Sneak Peak

Can you guess Joel's costume this year based on these clues?










This injury is now a cute little scar.

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Sweet Dreams

I've been wanting to use some of Lucas's old t-shirts to make something for Joel for a while now and finally got around to it. I decided to try pjs since they are pretty basic in their construction. I traced a pair he had for the pants. They are a little tighter than I thought they would be, but they will work for pjs. I did have to redo the neck of the top. The first one was too tight in the neck. Hopefully try two fits. To make the pattern I cut apart an old top for the basic shape and went from there. I loosely followed the steps of the 90 minute shirt on Made.


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Worm Love

This little gal get to go to her new home this weekend. I wish I could be there is person to give her to my niece even if it is a very belated birthday gift. Next year I plan to be more on top of things.

There is a patten out there somewhere for this snake/worm, but I can't remember who makes it. Joel has one that I got at a craft fair last year, and I just make up my own pattern based on his. I basically made a tube and rounded the ends. I left an opening at one of the sections to stuff her, and then hand stitched it closed. Next I embroidered the eyes and a little mouth (not pictured). I added some extra detail to the back with the little heart. I felt it was fitting for the personality that was coming through with fabrics. Enjoy your new friend, Annie!

New Wardrobe

If only I could make myself a new wardrobe as easily as I did for my niece. Her birthday is coming up so I recycled some old clothing of mine and raided my fabric stash to make some new closes for her American Girl doll. I used Simplicity pattens 7083 and 4297 for my basics.

I wanted to tie the shirt and pants into the sweater I made so I added some green daisies to spruce them up a little. I think the hoodie is pretty cute. I made it out of an old sweater of mine that had a stain on the front. Kalena happens to love purple. I thought the polka dots were cute. I love that they also had the same shade of green. Don't you love it when things work out that way.

Frozen Lemon-Ginger Yogurt

The other day I was looking for a recipe that used some leftover buttermilk that I had. I was looking through the recipes at Epicurious and came across this one for Lemon-Ginger frozen yogurt. They also have a cool app for the Iphone/pod if you are interested. I'd always been interested in using fresh ginger and thought that it sounded delicious. After reading the reviews I decided to use Greek yogurt to give it the tang. (One of my favorite treats right now is the tart frozen yogurt.) I enjoyed the finished product. After the initial shock of the tart my son enjoyed it too.

My Weakness

I'm a sucker for pomegranate. If you put it on the label, there is a good chance I'll buy it at least once. My latest pomegranate impulse buy was this gum.




It not too bad. My normal gum choice is something with mint. However, if I'm ever craving berry, I would consider this again. I'm not sure it has a strong pomegranate taste, but good none the less.

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Grandma Camp!

I have the best parents in the world. Every summer my mother hosts a week long Grandma Camp for the grandkids. Yes, a whole week with just the kids. This year we decided to do it in shifts with an overlapping weekend for the grandkids (and kids.)

To celebrate I decided to make shirts for the grandkids. I wish I'd thought ahead and made one for Grandma too, but there is always next year. I originally was planning to use freezer paper to stencil the words and design. I jumped on the computer and played around with some ideas in PowerPoint until I created something I liked. First I came up with the saying. I kept playing around with the idea of Hanging Around with Grandma, but ended up settling on Monkeying Around at Grandma Camp. After choosing the idea of a monkey, I looked at different clipart. While looking at them, I decided to applique the face of the monkey in the middle of each shirt. I knew I would need some brown and tan knit. When Hobby Lobby didn't have any tan, I thought I would try Savers. I could always use the rest of the fabric for a future project. So I bought two t-shirt in the right colors to cut up. Thank goodness that Savers is color coordinated. Next I scoured Walmart to find the shirts. I wasn't able to find ones that I like for all the kids so I dyed white ones instead. While at Hobby Lobby I did pick up some dye just in case. I like how the color turned out slightly variegated. I didn't stir constantly so the dye soaked in differently across the fabric. (It is hard to tell in the picture, but trust me it's cute.)

The one and two year olds have matching plain t-shirts. For the almost five year old I bought a single shirt with a little more detailing. The top is a little gathered giving it a feminine feel. I was not getting the look I wanted with the freezer paper for the letters so I choose to embroider the words instead. This also allowed me to curve the letters around the face of the monkey. I think they were a big hit!

The kids all wore them to the animal park. It did rain on us while we were there, but who lets a little rain ruin their fun? I think the rain was Joel's favorite part.

Now I just have to figure out next year's shirt. Any good ideas?