We did it!

And she's off!

Rory started her first day of kindergarten today and she couldn't have been more excited.  I think she's been ready to start school for the past three years...

Confession time.  Last night I was going through my list.  Pack lunches? Check.  Get clothes ready? Check.  Paperwork all signed and in backpack? Check. Alarm clocks set? Check.  Teacher gift made and ready?  Uh-oh!

It still lived in my head.

Outlets in pictures are so classy!

I'd seen apples made from two soda bottles on Pinterest.  They're are several different versions.  I didn't actually read about any of them, but it seemed pretty easy.  I didn't have a zipper to join the two pieces together like the apple idea in my head, so I just notched one layer and wedged them together.  We wrapped up the gifts in red tissue paper, lovingly crammed them into the apple and glued the stem on top.  Whew!  Close call.

I made a felt apple coaster with Mrs. Crowder's name embroidered on it, a little apple pin and some mini apple garland.  Rory looked at it and said, "Um, Mom...why are we giving my teacher apple everything?"  It's a theme, kid, work with me.

She needed a vinyl pencil bag for school- it is the only school supply that we bought that would end up specifically hers, so I had to make one for her.  Couldn't help myself.  Even though sewing with vinyl is a nightmare every single time, this wasn't so bad.  (Thank you, Scotch tape.)

We played with Shrinky Dinks and made a little name plate for her backpack, too.

Rory got to her classroom and was off without a hitch.  The apple's stem and card fell off in the parking lot and we didn't notice until we were in the building.  Oh well.  We'll have to send her teacher a picture of the apple in it's entirety.  I figure if we can make it with that as our only stumble today, we're doing pretty well.

Happy first day of school, Bean!  It all starts now!

It's Fab to be Four

Audrey turned four and had a Beatles party.  How cool is that?  It was genius- Twinkie Yellow Submarines, hot dogs made into octopuses, Here Comes The Sun Chips, and on and on.  So cute!  My kids especially loved watching the Beatles cartoon that was playing.

A kid's Beatles party!  For Audrey!  The crafty section of my brain was exploding with glee.  I reigned myself in and came up with a Yellow Submarine pillow with mini Beatles dolls.

I looked up a few pictures of the Yellow Submarine and the Fab Four (and their outfits) to give me a starting point.  I used felt and a scrap of yarn to create the submarine pillow front and loosely based the dolls from this pattern for mini felt dolls.  I sewed the dolls and their clothes all by hand, so I took my needle and thread along with a bin of felt scraps in front of the TV and watched British shows on Netflix.  That's a least a little bit of added authenticity, right?

The clothes just crack me up.  They can all be taken off and rearranged except for George's orange coat.   I couldn't make it stay closed unless I sewed him into it.  The price of high fashion.

Happy birthday, Audrey!  We're glad we could share it with you!

* It's always nice to know that someone likes a handmade gift.  Making things is fun all it's own, so knowing that it makes someone else smile is definitely a cherry on the top.  Or a touch of Cool Whip.  Mmmm.  Ice cream....  Thank you, Casey, for sharing the pictures of Audrey opening her gifts.  The look of your face is the best reaction.  Ever.

Happy Birthday, Braelee!

Rory and Jack were invited to a Brave party for Braelee. They had a huge inflatable water slide in her yard, and although my kids spent the majority of their time at the bottom wading pool part of it, they had a great time. Lot of giggles and squeals. Good stuff. I made Braelee some fake make-up. I was calling it play make-up but then confused my husband. He thought that meant it was actual make-up meant for playtime. Which I guess isn't altogether different than what I came up with, but a lot less messy.

For her Fake-Up, I took some dollar store eye shadow and blush containers and filled them with nail polish. I've seen this done a million times over on Pinterest and it worked like a charm. It's definitely something you have to plan a few days for because that much polish takes a long time to dry. And a long time to stop knocking you out with its nail polish smell. I also took another idea that I'd seen online to make "lipstick." (I somehow managed to forget to pin either idea, but they are really all over the place.) I pulled the hot pink cheap lipstick out of its tube and replaced it with a wooden dowel. I know, right? Doesn't it look real? I took the dowel, chopped it to size, sanded the edges, painted it and sprayed some acrylic sealant on top.  Once it's glued in, it goes up and down just like the real thing.

 Happy birthday, sweet girl!

My Sunshine(s)

When I was little instead of reading a bedtime story my dad would grab his guitar and sing me to sleep.  One of my favorites was always You Are My Sunshine.  And really, isn't it on everyone's favorites list?  Sometimes it's the simplest little things that stand out.  I really wish I had my dad's ability to send my kids off to Dreamland with an acoustic concert.  Vocalist I am not, but luckily my kids don't care.  We have a few songs on our snuggle-before-bed rotation, but You Are My Sunshine always gets an encore.

I've had several canvases lying around for a while waiting for inspiration.  When I rediscovered a video of Rory singing several years ago, I had a light bulb moment.

The process wasn't all that glamorous or amazing. I figured it out as I went and made changes along the way when things didn't work exactly as I'd originally planned.  Sometimes that all works out.

I used painter's tape to get nice pretty stripes and then used vinyl stickers for the letters.  I was short one "Y." Of course.  I almost stopped there.  I really liked the bold stripes and black lettering.  But that pieced together "Y" was irritating me.  And I still had something else in my head.  So I grabbed the white paint and covered everything.  Again, I had a fleeting desire to stop there.  It did look kind of cool.  When I peeled off the letters, the paint had bled.  I was fairly sure that was going to happen- the stickers were "repositionable" which really just translates to "not very sticky."  My visions of crisp, simple lines were cut short.  I used my nail to clean up a bit of the mess and mixed up some grayish paint.  That and water, plus paper towel blotting and wiping got me to a minimally distressed look that I was pleased with.  Whew.

Everyone is happy.  Sure, they are a little messy and the stripes show through the tiniest bit.  They're imperfect.  And that's cool with me.  Rory has "You are my sunshine" hanging in her room and Jack's wall is now adorned with "You make me happy when skies are gray."  And despite that, neither of them will ever know how much I love them.

One Down, Lots To Go.

I read about Quilts For Kids/Downy Touch of Comfort a while ago on Make It and Love It.  They collect and deliver bright & cheery quilts to kids in the hospital all over the country.  I knew I had to make one.  They ship you all the fabric (pre-cut!) needed for a small four patch quilt with instructions.  You provide the batting and cost of shipping to back to them in 4-6 weeks.

Um...pre-cut?  You betcha.  That's half the battle.

My sewing machine had to go visit the repair shop in the middle of my 4-6 week window, but I finished my first quilt and shipped if off today.  The kids helped me give it a little extra love before sending it off.

I want to make more.  Pretty sure I will.  I could think of worse habits.

***  I got the batting for this one at SCRAP Denton.  I was there looking for (a million) other things and hit the jackpot with a package of batting.  I think it had my name on it.  Then again, I think everything there has my name on it.  If you're in the Denton, TX area, you should check it out.  You can buy buttons by the scoopful.  Trims by the handful.  Markers, paint, fabric, random game pieces, yarn, glass bottles, beads, stamps, and about a million other things.  They also have a RE:Boutique, selling things that are made from at least 75% recycled materials.  There might even be some fused plastic bibs in there.  I'm just sayin'.

If you get the quilting bug, you can request a free kit here.

It's Twin Day!

I have a lot to catch up on here, but it can wait.  Today my best friend had twins!  We've known each other for 24 years now, so I've been waiting for them a very, very long time.  They are lucky kids to have such an amazing woman as their mother.

A few weeks ago, I finished two knitted hats that she asked for and sent them off...along with several other things.  I couldn't help myself.  I've got more in the works.  For this shipment, I made them keepsake bonnets/wedding hankies from handkerchiefs, dyed them some onesies and made a cute little zipper pouch.  For her.  And possibly me.  For no good reason.  And then I drew a card to explain everything.  Because I'm just SO EXCITED.

Welcome to the world, Morgan and Collin!  You are already loved by so many.

Close Call

An hour or so before we were ready to head out of the house for some food and fireworks, Rory informed me that I hadn't made her anything patriotic this year.  Crafty mom fail.

I quickly found scraps leftover from last year's shorts and made a pinwheel hair clip just in time.   Whew, that  was a close one!

I put a little bit of Mod Podge on the back of two small squares of fabric, stuck them together and let them mostly dry.  Then I cut the edges to make a pinwheel and dried it completely.  Or, you know, close enough. We're impatient around here.  And always running late.  I sewed a button in the middle and glued it onto a clip and we were off in time for burgers, water balloons and fireworks!

I hope you had a good Fourth of July, too!

Tasty Math

Whipping cream = buttermilk + butter

Well, maybe it isn't quite that easy. Throw in a standing mixer and about ten minutes.

I didn't realize it was so simple.  The butter is every bit as delicious as I thought it would be.  Our pancakes tomorrow morning will have real buttermilk.   Mmmmm.  And yeah, maybe whipping cream is more expensive than just buying butter, but it's soooooo good.  And kind of cool watching it come together.

Fresh butter on bread?   Divine.  Sorry Country Crock, I can't even look at you right now.  I can't imagine how good it would be if I had access to fresh cream...

 Oh my.

Royalty on the Quick

We have exactly one Burger King crown in this house.  It's several months old and it looks like it.  The kids looove it, though, and having one of something with two kids doesn't ever seem to work out.

So I made some.

Truth: I could have spent more time on them.  They would have looked a lot better.  But I didn't want them to cost anything and I didn't want to leave the house and it was after midnight.  So I grabbed some fabric, some stabilizer that was sitting by my sewing machine and some jewelry from the 1980's.  I took the beat up BK crown and traced it, then sandwiched the stabilizer between the fabric and sewed along the edges.  The elastic I added in the back helps them to fit Duncan heads. The stitches aren't pretty.  Shoot, the layers don't even line up all that well.  But I think they were a hit this morning.

"Cool!  I'm a queen!"
"Me too!  I'm a queeeeeeeeen!"
"No Jack.  You are a king.  I'm a queen."
"I'm a queeeeeen!"

update:
Roscoe the Great, who is staying with us while his family moves into their new house, looks especially stunning, don't you think?  He's easier to take pictures of than either of the kids.  Roscoe poses.  It's awesome.

Happy Birthday, Bean!

Today Rory is five.  I keep reminding her that this is completely unauthorized and she keeps giving me her best "Oh, Mom..." teenage look impression.  Five!

The dinosaur obsession continues and is now joined by an affinity for superheros.  And pink.  I love this kid.  

We made some cupcakes for her class at preschool and found some Avengers erasers to decorate with.  I used a few pages from one of Andrew's old comics for a little extra fun.  (Yes, I had permission!)

Jack spied some cool superhero fabric at Walmart a few weeks ago and I soon found myself with a yard of it in my cart.  Just try to say no to a two-year-old enthusiastically yelling, "Look, Mommy!  Look!  Iron Man!  Captain 'Merica!  Hulk Smaaaaaaash!"   Last night I made Rory a birthday dress and have enough left over to make Jack something, too.  (He asked for a dress like his sister, but he may have some loud shorts coming instead.  Pajamas?  A shirt?  To be determined.)

I also made some magnetic paper dolls.  Pinterest helped me find a site with scans of vintage Betsy McCall paper dolls.  I loved that they resemble Rory.  I'm also jealous of Betsy's wardrobe.  Betsy's a smart little dresser.  She can rock corn as an accessory!  I picked a few favorites and printed them on some magnetic paper.  They work perfectly on a dollar store cookie sheet!

Happy, happy birthday to the coolest five year old ever!  I love you, Bean!

Birthdays and Babies, Part II

Rory was invited to a party for one of her preschool friends and I tried and tried to come up with a good gift to make a five year old boy.  I thought of some pretty good ideas and got some great suggestions and then found a cool action figure instead.  And I'm okay with that.  I felt like we needed to add a homemade touch in somewhere, though, so I decorated the gift with keyboard letters.  It counts, right?

I had two weekends in a row that I got to celebrate babies!  At church we had a shower for new mom Becca and the adorable Alaina made an appearance.  Beautiful mommy, beautiful baby!  Rory was thrilled that she got to attend the shower and stretched her social butterfly wings the entire time.  We made sweet Alaina a personalized name bag (seriously, they never get old) and I trimmed a plain white newborn tee with some vintage red polka-dot bias tape.  Voila!  

The next weekend my mom and I went to Shannon's twins shower in El Paso.  I was so excited to help host this one- it's not everyday you get to celebrate that one of your very best friends is going to be a mommy.  It's not everyday you get to celebrate TWO babies at one time.  Shannon and I have been friends for twenty four years now.  I've been excited to have this shower for a long time.  

That being the case, you'd think I would have remembered to take pictures of the gift.  

Oops.

I think part of the issue is that I actually finished most of it before the eleventh hour.  Weird, I know.  My natural "hurry up hurry up HURRY UP" rhythm was off.  I made the twins six burp cloths, two washcloths, two lightweight swaddle blankets, four fused plastic bibs, two knit hats and decorated onesies (one ruffly, one necktie).  My mom added some cute drool bibs and adorable outfits. We clipped each thing to a clothesline and put the whole thing into a wicker hamper. (Can't take credit for the idea- I loved when I saw it at Kelli's shower several years ago).  

Can't wait to meet these babies!  Neither can Rory.  She's already decided that they should be named Bug and Ruby.

Happy Birthday, Jack!

My baby turned two!

He has a slight Angry Birds obsession.

 "A-Birds!  A-Birds!"
"Yellow A-Bird say, 'Ack! Wheeeeee!'"
"iCat? iCat! iCat! A-Birds!"

He loves to play on the iPad, which is affectionately calls "iCat."  Since letting a two-year-old go to town on an iPad isn't something I'd like to claim to do all that often, I made him some bean bags from felt and old t-shirts.  We like to set them up on wooden blocks and play real-life Angry Birds.  Yeah, sure, not as fun as the electronic version, but it works.  And it has to be better for his brain, right?

I used a plain red shirt and more scrap felt (okay, it does spontaneously reproduce, yes?) to make him an Angry Bird shirt.  He was in love.

Odds and Ends

The category idea for catching up only goes so far.  Here's what I made that qualifies as "miscellaneous."

Nest charms for necklaces.  Hello, addicting. I didn't intend to make eleven of these, but I looked down and they had just kind of happened.  I had all the materials on hand.  That can't be altogether normal.

I made some birthday invitations with removable magnets.  I can't take credit for the design idea- my super awesome customer had the vision.  The fish magnet has all the party details.  Clever!  Printing on magnetic sheets has worked out surprisingly well.

I got a request for larger fused plastic place mats and quickly got to work on some full size place mat sets.  More of these puppies coming soon.

Andrew's sweet cousin Karen got married last month and I had the chance to make the wedding invitations and the bride's veil.  

Hoods and Tails. And Outfits.

I have an ongoing love affair with my camera.  I feel like I have so many good pictures of my kids.  With my camera and digital photography, plus Photoshop Elements, I get at least a few good shots out of the bazillion that I take of the kids on any given day.

Usually.

Sometimes, the stars just don't align.  I have to remind myself that the pouts, blurs, nose picks, cheesy grins, awkward poses, wild hair and uncooperative model shots are funny.  Because generally I chuckle about it five minutes after I've yelled in frustration, "Oooookay, you know what?  Nevermind.  This isn't working right now.  Everyone back INSIDE THE HOUSE!"

I used to of Andrew's old dress shirts to make the kids some clothes.  I have never been into the matchy-matchy thing, but I'll admit that every now and then, it can be kind of cute.  There.  I said it.  Jack's shirt is made from the Pox Couture pattern that I've used before.  Rory's skirt is the Emma Ruffle Skirt pattern. 

I came across this tutorial from The Cottage Home for hooded towels and made a trip out to get some cheap towels.  Contrary to what it looks like in these pictures, both Rory and Jack love their new bath towels.

I made both kids some dinosaur tails.  My friend Casey shared it with me and then I saw it on Pinterest (I know!) and knew that this needed to happen.  I actually ran out of polyfil when stuffing them, so Jack's is filled with stuffing and t-shirt scraps.  Clearly, he cares.  Rory wore hers when she did a presentation on her favorite dinosaurs for our church's Winter Follies talent show.  They both get a little irritated that they can't wear the tails and eat at the table for dinner.  "Well, honey, I'm not really sure what a real Diplodocus would do, but you need to take your tail off.  It doesn't fit in the chair."

Holidays

For Valentine's Day and Easter I made things for Rory's preschool friends.  Both times, around 2:00 am, I found myself thinking that it would have been a million times easier to just buy some candy and be done.  But since I am apparently incapable of that, I didn't.  And that's okay because I really do like making things.  And it's not like the kids were going to be short on sugary (delicious) candy.

For Valentine's, I was completely unoriginal and made swirly crayons.  And then, because I felt bad for being unoriginal,  added little mini notebooks with fused plastic covers and recycled cardboard backs.  I had Rory write a message and put it all together as little bag.  She was crazy about the idea, which was really all the motivation I needed.  (She might have been just trying to butter me up so I'd let her use my good markers.  The girl knows how to work it.)

We also took a cue from Dana at made and made a quick felt heart garland for the kitchen window.  15 minutes, tops.  For real.  You have to love that.

For Easter, I made a thousand and one bunny finger puppets, give or take.  We stuffed them into plastic eggs for preschool and church.  

Birthdays and Babies

It happened again.  Plain old life.  It keeps getting in the way of blogging.  Oops.  But really, this time I'm going to do better.  As soon as I catch up.  Yikes.  So here we go.  I tried to organize everything from January until now and it didn't exactly work.  I'm going to try lumping things together by category instead of chronological order...

Let's get this party started.

I'd been waiting for someone to have a baby so that I could make one of these onesie cupcakes.  (Thank you, Lori!)  Lori's makes beautiful babies and her latest, Ryan, is certainly no exception.

I found this tutorial somewhere.  There are lots of them.  I honestly can't remember, but it was probably from Pinterest (shocking, I know.)  I serged the edges of some cute baby flannel to make a receiving blanket.  Blanket + onesie + coffee filter + fabric ribbon = baby cupcake.

Happy Baby, Lori!

Making gifts for boys is always a bit of a challenge, especially as they get a little older.  I accept, though and refuse to believe that you can't make cool things that boys would like.  I found this tutorial for a tangram-esque fabric puzzle and decided to tackle it for my nephew Philip's birthday.  I used to have a tangram puzzle.  Remember those?  This version isn't quite the same thing, but the inspiration is there.  I knew while making this that I would need one at my house, too.  For me my kids to play with.  So many possibilities.  Turning that many little squares takes a lot of patience and time, though, so my set is still in it's early stages.

Happy birthday, Philip!

Michael's birthday was in February, too.  What is the perfect gift for one of the most genuinely happy and caring people in the whole world (who has made my hair look good for over 10 years)?  Yeah, I still don't know, but I made him some fused plastic love.  It's possible that I liked how this turned out and made myself one, too.  Seems to be a recurring theme...

Happy birthday, Michael!

Claire had a birthday while we were on vacation, so we decided to birthday bomb the kitchen of our rented beach house with streamers.  I dipped a roll of white streamers into some colored water.  The drying process takes forever.  We're talking days here.  Days and small fans, but I like the result.  You can do a lot of fun things with streamers, but sometimes subtle is perfect. (Idea from Dandee.)

Happy birthday, Claire!

My niece turned one in March (ONE. Where did a year go?  Seriously.)  I made Miss Addison a Brooke dress from fabric that I recently got from my grandma.  Good stuff.  And who can resist an adorable little girl in blue?  Or pleats?  Ruffle cap sleeves?  I love this pattern. (Brynnberlee patterns)

Happy birthday, Addison!

My friend Laine's youngest just turned one as well.  What's with these babies getting older?  I don't remember approving this.  I made her a personalized tote (which is really more for her mommy, but shhhh...don't tell Carolyn) and a whale softie toy.  A whale!  I found the free pattern from Small Dream Factory.  

Happy birthday, Carolyn!

Procrastination

I've got a list of things to do.  I need to fuse some plastic.  Three or four blog posts need to be done.  I need to unload the dishwasher, do several loads of laundry and truth be told, my vacuum cleaner probably thinks I forgot how to use it.  So what's a girl to do?

Make superhero capes.  (Duh.)

And so instead of spending my morning being productive, I whipped up some very special capes from old t-shirts, put them on two willing kids and went outside to play and have a picnic lunch in the backyard.  Time very, very well wasted.  I'll catch up later.