday! We joke in my family that we have birthday season in February and March. Both nieces, my father, father-in-law and two children all have birthdays in those months. We eat cake. Lots of cake. Here is Dorothy's birthday dress, which features a yellow Volkswagen Beetle patch. She wanted a pinch buggy birthday so that is what she got. She declared that her dress should not be constructed of pinch buggy fabric (although I did find that, see below), but should be a pretty dress with just one pinch buggy on the front. I found the patch on eBay, the fabric and Joann, and the pattern is Simplicity 5695, which I think I've made a zillion times now but she asked for that style specifically. (She wanted it to be like this dress of the same basic pattern.)

I don't often make hair bows for Dorothy because she won't keep them on, but I did make one for this event and she did keep it on just for the duration of the party. Hair bows are so easy--I have no idea why they cost so much. Yet there is something about just dragging out the glue gun that has made me an Etsy hair bow purchaser myself, back before my kid started refusing to wear them. This one is made from ribbon left over from another project with flowers cut out of the dress fabric (raw edges and all) and one purple button that came as an extra with a store-bought sweater. Now she'll probably never wear it again but who knows, I might.

I found this Volkswagen fabric on Etsy. (Or was it eBay? I find novelty fabric in both places.) This is the third time I've made an accent tablecloth for her birthday table. It's just one yard of fabric, squared off and hemmed all around on the serger. In the past I think I layered them over other tablecloths, but since Worth likes to yank at tablecloths I skipped the layered look this time. The small homemade tablecloths set off the theme for her parties by decorating the table, then they find a more permanent home in our playroom housekeeping area where they perfectly fit the small play table. As usual, we have Nana to thank for the beautiful cake, and the theme was inspired by Rob, who drives a pinch buggy convertible.

More t-shirt embellishment

2011-03-16T20:05:00.000-07:00

You'll only like this one if you, like me, are a fan of Mo Willems. (It's for personal use, so I'm not trying to do anything evil here with copyright.) I cut out, ironed-on and stitched down a pigeon figure inspired by the book, then printed the word "drive" three times on printable fabric and ironed those on around him. Dorothy likes this one too.

I had a hard time photographing this shirt. It is another long sleeve tee like the ones in the last post. I used different colored thread and the decorative stitches on my sewing machine to create a border around the neckline and waist. The effect turned out pretty well and I think it makes this shirt look sort of mail order catalog-y, in a good way. This was a really rewarding project because it was so quick and simple and made such a difference in the shirt. I wouldn't try this with a dull needle--decorative stitches on knit need a sharp, fresh needle designed for knits.

I recently ordered this book on crochet motifs, mostly because I was a little short of the free shipping threshold when I was ordering something more urgent (how much money does Amazon.com make that way? so brilliant!) and I really like it. The little shapes can be the building blocks for any larger project one can imagine, but they are also fun little quick projects on their own. I was feeling frustrated with our cheap, stupid (yes, I have a 4-year-old and I know "stupid" is a bad word) tea kettle because the stupid product designers made the handle out of some material that heats up so much when water is boiled in the kettle that unsuspecting, innocent tea drinkers get their hands burned every time they fail to remember that this stupid kettle isn't like every other kettle they've ever owned, and that they can't touch the stupid handle to pour the water out when the stupid thing whistles. Tired of reaching for a potholder just to pour water (or failing to), I decided to crochet something decorative and insulating to stay on the stupid thing to avoid this problem in the future. I made one of the hexagons in the book and tied it right onto the handle at the points. The red and white wool matches my kitchen, so now the stupid kettle looks prettier too. If anyone thinks that a person who repeatedly burns their hands making tea is a little bit stupid herself...well, no one asked you.

The kids and I are off on an adventure tomorrow. The car is packed, the MP3 player loaded, and a basket is well-stocked with snacks. We're headed to Chicago to visit my college roommate. I used to travel quite often with just Dorothy before Worth was born but our preschool schedule and being outnumbered by my kids has kept me home more this past year. I'm hoping that all goes well so we can make travel a regular part of our homeschooling experience next year. On this trip we're hoping to take in a St. Patrick's Day festival at the Irish Heritage Center and the children's museum. I have used my mother's trick of wrapping small gifts in old newspaper to hand out to the kids at regular intervals to keep them happy in the car. Some art supplies, a tiny backhoe that makes noise, books...I think they will be well received.

Some wearables

2011-03-12T17:12:00.000-08:00

Happy birthday to my sweet niece! I can't believe it was two years ago that I videotaped her amazing and beautiful birth at the home of my brother and sister-in-law. I crocheted the flutter sweater as a gift for Maggie, and it looks completely adorable on her. The bottom and front edges curl up on purpose in a really cute way. The pattern was easy, but it was such a start-and-stop project for me that it took forever. I'd intended to give it to her for Christmas but couldn't find my hooks in the move, so it became a birthday gift instead. I did it in a lightweight organic cotton yarn so hopefully she can wear it on in to warm weather.

I mentioned in my last post that I got some new tees to craft up for summer. A friend pointed out that they are also very nice plain--which they totally are. These two shirts remained plain (and nice) all winter while I meant to do something to them but never got around to it. These came from Target months ago. I finally took some time to embellish them this week, and here are the results. On this green one I appliqued some owls on a branch by using fusible web and the zig-zag stitch.

This one I was especially pleased with. I used acrylic yarn left over from another project and machine stitched it to my shirt using a wide zig-zag, three bands around the neck, bottom edge, and each arm hole. Then I washed it, just to make sure nothing terrible would happen to it before I blogged about it. :)

And while I was doing that--just so no one thinks I have more hours in my day than any one else--my house descended into utter chaos. The kitchen came to look like it had never been cleaned, the girl fed yogurt to the boy in a messy and indiscriminate manner, and the boy "painted" my sofa with his yogurty hands. There is, um, no place like homemade!

A very exciting trip

2011-03-08T13:07:00.000-08:00

For the first time since preschool began in the fall, I really can't wait for it to end. Dorothy has had a great experience but the commute is getting to me. I'm tired of trying to schedule all of our family's living around the picking up and the dropping off. I'm increasingly plagued by the annoying feeling that I can never get anything done, which must mean my priorities are off somewhere. At this point I'm thinking that the problem is the prioritization of sending my kid to a great school on the other side of town, and I know how to fix that. I'm glad we've chosen to homeschool next year so our lives and our learning can be more seamless. In the meantime we're making do with weekends, like this Saturday when Noah's Ark and my sewing project collided, creating a brand new playscape and a cozy scene. It was neat the way the toy took on a whole new creative dimension after I'd scooted the sofa over and spread out my work--the animals took on completely new existences. I'm finally working on the yellow quilt for Dorothy's room that occasioned the purchase of many yellow-toned sheets almost a year ago, when we were still playing the real estate game and day-dreaming of living in our current house (wallpaper and all).

My household now includes (cue ominous music) a walking toddler. He took steps the day before his birthday, apparently feeling the pressure of that milestone--or perhaps all the overheard whispered conversation about what an early walker his sister was. In any case, he's a full-fledged across-the-room walker now, and wow is that dangerous. I'm so tired of replacing all the contents of my drawers that I went to the hardware store and bought an entire can of bungee cords and have been attempting to babyproof with them. They actually work pretty well on places like these. I have to make sure I don't get them on there too tight because I don't want to put stress on the cabinetry, but they do seem to be deterring the marauding child for a whileand I didn't have to screw in any complicated locking mechanisms. (P.S. Stay tuned for a future before and after in which those kitchen cabinets become white!)

Also this weekend we took advantage of a Monday preschool holiday to take a one night getaway with our extended family. In honor of Dorothy's upcoming birthday we journeyed to her idea of Paradise--the Great Wolf Lodge outside Cincinnati. We went there once before, as a sort of consolation prize to her after a summer spent watching a newly-pregnant Mommy lie on the sofa in nauseous misery, and she's talked about the experience ever since (the Lodge experience, not Mommy's pregnancy--ha). I'm on their e-mail list so I know when they have good rates, and I really do think it is a worthwhile trip for the money. It's not too far from home, not as overwhelming as a large park would be, and holds just the right amount of child-sized pleasures to keep a kid Dorothy's age happy for a short trip. From the discovery of the complimentary child shower gel to the wolf mascot's bedtime story, the experience kept a smile on Dorothy's face for 24 hours straight. (And did I mention that all her doting grandparents went? Lucky girl!)

I wasn't sure what baby brother's take on the excursion would be, but after a short hesitation as he explored the splashing water he seemed to enjoy himself as well. We had to keep his stumbling little zombie steps from carrying his chubby baby legs out into deep water!

Unrelated, if anyone else likes embellishing t-shirts for themselves or kids, Old Navy is having a spring stock-up sale right now that involves good prices ($4 and $5) on solid-colored tees. These shirts are much better for crafting than the ones sold at craft stores because they have a more flattering shape and are softer. They won't last forever, but do you really need them to? They are comfortable and cheap! Now I've got a whole bag full of future t-shirt projects waiting.

The dining room

2011-03-01T08:18:00.000-08:00

Except for my continued procrastination on painting the baseboard, the dining room is pretty much done. Here's the before (after we moved in, before stripping wallpaper)...

and after. I posted an in-progress picture back in January when we were picking paint. We didn't end up using that exact shade, but went with one that didn't have as much turquoise. It's Glidden's Pool Party, and it's a little brighter in the daylight. It's so happy! The old thrift store tablecloths made easy and bright drapes, and I really love the way the fun prints on the chair seats turned out. Rob and his Dad hung a light fixture here that we removed from another room; it was way too dark in there before. The biggest pain in this project was puttying over a crack in the ceiling and some cracks that had formed between the upper molding and the ceiling, but of course those tasks also made a very big difference in the look of the outcome. I'm gearing up to tackle the living room next but I think I may have to switch gears first and clean the basement, which is turning out to be a bit wetter than we'd though. (Since we, um, didn't think it was supposed to be wet at all. Oy.)

First birthday

2011-02-27T18:27:00.000-08:00

The big first birthday! And this is supposed to be the post in which I wax nostalgic and say something sweet about one year ago today, right? I think one year ago today I was using *very bad words* in a loud manner at Baptist Hospital East. Ha ha.

Here is a collage I made of the big boy. I used Photoshop to create a layout similar to one we purchased from Sears when Dorothy had her first birthday. (Before I purchased the good camera!) I hung a sheet over the stair railing and snapped away while Dorothy and Nana repeatedly handed Worth the ball, caught it, and returned it to him, guaranteeing happy faces.

I made ball-themed gift packs for the small guests at his party. I sewed little drawstring bags out of ball-reminiscent polka dot fabric and included ball-shaped candies, a swimming pool splash ball, and a little coloring sheet of Worth with a ball (more Photoshop). Worth has recently become obsessed with balls and sees them everywhere, always with an accompanying chant of "baw-ul, baw-ul, baw-ul."

Here's the table all decked out for his party, with a ball-themed cake courtesy of Nana. I made chili and we had a casual supper. It was fun to entertain in the new house, even though much of it is still a work in progress.

And the birthday boy himself, enjoying his birthday cake and all the general merriment. Sweet boy!

Some clothes for the boy

2011-02-19T17:51:00.000-08:00

I picked these overalls up at a yard sale last fall. For weeks they sat in my sewing basket, ready to be camper-ized, then then got abruptly packed away in a box, only to surface recently. I was worried Worth would have outgrown them already but fortunately he had not. These overalls had a baseball patch sewn on the bib, but were otherwise cute. (No offense to baseball.) I picked off the ball with a seam ripper and made my own camper patch out of a scrap of fabric left over from my camper sewing extravaganza. The patch is just a wee bit big for the size of the bib, but that was the only intact camper I could find to cut out from my scraps. Not a bad use of scraps and $.25 overalls, really.

Unbelievably, my baby will celebrate a birthday in just over a week. Mind-blowing. I thought Dorothy's infancy went quickly, but at the same time I felt like she (as a little person) was half-grown at a year. Worth, by contrast, still seems like a tiny baby to me. I think it's partly their personalities and partly a first-child/second-child thing. Dorothy was always so independent and concentrated on fighting her way, tooth and nail if necessary, to her next developmental milestone. She would see bigger kids do things and not rest until she had figured out how to do it herself. Worth is more content to by the baby. He's reasonably motivated and enthusiastic about the world, but he doesn't have Dorothy's ceaseless drive. Dorothy was also the first grandchild in the family, whereas Worth is now the baby of four cousins. So when you combine these factors you get a first birthday that seems like some sort of trick the calendar is playing.

I was not sure how to dress a boy child for his birthday. Boy clothes seem to be overdressy or very casual--there is no "business casual" equivalent for boys--but I came up with this. I made a little pair of cuffed pants out of some nice, soft thrift-store sheets. I just traced around one of his store-bought pants for a pattern. Then I put his initial on a blank t-shirt with the same fabric. I thought about doing the number 1 instead, but then he'd only really be able to wear it once. It's an outfit that I think it going to be both cute and comfy, and I feel good to have taken the time away from house stuff to make something special for the birthday boy.

Sorghum cookies

2011-02-18T19:11:00.000-08:00

This picture is blurry, but it's hard to shoot a moving target. Dorothy is displaying the apron I found at a thrift store recently. Guess where it's destined? This lovely turn in the weather has inspired me to make camping reservations for us at some state parks we want to check out this spring. I'm so looking forward to our first 2011 trip!

Today in the kitchen I experimented with a local ingredient I'm not very familiar with. I had picked up a recipe for sorghum cookies at the state fair last summer and had yet to try it. I altered the recipe to suit our diets and our taste, and they were really quite tasty. As Rob said, "I still don't really understand what sorghum is, but it makes very good cookies." Exactly.

Here's the recipe in case you decide to Bake Kentucky Proud as well (or something):
1 cup plus 2 TB sugar
1/2 cup softened butter
1/4 cup canola oil
1 egg
1/3 cup sorghum
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup oats
1 1/2 cup chocolate chips
1 cup unsweetened flaked coconut

Preheat oven to 350 and line three cookie sheets with parchment. Whisk together flours, soda, and salt in a bowl or large measuring cup, set aside. Cream butter, oil and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer, add egg, vanilla and sorghum. Beat well. Add flour mixture in two parts, beating well after each addition. Stir in oats, chips and coconut. Drop onto prepared cookie sheet and bake 10 to 12 minutes. Cool three minutes on the sheet, then transfer to wire rack.

In which we get expensive new windows and immmediately cover them with Valentine window clings

2011-02-13T18:47:00.000-08:00

We've been busy around here. Too busy to blog. But I'm so eager to share my progress! Here's another before.

And after. It's not done, but we've come a long way. The wallpaper has been stripped (thank you Nana!), the walls primed and painted, and a really painful amount of joint compound was applied by my bare fingers to a crack that ran all the way around the dining room between the crown molding and the ceiling. Ouch. But I'm loving the colors and the way things are coming together. I need one more vintage Louisville postcard for the frame to the right of the pass-through (Churchill Downs, I think--I found one online), and I want to make a family calendar for the other side. We ripped off the old, ugly rubber baseboard in the kitchen but have not yet purchased new, wooden baseboard. Pictures still need to be hung in the dining room and some of the trim is not yet painted. But wow! I'm feeling so pleased with how "mine" the house is starting to look. I'm also vowing to take a break from major painting for a few weeks, though. We need a break to focus on other things and avoid total house rehab burnout.

We did squeeze in some Valentine-making time. I let Dorothy use the hot glue gun for a while, then changed my mind after she was such a wimp about touching some glue before it set up. Maybe it was a bad call to let her use it in the first place, but I really do think she's a wimp. :) Either way, we glued faux flower petals, scraps of lace, and hearts we punched out of pretty paper onto purchased blank cards. Kind of like halfway homemade. Dorothy enjoyed making them, which was good since we needed enough for her whole class. I also had adorable coupons printed from Pear Tree Greetings and I thought they turned out very sweet (the photo is on one side, the coupon is on the other). I think the print quality is better for the money than from some photo sharing sites I've tried. I sent the coupons to our family and they've been well received.

We've also been busy getting more colds and ear infections--argh! It seems like the kids and I have been endlessly sick this winter. I'm blaming too much upheaval in our home and not enough downtime, but maybe it's just that both my kids cannot keep their hands off germy objects or out of their mouths.

Winter days

2011-02-01T19:56:00.000-08:00

I think every year my husband starts complaining about winter at about this time, and each year I'm surprised that winter is even in full swing already (wasn't it just Christmas?) and then all of the sudden I get impatient for spring too. I have to say, though, that I'm not as impatient this year. For one thing I'm not horridly pregnant like last year, and for another it is just much easier to live in the present now that this move is over. Without having to constantly put "real life" on hold to show the house or to spend so much time prepping for change it is easier to appreciate and even linger on each day. One of the things I've been really enjoying this winter (besides my fireplace, have I mentioned that lately?) is this cookbook. I got it for Christmas and it's the best. I love America's Test Kitchen (I've blogged about my fierce devotion to Cooks Illustrated before) and I love the unaffiliated magazine Cooking Light, and this cookbook seems to be the best of both worlds. The recipes have the reliability of Cooks Illustrated and the health aspects of Cooking Light. Perfect! Of course, some of them also have the fussiness factor and four-hours-later-dinner-is-on-the-table factor of CI, but that's part of the journey, right? I swooned over the vegetarian chili (with tempeh), scarfed up the cornbread, served the spaghetti and meatballs for Rob's birthday, splurged on the oven fries, slurped the lentil soup, and changed my go-to bread recipe to their basic whole-wheat loaf. And I've only had the book since Christmas! The only recipe I've tried but didn't love was multigrain pancakes, which were dry, but I think I may have overcooked them. In any case the red pepper frittata we ate with them was superb!

Could anything be sweeter than this? Both of my kids somehow made it into my bed in the wee small hours a couple nights ago and I snapped this photograph of them in the morning. I think they should always wear coordinating clothes because I'm surely more patient with them when I'm giddy over their matchy cuteness. Rock star pajamas! My sleeping angels. This picture will keep me going next time they are irritated with each other and I'm feeling likewise toward them.

The house is still coming along. The kitchen and dining room are shaping up and gradually other things are migrating to new, permanent homes. Sometimes stuff doesn't want to stay where you unpack it--it has to get moved around a bit before it settles. I organized my serger thread in a lovely old cabinet that belonged to my grandparents and I think the colors are so pretty; it's like a functional rainbow over in that corner of my family room. I also purchased an old wooden ironing board at an antiques store so that I can leave it out in the family room and hope it looks more like furniture than something that is on loan from the basement. I want all my sewing supplies to be out and accessible, but I don't want my living space to look too utilitarian. Hopefully I'll figure that out.

Bird curtains for the bathroom

2011-01-28T13:24:00.000-08:00

Dorothy and I both spent some time today sewing. Worth spent some time today being a nuisance. I think we've officially ended the sweet baby stage and entered the terrible toddler era. He's not walking yet, but his combination of seal-hop crawling and cruising gets him around quite well, and his toddler-esque curiosity is proving to be a menace to his health and the safety of everything in his path. Here is a cute picture of Dorothy trying to sew (before you get too impressed with my preschooler's skills, let me casually observe that there doesn't seem to be any thread in the machine) while her brother hovers annoyingly around her, using a thread cone as a megaphone and trying to figure out the best way to get his fingers poked with a needle.

And the very first befores and afters of the new house! Here is my downstairs bathroom before a paint job and new curtains...

and here is after. I wouldn't call the room "done," because I'm still going to sew a coordinating bathtub mat, commission some frame-able bird art from my resident young artist, and find some sort of tray to coral toiletries on the back of the toilet, but the painting is done and the curtains are hung. I used this fabric for the body of the curtains, and this for the scalloped edge, which I made using the very fancy (ahem) technique of tracing around a jar bottom. The paint was left over from Dorothy's old bedroom in our old house, and is Pastel Sage by Glidden. I love how much fresher a room can feel after a new coat of paint! Now when I get discouraged about the in-progress state of the rest of the house, at least I have one room I can visit to view progress.

Chair pads again

2011-01-23T16:20:00.000-08:00

I recovered the seats of our dining room chairs last spring, and it was basically an exercise in uselessness. The medium-weight upholstery fabric I'd used bunched over the decrepit old foam (I'd not bothered to replace it), and something about the nap of that particular fabric just seemed to attract cat hair even worse than what had been on there before. The new dining room is headed for a different set of colors, too, so the orange hue wasn't going to work. This time I went out and bought brand new foam and I'm using a laminated cotton fabric, which is similar to oilcloth but lighter weight and more stretchy. I don't think cat hair will stay on it at all, and most spills should wipe up easily (here's hoping), but I am a little concerned about the durability, given children with forks and cats with claws. We'll see. In the meantime, I really love the Amy Butler fabric and I can't wait to see it with the blue we're going to paint the walls in this room. (Note on that: you can see the wallpaper in here. There is a certain vintage appeal to this paper, I guess, but I'm way too fickle about prints to have them pasted on the wall. I need a clean, solid backdrop on the walls so I can choose other prints at will! Besides, you can't have flocked wallpaper and cats who rub up against walls. Ick.)

Yesterday was a special day here. We celebrated Rob's birthday in the dining room, in full view of the kitchen through the new pass-through! I still need to paint it (along with all the other surfaces in the rooms it joins--oy), but I already love it. It's amazing how much it changed our house! Now I can see the sunlight from windows in every room of the first floor while I have breakfast at my kitchen table. Dorothy made a paper chain for our birthday celebration and I hung it in the opening. I can tell I'm going to need a couple nails, or maybe a tension rod, to hold this sort of temporary (yet eternal, ha ha) decoration.

On the death of the mural...

2011-01-20T12:44:00.000-08:00

...and the opening of my kitchen. Squee!

I got stood up by my contractor on Tuesday due to light rain, but for some reason the guys had no problem showing up this morning, the day of a forecast blizzard. They left at lunch time for a break and some supplies and I haven't seen them since, so I don't know if they'll be back (now that the forecasted snow has actually appeared) to frame it and finish the wall this afternoon or not. Either way, I'm already loving this work in progress! It's so fun to watch a vision become reality, even when someone else has to do the hands-on work. The whole house feels different now that the dining room and kitchen are open to one another. The job will include a small counter for me to put food on so I can serve the dining room from the kitchen. No more dinners with the four of us squeezed into the kitchen! It just seemed odd for us to use the dining room when it felt so closed off, but now I know we will.

Speaking of snow, this is the view from my new bedroom. Yes, I live within the limits of a fairly large city. Yes, those are horses. Miniature horses, actually. Isn't that wild? Dorothy can watch them from her room too. I have no idea why people in the city are raising miniature horses, but I do like watching them from the window. Today they look cold. I only see a few of them out there (we've counted seven total, I think?) so they must have somewhere sheltered they can go, but for whatever reason they are choosing to stand in the snow. From my other bedroom window I can see the very elaborate all-season food gardens of some other neighbors. They are raising chickens and some other caged bird (doves, maybe?) for meat, I assume, and have had covered winter lettuces growing until recently. I love the vibrancy of this view and my multicultural neighborhood; it's so unique!

This photo may look familiar. It's the mobile I made for Worth before he was born, and which was finished one month and seven days before his birth, January 20, 2010. I needle-felted the animals and then made my very first blog post about it! I recently realized that I've been blogging for one year, and that today is my blogiversary. (Is that a word?) I thought I'd give blogging a try, and just like that a year went by--with a baby, and some projects, a camper and a house. I hope my blog focus returns to more crafty things soon, once things get more settled with the house. Anyway, just for fun, I'm going to offer a giveaway in honor of the day. During our move I found a small fabric handbag and a crocheted hat that I made but never gave to anyone; I will give one or the other (your choice) to the first person to comment on today's post.

The fun stuff

2011-01-14T07:03:00.000-08:00

All over my house are signs of progress! Or actually there are taped-up fabric "samples" I've printed off the internet and swathes of paint choices. Here are some Heather Bailey prints I like for curtains and pillows in the living room, and we like the top shade of green.

The dining room, in which I'll make curtains from this awesome old tablecloth. Rob and I are both loving the bright shade of blue on the top, although we'd not expected to choose something with that much intensity. He did ask if I was trying to bring the camper look indoors. (I'm not, I'm just enjoying bright shades of blue right now!)

And the family room, which will be the same buttery yellow we've grown attached to in our last two houses. I like the fabric print I had taped up here but we decided on a different one for the curtains, one that brings in punches of brown and black to tie in our mish-mash of furniture. It's very large-scale (think plate-sized flowers) and tropical, but this huge back room needs something big, bold, and warm.

A friend of mine has a theory about interior house colors corresponding to the colors a woman likes to wear, but my history of using mostly fall colors inside (and on me) seems to be giving over to a new era of springs and summers in this house. I'm excited about all the bright happiness, and I'm glad that all these choices are easy to change if we tire of them. If we reach a day when we decide we simply can't eat dinner in a robin's egg blue room one more time, at least no wallpaper removal will be involved!

Oy vey mural

2011-01-11T12:25:00.000-08:00

First and foremost today, I'd like to come clean about something I referenced a couple months ago. I mentioned back in November that a Major Life Change was coming to our family that I could not yet discuss. Now that it has come to pass it's no longer a secret! The man fondly known as Daddy in this family has been hankering after more independence in his work life for quite some time. This fall he and a friend concocted a plan to team up and start their own law firm. We've been excitedly plotting and planning this professional move, but we knew that our mortgage company wouldn't exactly be excited to hand over money to borrowers who just embarked on an adventure of self-employment, so we thought we might have to put our personal moving plans on hold if we didn't sell by mid-November. Just about the time we thought we really were going to have to rearrange our old house a bit and commit to a couple more years of extreme coziness, we sold! You all know that part of the story. On the professional side, Rob gave notice at work the week after we closed on the house and is now happily hitting the pavement, building his business. We expect a rough period while he gets started, but it seems like a small price to pay for all the adult members of our family to be in vocational situations that make them feel happy and fulfilled.

On the home front, I'd been really determined to only peel wallpaper in one room at a time. I figured it was better to have intact wallpaper in most rooms than rooms of half-peeled wallpaper. Rob still couldn't resist, picking here and there at loose edges. Then last night I finally gave in and declared open season on wallpaper. Now we're peeling and picking all over the place and I have no idea when all this will end. I got all the wallpaper down in one bathroom last night, though, so at least I know where to go once I decide to declare open season on sanding and paint preparation. For kicks, here is the mural in the kitchen. I think I've referred to it several times during this move extravaganza. Unfortunately it seems stuck on pretty tightly, but it's comin' down. Most of the wallpaper in the house is dated but pretty in its own way. This is really the only one that makes me wonder what on earth they were thinking. The longer I look at it, the more I just don't understand. :)

Our craft studio and play space in the new basement is far from being set up, but it too is finally starting to take some sort of shape. We have a comfy futon down there by the fireplace, the toys are out of boxes, the craft table is set up, though not much more. Dorothy was eager to try it out, so today I set her up with some paint and a (previously blue) shelf we'd found at the thrift store. We're going to hang the shelf in her room to hold her little knick knacks.

I also started unpacking fabric to put on my new shelves. I'm not sure what these recessed places in my studio wall did before (maybe hold unattached shelves?), but my brother came over and put nice sturdy shelves in them so I will have dedicated space to store my fabric out where I can see it and access it. I feel spoiled! I was so eager to put the fabric out I almost didn't paint the shelves first, but I know it would be a lot harder to go back and do it later, so I went ahead and painted before I began unloading my treasures onto the clean, painted shelves.

Lite my fire

2011-01-05T18:59:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! I've been doing really un-bloggable things lately like unpack boxes, but things at the new house are progressing. For one thing we got new appliances. Now I'm a girl who likes old things--vintage, used, recycled, repurposed...I'm usually all over that. But the appliances in this house just crossed some sort of line for me. They weren't like old/vintage, they were just like old/nasty. The stove in particular bothered me. It's not all the old-style knobs and dials, which are rather fetching, nor the retro "futuristic" font. It's the fact that in the late 1970s, the previous owner of this house installed a cutting-edge stove that included an early microwave oven right there in the oven cavity, and that I was concerned about accidentally radiating my family each time I turned it on. Tucked in the folder of paperwork that came from this house was even a letter, dated 1980, from the range manufacturer informing the previous homeowners that their microwave oven was no longer up to code. Apparently it lacked appropriate locking mechanisms. Yikes. So this old stove just had to go, although I did feel like it should have gone to some appliance museum instead of the inglorious end it met by being hauled away by the new appliance delivery guy

I was super-excited about the new stove, which I thought I chose with care. We had the plumber run a gas line to the kitchen so I could get a gas range, which is something I really missed in our last house. My appliance dreams included a long, middle gas burner with a built-in griddle pan, which this new stove has. As I got to know my new stove better, however, I realized it wasn't going to make all my kitchen dreams come true. I do love the griddle, and the whoosh of flame that looks like "real" cooking in ways an electric burner never will. But the stove is also some odd appliance equivalent of look-alike new construction housing developments (aka, not my cup of tea). It says "lite" instead of "light," or "on" or "ignite," which seems needlessly stupid--couldn't they have made the font smaller or something?

But I was willing to forgive "lite" until I saw this. My new range has a "chicken nuggets" feature. WTF, you might ask? I turned to my trusty appliance manual. This feature apparently brings the oven to the correct temperature to heat "convenience-style" chicken nuggets, then keeps them warm for up to three hours. I'm not sure at this point which is worse--an early microwave oven that may leach radiation, or a stove that has a special feature to "cook" frozen, breaded chicken bits without human interference. Having never purchased "convenience-style" chicken nuggets myself, I'm starting to suspect this stove was not meant for me. I'm going to suspend judgment, though. There is still the griddle, and "lite" seems to ignite a healthy flame that I can use to cook my own less-convenient family favorites.

Finally, wallpaper demolition started today! The main living rooms are feeling unpacked and comfortable enough now that I felt like we could take the move-in to a new level. My own dear Mum started peeling paper in the living room, and I'm afraid it's going to be quite a task. This is her wrestling with the liner. Underneath all that liner, however, is a lovely plaster wall that should like quite nice once it is painted sage green. At some point!

A room of his own

2010-12-28T15:35:00.000-08:00

It's not finished--but it's unpacked. Hooray! Worth's cozy attic room is so fun to work in after all the time I spent daydreaming during my pregnancy and beyond about creating a space for this child. His room is actually on the same level as the master and Dorothy's room, but our new place is a camel back, meaning that the back of the house has a full second floor but the front does not, making his bedroom seem like a little attic perch while ours are just plain (full-height) bedrooms. Dorothy could have chosen any room she wished, but she did not choose this one because of the paneled walls. I see her point, but the space is twice the size of hers--she'll regret it some day. I have big plans for this room (map-printed curtains are a priority, as is painting that dingy ceiling), but for now it is set up and functional and, for the first time, a real space constructed with my son in mind. His father's Marine Corps foot locker is his toy box; his "piggy bank" is a combination safe of the same origin. His big-boy bed is on the floor so we won't have head-bumps, and I repurposed a shoe organizer to hold toy cars and finger puppets. It seems fitting that Worth's room should be the first room that is fully unpacked and put together--he's waited long enough!

Christmas sharks

2010-12-27T21:37:00.000-08:00

If I thought it was going to be difficult to unpack and get tidy in the new house before, I clearly didn't realize how much worse the situation was going to get with the addition of all the Christmas paraphernalia! Between the fancy pink Polly Pocket camper (it's called a glamper, no joke) accessories and the noisy baby instruments it may be spring before I find a clear spot on this new floor to set my foot without stomping on something precious or loud. But we had a good Christmas! Here's me and my girl in our matching pajamas on Christmas morning. They aren't homemade; they are from Target. :)

And baby Worth sporting his White Socks bib (I did sew that, but it was before I knew we were moving) and shark hat. The hat has a story. I finished most of my shopping as soon as I found out we were moving, wrapped up the gifts, then sent them off to Nana's. I blogged about that at the time. But of course my early shopping did not account for closer-to-Christmas requests from Dorothy. I could not have predicted that the item she would get her heart most set on receiving from Santa Claus was a shark hat and mitten set that matches those owned by her little preschool crush. I had to e-mail the boy's mother to ask where she'd gotten them, then get myself to the Gap in the midst of all our move craziness to secure the hat. Fortunately, the store did have exactly two hats left when I got there--one in Dorothy's size and one in Worth's, so of course I bought them both. If I'm buying my daughter a shark hat from the boys' department, why not also purchase one for my son? Dorothy was extremely happy with her her new shark gear and has mentioned several times how she and her little friend will now have matching hats on the playground. I'm totally charmed that 4-year-old love is taking the form of identical fleece hats in the form of marine predators. I'm also totally into the hats myself--they are so unexpected on both my pink-clad daughter and my rosy-cheeked baby. The kids kept getting pawed at and cooed over by strangers at Costco today. Who knew that shark hats could be such a thing?

This picture is being included just because I love it. It's Dorothy expressing her love for her newly-unwrapped skunk toy. I bought a bag of seemingly new (with tag) Beanie Babies at the thrift store for about a dollar, then parceled them out to the kids and wrapped them individually from Santa. Dorothy loves stuffed animals that are about that size and heft, and I like toys that don't fall apart in the washing machine. (Beanies wash pretty well, in my experience.) She told my mother that her skunk and owl toys were her favorite Christmas gifts. Not a bad second life for those erstwhile "collectors' items."

I'll post more house photos soon! I'm probably going to spend the rest of the winter on befores and afters, kind of like the camper, but first I just need to get more boxes unpacked. A planned trip to IKEA later this week should help me with some needed storage; right now I'm a bit stymied by not having the right places to put the things I'm unpacking.

Home! No place like home!

2010-12-23T15:40:00.000-08:00

We're a mess of boxes and dirty laundry over here, but the move is over. We had a rick of wood delivered today, and friends came to help us drag boxes to one side of the room (under that window, see?) so that at least the cozy space around the family room fire looks habitable, and we are enjoying it! We bought one of the last live Christmas trees available at our local lot, and though it's a bit sad looking and uneven Dorothy loves it. She was so eager to put on ornaments that she started decorating the tree at once--before we put on lights. Skipping lights at least means there is one less thing to put away after Christmas! The empty table on the other side of the fireplace is my sewing table. I am so excited about the happy hours I will spend under that beautiful picture window (which will be replaced with one I can slide open when our new window order is installed in 4-6 weeks), and Dorothy's wee desk next to mine will (she hopes) get a little starter sewing machine on it after Santa arrives on Saturday.

Hope everyone else is feeling like they are occupying the right space this Christmas. :)

The stockings were hung

2010-12-13T19:05:00.000-08:00

by our new chimney, with care! And cheering! And lots of exclamation points! We got access to the new house today and rushed over to take care of first things first, like hanging our stockings. I think we all feel better now. In addition to our stockings we took over some fragile items (lamps) and some that would be overly difficult to pack, like my stand mixer. It sure gives me a mental boost to know that my stockings and my stand mixer are waiting for me over at the new house!

Our stockings each have a bit of a story. Mine (first) was a gift from Rob during the Christmas of our engagement. Rob's is from his childhood. Dorothy's (ivory with the silver tree) has eighteen silver hooks sewn on it. Each Christmas Santa brings her a sterling silver charm representing something special about her year, and he hangs it on a hook on the stocking. By her eighteenth Christmas she will have a nice collection of meaningful charms that she can choose to leave on her stocking, or put on a bracelet if she wishes. I like this tradition because it takes up less space than ornaments, and can double as something functional (wearable jewelry) instead of just (pardon me) a box load of crap that she feels like she has to keep until one of us dies. Not to be all anti-sentimental, but I just am not in favor of traditions that burden people with lots of stuff they must store. The cat's stocking is next, and then Worth's. I had a hard time thinking of how to adapt the charm tradition for him, but I did come up with something. His stocking has big circles on it, and eighteen of them are well-centered on the stocking. Santa has purchased a good supply of silver letter beads and will string one word in the center of a circle each year. It's not wearable, but at least it will never take up more room than a stocking. Santa still hasn't decided what word will sum up Worth's first year, though--for some reason "victuals" keeps coming to mind, as that boy is such a big fan of his dinner!

There's no place like...

2010-12-11T13:41:00.000-08:00

Worth met Santa this week! I don't like screaming pictures with Santa so I opted to be included after it was clear Worth would not willingly participate in a hand off. I have a similar picture of Dorothy, Santa, and my arms from her first Christmas. I have no pictures of Santa with Dorothy since then, what with the unwillingness on my part to hand a screaming child over to a scary stranger in a red suit, and her unwillingness to get anywhere near him. (The picture looks like an old Polaroid because I downloaded this software and am now slightly addicted to using it on my photographs. You should try it--it's fun to watch the picture develop over the course of two minutes!)

And the packing continues. Poor Rody Pony, getting squashed into a box! We were sure we'd have the keys to the new place by now but we don't. There was a problem on the seller's end with one of the repairs we requested taking longer than expected. I'm trying not to feel excessively frustrated about it, but it is frustrating to have thought we'd have access to the house by now but not. My plans to move everyday items (like most of the kitchen and closets) by tote and unpack them directly into their new spots have fallen through, so now we need many more boxes, much more packing paper and a lot more takeout than we'd thought. Still, I'm trying to focus on the merry Christmas we're going to have around our new hearth, and being glad our conscientious seller is taking care of everything at the new house. I'm thankful for the Vietnam Kitchen down the street and for disposable diapers for one week only!

Instead of 1000 words

2010-12-07T07:19:00.000-08:00

A handmade hat that turned up during packing.

The mess inside our house.

The mess outside our house.

An angelic-looking baby who has unwisely chosen this moment of upheaval to cut new teeth, all night long.

Two nice-list hopefuls.

The mobile imp who has discovered that un-baby-proofed interiors can be a landscape of pure fun.

Sweet feet

2010-12-02T15:26:00.000-08:00

Most of the sweet baby booties I made when I was pregnant are no longer in use at my house. Now that Worth can pull himself up he needs grippy-footed soft-soled shoes to keep him from skidding all over our hardwood floors. This one pair does still work, though. Since I'd made this pair to fit a bigger baby, I'd had the foresight to also do something about the slipping issue. It doesn't work perfectly well, but really neither do leather soles, and it's too cold for bare feet. I sewed a felt sole onto the bottom of these booties, then used rubbery puffy fabric paint to paint little paw prints on the bottoms. The paint provides some traction on the floors and keeps Mr. Baby from whacking his head for any reason not related to his own nascent motor skills. These booties stay on with the help of red leather cord laces and are very cutely U of L-y, but unfortunately I did not think to put them on him when he made his first trip to the new stadium last week to see his first basketball game!

The real estate project is progressing nicely. We've taken care of our buyer's inspection repair quests and our seller has responded positively to ours. We're hoping for a Merry Early Christmas closing in about two weeks. In the meantime, *I think* (and I almost hate to jinx this by even blogging about it!) that our buyers are going to allow us to have a key very soon to start moving in some of our things. I'm so excited! I couldn't resist popping in on Early Bird Thursday today at my favorite thrift shop to see if I could score some goodies for our new digs, and I totally did! A yellow bed skirt for Dorothy's new room, a little knick-knack shelf for our crafty studio, a vintage Christmas tablecloth, a rug for our studio, a mirror to hang over our dress-up box, and this little bell for my vintage Kentucky kitchen. $18 well spent, in my opinion.

Looking ahead, I think Dorothy must have an owl pillow similar to these in her new vintage-floral bedroom. I'm pretty sure there is a sheet in that pile just crying out to be an owl pillow. How cute are they?

Black Friday skirt

2010-11-26T13:27:00.000-08:00

I am not a big fan of shopping on the Friday after Thanksgiving. When I was a kid we always spent the day out in the country at a farm belonging to family friends. When my husband and I were first dating, we enjoyed the "cheap date" quality of milling with the shopping throngs and having lunch out, but now most years I'm happy to leave that scene alone. All my Christmas gifts are Internet-order or handmade (sorry Toys R Us, but your cheap, bad-quality, made-in-China, creativity-sucking, ugly plastic crap just doesn't do it for me, at any price or any time of day), and I have enjoyed spending this peaceful chilly Friday cozily alternating snuggling my ailing baby with working at my sewing machine.

I bought some nice black jersey to make a skirt several weeks ago, but with all the real estate hoo-ha I hadn't had time to put it together. It was a bit hard to cut this project out with much of our square footage being sucked up in towers of packed boxes, but I'm glad I got it done so I can wear it over the holidays. I based the skirt on Simplicity 2758, which is a pattern I've made (and blogged about) a number of times. I like the cut of this skirt, and when I make it in stretchy knit I get to skip the zipper, making it that much easier to sew and leaving time for embellishment. I serged the bottom of the ruffle to look a bit raw, and the overhanging lip of the main skirt panel is serged in the same way, which is inspired by the look of store-bought clothes I've admired lately. In ten years we'll wonder why we wore clothes that looked like they weren't finished.

We woke to a dusting of snow here in Kentucky this morning. I called Dorothy over to the window and she was utterly thrilled. She had her snowsuit in her hand and was ready to go out and play in less than an inch of snow before I'd even poured my coffee. Rob had to meet with a client so he couldn't take her, and there was no way I was dragging my sick baby out into the cold, but I also hated to deflate Dorothy's enthusiasm. She was willing to wait until her father got back, but we knew the snow wouldn't last that long, so I came up with an alternative solution. I took a plastic container out onto the deck and scraped the snow off the railings and into the dish. Then I gave my little housebound snowbird an assortment of measuring cups and kitchen utensils and she had a blast scooping, measuring and dishing the snow. She crammed the snow tightly into an empty salt shaker and felt clever, like I'd never get it out, and my salt shaker would be inconveniently jammed with snow forever, right here in the warm house. "How will you get the snow out, Mommy? Will you have to use pliers or some scissors?" Only time will tell, Dorothy...

Don't feed the wildlife

2010-11-24T09:43:00.000-08:00

We have a house! Hooray! To our great surprise and delight, the owner of the Good Memories house (see below) accepted our offer outright. Now we're feeling a little foolish that we didn't just give that a try a week ago and save ourselves the anxiety. We have the housing inspection and tests yet to get through, but we're hoping for the best. I'm so excited about this new house and I think it's going to be a great fit for our family. There is such a terrific crafty space with a cozy wood-burning stove in the basement! There is also all the crazy wallpaper, outdated fixtures, and appliances that might be as old as me, but we'll deal with those in time. It'll be like the camper project but on a large scale. This house it the one I had in mind months ago when I bought all the yellow florals to make Dorothy a quilt. The wallpaper will stay up in her new room at her insistence, and I'll finally give those sheets a second life once my sewing space is unpacked at our new address.

The kitchen in this house is so bad right now, with a wallpaper wharf scene, outdated cabinetry, and brown appliances, but I can already picture the makeover in my mind. The whole house has a real World War II vibe (it was built in '41) and I'm going to accessorize the kitchen with a vintage Kentucky tourism theme in mind. I have already picked up a few charmingly hokey vintage plates that were sold at Kentucky tourist destinations decades ago (eBay and local thrift shops) and these sweet salt and pepper shakers. And out of respect for the home's time period Rob and I have vowed to drink more martinis and listen to more Frank Sinatra.

This scene was from my kitchen this morning. Worth scooted over to Dorothy's chair and was gruntingly begging her for food. Dorothy asked if she could feed him, and my first reaction was, "if you feed him, he'll never leave you alone." But then it occurred to me that he's a baby not a dog, so I said she could. So she fed him bits of cereal from her cup, and well, now he'll probably never leave her alone.

The caterpillar

2010-11-22T13:12:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I was trying to figure out something nice to do with a particularly cute caterpillar drawing of Dorothy's and this is what I ended up with. It's a custom t-shirt from Cafe Press that we will give to Dorothy's cousin for Christmas. I hope it isn't too redundant with the joint venture Dorothy and I made for the same cousin last winter, but since that gift was appreciated, this gift in the same vein probably will be too. Dorothy really enjoys feeling like she contributed to the making of any gift, and the benefit of a professionally done t-shirt is that it should wash nicely, unlike (unfortunately) the print-at-home transfers, which require fussy care to stay nice. I removed the white space from the caterpillar image using Photoshop, then saved the file as a PNG with a transparent background to make the design.

I took advantage of the warm weather this morning and did some more camper painting. I still have not had the chance to finish what I started with the handkerchief paisleys, but this morning I made solid progress on the opposite side. I purchased new, good quality brushes and they make all the difference in the world. Maybe I should have thought of that before, but the difference was really amazing. It was like I was trying to chop vegetables with a kiddie knife before! This time the paint went on much better and the lines look more smooth. It was faster going, too, so if I get another golden moment while both children are asleep or occupied and the weather is right I will get back out there. Otherwise, the camper may have to stay incompletely decorated until the spring.

As for our housing situation, who knows. We're working on a response to a set of nit-picky repair requests from our buyer. We made a fair offer on the Good Memories house, but have no particular confidence that the owner is ready for the kind of reality check that would mean taking our reasonable offer. I'm sure something will work out (Renata clutches at optimism), but at this point we're certainly curious about just how that will look.

Boxes

2010-11-19T06:19:00.000-08:00

The boxes, oh the boxes! We had to clear out much of the basement for yesterday's home inspection. The buyer's agent at least sent us a warm message of appreciation after the fact, which helped us feel better about all the work. (Full disclosure: by "we" I mean my husband and my mother. I think I mostly ran around like a crazy chicken picking up and dropping off children, nursing a baby, and looking at houses while they cleaned out the basement.) The main level of our home now looks like the basement threw up all over it. The inspection reportedly went fine; if they decide to request minor repairs we expect to hear about it Monday.

Meanwhile, we have not yet found a home to move into, and time is ticking towards a closing date. Ouch! The house that was not for sale did not work out. We're developing a plan (subject to change after I see a few more houses) that I think will involve a fair offer on the Good Memories house with the caveat that we are not willing to waste time negotiating on our fair offer, and that it will continue to sit lonely and empty while we pursue other options if they do not take it. Our other options are to choose one of the good and decent houses that we would not want to live in for more than, say, five years. Another five year house is fine in some ways--it leaves us open to pick a house we feel will make us more comfortable than our current cramped quarters without having to make a longer-term commitment, but it also raises issues of resale value and move-in readiness. We don't mind putting effort into a house we'd stay in indefinitely but don't want to sink much investment (time or money) into another five year house. We'll see...

The waiting is the hardest part

2010-11-17T07:00:00.000-08:00

Housing inspection tomorrow; the buyer needs everything moved away from the walls in the basement. That's rough, because our basement is crammed full of stuff. Crafty supplies can unfortunately take up a lot of room, and we've been hanging on to miscellaneous stuff that we intend to put in our next (bigger) house, and it's all been stashed in the basement. In the midst of all the basement chaos I am intent on acquiring and wrapping Christmas gifts. While it seems like one of the less pressing things we've got going right now, it is near the top of my mind. Santa must be able to find us, wherever we are! I typically do my shopping gradually, and I'd ordered a number of things just in the last week or so since it started looking like we'd be moving, so now most of our Christmas things are simply and hastily wrapped and sent off to Nana's to hide in a closet until we need them. Having at least one thing under control makes me feel a little better.

Dorothy and I also made spice cake (we skipped the pecans) from this month's Cooking Light to celebrate selling the house. I guess I overcooked the maple part of the icing a bit because it hardened too quickly and is more like fudge, but it still tastes good. It was nice to take the time for a mother/daughter project in the midst of all this housing hustle.

And speaking of the housing hustle, we still don't know where we're going. I'm starting to, ahem, sort of lose my s#!$ about it, and I'm tired of waiting to know where my family is going to be sleeping next month. The short version of the story is that we made a verbal offer on a house that is not for sale. It is none of the ones I described in my last post. As you might imagine, there is slightly more to the story than that, but I don't feel like detailing in the blog. I don't want to live in the knives and lizards house (besides, did I mention the kitchen there? Bleah!), the good memories house is overpriced, and the dilapidated charmer is really just too dilapidated. We've been waiting since Monday afternoon to hear back, and at this point I'm jumping every time the phone rings. I need to go back and read my own post about not wishing my life away! But housing is a basic need, and even though I realize and am thankful that we are not actually faced with homelessness, with every box I pack in the basement I get more anxious about not knowing where these will be unpacked. Please send me good housing vibes!

The choices

2010-11-14T16:38:00.000-08:00

So we saw one more house today and will see two tomorrow. For your amusement (and as an exercise in working out my own feelings about them) I'll describe our strongest options.

The Bad Karma House
The bad karma house is practically right around the corner from our current home. It's a very attractive home on a pretty street. I like the way there is a good play space for the kids right next to a good sewing space for me. It's a totally respectable and nicely maintained home that is probably the "smartest" purchase on our list. Your mother would approve. But why the bad karma? I don't know if you'd call it karma or "vibes" or what, but even though I'm not a superstitious person I still feel like I need to have a positive feeling about the home I buy. If I am going to lay my head down in it every night, I want to feel some positive association with the space itself. When we walked up to this home and Rob was inspecting the exterior he found (this is no joke) a butcher knife in the immaculately well-kept front bushes. A butcher knife in the landscaping. Was it left over from Halloween? Was it being used as a hedge-trimming tool? I have no idea. Strange, but we went inside anyway, toured the upstairs and the main floor, noted the acceptable floorplan, etc., then headed down to the basement where there was a small neighborhood lizard writhing miserably in the middle of the floor. In our very path through the basement, there was a lizard dying. I think it actually died while we were down there. So on a tour of this otherwise totally respectable home we a) found a butcher knife in the hedges and b) witnessed the death of a small reptile. I don't need to be a voodoo practitioner to feel like maybe that is just not the house for us, right? Plus, in such a respectable home, could I ever feel comfortable rocking out to classic outlaw country with my family while we cooked and I drank gin? It just didn't have any grit to it at all.

The "Good Memories" House
This is a house we've had our eye on since we put our own on the market. A young couple built it in 1940, raised their family in it, and lived in it until their own deaths, the most recent of which was five years ago. It was well-maintained and has a sunny, cheerful feeling. It's also got the worst 1970s wallpaper you've ever seen. In every single room. Crazy floral patterns in every room, all in shades of yellow and gold except the kitchen where there is (drum roll please) a wallpaper mural of a wharf scene. Still, you know me, I like vintage things and I really love the floorplan of this house. I can totally picture the happy hum of home life my family would have under this roof. I also love the idea of taking up the banner of life in a house that grew old with one loving family. So the problem (besides the damage to my fingernails that a full year of peeling off wallpaper would cause) is that the daughter who grew up in this home and now owns it is completely delusional about what the home is "worth." She loved it, she grew up in it, she watched her parents take good care of it, and now she's asking a completely nutty amount of money for it. So it has sat empty, lonely, cold and unkempt for three years while no one buys it. Someone has cut the grass but not much else. A shutter has come loose, and who knows what has happened to the pipes. I guess we could make a low offer on the house, one that is more in keeping with what the actual real estate market says the home is worth, but we don't have much confidence she'd take it. Then we'd have wasted precious time making an offer that has almost no hope of being accepted. That would leave us in an even bigger hurry to find a house and kind of sad, too, because when you actually make an offer you can't help but to get a little emotionally involved.

Dilapidated Charm
Last but never least, there is a very beautiful home on a very lovely street. We toured it at an open house last winter. We were amazed at how pretty it could be, and our jaws dropped at the amount of work it needed. The kitchen is horrifying, the basement leaks, the roof looks shoddy, the home needs new windows. "What a labor of love," we thought, "for someone who doesn't mind living though all that work." "What a beautiful and charming home for someone who can give it the love it needs." And we walked back out. But the house is on the route of our daily family walk, so each day for approximately eight months we've walked by it. "That house needs someone to love it," we'd say. Then, gradually, a funny thing happened. We hardly wanted to say it out loud, but it became increasingly clear that maybe we were falling in love with it, just a little bit. "We could rent the upstairs apartment," one of us would suggest, "to help with the cost of the renovations." Or "I guess buying a house that needs a lot of work would mean that the people doing the work would get to choose how it turns out, which is much nicer than buying a nice house that is imprinted with someone else's taste." And slowly we realized we were trying to talk ourselves into it, that we did love the house, and that it was at the top of our list of places to move. Then, a few months ago, the real estate sign disappeared from the yard. We were shocked and sad, like the house cheated on us somehow. We asked around; it appeared the house had found a buyer. "At least someone will give it the love it needs," we said, and told ourselves it was for the best. Every day we took our walk, and every day we watched for there to be lights on in the house, or some sign that work had begun, but nothing happened. Then, two weeks ago, right about the time we were deciding to take our home off the market the for sale sign went back up. I swear I'm not superstitious, but just as much as knives and lizards make me feel uncomfortable with the respectable little stone house around the corner, there was a funny flow to the set of events that brought us from "should we take ours off?" to "oh look! The sign is back up in the yard of that beautiful fixer-upper," to "OMG! We've finally got an offer!"

So the knives and lizards house would be a smart buy, the dilapidated charmer would be stupid. Who buys a house they know will be a money pit? Shouldn't transactions like real estate be made with the head more than the heart? So we'll take our final looks at our options tomorrow and then figure something out. A home inspection might shed light on our charmer, and maybe a serious offer would sway our Happy Memories owner more than we think. It might be a nice middle ground? In the meantime, I'm off to pour myself another margarita.

House house house house house house

2010-11-13T20:00:00.000-08:00

The house that is soon to be someone else's! She offered. We counter-offered. She accepted. OMG! There will be an inspection late this week, but I feel pretty confident it should go well since we know of no problems with our little home. (Other than the size of it, if you are a family of four, which she's not.) She's on board with a pre-Christmas move, but there is now the not-so-small detail of finding a home for us to move into. We looked at a half dozen places today and I'm afraid they were underwhelming. The boring cape cod, the house with the terrific sewing space but closet-like kitchen, the home that is lovely but in a bad location. Hmm. We have a few more to see yet, so we're hopeful. This isn't really the best time to be looking for a new place, calendar-wise, but I'm sure something will turn up. In the meantime I'm having a bit of trouble sleeping. I can't even mentally plot out furniture layouts or curtain plans since I have no idea where we're moving!

We pass the time

2010-11-12T10:00:00.000-08:00

I really don't like it when people say "this too shall pass." By which I guess I mean people who aren't really going through horrifying circumstances--I guess if someone living in squalid conditions in a refugee camp said it, or someone suffering from cholera in Haiti, then I'd be on board. But in general, the people I hear say this are American parents with relatively comfortable lives who are simply wishing their lives away. I prefer to not wish my life away. Life is already short (and we never know exactly how short it is, so it's probably best to assume it's shorter rather than longer), and I want to live it fully, not to pass the time wishing it were tomorrow. So I'm trying to remember this while we wait for our housing situation to be resolved. Today is just as much one of the precious days of my childrens' lives in my care as yesterday was, and it counts against my total just as much as any day next year, no matter what my address is.

In light of that, here is my beautiful daughter, a person I treasure, being beautiful. She is reciting a book from memory ("reading" it) to her doll, who is (over)dressed just like Dorothy. And while my daughter is being her beautiful self, and my son is learning to crawl, talk and wave bye-bye, we are also having housing "adventures." The potential buyer made an offer. We are countering, but our counter is not far off of her offer, so it seems likely that a sale will work out. We have some non-monetary terms to agree on such as a closing date, etc, and there will be an inspection, but things seem to be moving in the right direction. Wow! So my husband and I will spend the weekend interviewing new homes for us, which is very exciting. Where is the kitchen in which Dorothy and I will be baking bread in just a couple short months? I'm curious, but I'm going to take a deep breath and remember to fully enjoy our last loaves here.

Carbs and a calendar

2010-11-11T07:42:00.000-08:00

For various reasons that I cannot blog about yet, we have decided to take our house off the market next week. I don't mean to be secretive (can one be secretive and have a blog?), but there is a Major Life Change coming to my family that simply cannot yet be discussed in public, but it effects our plans to move. (It is, for the record, absolutely NOT a new baby. So please don't start rumors!) After much pondering, heart-searching, bookkeeping, and discussion, we concluded that the house should either be sold or off the market by November 15, almost 11 months after the for-sale sign first went into our frozen yard last winter. So I've been making plans for how to live in our current home better. I've poured over the IKEA catalog, Craig's List, fabric swatches and organization web sites. I've plotted out which furniture we will keep, which will go, what needs to be moved around in order to make this little house work more efficiently for our family. We also agreed to have a last-ditch open house, so we at least felt like we fought the real estate fight to the bitter end. And I'm afraid it was bitter--I had already buried the idea of moving, and I did not want to clean and vacate the house on Sunday. I left our spotlessly clean house with a very grumpy attitude. Then a very surprising thing happened. Our Realtor called and said she expected an offer from someone who came to the open house. What?

We're trying not to get our hopes up, since the last time we thought an offer was pending things didn't work out so well. Still, it's been three days and things seem to be progressing. The potential buyer has been back, asked questions, reportedly gotten a mortgage pre-approval. We'll see. A written offer is still pending. I'm trying very hard not to dissolve into an emotional mess, but it's tough. Should I carry on with my plans to change our house? Should I be scouring the real estate websites trying to find a house for us? Should I quickly finish and wrap all my Christmas shopping in case a sudden move disrupts Santa's progress? Eek! So everything feels up in the air, my stomach is quavering, I jump when the phone rings, and I'm craving (and eating) carbs. The picture above is the first of two "cream" sodas I drank yesterday (in a glass Dorothy decorated). Fill a glass with ice, then 3/4 full of plain seltzer, then a dash of vanilla syrup (like the kind coffee shops sell), then top it off with whole milk or cream. Yum. Sugar.

And while the real estate mess has been stressful, this totally made my day! Mama Shell, of Shell Shares Recipes, sent me an amazingly fabulous calendar. It's twelve super-cool pages of illustrations of vintage campers and I love it! My first thought was to put it in the camper, but then I wouldn't get to see it as often, so it's going in my own kitchen (wherever that may be?) so I can drool over how cute they all are every day. Thank you Shell!

Crochet is perfect for fidgety, nervous fingers. I've also found that I have three or four minutes each morning and afternoon to crochet while I'm waiting (parked) in the carpool line for Dorothy. It doesn't seem like a lot of time, but it adds up. I just keep a project ready to pick up in the passenger seat. I'd purchased this fun shiny coat this fall but wasn't sure what kind of accessories to wear with something so...shiny. I decided to go for contrast, so I ordered some really fuzzy alpaca blend yarn. I like the fuzzy with the shiny, and the scarf and hat are warm and soft. I didn't use a pattern, they are both just very simple. I made the hat big enough that it will (hopefully) just sort of sit down on top of my hair without squashing my curls. It's hard for curly girls to wear hats, but this really warm yet lightweight yarn should help.

My house is a mess and the newspaper pissed me off

2010-11-06T07:19:00.000-07:00

The stomach virus is gone, but we're not fully operational around here. Everyone is still tired and we've all just lost a little momentum. The house is a mess and we have a real estate open house tomorrow--yikes. The table I photographed happens to be covered with 4-year-old girl ephemera, but my own desk is just as overflowing, with mail, stamps and a stamp pad from an old paper project, a shirt that needs mending, and three different yarn projects in various stages of completion. Somehow we will get all this cleaned up and the Halloween decorations put away by tomorrow midday. (So this morning blogging takes the form of procrastination.)

I also just have to comment on this ugly article that met me at the breakfast table this morning. I don't understand the so-called "mommy wars" at all. It seems to me that some people take others' strong commitments to a parenting philosophy personally, and feel indicted if they don't share one, whereas the focus of most parenting philosophies is actually on children, not other mommies. If a mother doesn't like a particular philosophy, perhaps she should just avoid using it, instead of suggesting that its existence is undermining decades of progress in women's liberation. Jong seems to miss the point that if a woman disagrees with a philosophy (in this case, attachment parenting), then she is free to ignore it and move on. It is only if she actually finds it compelling and thinks in her heart that she should be following it (or doing something differently) that it has any sway over her at all. If she does not find a philosophy compelling, then the fact that other mothers practice it should not even be on her radar--parenting is a very personal quest, not a contest, and mothers do not have to register their commitment to any particular set of values anywhere.

I am grateful for a community that allows me to parent the way I feel is right. Sometimes that is an accord with one particular parenting book or another, and sometimes it is not. I know women who largely share my parenting views and work full-time at demanding jobs. I know others who stay home and share none of my philosophies. I am glad that in this garbled world of feminism, post-feminism, and feminism-yet-to-come that I can stay home and tend my family's metaphorical fires without feeling like I have something to prove. I stay home because that is what feels right to me. I enjoy contributing to my family's economy in the kitchen, at my sewing machine, and out of my crochet bag. I hold a masters degree from a prestigious university and if I felt like that piece of paper forced me out of the spot that makes me happy, then that would be enslavement. To each her own. I can't imagine any child would be better off staying home with a mother who felt stranded in the role. Nor do I think women should work outside the home just because that's what they thought they would do when they were 22 and made expensive educational choices. It's a big world--can't we make room for all the choices that are as varied and ever-changing as the individuals who make up our current generation of mothers?

More tricks than treats

2010-11-02T06:46:00.000-07:00

Our Halloween was not exactly as pictured. First Dorothy, then Worth, then me, then Rob fell to a nasty stomach virus over the course of two days. Today we're all recuperating and working on the awful pile of laundry, but the last couple days weren't pretty. Dorothy still got to trick-or-treat a little bit in our own neighborhood (that was before the adults got sick), but we missed our ritual of pizza and trick-or-treat with the cousins, who went as the Princess and the Pea.

I'm glad I took my kids' picture when the costumes arrived instead of waiting for Halloween. They made adorable rats, even when sick. I didn't make these costumes--they are Old Navy costumes that I bought off eBay. I could never make costumes for the price I got these for, and the Old Navy costumes are nicely made, washable, easy to put on and take off, and reused. What more could you want?

Dorothy got a new pair of ruby slippers last week and I couldn't resist a snapshot of the old with the new. She's worn these little ballet-style shoes from Target ever since she was old enough to wear hard-soled shoes, and they have become a signature fashion item for her. To the yellow brick road, anyone?

Fall fun

2010-10-29T14:05:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I finished crocheting a sweater I started last fall. I was pregnant, and I was pretty sure the style of this cardigan would work hanging open over a baby bump. The further I got on the sweater, though, the bigger my belly got, and I finally decided it was going to look stupid and I quit. It was fun to pull it out this fall, though, a nearly-finished sweater, and just complete it and wear it. I haven't blocked it yet, and I definitely think blocking will help the shape a bit, but I'm still really pleased with it. The wool is nice and warm, too, so even though today was chilly I felt comfortably warm out in the air but not overly bundled inside the car and house. The pattern is available here, though I didn't follow it exactly.

Today I wore my new sweater on a lovely walk down Hillcrest Avenue in Louisville, a pretty street in any season, but particularly nice before Halloween. The street has become known locally as a Halloween destination, with many of the homes decorating exuberantly. We've taken walks down Hillcrest on sunny mornings before Halloween each year since Dorothy has been old enough to care, and it's become a fun tradition. Some of the decorations could be gruesome (especially for my small ones) by night but are funny and interesting by day.

This caterpillar drawing came home from school with Dorothy recently. Her class focused on caterpillars and butterflies for a while, which included artistic representations of both. This cheery caterpillar drawing of hers has totally stolen my heart. I want to do something special with it but can't decide what. Maybe have it put on a Sigg bottle? Or a t-shirt for her cousin for Christmas? Or a mouse pad for myself?

Weekend pictures

2010-10-26T07:12:00.000-07:00

Another fun, busy weekend! I finished this hat before we left for an overnight camping trip, to take to a 5-year-old birthday party when we returned. The new owner seems to like it. Dorothy approved of the "gem" beads in the center of the flowers.

We took the camper to Lake Monroe in Bloomington. I went to college at IU, so it was fun to be back in that area. We drove to campus in the late afternoon just to see how things had changed and vowed to go back next summer to visit some of my favorite old haunts. Our campsite was, once again, not very woodsy. Next fall we will know that we have to make reservations early (or commit to 2-night stays) if we want to camp in a natural setting during October. The place we went was more of an RV park for Indianapolis fishermen or weekenders who are interested in an RV intentional neighborhood scene, not so much a woodsy campground one. We had no idea going in, but it was also the weekend of this site's annual Halloween festivities, including a campsite decorating contest and trick-or-treating. We hadn't planned on this, so during our excursion to campus we stopped by a grocery store to purchase candy and a makeshift costume for Dorothy--a $2.99 tiara and wand set. It ended up being a fun surprise. The other families were very nice, and the whole evening ended up being very enjoyable even though it wasn't what we pictured. Since groups were walking around from site to site, many people also made a point to go over and peek in our cute camper, which was once again very unique among much larger and newer (and neutral-colored) campers. My favorite comment was from one person who asked if it was really retro, or had we purchased it new to look like that. :)

Now for my pictures. Above, Dorothy is broom-sweeping our camper as we get things set up. She fancies she is like Laura Ingalls doing her chores.

Even though our site itself was not woodsy, the campground was right next to the woods surrounding Lake Monroe. We took a gorgeous hike through the pretty foliage and down to the lake. (Can you spot the baby?)

Dorothy pretended to be a lake mermaid. I got this photo of her pretending to jump back to her watery home, but unfortunately did not capture the hysterically cute affected mermaidesque hair-tossing of a moment before.

We cooked chicken sausages on the fire, and enjoyed our favorite fall acorn squash soup, which I'd prepared at home and warmed in the camper microwave.

The almost-full moon was a perfect backdrop to the campsite trick-or-treating.

Overconfidence

2010-10-22T14:29:00.000-07:00

Some people are afflicted with a lack of self-confidence. Others of us are afflicted with a little too much confidence. Like people who say, "even though I have never been a 2-dimensional artist, was not chosen to help paint the school's windows in the third grade, and would never even consider painting anything on paper or a canvas to be displayed in public or private, I'll borrow my 4-year-old's paintbrushes and use oil-based permanent paint to decorate my camper with handkerchief paisleys." And so I did. One man almost ran his pickup into the fence while driving through the alley, and neighbors I have never met walked dogs (were they even their dogs?) over my way to see what the [heck] I was doing to the little red camper in my back driveway. It looks...(long pause)...better from a distance than close up. But no one, ever, nowhere, will have a camper that looks just like mine. One side down, three to go!

Pumpkins

2010-10-21T15:36:00.000-07:00

Another busy week around here. Lots of fall fun, including a trip to the pumpkin patch. We've had several house-showings, which is driving us a little crazy at this point. I think we've given up hope of actually selling, and just wish people would leave us alone. Why do we keep giving free tours of our home to people who will just say things like "oh, it's so cute! We just love it! But we needed an extra bathroom." Or first-floor bedroom, or extra square footage, or garage...it's always something that we clearly didn't have based on the information in our listing, but for some reason people want to come see it (and not buy it) anyway.

This photo was an accident--he looked away as I was taking it, but isn't his hat adorable next to the real pumpkins? I made that for him last year. I'd just made a similar one for Dorothy and she insisted the new baby would need one too. Obviously she was right. Speaking of her being right, today she was putting on her ruby slippers and talking to my mother-in-law. She said, "when I wear these shoes, people always say, 'are you Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz?' But I'm like, 'ummmm, no, I'm Dorothy from the city.'"

When did she become such a teenager? She also seems to have a particular interest in a boy from school, in a way that seems to indicate to me that she's got a budding awareness of "special" boy/girl relationships. She always tells me what he's up to, talks about him often, and last night after church choir (which they also both participate in) she said, "C. sat next to me at choir, then I patted his back, and he went [ insert giggle silly face with tongue sticking out and full body wiggle]. Then after choir I gave him three different hugs." Oh my!

Today we made cookies, without boys. (Except Worth, I guess, who was kept happy with pea crisps while we baked.) The last few years I have tried several different recipes for pumpkin cookies, but to be frank they all sort of suck. I mean, the are edible, they made from butter and sugar after all. But they aren't good like pumpkin-bread-in-cookie-form or anything. Today I thought I'd try a different route and make a recipe for applesauce cookies, but sub in pumpkin. I also added pumpkin pie spice, and substituted chocolate chips for the recommended raisins. They taste good but are too chewy, and the bottoms basically scraped right off when I severed them from the cookie sheet they were stuck to. Parchment might have helped with the release, but not the texture. I think it must be hard to develop a pumpkin cookie recipe because of all the moisture in cooked pumpkin. If anyone has one, please let me know!

In between house-showings and pumpkin patches this week I did something that makes me feel really smug and obnoxious--I ordered my Christmas cards! I know it's early, but it was this gorgeous afternoon, the kids were playing out front, and from the basement I'd just unearthed the holiday dress I'd purchased on clearance last year for Dorothy. It has a matching dress for her doll, which is always extra special. Dorothy saw it and had herself and her dolly dressed in no time, so I popped the baby into this little fleece Santa suit left from Dorothy's babyhood, and clicked away. I got adorable photos of both kids in their holiday get-ups, so I figured I might as well finish the task while I was on it and selected a pretty photo card online. Now bring it on, season-accelerating commercial world, I'm ready for you! Before you even change your displays from spooky to Santa, my holiday cards are done. Pow!

I am a dork, but you are reading my blog--please love me anyway. :)

A busy week

2010-10-14T12:19:00.000-07:00

When we arrived home after our camping adventures last weekend we noticed the refrigerator was making an odd noise, sort of like a zombie. Being the (apparently) stupid and ineffectual people we are, we just noted the noise and moved on, not stopping to check on details like are all the frozen foods thawing? And unfortunately they were, but we didn't realize it until it was too late and much of the frozen stuff had to be thrown out or cooked. So we bought a new refrigerator (with some odd combination of an Energy Star rebate, appliance disposal fees and a Columbus Day sale making it more cost-effective than buying used), and we've also once again lowered the priced on our house. Perhaps someday so the new buyers, wherever they are now, will use the new 'frige for something beautiful like leftover wedding cake or champagne to toast something wonderful and we will stop banging our heads against the wall over our housing situation. A girl can dream, right? In the meantime we're eating meals of baked chicken with a side of fried fish, since both fish and fowl were saved from the freezer, and being glad it's not worse.
Then on Wednesday, the very busiest and most hectic day of the week, as I was recovering from the new refrigerator blues but beginning to suffer a sore throat, Dorothy informed me at approximately the halfway point on our drive home from preschool that IT WAS THE DAY, the very special and most important day, that she got to take the traveling classroom gingerbread person home, and that she had accidentally left [him? her?] at school. I considered making the gingerbread person wait until we were already back at the very same building for choir practice later that night, but instead I rallied my inner good mother and turned the car back around. "Gingy" was fetched, along with [his? her?] tote bag, and brought on home with us. Gingy listened to our daily chapter from the Little House on the Prairie book, then settled down with Dorothy for a nap. A couple hours later it was time almost time to leave for ballet lessons and I realized I should look in Gingy's journal to see just what was expected of us with regard to this plush traveling pastry. About a half dozen of Dorothy's peers had already brought Gingy home (Gingy visitation being determined by drawing names), and those students' caring and creative mothers had written long and lovely essays about Gingy's stays with their families. Things like "in honor of Gingy, we made gingerbread cake!" and long tales of Gingy-inspired adventures. Those bitches, I thought. Never mind that enthusiastic parent involvement is actually one of the things I treasure about our preschool. All the mommies who get Gingy after us will love me, though, because I took things in the journal down a notch or two out of necessity. We sent Gingy back today with just a few brief sentences about our busy day and one potentially embarrassing (given Gingy's uncertain gender) home-printed photograph of Gingy wearing a pink tutu.

Returning to my regular blogging business, these Lego cufflinks were a Christmas gift to Rob last year. They are Legos from his own childhood, and I glued them to cufflink platforms I purchased from a jewelry supply store online. He loves wearing unusual cufflinks, and there aren't very many opportunities to make gifts for him. I snapped a picture of them when he was on his way out the door this morning.

And who can stay mad about houses and refrigerators with this juicy baby around to squeeze on? He's wearing a t-shirt I did before he was born, an inkjet-printed lobster applique on a plain white tee. He's turning into some adorable little butt-scooting backwards-crawling cherub-demon, and I'm afraid I'm having to babyproof this house already, even though I'd hoped to just do that in the next house!

We went camping!

2010-10-10T13:47:00.000-07:00

After several weeks of work we finally took our 1978 Fleetwing on the road. We didn't go far--just over 30 miles down the road to the closest state park we could get reservations at on a few days notice. It turned out not to even be in the woods, but on a golf course behind a state attraction less than a mile from the little downtown area. Not exactly the hiking venue we'd had in mind, but this was, after all, just meant as a trial for our camping set up. We had a little trouble backing in to our spot, being towing neophytes, but our camp neighbors helped guide us in and we quickly set up. Dorothy "decorated" the hitch with acorns upon arrival.

Then she decorated our table bench with fall leaves.

I got things together in the little camper kitchen.

This picture shows scale. Our camper was by far the smallest one there, no contest, and the only one that wasn't white or offwhite. (If you click on the photo it will enlarge and you can see it better.) It was a real conversation starter. "Oh, you all are the ones in the little red camper!" That's us, all right.

We walked around the campground in lieu of hiking. Dorothy collected nature finds in the treasure box we brought along for that purpose.

There was an old school playground with a steep metal slide (wheee!) and these creepy clown swings.

Dorothy and I broke out the camper craft supplies and made some acorn people after our dinner.

Everyone got tucked in; Dorothy up, the rest of us down. I was surprised that Dorothy actually slept the night through up there in the bunk. We had a great time. We've tent camped with Dorothy on several occasions, but she doesn't remember any of them. She was curious about the fire ("how will we unlit it when we're done?"), was confused that all the wood had disappeared this morning ("did the fire melt it?"), roasted her own chicken sausage and marshmallow, and insisted that we take showers in the campground facilities this morning. Traveling with a four-year-old is such a great reminder to savor every experience! We had a great time. We brought some things we didn't need, and failed to bring a few things that would have been nice to have. Now that we're a little wiser we're excited to try it again soon.

I made a camper fridgie

2010-10-08T14:35:00.000-07:00

More spookies in the house! A few years ago I got this brainstorm on how to display some of the crocheted doilies that have ended up in my linen collection from various dearly departed relatives. I dyed them black, starched them stiff, and hung them in my windows with suction cups and little plastic spiders. This way I get to enjoy the beauty of the fancywork done by the women who came before me, but I don't actually have to use white doilies on my dresser. Dorothy has enjoyed arranging (and rearranging) the spiders.

Think back twenty or thirty years and imagine your grandmother's refrigerator. It has a little crocheted yarn shape of some sort attached to it with a magnet, doesn't it? Fridgies are a bit of an art that time has forgotten (and maybe that's for the best), but I revived it for this little project as one of the details to finish of my camper's interior. My camper doesn't have an actual fridge, but I've attached this one to the galvanized metal backsplash I glued up over the propane range. Very appropriately campy, I think.

All four sides of the camper are now painted and it's mostly ready to go. I hooked up the water as a test, and it works. The propane range does not work but I'm hoping it's just because the tank is empty. I've been stashing bedding and kitchen essentials in it (a camper quilt is forthcoming but not done), and today I completed the very important task of putting together a camper art bag, with supplies for sketching or painting scenes, rubbing bark, collecting leaves, and gluing googly eyes and fake hair to acorns. I foresee many hours of mother/daughter fun at picnic tables, stringing nature finds on fishing wire and creating little woodland whimsies with the help of glitter pom-poms! I also found an old notebook, filled it with lined paper, and tucked a pen inside. I hope to keep a camper journal with as much or little as we care to log, as a record of our travels.

Skeletons in my...china cabinet

2010-10-05T14:30:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year.

The spookies are coming out, hiding in nooks and crannies.

Dorothy and I are equally thrilled. These picture are all scenes inside my china cabinet, where we just put out tin Halloween plates, shiny leaf dishes, and (naturally) poseable skeletons.

Brrrrrr!

2010-10-03T17:38:00.000-07:00

I love fall! The first chilly days are such a rush, I have no idea why. I really dislike cold weather (like January/February) but the preview days in fall are just gorgeous. It was fun to bundle my family up in new crocheted things this morning. Dorothy and Worth are wearing wool pumpkin hats and I'm in a sweater I made last year but was too pregnant to squeeze into. It's a terrifically soft alpaca that I scored for cheap at, of all places, Tuesday Morning, then ran out of and had to pay out the @ss on the Internet for more. Oops! But I love the sweater. It is based on a pattern (the Cupcake, from the Happy Hooker book) intended as a fitted, cotton spring thing, but I used a larger hook and improvised a bit to make a warmer tunic to layer with. I hate being hot in sweaters, but this one has some breathability.

And a new hat for me, finished just today. I used yarn that Rob bought me for our anniversary and a free pattern from Ravelry, the Bonita Hat. I love the colors he picked out and I'm trying to pretend it doesn't itch. I may give it a rinse in some Eucalan next time I'm washing woolen kid stuff and see if that helps.

Worth looks totally adorable in the hats I made for him last year while I was pregnant, but I'm afraid I'm having a little trouble squeezing them onto his sweet enormous noggin. I remember looking up in a book the "average" head size of a nine-month-old when planning this winter's hats (he'll be 9 months in December), but unfortunately these are tight. But for now I can still squeeze them on, and I love this stocking one in particular, which was worked on no particular pattern and with the goal of using up some scrap yarn. Cutie boy!

All your camper are belong to us

2010-09-30T12:21:00.000-07:00

Three sides are painted! The camper is looking so adorable in cherry red that I'm getting nervous about my planned embellishment. I guess once I'm to that point I'll just take a deep breath and do it, knowing I can always paint over it if it looks sillly.

photo courtesy of icesk8r on Etsy.com

How cute are these earrings? I wish I'd made them, but I didn't. I found them on Etsy, and I'm going to have to forward this post to my husband so he'll get them for me for Christmas. Or mabye this? Who said I wanted a hitch instead of jewelry? I want camper jewerly! :)

And chocolate cupcakes! The legend goes like this: circa 1980 a four-year-old big sister was jealous of a new brother's myriad baby milestones, whereas she only had a birthday once a year. The girl's wise mother told her that she, too, had more than one birthday--she had a half birthday that marked the six-month point in between regular birthdays, and they could have cupcakes to celebrate. So a tradition was born. Now that little girl's own little girl gets cupcakes on her half birthday, too. (Ahem.) So these are the cupcakes Dorothy helped me bake and decorate on Tuesday, marking the important passage to 4-and-a-half. I'm sorry to report that I caught her acting exactly like a 4-and-a-half-year-old; eating sprinkles right from the can during cupcake decorating, told her she had to stop, then saw her crawl under the table and hide for a moment, only to emerge with very red lips and the pronouncement, "the pink sprinkles are all gone!" I didn't let her decorate any more cupcakes, and she pitched a huge fit. But we had a nice half birthday celebration anyway.

A before and after

2010-09-25T09:12:00.000-07:00

photo courtesy of Fine Design Camper Sales

I'm making progress! The weather is finally nice and I'm hoping to make big strides on the camper exterior today, but right now I'm killing time in the house waiting for the baby to wake up. The fabric for the cushions arrived in the mail on Thursday, so yesterday I spent the day wrestling with those. The polka-dotted fabric is a nice thick indoor/outdoor upholstry fabric that I hope will easily wipe clean, and I found it at a great price online. We cut the table down to make more standing room in the camper, and to make nice places to sit without being crammed up against the table (for when you're say, nursing a baby and need a bit of room in front). The piece we cut off I stashed up above, so we can still use it when the table comes down to form a big bed. I haven't photographed the kitchenette yet, but finishing that up is also on my weekend to-do list, so stay tuned!

We're desperate to actually get this thing on the road and go camping, but I'm afraid if I move it from its present spot in my back yard that I will not prioritize it, and then it might never get done. It will certainly (barring unforseen circumstances) be completely done in time for next weekend, but Dorothy gets to bring the class guinea pig home next weekend, and I'm just not sure about a) camping with the class guinea pig, or b) dragging a screaming preschooler away from the class guinea pig to go camping. I'm open to suggestions on how to handle that one.

And as an update to our costume dilemma, the problem solved itself! Dorothy was just a tad jealous of her brother's cute rat costume and decided that she would also like to be a rat. So one more eBay auction won (and for a good price--hooray!), and we're waiting on one more package in the mail. I can't wait to get some pictures of my wee rat pack next month.

Trailer textiles

2010-09-23T13:43:00.000-07:00

With the interior painting done and the weather too hot to paint the exterior, I've been spending some time working on linens. I made these little camper potholders, and I'm a little embarrassed that they are way cuter than the store-bought ones in my real kitchen. My real kitchen is red, too, so I might do a switch so I can use these more often!

Now curtains! I don't know if the print shows up well in the photos, but the blue upper has illustrations of campy (pun intended) vintage travel sights, including enormous fake dinosaurs and, of course, campers. I went to the trouble of lining these with an old white sheet for extra privacy, and so the sun won't bleach the fabric as quickly.

And a nice stack of cloth napkins, all set for the campfire marshmallow messes of the future.

Progress pictures

2010-09-21T11:28:00.001-07:00

We're now on Day 9 of camper ownership, and my crafty energy is all camper, all the time, until we get this thing in the woods for the first time. But we're having tons of fun already, right here at home! The photo above is to compare to my primer picture, below.

Here's me on the unpainted side of the camper, rocking the schlumpy paint clothes look and inspiring my 4-year-old to beg for a hair bandana. :)

And the painted side! It's red! Embellishment to follow...

And my sewing table, covered in camper-related prints, ready for me to come back inside and stitch curtains, potholders, napkins...maybe a camper apron even? I also found a gorgeous red 100% wool throw at a thrift store that will become part of the camper ensemble. It has a patch sewn on it right now from a company; I guess it was a corporate gift of some sort. I'm just going to unstitch the patch, and I might sew on little white wool felt flowers to cute it up (ala Soule Mama).

In a momentary pause from camper things, I'm having a little Halloween costume trouble. I found a very inexpensive and adorable used rat costume for Worth on eBay, and it's ridiculously cute on him. I love the costumes put out by Old Navy because they are comfy and washable and easy to put on and off, so I just searched for costumes made by them to get inspiration for his. When I found the rat costume I knew it was just right. Dorothy wants to be a cat, so she can chase (and eat--eek!) her brother. The problem is, all the cat costumes I can find to fit my 5T daughter look like skanky cat woman outfits, not the least bit like cats. I did find one, with the help of a friend, but it's selling for between $40 and $50, which is nuts. I paid less than $5 for the baby's, with minimal shipping. And this might seem contrary to my whole blog bit, but I really hate the idea of making one. She'll wear it once, probably, since she's not all that interested in dress-up recently, and furry fabric is really expensive--much more expensive than run-of-the-mill costumes from Target. Plus, and this is really rather annoying, my kid doesn't want me to make her one. At all. I make her things all the time; Halloween costumes should be special. (Where am I going wrong? Eek again!) She wants a store-bought costume. So the search continues...

More primer

2010-09-17T13:21:00.001-07:00

We're still at work on this camper project. I haven't taken many pictures because I'm usually too dirty or painty to touch my camera, but I snapped this one today on my phone. I gave Dorothy a sanding block to use while I was using the electric wire sander thingy my brother loaned me. I got one side cleaned, sanded and primed today. The stripes are gone! (Insert evil laughter.) But I may not be able to move my arms or hands tomorrow, as they got the sort of workout they aren't used to. I just chopped vegetables for soup, and ouch. But it's so enjoyable to see this project take shape!

P.S. I feel like I just need to put this out there. Dorothy did not sand on the same side as me while I was using the electric sander, and I wore a mask! :)

Prime time for primer

2010-09-14T13:06:00.001-07:00

I'd planned to paint the outside of the camper first, but after Dorothy and I cleaned out the inside yesterday inspiration struck there instead. I'm not sure if there is more primer on the camper walls or me, but I'm having fun. This is the table and bunk area. I removed the table board to paint. The table board can be placed either table-height for eating, or level with the benches to make a large bed. The cabinets overhead can be used for storage or can be folded down to make a bunk bed, which Dorothy has already claimed as her own.

I went back to the hardware store today for interior paint and selected these. I'm going to paint the walls the middle shade of blue, and the cabinets (there is a wee kitchenette, not pictured) bright red. I love vibrant, true red, as anyone who witnessed my wedding already knows. Especially my lovely bridesmaids, dear folks, who wore shiny scarlet dresses in good humor. No apple or cranberry sidestepping for me, thank you. I found red with white polka-dot upholstry fabric for the bench cushions, and am planning to order one of the vintage camper prints with a coordinating red bandana fabric for the curtains. I hope Dorothy and I have as much fun camping in this tiny room as we're having fixing it up!

A one-day adventure

2010-09-13T12:01:00.000-07:00

So we loaded up the muffins and other picnic items and headed for Western Kentucky. We stopped along the way for a picnic in the park. That's my son munching his cracker in the photo above, not my husband, in case you were confused. (Genetics! Oh the mystery. That I can give birth to children who look just like my spouse. But in this case the outfit helps.)

And we saw the camper, but decided to think it over a possible purchase while we hit the touristy sites in Grand River. Patti's 1880s Settlement was totally charming, although we were a bit confused about where the 1880s bit came in. It was a delightful hodgepodge of home decor stores, feminine boutiques, sweet shops and touristy amusements.

Dorothy loved the playground, but loved the pink tractor outside its namesake boutique even more.

Then we took a deep breath and...went back and bought the little camper! This is the only "before" picture I'm going to share until I have some progress for comparison. It's a project! But I think it will be a fun one.

And finally we tucked our little explorers in for the road trip back home. They both slept, with visions of future adventures dancing in their heads, I hope.

Barley in a rice cooker

2010-09-11T13:40:00.001-07:00

Right around the time the baby was born I upgraded my rice cooker. Before, I had a little red one (Oster, maybe?) that was okay for making a small amount of white rice in a pinch, as long as you didn't mind a little burned to the bottom. But it wasn't very good at making brown rice, which we prefer, and it wouldn't keep the rice warm for any amount of time without scorching. I used the Cooks Illustrated method of making brown rice in my oven, and that never seemed like a big deal. But somehow the addition of an extra human to our family rendered the steps involved in making rice (boiling water, for example) too fussy, and I invested in a good rice cooker. It works great, and as of today I love it even more. A few weeks ago I tried making quinoa in it, according to a suggestion I read online. That worked so well that today I decided to branch out and try pearl barley. It worked! Hooray! I used the liquid-to-barley ratio suggested on the package (2.5 cups water to 1 cup rinsed barley). I rinsed my cooked barley to cool it down, then made it into a Greek-style grain salad similar to this recipe. It's yummy, and I'm about to take it to my "baby" brother's birthday party tonight in my fun new thifted bowl. (Is it possible he's 30?? Holy cow!)

And oat raisin muffins! Rob and I have a little tradition of taking homemade muffins on road trips. We once made a little peace summit trip to Galena, Illinois (our agenda: to discuss the possibility of ending nearly a year of not speaking to each other by getting just getting married) during which we munched on my homemade pumpkin muffins the whole time, and since then it just feels like small road trips and muffins should go together. Today I experimented with a new recipe plus adjustments for what I had on hand, plus addition of fallish spices, and this is what I got. They are yummy! We're going to take them on our camper-seeking expedition. I'll share the recipe I ended up with:

1 cup oat flour

1/4 cup quick oats

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp allspice

1/4 tsp cloves

2 eggs

1 cup vanilla yogurt

1/2 cup real maple syrup

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup raisin

Preheat oven to 400. Spray 12 muffin tins with cooking spray. Stir dry ingredients together in a large bowl by using a whisk or a fork. In another bowl or large measuring cup whisk together eggs and wet ingredients. Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients, blend. Stir in raisins. Divide evenly into muffin cups (each should be about 3/4 full). Bake for 15 to 20 minutes. Cool for 5 to 10 minutes before removing the muffins from the cups. If you take them out too soon or wait too long they will stick.

What this woman wants

2010-09-10T13:56:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I know some women are really into jewelry. Me, I like jewelry, it's fine, especially if I beaded it myself or if it was a gift. But if someone is going to spend money on me, jewelry is probably not where it's at. This is currently a big joke in my house, as my tiny-little-camper lust intensifies. My husband and I laugh about how horrified I'd be if he, say, bought me a diamond bracelet instead of a vintage trailer. It would catch on my crocheting yarn, get mucked in my bread dough, scratch my baby's head, and look terrible with my Old Navy t-shirts and Keen sandals. (Cue laughter.) But if he were going to get me a bracelet (and it were something I wanted), I'd probably go and get my nails done right before. But instead, I really want a little camper so my little troop of adventurers and I can go mobile. And this weekend we're going to go look at one in Western Kentucky! And prior to the (possible) purchase, instead of a manicure, I went and had a hitch installed on my little SUV. Ta-dah! It looks solid, and it's kind of exciting to think that we're now tow-ready, if we decide to buy. If we don't buy, at least we'll have the hitch already, and we'll surely have a fun excursion, hopefully not resembling our last mini-roadtrip adventure.

In further preparation, I've been investigating paint and fabric options for our wee, wheeled fixer-upper. I definitely think the exterior should be painted red, possibly with white polka-dots. And check out this terrific fabric for the inside, or this one. Who knew? Keen-wearing, bracelet-eschewing, cute-fabric-loving, adventure-seeking mamas who sew must be in such abundance that someone brilliantly created vintage camper fabric prints just for us. I feel so unoriginal, yet at the same time entirely pleased, because now I can buy one of these and stitch up some camper curtains!

In other news, Dorothy loves preschool. Her class goes Monday through Thursday only, and this morning at breakfast she asked me how many more days before she gets to go again. And we've shown our house twice this week, which means I've not had time to do much other than shuttle kids and plot my little camper kill. Still no buyer, but handful of recent showings is heartening.

Fall in the air

2010-09-07T18:06:00.000-07:00

So the weather went cool this weekend, and all of the sudden my bright and fun summer bag no longer seemed appropriate. Yet I wasn't fully ready to break out the fall colors (it was, after all, back to something like 97 today) so I pulled out a project from last summer. It's bright, but the wooliness of the yarn makes it seem a little more fallish to me. Anyway, it made me happy to get it back out. I crocheted it out of odds and ends yarn last summer based on a pattern in Crochet Today.

We had a low-key but nice holiday weekend. Here is a picture of the kids in the yard, getting some good use out of their sunhats before we trade them in for the woolly kind. I have to admit that rather than enjoy the gorgeous weather, I spent a great deal of weekend time inside ogling tiny vintage campers online, which was totally fun in its own way, so I don't actually regret it. :) I think teardrop and other tiny (meaning 10 to 12 foot) camper trailers are just so cute. (Search for "teardrop trailer" on Flickr if you don't know what I'm talking about!) I think we may buy one, and then I'll have the fun of personalizing it, not to mention making great adventures with my little happy campers!

And last but certainly not least, here is my big preschooler all ready for her first day of school. She had a really great day. Highlights for her included walking across an alley to the playground in a herd (not holding any one's hand!), building blocks, playing house with a panda toy, and being given a personalized cloth place mat at snack time that will be laundered and reused every day. My favorite quotes from her were, "the guinea pig was not as big as I expected. I thought it would be like a real pig," and "guess what, Mom? We get to go back tomorrow!"