W.I.P. Wednesday

Lots to share, so I’ll just get to it.

Now that these gifts are safely in the hands of their new owners… two tag blankets and matching newborn hats that I finished up last week. I just love these blankets. They are uncomplicated to make and the colors are fun. The hat is made from a pattern I drafted myself. I made several of these hats for Ember and she used them from birth until about 3.5 months. They are the only hats I could get to actually stay on her.

And from this week:

Another recycled wool glass straw cozy. I gave my mom one of my straws and of course she had to have a cozy for it. I love the sophisticated colors of this one. Her favorite colors are black, white and red. The snap was also a nice improvement to my pattern I think.

New slippers for me! Yipee. It is starting to get cooler here which means our floors are already freezing since we don’t have carpet. My feet are ALWAYS cold, so slippers are a must. I needed some new ones for this winter so I made these from the Sewing Green pattern. They are not quite done. I am going to add a decorative blanket stitch around the seams when I get a chance. They are made from recycled wool and recycled leather.

A new dish mat. After seeing Heather’s here, I knew I needed one too. We don’t use a drying rack because our sink is positioned at an angle and the rack wouldn’t be able to drain into the sink. So, I have always just used any old towel under the dishes. This is sooo much cuter. I love it. The only problem is that I need a second one to use while this is in the wash.This is made from an old towel we already owned and a thrifted 100% cotton shower curtain.

Some new flannel pants for Kage. I pulled out all his winter clothes and realize that not only are most of his pants too short on him, but he doesn’t have any comfy lounge pants. Since I am enjoying my new pants so much I decided to make him a pair too. These are made from a pair of thrifted mens flannel p.j.s. The pattern I drafted myself using a pair of pants that currently fits him. You might recognize these from yesterday’s post. I finished them while he was sleeping and of course had to put them on him as soon as he woke up.

I have two neices who have birthdays at the end of the month. For my niece turning six, I am making a quilted pencil roll case. Here is the fabric all washed and ready to cut. I love the rainbow colors here.

And finally, the felted balls for Ember. Here is what they looked like after the first wash.

Next, I took the scrap yarn and started wrapping. Don’t worry if some of the strands are sticking out. They will all get felted in the wash. I used scraps that were as short as two inches long. I would just add a few short strands and then wrap a long strand around them to hold them on to the ball.

Once they are wrapped, toss them into an old nylon stocking and separate them by tying with a piece of non-wool yarn.

Once they have been washed and dried one time, they will be felted enough that you can cut them out of the nylon and just toss them in with the rest of the clothes if you would like to felt them more.

There isn’t a whole lot you can do with such short bits of yarn, but I couldn’t bear to throw out any of the beautiful yarn I have used to make the kids longies and shorties. These felted balls are a great way to use up those tiny scraps. I tried to make them small enough that her little hands will be able to grasp them.

There are a few more projects I am working on, but they are all gifts for Yule and since my family does check out my blog I won’t be able to post about them until after the holidays. I guess I will just have to have a big, post-holiday share.

My first loaf

I have been making bread from Artisian Breads in 5 Minutes a Day for a while, but they have all been freeform loaves. Is that what they are called? The kind with out a pan is what I mean. Well, I have decided to tackle the sandwich bread loaf. I would really love to find a recipe I can use to make great sandwich bread so I don’t have to by store bought anymore. I haven’t been all that excited by the organic store bought bread I have tried. It all seems a bit dry for being so expensive. And the rest of the breads have way to many strange ingredients in them. I love knowing exactly what is in the bread by making it myself and I swear this book makes it so easy. I was never able to make bread until I got this book.

This was my first attempt and I am pretty happy with how it turned out. This is the 100% whole wheat recipe. There is another recipe in the book that is slightly different from this one that I will try next. But for my first attempt I was pretty happy. The crust is a little crunchier than store bought bread and the crumb a bit denser, but it had a nice flavor and texture overall. It sure did smell great cooking too!

I put the loaf in right after Kage went down for his nap and it was ready when he woke up. We have had a few fairly cool days recently, but today was gorgeous so we grabbed the beach blanket and had an afternoon tea party on the deck. I made some Honeybush tea for me and Peach Passion for Kage. He thought it was pretty cool to be drinking his own cup of tea (cooled down with ice of course). He gobbled up two slices of bread with jelly so I guess it passed the kid test.

I had fun taking photos and Kage had a fun time playing with his tongs. It is so funny, but our cooking tongs are one of his favorite toys. They are great for picking up all sorts of things. Today he was using them to “cook” rocks on our grill.

I can’t tell you how hard it is to get a photo of the both of them looking at me. Maybe if you have two little kids you know already. It is virtually impossible I tell you! I had to settle for this one which was super cute even though they aren’t both looking at me. This is Ember giving Kage a big kiss on the head. It is so sweet to see how much she adores him already.

And a portrait of each of them.

Pyrex Love

Great. I have found out about vintage pyrex. Thanks a lot all you blogging ladies out there that have shared your vintage pyrex with us all.  I am hooked!

I had some time to kill on our vacation a few weeks ago so I started researching vintage pyrex. I found this website and then this Flickr group. Oh boy. I am sooo hooked. I ended up bidding on ebay and bought the Spring Blossom Green mixing bowl set above. I just love this pattern. This set was still new and in its original box from the 60s!

I have been using the bowls quite a bit already and they really make cooking more fun. Up till now I have been using a very old set of stainless steel nesting bowls I think I got from my mom. Those have worked well, but these bowls are pretty to look at and feel good too.

Since bidding on Ebay can be addicting, I ended up bidding on this set too which also was new in the box. This pattern is Autumn Harvest. While the sets themselves weren’t all that expensive, shipping was! Yikes. So, now that I have that out of my system, no more buying Pyrex on Ebay.

Instead, I have been searching all my local thrift stores and scored a few new pieces this week. My absolute favorite is this little 12 oz Spring Blossom Green fridge dish. It is small, oh so cute, in perfect condition, and was $1! My heart literally skipped a beat when I saw it. At the same store I found this Americana dish for $1.50.  It didn’t have a lid, but the bowl was in great shape so I picked it up as well.

On another shopping excursing I found this Old Orchard casserole dish, also in excellent condition and was a little pricier at $5.

I think you will be seeing lots more pyrex here in the future!

W.I.P. Wednesday

This is going to be long. I have been a crafting crazy woman and my disaster of a craft room proves it. It looks like a bomb went off in here. I have tons of started Yule and birthday presents strewn all over the place. And to add to the mess I have picked up a bunch of new linens from my thrifting this past week that need to be sorted, washed and put away. I am having a blast though. So many fun projects ahead.

Here is what I have finished up this week.

My pants.

LOVE them! The fit is great. Much better than the McCalls pattern I used last year. If you are going to make these pants from Sewing Green, be warned that the pattern piece for the optional contrasting cuff is wrong. The piece is way too short to fit on the pants. I had to add over two inches to the width of the pattern in order for them to fit the width of the pants. I found this out the hard way after I got the fabric cut out and was having a heck of a time trying to figure out how to sew them together.

The snow flake pants are an inch longer. I decided they were a bit too long and shortened the pattern slightly for the second pair. I just love, love the fit and will be making a bunch more of these for myself when I get the chance.

The rehabed quilt I mentioned last week is done and already getting tons of use around the house. I took photos of the entire front of the quilt so you could see the pattern, but they all came out blurry so you just get the close up shot. This was a really easy project. The binding I made as bias tape and sewed it all on by machine. While it was quicker to do it this way, I think I prefer the look of sewing the binding on the front by machine and then folding it over and sewing it by hand on the back like I did for Ember’s play mat. The look is a bit cleaner.

Ember’s Anniversary Longies are finished. I wasn’t so sure about this yarn when it was in the skein, but I just love the colors now that they are knit up. Ember was four months old yesterday, I can’t believe it! Look at the attitude she is giving me in this photo. Am I going to have my hands full when she is a teenager or what? She is such a social butterfly now and loves to chat with anyone that will talk to her.

She is also starting to reach for things and might be teething already because she wants to chew on everything. Please no teeth this early! I love the snowflake flannel pants I made so much that I used some of the left over material to make her a little tag blanket. The back is made from organic bamboo velour.

She seems to be enjoying it already.

Last is some felted balls and fall garland I am making using some thrifted skeins of brown wool I bought for $.25 a piece. The yarn isn’t really nice enough to make clothes with, but works great for crafts.

The i-cord is about 9 feet long and once I felt it I plan to add a bunch of felted wool leaves to it to make some fall garland. The balls will be felted in the washing machine once and then I will use all the colored scraps of yarn for the outside of the balls and felt them a second time. Did you know felted balls bouce? I think that is so cool. The balls will be gifts for Ember for Yule. I made some of these for Kage last year and he has had a great time playing with them.

Phew, that is it for now. I didn’t have time to get photos of all the rest of my half-finished projects, so those will have to wait until next weeks W.I.P.

Vegetarian Awareness Month: Curried Red Lentil Soup

October is Vegetarian Awareness Month. I thought this would be a great time to share a few of my favorite vegetarian recipes. I would love to hear other people’s recipes too since I am always on the look out for new things to cook. Leave a link to your blog post in my comments section.

I was really excited to see this recipe in the October issue of Vegetarian Times because I had been on the look out for some new  recipes using red lentils.  I love lentils and have so many in my pantry. They are cheap, quick to cook and a good source of protein. I also love cooking soups because they are usually a one pot dinner and less mess to clean up is always a good thing.  With the cool weather coming, a hot bowl of soup is a great way to end the day.

Curried Red Lentil Soup

2 cups red lentils, sorted and rinsed
1 qt. low-sodium vegetable broth
1 large onion, finely chopped (2 cups)
4 celery stalks, finely chopped (1.5 cups)
2 large carrots, finely chopped (1.5 cups)
2 cloves garlic, minced (2 tsp)
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1 Tbs. curry powder
1 tsp. ground cumin
2 Tbs. lemon juice

1. Bring lentils, vegetable broth, and 4 cups water to a simmer in a large pot. Skim away foam that rises to the top. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

2. Add onions, celery, carrots, and garlic, simmer uncovered for 20 minutes.

3. Add cilantro, curry powder, and cumin and cook 20 minutes more or until lentils are soft.

4. Season with salt and pepper to taste and stir in lemon juice.

I served this with some hot slices of  home made, light-wheat, roasted garlic bread smeared with lots of Smart Balance.

Enjoy!

W.I.P. Wednesday – Quilt Rehab and New Lounge Pants

While I was out thrifting on vacation (I managed to hit up just about every store in town!), I came across this cute black, white and red quilt. Obviously handmade, but it looked like someone was in a great hurry to finish it. The back was made with solid red fabric. The maker used black thread and a zig-zag stitch to quilt it so the back just looked a mess.  The front was in great shape and it has pandas! Me being a sucker for all things pandas, I couldn’t leave it. And it was only $2.

I thought with a little rehab it will be a great quilt (it is kid size) for the jogging stroller. Since it will be getting cooler here soon, Kage can use this to snuggle up while I am out walking/running. I added a new backing made from organic bamboo velour that I have in my stash. I also bought some new black quilters cotton to create a bias binding. I think it is going to come out really nicely. The new backing gives the quilt and extra layer of warmth which it needed anyway since it is quite thin.

It won’t win any quilting awards, but it will be very functional and hopefully Kage will like it. So far I have only spent two hours on it – that was attaching the new back and cutting out the strips of fabric for the binding. In all I only expect to spend 4 hours on this which isn’t bad for a handmade quilt!

The other projects I am working on are two new lounge pants for me using the pattern from Sewing Green. Here are my fabrics all washed and ready to cut. One pair is from my new “Bijo” fabric and a matching red/white polka dot for the cuffs.

The second pair is with a thrifted flannel sheet I scored for $2 while on vacation. I love how bright and wintery the fabric is. I have a matching hot pink flannel for the trim on these.

I finished the longies I was working on for Ember. No photos of those today. I also felted a ton of wool sweater scraps today. I hope to make a bunch of ornaments, a stocking for Ember, and some decorative garland from them. I am really in full swing with the holiday crafting. This is such a fun time of the year!

Home again.

It is always nice to return home after a long vacation. How I missed my bed! We had a wonderful time at the beach. We spent lots of time laying around, swimming, collecting shells, building sand castles (and destroying them) and enjoying being free from many of our day to day responsibilities.

I took several knitting projects and books, but did very little knitting and didn’t crack open my books at all. I spent most of my time ready about photography and trying to learn my camera and flash better. I feel kind of stuck in my skills and am ready to get to the next level. We had a few photo shoots which every one (but me) was sick of by the end. Kage actually started running away from me when he saw the camera. Here are a couple of my favorites from the 250 something photos I took.

I set up a quick indoor shot for Ember while the boys were out swimming and got this cute one.

Worked on silhouettes and using my tripod to catch this self-portrait.

Practiced some back lighting at sunset.

And managed to catch one of Kage not moving.

We lucked out and had great weather all but one day. On our next to last day it was quite cool, windy and a bit drizzly. It wasn’t good for swimming, but was a perfect day to enjoy our latest family activity – kite flying!

Bruce purchased a kite our second day there. We eagerly headed down the the beach with the kite in hand only to come home an hour later totally defeated. If you haven’t flown a kite before, I’ll give you a tip. Don’t start out with a stunt kite! That kite was near impossible to get up into the air and when we got it up it went into a crazy spin and came crashing back down.

Determined to succeed in kite flying, we visited another shop the third day and at the suggestion of the store employee purchased an easy flyer kite. What a difference it made. This kite was up and away as soon as we tossed it in the air. We were both really excited to see the kite actually flying. I am pretty sure I have flown a kite at least once in my life, I just can’t remember when.

While we were out flying, the song “Let’s Go Fly A Kite” from Mary Poppins came into my head and I couldn’t stop singing it. I watched that show quite a few times as a kid. I found the video clip on YouTube and was excited to share it with the boys. Kage loved it and has watched it at least two dozen times now. He asks me every day to play the kite song for him.

For those of you that don’t know what I am talking about, here is the video for you to enjoy. See you here tomorrow for W.I.P. Wednesday!

W.I.P. – Early Edition

I know, it isn’t even close to being Wednesday, but we are leaving for vacation today and won’t be home for a week. Whether or not I will have internet connection while we are gone remains to be seen. I was so busy this past week and didn’t get a chance to post my W.I.P.  I hated to wait another two weeks because I really want to share. My hope is that you will be so interested in my new projects you’ll forget it isn’t Wednesday yet.

I finished Ember’s quilted playmat and I am pleased as punch. I ended up not following the original pattern at all. I figured that if this was going to be a practice quilt then I really needed to practice. So, I ended up quilting all over the mat using free motion quilting and added a binding. I was so intimidated by the thought of making a quilt, but now that it is done I have to say it isn’t that hard. There were just a lot of new techniques to learn and thankfully there are dozens of tutorials on YouTube for each step. The videos really helped make it easy. Trying to figure out what to do just from reading the book was not workng for me. I needed to see it done.

The binding was machine sewn onto the front and I hand stitched the back. It was slow going at first with the hand sewing, but my stitches became more even and I got quicker as I worked. It was nice to work by hand for a while, although I won’t be hand quilting anytime soon. I added a few appliques as well – some dragonflys, stars and Ember’s initial.

The quilt is rather stiff, so it works great as a playmat. I assume it is that stiff because I recycled a wool blanket for the batting instead of using a new cotton or wool batting material. Or is it because I quilted all over? I’m not sure. Either way, I am feeling pretty confident now that I can make a quilt for Kage. I want to make him a quilt for his new toddler bed. I am thinking  it will have a tiger theme since his lovey is a stuffed tiger.

I got a few other small project finished this week as well. I made Kage a neck pillow for our trip to the beach. We will be trying a night drive to the beach in hopes that it will be easier for us and the kids.  Our last family trip was a bit rough. Ember generally dislikes the car seat and Kage gets bored on such a long trip. Hopefully they will go to sleep and stay asleep for most of the trip tonight.

I hate seeing his head flopping around while he sleeps, so a neckpillow was in order. The bottom is a tool fabric by Kumquat and the top which will go next to his head is a super soft organic bamboo velour. I had froggy model it for me (upside down so you can see the print on the fabric)  since Kage was napping while I took photos. This took me 30 minutes top. It was really quick and easy. Stuffing it took longer than the cutting and sewing.

Another super fast project was two felted wool cozies for my glass straws. The straws are durable, but I hated just tossing one in my bag with no protection at all when we go out. I don’t carry them all the time, but I do like taking one with me when I make my afternoon, drive through, iced coffee run to Dunkin Donuts. I have tons of wool sweater scraps left over from making shorties and longies, so this was a great way to use some up. I also wanted to learn to do a blanket stitch, so this was good practice.

Finally, I have been working on another pair of winter longies for little Ember. This is more Dashing Dachs yarn in their Anniversary colorway.

I hope you all have a good week!

Fun Mail

I love getting packages in the mail! Yesterday, I was so excited to get my hands on this package full of new fabric. I was sad to see the mail man come and go and not deliver this package, but then he drove back around to our house and said he had forgotten to deliver this one. I ordered about 7 yards of fabric. The top one is my all time favorite. It is going to be new pajama pants for me! The other fabrics are going to be used for a special project for Ember and Kage. The pink fabric was just too cute so I bought some just because. I think it would make a cute dress for Ember next spring.

I also got this in the mail – a full pound of organic merino yarn!!! I am ready to finally venture into dying yarn.  I bought the dyes through a co-op a while back, but I still need to get some other supplies like bottles and a pot to steam the yarn in. I am excited to dye my own yarn for many reasons: no more stalking yarn and being disappointed because I didn’t get what I wanted, getting exactly the colors I want, getting as much as I want (most yarns I have purchsed from Hyena Cart only come in 4 or 8 oz which isn’t enough to make larger items like sweaters), and the best reason is to save money. I have such a hard time spending money on something  I can make myself. Dying my own yarn will cost me about 50% less than buying the yarn predyed.

It was really nice to get these little presents in the mail – it cheered me up.  I needed a bit of cheer after Kage did this to his wooden kitchen yesterday morning. This isn’t a photo of a new split door oven, folks. This is the inch thick door that my son cracked in half as well as broke off the plexy glass. I have no idea what happened, I was out of the room at the moment it occured.  Bruce did however pull a splinter out of Kage’s foot not too long after this happened, so I believe he stepped on the door while it was open.

I was really, really upset. Not at him, just at the fact that he has destroyed so many of his nice toys. He has broken nearly half of his plan toys we bought him for his 1 year birthday and Christmas. Lucky for us, Plan Toys replaced most of them after I called to complain that their toys weren’t durable. It might be naive of me to think we can pass these toys on to our grandkids one day, but I was at least hoping Ember would get to play with them before they were trashed.

After venting for a while, I called Joe at Willow Toys. He was super nice and said he would send us out a replacement door at no cost right away. How wonderful is that! I love working with small businesses. To have a real person answer the phone is hard to come by these days.

It is a much different experience than the one I am having with World Market. I am tring to return some blinds I purchased from that store three years ago.  They are recalled due to strangulation hazard. Who keeps receipts that are three years old for things other than major purchases? I don’t. Well, they want to give me $2 in store credit per blind because that is the clearance price and I don’t have the receipt. What?? I paid about $25 a piece for them and $2 isn’t going to get me new blinds. I have been hounding their corporate office for three weeks, but am still getting no response or refund. Frustrating.

Anyways, Kage still played with his kitchen yesterday and enjoyed his new split oven. I decided to give him my apron to play in – something new and exciting for him – while he cooked. Several things ran through my head when I put this on him.

The first thought was, he would make such a cute little girl. It is a good thing I have Ember to fill my need for dresses and cute girly things.

The second was, I really look forward to seeing Ember in her wedding dress one day. I guess this thought came about since the apron is white, I dunno. It caught me buy surprise to be thinking already about that day which is so far off. I am not in any hurry for them to grow up, but I do really look forward to all the special moments we will share together as they get older.

Rainy Friday

I woke up today to greet a rainy grey sky, a sore throat and a head ache that just doesn’t want to go away. It is one of those rare days that I never change out of my pajamas. Today is one of those days to just stay home and be lazy.

I also thought today was a good day to remind myself of a few things I am grateful for.

I am grateful for:

The chance to stay home with my children.

Catching my son enjoying a quiet moment to himself looking out our window.

Watching him share his love with a hug.

Having both babies asleep at the same time (even if it was only 20 minutes) so I could enjoy a hot cup of tea and read a few pages in my book.

For another  successful and easy breastfeeding relationship.

For lots of baby smiles.