The first party.

If you can believe it this little lady is almost one!

It certainly seems the last year has gone by in a blink. I’ll never forget having two crazy toddlers playing at 4:30 in the morning at my house! Ha! Of course I had to volunteer my services to help celebrate since I never pass up working on a great party.

Found yet another use for the garland. Man I love that thing, I know, broken record.

Last picture of it for a while, promise (here’s the link to my original post about it).

This new garland Donna made with Ribbon Jar ribbon was so awesome (this is only part of it and the picture does not do it justice). My mom helped us figure out the best way to make it. Using a wider organdy worked for the base because when you tie ribbon on it you can still move the pieces around, yet they stay in place perfectly. The pieces that dangle are all about a yard, some a little less. The textures and colors were so welcoming blowing in the breeze and dancing in the sunlight.

I thought a bouquet would be appropriate for the “no gifts please” party. I put a little picture on the tag from Hazel’s first photo shoot (warning that link contains the cutest video of Tuesday that you can not help but watch five times at least).

The party was loosely letter themed so I used my Silhouette to cut out big letters for the kids to color.

I also used some vinyl (got it here) to make stickers for the goodie bags. Oh and I cut out that little H confetti. I also made Hazel a shirt, I’ll show that later in the week.

I think Hazel really liked her party. And we loved celebrating with her!

Another family pic! Only Tuesday got a little confused about what we were supposed to be doing and said “happy birthday Hazel!” instead of smiling. 🙂

For my muffin

For some reason Bj does not like the word “muffin” so when I call Tuesday my little muffin he cringes. I think it’s sweet though and it still slips out. I just started making her these muffin tray lunches for our out in the yard summer days. I’m sure you’ve seen them before, here’s our take:

Frozen blueberries, carrot sticks, kettle corn, CANDY, a gummy vitamin, “natural” cheetos, pitted cherries, yogurt, cold hotdog, and pasta salad. I was putting everything directly in the pan, but I took some pity on our dishwasher (Bj) since it sits out and coagulates until he finishes work. These silicon liners are much easier to clean. I got them a while ago at Homegoods and have only used them for this type of thing and not actual muffins. This was really too much food (don’t worry I helped her!) so I want to find a little six hole muffin tin that is a little lighter and smaller. I should have known better than to fill this up so full when there was a bulldozer in the neighborhood!

We sat in my neighbor’s yard staring across the street for a nice long while. And Tuesday was not the only kid in the neighborhood enjoying the driveway remodel, they were all out excitedly watching the machines dig and scrape.

Easy outdoor chair refashion


Despite annoying sewing machine setbacks that are making me want to pull my hair out (repair place, “well, we’ve never seen this before”) I managed to sew a little something. Bj and I are getting ready to have our first ever garage sale and it turns out he doesn’t find my collection of chairs-I-will-some-day-refinish as endearing as I do. His request was that I do something with them or put them in the sale. Since I bought the material to recover this um, years ago I figured I should get to it! I checked out a book from the library that went over how to take this type of outdoor lounger apart, but my (thrifted for a dollar) version was made with dowels and not easily deconstructed. So I decided on a slip-cover.

I was originally going to paint the wooden frame, but I really like the contrast with the fabric. And because we are letting all our other outdoor furniture weather like this I think it will fit in better.

To make the cover I measured the width of the cushion and added an inch. Though I continually under-estimate my seam allowance it seems I have not yet learned my lesson and this was a close call. I recommend an inch and a half. The length of the fabric I needed was longer than the length of the fabric I had so I seamed two pieces together to make one long piece. Then I folded one edge over twice, hiding the raw edge. On the first long stitch I stuck in 10″ lengths of ribbon, then on the second pass (the edge/top stitching) I pulled the ribbon to the edge of the fabric so it would be sticking right out and make for clean ties. I used one of my favorite, most versatile ribbons, herringbone. It is probably the ribbon I most miss having in the house whenever I need it because it is good for everything. And for tying it can’t be beat (the ties on Tuesday’s 4th outfit were a new organic herringbone my mom is carrying). I didn’t bother singeing the ends, as I usually do since this cover will not be on and off as often as say, a sunhat. I used the full eight yards I bought, I thought I would have loads of extra. Do not underestimate the ribbon you need for ties!

Once the ties were in place, and the edges hemmed I pinned where I wanted to finish the short sides. I tried ties, but a very wide (2″) piece of Velcro worked much better, and looked nicer. I happened to have it in my stash after I sent Bj to the store for me once for Velcro. He came back with all different types and asked shocked, “do you know how many types of Velcro there are?” The cover comes off easily, and if it happens to outlast the chair the fabric will be easy to reuse (good because it is regularly 15.99 a yard!).

Besides having to take my machine in multiple times during this super simple project, it was a fast and easy sew. I think it will be great to have on hand for extra seating. Right now I have it on the front porch so I can enjoy it a bit.

I’m happy to have this one off the list!

Outdoor Play Kitchen

Back in May I saw a post on Sew Liberated that I took note of, like many of hers! It was of a darling little outdoor play kitchen. Then I got busy and kind of forgot about it when I saw a post by Em about their garden kitchen. I showed it to Bj and we knew Tuesday would just love one. I asked around and no one had an extra cupboard (or didn’t want to give it to us for fear it ruin the look of our yard) so we went hunting for one. After a few garage sale drive-bys and thrift stores turned up empty Bj decided he wanted to build Tuesday one. So with 3 6′ 1 x 12 knotty pine boards, a 1 x 2 and a dented metal bowl the kitchen was born!

Tuesday was enamored with the white plastic handled silverware at the thrift store so I let her get a handful. The small metal bowls were stacked in the “sink” for $2.50, and the big hit is the mini floor sifter. All the other things I had; a little scale (bought a while ago for decoration off eBay), jars, plastic bowls, spice containers, pitcher (from Ikea in the plant section) and rags. Bj had the idea to cut a little piece of my left over butcher block countertop and make it into a cutting board.

It’s quite a well stocked little kitchen with beans, grains, and nuts from our real kitchen for her to play with. Here is her favorite creation of the day, candy soup!

Mmm, tasty Tuesday! I would say she loves this kitchen but that would be an understatement. She is obsessed with it. Four hours a row of playing there? No problem.

She just starts spreading out along our retaining wall. Bj moved over her little umbrella when it got bright in the late afternoon. Our neighbor heard us playing and came through our gate to bring fresh broccoli and peas from her garden. I have asked her if she wants to have friends over to play here and she has adamantly told me that she does NOT want to share the play kitchen. So we might have to work on that. Bj and I were left to tweaking the drip system, weeding and pruning as even we were not welcome to cook with her.

And while it will get weathered, as we’re not going to paint or seal it, it is quite tucked away back here. Happy little sounds of our favorite cook coming from behind the bushes and big fern. I really must insist, like Meg, that if you have room to make one and little ones that would like it make one today! Messy outdoor fun is the best. And REAL water in a play kitchen is like gold to toddlers. Good luck, let me know if you want measurements!

I still hear fireworks…

So I’m posting this, even though the forth is nearly over. What a fabulous long weekend we had as a family. Long days in the yard, family and friend BBQs, ah the good life. I also ordered 750 prints and realized only a few included a family picture, so I had my mom snap one right when we got to her place.

Note to self: must learn how to use new remote for camera and take more of these!
(Tuesday’s outfit was made by my mom and is so cute!)

That’s not a TV!

For a while I’ve been bugging Bj to get rid of our TV. He’d want me to get rid of something and I’d throw back a, “well how about you get rid of the TV?” knowing that then I wouldn’t have to get rid of whatever it was he was talking about. It’s not that I never watch it, I have a few shows, but my kid goes to be early at ten (last night 11:30… ugh!) so that doesn’t leave a lot of time for TV watching. I thought the living room would be much more useful without the TV, because we could arrange it however we wanted, not just to stare at one wall. Well something came over Bj a few weeks ago and he decided I was right and it should go. And last weekend he was digging around our basement storage room and found this old thing rolled up and put it in our garage sale pile. I saw it and remembered something I had forgotten about for years!

This map! A vintage old world classroom map. I bought this thing at a nearby estate sale a few years ago. I think it was half off day because the sticker still on it said $20 and I don’t think I would have paid that, pretty sure it was only $10. I brought it home, snuck it downstairs and stashed it in the corner of the basement where it slowly got wedged between a wall and shelf unit and I forgot about it. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it. I did. That’s why I had to buy it even though I had no place for it! I brought it upstairs once it was found again and begged Bj to hang it for me. He was so NOT sold on the idea of this on the wall, but I told him we could just put it up until the garage sale and if he still hated it then we could maybe sell it. I may  have whispered the maybe part.
As I mentioned above with out the TV the furniture can go (almost) anywhere in our living room. So we rearrange, we repurposed, and I’m sewing up a storm to redecorate . I need some dry days to paint the train table and I need to find a perfect orange bowl (according to my mom). Once all that is done I’ll show you the whole thing. Here is what it looked like about a month ago, we’ll call this the before.

And I don’t want to seem like a complete luddite. I’m addicted to my iPhone, we get three Netflix discs at a time, and I know about Hulu. I like Bones way too much, even when I don’t want to and So You Think You Can Dance is one of my favorite things about summer. But with the whole room basically being about television and Tuesday’s awareness about it becoming greater and greater I felt like we could do without this screen. We have a computer, and the projector I show my client’s photos on can be used as a TV. We actually got rid of cable a while ago for an antenna (free TV!) which helped the whole “just having the TV on because” thing (anyone else get hooked into marathons of How it’s Made or anything on HGTV?). So we were down to a handful of channels. I am MUCH more mindful of really wanting to spend my time watching something vs. doing something now. It’s been a few (three?) weeks and I’m not missing it. Go ahead and call me crazy (yes, we know, we have been told). I think it’s going to work. Bj has assured me that if it doesn’t we’ll just get a bigger one, ya right Beeg!!!

The unbelievable before and after

These pictures of my house seem like one of those crazy commercials where there is a little asterisk and it says results not typical. I can’t believe how much my yard has grown up this first year. This was July last year:

And late June this year:

We only lost a little lavender plant (you might notice the small gap) and our vine maple. The Guy (his name is Guy Countryman) who did our rock and everything brought us a new one this spring. It is pretty amazing if you consider that we planted on one of the hottest days of the year last year. My landscape designer told me this little rhyme, “The first year they sleep, the second year they creep, the third year they leap.” Um… I don’t know how much more leaping these plants will do, they all ready wow me every time I walk up to the house.
Before:

And now:

Are you kidding me with those plants? I had to move some of the little ones because these guys (Lady’s Mantle) went ca-razy! I love them, and have put them in loads of bouquets. Oh yes, bouquets. I can step out and make one whenever I like!
If you’ll recall when I was planning my yard I worked to find someone who would raze the whole top layer because I didn’t want to use any chemicals to kill the weeds/grass that was already there. I planned on having an organic garden and I’m happy to say I do! I love to be out in my yard so taking the time to weed and get to know my plants is very enjoyable for me. Luckily Tuesday loves it as well. She has caught the weeding bug so bad that she points them out everywhere, even on city property or other people’s yards! Ha! And you can’t see the slug damage on plants or powdery mildew on my roses in these pictures. Both things that I’ve had to find natural solutions for. I also had root weevil and used beneficial nematodes (that totally freaked me out).

I am in my soil and looking through my plants nearly daily. This gives me a pretty good idea of the condition of the soil (great, tons of worms!) and plants. At the bridal shower I was asked who my gardener was. We don’t have one. Bj and I do everything ourselves in the yard (including setting new drip lines, building things, electrical work—he’s put in some lighting, etc.). We have long workdays out there, but more often it’s mornings or evenings working together. Believe it or not it is a zero stress environment. We may not agree on everything decoration wise inside (oohhh wait until you see what I dug up to hang on my wall), but out here there is room for all the things we want to try. And if it doesn’t work out we’ll move it . When I planted this garden I knew so little about what to deadhead and when to prune. I’m paying for a that a little this year as some of my things got quite “leggy” from not doing it properly. Lucky for me we’ve had tons of rain this spring and I think that was very forgiving to me in a lot of ways. Can you believe looking at this lush loveliness that we’ve only been watering for a few weeks? Those rumors you hear about Oregon and rain are true (it is raining as I write this!)!
So yes, those plants will grow. Yes, you’ll kill a few. Yes, you can organic garden. And yes, it adds so much beauty to your life!

Showered

My dear friend Erin is getting married this summer. I am so excited for her because it is a perfect match, and also she is awesome and I love weddings. So when I took Tuesday to the carousel and noticed a little bee/honeycomb dish set in their gift shop (Erin is an amateur bee keeper) I had to pick up a few pieces for her shower. The next time I talked to her I asked her who was going to throw her shower and volunteered myself. She said she wasn’t thinking she would have one. Ok, I live for stuff like this so I was shocked! Who would pass up the opportunity to have a party thrown in their honor?!?! Eventually I wore her down (and I found out her BFF was working on her too) and was able to throw her a shower this last weekend.
I wish I had a picture of everything all set up, I am getting a little better about coordinating everything so it is ready when guests come, but I didn’t have a chance to snap photos before hand. I did run to get my camera when we started playing games because they were so funny.

For this one they had books on their heads and had a minute and a half to draw Erin on her wedding day.
We did another drawing game. I got a big pad of paper on an easel and had each woman draw a card that had a wedding word on it with a point value. The person who got people to guess the most cards (points) was the winner—like wedding Pictionary. The game before that was one where we stood in a circle and I said a rhyme while a gift was passed around. The last one was the most fun. It was called purse game when I found it online. Basically you have each woman sit with their purse and read a list of things that might be in there, along with a point value. So lipgloss 1 point, Target gift card 7 points:

This lady was awesome. She had everything, except for the condom which I valued at 20 points, and if anyone had one they were not owning up to it! 🙂
We had some yummy food. Erin’s best friend suggested the menu and it turned out great. A curry chicken salad (made from a beer can chicken of Bj’s, so yum!), and a spinach strawberry salad with vinaigrette. I added some fava greens which we got in our CSA box and I actually ate a bunch and liked it (huge for me as I’m not usually a fan of vinaigrette).
Edited to add the recipe:

2 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 tablespoon poppy seeds
1/2 cup white sugar (did you know you can get a huge bag of organic sugar for $7 at Costco now?)
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup distilled white vinegar
1/4 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon minced onion
10 ounces fresh spinach
1 quart strawberries cleaned hulled and sliced.
1/4 cup almonds blanched or slivered.
In medium bowl whisk together (we used an immersion blender) sesame seeds, poppy seeds, sugar, oil, vinegar, paprika, worcestershire and onion cover and chill for at least one hour.
Toss dressing with salad ingredients just before serving. Enjoy!
And the curry chicken salad:
Chicken (we used a beer can chicken that had been shredded, you could just use chicken breast if you wanted)
1 stalk celery, chopped
green onions, chopped
small apple, peeled & chopped
handful of dried cranberries
seedless grapes, halved
ground black pepper
teaspoon of curry powder…. actually I think I used more, I really like curry.
mayo
Mix it up and adjust as needed! easy! You can also add pecans.

Bj is killing me with all these cake pops! I helped decorate them, and just did a rainbow of sprinkles. These were the left overs.

Tuesday wasn’t invited (well she would have been welcome but I thought it would be easier to focus on the bride this way), but here she is after her nap scrounging on the left overs while I was cleaning up. The big poofs were from the tea party (and have already been loaned out once). They are holding up pretty well. The garland is from her first birthday party and I use it for every event, I love having it. I even put some on the porch this time:

So fun. I want to make a forth of July garland. My mom made one and her packs of ribbon and jars are on sale so I just might have to get on that! I’ve got a week right?
So yes, fabulous shower for a fabulous friend. I am happy to throw one anytime. Ah babies and brides… the good things in life!