Homemade Serenity

Science with Kids: Microwave Ivory Soap

2012-02-06T00:01:00.000-08:00

I asked The Boy what he thought might happen if we microwaved Ivory Soap. He considered this carefully for a moment and then said quite thoughtfully that he believed it would melt like an ice cube. Pretty astute for a 4 year old.

We decided to find out for ourselves as we removed a bar of soap from the package. I used a kitchen knife to cut a small piece of the soap off and placed it on a microwavable safe plate. Then we watched magic happen. Or science. Take your pick.

We set the microwave on high for 60 seconds. The soap, rather than melt, began to expand to enormous proportions, overflowing off the sides of plate! I carefully removed the plate and allowed the soap to cool for a few minutes before giving it to my son. It wasn't too hot, but do exercise caution when handing nuked soap to small children. We don't want them to accidentally receive a burn.

How it works: When you heat the Ivory soap, you soften it. You're also heating air and water trapped inside the soap, which in turn causes the water to evaporate and the air expand. The increasing gases (air) push upon the now soft soap, causing it to expand and become a foam. The appearance of the soap is changed, but no chemical reaction takes place. Other types of soap don't incorporate as much air whipped into them and don't have the same reaction in the microwave as Ivory does. The Ivory soap now feels soft and almost powdery, but it still works as well as the bar form. You can actually crumble it in your hands as it continues to cool - it looks a lot like snow once crumbled.

You don't have to worry about this little experiment damaging your soap or your microwave. Any foam that overflows the edges of your microwave safe container can simply be cleaned up with water. Science and cleaning at the same time. Pretty cool.

Learning as we go,

Simple Mama

Make It! Valentine's Day Coffee Filter Wreath

2012-02-05T10:41:00.000-08:00

I've wanted to make a coffee filter wreath for a long time now. All the examples that I've seen online were done in either the plain white coffee filters, or with natural, unbleached coffee filters. I needed color - and the more pink and red, the better!

Using the same dyeing technique from my coffee filter flowers, I started dyeing shades of the lightest pink imaginable. With each batch of coffee filters completed, I added more red to the dye water. I had hoped to end up with a deep crimson red for my last bunch of coffee filters, but alas, they never seemed to get as dark as I wanted.

I contemplated removing the plastic outer wrapping on the wreath, but opted in the end to leave it on to limit mess and straw shedding indoors.

Geordi Laforge anyone?

After my coffee filters dried, I pulled out my glue gun and started applying the filters in a random pattern to my straw wreath. I gathered each filter in the middle and twisted slightly to give them a flowery look. I also found this made gluing the filters to the wreath easier.

It's a bit tricky as you near the end of this project. There isn't much room to hang onto the wreath when gluing the last of the filters into place, but I did manage to manhandle my way through. Completed, I pulled out my craft scissors and trimmed the wreath up a bit in places where coffee filters stuck up too much. I actually really love the way this turned out, even without my deep red color. It's soft, fluffy, and oh so pink.

This one is staying indoors, because I don't trust the elements here in the Pacific Northwest enough to leave it outside. Soggy coffee filters are not the look I'm going for.

Valentine's Day is just around the corner! Get crafting!

Simple Mama

Lollipop Valentine's Day Cards

2012-02-02T14:10:00.000-08:00

It's that time again. Pink, red, white. Conversation Hearts, roses, love songs.

Yes...I'm talking about Valentine's Day - one of my absolutely favorite holidays. Seriously. What's not to love about love?

The Boy needed some cards for his classmates in his Montessori preschool, and he wasn't content with store bought. We looked at some of the store bought cards in the store - and he did sort of hem and haw over Captain America, but in the end, he looked at me with those big brown eyes and said, "Can't we just make some for my friends, Mama?"

Why yes, I believe we can.

I've seen variations of this project on the web before. It seemed simple enough, so I pulled out my camera and had him stand in front of the kitchen door, right arm outstretched with a fist. It took several shots to find the right arm level combined with a pseudo smiling face. He's right at the age where you ask him to smile and he screams, "CHEEEESE!" at the top of his lungs - which usually leads to a strange contorted grimace instead of a smile.

I found a code online a while back for 25 free photo prints from one of our local stores. A little photoshop, a free code later, and we were in business.

Using an Exacto knife, I cut a small slit at the top and bottom of his fist and inserted a Tootsie pop. A small piece of tape over the back of the lollipop stick ensures it won't go anywhere until The Boy's friends are ready for their treat.

The total price for this project? $2.50 for 25 Valentine's Day cards which was the cost of the Tootsie Pops.

A sweet project indeed.

Simple Mama

Holiday Vacation

2012-01-17T13:03:00.000-08:00

I was ready for vacation this year. So ready. Super Hubby traveled for business a lot this year. My Etsy store was incredibly busy from August until December. The Boy was navigating the exciting world of Montessori preschool. We all needed a break - and preferably someplace away from the steady cold drizzle of the Pacific Northwest.

Florida would be perfect.

Our vacation was a two parter. One week in the Florida Keys, one week in Disney World. The longest vacation we've taken with our 4 year old yet, and we were ready. We took too many pictures to share with you all - the majority will find their way into a special edition family vacation photo book - but I wanted to share some highlights with you.

Out on the boat.

Catching his first fish. He wasn't too sure about the whole process.

Visiting the Turtle Hospital in Marathon Key, Florida.

Swimming with dolphins. A favorite for sure.

Watching the chickens and roosters run around Key West. It should be noted that we also saw Hulk Hogan while we were in Key West, but he literally rode by us so quickly on his motorbike that we couldn't snag a photo.

Hanging out with Micky Mouse....

And Phineas and Ferb....

Taking a break from Disney to swim in the pool...

Eating - it seemed we were always eating somewhere....

Waiting to see the Toy Story characters

Meeting Woody and Jessie.

We had such a wonderful time we almost gave serious consideration to the idea of leaving our home with the house sitter and just staying in Florida permanently.

Planning our next getaway.

Simple Mama.

Silent Sunday - Marathon Key, Florida

2012-01-08T16:54:00.000-08:00

More pictures from our vacation coming soon...

Simple Mama

Pictures from Our Thanksgiving and Trip on the Polar Express

2011-11-25T18:31:00.000-08:00

I'm thankful that I have wonderful extended family who always welcome us into their home.

I'm thankful that my son loved putting up their Christmas tree. He was so earnest in his unwrapping of the ornaments.

I'm thankful for an Aunt who suggested we take a day trip as a family to ride The Polar Express in Hood River, Oregon.

I'm thankful for the best friends who joined us,and hot cocoa,

and wonderment,

And a Great Grandma who is still young at heart.

I'm thankful for Elves.

and Santa Claus.

But most of all, I'm thankful for believers.
Can you hear it? The sweet silver jingle of that bell?

Simple Mama.

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-23T15:48:00.001-08:00

Live long, and prosper. From our house to yours this Thanksgiving day.

Simple Mama

Christmasing...

2011-11-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

Already? Lots of Made-in-China decorations in the stores. Christmas music on the radio.

What's a girl to do?

Start in on the Christmas crafting of course by making some walnut shell jingle bell ornaments.
The Boy loves these. They jingle softly when you shake them. They're natural, beautiful, and simple.

You can buy these at my Etsy store, Green Baboon Designs.

Or...make your own. Carefully open up a walnut (we use a butter knife to pry open the shell), and remove the meat. Place a small jingle bell inside one of the empty halves and use glue (white or super glue, depending on how little the hands are that are helping) to glue the two halves back together. But don't forget to add your ribbon loop before closing it shut.

And remember....

Simple Mama

New in the Shop Today

2011-10-18T13:12:00.001-07:00

Our home is fragrant with the lovely scent of beeswax this week. We've been cracking walnuts and washing acorn caps.

Aren't these darling candles adorable?! We float them in a shallow bowl of water with a few brightly colored autumn leaves for ambiance and charm.
Walnut Shell Candles
Don't forget that during the month of October, $1.00 from every sale in my store, Green Baboon Designs is donated to the Susan G. Komen Foundation for breast cancer research.
Acorn Cap Candles

Simple Mama

Make It! Apple Print Bunting

2011-10-10T11:34:00.000-07:00

Wow. I have no idea where the time has gone. I looked at my calendar and then looked at my yard and realized autumn was well and truly upon us. Leaves are falling, canning is complete, the garden is tucked away for the winter, and somehow we've managed to go weeks without doing any organized crafting, save a few random crayon colored pictures.

You might remember earlier this year when I managed to score a car load full of burlap coffee bags for free. I used the rattiest, dirtiest bags as weed barrier in my garden - I even planted potatoes in one, which worked out well and will be repeated in the garden next spring. I pulled the nicest bags - the ones with interesting prints, clean burlap, and fewest tears and placed them carefully in a pile in our garage, thinking I might do something crafty with them.

As I was sharing an apple with my son last week, I remembered seeing an apple print project on
Martha. I knew as I watched juice dribble down The Boy's chin, exactly what we were going to do with that burlap.

For this project you'll need:

Burlap - free is best, but you can buy it from a fabric store as well.
Red, black, and green tempura paint
Paint brushes
Shallow plates to hold paint
Scissors or a rotary cutter
An apple
Fork
Newspaper.

I pulled out my fabric mat and my rotary cutters and made short work of a burlap bag. I cut twelve 6"x6" squares and placed them in a single layer on some newspaper to catch drips. Slicing my apple in half, I used a fork to pierce the skin and create a handle.

I filled two separate plates with paint. One red and one green. I had The Boy liberally paint the apple with green paint and start stamping.

After the apples were dry, I took some black tempura paint and a small, fine brush to add some apple seeds and a stem to each print. Using hemp cord, I found that my coffee burlap bags had a weave open enough that I could just thread the string through. We alternated red and green apples and hung it from our fireplace mantel. The perfect autumn bunting for our living room!

I love how rustic and simple this project is. And the total cost for us? One apple, tempera paint and string, which we already had on hand.
Taking time to notice all the seasons,

Simple Mama

Putting Food By

2011-09-21T21:24:00.000-07:00

Pardon my absence. I've been busy doing this:

spicy plum sauce, salsa verde, pickled pears, mixed pickled veggies, blackberry lemonade concentrate, zucchini relish

And turning some of this into a plum chutney:

And then there were these:spicy dilly beans

And some of these:

Which are so delicious!

Mexican style spicy pickled carrots

and turning these:dried elderberries

Into this:elderberry syrup

Yes - we've been elbow deep in produce, fruit, and canning jars. We're getting ready to tackle the tomatoes and pears next. Salsa, spaghetti sauce, and vanilla pears soon to be on our shelves.

How is your autumn canning going?

Simple Mama

The Studio

2011-09-05T13:43:00.000-07:00

Our house in the suburbs has more than enough space for all of us. In fact, we generally have two rooms that aren't utilized on a regular basis. My son's room, since he sleeps in our room in his own bed, (yay for family bedrooms!) And our guest room - which is used maybe once or twice a month.

We've often talked about downsizing to a smaller home with more land, but with the current housing market, we've decided to delay looking and make our home a place that we're content with, happy, and love now.

So we dumped the guestroom. We thought briefly about turning my son's room into the studio, but on the off chance that he decides he wants to start sleeping in it, we decided we better leave it as is. (Sorry friends and family - we'll have a blow up mattress and a nice couch for you.) We turned the now empty room into a studio for my Etsy store, Gre en Baboon Designs.

I just love this space! I'll probably be tweaking bits of it as I go along in order to find the most optimal and efficient workspace, but right now it is everything that I had hoped for.

The first thing we had to tackle was that mess of wool that trailed all over our house in various wicker baskets and plastic containers. I knew exactly what I wanted. The Ikea Expedit shelving.

How great is that? It's so nice to be able to see exactly what I have, what I need, and to pull it out when I want it rather than search through bin after bin. On top of the shelves I have a few wicker baskets with what we call "fairy bits" around here. Cotswold curls for doll hair, angelina fibers for shimmer, silk strands for detail. The clear bins hold some of my acorn caps that my son and I collect in the fall from the local parks. The small pillow was an embroidered sampler my grandmother made - incredibly dear to me.

The workstation is a dining table my neighbor was going to get rid of when they upgraded. Its large flat surface works perfectly for me. I chose to extend a hanging light (also from Ikea) over the desk to further illuminate my needle felting area. The shade also has embroidered flowers on it - so sweet. It's imperative you have excellent lighting when felting. Those slender needles are s.h.a.r.p. I can look up and see the beautiful floral bunting I purchased on Etsy from LoudMouse.

On the other side of the room is my shipping station. It's always a little cluttered. Printer, packaging, ribbons, tools, etc. The green shelf was gifted to me from one of my aunts, and it blends in perfectly with the rest of the room.

The pièce de résistance? This print I picked up from dpsullivan. My. Green. Baboon. Freakin' sweet. I still need to have it framed - it wasn't until this weekend that I had an actual place to put it. I can't help but smile every single time I look at it. It fits my personality, my shop, and my workspace perfectly.

I'm planning on spending many a happy hour in here creating. I'd love to see your workspace if you have one.

Cheers,
Simple Mama!

In Which the Crazy Canning Commences

2011-09-05T10:40:00.000-07:00

(Excuse the awful photos. I have no excuse, except I'm too busy to care.)

Summer finally decided to show up in the Pacific Northwest. About 1.5 months late, but she came. By this point in the year I'm usually 3/4 of the way done with putting food up for the season. This summer is different. I've hardly even started. However....

The peaches came in:
Which required putting up peach lemonade concentrate and canned peaches in a light syrup.

And then the beans decided to grow - which meant spicy dilly beans:
The dilly beans usually go quickly, especially when my brothers stop by to visit.

The next thing I knew, I was elbow deep in zucchini. I made my standby - zucchini gummy candies and still had enough left over that I decided to make extra zucchini relish. This stuff is delicious in tuna fish sandwiches, with grilled cheese, or in a tartar sauce. Hot dogs and hamburgers too if you have any grilling left in you this summer.
Zucchini Relish

10 cups shredded zucchini
2 white onions, chopped
3 shredded carrots
1 green pepper, chopped
5 tbsp. canning salt

Mix together, let soak overnight. Rinse in cold water, squeezing out excess liquid. Put in large pot with:

1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp. tumeric
1 1/2 tsp. dry mustard
1/2 tsp pepper
2 tsp celery seed
1/2 tsp baking soda
3 tbsp cornstarch
2 1/2 cups white distilled vinegar
6 cups sugar

Cook all ingredients on medium heat, stirring often for 30 minutes. Process in water bath canner for 10 minutes.

Yields about 6 pints.

Happy canning!

Simple Mama

Melted Crayon Canvas Art

2011-08-26T16:41:00.001-07:00

Bless me Internet, for I have sinned. It's been....eh...a really long time since I've blogged.

Back in May, my son caught pink eye. Not a big deal, as lots of kids get pink eye and live to tell the tale. The problem occurred when he passed it on to me. Thus began my tale of woe and misery. Four months of recurrent illness. Pink eye, bronchitis, sinusitis, pneumonia, on top of a dislocated finger and a trip to the emergency room for my son after he fell and shoved a stick clear down his throat.

Oh yes, we've been busy here. Physical therapy appointments, numerous doctor appointments, specialists, allergy tests, sleep studies. You name it, and our family has probably done it recently.

We seem however, to finally all be well and mended. (Shhh....don't tell anyone, I don't want to jinx it.) Our house is a mess, appointments with friends backed up, craft supplies have been sitting silently for months waiting for someone (me) to get up and do something with them.

A few weeks ago while browsing Pinterest I came across a melted crayon art project that looked simple and beautiful. I just knew that this was exactly what we needed to get our creative juices flowing again.

Using two boxes of Crayola crayons (64 count) The Boy and I picked out our favorite colors in each, in some cases doubling up on our favorite hues. We lined the crayons up at the top of the canvas, with the pointy ends facing down. Pulling out my trusted glue gun, I secured each crayon to the canvas, making sure the Crayola name was facing outward.
It's been warm here for the past few days, but not nearly hot enough to melt the crayons by leaving them in the sun, so I found my old hair dryer which hasn't seen proper use in over two years and set it to the highest setting. Propping the canvas up at an angle, I set The Boy to the task of carefully warming the crayons with the hair dryer:

It didn't take too long for the crayon wrappers to turn shiny from the heat and melting waxy goodness. Impatient as we were to see a finished art project, we left the heat on high the entire time we were melting the crayons. This led to a little splatter and caused the crayons to drip in an irregular fashion rather than melting in lines straight down, but I have to admit, I rather like the look.
Had we demonstrated patience, we probably could have turned the hairdryer to low after the crayons started to melt and allowed that straight down drip. Something to aim for next time.

My son was thrilled with how beautiful the rainbow art turned out. He wants us to hang the picture in our bedroom so that we always have "a pretty rainbow to wake up to." How sweet is that?

This was such a stunningly simple project with a big return. How can you not look at this and smile?

Happy to be back,
Simple Mama

This Moment

2011-07-15T07:50:00.000-07:00

{this moment} - A Friday ritual inspired by Soulemama. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

The One Where We Were All Sick or Injured.

2011-06-10T16:02:00.000-07:00

Pardon my absence. My little family has a rough go of it lately. Recurring Pink-Eye, flu, sinusitis, bronchial infections, double ear infections, emergency room visits when The Boy fell out of his camping chair and ended up with a stick down his throat. Dislocated pinkies, physical therapy.

We're trying to mend and heal here, but it's been a rough road the last several months - seriously it feels like we haven't been able to catch a break in about 5 or 6 months. Please send healing thoughts into the universe for us if you will.

We'll be back when we can.

Simple Mama

Friday Kitchen Love

2011-05-20T00:05:00.000-07:00

Chalkboard contact paper purchased from Amazon. Pretty neat, eh? I love how this little project turned out for my dry goods storage. And when I need to change out the contents of a jar, relabeling is a cinch.

How do you organize your dry goods?

Simple Mama

PS - for those of you wondering where I get my bottles
And a link to the chalkboard paper.

On Growing Cultures

2011-05-19T14:45:00.000-07:00

I love fermented beverages. The fizz, the tang, the slightly sweet/slightly vinegary taste really speaks to my palette. I was first introduced to Water Kefir about a year ago while taking a class on the fermentation process with a friend. We were sent home with a jar of water kefir grains and a head full of knowledge. I managed to keep those kefir grains alive for about 6 months, until one day I decided to try fermenting orange juice. The result was gross and my poor kefir grains never recovered. Lesson learned. If I want a citrus taste to my kefir, I add it after the main fermenting is done, and not directly to the vessel which contains my grains.

Recently I had another friend pass along some of her excess grains. (They multiply, in case you didn't know.) We're back in business! Currently I'm brewing a batch of plain sugar water. Once I strain my kefir grains out, I'll add a dehydrated fig to the bottled water and allow it to continue to ferment gently on my counter for a few days before placing it in the fridge. I like to add the resulting water kefir to my green smoothies. Water Kefir Grains - translucent and gelatinous.

Brewing my water kefir. This jar usually sits on top of my fridge, where the slightly warmer temperature helps the grains do their thing.

I'm also in the process of brewing my own kombucha tea. I acquired a kombucha SCOBY -symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast- from a different friend (we're all fermenting freaks, right?) and got to work. The process is similar to water kefir, but the SCOBY looks very different from kefir grains and you ferment tea, rather than water. Here, take a look:
You can see the SCOBY floating up near the top of my gallon glass jar. Kind of gross looking, actually. It's like a weekly science experiment in my kitchen. With each brew, the SCOBY mother creates an off-spring. Pretty soon I'll have SCOBY's to share with local friends. Once the 10 day minimum main fermentation process is finished, I fish out the SCOBY and start a new batch brewing. The original tea is bottled with a teaspoon of sugar and, if I want, some fruit. It's allowed to ferment on my counter for an additional 3 days before I pop it in the fridge to stop/slow down the fermentation process.Kombucha passion fruit tea with (L-R) mango, blueberries, fig, and straight up.

These drinks are not only full of beneficial bacteria, but they taste delicious to boot. Home brewed kombucha is a much milder flavor than the kombucha tea you can by in the health food stores. If you have the opportunity to try your hand at either water kefir or kombucha tea, jump on it!

Cheers,
Simple Mama

Wordless Wednesday - A Warm Day, Finally

2011-05-18T16:33:00.001-07:00

Make It! Light Bulb Oil Lamp

2011-05-17T19:04:00.000-07:00

I've been intrigued by oil lamps for such a long time now. They seemed so mysterious and ancient to me. The only type of lamp I've used is the electric kind, or battery operated when camping. An oil lamp seemed like such a good thing to know how to make for an emergency, yet the process was daunting to me.

It turns out, it couldn't be simpler. All you really need is some wicking, some oil, and a shallow vessel. I read up on making your own oil lamps. Many tutorials talked about making an oil lamp out of a tuna can. While economical and practical, it wasn't quite what I was hoping to make.

And then, one evening while I was changing a light bulb out of our side table lamp I decided to try upcycling it into a chic oil lamp. It just seemed like it was time to take the plunge. I wish I had taken pictures during the process, but alas I only have pictures of the finished product. I'll try to give you a rundown though of the steps I took.

Following the directions here, I carefully removed the glass end of the light bulb in order to put a wick and oil into the body of the light bulb. Once all the shards of glass were removed I noticed that there was a white powdery substance that was scratching off on the inside of the bulb from the glass shards and filament wire. I poured about a teaspoon of salt into the opening, plugged it with my thumb and shook like crazy. The salt took the remainder of the white powder off and I was left with a crystal clear light bulb. Pretty cool, and though not the effect I was going for. I didn't realize the white stuff would come off and I had planned on having an opaque oil lamp. I love the look of the clear light though.

Next I found a small flat washer in our garage and super glued it to the bottom of my bulb, allowing the glue to set for about 10 minutes. The washer allows my light bulb to sit slightly angled without tipping over.

Oil lamps require some sort of natural wick to work. Cotton, hemp, string, paper towels. All are purported to work. I had hemp rope available, but I also had an old cotton sock with a hole in the toe. I cut a strip of sock about 1/4th inch wide and 6 inches long for my lamp. It didn't take much time before I realized I would need something to hold my sock in place though, or it would sink directly into the body of the vessel when I tried to use it. I grabbed a diet Pepsi can and cut out a small circle, just slightly larger than the opening of my light bulb. I used an exacto knife and made a small "X" in the middle of the aluminum circle. It was through this "X" that I would thread my sock.

I poured some olive oil in the bulb, threaded the sock strip down inside the body and through the aluminum circle and waited for the oil to wick up through the top of the sock. It takes a LONG time. Like an hour for the oil to soak all the way up. This was the finished oil lamp:

Olive oil is thick, and doesn't wick very far or very easily. The lamp didn't stay lit very long. This is most likely why early olive oil lamps were made in shallow containers. You really need the wick to rest just above the level of oil. I filled the lamp a bit more, allowing the oil to come almost all the way to the top and it remained lit for about 1.5 hours. Pretty neat.
Today we decided to try our lamp with regular old lamp oil that you can find in any major box store. I actually prefer the look of the olive oil lamp better, but in this shape vessel, the lamp oil works much better. It wicks faster, isn't as viscous, and allows for a longer burn time. We'll keep our olive oil for shallow vessels and use the lamp oil for the light bulb. Oh...and also? I also don't recommend burning these where little hands might be - like near the wooden toys I have in the photo. It was simply staged for the shot. Ours is safely out of reach and ready to use in case of emergency, or when we just want to look plain cool.

Four Years Old

2011-05-16T13:54:00.000-07:00

Where have the years gone? In a blink of an eye, my little one is no longer a baby.

To celebrate his special day we met up with some friends at a local paint your own pottery store.
Four children in a room full of unfired pottery is a bit like unleashing bulls in a china shop.

The birthday boy waiting patiently for some instructions and paint.

His good friend J.

My favorite thing about this picture? All the adults are doing the painting!

The heart shaped bowl he picked out. To be used for cereal and popcorn. We'll pick up the fired pieces next week.

Blowing out the candles on his birthday spiral. He requested carrot cake, so mama made some vegan carrot cake cupcakes. Yummy!

You bless me each and every day my love. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be your mama.

I love you,
Mama

Kitchen Love

2011-05-10T15:39:00.000-07:00

I've been using this time off from crafting and blogging to work on some spring cleaning and organizing. You know...the things I never get around to when life is coming at me full throttle. So today, how about a little kitchen love?vintage blue pyrex mixing bowls in butterprint

vintage pyrex mixing bowls in golden butterfly

A mix of vintage and new Le Creuset. I didn't realize I was going for a gold and blue theme until I took these photos.

This fantastic orange #18 sauce pot was a Craigslist find. It went with all the other orange pans pictured and I spent a total of $35 for all of them.

I've been collecting my vintage and new kitchen finds for several years now, scouring thrift stores, hunting down online or outlet mall deals, and keeping an eye on Craigslist. What are some of your favorite kitchen items?

Spring cleaning,
Simple Mama

Make It! Number 2 Pencil Vase

2011-05-04T14:17:00.000-07:00

Bless me Internet, for I have sinned. It's been 10 days since I last blogged.

When it rains it pours around here. My dislocated pinky is still trying to heal. Most of the day - I would say about 22 hours of it, I'm in a curved metal finger brace, wrapped tightly with tape. I take the brace off for a few hours a day to do necessities, like oh...I don't know, bathe. I also ice my pinky during this time while my brain tries valiantly to literally bend my pinky to its will. So far, my brain is unsuccessful. My pinky remains stubbornly straight, refusing to bend at all at the second nuckle. I'm beginning to worry that it may be permanently straightened.

To top of my ridiculous hand injury, I decided last Tuesday to catch a case of the preschool bug. By Friday I was completely out of commission. My husband took my son and picked him up from preschool on Friday. And then, in an effort to allow me to continue to sleep and rest quietly, he took my son into work with him. I was literally in bed all weekend long feeling as badly as I did last year when I came down with a case of H1N1. I believe I'm finally turning for the better. It can't come soon enough, as I have much to do. Such as these little teacher appreciation gifts for my son's Montessori preschool teachers.

Following my inspiration from my twig vase here, I decided to make a similar vase with yellow #2 pencils. The photos were taken by my husband because I don't have the manual dexterity to operate our large DSLR yet.

You'll need:
#2 pencils
a recycled glass jar
hot glue and glue gun
ribbon

Gather up your supplies:

We chose a glass jar over a tin or aluminum jar to make sure our teachers wouldn't experience rust issues when filling their vases with water.

Using your glue gun, begin by placing a line of hot glue along one side of a pencil. Press the pencil firmly against your selected jar and apply steady pressure to make sure it stays in place. You'll need to watch carefully to make sure your pencils are all facing the same direction and to make sure they are completely upright. It's very easy for them to start listing a bit to the right or left, making the last few pencils difficult to place.

Just in case you're curious, the jar in this photo is clean. The white stuff on the outside of it is leftover gummy from the old pickled asparagus sticker that was once on it.

Add pencils all the way around your glass jar. When you're done, tie a sweet ribbon around the outside and fill your vase with flowers. Our teachers will be receiving fresh cut flowers in their vases, but for the purposes of these pictures we used some of our coffee filter flowers.

I think these will make the perfect teacher appreciation gifts. It's a simple project that just about anybody could do - even me with a gimpy hand and a case of the flu.

Simple Mama

Silent Sunday - His Hand Knit Easter Bunny

2011-04-24T14:13:00.001-07:00

Thank you Jessie, for such a beautifully special bunny.

Simple Mama

Simple Beauty

2011-04-19T00:06:00.000-07:00

I can already tell the worst part about not being able to use my right hand, other than this silly hunt and peck typing method I'm perfecting, is the inability to create. To make beautiful, fun, original things with my son.

Yesterday we took a walk around the neighborhood. Across the street is an open field where he picked a small spring bouquet of early flowers. When we returned home I made us a lunch of scrambled eggs and toast with homemade raspberry jam. I picked one of the little brown eggs our Light Brahma laid and knocked the top off just a bit with a knife. Rinsed, filled with water, and nestled into a porcelain egg holder it's the perfect little vase for my tiny bouquet.

It's about all the craftiness I'm able to manage right now, but it's perfect for the little handful of flowers he brings me.

I love his sweetness.

Poop on the Patio

2011-04-18T14:11:00.000-07:00

Warning - this post contains a gnarly photo. Stop reading if you don't want to see it.

This weekend I had big gardening and outdoor coop plans. Things that included finishing the chicken run so that I can keep the chickens from pooping on my patio. Seriously. I love my girls, but there are few things more gross than cleaning up compost scraps turned poo from under my patio chairs. Unless of course you slip in the poo when it's raining as you're trying to take out a container of slightly expired yogurt for the girls to enjoy. And if, when you slip in the poo, you manage to knock over the barbecue and dump ashes on yourself so that you're now covered in chicken poo and powdered with gray ash, AND if you manage to land on your pinky finger in such a way that when you sit up and look at your hand covered in yuck and ash you notice that it is now bent awkwardly at an unnatural angle and your first thought is, "Crap! I'm covered in sh&t!," closely followed by, "Crap! I think I broke my finger!"

Yep. That's grosser than just cleaning up chicken poo. And not recommended. A trip to the emergency room revealed it was not broken, but it was a severe dislocation.

Gross picture coming up:

Urban homesteading is dangerous. I'm just saying. And the actual finger looked way worse than it does in this photo. I wasn't really up for hand modeling when Super Hubby snapped this shot.

Resetting a bone is painful. It hurt worse than dislocating the finger in the first place. I'm in a splint now for anywhere between 10 days to 4 weeks depending on how I heal. You have NO idea how much you need your pinky until you can't use it.

My little Etsy store is on vacation while I recover. All the Easter crafting I had planned for The Boy and I is being reconsidered. Blogging will be sporadic at best. Gardening?

Sigh.

Maybe La Nina will hold on a few weeks longer and I won't feel as badly about not getting the seedlings out.

I'll be back soon. I pinky promise.

Simple Mama

What Happens When I Procrastinate....

2011-04-15T14:13:00.001-07:00

When I procrastinate I usually end up thinking of all the things I have to do in the middle of the night - leading to insomnia.

Remember last year when I had that bought of insomnia?

Yep - It happened again. Only this time I took it to the next level:

I just picked up that sharpie and started doodling all over our brown chicken eggs. (I've been making lots of scrambled eggs in the morning.) Flowers, paisley, scales, stripes. I can't seem to stop.

Obsessed.

Simple Mama

Make It! Easter Egg Wreath

2011-04-14T16:39:00.000-07:00

After blowing all those eggs and dyeing them with silk ties, I was left with more than a few that didn't turn out quite as brightly or vibrantly as I would have liked. I have our favorites piled together in an old goldfish bowl...but the light ones? I wasn't sure what to do with them until I ran across some reindeer moss and a wreath frame at the dollar store. Inspiration!

For this project you'll need:

About 1 dozen blown eggs, plain or decorated
1 small wreath frame
2 packages of reindeer moss
Hot glue and glue gun
Hemp twine
1 paper clip
Scotch Tape
Scissors

Let me start by suggesting that you work on a piece of butcher paper, craft paper, etc. Moss is messy, and it's so easy to just sweep the whole mess up into the paper and compost it when you're done.

Begin by dabbing a bit of hot glue onto your frame and placing a bit of moss on it. Work in small sections and work quickly, or your glue will harden before you get the moss applied. Continue working your way around the frame, adding a bit of hot glue and a bit of moss until your frame is completely covered. Once your form is covered in the soft moss, fill in any bald spots. I pressed the moss firmly into the glue, but be careful not to burn yourself doing this.

After your wreath form is completely covered in moss, add a good dollop of hot glue on top of the moss in a small section. Pick out a blown egg and press it down into the hot glue gently, but firmly. Continue adding eggs all the way around the wreath. Leave a small space open at the top to add a hanging ribbon.

Gently turn your wreath over so that it's resting on the eggs. Using a unbent paperclip and a small piece of scotch tape, tape your hemp string to the end of the paper clip. Carefully thread the hemp string through one end of a blown egg and out the other. Tie the hemp in a neat knot at the back of your wreath to help hold each egg in place a little more firmly. Make sure to get the eggs good and tight against the wreath, but use caution not to pull the string too tightly, or you'll break your eggs. I speak from experience. Once all your eggs are firmly tied to the wreath, you can use your scissors to trim any wayward excess hemp string.

Pick a pretty grosgrain ribbon and hang your wreath from a nail or wreath hanger. I love how organic and natural this darling wreath turned out! I plan on making one using plain brown and white eggs as well.

Happy Spring!
Simple Mama

Make It! Twig Vase

2011-04-13T16:02:00.000-07:00

After a weekend of yucky colds and general malaise in our home, The Boy and I were ready for a little outdoor time. We took a walk to one of our local neighborhood parks during a rare sunny day and brought along a reusable tote to cart home our treasures.

We filled the tote with pretty stones, acorn caps, lonely leaves left over from autumn, birch bark, and a huge assortment of fallen twigs. I promised The Boy we would make something special with his treasures when we returned home. The tote was set aside as we made our way to the playground to swing in the fresh spring air. It was abandoned on a green park bench when we consulted with the GPS on my phone as we tried geocaching for the first time. We followed the purple path on my phone through a nearby field with knee high grass looking for our geocache treasure. Midway through the field the ground gave way. We both found ourselves calf deep in the cold, dark mud. We gave up on geocaching and squish, squish, squished our way back towards our oilcloth tote full of treasures that were much easier to find.

Later that evening my son asked if we could make something fun. It seemed like more fun to get crafty than make dinner, so I agreed. For this project you'll need:

Twigs - please only use dry twigs found on the ground, unless you're already pruning a plant.
A glass jar, mason jar, recycled bottle, etc.
Pruning shears
Hot glue
Ribbon or Twine

I pulled out the myriad of twigs, grabbed an old pickled asparagus glass jar, a small set of garden shears, and my hot glue gun. I measured a twig against the glass jar and snipped it to the right length. Running a dab of hot glue along one side of the twig, I then set it into place on the jar, carefully making sure to keep it flush with the bottom of the jar so that it wouldn't sit cockeyed.
We worked the twigs all around the glass jar, adding a second layer to cover up the glass as needed. You can see I was lazy and didn't even bother removing the pickled asparagus label. No need, as it was soon going to be covered in beautiful, mossy sticks.

Once all the twigs were in place, I double checked to make sure the bottom was still flush. Using my pruning shears I snipped here and there to adjust length on both the bottom and top of the jar. Then I pulled out an old ball of twine and wrapped it a few times around the jar, tying a bow in the front. I love the rustic charm of this simple vase - that, and the bits of dried moss clinging to the little sticks and twigs we found.
We piled the vase full of some of my favorite springtime flowers, daffodils.

Such a sweetly simple activity, and a beautiful way to showcase our treasured "finds" from our outings. The Boy just beamed when he saw how his little twigs were turned into something beautiful and functional.
We spent some time looking at flowers online today - and he's determined that tulips will be the next flower to go inside his treasure vase. A fine thing indeed, as we plan to head to the tulip festival this weekend.

Enjoying the simple treasures every day.

Simple Mama

Weekending - Around the House

2011-04-11T11:22:00.001-07:00

When The Boy started Montessori preschool last week, I didn't even think about the germ infestation he might bring home. But sure enough, he did. And Super Hubby and I both managed to come down with the early spring cold crunk.

All our plans for going out and about in the PDX area sort of fell through the cracks, and we ended up staying pretty close to home. A good thing too, as it turned out we had much to do.

Four cubic yards of 3 way compost mix were delivered to our driveway Saturday morning. We *might* have overestimated our needs slightly. We spent the better half of the morning wheelbarrowing it into the backyard into an unsightly pile. The goal was mostly to get it out of the driveway. Saturday was a dry day - but we knew the rains were coming again. I didn't want all the soil to wash down the driveway into the street. Soil, in case you haven't had the pleasure of purchasing it, is expensive.

We plan on spreading a good portion of it flat in its current area. The yard slopes down here and we're relocating our chickens to this portion of the yard. I'm sick of the chicken poo on our patio. They'll have a new run built, and access to our compost pile. The rest of the compost will fill containers, potato bins, amend current garden beds, etc.

And speaking of garden beds, we also built these new square foot garden beds. They're 4 foot by 4 foot, and located on the south side of our house for optimal sunlight:

We used cardboard boxes as the weed barrier underneath them, and managed to get the new soil and compost mixture into them. We still need to grid them out and put up the vertical climbing wall behind them to trellis peas and beans. Super Hubby is going to create a border around the gardens similar to our current beds and we'll fill in the entire area with wood chips and shavings as mulch. I find mulching the areas around the beds makes the whole garden endeavor easier. If I allow grass to grow right up next to the beds it's a constant struggle to keep it mowed and trimmed and I'm continually pulling grass that manages to grow in the beds. Work smarter. Not harder.

We planned to go this week and pick up some black weed barrier cloth from the hardware store when I found a posting on our local Craigslist for FREE burlap coffee bags. FREE! I immediately contacted the poster expressing my interest and loaded The Boy into the car before someone else came by to stake my claim. The place we ended up was a huge coffee processing plant. It smelled soooo delicious. I've never seen so much coffee in one place at one time. The warehouse was literally the size of an IKEA store with pallets of coffee beans piled up to the ceiling.

And wow, did we get hooked up! The back of my mid-size SUV is filled with burlap bags. Literally 200 of them, and the promise of more if I needed them - and the nice Craigslist guy gave me a bag of beans to grind at home. We'll lay the burlap bags down on the grassy area around the new garden beds as a natural weed barrier and then cover with 3-4 inches of mulch. How awesome is that? I LOVE free Craigslist finds, and I LOVE repurposing something that would otherwise end up in the landfill into something useful. Some of those burlap bags are so cute that I'm going to pull them aside for crafty ideas running through my head. Later. Like at some point when I'm not elbows deep in garden dirt, Etsy projects, and crazy, crazy life.

Loving this life I'm living,
Simple Mama

-18.4

2011-04-09T09:40:00.000-07:00

-18.4. Pounds that is. I joined Weight Watchers 10 weeks ago. I haven't blogged about my weight struggles, but I have them. And I have a LOT more weight to lose, but I felt the need to mark this weigh in permanently. It's a big deal to me - and my goal for next week is to hit my 20lb weight loss mark. I'm putting this out there to the universe. I. Am. Proud. Of. Myself.

Shrinking,
Simple Mama

Make It! Egg Carton Wreath

2011-04-07T15:26:00.000-07:00

Next to the coffee filter, egg cartons are my favorite recyclable craft item. Rather than compost them, we save them in a stack in our pantry until we have time to craft with them. A few weeks ago I saw a gorgeous egg carton wreath linked on The Crafty Crow. I showed the project to The Boy and he thought it was beautiful.

Last night, after a full day of Etsy crafting, he was itching for mama to do something crafty with him. We set about gathering our egg cartons and deconstructing them. We didn't waste much in this process. The portion that holds the eggs was turned into various flower shapes. Some with rounded petals, others fringed. We cut out some of the pointed in-between pieces for flower centers. We used the flat top and sides of the egg carton to make leaves.

After everything was cut into shapes, I had The Boy sit down with some tempera paint and get busy. I LOVE those beautiful Waldorfy wooden paint boards, but I'm a stickler for frugality and repurposing old objects. We use old cookie sheets as painting boards. The side benefit of the cookie sheets is that they hold water spills beautifully.

Our tempera paint was limited to 5 colors. Red, Yellow, Green, Blue, and White. Using small, resealable paint jars, I helped The Boy mix different variations of those colors to create oranges, purples, and lighter cream colors. Per his instructions we worked out a system. He would paint the inside of a flower, and then hand it off to me to paint the outside so his hands wouldn't "get so messy." That didn't work so well - the not getting messy. But tempera paint is great because it cleans up so well with soap and water.

After our flowers dried a bit, I went in with a finer brush and added just a bit of detailing. While I was doing that, Super Hubby was cutting out a large cardboard circle from an old box. The circle was painted a basic dark green and allowed to dry.

Then came the fun part. We carefully chose where to place each egg carton flower along the cardboard frame. The flowers, when dry from the paint were a bit stiff so in some cases we manhandled them a bit. Other times we simply moved them around until we found the proper configuration. I attached them to the frame with my trusty hot glue gun.

The finished wreath is so stinkin' cute! We hung it on the wall near our front door. Because it's made of cardboard and watercolor paint, I don't recommend hanging it outside in the elements. Best to keep it inside where everyone can enjoy it.
We'll be enjoying this all spring!

Simple Mama

The One Where the Frantic Gardening Starts

2011-04-04T12:59:00.001-07:00

Oh boy do I feel like we're behind here. La Niña is wrecking havoc on all my best laid gardening plans. We've been inundated with rain, rain, and more rain. Oh...and cold weather too. I keep crossing my fingers hoping that we don't have a repeat of last season when my tomato plants refused to grow, it rained until June and then decided to start up again in August. Even my CSA had a tough season last summer.

It's been so wet outside that we haven't been able to get out and amend our soil in the raised beds, do much mulching, prepping, well - really to do anything. Sure. I know if we were die hard gardeners, or even true Northwesterners we wouldn't be complaining. We'd be out there come rain or shine getting things ready. But my goodness, we're from the hot, dry states of Idaho and Montana. This ridiculous amount of moisture makes me want to stay curled up on our couch nursing a mug of hot tea. It does not make me want to put on the garden shoes and sink my hands into freezing mud.

Still, summer will come eventually and there are things to be done. Like start our seeds:

They all seem to be on track. I was concerned that a few of our tomatoes wouldn't germinate since some of the packets were 3 years old, but proper storage, a heat mat and a nice garden light seem to have done the trick. And those wildflowers that The Boy planted on the first day of Spring! finally decided to pop up through the dirt in their tiny little egg shell holders.

What has me concerned is this mess of mud and mulch. Our chickens have free ranged in our backyard all winter. We're in the process of sectioning off an area of the yard within which they will have free reign, but you can see for the compacted, muddy soil that they've been digging around in my bed looking for grubs and plants all season. We have 4 cubic yards of soil coming this weekend so the chicken area has to be ready by then, come rain or shine. Those cute little beds are so lovely when they're planted and we're adding two more 4x4 foot squares once the chickens are cordoned off. But we've got to get started on it. Like yesterday.

New to our little backyard homestead is our mason bee home. Super Hubby put it up recently on our back fence. The mason bees will be in shade there, away from the hot mid day sun, protected by the neighbors overhanging tree branches. He doesn't know it yet, but I consider this my first timid step into full fledged honeybee keeping.

And of course, around here there are always the girls to take care of:

Waiting on some sunshine....
Simple Mama

Have Dandelions Ever Been as Sweet?

2011-04-02T03:09:00.000-07:00

The Boy picked his first bouquet of the season. He didn't pick the daffodils blooming in our flower bed, or the crocus out front. Nope. It was dandelions of course. Stubby little things, as they haven't had long to grow and take root. We have more than I'd care to admit, since we don't use chemical lawn treatments in our yard, and I was just thinking to myself that I needed to get out there and start digging them up. The Boy beat me to the punch, although there is surely much more digging and pulling to be done.

Without long stems, we weren't sure where to put them. My traditional flower jar, a washed out mason canning jar was simply too big. Even the few shot glasses that I have tucked back far in the dark confines of my cupboard would be too large. (Yeah...they were double shot glasses, but who's telling? I had a different life and a bunch of years in college/grad school under my belt before I started down this parenting road, but I digress.)

Then I threw this together:

And seriously. Have dandelions ever looked as sweet as they do here, in this little blown egg perched cheerfully in an inexpensive egg cup? Invasive weed perfection. Pick away my child. Mama loves this little bouquet.

Growing where I'm planted,
Simple Mama

This Moment - First Day of Montessori Preschool

2011-04-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Inspired by Soule Mama.

Moms Night In

2011-03-30T11:18:00.000-07:00

I'm blessed to have wonderful friends. I often refer to them as my "Crunchy Mama Friends." These were the women I actively sought out after the birth of my son when it was clear that my old ways of socializing and having fun were over. Those of you with children know what I'm talking about. After 5pm your evening is essentially shot. You're making dinner, cleaning dinner up, giving baths, brushing teeth, reading books, preparing for the next day, tucking littles into bed, reading another book, getting a glass of polar bear juice (ice water), tucking babes back into bed again, getting more polar bear juice...and you look up at the clock and it's 8pm. Except, unlike your college days, when you were JUST starting to think about going out someplace at 8pm, you are now well and truly exhausted. And your child still isn't asleep. The idea of finding a clean shirt that doesn't have peanut butter fingerprints on it, actually washing your hair for the first time that day, and finding a pair of matching shoes that aren't your slippers is overwhelming. So you go to bed too. And eventually your friends without children stop asking you out. Which is TOTALLY understandable.

But at some point you start to desperately crave adult interaction. And not just the interaction you get from your significant other. You miss girlfriends, or at least I did. So I went online and I sought some mamas out. Crunchy mamas. Mamas who thought outside of mainstream parenting norms and didn't think that decisions and way we chose to raise our son was crazy. And it was a little weird at first. I'd never been one to first cultivate friendships online. I'd always met people in real life and just clicked. Finding friends online was daunting, and a little scary. Sort of like internet dating for friendship.

Persistence pays offs. Eventually I discovered a group of women who would become some of my closest friends. Women with children - some with one, some with five. Women who understood the daily schedule of a stay at home mama. Play dates became as much about letting our children play, as it was about our chance to connect with each other and replenish that part of ourselves that can only filled by the company of other women. Occasionally we have MNO's. Moms Night Out (babes in arms are always welcome. Nurslings need their mamas of course). The Biggers stay home with Daddy, a significant other, or a sitter and we get a chance to catch up. I always feel like my cup has been topped off after an evening with these wonderful women. This weekend we had an MNI - Moms Night In, which I hosted in my house. I had a huge bag of silk ties waiting for egg dyeing. I just needed ready and willing participants to help with the dyeing.

So we came together at 4:30 in the afternoon for an evening of snacks and crafting. And more than a few crude jokes about blowing eggs. Don't tell.

Love how she rocks those glasses!

Playing dress up. Ties as fashion accessories.

Five hours later, and with over 12 dozen eggs dyed we wound down our evening. Nine women replenished, craft exhausted, and smelling slightly of eggs and vinegar. We made plans the next day to start a regular monthly MNO.
Wishing you all friendship that fills you to overflowing,
Simple Mama

Make It! Egg Bumble Bees

2011-03-24T14:02:00.000-07:00

We're egg central around here. Springtime is my favorite season of the year. The promise of new growth and fresh beginnings fills me with a renewed spirit and sense of purpose. It is fitting that the simple egg, symbolic of fertility and life is used in so many of our spring crafts.

When I found these Easter egg bees at Family Fun, The Boy and I decided to give them a try. Our bees have slight variations which I thought made the project easier, so I'm including another tutorial.

You'll need:

eggs
egg dye

black and red permanent markers
white coffee filters
glue
Scotch tape
fishing line
black chenille pipe cleaner

Begin by carefully dyeing your raw eggs in yellow egg dye. The longer you leave your eggs in the dye, the more vibrant the color will be.
After your eggs are the right shade of yellow, remove them from the dye pot and allow them to dry. Using a bead reamer, needle, awl, etc., carefully poke a hole in each end of the egg, so that you can blow the contents out over a bowl or the sink. Rinse your egg briefly to make sure no egg material is left on the outside, and allow your egg to dry completely. Rinsing too long will cause some of the dye to wash off.

Grab your black permanent marker and draw two circles around the body of your egg. The pointier end of the egg will eventually become the bee's behind (stinger).
We cut two small wing shapes from a white coffee filter and using a small dab of glue, situated them in the middle yellow section of the bee.

Take your black and red permanent markers and draw eyes and a mouth on the rounder side of your egg:
Cut a length of fishing line and straighten a paper clip. Using a small piece of tape, attach the end of the line to the paper clip and thread the line through the two holes in your bumble bee:

Cut a small piece of black chenille pipe cleaner smaller than the length of your bee and carefully thread it into your bee's behinder. This forms the bee stinger. Using a teeny, tiny piece of clear tape, tape the fishing line to the back of the bee body. This allows your bee to stay hanging upright. If you look carefully, you should be able to see the tape in the photo:

Now just hang your bee! Ours are hanging in our window - overlooking the area where we will plant our garden in a few short weeks.

Buzzing about,
Simple Mama

Make It! Egg Garland

2011-03-23T09:03:00.001-07:00

Last year, I shared one of my very first tutorials on how to dye eggs with thrifted silk ties. You can find that tutorial at the bottom of this post here. (Excuse the poor photos - I was still what I consider a newbie to the blogging world back then.)

With Easter right around the corner and spring beckoning outside, we've started dyeing eggs again. This time, we've been blowing them out before dyeing them so that they can last indefinitely. There are many ways to blow an egg out - my preferred method, which took many poorly blown eggs to discover is so simple. I use the two hole method and I use a bead reamer to make the holes which the whites and yolk pass through. You can find them here on Amazon.com. The reviews aren't stellar as far as actual bead reaming go, but for egg blowing they are perfect! The bead reamer has a diamond like coating on it, which allows it to pierce the egg shell easily with gentle pressure and twisting. The resulting hole is perfectly shaped. Make sure to blow your egg yolks into a bowl if you want to use them. They will store in the fridge for up to 3 days.

The dyeing method for blown eggs is egg-sactly the same as with raw eggs. You do need to exercise caution, so as not to crush the egg shells. Once your eggs are all wrapped up in their pretty silk and white linen, gently place them in your nonreactive pot full of water and vinegar. They will float, but it won't matter. You'll be covering your pot with a lid and simmering these eggs for 20 minutes. The fabric covering them WILL get wet and the pattern will transfer. I usually give them a stir about 1/2 through the simmering time just for good measure. After we remove our blown eggs from their water bath, we allow them to cool to the touch. Be aware, blown eggs will fill with HOT water while simmering. Be careful that they are fully cool before you blow out any water that has accumulated in the shells.

To make our egg garland I cut a length of hemp rope slightly longer than the width of our fireplace mantel. I puzzled over how to thread my eggs for a bit. A darning needle probably would have worked well, but I didn't have one on hand so I improvised by straightening a paper clip and taping it to one end of the hemp rope.

The hemp rope was now easy to thread through each egg.

I continued threading the eggs onto the rope slowly. As you add new eggs you want to make sure they don't hit the eggs already on the rope with too much force, or you might crack a shell or two. Once your egg garland is the length you want it, simple knot it off on either end and hang it where you want it. Ours graces the mantel.
I love how delicate this garland looks - and how it sweetly reminds me of spring every time I look at it. By the way - aren't those daffodils on the mantel so precious? A dear friend gave them to me during a mom's night out to celebrate February and March birthdays. (And my birthday isn't even until autumn. I feel well loved.)

What I love about dyeing eggs this way, is that you never know exactly how the silk images will transfer. Unwrapping each egg is like unwrapping a little springtime present - a gift from nature.

Of course you could make your garland with any manner of blown eggs. Plain white, brown, dyed a different way. The point is to have fun.

Springtime blessings,
Simple Mama

Spring!

2011-03-21T14:35:00.000-07:00

Growing borax crystals and wildflowers inside egg shells. The boy planted the flowers by himself to ring in Spring!

"I knew when Spring was come -
Not by the murmurous hum
Of bees in the willow-trees,
or frills
of daffodils,
Or the scent of the breeze;
But because there were whips and tops
By the Jars of lollipops
In the two little village shops..."

- from "The Calendar"
by Barbara Euphan Todd.

Lighting our special braided rainbow beeswax candle for dinner.

Wishing you all a wonderful Spring! full of growth and new beginnings.

Cheers,
Simple Mama

Putting Food By - Lemon Curd

2011-03-19T15:07:00.000-07:00

By now you're probably all familiar with my new found affinity for Meyer Lemons. I only discovered them this winter, and I've been shaking my head every time I use one, wondering why I didn't know about them before.

Meyer Lemons are thought to be a cross between a true lemon and an orange. They are rounder than a true lemon, and the thin skin is so fragrant you could swear you were standing in a grove of citrus trees. They taste like a little bit of lemon heaven, juicy and bright without the tart bite that regular lemons impart. I've been known to peel and eat them whole this winter.

I had about 6 Meyers sitting in my fruit bowl, begging for use. I'd already canned Meyer Lemon/Vanilla Bean Marmalade, and have a quart size container of Meyers preserving in salt in my fridge. I also have another quart of apicy pickled lemons curing on my window sill, but I digress.

I stumbled upon this recipe yesterday at Food In Jars. I knew immediately I would try it. I've always wondered about lemon curd.

Loving those bright yellow yolks from our chickens.

You can usually find lemon curd in the jam or jelly section of your grocery store. Having never tried it, not sure how to use it, and balking at the price I'd generally ignored the lemon curd section and instead reached for my trusty strawberry jam. (Eh...until I learned how to make and put up my own jam. Store bought jam hasn't touched these lips in over 5 years.

Lucky you, who have Meyer Lemons growing in your area. Take advantage of them!

I'm going to pause for a moment and talk about a point a friend brought up yesterday. I posted on Facebook that it was citrus season I was going to make lemon curd today, and her response was that it was indeed citrus season in the southern regions. Meyer Lemons have no business in the north. Ah....the complexities of eating sustainably and locally. In truth, we do try to eat locally as often as possible. We grow our food. We raise our own chickens for eggs (which make an appearance in the Meyer Lemon Curd recipe.) We have a full share at a local CSA, which provides us with locally grown, organic produce throughout late spring and into the middle of fall. We frequent our farmers market. We do try to be locavores. Really. That said, I'll confess right now that we have a Costco membership. And it was at Costco that we found these Meyer Lemons. Twice. And I purchased them both times. Sometimes friends, things are so good, so delicious, so infrequent and fleeting that they are worth the purchase.And so it is with Meyer Lemons. Holy cow is lemon curd good. In truth, I think more lemon curd made it into my mouth than in the jar - because the recipe said it would fill a pint. A pint! I don't believe that I actually ate THAT much off the spoon, so the recipe may make a bit less than stated. On the other hand, it is entirely possible that I just consumed my daily allotted caloric intake in Lemon Curd. If so, I am unapologetic. It was delicious. It's in our fridge waiting to be finished. You can water bath process it, but the shelf life is only something like two months. I don't think it will be around that long. I'll add a bit to The Boy's plain yogurt in the morning. And I'll probably make some meringue cookies tomorrow with the leftover egg whites. Dipped in the curd they will be like a mini lemon meringue pie.

Have a wonderful weekend,

Simple Mama

This Moment - Aboard the Monorail

2011-03-18T00:06:00.000-07:00

{this moment} - A Friday ritual inspired by Soulemama A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Why Don't You Make Sea Shell Candles

2011-03-15T00:06:00.000-07:00

Last week, a friend of mine from South Carolina sent us the most amazing package of south east seashells you could imagine. The Boy was thrilled beyond words that so many BIG shells came to him in the mail. Thrilled!

We placed the seashells in a large glass vase while we waited for inspiration and free time to hit.Today we decided to make seashell candles!

For this project you'll need:

*A flat clam shell, or other bivalve shell without any cracks or holes.
* Scissors
* Wicking (Lead Free)
* A hot glue gun with glue sticks
* Beeswax
* A dedicated crock pot for wax or a double boiler.
* Something to hold your shell sturdy - we use an old bowl full of rice.
* Something to pour your beeswax with. I used an old plastic spoon.

Pick out your best bivalve shells and set them aside.

Snip off a piece of your wicking so that it is long enough to fit inside your shell and is 1/2 inch over the rim of the shell. Make sure when you're purchasing your wicking that you get the correct size. Mine was too narrow for the vary largest shells. I had to place them in a freezer after they were hardened so that I could pop the wax out and start over with thicker wick.

Using your hot glue gun, place a dab of glue in the bottom of the shell where you want your wick centered. You can see we coiled our wick a bit to allow for a larger gluing surface area.

Place your shells on a surface where they won't roll around on you. We use an old pyrex pan full of rice to keep them steady. Carefully pour your liquid wax into your seashell. We used an old plastic spoon to pour the wax bit by bit. I have a pitcher that acts as a double boiler - but usually I melt my wax on low in my dedicated craft crock pot. I find using a spoons works well for smaller pours.

Allow your seashells to cool and harden completely before using them. Ours look lovely on our mantel and scattered about our home. When we light them, we make sure they are securely propped up, using other shells, or on a glass fireproof surface to help prevent spills.

Aren't they beautiful? A special thank you to my friend, Sarah, for sending these special shells to us.

Aglow,
Simple Mama

These are a Few of My Favorite Things...

2011-03-14T12:00:00.001-07:00

We spent part of the weekend working on clearing a path in the garage so that we might actually be able to reach our seed starting shelves and get started on sprouting all sorts of wonderful things for our garden. The process of boxing up items for Goodwill, pulling out broken items beyond repair for our local dump and recycling what we could spurred my need to get down and dirty with some serious decluttering. Spring is almost upon us and it's time to lighten our load.

While I've been decluttering our home the last few days I'm reminded of those things in my home that have been carefully chosen to stay. Items that are beautiful, useful, or loved. I've decided that I'll start sharing some of those things with you each week. Some of my favorite things.

The message above our dining room table.

Our air plant hanging in the entry

Our mantel. I especially love this area. The candlestick holders belonged to my mother. The wood clock was something we picked up on a trip to Pennsylvania Dutch Country. The artwork was created by my 3 year old son.

Our guest bedroom. It's actually my favorite bedroom in the house, and I've been known to sneak in there some evenings after everyone is asleep. The down comforter is soft as a ...well...a feather. The pillow was cross stitched by my grandmother. The bunting was a trade with a fellow Etsy artist. It's such a peaceful spot for me.

So the decluttering continues. I think that often times we're discontent with what we have because we can't SEE what we have. We pile stuff on every single surface. Nail pictures up on every single wall. The clutter gets in the way of the peace and tranquility we long for our
homes to exude.

I'm going to work hard this year to rid myself of some of that extra "weight" that keeps our house bogged down. To remind myself that yes, less is more. What are some of your decluttering goals for the rest of the year?

Simple Mama

Silent Sunday - Putting Food By: Chicken Noodle Soup

2011-03-13T11:06:00.001-07:00

Simple Mama

Putting Food By - Beef, Onions and Vanilla

2011-03-11T10:50:00.000-08:00

A freezer door left open accidentally left me frantically trying to figure out what to do with the contents. I was especially concerned about the organic, free ranged, grass fed beef and chicken steadily thawing.

I have this marvelous All American 921 pressure canner, which I had only used to cook meals in. For whatever reason, the idea of actually using it to CAN scared the self sufficient right out of me. So I posted on the Facebook page, "Take Back Urban-Homestead(s)" for help and support - and the members there came through in a hurry. When I realized I couldn't find the rack that came with my pressure canner, it was recommended that I use quart size canning rings in the bottom to keep my glass jars off the metal. Who knew? Well, probably most of you, but I never would have thought of that trick.

I managed to get all the beef put up yesterday. It was surprisingly easy, and now I have stew meat ready to go whenever we might need it. A few things I wasn't expecting, being a first timer and all:
1. When I took the jars out of the canner the contents were bubbling like mad! Amazing to watch, but I was concerned at first that I had done something wrong. Turns out it's fine.
2. Canned meat in glass jars looks strange. This must be why they can meat in metal cans for the grocery stores. Regardless, I know what's in my jars; Organic beef, salt, pepper, and water.

I managed to put up 5 quarts of beef. I wanted to put them up in pint jars, but I didn't have any empty, so I made due with what I had.

And did you see that little bit of green hanging out in the picture above? Those are our scallions previously posted here. This is what they look like now:

You can see in the next picture how the roots grow and tangle in the cup of water. If you want to do this at home, it's simple. The next time you have green onions, don't throw away the white ends. Simply submerge them in a glass of water and place them in a sunny window. Your onions will begin to grow almost immediately and can be harvested almost indefinitely. We just use kitchen scissors to cut what we need for meals. I periodically empty out the water, rinse the roots off and give them fresh water.

Finally, I wanted to share our new adventures with vanilla. Growing up I was only familiar with one type of vanilla. Imitation. Can I get a resounding "Gross!?" Did you know imitation vanilla is often made with wood byproducts and chemicals? Yuck.

About 2 years ago I discovered real vanilla. In the pod. It was like the heavens opened up and a chorus of angels started singing. I'll forgive my parents. They were broke. They didn't use the internet much (to be fair, it wasn't really readily available like it is today.) And they probably didn't know any different. I get my vanilla from Vanilla Products USA. They have a site on Ebay that sells the same vanilla bean for even less and I've been very pleased with the quality and quantity.

This week I decided to make my own vanilla extract and vanilla sugar. The extract is simple. Buy the cheapest vodka you can find. Pour it into a mason jar. Add 6-8 vanilla beans, sliced open and chopped up. Put a lid on it. Store it in a cool, dark location for 8 weeks. Shake it every now and then. Strain into a new jar when you're ready to use and add more vodka to the beans in the old jar. Whenever you use a bean for another recipe, toss the remains into your extract jar. It will store indefinitely if kept properly.

Vanilla sugar is also simple to make. Take plain old white sugar and place it in a mason jar. Add a few chopped up beans. Put a lid on it and shake. Store in the pantry. The sugar takes on such a delicious, light vanilla flavor. Perfect for baking, adding to coffee, sweets, etc. Yummy!

Today I'm prepping the makings for chicken noodle soup. Now that I'm no longer terrified of my pressure canner, I'll be using it to save all the chicken that thawed in our freezer. The Boy loves chicken noodle soup, so this will actually be a wonderful thing for us to have on hand. I'm also going to buy a freezer alarm......

***update - 2/5/12. Wow! So much traffic to this post. I had no idea that regrowing scallions in water would be such a popular topic. Having grown our green onions like this now for several years, I should clarify my earlier statements. These onions most likely won't grow indefinitely, but you can get 7 - 15 new clippings from them if you're vigilant. Please empty and replace your water regularly. Every 1-2 days. Rinse off your roots when replacing your water. This keeps down on onion-y smell and possible rot. And keep that water right around root level - don't fill the jar all the way up to the green portion of your onions. That's a sure way to have green onion rot develop. Happy micro-farming!
Learning new skills every day.

Simple Mama

Wordless Wednesday - Pikes Place Market Gum Wall

2011-03-09T00:06:00.000-08:00

Yeah....it was awesomely disgusting.

Why Don't You Make Magazine Butterflies?

2011-03-08T15:33:00.001-08:00

Grab those magazines out of the recycling bin, we're making paper butterflies today!

With the sun peeking out from the behind clouds this morning, we opened up the windows and aired out the house. The first signs of spring are finally on the way; crocus bulbs pushing up through the ground, the sounds of birds chirping in the morning, the daylight slowly pushing the nightime back further and further.

After spending quality time with the chickens, turning the compost pile over, and raking up some wayward mulched leaves that escaped from the flower bed we came back inside for lunch and reading time. The Boy was oohing and awing over some gorgeous photos in a few of my favorite magazines and lamenting the fact that they always end up in the recycling bin. With spring fresh on my mind, I decided to usher her in a little earlier with some homemade magazine butterflies.

For this project you'll need:

Magazines with gorgeous colorful pages
Scissors
Ruler
Pipe Cleaner

I had The Boy pick out some of his favorite pages in the magazines. We carefully tore the pages out and put them in a pile.

Using our ruler and scissors, we drew two squares per page and then cut them out. One 4"x4" square and one 5"x5" square.

Fold each square accordion style, going from corner to corner on the diagonal. Your accordion folds shouldn't be too large - about 1/4" each. Each piece of paper will look like a fan.

Using your scissors, cut a regular sized pipe cleaner in half. We used black for our project, but you could use whatever color you like.

Face the pretty sides of the paper the same direction. Lay the smaller sized fan on top of the larger sized fan. Wrap the pipe cleaner around both pieces of paper and twist a few times to secure them. Gently curve the ends of the pipe cleaner down to form the antennae of the butterfly.

Carefully open your fans to reveal the wings of the butterfly. We found it helpful to pull the smaller wings up towards the antennae and the larger wings down before opening up the fan.

Now find someplace to display your butterflies! Using Glue Dots, we secured ours to our wall and mirror (A fantastic Etsy find made of recycled materials leftover from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.)

I'm picturing many more of these - traveling the walls all over our house. Recycled materials repurposed into springtime beauty!

Cheers,
Simple Mama

Fruit Rainbow with a "Pot of Gold"

2011-03-07T13:15:00.000-08:00

St. Patrick's Day is coming up people! We're determined to get some kid-friendly crafting in during the next two weeks. Shamrocks, leprechauns, and rainbows oh my!

We started off our festivities with snack time. While I can't say it's an actual craft per se, it's easy, tons of fun for little ones - and healthy eating at the same time. Who could resist this fruity rainbow with marshmallow clouds and banana slice gold coins?

Just the "craft" project I needed for our manic Monday.

Shop for fruits that represent the 6 colors of the rainbow; Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple. We used strawberries, orange slices, cut up fresh pineapple, peeled kiwi, blueberries, and red (purple) grapes. Banana slices made up our pot of gold. We soaked them in lemon juice so they wouldn't turn brown.

You can mix this up with any items you might find at the grocery store. Red apples, green grapes, purple plums, canned mandarin orange slices, orange-ish peach slices. Really, you're only limited by your imagination.

Happy snacking!

Simple Mama

Silent Sunday - Baby Chicks

2011-03-06T00:06:00.000-08:00

Our newest addition - 5 day old Araucana chicks - or perhaps Easter Eggers. Time will tell.

Putting Food By - Meyer Lemon Marmalade with Vanilla Bean

2011-03-05T12:54:00.000-08:00

The first food preserved in 2011? Meyer Lemon Marmalade with Vanilla Beans.

Recipe discovered at Tea and Cookies

The verdict?

Delicious.

Happy Weekending.

Simple Mama

Winner!

2011-02-28T09:02:00.000-08:00

So sorry for the delay in announcing the winner, dear readers. I've had family in town from the east coast.

Mama Rae - You are the winner of a $50 gift certificate to my Etsy store, Green Baboon Designs I'll be contacting you later today with instructions on redeeming your prize.

Congratulations!

This Moment - A Child's Work

2011-02-25T12:58:00.000-08:00

Settling in for more Winter

2011-02-24T10:32:00.000-08:00

Remember how I've been talking about longing for spring?

It would seem that nature has other plans in store for me today. This is what we woke up to:

Of course The Boy had to pull on some warm clothes and dash outside to check on the chickens once he saw the white stuff covering the ground:

The girls are quite vocal this morning, not sure how they feel about the snow. They keep walking around with quite the quizzical looks on their faces.

Me? I just settled down to read my book that came just in time for breakfast. How cute is that thrifted teapot?:

Watching winter hang on,

Simple Mama

Wordless Wednesday - Gifts from the Chickens

2011-02-23T00:06:00.000-08:00

It's a New Day and a Giveaway!

2011-02-22T10:29:00.000-08:00

First and foremost, I want to thank you all for your kind words from a few days ago. I was having one of those, "Wow...I really suck at this stay at home mama thing" moments. Your encouragement, support, words of wisdom and empathy were much needed and heard.

I'm relieved that I seem to be back on track. The Boy is feeling better. We made it through the, I'm-feeling-marginally-better-but-I'm-still-sick-enough-to be-cranky stage and we've moved onto the What-can-I-get-into/help with/mess up-now stage. The sink is cleared of dishes, there's laundry in the wash, and lunch is planned. The floor isn't swept, the beds aren't made (but they rarely are) and I think I forgot to feed the dog last night, but all in all the world has righted itself again.

Because you all have given so much to me over the past 2 years, I want to do something in return. I'm holding my 3rd giveaway. Up for grabs is a $50 gift certificate to my Etsy store, Green Baboon Designs. Shipping is on me. Please make sure I have a way to contact you either through your own blog, or leave your email address. Email addresses can be left as JaneDoe at gmail dot com so that spammers and the like can't pick them up automatically.

There are four ways to enter.

1. Follow this blog. If you already follow me, leave a message on this post telling me that.
2. Leave a comment on this post. Any comment. Tell me what you're going to have for dinner, what your favorite book is, how your spring garden is taking shape.
3. Sign up for Swag Bucks under my referral link. If you don't know what that is, see this post. If you've already signed up under my referral link, just leave a message letting me know.
4. Blog/Tweet about this giveaway. Come back here and leave a link to the blog or tweet.

Giveaway is open until Friday, Feb. 25, 2011 at 12:00 noon PST. Winner will be announced Saturday, Feb 26th and chosen via a random number generator. Giveaway open to all - including overseas readers.

With much gratitude in my heart for all of you,
Simple Mama

I Am An Urban Homesteader!

2011-02-21T09:59:00.000-08:00

Recently the inter-webs have been abuzz with news that the Dervaes family of Pasadena has successfully trademarked the terms "Urban Homestead" and "Urban Homesteading". The family sent out at least 16 "cease and desist" letters to various groups asking them to find alternate phrasing, including the Santa Monica Public Library for hosting a free, educational event on urban homesteading.

These terms can no longer be used in Facebook page titles, on personal blogs or otherwise for profit. If you use the term in a not for profit manner, you must use the trademark symbol and "specifically identify products or services from the Dervaes Institute." They add that it would be "proper to use generic terms such as "modern homesteading." They have had Facebook pages with the terms Urban Homestead and Urban Homesteading in the name shut down without notifying those pages first. -Take Back Urban Homesteading Facebook Page

Hmmm.

And the word is the Dervaes family went after these guys too: The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-sufficient Living in the Heart of the City. A legal battle appears to be brewing with that one. You can read about it here.

The Dervaes family claims it sought these trademarks, among others, to protect their intellectual property. I would argue that the intellectual property they claim needs protecting is actually open source. While what the Dervaes family has done with their little plot of land is admirable, it certainly isn't original. People have been putting these agricultural and environmental practices to use for decades, if not longer. Going after the little guys seems to me to be counter productive to the movement they claim to want to inspire. To claim "intellectual property" on words that have been used together since at least the 1970's is a slap in the face to all the homesteaders, urban and suburban gardeners, back yard chicken keepers, and food preservers - really anyone that tries to employ sustainable, self sufficient living styles in the city (or in my case, suburbia).

Head over to the Facebook page, Take Back Urban Home-steading and show your support for a community that is tight knit and would strive to keep Urban Homesteading an open source idea and lifestyle. There you can find out what else you can do to help

In the meantime, enjoy a few scenes from our suburban homestead.

Ladies Lunching

Two Weeks

Vanilla Pears

Starting From Seed

Growing hope, one seed at a time.

Simple Mama

2011-02-18T09:44:00.000-08:00

My Truth

2011-02-18T09:06:00.001-08:00

I've been feeling irritated as of late. Like I just can't keep it all together. Perhaps it's The Boy who has come down with his 989th cold of the season. Perhaps it's the dreary weather we've been having. Maybe it's our own lack of daily rhythm since we've returned back from vacation.

You see, here's the thing Internet. As much as I would like to portray myself to the world as a Super Mom, I'm simply not able to keep up. I'd like to don my cape and fight wayward laundry and dirty dishes all the while creating a charming craft, keep my Etsy store stocked and create a nutritious and healthy meal from scratch for my family each evening. But this is my truth:

And there's more where that came from. Photos I'm not willing to share yet, lest you feel the need to contact CPS about the state of my dirty home. Laundry unwashed. Floors unswept. Beds not made. And don't even get me started on the garage.

And here's a secret. Sometimes, when I need to take a picture for my blog - I simply move the mess from one spot to another. You know. To give the appearance of a spotlessly clean space!

Fellow bloggers, I'm in need of some support. And maybe even a little truth telling of your own. Are your homes really as neat and tidy as you portray them? Do you really bake that bread every day from scratch? Is your craft area neatly organized and labeled? Do you truly make your beds every. single. day?

Because I don't. And I'm feeling the guilt of a stay at home mama who doesn't really have it all together. Breakfast this morning? A sliced pear, Crystal Lite, and left over Mac and Cheese. There. I said it. I did not make pancakes, french toast, or steel cut oats for breakfast today.

I'll still use this space to journal all the beautiful things in my home, my family, my life. I don't need a daily visual reminder of the chaos that all too often resides in my kitchen or laundry room on the internet. When I'm old and gray (actually I'm already gray) I'll want to be able to use this space and focus on all the things I got right. The crafts, the love, the trips, the memory making, the attachment parenting. But I'm feeling a little raw today. A little undone by those dishes sitting in my sink and my own lack of motivation to wash them. I'd rather sit on the couch with The Boy and read.

Simple Mama

Why Don't You Make Coffee Filter Flowers

2011-02-16T10:18:00.000-08:00

I'm longing for spring. For an end to the gray, misty mornings. An end to the drizzle and cold. For a while it seemed as though mother nature was going to oblige. Temperatures crept up into the 50's. Crocus and other early bulbs started to show their green tips. And then BAM! This morning we woke up to snow. (Insert grimacing face here.)

To brighten our days we've been making coffee filter flowers. We used to make a variation of these when I was a child, but recently I stumbled across Aunt Peaches coffee filter flowers and I was inspired. Our version is slightly different, so I'm going to post a tutorial here - but make sure you stop by her blog and take a look at the creations she makes. They are outstanding!

You'll need:
5 white coffee filters
Food coloring
Wooden skewers
Florist Tape
1/2 cup water
A small shallow pie pan

We started our project late one evening on "Family Craft Night." I've recently been asked when family craft night is, as it seems we're always crafting. To be dubbed "Family" craft night, the event must take place in the evening when Super Hubby is home and said Hubby must participate in the craft. :) But I digress.

This is a great project for little ones and big ones alike. To start, take your pie pan and fill it with 1/4 cup water. Add food coloring. For this tutorial, I'm going to show you a gradiated flower. We began with 2 drops of yellow food and two drops of red food coloring. Place a stack of coffee filters in the water and let them soak for a few moments. We soaked between 10-15 filters at a time. I should add that if you don't want your hands to turn funky colors you might consider wearing rubber gloves. We didn't and we all have awesome orange and red hands.

Wring the coffee filters out and lay them on some old towels to dry over night. Add a few more drops yellow and red food coloring to your water so the color is more concentrated. Soak more coffee filters. Lather, rinse and repeat with a 3rd set of coffee filters and more food coloring.

See the difference in coloring?

Take two of your lightest shade, two of the medium shade and 1 of the darkest shade and set them aside. Each flower is made from 5 coffee filters. Begin with the darkest coffee filter. Fold it in half to form a half circle. Fold it in half again to create quarters. Fold it in half one more time to create 8ths and then one more time for 16ths. The medium colored coffee filters are folded into 8ths. The lightest coffee filters are folded into 4ths. Clear as mud, right? Take a look at the photo.

Using your scissors, cut teeny, tiny jagged petal shapes into the darkest coffee filter. This forms the center, or stamen of your flower. Cut larger petal shapes into the medium colored coffee filters. Create wavy scalloped shapes for the lightest shades.

Snip the very end off of each triangle shape on the folded side, or very center of the coffee filter. This creates a tiny hole in the middle of each filter:

Take your darkest filter and place your wooden skewer through the center hole. Move it up the skewer til it's about 3/4" from the top of the skewer. Gather the base and twist it around the skewer. Using florist tape, wrap it around the base of the coffee filter so that it sticks to the skewer. Florist tape is sticky, but must be stretched slightly to activate the good gummy stuff. Don't stretch it too much or it will break.

Next, add your first medium color coffee filter. Twist it just as you did the first filter and tape it up:

Repeat this process with the second medium coffee filter and then finally with the 4th and 5th lightest coffee filters:

Once all 5 filters are on your skewer, continue wrapping your florist tape all the way down the length of the skewer.

I did manage to snag pictures of the finished flowers outside. I just couldn't take photos of the actual works in progress because it was too wet and cold to work outside with the delicate coffee filters. I love the subtle graduated color.

Yellow Gradiated Flowers:

So sunny and cheerful!

And of course you can make these flowers with any color coffee filters you wish - we made some in about every color of the rainbow. The more dye you use, the darker the filter will be after it dries.

Here they sit on our nature table. Yep. I'm trading in seasons early. Manifesting an early spring just like the ground hog said we would have!

It's our own version of forcing bulbs indoors. :)

Cheers,
Simple Mama

From Our Home to Yours

2011-02-14T13:43:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentine's Day!

(*tutorial coming soon*)

Why Don't You Make Potato Stamp Valentine's Day Cards

2011-02-13T10:54:00.000-08:00

We needed a last minute Valentine's Day card craft for Super Hubby. He had already seen our celery stamped rose cards. Doily heart cards were so last year. Store bought cards seemed impersonal. What's a mama to do when her creative juices are running low?

Why pull out the old potato stamp trick, of course.

You'll need:

Card Stock Paper
Paints (We used tempera)
A medium potato
A heart shaped cookie cutter
A small, sharp pairing knife.

Begin by cutting your potato in half near the widest portion. We used a potato that was just past its prime - starting to grow eyes:

Using your small heart shaped cookie cutter, insert it into the potato until the top is flush with the flat end of the potato:

Adults, using a small sharp pairing knife, cut into the potato about 1/4 of an inch down until you feel your knife touch the cookie cutter. Continue cutting all the way around the potato until the waste is easily removed.

Make sure your paint is thinned enough that when you're stamping, it doesn't come out like a thick glob. Likewise, make sure it isn't so thin that it just runs off your stamp. You may need to play around with adding just enough water to the paint.

We used a regular piece of 8.5x11 card stock, folded in half twice to make a card. I gave the potato stamp to The Boy and allowed him to go crazy. We started with bright red paint. Stamped a few hearts, and added some white to make pink. This way we only dirtied up one bowl.

Just like with the celery stamping, make sure to press your stamp firmly on the paper, but don't rock it back and forth too much.

This makes a great last minute Valentines Card. Make it early enough in the day that it has time to dry. In a pinch you could speed up the paint drying process by aiming a low heat hair dryer at the card.

And Super Hubby, if you're reading this, act surprised tomorrow when The Boy gives you his card.

Happy card making!
Simple Mama

This Moment - Preserving Lemons in Salt

2011-02-11T09:00:00.000-08:00

Why Don't You Make Acorn Cap Jewels

2011-02-10T14:40:00.001-08:00

It's no secret, we're big on acorns around here. I use them frequently in my Etsy store, Green Baboon Designs. We decorate with them during the seasons. The Boy uses them as "food" in his play kitchen. Yesterday we found another use for them - shiny acorn cap jewels.

You'll need:
Acorn caps
Elmers School glue
Markers
Rice, beans, playdough, etc - something to hold your caps secure.

Pick out your favorite acorn caps. We have an abundance on hand at any given time, collected from our outings to our favorite parks and forests in the autumn. Make sure the insides of the caps are free from dust and debris.

Using your markers, color the inside of each cap. If you want a bright, jewel tone for your finished acorn cap, color the entire inside leaving no space blank. If you want a pastel shade, don't press as hard, or worry too much about getting every little space covered:

(Yes - he's wearing the same shirt two days in a row. I sent him upstairs this morning to pick out his clothes and get dressed and this is what he came back down in.)

Once your acorn caps are all colored, place them in your rice, or beans, or play dough. We have rice that we're careful to only use with our crafts.

It's hard to see the marker, but it's there. It will be more noticeable once we're done.

Fill each acorn cap up to the rim with white school glue. We used Elmers.

Allow your acorns to dry over night. Ours needed close to 20 hours to dry completely.
When the glue dries it forms a hard enamel like coating over the colored part of the acorn cap, allowing the color to really shine through. The Boy called them acorn treasures. He's big into pirates, treasure, and all things jewel like.

We're using our jeweled acorn caps to play Memory. We made sure to make 4 of each color. We turn them over and take turns lifting two caps each until a match is made. The person with the most matches once all the caps have been turned over wins.

I foresee a batch of acorn rainbow "soup" in my future as well.

Cheers,
Simple Mama

Why Don't You Make a Valentine's Day Lei?

2011-02-10T00:06:00.000-08:00

As The Little gets older, we try to create something together at least twice a week. I admire all you bloggers who manage to create something every single day. I just can't seem to find a way to balance everyday toddler crafting into our routine.

We planned a project that ended up being too big for the reality of our day this afternoon. After a morning play date with some of my favorite mamas and their children, a missed nap, and no dinner ready I decided to switch gears and go with something much simpler.

We made Valentine's Day inspired Leis to wear.

For this project you'll need:

Several plastic straws (Gasp! Plastic! I know! Yet even in our house, we're we've tried to rid ourselves of plastic we still keep straws on hand).
Card stock paper in various colors
Scissors
Hole punch
Twine, hemp rope, thin ribbon, or the like

Cut your rope/twine/ribbon into a length long enough, that when tied off at the ends, it will slip easily over your head. Using scissors, cut your straws into small lengths. Ours were about 1 inch in length.

String one of the straw lengths onto your twine. Tie off at the end so that it doesn't slide off and you can continue stringing.

Cut out hearts in various sizes. My son opted for bright, non-Valentiney colors.

Using the hole punch, punch a hole at the top and the bottom of each heart. String your twine through the top and then the bottom of a heart.

Begin alternating a straw length and a paper heart until your twine is full. My son loved stringing the straws on.

When you're finished, tie the two ends together and slip it over your head. You now have your very own Hawaiian inspired Valentine's lei.

Happy creating!

Simple Mama

Wordless Wednesday - Regrowth

2011-02-09T08:54:00.001-08:00

regrowing scallions (green onions) in water.

Transferring Scrap Booking Images Onto Stone

2011-02-08T09:57:00.000-08:00

Scrap booking image transfers onto rocks. What could be sweeter or more simple? I first saw this craft over at gardenmama. If you haven't had a chance to pop over to her blog, take a moment to do so. It's full of beautiful images, creative crafts and thoughtful words.

I knew immediately it was something I wanted to do with my own son.

We went about picking out our stones for the project. We had quite a few to choose some, for which I was thankful. These little stones turned out so beautifully that they are accompanying our stamped Valentines Day Cards.

We found butterfly and heart scrap booking image transfers at our local craft store and picked out the correct sized rocks for each image we wanted to use. Here are the fruits of our labor:

My son carefully rearranges these rocks, telling me out loud which rock is going to which Valentine recipient. He's so proud of this simple little craft. We'll be repeating this again for each season so that we can add to our collection and our nature table.

Cheers,
Simple Mama

Silent Sunday

2011-02-06T16:37:00.001-08:00

A new rag wreath for our door in Sandi Henderson Meadowsweet Fabric.

Why Don't You Make Celery Stamped Valentine's Day Cards

2011-02-04T13:13:00.001-08:00

I blatantly borrowed this idea from Maureen Cracknell.

The moment I saw it on her blog, I knew we had to try it ourselves. My photography isn't nearly as beautiful as hers, and my stamping wasn't as perfect, but oh my goodness we had fun with this project.

It's so simple I'm not sure instructions are even needed.

Here, take a look:

Don't you just LOVE the way the base of the celery stalk makes a beautiful rose print? We used red tempera paint. I watered it down just a bit because we found that straight out of the bottle it was too thick and didn't leave that gorgeous flower print image, just a glob of paint.

Make sure you apply even pressure when you press down. Don't rock back and forth too much. Make sure to smile and look cute while you're doing it in case someone takes a picture.

We added some glitter, some green tempera paint leaves and wrote "Be Mine" on the outside of the card. The inside is blank so that my son can color, practice his "H's", and leave dictated love notes for friends and family. Such a sweetly simple Valentine's Day card. Thank you Maureen for the inspiration!

This Moment

2011-02-04T00:06:00.000-08:00

Why Don't You Make Valentines Day Votives?

2011-02-03T11:20:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know that Valentine's Day is a Hallmark Holiday - contrived to convince people to spend money on chocolates and cards and roses and jewelry. Exactly the sort of holiday you would think I would avoid with my need to limit consumerism and commercialism in our home. But I can't help it. I LOVE Valentine's Day.

I love that it's a holiday about love, passion, affection, sweethearts. I love the cupids, the flowers, the chocolate, the cards, and yes, I even the love sparkly jewelry. Say what you will, I jump into this Hallmark Holiday feet first.

Still, it wasn't until I had my own child that I rediscovered the joy in creating our own Valentine's decorations. The beauty in handmade. Somewhere between my own childhood and womanhood I forgot that half of the beauty of this holiday belongs to the cut out hearts, the puddles of craft glue, and copious amounts of glitter.

Yesterday we made our own Valentine's Day votive holders out of material we already had. I'm not reinventing the wheel here. This project has been done by many, many bloggers, in many schools, and by generations of children. Still, it was fun, cheap, and turned out so sweet.

You'll need:
A recycled glass jar (We used a washed out pickle jar)
Colored tissue paper
Scissors
Liquid starch
Craft brushes
Newspaper
A container to hold your liquid starch

We began by laying newspapers down across our work area. Liquid starch is just that. Liquid. It's runny and messy - which is half the fun.

We took white craft tissue paper and tore it into small squares. 3 inches square or so works well. Under supervision, to make sure that our recycled pickle jar didn't roll right off the table, I had my son lay a piece of tissue paper across the jar. He then painted a small amount of liquid starch right over the top of the tissue paper. We tried just dipping the tissue paper, but it was too soggy, and just matted together.

Continue laying the white tissue paper over your glass jar until the entire jar is covered:

While the jar was still wet, we took shades of red and pink tissue paper and cut out itty bitty hearts. You can add the hearts directly to the top of the first wet white layer. It will help them adhere. If you need too, feel free to paint on just a wee bit more liquid starch:

Add as many tissue hearts as you want and make sure to layer some of them.

Allow your votive to dry overnight. When it's completely dry place a small tea light inside.

The result is charming, don't you think?

Happily crafting away.

Simple Mama

Wrapping It Up....El Yunque National Forest

2011-02-02T08:15:00.000-08:00

Our cruise was over before we knew it. 7 days of sun, water, beach, new experiences, new cultures, new people. Before we were to head home however, we had one last full day in Puerto Rico.

Super Hubby and I decided that the best way to spend the day was to rent a car and car seat and drive to the far eastern side of Puerto Rico to see Luquillo beach and the El Yunque National Rain Forest.

The waves at Luquillo were far too high for us to play in. It wasn't until later that we discovered that there is a coral protected beach that the locals come to play in. When people talk about Luquillo, that is the spot they speak of. Still, we snapped a few photos. The sand was so different from the other beaches we had been to. Almost a bright orange. It was gorgeous little spot though, with a handful of surfers and picnickers playing during lunch.

From Luquillo we headed east and then south, planning on entering El Yunque from the southern end and working our way back up north. As we made way down the eastern side of the Luquillo mountains the road became more narrow and unimproved. We found ourselves in the back country - little houses dotted the mountainous terrain, perched among some of the most gorgeous scenery I have ever witnessed. As we kept driving up, up, up, I mentioned on more than one occasion that this seemed crazy! Surely we were on the wrong road? Wouldn't a main road to a national rain forest be in better repair? I should add, it was raining off and on all morning - so the road seemed even more treacherous and muddy.

We finally pulled over in a small residential area and stopped to talk to two gentlemen. One was a native Puerto Rican, the other an ex-pat from Florida. (Are you considered an ex-pat if you move from the States to Puerto Rico?) The assured us that we were indeed on the correct path, but that the south entrance to El Yunque had been closed for years due to a washout. You could still go up to the entrance, park your car and walk around, but you couldn't drive through. After finding that the entrance was only another 6 miles or so, we decided to head up. How beautiful it was! Wild and untamed. Overgrown and magical! We found a short trail that led down to the roaring river and explored for a bit.

After finishing up on the south side of the forest, we hopped back in the car and made the journey back up to the north side of El Yunque to the main entrance. The roads this direction are well maintained. There are periodic services such as parking lots, bathrooms, marked hiking trails and even places to get food.

We spent several hours in El Yunque. I mentioned to Super Hubby on multiple occasions that I felt like I was walking around in scene from Jurassic Park. With nightfall not far off, we realized we were going to need to head back to our hotel soon. There wasn't nearly enough time in one afternoon to feel like you had even scratched the surface of this amazing rain forest.

I was so happy we made the decision to rent a car and get out of San Juan. Once you're out of the city Puerto Rico feels so, well....Puerto Rican. English isn't spoken as widely here, the buildings and houses look and feel different. It loses much of the commercialized, touristy feel and takes on a whole different appeal. One that we liked very much.

Finally, before I wrap my vacation series, I wanted to take a moment to share the following picture:

A photo of our family on the formal night aboard the Carnival Victory. My grandmother had recently celebrated her 87th birthday. Having always wanted to go on a cruise, we asked her to join us. Her eldest daughter, my Aunt C. joined us as well. Three generations of the oldest women in the family. Now that I think of it, every single person in that photo is a first born.

It was such a blessing to have my grandmother and aunt on this trip with us. A memory that I will always cherish and be thankful for.

And with that, I'm at the end of our Southern Caribbean vacation. It was over far too quickly. It left me with a renewed travel bug. Longing for sunshine, beach, and warm water. Thank you for following along!

Simple Mama

St. Martin

2011-02-02T00:06:00.000-08:00

St. Martin was simply a beach day for us. My son was still feeling too icky for anything other than playing outside for a few hours. Sounds strange, right? Playing outside when you have a cold. But I figured we could spend the hours in our stateroom watching mindless TV, or he could be out in the waves and water dealing with his stuffy nose there. We opted for the water.

We grabbed a taxi and headed over to the French side of the island. Most people asked to go to Orient Beach. Orient, to my understanding can feel a bit like a full on circus on busy days. We were looking for something a little quieter. A little more local. We opted for Le Galion, also called Coconut Grove, Baie de l´Embouchure, and nicknamed "Baby Beach". It was just a 3 or 4 minute car ride from the clothing optional section of Orient, but had a local vibe to it. The beach is part of a preserve and buffeted from harsh waves by a huge coral reef. You could walk out 20 to 30 yards and still not be up to your waste. The perfect beach for just lazing around.

He's way cool.

Contemplating joining in on the play. He ultimately decided he wanted to just play by himself.

It's a rough life.

When you're done in the sun, you can grab a quick bite to eat at the Tropical Wave just up the beach. They'll even call a taxi to come pick you up. A great little beach. Uncrowded, white sand, just enough toplessness to feel exotic. I keep thinking if we go back to St. Martin we might explore other coves and area, but I really feel like we hit it right on the money with this stop at Le Galion.

San Juan and the El Yunque National Rainforest next.

Wrapping up Caribbean vacation...
Simple Mama

St. Kitts

2011-02-01T11:02:00.001-08:00

St. Kitts turned out to be our favorite port of call. My son was feeling marginally better the morning we anchored in, so we decided to go ahead and make our scheduled tour with Captain Sunshine.

Devin and Kenny greeted us just inside the port terminal with a sign and a smile. They promptly set about the business of making us feel welcome, taking time to show my son Kenny's badge - he's a police officer on the island I believe.

Devin was our driver for the day and he took us all over the downtown Bassterre area pointing out important buildings, talking about the culture, the weather, and the people. We stopped for a moment to get a picture of the infamous St. Kitts Rum Tree:

We stopped in a local neighborhood and picked up some sliced sugar cane and played with an itty, bitty baby monkey. We tried to get the 3 year old to eat some sugar cane later in the day, but he informed us it was "monkey food."

From there our tour took us up to Samuel Jefferson's house (ancestor to Thomas Jefferson.) The house is now home to a batik factory and beautiful gardens.

And then we were off to Brimstone Hill Fortress. This was the stop my husband, a history buff was most looking forward to.

Boy...am I out of shape. These steps seemed to go on longer than I was expecting.

The view from the top. Yeah...the kid was bored, hot, and cranky. You can see why this was such a strategic location for the fort.

On the way back down The Little found an old rusted pay phone and promptly tried to call his Uncle Chris back in the states to let him know we were torturing him.

Devin found him though, and quickly put a smile back on his face:

Finally we were off to my most anticipated portion of the day. The beach. On the way back down from Brimstone hill we picked up Devin's daughter Devisha. She was such a wonderful playmate for my son the rest of the afternoon. We set out for South Friars Beach.

Devin pointing out my favorite view of our entire trip.

On the left side, the Atlantic ocean in all her turbulence. On the right side, the Caribbean Sea - calm and tranquil.

Devisha grasped my son's hand and led him back to our car so that we could make our way to South Friar's Beach on the Caribbean side. How sweet is this picture?

The beach of course was perfect. Not the pristine white sand we had seen previously, but gorgeous nonetheless. I'm in this shot, The Little on one side, Devisha on the other.

After several hours at the beach and another glorious open air shower (!) we drove back to the cruise ship terminal to leave St. Kitts behind. But we'll be back. It was a perfect day.

St. Martin next.

Simple Mama

Barbados and St. Lucia

2011-01-28T00:28:00.000-08:00

The Little woke up our morning in Barbados complaining of a sore throat. *Sigh*

A little warm water, some cuddles, and a promise of a fun day had him claiming to feel better after about 30 minutes, so we threw open our curtains to look outside at the port we had just pulled in to.

Hmm....overcast and drizzly. It reminded me much of home here in the Pacific Northwest. Determined not to let our rocky start dictate the rest of the day, we dressed ourselves and headed off the ship.

They both look thrilled, right? We had a rough start that day.

As we worked our way through the parking lot at the cruise ship terminal we were approached by a taxi cab driver and offered a tour of Barbados. He had two other passengers from our ship with him. The price was reasonable. We had no other plans. We took a chance.

Our first stop after working our way through town and seeing sites like "the place where Ricky Martin lives" and "The fence that guards the home of American Idol judge, Simon Cowell" was an Anglican Church:

We then wound our way up through the interior of Barbados. Beautiful country side here. We chugged through it so quickly I sadly didn't get many photos - and certainly none that are blog worthy. We ended up at some strange tourist trap with a bunch of random taxi cabs for a misty, soggy, wet photo op of a shore line we couldn't see well through the clouds and mist.

Hanging around for about 20 minutes while people wandered aimlessly about, The Little and I decided to go on a nature hunt. We found the largest African Snails I've ever seen. There were so many of them it was like a snail convention.

When we left, we had the opportunity to head to a local beach, about a 5 minute walk from the cruise ship terminal. Looking out at the rain clouds that kept forming and pushing the hair back from my sons eyes I could tell that a beach excursion just wasn't in the cards for us this day. The Little really wasn't feeling very well and teetering on the edge full nuclear melt down. We opted to head back to the cruise ship for rest and lunch.

All in all, Barbados didn't leave me terribly impressed - and I should add this is not the fault of Barbados or her people. Just our dumb luck that day. The one beach we did see as we drove through town, Paynes Beach, seemed to push right up against the busy main road and wasn't nearly as beautiful as I thought it would be. We stayed in our state room all night and ordered room service. The 3 year old just wasn't up to the main dining room that night. Keeping my fingers crossed that a solid nights sleep would make everything better we turned in early.

The next morning we were in port at St. Lucia. I was so, so excited! Of all the ports we were scheduled for, this was the one I was most looking forward to. After some careful study, I had arranged a tour with Spencer Ambrose Tours He came highly recommended on cruisecritic.com and I couldn't wait for our day of adventure.

The Little had different plans though. Waking up the second morning with a sore throat and now a cough and runny nose I knew our plans were over. We cuddled all morning in bed. We watched cartoons. We drank warm tea and I pouted.

Finally around noon, the kid seemed to perk up a bit. He'd been devoid of a fever the entire morning. I made an executive decision. It was clear this was probably a cold picked up from the airplane or perhaps Camp Carnival. We were at least going to a beach. He could be miserable in our stateroom and rot his brain on cartoons all day, or he could deal with a runny nose at the beach. I almost couldn't handle the idea of having two days in a row without a beach.

We quickly dressed and grabbed a taxi to Reduit Beach. It was a nice beach. Public, a bit more crowded than I would have liked. Lots of facilities and pretty white sand. The water was fairly calm and butted up against some fabulous forested green mountains.

Always building sand castles with his daddy.

We only stayed for about 2 hours. It was all the kid could handle. We grabbed our taxi again and headed back to the ship, traveling through some beautiful and interesting scenery. I'm still disappointed we weren't able to do our tour with Spencer Ambrose. Hopefully we'll be able to return some day and utilize his services. St. Lucia held the promise of being my absolute favorite port.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in our stateroom again. Thank goodness for the Lido deck and room service. There was no way I was taking my congested, sickly feeling child into the main dining room. We settled in for another evening of reading stories, watching cartoons, and cuddles.

St. Kitts next.

Simple Mama

St. Thomas

2011-01-27T10:21:00.000-08:00

Really the title should read St. John, as the only time we spent in St. Thomas was in transit to the Red Hook Ferry line to catch a ride over to St. John USVI.

We were looking for an out of the way, not-too-crowded beach. You know....something like this:

That stunning picture is of Trunk Bay, the most photographed spot on St. John. With good reason too - it's gorgeous. While not too many people traveled over to St. John the day we were in port, it seemed that most of them who did were headed here. So we opted for a different location.

Our day started with an open air taxi ride over to the Red Hook Ferry line across the island where we waited about 20 minutes for the 9 am ferry. The ferry from Red Hook leaves every hour on the hour - and prices were so reasonable!

My little mini me, waiting for the ferry:

We arrived in St. John after a short 20 minute ferry ride - as we pulled into Cruz Bay it seemed a perfect day awaited us:

We passed the aforementioned Trunk Bay. As everyone else piled out of the taxi, Super Hubby and I made the spur of the moment decision to have the taxi driver take us to Cinnamon Bay, just down the road a few miles. Cinnamon Bay is managed by the US Park Service, something we didn't realize until we were there. Little concrete bungalows line the area above the shore line. Bare tent sites and sites with large canvas tents, cots, bedding, and kitchen supplies are also available. There is a little convenience store and restaurant on the premises too. And the beach is stunning! This little fellow was waiting to greet us as we rounded the corner to the powder white sand and gently lapping waves:

We built sand castles, played in the water, and enjoyed the scenery and sunshine for hours under the shade of gently swaying palm trees and lush vegetation!

After we were appropriately sun kissed and tired from our day in the sun we made our way up the short walk to the open air, cool water showers. If you haven't had the opportunity to try an outdoor shower, you really should. It's one of life's truly simple and extraordinary decadent pleasures in my opinion. Showering under the bright blue sky, rinsing the ocean water from your body is incredibly refreshing. Too soon we hopped on a taxi waiting up at the top of the Cinnamon Bay parking lot and wound our way through the scenic hillsides back to Cruz Bay to catch the ferry to St. Thomas.

The day was magical. St. John is gorgeous. Cinnamon Bay is a true jewel. We're contemplating a trip back this fall just to stay in the campground area. They provide just about everything you need. And if you don't want to make your own meals, head over to the restaurant on the premises. There was so much of St. John we didn't see, and I can't wait to visit again. St. Thomas, I'm sure was lovely, but we're more interested in off-the-beaten path vacations. Something I wasn't convinced could be done on a cruise, but am pleasantly surprised every time I'm proven wrong.

And finally, this last picture. Back in our Ocean Suite cabin. Exhausted. In our house, we're co-sleepers. Have been since The Little was first born. Admitting to co-sleeping is an interesting experiment in societal norms. People either stand squarely behind your decision to have a family bed, or they sway to other side and believe that children and parents must have their own nighttime space. Without getting into the nighttime routine debate, let me just end with this: I'm never so thankful that we co-sleep as I am when we're on vacation. The Little falls asleep easily, no matter what our room looks like, where we are located, or what we've been doing, so long as Mama or Daddy are there. Co-sleeping makes traveling a breeze.

Barbados next!

Simple Mama

San Juan, Puerto Rico

2011-01-26T13:39:00.001-08:00

Our vacation started in San Juan, Puerto Rico 3 days before our cruise. After a long flight across country with a 3 year old and my 87 year old grandmother we found ourselves enjoying the warmth and humidity of this southern territory of the United States.

He's all smiles after an 11 hour flight.

We headed into Old San Juan to visit the Castillo San Cristobal fort. San Cristobal was started in 1634 and her primary job was to guard San Juan against land attacks.

These large iguanas were lounging in the sun all around the fort.

The Little's feet started to hurt in his hiking shoes. The kind ranger at the fort took pity upon him and gave him bandaids, a junior ranger button, and treats. I think she had a little bit of a crush on him.

After touring San Cristobal we headed into Old San Juan. Much to our surprise we found ourselves there during the San Sabastian festival. (Think Carnival for San Juan.)

The old cobble stone streets were full of food, music, performers, and fun!

Kid photo of our shoes. We picked him up some soft soled water socks to walk around in so that we could ease the blisters on his sad little feet:

After much walking we stumbled upon a large open field, where locals were flying inexpensive kites. We discovered a discarded kite and spent some time kite flying too. When in Rome...

Our day ended with the long walk back across town to pick up a taxi to our hotel. The Little was so tired that his papa ended up carrying him piggy back style the majority of the way. Does anyone else have problems finding pants that stay on their children?

More later...
Simple Mama

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted....

2011-01-25T05:52:00.000-08:00

We spent the last week enjoying some gorgeous weather in the southern Caribbean celebrating our 10 year anniversary. I'll be posting more photos later, but for now, here are a few teasers from our time in the sun:

Trunk Bay, St. John, USVI

Monkeying around in St. Kitts

Flying his "kite" in St. Martin

Wishing you could all be as relaxed as I am right now.

Simple Mama

Why Don't You Make Rainbow Rice?

2011-01-12T13:31:00.001-08:00

We needed a fun, colorful activity during one of our many recent gray, rainy days. Rainbow rice fit the bill perfectly.

I first read about rainbow rice on the ForesterClan blog here.

We followed the instructions for Rainbow Rice using food coloring and my own tube watercolor paints. I just squirted a dab of watercolor into a baggy, added a tablespoon of water and a teaspoon of rubbing alcohol. I'm cheap and wanted to use what we had on hand. After the bags of rice were completely mixed, I dried them on a fruit leather rack in my dehydrator. It took each bag about 15 minutes to dry completely. Look how pretty the colors are!

Of course H wouldn't let the colors stay separate for long. He went right to work mixing them up.

A few old kitchen utensils and a play rug to help corral the mess equals hours of fun. Clean up is a breeze. A quick vacuum of the area and wash of the hands (yes, the color on the rice does come off on your hands a bit - so have wipes or a bathroom sink available.)

Such a fun, rainy day project!

I'll be gone from this space for a while - taking a vacation to the Southern Caribbean. Pictures when we come back, rejuvenated and sun tanned.

Much love,
Simple Mama

A Look Back on 10 years of Marriage

2010-12-31T00:06:00.000-08:00

December 31, 2000 - Our wedding day, Boise, Idaho with the pastor who married us.

Happy Anniversary to my Love. Without whom I would not know what to do. I love you more than I did 10 years ago when were just crazy kids saying "I do" at the alter. There is nobody I would rather take this journey with than you.

Chicken Eggs! We have Chicken Eggs!

2010-12-27T09:26:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to post this. Somewhere in the last two weeks our chickens started laying actual to goodness eggs. You know, the stuff of legends that omelettes and breakfast burritos are made of?

What's the most fascinating to me is that these eggs are so completely different from their store bought counterpart. We purchase cage free, organic eggs from the local grocery store. We cracked one of our eggs next the store bought egg and were so surprised by the difference in yolk color. Our hens laid eggs with such beautiful, dark yellow yolks. It makes the organic eggs from the store look sad by comparison.

And here they are collected in their bowl. Aren't they cute? I love how they vary slightly in color. I do believe we have at least two chickens laying eggs on a regular basis as we're now collecting two eggs a day. Ignore the dark spot - I seem to have a spot on my lens.

Way to go girls!

Simple Mama

Mini Beeswax Christmas Tree Lanterns

2010-12-24T16:23:00.000-08:00

Last year during Autumn Color week I posted a picture of my homemade beeswax luminaries made the previous fall. What I didn't do was tell the story behind them.

As beautiful as they were, they made a mess that two years later I'm still trying to clean up. You see, these luminaries were made with water filled balloons dipped into melted beeswax. Usually, all goes well. But on occasion, the beeswax gets too warm, or your water balloon too cool. Or the balloon is weak. Or the Gods just want to laugh at you that day. I think probably all of the above took place the day I made these luminaries.

As I toiled over the double boiler on the stove, the balloon I was dipping exploded. The water hit the beeswax with great force, causing beeswax to literally propel itself into ALL corners of my kitchen. My hair was covered, my arms were covered, my clothes ruined. My floors, counters, cabinets, and ceiling? Well, lets just say I'm still finding beeswax to scrape up. My son, just learning to walk and say a few words, was thankfully in the next room watching me from the doorway. "Whoa." He said in his excited baby babble.

Whoa indeed. And it was enough to cause me pause and not attempt this process again.

Until yesterday.

Over on Morning Rae Sun there was a fabulous tutorial on making mini beeswax luminaries for your Christmas tree. I KNEW I had to give it a try again. Rae was kind enough to send me some pointers via email, and I readied our supplies.

Let me be forthcoming here. I only made 1 of the lanterns. I had Super Hubby dip the rest. He's infinitely more brave than I. Dipping one lantern sent my heart racing and caused me to break into a sweat. Too be fair, just as I was getting ready to dip my first lantern, Super Hubby, standing by my side said loudly, "Watch out!" That stinker. I gasped and almost dropped the entire balloon in the beeswax.

Here are a few of our photos from this afternoon. Please excuse the dark spot on all the images - I have some sort of dust fleck on my camera lens that I can't seem to clean off:

Melting rescued beeswax chunks from ancient projects and used candles in our old crock pot. This crock is specifically used for beeswax projects.

Super Hubby dipping one of our water balloons. Such concentration.

Some of the dipped luminaries cooling on a wax paper lined cookie sheet:

After we popped the balloons over the sink, we allowed the luminaries to drain on a towel on the counter:

And the finished luminaries hanging from the boughs of our Christmas tree. I think they turned out beautifully. You can see a bit of the rainbow paper chain we adorned our tree with behind them:

I'm so glad Rae convinced me (er....my husband) to try this craft again!

Wishing you love and light this Christmas Eve.

Simple Mama

Unexpected Gifts

2010-12-23T13:14:00.000-08:00

When Christine posted on Facebook the pictures of her new Wichtelmen for sale in her shop at The Puppenstube, both my son and I fell in love with a darling little Wichtelman that reminded us of Santa. My son clapped in delight when he saw the photo online, and didn't want me to stray away from the page. I messaged Christine letting her know how much my son loved the red outfitted Wichtelman with snowy white beard.

Imagine my surprise when a few days later an unexpected package came in the mail from The Puppenstube. I opened the package when my son was occupied with something else and was rendered speechless. Inside was our Santa Wichtelman from "The Puppenstube Elf." I am still floored when I think of the generosity that Christine bestowed upon my little family this holiday season.

My plan was to wrap the Wichtelman and surprise my son on Christmas morning. It was not to be, however. The three year old had other plans. With a few weeks to go before Christmas, and only two packages under the tree at the time, he took it upon himself to open both of them. And of course he was thrilled that "Santa" had come to visit.

And so it was two weeks ago that we started what I hope will be a new Christmas tradition. Our Santa Elf sits in an undetermined location each morning. And each morning, my son runs around the house trying to locate him. He tells "Little Santa" good morning each and every day. He converses with "Little Santa" about what he wants for Christmas, and how the day went before he heads up to bed. And Little Santa in kind, returns to the North Pole each night with and recalls my son's activities to the Big Man himself, Santa Claus.

I've been careful to keep rewards and punishment out of this new tradition though. I refuse to have Little Santa be a reporter of "bad behavior" as I don't believe that children should feel like Christmas is about rewards and punishments. Rather, Little Santa is merely a Christmas elf friend who keeps Santa apprised of how wonderful and magical my son's day is (and of course his desires for Christmas.)

Christmas is about generosity of spirit, love, kindness, and hope - all things which Christine possesses naturally and in abundance. We are truly blessed to count her as a friend.

Wishing you friendship and a season full of giving and generosity,
Simple Mama

Filipino Christmas Stars

2010-12-23T11:25:00.001-08:00

I first stumbled upon Filipino Christmas Stars last year at Urban Organica. They looked like so much fun, with their shimmery cellophane paper and shiny star garland that I knew I wanted to try making them in our home. I filed the project away as something to try later.

So, as I was browsing through my holiday craft projects file this year I came across the link again and decided to start gathering the necessary items.

Urban Organica suggests using bamboo strips. Unable to locate this, I went with balsa wood strips. They worked out, if proving a bit tricky. Be advised, you'll want to buy extra balsa wood in case some of your frame support decides to bend and break, like mine did twice. I'm not going to show every step of the process, because the link I provided has superb photos and directions, but I did take photos of our progress.

Here is our first star frame all lined up. The balsa wood strips are all equal lengths, woven together and secured at the points with small rubber bands. We made two of these.

See? The ends secured with rubber bands. I had a hard time locating tiny rubber bands - so I picked up a multi-pack and wound the band several times. Next year I'll go to a beauty/hair supply store and see if I can find any.

Next we secured the criss-crossed segments with twisty ties:

We took both star sections pieces and lined them up so all the ends matched and secured the pointy parts loosely with another rubber band. I didn't get a good photo of this step, but the link shows exactly what I'm talking about.

We used copious amounts of hot glue to secure the cross beams. These are smaller pieces of wood placed at all 5 cross points in the star to open it up and give it the 3 dimensional look. This is where I broke several of the frame pieces and had to undo the project and start again. I recommend making sure your two frame pieces are loosely held together at the points so that you have a little more give in your frame if you're using balsa wood.

The Little started covering our frame using white glue and cellophane. This was his favorite part of the project. You can see in the photo the little bridge I added so that an LED tea light can illuminate the star at night. We left the back middle section of the star open to get the tea light in and out.

We just cut large sections of cello paper out and laid them on the sticky frame. I didn't worry about trimming until everything was dry.

We added silver and gold star garland to the top and the middle points of the star for shimmery, sparkly effect. Here's a not-so-great picture from last night when the lighting was a bit too low:

And the finished project by light of day hanging in our front window:

Such a fun craft! There was definitely a learning curve to the process. Ours is a little messy, with a lot of goofs, and perfectly imperfect in all it's shimmery glory. The whole project took about 2.5 hours from start to finish.

Wishing you and yours light and love this holiday season.

Simple Mama

Almost Wordless Wednesday - Paper Star Ornaments

2010-12-22T00:06:00.000-08:00

First seen at An Art Family

Try using old newspaper/newsprint. It makes gorgeous silver stars!

Simple Mama

Why Don't You Make Orange Pomanders?

2010-12-20T11:42:00.000-08:00

We've (I've) been very busy and over extended this holiday season. As such, I've been looking for some easy, fun craft projects that my family, and more specifically my son could enjoy in our periods of quiet and downtime. Remembering one of my favorite projects as a child, I decided that we would make orange pomanders this year. Making these is a memory I have from preschool, and it proved successful with my own 3 year old.

Orange pomanders date back to the Victorian times, when people used them to scent their homes, closets, and bathrooms.

Ours were not "true" orange pomanders, as we didn't roll the oranges in the traditional spice mix of nutmeg, cloves, ginger, cinnamon, and ground orris root powder to cure them. Rather, they were a quick project, done yesterday afternoon while my family came to visit while we sat around the table talking. As they weren't cured, they may not last very long, but for now the scent is heavenly.

You'll need:

Several navel oranges or clementines
Whole cloves
A wooden skewer, pin, or other sharp, thin, pointy apparatus.
Ribbon if you wish to hang your oranges.

Using your skewer, make a small whole in your orange. This makes pushing the whole cloves into the thick flesh so much easier. Push a clove clear in until only the head is visible. I like to cover my entire orange with cloves, others in my family made gorgeous designs - hearts, stripes, stars.

Once your orange is covered in cloves, take a length of ribbon several times the width of your orange and wrap it around the flesh, crisscrossing at the bottom - dividing the orange into 4 segments. Hopefully the photo is helpful. Knot the ribbon tightly at the top near the orange and then again a few inches up to create a hanging loop.

Orange pomanders are beautiful, natural, delicious smelling ornaments and decorations to have in your home.

Creating memories with simple crafts,

Simple Mama

This Moment

2010-12-17T19:40:00.000-08:00

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. inspired by soulemama

Riding the Carousel at Jantzen Beach

Wordless Wednesday - Happy Hanukkah

2010-12-01T18:51:00.000-08:00

sine qua non

2010-11-30T08:29:00.000-08:00

On this last day of November I'm contemplative. Thinking about things for which I'm grateful. Things that make my life wonderful. Sine qua non - Without which not. Those things that without my life would be bland, dull, unappealing.

This boy and his zeal for life.

Creativity, creation, and custom orders.

This wonderful man who shares this life with me. Love, friend, father, provider, partner, equal.

This beautiful part of the country in which we live. Even in the winter she's stunning.

I have much to be thankful for. Every single day.

Simple Mama.

Silent Sunday (On Monday - woops)

2010-11-29T08:51:00.001-08:00

Happy Martinmas!

2010-11-11T12:55:00.000-08:00

The sunlight fast is dwindling,
My little lamp needs kindling.
Its beam shines far in darkest night,
Oh, lantern guide me with your light.
- Traditional Martinmas song

As a Waldorf inspired home with a preschooler we don't really belong to any specific Waldorf community here. As such, we loosely celebrate Waldorf festivals, particularly those that strike a chord withing me, such as Martinmas.

St. Martin was a man who started out as a Roman soldier. As an adult, he was baptized and became a monk, leading a simple life. He was known for his generosity of spirit, for one frigid evening he stumbled upon a poor and dying beggar. With nothing to share but literally the clothes on his back, Martin halved his coat and gave the other half to the beggar for warmth. Later that evening, Martin had a dream that Jesus appeared to him wearing his cloak, proclaiming that Martin had clothed him.

Such a beautiful and simple story. Giving unto those who have little. In that line of thought, my son and I sorted through our outgrown winter clothes readied them to take to the local shelter for those who have so little this winter season.

On the natural calendar, Martinmas marks the end of the winter preparations and the end of the harvest season. Now is a time for moving indoors as the nights grow longer and colder. This movement indoors marks a period of inward reflection for myself. It seems fitting that we would light a candle to guide our way through the darkness that is upcoming.

Which leads me to our Martinmas lantern. We don't participate in a traditional Martinmas lantern walk, but we do make and light a lantern together while we reflect on the season of giving and the end of the harvest. I first saw these lanterns over at Morning Rae Sun and knew they would be the perfect project for small helping hands. They really did turn out quite beautifully.

Happy Martinmas everyone!
Simple Mama

More Weekending

2010-11-07T11:05:00.000-08:00

More weekending...you know. From LAST week. What can I say? We were busy, we had family out, AND I've been sick. You know...for like the 1000th time this year. I NEVER was sick pre-child. Now it seems I'm always sick.

Anyhow..picture heavy post to catch up on the weekend and week. I must be better about blogging

Halloween. Yes. It's Darth Vader. We had other plans for a handmade Halloween outfit, but they fell through when life got in the way. So we took the kid to Party City and let him pick his favorite off the wall. He insisted on Darth Vader. Sometimes you just have to let go and let them decide.

A rare perfect fall day at the Seaside beach:

Oh yes...Darth Vader and Mario Bros. Commercialism creeps in, even under the best of intentions. I'm learning when it's important to put my foot down, and when it's important to pick my battles.

My two favorite men:

We did more, lots more last week. Including a fantastic day trip to Mount Hood with a stop at a mountain apple orchard. But wouldn't you know, mama forgot her camera. And then the plague hit and I haven't picked the camera up recently.

Wishing you all health and happiness. And more health.

Simple Mama

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T09:18:00.001-07:00

Have fun and be safe!

Wishing you a ghoulishly scary Halloween from our house to yours,
Simple Mama

Weekending Part 1

2010-10-30T15:33:00.000-07:00

We are incredibly busy here this week. My dad's cousins are visiting us from New York and we've having so much fun showing them around the Pacific Northwest.

Since they've been in town we've celebrated a birthday (mine), visited a gorgeous waterfall, and spent a misty morning at the pumpkin patch.

The view from here - Highway 14 - Cape Horn looking east:

Cousins Rusty and Sharon and The Little at Multnomah Falls - it was so, so chilly there. We warmed up to a light lunch in the old lodge after standing in the mist for a bit:

This morning we met Uncle Chris and Aunt Lavina at the local pumpkin patch. Raining again, but we were down to the wire for a visit to the pumpkin patch.
We played in the corn pit:

We rode tractors:

We got lost in the hay maze:

We visited all the animals in the petting zoo:

We shucked dried corn:

We rode a pony:

We launched pumpkins:

We giggled and kissed on the hayride:

We picked out our pumpkins:

Stayed tuned for Weekending Part 2

Simple Mama

This Moment

2010-10-30T15:25:00.000-07:00

A friday ritual (inspired by soulemama). A single photo capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment to pause, savor and remember.
(A day after Friday - I fell asleep last night before I could post the photo)

Salmon spawning at Multnomah Falls, Oregon.

Homemade Serenity

Science with Kids: Microwave Ivory Soap

Make It! Valentine's Day Coffee Filter Wreath

Lollipop Valentine's Day Cards

Holiday Vacation

Silent Sunday - Marathon Key, Florida

Pictures from Our Thanksgiving and Trip on the Polar Express

Happy Thanksgiving

Christmasing...

New in the Shop Today

Make It! Apple Print Bunting

Putting Food By

The Studio

In Which the Crazy Canning Commences

Melted Crayon Canvas Art

This Moment

The One Where We Were All Sick or Injured.

Friday Kitchen Love

On Growing Cultures

Wordless Wednesday - A Warm Day, Finally

Make It! Light Bulb Oil Lamp

Four Years Old

Kitchen Love

Make It! Number 2 Pencil Vase

Silent Sunday - His Hand Knit Easter Bunny

Simple Beauty

Poop on the Patio

What Happens When I Procrastinate....

Make It! Easter Egg Wreath

Make It! Twig Vase

Weekending - Around the House

-18.4

Make It! Egg Carton Wreath

The One Where the Frantic Gardening Starts

Have Dandelions Ever Been as Sweet?

This Moment - First Day of Montessori Preschool

Moms Night In

Make It! Egg Bumble Bees

Make It! Egg Garland

Spring!

Putting Food By - Lemon Curd

This Moment - Aboard the Monorail

Why Don't You Make Sea Shell Candles

These are a Few of My Favorite Things...

Silent Sunday - Putting Food By: Chicken Noodle Soup

Putting Food By - Beef, Onions and Vanilla

Wordless Wednesday - Pikes Place Market Gum Wall

Why Don't You Make Magazine Butterflies?

Fruit Rainbow with a "Pot of Gold"

Silent Sunday - Baby Chicks

Putting Food By - Meyer Lemon Marmalade with Vanilla Bean

Winner!

This Moment - A Child's Work

Settling in for more Winter

Wordless Wednesday - Gifts from the Chickens

It's a New Day and a Giveaway!

I Am An Urban Homesteader!

{{This Moment - The Boy and his chicken}}

My Truth

Why Don't You Make Coffee Filter Flowers

From Our Home to Yours

Why Don't You Make Potato Stamp Valentine's Day Cards

This Moment - Preserving Lemons in Salt

Why Don't You Make Acorn Cap Jewels

Why Don't You Make a Valentine's Day Lei?

Wordless Wednesday - Regrowth

Transferring Scrap Booking Images Onto Stone

Silent Sunday

Why Don't You Make Celery Stamped Valentine's Day Cards

This Moment

Why Don't You Make Valentines Day Votives?

Wrapping It Up....El Yunque National Forest

St. Martin

St. Kitts

Barbados and St. Lucia

St. Thomas

San Juan, Puerto Rico

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted....

Why Don't You Make Rainbow Rice?

A Look Back on 10 years of Marriage