melody*made

.: knitted goodies :.

2011-11-21T06:34:00-05:00

Melody Park Shin

.: Baby's environment :.

2011-11-17T18:35:50-05:00

Asher at 10 months is very busy busy busy:-) He loves exploring the cupboards in the kitchen...taking out bowls and canteens. Oh, so much fun! I must get a picture next time when he's in the dishwasher! He get's so very excited when he sees the dishwasher door open! Oh, how he crawls over so quickly! Tee hee, it's actually quite entertaining to watch him light up when we're doing our usual thing of cooking and cleaning up.

I'm very relaxed about Asher exploring his environment. Almost nothing is off limits because I'm right there next to him. Well, nothing super sharp and dangerous or toxic like that, but you know what I mean;-) I don't limit him to "baby toys". He actually don't have much "toys". I've noticed that children, even babies, prefer real life objects over plastic pretend toys.

He's learning so much about his environment and about relationships... This is a perfect time to exchange things with them and play "please" and "thank you". He loves to hand over things to me and delights in the interaction so very much.

{this moment}

2011-11-04T13:46:10-05:00

Melody Park Shin

.: our typical day :.

2011-10-19T03:34:00-05:00

Melody Park Shin

:: what I've been knitting ::

2011-10-17T03:32:00-05:00

Knitted up some cozy longies for Asher...just in time for chilly weather:-) The last picture is Asher wearing his pants, all fuzzy at the knees.

You can see details on my Ravelry page and get the free pattern here.

:: homemade ::

2011-10-14T12:49:14-05:00

Made mayonaise from scratch;-) I didn't plan on it, but I had some hardboiled eggs from yesterday and I didn't have any moyo for egg salad... So I looked up a recipe online and used my vitamix! Voila! It turned out so yummy~ How simple was that? FYI, I used garlic powder and grapeseed oil instead of what the recipe said. Super fast and delish~

So here's my lunch with the fresh sesame leaves from my friend's garden and low-carb tortilla from TJ's (I'm not on a diet, just like how it tastes;-) And, my 4 yr old, Ryker, lit the pretty candles.

mmmmmm, life is indeed abundant and good! :-)

Tutorial::How to upcycle a baby sweater

2011-10-06T03:22:00-05:00

So I had this tiny baby sweater for 13 years! Talk about hoarding! Ha:-) Well, it's a mighty cute little sweater from the Gap. However, the arms always felt a little too snug to put them easily on little tiny babies. And now that I really need to keep my little ones as warm as possible (we're not in CA anymore!), I wanted to repurpose it somehow.

Then I thought maybe I'd make some hand warmers for my 4yr old, and made these. I just sewed up the raw edge and tacked down between the thumb and the pointer. Well well well, what do you know! They fit me perfectly, thank you;-)

Then I made the body part into a hat. I left the buttons as is and just sewed a dome-like shape. All done! A brand new slouchy hat!

And then I had this hoodie...what can I do? Hmmmmm....

Sewed up one end to close it up into a little pouch. Added a twizzle handle and cut up some applique out of other felted sweater scrap to make a cute tree~ Ta da!!! Oh so cute! Asher liked it, too;-)

.: Pumpkins and Mother Earth :.

2011-10-05T04:04:00-05:00

Take a look at my cute little autumn peeps~

Taking out old favorites and adding new handmade and found treasures to our nature table. This is truly my favorite season:-) Here's my autumn nature table from Los angeles, 3 years ago. You can see that iPhones pictures have come a long way! LOL

If you're wanting to needle felt some pumpkins yourself, here's a link to my popular video of the pumpkin tutorial.

I've been busy making new pumpkins as you can see!

Oh, what do we have here? Mother earth is getting ready to put little root children to sleep very very soon~ Stay tuned! :-)

.:Autumn Natureschooling:.

2011-10-04T03:23:00-05:00

We're so fortunate to be able to go out into nature whenever we wish to...

Today was especially beautiful as the weather is becoming cooler and the air is crisp~ It is especially heart-warming to see my 4 year old & 9 year old holding hands as we all took a walk in the woods.

So grateful for their close relationship and all that our life has to offer our family.

.: Rainy day inpiration :.

2011-10-03T15:20:48-05:00

It's been raining a lot over here, so we've been taking advantage of the cooler weather and getting inspired by the change of season. It's amazing how the fall weather seemed to hit us all of a sudden and we notice the leaves falling... So we made some warm drinks, baked bread, and did some leaf rubbings with our beeswax block crayons~

I then made a felt leaf streamer after being inspired by this blog.

I just love love this season, and we're all looking forward to the fall fair at the local Waldorf school next weekend! ~Happy Autumn, everyone~