Once your Baby turns 2, do you have to stop calling him Baby?
I hope not.
P.S. Birthday Morning Donut Cakes have become a tradition in our family, completely replacing the traditional birthday cake. When we don’t have a big party (every other year), we invite the neighborhood kids to come over in their jammies to help celebrate. I highly suggest it.
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My kids are always looking for ways to earn money. It might have something to do with me always responding “save your money!” to their every candy and toy request. Starting young, I have payed them for odd jobs around the house, but the girls have quickly realized being your own boss beats being an “employee” or a “contract worker”. Being your own boss also means endless possibilities for cash earnings as evidenced by my ten-year old’s successful Cake Pop/Bon Bon business. What does this have to do with face paint? Well, with the help of Klutz Face Painting book, it looks like face painting might turn into a new, child-owned business in this house.
With easy-to-follow instructions and all the supplies included, the Klutz Face Painting book quickly taught my 10 year old daughter and her best friend some pretty impressive face and body painting skills that got the attention of all the neighborhood kids. After a little practice on each other, the kids were lined up and willing to pay a quarter a design.
With just a little more practice, I think they could hit the neighborhood birthday party circuit and make a little college money.
You can find the Klutz Face Painting book as well as a bunch of other fun and creative titles that will no doubt promote entrepreneurship in your kids at Klutz.com (and they are now packaged in easier to wrap shapes just in time for holiday gift giving).
If you love Klutz as much as we do, enter the Wrap It Up With Klutz! Sweepstakes every week until November 26th for a chance to win some prizes too! Ten winners each week win 10 Klutz Titles!
Disclosure: I’m thrilled to be a Klutz Books Ambassador for this holiday season. I’ve been a Klutz fan since I was a kid when I got my first Klutz book about games you can play with a Koosh Ball. Yes, I’m that old. I’ve bought numerous Klutz books for my kids and others over the years. They are definitely my “go to” birthday & holiday gift. While I received compensation as well as a gift or sample of a Klutz product for consideration in preparing to write this content, all thoughts and opinions are my own. I assure you my undying love and adoration for the Klutz brand was not bought, it was cultivated over 20 years of great and real experiences with the company.
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Before now, I’ve ventured into the world of crochet amigurumi only twice in the 20 years I’ve known how to crochet (1, 2). Enter Long-Legged Friends. The long legged animals and Japanese sensibility make this book irresistible. Amigurumi #3 was inevitable.
Pattern: Fluffy Poodle from Long-Legged Friends Book
Yarn: Lion Brand Yarn Silky Twist in Olive (with it’s great texture, this yarn really made the animal)
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Today I’m sharing one of our family’s favorite holiday crafting and sewing traditions at the Holiday Sew Along hosted by Cindy at Skip to My Lou. Head on over to check it out! While you’re there, check out all the other awesome “Handmade Holiday” gift tutorials she’s featured these last few years.
Click HERE for tutorial.
But that’s not all, find all sorts of handmade holiday goodness going on over at According to Kelly and loads of Holiday-baking-yumminess at A Southern Fairytale!
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I pieced together my very first quilt at Sewing Summit 2012 with the help of all the amazing quilters (especially Danny from Mommy for Reals) during free sewing time. They shared their tips & tricks, giving me the confidence to cut my pile of vintage, new and scrap fabrics. I wanted it to look like a old quilt you might be lucky enough to find in a thrift store.
Even though it’s just a small, 30″x30″ baby blanket, it’s made up of 100 tiny squares. It’s machine quilted it to a thin piece of natural cotton using my new best friend, 505 Spray to keep it from shifting around. Since my corners didn’t all match, I decided to straight stitch parallel lines along the long seams where the corners did match.
The key to any good “blankie” is the super soft backing. I picked up some “minky” during my last trip to downtown LA (not that it was any cheaper, but there always seems to be more interesting choices). You can find similar, embossed minky HERE.
I think the recipient approves of her new blankie.
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Since we lived in NYC for almost seven years, the devastation left in the wake of Hurricane Sandy is close to our hearts. While our friends who still live in the area fared well, many people did not. After showing the kids photos and video of the areas that were most affected by the storm, they decided to pool the “sharing” money they’ve saved over the past few months to send needed supplies to the Occupy Sandy team in Brooklyn. Whatever you may think of the effectiveness of their Occupy Wall street operation, there is no denying the amazing things this group is doing in the trenches of hurricane Sandy recovery.
With their $48 the kids settled on a few packs of face masks from the Occupy Sandy Amazon Registry. As instructed by the website, Princess immediately sent off an email to let the group know what had been ordered. You should have seen the smile on her face when she got this email from in return:
“WOW! We LOVE your support! You guys are amazing. Thank you so much for your donation! Face masks are so important – thank you guys for buying these for the victims of Hurricane Sandy. I hope all your friends from NYC are safe – take care and thanks again for helping out so many people in need!!!”
While “thank yous” are never expected, this one got the kids excited to do more. There may be a “Hot Cocoa for the Hurricane Victims” stand in works. Thank you “John H” for all you’re doing for the recovery effort and for taking the time to write that email.
You can find updates on the Hurricane Sandy recovery efforts and more ways to help HERE
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There’s a big, selfish part of me that doesn’t want to give Sewing Summit anymore publicity because I want/need/have to go next year and tickets are super hard to come by already. I guess I could tell you it wasn’t that great, but that would be a HUGE lie. I spent 3 days thrifting, friending, sewing, learning, networking, and eating. For me, someone who loves all those things, it was weekend of pure awesome.
The trip started off with a thrift/antique/vintage store hop I co-hosted with the talented Melissa of I Still Love You. She did most of the work by putting together a fab shopping route around downtown Salt Lake City (if you visit, you should use her map to hit some fun shops).
Maria, Lisa, Heather, Melissa, Katie, Veronica and Me
I met some of my favorite people from the whole weekend on that shopping trip. Katie, the second girl over from me in the photo made her ENTIRE outfit including the red skinny jeans. You COULD NOT tell the difference between them and store bought. She’s my garment sewing hero. Heather and I connected immediately with our similar background in the fashion industry. We actually worked for competing companies at the very same time. The company she worked for rhymes with Gildren’s Space.
?, Mia, Tiffany, Me, ?, Miranda (totally drawing a blank on some names -please help me out if you can identify these two girls!)
Early friday morning, I took out a small group of attendees on a 5K fun run through downtown SLC. When it’s 6am, you know who the die-hards are. I rewarded one lucky runner/sewist with a prize package donated by Another Mother Runner, Nuun, & Team Sparkle. Then we all rewarded ourselves with french toast at the hotel coffee shop as we bonded over our mutual love of running & sewing.
I’m so glad I got to teach my “Down and Dirty Patternmaking Skills for Childrenswear” class on Friday afterrnoon. Otherwise, I would have had a tight knot in my stomach the entire weekend. It’s stressful to take a subject that deserves a few semesters of hands-on classes and try to teach it a two hour lecture format, making sure everyone (with their varied backgrounds and experience) understands the content and learns something from the class. I think it went well, but after it was over, I was itching to do a “hands-on” Down and Dirty Patternmaking for Childrenswear class. Sewing Summit 2013 perhaps?
Someday, I might post a synopsis of the class content. For now, if patternmaking interests you, follow these two boards on Pinterest:
Childrenswear Patternmaking-Sewing Summit (I’ve put links to all the supplies & books I referenced in the class as well as some online tutorials).
Pattern Practice (as I come across interesting styles, I’ll pin them here for “pattern practice”).
The classes I took at Sewing Summit were awesome. I loved rubbing elbows with women who are talented, inspiring and willing to share their expertise.
I learned how to quilt with Amy Ellis from Amy’s Creative Side. I practiced my pockets with Deborah Moebes from Whipstitch Fabrics (I was also lucky enough to be Deborah’s roomie – keep your eye out for her new book). I soaked up all sorts of sewing tricks and tips for special occassion sewing from Sarai Mitnick from Colette Patterns, and I whipped out a couple maxi skirts on a drool-worthy Baby Lock serger with Leanne Barlow from Elle Apparel.
My favorite part of Sewing Summit might have been the late night sewing in the rooms filled with Baby Lock sewing machines and Olfa cutting tools. It felt like a college dorm (complete with pj pants, candy and giggling) but sewing was the late-night activity of choice. I knocked out a couple projects I’ve been wanted to tackle for FOREVER and did it among a group of people who appreciated the delicacy of a perfect placket and the satisfaction of a well-pieced quilt.
At the end of it all, Sewing Summit 2012 was an amazing, relaxing, inspiring weekend full of networking, sewing, running, and eating. It was a weekend I totally needed and will look forward to in 2013.
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The Baby used his first sentence, “More Candy” at Todd’s office party.
The Hulk got into a tussle with “the scary guy from Scream” in the office “Spook Alley”. The Hulk threw the first punch. The Scream guy was just trying to defend himself.
The Fab Five were together again thanks to all the girls on the cul de sac joining in on our Olympic costume fun.
Thanks to the internets, my guacamole display was the hit of the neighborhood Halloween party.
We brought back the Mighty Mouse costume Pumpkin wore when she was 3 years old (after I ripped off the girly sequin trim). The Baby loved it more than his Olympic swimmer costume.
I was totally impressed by the kids’ pumpkin carving.
Happy Halloween 2012!
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We went with an Olympic family costume theme for the church Trunk or Treat. The girls were Olympic gymnasts, McKayala Maroney and Gabby Douglas. The boys were Olympic swimmers, Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte. Todd and I were Olympic coaches in our spruced up warm up suits from the thrift store.
It was easy to pull together the boys costumes using bike shorts as Speedo swim trunks and accessories pulled out of my swim bag. The same tutorial worked for the girls Olympic gymnast jackets and for the boys’ warm up hoodies. The gold medals were the same too, I just had to make a whole lot more of them. My only regret is that I couldn’t find a 4 year old appropriate, blinged out grill for our little “Ryan Lochte” to wear.
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Big Brother was great to play along with our family Olympic theme for the church Halloween party, but for “real Halloween” he wanted to be the Incredible Hulk. I was about to buy a pre-made Hulk costume when I came across this tutorial for a DIY muscle shirt costume.
I decided to give it a shot.
If I were to do it again, I’d cut the neck smaller (my green fabric was super stretchy) and I’d make some muscle leggings to go along with it. But otherwise, I was pretty happy with it. Big Brother on the other hand thought I was “The best mom ever” for creating this transformative costume of his dreams. I may have made it for Halloween, but this costume will get worn all year round.
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