Valentines Potato Stamping

Yo, yo!

Okay, now that Valentines Day has come and gone, I'd like to share with you the Valentines that we put together for Ella Rose's preschool classmates.
In this post, you saw the teaser image of the hearts in production.

Well, what we did was create little stuffed hearts.
We simply machine sewed two hearts together (right sides touching and leaving a little inch or so open), flipped them inside and stuffed them with plushie stuffing material.
Ella Rose did most of the stuffing and then I sewed up the little opening:

Each heart was made of two different fabrics, one for each side.

Ms. Christine, the Peach Blossom teacher, had requested that we only put the name of the giver on the Valentines (no recipient names), so here's how we did that:

Daddy crafted a potato stamper using little knives and an eyeglass repair tool too!

Always remember to do the letters backwards~!

I've never done potato stamping before, but it really is such a nifty medium!
Using a sharpie as the "ink" for the "stamp", the names got stamped on the hearts:

Soft and plushie, they can double as baby pillows?

Ella Rose enjoyed that part of the production process too.
And I must say Dash and I loved it too!

Growing up with parents that were too busy, whenever Valentines Day rolled around, the most effort we made was going to the store and purchasing premade cards with whatever the latest kid-targeted brand was (Barbie, Jurassic Park, etc).

I remember once, we hadn't even had time to go to the store, and my mom randomly suggested that I just make some cards. I know her heart was in the right place, but it ended up being a very dismal experience for me. By that point in my life, I was so used to the creative process being taken over by companies and believed that prefabricated was uniform and therefore more beautiful, that my attempts were pathetic and depressing. I remember literally crying to my mom about how inferior my cards were...how they'd be the worst in the class! My mom tried to encourage me saying that homemade is heartfelt...but I feel she was forgetting the second half of the equation. If only I'd had the tools and know-how of actually creating something...how to work with paper, and color, and put things together. I didn't know a lick of it! In the end, I submitted my sloppy crayon scribbled cards (the best thing I could come up with was a squirrel with a nut saying "I'm Nuts About You") and just put my face down on my desk for the duration of the card exchange..

I remember that Valentines Day disaster very vividly and hope to imbue in my kiddos real knowledge on how to create things for themselves so that they don't have to rely on buying whatever they want or need. I think it's also a confidence booster, because you don't feel as helpless and consumption-dependent.

Anyway, sorry for the long-winded trip down memory lane.
Hope you all had a good V Day and that maybe this inspires some more crafting in your lives too!
Until next time, take care and Happy Potato Stamping!

Valentines Day Cake

G'daaaaay!

And Happy Valentines Day ♡

Today I'd like to share with you the special cake that Ella Rose and I baked for the occasion.
The recipe was by no means ours. I merely plugged in "valentines day cake" into allrecipes.com and we followed this nifty recipe video!

If you've never watched a video to follow a recipe, I would highly recommend it!
It was a first for us too, and very effective.

Anyway, the one thing we did that made the cake somewhat personalized was "masqued powdering" as I like to call it.
Here's what we did:

Cut out shape from paper and lay on cake

Sprinkle powdered sugar all over the cake

Peel away the paper cut-out and enjoy the resulting effect!

It's definitely not rocket science, but it's really very easy and satisfying.
Ella's very excited about her Valentines Day cake which we will be eating for a while, me thinks ;)

Until next time, take care and Happy Valentines Day!!

Valentines Crafting

Bon jour, folksies~!

That special time of the year is coming up again.
That's right -- Valentines Day.
I always feel a little torn about the big ol' V Day.
On one hand, I tell myself  "Hmph! Who needs one particular day to express how you feel to loved ones?"
But on the other hand, I know that I need this holiday to remind myself to take the extra time and energy to be that much more loving toward my husband...
Ah well, c'est la vie~

As a solution to all that internal tug-of-war, Dash and I have agreed to just go chill this year.
We're going to make V Day more about what we can do as a family, since Ella Rose is a lot more into the holiday this year than ever before. For starters, we've been making more Valentines Day cards than you can shake a stick at.
Which brings me to the item at hand:

WIP

This little beauties will become the Valentines Day cards for all of Ella Rose's Peachie friends from school. I don't want to spoil the surprise and show you the finished product (some Peachie mamas frequent this blog ;) ) but I will definitely show them off after the fact.

And with that, I hope you all have a lovely Valentines Day no matter what you decide to do.
Love is a daily thing, always available, and always something to be practiced!!
Take care and Happy Valentines Day!!

First Steps!!

Howdy howdy!

It's happened!
Today, William has officially taken his first steps!!
By no means am I going to say "he's started walking" because these are really just little baby steps (literally) but the prospects are good.

Behold the video evidence:

(The coughy/unhappy version)
And forgive my poor camerawoman work -- I randomly decided to rotate the camera sideways. Smart one, Chrissy. Really.

Just a couple more steps. All taken sideways again.
Sigh...

And this is him just being cute with our prayer bowl:

Okay, so it's just a couple of steps.
But it's exciting!!
He'll be 10 months by the end of the week, so he's holding true to the Ella Rose "standard" -- that is, Ella Rose was taking her first steps at this age too. And I think I've mentioned before how much I'd hoped that his milestones would be in synch with Ella's...because I don't trust myself to remember two unique times. Now I only need to remember "before they were 10 months old" and it applies to both kids! Score!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my lopsided videos and are having a lovely evening.
Until next time, Happy Walking!!!!

Glorious Teething Necklace

Good evening, friends:

So I usually am not one to promote baby products (in fact the point of this blog was to demonstrate how little one really needs to raise a happy/healthy child).
But truth be told, there are some things that have come my way that have made parenting easier.
Item #1 is the Moby Wrap which I will have to demonstrate some time.
Item #2 is the newly found teething necklace.

Lent to me by the lovely Sophie, this charmer is just what the doctor ordered for William's pain-ridden teething. Ella Rose's teeth came in with no such discomfort, but William is a whole other story. I can feel the frustration emanating from him when his gums are particularly painful.
But this has solved all this problems:

From the creator's Etsy page

It's called an "Etno Mama Nursing Necklace" and it's by KangarooCare. The owner is from Estonia and her skillz are the real deal.

Apple wood beads with tough thread crocheted over them tightly to form these delectably gnaw-inducing teething nodes. The apple wood gives off such a lovely scent and the thread feels so satisfying to William, I can just visualize the fine layers of cells giving way on his gums to let his teeth through.

Workin' 'em goooood.

And the necklace Sophie lent me comes in the delicious colors of avocado, forest, and mint green. Mmm!

Okay, I look like a freak.

 Isn't that a happy little boy? :)
I, on the other hand, look like I'm in pain or something.
But William here looks like he could be selling something on TV. Like, "Aaaah, nothing hits the spot like apple wood beads. Thanks, Mom".

And with that, I bid you a good night and hope your teeth aren't bothering you!
Take care and Happy Teething!!

Social Sunday~!

Hi, all!

Today was another very social day from beginning to end.
Although we skipped going to church, I did get to catch up on much needed sleep by napping with William for his morning nap. Buya.

Upon waking, we biked on over to a one-year birthday party for our dear friend-neighbors' daughter, Annika. How crazy, I remember a year ago receiving the text  about the birth while on the airplane before we took off for Spain. That was a year ago?? Really?? Crazy...

Anyway, we then hung around (even crashing the following birthday party -- oops!) and got to catch up with a lotta folksies from town.

At home, Ella Rose opted to hang with Dada while I went on to a "chocolate desserts and letter writing" party!! Again, the ever hospitable Putmans invited us to partake in the "A Million Thanks" campaign where you write to men and women in service who are far away from their friends and family.
I ended up being the only person who showed up so I got to have them all to myself! Such a lovely visit and I got to indulge in delicious hot chocolate too - yum!

The evening wind-down at home was fun too. William was an absolute goof with hide-and-go-seek:

And Ella Rose showed off her artistry.
(Can you see that pregnant mermaid princess in the center??)

A wonderful way to begin the week.
Wishing a good one to you and yours -- Happy Sunday!!

Brinner

Good evening~

We got to spend tonight in the lovely company of the Grow-Schuffs again! :)
We got together for brinner, and for those who don't know what that is, read on:

Brinner = breakfast for dinner~~~!!!

Dash whipped up pancakes, bacon, sausage, hashbrowns and bean omelets. Oh! And mimosas!!
Then Sophie brought homemade marionberry and strawberry sauces, lemon curd, and cinnamon buns. Mmmmmm!!!!!!! Delish~

We should have pulled the camera out during the stay to "capture some memories" and at least to document the expanse of the feast. But, as always, it completely slipped my mind!

I would highly recommend brinner to those who haven't tried it, and especially when having people over.
I recently learned a handy frugal tip and that is, instead of inviting people over for dinner...have them over for breakfast! Pancakes feeds a good crowd for a fraction of the cost of what it would to feed them steaks! ;) And there's that undeniable good feeling that comes with breakfasty foods.

Well! Give it a try and tell me how it goes~
Until then, take care and Happy Brinner!!