Pretty little maids all in a row

In our house we love making peg dolls. I just give my Little Miss some clothespins, scrap whatever and some markers and she goes to town. I help her with the hair and that's it. I need to do more with her. I feel guilty today. I don't spend enough one on one time with her. I know she's craving it and I need to, especially while she wants to. I'll have to plan a crafting day just for the 2 of us. Yesterday she was begging me to do knitting camp at the yarn store here. Isn't that a dream come true?

We thank thee O God for a Prophet

Words can not express the love, admiration and gratitude that I feel for this man. He has helped to lift my soul on a daily basis. I will miss you.

Recipe Swap

Today I was going through all my old magazines and came across one of my all time faves that I thought I would share with you. This is from the Feb/March issue of Home Companion. It's an idea I've wanted to do since I very first saw this article 4 years ago. The invitations are machine embroidered dish towels. You all get together with the theme of My Mom Makes the Best.... You bring your favorite recipe of your mothers printed out for everyone along with a picture of her and a sample to share. Then you spend the evening making little scrapbooks of all the recipes and eating. The party favors are the cookbooks, little woven potholders, a personalized napkin with little mini utensil ornaments on it, plus a dishtowel apron. Can you believe it? Even the little place cards are amazing, standing up in vintage cookie cutters. It's funny, but I would love to do this for my 30 th birthday party this year. If only I had a bigger house and an embroidery machine.....It sounds like the most amazing time! It's on the list of things to do before I turn 30, maybe I'll do a post about that sometime.

Felts of fortune

We made the cutest thing tonight in Brownies. They are fortune cookies for Valentines day made out of felt. So cute and so easy! Take a 3 inch circle fold it in half and place a stitch in the middle at the top. Place a fortune in side and fold the points together while pushing in on the middle . Sew together just beneath the points on the inside....voila! A pretty Valentines fortune cookie with a sexy fortune in it for your sweetie! Maybe I'll do a tutorial at some point with pics and everything, but until that day comes, enjoy the inspiration!

Pellon Printing

A few years ago I started collecting quiet books. I love them. I think I've made 4 all together. I have 6 pattern books. They're so detailed and time consuming, they do take awhile to make, but the results are so worth it. Normally I do these on muslin. However, this week I have discovered something new. Quiet books can also be made on a material called pellon. It's amazing stuff. Especially because I just found out you can print directly onto the stuff if it's cut down to the right size. And you can even print in color. The color is a little bit light, but I think I can fix that by coloring lightly over it with crayon. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities. I envision doing a bunch of file folder games in one big book. I have plans to get one done for each of my kids for Valentines day. It might just happen with this new technique, I'll post when it's done.

Neked Chef

I have to admit for quite some time now I have had a total suburban housewife crush on Jamie Oliver. Now he has a new show: Jamie at Home. I love it. Really I can't get enough. How can you not be enamoured by a hot guy in sandals, a knitted hat, camo pullover talking about how his endorphins are going all over the place thinking about what he's going to make with the variety of chili peppers he's just picked from his garden. He has such a passion for really great food with natural earthy fresh flavors. I also love how down to earth his recipes are. I can make them and they turn out. I'm so glad I have cable. I watch this show and salivate. Plus you know he's got to be amazing to have two little girls with the names Poppy Honey and Daisy. That's enough Geeking out for now, the commercial break is over!

Happy New Year

So, the first week of my new year was not what I could have hoped for. My Honey had to start the overnight shift at the beginning of the week. Which means that he leaves at 11:30pm, gets home at 9am, sleeps all day, wakes up around three back to bed at 8, and then starts all over again. I am not a big fan of this schedule. Transitioning to this routine might not have been so bad except for the first 3 days the baby was super sick and puking all over the place, but only at night. Then I got it then Miss C got it. I think today is the first day where we all feel OK. So if you're like me and just having a freakin great new year, you probably could use some magic and/or a good laugh in your life right now. Let me recommend these 2 movies for you. Stardust was amazing! Personally I'm not sure why it didn't do better in the theater. A movie about a nerdy boy who is in love with a girl who won't give him the time of day. Then he sees a star fall from the sky. If he can bring the fallen star to her she will marry him. As it turns out, stars are really human like creatures. The witches see the star fall and are trying to hunt her as well, to cut her heart out in order to be young again. Then there's the evil princes and the lightning pirates and the magic and everything else. I'm not always great at descrbing movies, but this one is fantastic.

Then there's Balls of Fury. If you need a good laugh and enjoy ping pong and Christopher Walkien like I do, you will laugh so hard watching this. Really, I don't think that there's much more that needs to be said for that. Anyhow, hopefully week 2 of 2008 gets better!