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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."

Summer, 1980.
Are you diggin' the polyester? My Great Aunt Molly was visiting from England, and decided it was high time this girl learned how to knit. In the picture you can (sort of) see my brow furrowed in concentration as I SLOWLY, painfully work one stitch after another. My mom still jokes that it was the quietest she had ever seen me...both in all the time before the picture, and all the years since ;)

I think about teaching my own kids to knit. I have a hard time imagining that at 6 years old they will be able to concentrate long enough to figure it out....but there I am, living proof that it's possible. I can't wait to pass this tradition on.

I'd love to hear about the traditions you plan to pass on to your own kids.....

I have Multiple Craft Personalities Disorder..... (Alternate title considered for this post : Help me, I'm an Indecisive Gemini....)

Something about spring causes me to pull out my all-time favorite book. Dying to knit is filled with eye-candy that lights a fire in my creative soul! Every spring I lovingly pour over the pages of this how-to guide to fiber dying. I always find something new, something I swear wasn't in there the previous spring. Some new tid-bit of information, or a new picture with colours so beautiful I can hardly wait to heat up the dye bath. Over coffee the other morning, I found this....


On these pages the author, Elaine Eskesen, talks about looking for colour inspiration in your child's art work. How timely!! In the top left corner of the page, she shows readers a batch of newly dyed wool, the colour-way inspired by the art work in the lower right corner. I started rifling through the kids art portfolio almost immediately, pulling out several pieces that caught my eye. I was already imagining what I would knit with the not-yet-dyed wool.

And then I got side-tracked (not hard to do with the young Birds around). The day went on....and then the mail came. And this arrived:

I ordered this pattern last week. Last night I was telling the hubby with a sigh that I want to sew as well as I knit. His response,

"well, then I guess you should sew as much as you knit"

Are men really that simple? Why couldn't he read my mind and understand that what I was REALLY saying is that I want to sew as well as I knit RIGHT NOW....not 27 years from now, which is how long it has taken me to knit this well. In 27 years my kids will have NO interest in wearing anything that I make for them. This is URGENT! I must sew well NOW!

To soothe my panicking soul I went to SuperBuzzy to find the perfect fabric for my sweet Baby Bird's sundress.

As I was straightening up before bed, I stumbled (literally) over Dyeing to knit where I had left it lying (laying? I'm grammatically challenged) earlier in the day. A shot of guilt went straight through my heart. I felt as though I had been caught in a moment of infidelity. Am I seriously considering cheating on my first true love, knitting? Is it possible that I am moving on from an almost 3 decade long relationship, for something new and more exciting? Is there room in my life for 2 loves?

Why is it so hard for me to make a decision about where to start?! Please tell me that I am not the only one out there who suffers from this kind of indecision.....am I?

With the mind of a child....


It started about a year or so ago. One night, while looking at a waning gibbous moon, Big Bird asked me

"mama, what's wrong with the moon?"

It took a few minutes to get to the root of his question. It turns out that he was concerned about the size of the moon. Apparently it was too small. Apparently in his mind it was supposed to be Full all the time.

I explained how sometimes the moon is big, and sometimes it is small, but that it's always changing size.

"That's okay mama, Ito will fix it."

Ito is one of Big Bird's grandfathers. He is legendary for his ability to fix pretty much anything. I realized that in the world of my then 3 year old, it was completely plausible that Ito would climb up his ladder, use his hammer, and "fix" the moon. At the time I thought, oh how sweet, but didn't think much more about it.

Fast forward a year. Last week, I was trying to distract the kids attention away from something they were not supposed to be doing (beating on each other, if you really want to know). Look! A herd of Velociraptors is walking through the yard.... I point out the window, both kids rush to the door to check it out.

"where mama, I don't see them?"

"there, by the mailbox, don't you see them?" I ask

silence for a few moments.....

"oh. you're pretendin'."

And with that, Big Bird walked away. I'm sure I saw a look of disgust on his face.

It dawned on me in that moment, that in his world, it was completely within the realm of possibility that a herd of flesh-eating dinosaurs was indeed walking through his yard. Where he would have thought oh cool! let's go play with them!, I would have thought oh sh*t....., call 911!

And then a couple of days ago....

"mama? is jelly made from jellyfish?"

I rush to reassure him that jelly is definitely NOT made from jellyfish. Poor child...he must be traumatized....but then, I saw the look on his face. And I could tell that he wasn't worried, he was just looking for clarification. He would have been just as willing to accept "yes" for an answer as "no". Again, it was completely within the realm of possibility that jelly is made from jellyfish. If I had said "yes", he would have said, "oh", and wandered off to keep playing. I would have gagged, and thrown the PB&J in the trash.

Okay, I'll get to my point (and I do have one, I promise). Over the weekend, I was at my twice weekly yoga class. At one point I was standing on my head trying to do this. And it wasn't going well. At all.

I was fighting a bit against muscle fatigue (it was the end of a long class), but honestly, I was fighting mostly against my own mind. ummmm, robyn? what are you thinking? this is impossible! you can't do this! That sort of counter-productive internal dialog that most of us (except maybe Buddha) are familiar with. And then, in less than a second, all of those moments with Big Bird flashed through my mind. And it all came together for me. If I approached this pose with the mind of a child I would be just fine. If I believed that it was well within the realm of possibility for me to stand on my head, balance on my arms and just DO the pose, then it would happen!

Of course, it didn't happen.....by then I was too exhausted. BUT.....I have class again on Tuesday. And between now and then I'm working really hard on changing the pictures and the dialog in my head.

Imagine all the things we could accomplish if we approached challenges with the mind of a child.......

We have been sick. All. Week. Coughing, drippy noses, fevers, hallucinations......you name the symptom, we've had it.

And frankly, we've been grumpy too. It's hard to be kind and loving when you feel like....well, like crap. Both kids are at that stage of sickness where they want/need lots of comforting, but they can't find it within themselves to be nice to anyone. Which makes mothering a bit of a....oh, let's call it a challenge. Especially considering that I am sick too, and really just want to lock myself in the bedroom and crawl under the covers.

That said....I did manage to pull it together long enough this morning to get some paint out.


My intent was to use acorns, but in my delirium I couldn't remember where I had hidden them (I can hear the squirrels laughing at me). So we opted for the next closest round object I could find; wooden lacing beads.

Lay some paper in the bottom of a box (conveniently, the average size Amazon.com box is 8.5 x 11 inches) , roll the beads around in some paint, toss them in the box, shake and roll at will.

Voila! A Masterpiece.


Big Bird noticed that this picture looks like it has a T-rex in the middle of it. Of course he did.

Anyway.....my point this morning is not really about this project. It's about what happened after this project actually.

I went inside to find some clothespins so that we could hang our pictures on the fence to dry. Again, in my semi-delirious state, I left the kids outside. Alone. With the paint.

You can imagine what happened next. And I have to tell you, it turns out that covering your entire body with paint is really, REALLY good therapy for sickie kids! And sickie mommies too. Unfortunately for you, I had to put the camera down in order to participate in the fun. I did manage to capture this pic before they attacked me though.

It was warm enough today (sort of) for some outdoor painting. I chose black and red...not really sure why, I guess I'm just in a black and red mood!

The kids always enjoy painting outside....they seem to relish the fact that they can fling the brushes around a bit more wildly than they would do inside. A little paint on the lawn never hurt anybody!

They also seem to find clothes pins endlessly fascinating. Both Birds enjoyed helping me clip the paper to the fence.