That’s Thrift-Tastic!

I’ve finally found my groove when it comes to thrifting in Texas. It takes more work than it did in Washington, but I’ve found a few great stores. Yesterday I went thrifting with a friend and found lots of wonderful things. Also, some really, really terrible things. As in this:

Sorry for the crappy camera phone photo… who knew there would be something so wonderfully ugly that I would need photo evidence to show my discovery to others?

But as I said, I found a ton of great stuff, the kids and I both got new clothes and I got a bunch of items for my newest project. It’s an Etsy shop called Pecae, Love and Tickles. I am going to be devoting my shop entirely to items made with repurposed materials, mostly kids clothes but whatever I am inspired to make with what I find. I am super excited. I’ll update as I get set up. I am really excited about this as it not only gives me a creative outlet but makes old things new again and saves them from the landfill. If you’ve read this blog much you know that’s something I care about very, very much.

I’ve found some really wonderful materials to work with and I can’t wait to get sewing. I’ll have some really fun items made quickly. I am going to wait a bit before I post them on Etsy, but I’ll share them here as I go.

In other news, we’ve really started to love our local library. Well technically, it’s not “our” library. The one in our town sucks. But the one eight miles down the road is great. Totally worth the drive for ten times the kids books. Keagan and Eden love the place.  We went this morning, Keagan picked out 17 new books to read and we read half of them before lunch. Which I dubbed “rock star lunch” because Keagan said he wanted to have a rock star dance party. He ate those veggies up so fast just because they were “rock star” veggies. I am filing that one away for the days he won’t eat.

Off to enjoy what’s left of naptime 🙂

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Advent Activities

We’re doing a Christmas activity each day until Christmas. We started the 30th of November by making these activity cards:

I found the numbers on some blog and I feel pretty crummy because I just can’t remember where! If anyone sees them and recognizes them, please tell me where they came from!

So we colored, stickered (we were given a large amount of Christmas stickers)  and glued those on the 30th. I’ve been adding the activities to the back here and there. I want to be sure we have one each day, but I also want to be flexible. With a 2 1/2 year old and an 8 month old I have to be!

On the first, we decorated one of our “faerie trees” out front that Keagan insists his friends, the faeries live in.

Keagan was really excited.

Keagan had a blast decorating and now gasps with joy every time we go outside. I love it! He said he made his faeries happy and their tree is pretty. Sounds good to me.

Yesterday, we made snowmen (I cut, he glued) and read “A Pirate’s Night Before Christmas” by Phillip Yates. The book was great! We read it several times and it’s a lot of fun. When you read this book aloud, you can not help but to talk like a pirate. And what kid doesn’t want to combine all the fun of pirates with all the wonder of Christmas? It was the first book he wanted to read when he woke up today as well. It’s a hit. It’s not one that will leave you all warm and fuzzy when it’s done, but it’s great.

Today, we made salt dough ornaments. We baked today and we’ll paint tomorrow. I’ll share photos when we’re done, but Keagan’s loving the process thus far.

I hope everyone’s enjoying the advent season. It’s a lot of fun to lead up to the big celebration with lots of fun activities. Christmas should be more than just a day, I think. Is anyone else celebrating the whole season? Anyone have any fun activities they’d like to share?

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Getting Ready for Thanksgiving

We’ve been making a lot of Thanksgiving crafts the past two weeks and while a lot of them were things I made up on my own, we have done a few we found online. I thought I’d link to some of the fun activities we’ve found.
http://www.dltk-holidays.com/thanksgiving/crafts-other.htm
http://crafts.kaboose.com/holidays/thanksgiving
http://familyfun.go.com/thanksgiving/thanksgiving-craft-decorations
We also found a few fun ideas over at Chasing Cheerios.

We also started using the lesson plans from Little Acorn Learning. We don’t use all of it, and we change things around a bit to work for our family, but it adds a nice rhythm to our day. Keagan seems to enjoy it and it’s all simple stuff that’s easy to do with Eden around. I like the reverence for nature, the acknowledgment of a creator and the fact that it’s not expecting too much academically out of a two year old. That said, we do our own letter/ early reading learning on the side and lots of craft projects as well. But it helps to fill out our day and give me motivation.

With Thanksgiving just two days away I am sure many of you are busy getting ready. I’m spoiled. All I am doing is making a pumpkin pie, which I’ll probably do tomorrow night. My mom hosts each year, makes wonderful food and doesn’t like to lose control of much, so pie it is. I will bring a few things along that are allergen friendly. Nick is trying this http://www.enzymedica.com/products/GlutenEase to see if he can get through dinner without feeling sick and still enjoy all the yummies. I hope it works for him. It’s nice to have one less allergen to think about!

Happy cooking and happy feasting to all!

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Gobble Gobble Craft!

Not a whole lot going on right now. Lots of turkey crafts being made. Simple hand-shaped ones. Keagan loves turkeys right now.

Eden started saying mama and it makes my heart warm.

I’m realizing my goal of finishing my Christmas gifts by Thanksgiving probably isn’t going to happen, however I have a great start and I won’t be nearly as stressed as last year. That’s a very, very good thing.

I’m so looking forward to Thanksgiving with my family. My mom makes a wonderful dinner every year and most of the food can be consumed by most of my family. Hooray!

I have quite a few half finished craft projects that need to become finished projects. Felt food (so cute… I never knew little felt cookies were so fun!) a few pairs of wool longies that are pinned and not sewed. I have silk to be dyed for play silks. And I have the most awesome fabric ever I need to make into beautiful clothes for Miss Eden.

I got it from SuperBuzzy. They have an awesome selection of unique (mostly Japanese) fabrics. I spend forever drooling and bought half a yard each of these two:

Only the second the background is red, not pink. I guess she’s out of the red now. They arrived fast and she even send little candies with it. Awesome. Now I have to patterns and I just can’t decide.

Now it’s time for bed.:)

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On Being a Faerie’s Helper

The past week or so has really been a blast with Keagan. I told you all before about Keagan’s Halloween Faeries. Well I’ve been having to come up with gifts for him each night ever since he decided that the Halloween gift exchange with the faeries was not just a one night thing. We were sick last week and I decided a few store bought (wood and made in the US) toys wouldn’t kill us. He really loved the wooden top and airplane. He did forget a few nights and that helped me as a tired sick mama. Last night, we ran out of store bought toys and were back to making them again.

I wanted to make him a plush monster as he’s really loved monsters lately and they don’t have to look perfect. I also wanted it to be small so I could use my scrap felt. My wonderful husband got in on the whole project. He cut and sewed the original shape and then told me how he wanted the eyes and mouth to look. I attached the eyes and mouth with sloppy (on purpose this time haha) embrodery.I was up into the wee hours of the morning finishing “silly monster” (as Keagan has been calling him) but the look on Keagan’s face when he saw it sitting under our “faerie tree” made it all worth it.

So sweet!

I will be glad when Halloween is done so I can get back to my Christmas crafting. I love doing this, but I know I have so much to get done. Ido think I will have a helper for that now, as my sweet husband seems to have caught the crafting bug. How can you not love creating for the ones you love?

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Um, That’s Not What I Meant

So in yesterday’s post, I told  you that Keagan and I made a paper chain to count down to Halloween and that I’d explained to Keagan that when all the chains were gone, we’d put on a costume, go out and get candy for the faeries and we’d leave it under our “faerie tree” where he’s told me they live and the next day, he’d have a gift from them. Keagan seemed excited and it seemed like he understood (he’s 2.5 if you’re not a regular reader)

Well last night, we tore a link off the chain while getting ready for bed. Then Keagan’s eyes lit up and he said “Let’s go give the faeries their present!” and ran to the front door. I stood there, in that moment knowing that I could either a) crush is happy little idea and have a toddler who would be angry with me until Halloween when we would be giving the faeries their present (candy) in exchange for some goodies or b) Allow it and know that I’d have almost two weeks of small gifts to come up with, thus creating a tradition that puts Halloween in competition with Chanukah for holiday with the most days of gift giving.

I chose b. The world needs more magic. So Keagan ran out the front door gleefully and called out “Hey faeries! Look! I have present for you!” We placed his paper chain under a pile of pinecones and I told him the faeries would take it while he was sleeping. “And bring Keagan a present!” (this was a statement, not a question) “Yes and they’ll bring you a present,” I said, wheels turning in my head. What on Earth would I give him?

Hubby suggested the woodland elf hat in “Bend the Rules Sewing” by Amy Karol of Angry Chicken. We have the wool felt on hand for that.  But I’ve been planning on giving that to him the day after Halloween, when he was feeding the faeries his trick or treat candy. Plus, if I start with something that big,  it’s going to be hard to make it fun every day.  And I didn’t feel like sewing a hat.

So I thought about what we have laying around the house. Lots of toliet paper rolls. I save them compulsivly, because I think we can use them for craft projects. Probably because I feel guilty that we haven’t switched over to using cloth instead of paper yet. Anyway, we have a ton of those. Could I color it? Too cheesy. Make a necklace? Maybe.  Then I got the idea to make a telescope to see the faeries better.

We have a lot of felt from various projects I over bought for, so I wrapped the felt around two tubes (one stuffed into the other) and cut the fabric. Then I wanted to use fabric glue to make it stay, but I couldn’t find it. So I decided I’d duct tape it in place. haha. Then I decided to embroider his name on it. The embroidery hoop was dangerously close to the sleeping baby and I didn’t have time to wash off any fabric markers, so it was totally free form and pretty sloppy.  Oh well. Then I added the leaves because I thought it made it look more faerie like. All in all, I don’t think it turned out too terribly for a  tired rushed project with limited supplies on hand.

Keagan seems quite pleased with it. Now I just have to come up with something for every night for the rest of October.

Looking at him and thinking of the fun that we could have with this tradition, I think it’s worth it 🙂 I will, however, start the Halloween chain much later next October.

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Reflection and Resolution

Well I can’t believe that 2008 is coming to a close. It’s shocking really.

A lot has happened this year. When the year started, we were so afraid of having another baby after Keagan’s traumatic birth that we thought we’d never have one.  We thought we’d probably have the husband get the “big v” and think about adoption.  Thankfully, a friend convinced me to at least TALK with a midwife about the possibility of getting pregnant.  And I did. I talked to a wonderful midwife and we’re so happy we did. We talked about all that went wrong last time, and how to prevent it this time. The OBGYN group I saw was not about prevention at all… they only acted after something went wrong.

So after talking with the midwife, we decided to start to try to conceive. We thought it would take months -I was still nursing and my cycles were anything but regular. On the midwife’s recommendation, I picked up “Taking Charge of Your Fertility” (and happened to find it at Goodwill for $2! I love thrift shopping!)  and we got pregnant on the first cycle! Even the midwife was shocked to see how quickly I was pregnant!

So thanks to all of that, our sweet Eden will be here sometime near April 4th. And we are very grateful for that. This pregnancy has not been full of any of the problems I faced with Keagan’s. I am visualizing a wonderful, peaceful water birth in a birth center and feel that I will be able to achieve that. And  I think that Keagan will benefit greatly from having a sister to share his childhood with.

Another big change this year came after reading Shane Claiborne’s book, “The Irresistable Revolution.” It really changed how we thought about a lot of things. It’s from a Christian perspective, but I suggest it to anyone and everyone. It’s about humanity;  it’s about love; it is about how human beings should treat one another. It made me think about things I’d never considered before. Now, because of this book, I am not afraid of the homeless. I am not afraid to try and help people in need. We’ve also simplified our lives quite a bit. I’ve gotten really into thrifting after reading about how badly child laborers are treated. I don’t want to support the companies that hurt those kids, plus it is great knowing that I am reusing materials that could have otherwise been thrown away. It brought on a lot of changes for our family, all for the good. When  a friend recommended it to be the first time, I was pregnant with Keagan and just didn’t have the attention span. I am glad I went back to it later.

My husband took a lower paying job this year, but it was a step in the right direction. He’s in a feild that he wants to be in, his job is secure, and he’s moving up quickly within his office. It was a scary choice to make, but it was the right one.

Keagan has changed so much this year. He was a baby when the year started. As the year closes, I have to admit that he’s much more of a little boy than a baby. He’s smart, funny and full of life. What more could a mama ask for?

We also moved this year. Our new home is much smaller, but much better suited for us. It’s kind of in the middle of nowhere, but that’s okay for now. We do toy around with the idea of living in Tacoma, where my husband works. I always thought I was a country girl, but more urban living really seems appealing to us right now. I think that is a change 2009 will bring for us.

All that said, I am ready for our new year and the many new challenges and changes it will surly bring. I am a little nervous about being a mama to TWO kiddos, but I think I am up to it. I kind of have to be, don’t I? 🙂

I have quite a few goals for 2009

1. Read the Bible. All of it. It’s not as if I’ve never picked it up before, I’ve read most of it, many parts over and over again. But I want to read it all and I want to make sure I am doing it every day.

2. Get Organised! My dirty little secret (or not so secret if you know me in real life) is that I am a TERRIBLE hosuekeeper. I will not let this be the case anymore. I won’t! If anyone has any motivation and organisation tips, please let me know!

3. Quit being scared of my sewing machine! I KNOW I can use the thing. I am capable. I need to realize it.

4. Complete 40 craft projects. I love to craft. But I never do it, or I start and don’t finish. I want to do about one a week, giving my self space to take time off with the new baby and to have some projects that are bigger and therefore take longer. I am going to quit drooling over other people’s creations and make my own!

5. Get out more! I’ve been in mama isolation too long. I love my son, but I need to get out. With a second one coming, this is going to be even more important. I am to the point where I get out so rarely that I become awkward in social settings sometimes. EEK. I need to get out. With the kids or without.

6. Get back into my charity work. I was doing great for awhile, but the move, the pregnancy, the holidays etc all got in my way. But that’s no excuse. People are still hungry out there!

7. Find more natural learning activities for Keagan. He is so smart and he just eats this stuff up. I need to nurture his little mind.  I am not talking about flash cards and drilling information into him here. I am talking more about Montessori inspired, child-led activities that will help nurture his learning and creativity.By the end of the year, we will probably be working on a bit more, still child led as he will be preschool aged and we’re going to homeschool him. I have a feeling, however that it will be leaning to the side of unschooling, at least for his early childhood.

8. Be a better cook. I really fall short in most things related to home making, so this is another goal I am going to be working on. I hate processed foods, yet I get lazy and use them anyway. I’d like to stop that!

That’s all I can think of at the moment. Maybe I should stop it there for now anyway. Don’t want to set myself up to fail 🙂

What are your goals this year? Have any tips for me to help accomplish mine?

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Fingerpainting for Christmas

Keagan made some finger paintings for family members this Christmas. After he painted them, we traced his little handprint on them. They came out quite cute, but I think the process may have been even more cute!

Unfortunatly, I forgot to take a photo of a finished handprint fingerpainting before I gave them all away.

He is really loving art these days, so I will be sure to do more art projects with him. He got an easel for Christmas (and I will blog about his Christmas soon!) and he is loving it!

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Crafting in the snow…

We’re under a huge blanket of snow right now. Maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it will make me finish my Christmas crafting. I sure as heck can’t get out of here for a few days. The news predicted something much worse than this (don’t they always?) so I  relieved that there’s less than a foot outside and no wind.

Keagan is not a fan of the snow. He likes running around in it, but he does NOT like how it feels to touch it. And he won’t wear his mittens. I will try again tomorrow, but everytime the cold hits his hands, he screams. Maybe if I distract him, the mittens won’t bother him somehow.

With only a few days left until Christmas, I still have much to do. I should be feeling “the stress” right now, but for whatever reason, I am staying calm. That’s a good thing, but I need to get my bottom in gear to get done in time. I have to paint a table for my son, finish his felt board, make and embroider some ornaments, finish some finger painting projects with Keagan and embroider some handprint poems for the grandmas. And do a lot of baking. But it should all be fun and I am doubting hubby will be able to work most of this week because of the weather and has Christmas eve (and Christmas) off, so I bet he will be around a lot to keep track of kiddo while I work. If I felt like it, I could finish the felt board tonight. Maybe I will.

Today was my birthday. I’m 26. I am mildly bummed about the big day as we’d planned to go out of town, but too many roads were closed to accomplish that. We’ll go eventually, so it’s not too upsetting. I am kind of bummed that hubby passed out on the sofa about ten minutes after Keagan fell asleep. Oh well. It’s just a day. Jesus has always beat me for birthday attention anyway 😉 I am okay with being second to the Son of God.

Okay. I’ve rambled enough. I hope those who read this are well and that you have a wonderful Christmas if I don’t blog before.

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