homemade toys vol 1

My friend Jennifer and I are always joking how we should never even bother with toys for our children because they are so much more interested in EVERYTHING but their toys. Her son Wylie much prefers the dog toys to his own and Charissa likes, well, rocks. And clothespins. And the empty coffee container. So I have decided to take on the challenge of making a new toy each week out of stuff I have around the house already.
Right now, Charissa loves to collect and sort anything, hence the rocks and clothespins. She moves things from place to place, puts them into different containers, hands them to me, over and over and over. With this in mind, I decided to make play dough. Yeah... I don't really see the connection either, but it worked out anyway. I used the old stand by recipe of 2 cups flour, 1 cup salt and 1 cup water. I found a recipe for cooked playdough, but that's way too complicated for me. A little food coloring completed the project. Combined with some mixing bowls and of course, nakedness, the playdough was a big hit. We played with it for a very long time. She squished and tore and sorted and made funny noises when I rolled the playdough into little balls. (Wish I could describe that, but really it was indescribable)In fact, I think I was bored of it before she was! Even after we put away the other colors, she insisted on carrying around the yellow in the plastic baggie.
First homemade toy = successful. Now on to some others. It's kind of fun hunting through the house for things I can make into new toys for the Little Bee!

Amy Blooder, um I mean Amy Butler shirt

I have been in a baby girl sewing frenzy lately. I think I got sick of sewing baby stuff, then got sick of sewing and just read (and I admit, napped) when I had time. But I wanted to make a gift for a certain sister in law out of a yard of Amy Butler fabric that I had lying around. When I had finished the gift - more on that later - I had some fabric left over and let me tell you I am not going to let Amy go to waste! So I wiggled a pattern I had around until gosh darn it, I made it fit onto that little scrap. What I got was a little baby belly shirt, so I bought a chubby 8 that coordinated with it and added it to the bottom. I think it made it even cuter! I love Amy Butler.
Little Bee wore her new shirt to MOPS on Wednesday and then to her Auntie's, who watches her when I am at work. My last words before I left were "please put a bib on her if you give her some of that chocolate ice cream that I know you are hiding from me because I just made that shirt" Okay so that's almost what I said. My poor little sweetie is wanting so bad to run but her tiny feet can't keep up with her brain, or in my language, she lacks neuromuscular coordination (ain't I smart?) and in her quest for speed she apparently fell right on her nose about ten minutes before I came to pick her up! Awwwwww. Good thing I wasn't there - I would have cried more than she did. The shirt that Auntie so carefully kept chocolate free suffered the consequences of a lack of neuromuscular coordination. Oh, and so did Little Bee's nose. So that's how the Amy Butler shirt became the Amy Blooder shirt. Don't tell Amy...

oh hello there...

Yes, it's been a while. Here's what I've been up to. Lots and lots of baby goodies. I'm hoping to do a craft fair or two before Christmas, but to be honest, I've kind of lost steam. I also have an etsy shop with nothing in it. Yay for starting strong. Anyhoo...there are bibs and burpies and changing pads galore all stacked up on the guest bed if you know anyone who needs one!

Wait a second!

Why does my Thankful Thursday post say it was published last Friday? Hmmmmm....

Thankful Thursday

I can't remember whose blog it was where I first saw Thankful Thursday, but I found it during a time when I really needed it. In retrospect, it really wasn't that difficult, and even in the middle of it I knew that my "problems" were sort of, well, ridiculous compared to the real opposition that faces people today. Everyone struggles to adjust to motherhood. In my heart I know that even those amazing women who seemed to make the transition seamlessly had their share of tears and phone calls to their own mothers and feelings of doubt and guilt and anxiety.
Anyway back to Thankful Thursday...so at that point whenever I felt overwhelmed, I would write down things I was thankful for on a yellow legal pad on the kitchen table. I left it on that table where I could read it whenever I wanted. Some days I spent a lot of time at the kitchen table!
So today on my first blogged (is that a word?) Thankful Thursday, I am most thankful for my husband. Duh, right. Isn't everyone thankful for their husband? But mine is exceptional. (Yes I know yours is too, but hear me out) A couple of years ago when we had first moved here to AZ, my Poppa was not in great shape. He frequently would fall, and my Nana hurt herself a few times trying to get him up. One day my Poppa fell and Nana really had no chance of getting him up. Poppa had fallen in the bathroom, and my delicate Nana did not want one of his daughters or granddaughters to see him that way. So she called Loren. He didn't hesitate or claim that it wasn't his responsibility, he just went over there, picked up my Poppa (who was definitely not his usual kind and loving self at this point) and cleaned him up. Loren didn't even tell me about it for a few days. That is an exceptional man.
I'm thankful for his diligent attention to our finances, even when I wish he wasn't so diligent so I could slip a few things in here and there *wink wink*. I'm thankful that he gives me a little break in the evenings by reading to the Little Bee before bed. I'm thankful that he doesn't mention the messy house or the half cooked dinner when he gets home from his own sometimes challenging job. And man am I thankful that he puts his own laundry away....

good bubbles and bad bubbles

Did you know that there are good bubbles and there are bad bubbles? I did not. But now I know that some bubbles are happy and fun and some are just plain old scary. Here's how I found out... The Little Bee got a bubble machine from her Aunt and Uncle and cousins for her birthday. Lately we are not allowed to go outside with out the bubble machine turned on. By not allowed I mean there are lots of shreaks of protest and lately a very emphatic yell of "Buh! Buh!" that come out of my little angel's mouth. Even when she is not playing with the bubbles, she can hear me turn it off and comes running and hollering. So those are the good bubbles.
On to the bad bubbles. Little Bee likes to play around the bathtub while I am getting ready for work, and on this particular day, she tossed the baby shampoo into the tub with considerable force. I didn't know that the top had opened and half of the soap had spilled out until I turned on the bathtub and returned two minutes later to an I Love Lucy sized mound of bubbles. "No use crying over spilled soap" I thought to myself and plunked the little one down in the middle of it all. Bad bubbles! Bad Bubbles! We even scooped out 90% of the bubbles and she still looked at the tub like it was going to eat her. Now I know. Bubble machine bubbles good, bathtub bubbles bad...

Mama Luciana

Right now I think about 30% of the women in my Sunday School class are pregnant. I guess that is what happens when your teacher does a 6 week series on intimacy (insert sly grin and giggle) Luciana is the closest to her due date, so we had a little shower for her on Thursday night. Good friends and good food, what else can you ask for - besides eating candy bars out of diapers and melting ice cubes with our hands, of course. I don't think I will eat another cupcake for a month...maybe a week...okay I ate one for breakfast this morning.

Baby Beans

When my sister and I were little we had these adorable dolls that were filled with beans, so of course they were called our baby beans. Yeah I know, sophisticated naming huh? Hers was orange, mine was yellow (I think).Well, as I'm learning now, sometimes mommies get as attached to toys as babies, and my mom really loved baby beans. That coupled with my mom's obsession with ebay led to this little vintage find for the Little Bee's first birthday. The funny thing about baby beans is that she has a lovely little flap over her cute little plastic tushie...for what reason, I have no clue. However, little vintage baby beans came complete with TEETH marks on her sweet little plastic tushie. Teething children are truly industrious. Charissa's baby beans gets dragged everywhere, thanks to her perfect size and easy handling (ah the wonders of bean filled stuff) and she gets into some interesting predicaments. Imprisoned in the laundry basket...taking a nap in the loaf pan...and of course, getting her poor little bottom chewed by the sweet Little Bee.

Apples + Pears = a minor obsession

I have a minor obsession with this apples and pears fabric. I just can't stop making stuff with it! First I made the awesome Amy Butler domestic goddess apron and I thought it turned out SOOO cute. I know, the picture is so nerdy) Then for some reason I was all about making bibs, so I made a bib and some burp rags for a friend who is having a little girl in August. THEN I still had some left so I made this cute little dress for little bee. What's next? Hmmm...

Cute little camper girl playin' in the dirt! My Aunt told me that she used to just throw away my cousins' clothes when they would come home from camping. I'm beginning to think there's some wisdom in that...

Here we go again

Okay, that was a totally pathetic attempt at starting a blog. One post?!? I must admit, I actually totally forgot that I'd even set this thing up until last week when a friend encouraged me to start a blog to show off my baby girl and my totally awesome craftyness. (Yes Kaylee, you're probably the only person who will read this) So along those lines, I give you a picture of my sweet baby girl in all her dirt smeared campin' girl splendor and a picture of the infamous Ashley apron...when, of course, I figure out how to do that. Grrrr. I told you I am clueless.