Mushroom Villagers

“I’m bored” has been an often used phrase around here. I’m busy, Chris is busy and the kids are going nuts. I found this “Super Foam-erator” idea from this post and was amazed how fast and easy it was!

The kids loved it and the best part was that all of my kids could do this easily. Ms O loved making the long worms and Eddie was the champion blower.

Directions can be found here, but really all you need is a plastic bottle with the bottom cut off, a rubber band, some terry cloth, and some sort of bubbly soap poured into a lid. It’s stuff everyone has around the house already- love it!

Simply cut off the bottom half of the plastic bottle and attach a small piece of terry cloth with the rubber band. (The thiner the cloth the better since the kids have to blow through it.) Get the cloth wet, dip it into the soap and blow. It takes less than 5 minutes to make and results in alot of fun. I do have to warn you to remind the kids to breathe in through their nose and out their mouth. My boys keep sucking the bubbles up into their mouths through the bottle because they were breathing out and in with through their mouths. Funny, but not really…

Anyhoo, try it out today. It’s hot, the pool’s up and there’s plenty of sewing to be done. Keep them busy and happy!

Spelunking in Central OR:

After 3 hours we didn’t find any Morels, but kids are still happy:

Catching up with our horse friends:

Feed, bathed and now happily relaxing in the sun:

We hope you had a great 4th of July as well!

So I started this lovely dress a month ago. After this success, I thought I could conquer Simplicity 9784 with ease. NOT. In reality, it had nothing to do with the pattern. It was entirely me.
I was trying too many new things: piping inserted on the collar, working with corduroy, adjusting the size since the pattern only went up to 18 mos and I was going for a 2T. Also, I’ve said this before, but I can’t read. After ripping out the same step at least 5 times, I asked Chris what he thought the step was instructing. Duh! I was missing a whole pattern piece and didn’t realize it.
Anyway, I finally finished the dress today and it’s a little short, but it works.

I found this material at Mill End here in Beaverton and had to have it. I love polka dots!

The collar was a little tough to sew because I was trying to sew two pieces of thick corduroy with piping inserted along a curve. Curves alone throw me off and adding the other two issues really took some patience. I love the look of piping though and will be trying this again.

(Sorry to insist, but you gotta see what my little princess wears under such a dress.)

Also, after reading this article, I *really* want to try pleats. Something straight, cotton, tank, square-neck with nice crisp pleats is on my must do list.
But first, I still have to finish Fini’s April b-day presents- yikes. Sorry Fini!

Wonder where I’ve been? Here’s the rundown:
- Wedding in Seattle, beautiful
- Week at Black Butte Ranch in Central Oregon, aaaah
- My 35th Birthday, along with baby sis Liz- on the same day
- Mother’s Day, I cleaned
- Step-sis’ Baby Shower, lovely
- Dad’s 62nd Birthday, hot
- Chris’ and BIL’s Birthday, busy
- 2 hours of tennis lessons every Saturday for the boys, pure entertainment!
- More typing work, argh
- Nailing notes on my guitar and now moving on to chords, ouch
- Not one sewing project started or completed! (Well, one- I made a cozy for a glass ikea stein for my dad’s b-day. He’s a fanatic boiling-hot-water drinker. Not much of a project and no picture to post so there you go.)

- And lastly, Memorial Day Morel hunting on Mt. Hood- found nothing, but LBMs (little brown mushrooms for you non-shroomers).

Here’s some shots from our day up in the mountains:

Things that are making me happy lately:

New Marriage

New shoes

(These are Naot Gardenia Shoes in Toffee)

New Sunglasses

New Morels

New Baby Geese

New bike trails we have yet to explore!

Edward, my middle one, turned 4 several weeks ago, but we finally had his party today. We had to cancel it twice due to several bouts of different viruses both of which were extremely contagious and ones we didn’t want spread to anyone else.

After many weeks, we finally were able to gather our family and friends together for some:

Cake

Chris made this “Golden Snitch” cake (from Harry Potter) for Eddie by pouring the cake batter into a large pyrex bowl, baking then inverting it onto a foil covered pizza pan. He made a yellow butter cream frosting and covered it with metallic gold sanding sugar. He used black gel icing for the design on the cake and two gold spray-painted cardboard wings to finish it off. Eddie loved it!

And there were wands:

These were carved out of apple, maple and rhododendron branches. They were also sanded down and oiled to keep them from getting brittle. These were a hit for all the little ones that came.

And lastly, some enormous bubbles:

We did something similar for Eddie’s 2nd birthday and wanted to do it again since he still loves bubbles- who doesn’t?!

Chris made the bubble solution using Joy dish washing soap, corn syrup and water. He made gigantic “wands” out of two sticks and some rope with a washer to help give the rope some shape when forming the bubbles. (I have no idea where he retrieved all his info or else I would link some sites. I do know it was all off of the internet so I’m sure you can find great info too if you just google it.)

Some tips when bubble making:

• There can’t be too much wind. The wind pushes the bubbles out too fast and they break before the kids can get to them.
• When forming the bubbles, keep your wands up high away from the kids. Seal off the bubble, by bringing the sticks together THEN let the kids pop them. If the bubble is popped before it is free from the rope, you will have to re-dip your rope in the solution.
• You need ALOT of solution and a bucket or pan to dip all the rope into.
• The colder the weather the better bubbles. Don’t try and do this on a 100 degree day. The bubbles won’t form well and won’t last long enough for the kids to enjoy.

So all in all, Eddie had a great day with lots of friends and family even if it was weeks delayed! Happy 4th my love.

Could it be…

Is that a finished sweater? Is that the one I started over 6 years ago?

Yes, folks- I do knit and on occasion, finish a project as well. It took me a long time to finish this sweater, but I’m happy to say that it’s done… except for one thing:

Does anyone know about blocking?

I’ve never blocked anything so I don’t know what I should do in this case. The sweater is Debblie Bliss’ Shawl-Collared Fair Isle Cardigan from her “Quick Baby Knits” book. (Quick?  Yeah right.)  I used her Rowan Cotton Glace yarn and read that you usually don’t block cotton.  In other places I’ve read that you must block anything that’s fair isle so I’m stuck.

If I block this, then won’t it simply reshape itself after each wash?  Hmmm…  Any thoughts or suggestions?

Feeling spring-y, I made this dress last night:

It took me almost 4 straight hours of sewing, but it was fun. I used Simplicity 3511 and actually understood most of the pattern’s directions.  The best part of the pattern are the buttons on the back. Although they aren’t really necessary since I can get the dress on and off Ms O without using them, the buttons are too cute to leave out.

I haven’t made a square neck in a while and wanted to make a “practice” dress before sewing the dress which Ms O will be wearing to a family wedding in a couple weeks. I thought about making the practice dress out of muslin as most people do, but I knew that if I put all this effort into making something I wanted it to be wearable even if it may be a little off.

I am so picky about my fabric. For this dress, I used fabric from Denyse Schmidt’s Katie Jump Rope line. I had made myself a skirt out of this stuff last year and really like it because it’s light-weight and super soft.

Overall, easy pattern, straight forward and cute finished product. I’ll be making the actual wedding dress today out of this fabric and can’t wait.

And on a different note, have you noticed my new Sew, Mama, Sew! button in the sidebar? I was introduced today as one of the four Editorial Board Members. When Kristin asked if I would be a part of a new planning team, I about fell out of my chair. ME? Of course I would! Since then, we’ve started brainstorming great ideas for next month’s theme and I can’t wait for it to start. I’m always going to SMS blog for their great tutorials, links, and of course, fabric! I hope you will swing by and take a look as well.

My plants have been ignored lately with all of us sick and I actually had one die on me.

I’ve had these african violets, christmas cactus and rosary plant for years. I don’t know why, but they like me. They bloom all the time, require very little maintenance and water- we get along well. Chris has given me a new violet with the birth of each of our kids so when one rotted because of too much water, I was crushed. I couldn’t believe it died because of too much water, but something was wrong. I need to re-pot all of them asap… as soon as I feel better.

Meanwhile in the next room, the legos have taken over the train table.

I know, there’s ALOT.  And if you can believe it, the boys still don’t think we have enough.  Say what?!

Eddie’s birthday is next week, but we gave him his present today:

And oh man are they having fun with this!

Neither one has mastered the spin-out yet, but I’m sure the day is coming soon. This is a Kettlercar and I’m impressed how well this car stays on all 4 wheels. It’s a sturdy one, but well used before we got it.

Yes people, it’s another Craigslist purchase. I love rescuing old things and giving them a purpose again. I mean, really- why buy new when there’s so much treasure out there already?