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The Dress....Part I

I borrowed some inspiration from SouleMama over the weekend, and soothed the frustration which had resulted from The Other Dress (see Part II below). I traced the outline of one of Baby Birds tops, added some shoulder ties, and then pretended I know how to sew ruffles.

Hurray! It fits :) I mean really, is it so much to ask?

Later this week I hope to debut a matching pair of bloomers. It doesn't look quite finished with a little diaper bum hanging out at the bottom ;) Cute (oh, how I love that little diaper butt), but not finished.

The Dress....Part II

Okay, so other than the fact that you could fit three Baby Birds inside of it....I am very happy, thrilled even, with how it turned out. Considering that the last time I used a pattern was Home Ec. in the 8th grade......this brings to mind the lovely red and white, horizontal striped, jersey knit fabric that I chose for my home ec. project. A fabulous, off the shoulder (think Flash Dance style) long-sleeved top. Ahhhh.....the 80's. I can't honestly say that I miss them.

But I digress.... what a buzz kill that the sundress doesn't fit! I was so angry I couldn't even look at it for a few days :(

Oh well.... I guess I'm already one step ahead for next summers clothes?

An update...

In March, I told you about a great new idea for kids birthday parties called ECHOage. I also promised to give you a report once we had tried it out for Big Birds' 4th. So here we go......

I have to say first, that the website does everything it promises to do. It was easy to sign up, easy to organize, and uncomplicated to send out invitations. I would advise you to have a list of email addresses handy when you are creating your invite list....something I did not have. I opted to cut and paste addresses out of my email address book instead, a minor hassle, but not the end of the world.

ECHOage kept track of all the gift donations, and that information was easy for me to view from within our account on their site. As promised, a week before the party, they sent out a reminder notice to all invited guests, which was great for us, because there were a few, oh, let's call them slow pokes who had not yet responded to the original invitation.

And that brings me to my final thoughts about ECHOage....the only *problem* we had actually had nothing to do with ECHOage itself. If you read my original post (linked above) about this approach to birthdays, you'll see that our main reason for using it was to try and cut down on *Gift Overload*. We really want to help our kids understand the joys of giving AND recieving, as well as to minimize the expectation of a mountain of gifts on special occasions. ECHOage helps to do this, *as long as your family and friends are willing to play by the rules!* Several folks on our list graciously donated to the ECHOage site, but also brought or sent gifts as well.

That said, the mountain of gifts was MUCH smaller this year, so maybe we're making progress afterall? (baby steps, Robyn. baby steps.)

I wish you all a happy weekend .... we will be spending most of our time trying to avoid the one hundred degree sun. ( i'm meeelllttttiiinnnggggg.....)

102. That's right folks....one hundred and two. That's the number of degrees fahrenheit it will be at our house today.

8:30am isn't too early for popsicles, is it?

Excuse me while I go crawl into a dark, shady hole.

Make mistakes.....
...isn't that what Ms. Frizzle always tells us? Baby Bird and I made a fun one yesterday. I read somewhere (couldn't tell you where) recently that mixing craft glue with tempera paint can be a whole lot of fun. In my early morning, pre-coffee, mother-of-two fog I grabbed the finger paint instead. Okay, so it's not an 'oops, there were no weapons of mass destruction' kind of mistake, but still- it lead to completely different results. The beauty of open-ended *art* is that since there is no planned outcome, mistakes like this really don't matter!

We filled up our trusty squeeze bottles, and almost immediately noticed the raw egg-like consistency of the glue/finger paint combo. Sort of sticky, stretchy, and shiny all at once! Baby Bird was in sensory/texture heaven :)

Like any good almost-two-year-old, the fingers got involved fairly quickly...

Maybe tomorrow we'll do it the *right* way.....or, maybe not!

Can we talk for a minute?

I have a bit of a problem.....it seems that I have laundry *issues*. Laundry-folding issues, to be more specific. Yep.....that's clean, unfolded laundry you see up there folks. Six baskets of it, if you really want to know. See how cozy my sweet Baby Bird is in her little nest? I'm good through the collecting, washing and drying stages of this process.....but that seems to be where things start to break down. It turns out that if I find myself with a moment or two of spare, uninterrupted time....I'd rather knit, sew, read, drink my coffee, do yoga or blog. But definitely NOT fold laundry.

I used to keep this *problem* a secret. I'd rush frantically to move all the unfolded clothes into the office just before playdates would arrive; trying to appear as if I had it all together.... another successful happy homemaker.

Then one day, on a whim, I confessed; to the one friend who I thought maybe wouldn't disown me if she knew about the mountain of laundry hiding just behind the office door. And guess what I discovered (after she finished laughing at me)? I'm not the only one who does this! It turns out that other people avoid folding their laundry too....some folks stash it behind closed doors like me, some pile it high on a spare bed, and others leave it in the dryer until it can no longer be avoided.

It is such a relief to let the world know that I HATE FOLDING LAUNDRY! I GET MINIMAL AMOUNTS OF TIME TO MYSELF IN A DAY, AND I DEFINITELY DO NOT WANT TO SPEND THEM FOLDING THE STINKING LAUNDRY!

Go ahead, give it a try. Confess to someone today. Where do you stash your dirty little secret?

Daddy doesn't often get the opportunity to "do art" with the kids (something I suspect he may secretly be ok with!). On Sunday I set them up for this activity from Preschool Art, by MaryAnn Kohl. The glue and squeeze bottles came, as usual, from here.

First, a little design with the glue.

Next, sprinkle some sand on top...

er.....and a little more sand.....

... and then shake off the excess. Both kids enjoyed this, although I will say Baby Bird got a much bigger thrill out of it. She was ready to keep going after completing several pictures. The designs are dry now, laying on our kitchen table. Every time the kids pass by, they stop to run their fingers over the sand squiggles; they seem to be enjoying the texture.

This activity would be fun with coloured sand too. You wouldn't necessarily need a backyard sandbox to make it work either. A large, shallow container from your local dollar store would do the job just as well.

Happy Monday! Have fun :)

Happy Mothers Day!

I got to spend a glorious morning in bed, talking on the phone with some of my favorite mothers :) Miraculously, my kids let me get away with it.... I realized this morning that the number of mothers I know has grown quite a bit in the past few years years. It seems like just a short time ago, many of us were celebrating Mothers Day for the first time, with the arrival of our first babies. And now, slowly but surely, we're starting to celebrate being mamas to two babies .....I wonder who will be the first to celebrate the arrival of a third?!

Enjoy your day, mamas!

Driving in the car yesterday, I was suddenly overwhelmed by the urge to toss ALL of our CD's out the window (picture me, hair blowing in the breeze as I speed down the highway, the kids are screaming in the backseat. I'm flinging CD's one at a time out the open window.....accompanied by maniacal laughter, of course).

If your car is anything like mine, then it has been taken over by childrens music. I swear the CD's multiply when I'm not looking. Occasionally it gets to the point where KinderMusik songs are cemented into my brain, permanently stuck on *play*. They cycle over and over and over again.....peekaboo, peekaboo, peekaboo i love you....peekaboo, peekaboo I love you....... and then I know it's time for a new infusion of life into our "Entertain the Kids While Driving in the Car" cd collection.

***To give my kids credit, I should mention that they do enjoy artists like Jack Johnson, etc as well. However, even Jack gets old after hearing the same songs 1,000 times (sorry honey).

And so.....I spent some time online earlier this morning (being the good Idle Parent that I am) looking for audio versions of some of the kids favorite books. Please allow me to share the fruits of my labour with you...

First, a link to one of our favorite authors, Robert Munsch. From this site you can link to downloadable audio versions of all of his books.....read by him, which is pretty entertaining. If you are unfamiliar with his work, consider starting with Mud Puddle, Alligator Baby, or Angela's Airplane.

Next, a couple of more general links to sites with a wide variety of audio books to choose from, for all ages.

Have the technology guru at your house (which in the case of our family, is most definitely NOT me) burn some new cd's for the car with the files that you download.

What a relief. Your family will thank you for it.

Ahhhhhh silence...the birthday boy is asleep, buried beneath a mountain of new dinosaur friends. We generally limit the number of 'friends' that accompany the kids to bed, but I didn't have the heart to make him choose tonight. The cake is eaten, the kitchen is clean (well, as clean as it's going to get anyway) and I can now FINALLY start playing with the fabric that arrived a few days ago for Baby Birds' teaparty sundress.
Picture the kimono girl print on the bodice, and the burnt orange polkadot print for the skirt. It's a colour adventure, especially for me, but I decided it's time to get off the fence and just dive in!

While I was in Marin over the weekend, I spent a few hours at a mega bookstore, something I do not have access to here at home. There I sat, on the floor in the crafting aisle. I had books strewn all around me....pure bliss :) I picked up the Sew Everything Workshop by Diana Rupp. I've been looking for an all-around general guide to sewing, which this is, plus it has the added bonus of a few cute patterns included with it. I see many of these Tokyo Tie Bags in my future ;)

Four



(the debut)

(One candle on the cake...)


( two...)


(three...)



(and four!)

Sorry.....no time for more blogging today. We've got some serious dinosaur hunting to attend to :)

( I'm pretty sure our computer is free from the you-know-what....but in the event that it is still lingering, I feel for some reason like I should whipser! I just wanted to say quickly that I'm happy to be back :)

Our alphabet stamps get frequent use around the kitchen table. They are one of those toys that we all stumble across occasionally. One with limitless uses, and which can be enjoyed by children (and adults) of a wide variety of ages. (One that makes you feel like maybe this time you didn't waste your money!)

At the moment, Baby Bird enjoys picking any ol' letter, and stamping wildly with it! She seems to understand that each one of them has a name, and occasionally asks "dat one? dat one?" and points at a letter. When I answer with the name of the letter, she seems satisfied, so I guess I'm not too far off ;)

Lately Big Bird has been "writing" stories with the stamps. He stamps away with furrowed brow for a few minutes and then calls me over to read his story. Sometimes I see him sounding out words as he stamps, which of course makes this former teachers' heart SING!

If you have creative aspirations, look here for another great idea.

Seeing as tomorrow is the BIG DAY, the stamps will be seeing some use in the thank-you card arena as well. Big Bird wanted me to be sure to mention that today is only his Practice Birthday. He's just gearing up for the real deal tomorrow. I'm happy to play along, but I had to draw the line at a Practice Cake ;)

Ugh. Spyware.

The poor hubby tried to explain it to me.... something about downloading some kayak plans, that weren't really kayak plans, but actually cleverly disguised Spyware.

The whole thing makes my brain hurt.

Needless to say, I'll be off-line today.

Cross your fingers that tomorrow will bring a healthier computer.

Wishing you a Spyware-free day :)

Mama is getting some time to herself this weekend! 2 entire nights away.... Actually, I'm not sure whether to laugh maniacally or sob hysterically.

This is the second time in 4 years that I've had a chance to escape for a bit ... mostly because I'm pretty good at convincing myself that everyone will self-destruct in my absence ;) And also because nursing babies make it hard to be separated.

I will be attending three yoga classes this weekend, taught by my yoga teachers teacher (did you follow that?).... I'm trying to be only slightly intimidated. So far, so good.

I'll be heading to Marin, which for this introvert is as close to the Big City as I care to get.

Packing List:
Yoga Mat
Knitting
1 bottle of wine...hmmm... on second thought, maybe 2


I'm looking forward to *seeing* you all next week. Hopefully calm and refreshed.

Have a great weekend!

Where babies wait.....


On the way to a nearby lakeside park this morning, Big Bird and I had another one of *those* conversations. A conversation which again reminded me that our children do not exist in the same part of the universe that the rest of us do. They really are only partially here....and definitely partially somewhere else.

Big Bird was explaining to his sister that we were going to a park she had never been to before (not entirely true, but beside the point).

"you were still waiting with the other babies" he told her, "you weren't with us last time we came".

Too curious not to ask,

"still waiting with the other babies?" I inquired

"ya mama...in that place...what do you call it? where the babies wait to pick out their parents."

Not having a well thought out answer, I offer

"heaven?"

"Yes! Heaven. Where all the babies are all together while they pick out their parents. We picked you and daddy."

Whoa.

Silence for a few minutes.


"well buddy, i'm really glad you did."

"Ya mama.... me too."