Our girl is 7! Her birthday was last Friday the 15th, and we had two full days of celebrating. Everyone here is still recovering, and I’m getting over a bug that left me with a fever upwards of 103 last night. Friday morning we were at school for her class’s birthday circle, then we left school for a day at Ikea (she asked for a new desk for her birthday) and Emerald City ComicCon. Saturday morning was her Wild Kratts-themed birthday party, and Saturday night we went to Monster Jam.
Category: Making Stuff
Here’s a simple, quick, cute project to make with your kids. We made these googly-eyed love bugs for H’s class Valentines this year, but we’ve made them in the past just for fun. H’s party was postponed a week because of a giant snowstorm the night of my birthday that, combined with midwinter break, meant school was closed all of last week. It was the fourth snowstorm we’d had in just over a week, February has been wild around here. So one day while H was home and I was working, I set her up to work on these for school.
Last year was unlike any other year I’ve ever had. I think the silence on this blog kind of reflects that. Trucking along in a quieter-than-usual but other wise normal year, and then June 17th comes and off the grid I go. That’s when we finished packing up everything we owned in NJ (everything that was left after weeks of purging, yard sales, and donations), left the house we’d owned for 10 years, 7 months, and 12 days, spent a week driving across the country to Washington, moved into a rental apartment, spent three months looking at houses/putting offers on houses/buying a house, and then moved into our farmhouse on the 28th of September. It’s on six acres of forested woodlands, it’s beautiful, and I’m so in love with it out here.
It’s been a little more than six months since I last posted here, which is a record. This blog is ten years old, and I’ve never gone that long without posting! But it was kind of a welcome break–I needed to concentrate on packing up, moving from New Jersey to Washington, getting settled, finding a house, getting H settled at a new school. It’s been a ride, and we’re just starting to settle down.
I started this quilt almost two years ago with a ton of sketches, and it is finally, finally finished. I don’t know why I’ve never posted photos of the progress on this quilt, only sketches. But I’ve worked on it, put it aside, finished the top, put it aside for months upon months before making the backing, and then putting it aside again before I finally got it quilted and bound. But now it’s done…just in time for us to move out of this house, and out of this bedroom that we specifically painted to coordinate with this quilt. It’s like the curse of the boyfriend sweater, but for bedrooms.
This was, by a mile, the best birthday party H has ever had. Four of her friends and their moms met us in Brooklyn at Brooklyn Owl, a unicorn horn store, for a day out in NYC. The moms went for coffee, and Adam and I stayed to take photos of the girls picking out their own special unicorn horns, making unicorn crafts, eating unicorn cupcakes, and solving clues for the store’s magic mirror, which spoke to them and transformed them from little girls into magical unicorns. We could not have packed more unicorns in if we tried, it was fabulous.
I made this quilt for H’s 6th birthday this week, I finished it last week just in time for her big day on Thursday. I used the Lisa the Unicorn pattern from Elizabeth Hartman, and it was phenomenal. Clear directions, and so much fun to make.
This is a great experiment from our Learning Resources Deluxe Lab Set. It was quick, it wasn’t too messy, and H thought it was completely fascinating. You’ve got all these ingredients at home already, so this is a great one for a snow day (like tomorrow), a rainy day, or just when you need a quick experiment to do with the kids.
Read more on Tie Dyeing Milk Is a Fast and Fun Kids’ Science Experiment…
We gave H this Hape Puppy Pouch kit for Christmas, and we sewed it up this month. I haven’t seen it available anymore, I’m not sure if it’s just sold out or discontinued. But if you can’t find the puppy, here’s the fox kit.
Read more on Kid Sewing Project! We Made This Hape Puppy Pouch Together…
I did it! I sewed something, and it’s only 13 days in to the new year. I didn’t make much last year, it seemed, but I went back to work full time in July. I was a lot busier. This year, though, is my year of doing and making and reading and having some head space.