I'm pretty sure that watching this video has been more fun for Biscuit than making this video. (and the sledding was pretty fun)
Despite a bloody nose. It barely slowed her down (but did convince her not to ride on her tummy anymore).
Hope your weekend was equally exciting.
45 minutes later I just realized I put Biscuit to bed a full hour early. She fell right asleep. I'm thinking we all need more sleep around here.
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On a separate topic, as promised, here are some Japanese craft book images for you:
ISBN: 978-4-391-62449-6 Conveniently called, "Book" (in English anyway)
This book has very detailed instructions for 18 projects in a range of mediums from crochet to wire work to sewing. Mostly sewing:
Images from the inside (sorry all these are so blurry)
And another book, ISBN: 978-4-579-11133-6 "All Your Kids Need"
I like the little rubber stamp ideas:
These are all the categories in the book (not sure if you can read them, click to enlarge):
That's it for tonight. Happy Wednesday to ya!
A sick day almost exactly 2 years ago after a trip to Portland.
Today.
Other than the use of the big girl bed, everything in that post from February 2006 is about the same. Oh, and I rarely blog about home improvement these days. Being able to look back like that makes this blog worth it.
Mr. H had a crazy, busy, long day at work today so I picked up Biscuit and took her out on the town. We went out to a (semi) fancy dinner at the Creperie where she ate an adult portion of quiche and fruit and I had a crepe. I swear the kid has a hollow leg lately with all the eating. Other than throwing her napkin once and chewing on a sugar packet she was a perfect lady.
We came home and made a pie for daddy. She was so helpful.
Eating the sliced apples
Measuring and mixing
Describing this piecrust as "awwwesome" (her favorite adjective these days)
"prinkling" the topping
We popped it in the oven during bathtime and she was sound asleep by the time I drizzled the caramel topping:
This was the recipe I used.
Verdict: I ate the caramel and walnut part and it tasted delightfully caramel appley but it was too sweet. It was also too runny (perhaps letting Biscuit measure the flour was a bad idea). I give it a B+
So, as I recall, this used to be a crafting blog. Not so much lately but I've been on a baking kick and there are only so many hours in the day. Tomorrow we're off for and early birthday dinner in San Francisco and Friday I leave for a girls-only long weekend in Portland with my friend so I'll probably see you next week. Have a good one.
I'll be back later with some sort of interesting Year in Review/I love sergers/Christmas present recap post.
But in the meantime, any suggestions as to how to approach this? I don't think it's brushable. Do I just put a hat on her?:
And also, Jill has my gratitude and I'm very impressed she was familiar with the Urial (which is actually spelled Uriel). Also, Far From CA wins the niceness award by gently suggesting the answers are on the box. Indeed, we did still have the box floating around:
I could go on an on about the illness swirling around me and how I am staying well despite untold snot dousings (mostly from Biscuit but Mr. H may have provided a few in his sleep). The chorus of coughs makes me wonder if I'm not living in some sort of tuberculosis quarantine (they just have colds but nasty coughs). But I won't go on and on and will instead focus on a very confusing Christmas gift.
Biscuit got this little people animal alphabet toy from her Aunt. Mercifully it came broken and only the A, B and C sing their tune about the animal. Mr. H wanted to return it but I overruled and reminded him of how much we already hate the song for the fridge alphabet toy. "Every letter makes a sound, T says 'tuh', T says 'tuh'" You got that one?
Anyway, I digress again.
This animal toy is an excellent fit for Biscuit's OCD tendencies (must line things up!) and her current obsession with letters. She is also quite fond of animals and slept with the X-ray Fish last night.
So, a clear fish with just a skeleton and a letter "X" emblazoned on his (her?) chest. An X-ray Fish. I got that one. The tall, yellow, spotted animal with the long neck and the "G"? Gotta be a giraffe.
But the small brown bird with wings open wide and an "N"? What is that? A Nuthatch? You can see it in the back of the top photo.
And what about the apparent Bighorn Sheep with a "U" on it? I thought I knew my animals but the "U" has me stumped. The vulture also appears confused. Shouldn't he (she?) be sitting by a Umbrella Bird? That's the U animal in our animal alphabet book.
I'm also wondering what that tiger has in mind for the seal. He is posed in a menacing pouncing posture.
So, if you can definitively tell me what the N and U are supposed to be, I will give you....gratitude. And perhaps another photo of the carefully aligned zoo.
I'm off to spend some time with a glass of wine and a serger I have on loan. This is unlikely to be a good combination!
I have several lists going right now. The "it must be done, shipped, ordered immediately list." The "it must be done by Christmas but not a minute before" list. And the "it really doesn't need to be done at all but it sure would be fun" list.
In the spirit of the third list Biscuit and I decorated these gingerbread houses. Dough recipe was a bit of a dud (from Martha) but the houses came together well.
Biscuit was a decorating champ and even used the piping bag. Mr. H got in on the action with the graham cracker cottage and did a spectacular job right down the Rudolph the Red Nosed Hippo. What, you didn't know Rudolph was a hippo?
I think this'll have to be a tradition.
after the first day (she picked the outfit)
For some reason, when Biscuit says,"school" it sounds an awful lot like, "god." So for two weeks now we've been hearing all about her new god.
From a frantic, screaming, "NO NEW GOD, NO NEW GOD!" last Monday.
To a more whiny, "No like new god, my mommy, no new god." followed by tears the whole rest of the week.
Then this Tuesday we had a breakthrough. On the way to school she announced, "My brave. My big girl. My blow kisses mommy." And indeed my big girl was very brave and after a quavery moment went right to her new teacher and right to the window to wave and blow kisses as I walked away.
This morning, once she got over the fact she couldn't wear her cow shirt again, I think she was actually looking forward to school and doing art projects and eating pencils (pretzels).
Daycare transitions officially suck but I think this is going to work out after all.
Mommy is also busy with "art" projects. Blogging is going to be sparse.
I hope your holiday plans are coming together better than mine.
Biscuit would only eat cottage cheese for dinner so we switched to crafting. After an excellent session of coloring using a great colored pencil roll from Sarah P Dot, we moved on to...felting!
I had never tried felting and on a whim bought a felt ball kit from WoolandHandcrafts.etsy.com. I've since learned from fellow Sac Craft Mafia member Kaytea that there is a great, local source for wool at a shop in Sacramento but I can't recall the name. That was useful, eh? If you're local it's next to Fox and Goose.
Anyway, since playing in bubbles is one of Biscuit's favorite things to do, felting seemed the perfect craft.
I wanted a candy cane ball so I wrapped red roving around the white innards.
Then, as instructed, we put the ball in a pair of sacrificed pantyhose and started to "gently" massage it in hot, soapy water. Oh wait, toddlers don't do "gentle."
This was interesting for about 5 minutes.
Then she got much more interested in the bubbles and putting them in her hair.
Yeah, really into the bubbles--note the increasing collection of wet tea towels. Meanwhile, mom was busy felting the wool in between photos.
Once the balls were sufficiently felted, we rinsed them in non-soapy water (aka the bath).
I'm not sure if these will be ornaments or pin cushions but they sure are fun to throw at each other around the house. Also, instead of candy canes, they kind of look like bloodshot eyeballs so I wouldn't suggest the red on white combo.
This was a very fun project. If I were doing it again with Biscuit I would have done the "gentle" part in the pantyhose without her and used her 5 minute attention span on the more vigorous felting after removing from the pantyhose. We have some lumpy balls here (ha, ha, ha)
In unrelated news, I created a clothespin doll tutorial over at Instructables.
I am very busy here. Busy being depressed that my very long (5 day!) weekend is over. And there are several things left on my weekend to do list.
Does everyone write a weekend to do list? I usually write mine Friday evenings and try to have it done by Sunday. I rarely succeed.
Usually, I get lazy and figure I don't have to do everything on my self imposed to do list. The fact that I got my car vacuumed and the laundry 3/4 done more than makes up for the unwritten thank you notes and the 1/4 laundry remaining. Also, I am good a rationalizing.
But for this NaBloPoMo thing I am NOT giving up. I am suddenly very stubborn about completing this challenge even if the entire internet has to read about my weekend to do list. (Actually, you don't have to read, that's the joy of the internet, you can click on by). So sorry about the lame posts lately.
On to the bonus content: ROBOT!
Mr. H carefully assembles the roller skating, clock headed robot using assorted duplos. Note the blond hair coming in from stage right.
The robot is complete. A masterpiece in yellow and green. It is ready to do your bidding. But wait,
in her continuing quest to take away all of daddy's fun the three foot tall, cell phone wielding monster destroys the robot with a single blow
Proud of her accomplishment, the monster moves on to other monster-like activities such as "pulling books off the shelves" and "drinking her bathwater."
The monster was stopped only by bedtime. And then the robot was reassembled and hides in the living room awaiting the monster's return in the morning.
The End.
