Who's watching the baby?

The Most Ordinary Miracle

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 12:30:00 +0000

Yesterday I woke up late. Over the Christmas break our kids developed the super-endearing habit of letting us sleep in a little bit, and I'm having a hard time mustering the maturity to break them of it. We alternately sped and stumbled through the day, cleaning and organizing and making ready to go back to our disciplined homeschool schedule on Monday. My husband brought home pizza after stopping by the pharmacy. Just another Wednesday.

As I sat in the den holding my sweet Joseph, gazing woefully at the mostly-packed Christmas boxes and strewn packing paper all over the floor, a tiny little miracle swept across my cheek. It's touch was so light that I barely perceived it, didn't understand what had happened, until I looked into the bright eyes of my happy little boy. He struggled and grunted, rolled his eyes back a little, scrunched up his smooth face, and swept his knuckles across my cheek for the second time.

I stared at him through watery eyes. Having a child with such profound disability, particularly when the delays are cognitive and social/emotional, leads to a highly developed sense of wariness in the parent.

"Did he just... do that on purpose?"

He sure did. Then he did it again, and again. For what seemed like a million moments in stopped time, my two-year-old son reached up and explored my face, on purpose, for the very first time. He looked at me, and swept his knuckles across my cheek. I helped him touch his delicate fingertips to my chin, and grasp my nose. I congratulated him, praised him, and encouraged him. I cried happy, grateful tears that soaked the front of his brown stripey outfit, nuzzled his warm little neck, and stroked his fuzzy hair. In my messy living room on a second-hand sofa, I felt one of the most extraordinary and beautiful things I could imagine.

There Will Never Be Another Dooce.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 06:51:00 +0000

Do you know who Dooce is? Probably. She's an uber-famous blogger, and she has all kind of opinions about stuff, some pretty controversial. Some people think she's funny, honest, a peerless writer, and that her kids are adorable (they...are. I mean really.) There are also a lot of other people who think she's a total bitch, too negative, too tough, too... whatever. Too much, in any case. She's making a living as a blogger, though, so she's doing something right.

I was hanging out at a Crafterminds tweet chat awhile back - 6 months ago awhile - when the topic of blogging 'niches' came up. One of the hosts of the chat tweeted something like (I'm paraphrasing, but true to the spirit of the tweet as I remember it), 'If you're a DIY-craft blogger, you should limit your blog focus to that. No sense in adding too many posts about your life, or thinking you're funny - there's never going to be another Dooce.'

Now, honestly, there are a lot of reasons I haven't blogged in the last few months. We started homeschooling (kind of the ultimate DIY), and there was a tragedy in our family's life that distracted us from anything but the essentials for a good long time. Each time I sat at the computer to write, however, I couldn't help but remember this 'mentor' and her comment that nobody subscribing to my Craft! and Sewing! and Glitter! (so much glitter!) blog would want to read about my life. Without a project to offer or a tutorial to share, the wind was sucked from my sails. After all, if I couldn't be Dooce, then why bother?

Now it's 2012, and you know what? Screw that. I'm still crafting and sewing, and Heaven knows I still love me some glitter. This year, though, I'm going to blog about other stuff, too. If that defies the conventional wisdom, I'll have to deal with that... but I hope at least a few of you stick around.

Happy New Year! Happy 2012 (pronounced twenty-doz - my sister and I are going to make that happen)! I will see you here... tomorrow.

If you don't know this family, then you are missing out.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 15:51:00 +0000

This post is going to contain a lot of words. If you're anti-word, you might want to turn back now.

I am still a little bit shaken, and a little bit shaky, and pretty all-around uneven. On July 1, while on vacation in Georgia, my best friend Susie and her family were in a horrible, horrific, tragic crash. While pregnant mom, dad, and 4 sleepy kids waited at a traffic light after an early fireworks show, a teenager plowed into their minivan at 80+ MPH, instantly taking the life of their 6-year-old daughter Hannah. Their two oldest kids, Brooke and Kathryn, were crushed by the force of the collision and suffered multiple broken bones in their legs and arms. And their only son, little Owen, who's three, sustained a debilitating spinal cord injury - a complete transection of his cord at the C2 vertebra, leaving him a ventilator-dependent quadriplegic. Did I mention that he's three? 'Cause he's three. Three years old. Not even almost 4 - just three.

I have a lot of feelings about this, more than I can share here, more than I even understand well enough to write about. And I've had several false starts on this post - I just couldn't seem to get it right, and I still may not, but here goes:

There's something you need to know about my friend Susie: There is nothing she cannot do. I really believe that. She is up for any challenge - she always has been. I don't say this to minimize her pain or her loss, because there are simply no words sufficient to describe either - I'm not even going to try. But when it comes to caring for Owen, to maximizing his opportunities, to giving him the richest, fullest life, to encouraging him to keep growing and learning and improving and trying, there is nobody better. Through her faith in God and her firm knowledge that Owen's miracle is coming, she will guide her family through this tragedy and come out stronger than ever before. It will be hard, too hard - but she will do it with grace and love. I know she will. She has so far, and there's nothing to stop her now.

I mentioned that Susie is my best friend, and it's true - she was the matron of honor at my wedding, and stood up beside my sister as I took my vows. The thing is, Susie is everybody's best friend. I don't know anyone who knows her who doesn't feel an instant connection to her. She's open and loving in a way that makes you feel welcome not only in her home, but in her heart. There's always another place at her table. I've honestly never met anyone else like her. Nothing is ever too much trouble, too late, too soon, too many, too much - she can handle anything, and make it look easy. Her breezy, friendly way was echoed in Hannah, which was perhaps the biggest tragedy in Hannah's death. Hannah had a million friends, and everyone instantly loved her. She had a giant happy smile and a tiny chipmunk voice, and she never met anyone without leaving an impression on their heart. For the world to lose another Susie, another soul with nothing but love to give, is a loss that is almost too great to bear.

There's so much more to say, but I won't just now. I could tell you about Susie's family, and how they dropped everything in their lives to help their sister. I could tell you about our community here and the community in Blue Ridge, Georgia where the crash happened, and how so many people have embraced the Johnson family with their prayers, thoughts, donations, good wishes, cupcakes, stuffed animals, blankets, cards and gifts - anything you could name. I could tell you (again!) how pediatric doctors and nurses are like none other in the world - how their care for their patients and families makes me proud to be a human being and continually restores my faith in humanity. I'll save all that, though, for another time.

If you would like to keep up with the Johnson family and their journey, you can read their CaringBridge site here. If you would like to make a financial donation to the family, you can through PayPal here. If you live in Florida and would like to take part in local fundraisers and activities, you might want to take a look at this Facebook page. Perhaps most importantly, if you would like to lift Susie, Owen, and her family up in prayer, please do. Susie is asking that we pray for Owen to breathe on his own, that he will no longer be dependent on the ventilator to breathe.

Hug your babies tight, my friends, and count your blessings each day.

Kid Wardrobe Refashion Number 4: Make Mine a Double

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 13:00:00 +0000

For real, make mine a double. I would love to have this skirt, in my size - I would wear it all the time. But I would need at least twice the fabric it took to make it for a six-year-old:

I'm sure you remember the distinctive waistband fabric from this little dress. I have a big pile of thrift store t-shirts lying around - they're $.75, and good for so many things! - so I just cut off the bottom and gathered it up until it was the right size to fit my waistband.

She is so tired of modeling for blog pics that she can no longer be arsed to brush her hair.

True story.

Right now, she's wearing the waistband folded over. If she unfolds the waistband and wears it wide, it'll fit forever and she'll be able to wear it to her prom. Right?

Just tell me yes.

If you like this, you might want to check out the other summer refashions I've whipped up here, here, and here!

What are the coordinates for the pediatrician's office?

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 05:25:00 +0000

We had a very special birthday this last week! Sweet Joseph's amazing physical therapist had a birthday last Thursday, and I had a very difficult time paring down the gifts I wanted to give to her. She cares for our son with such love and compassion - there's really nothing I could buy or make that would adequately show how much we appreciate her.

Knowing this, I decided to focus on her favorite things. She loves vacationing in St. John with her family, scuba diving and practicing her photography and generally relaxing in one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

(source)

This pillow was the answer:

These are the latitude and longitude coordinates of Cruz Bay in St. John. The envelope-closure pillow is made out of crisp white linen trimmed with red piping. Using Silhouette vinyl as a stencil (expensive, I know - you could easily use freezer paper!), I painted the characters on lightly so they would resemble a stamp:

I'm happy with the way it turned out! Our birthday girl was sick last week, so we won't see her until this Thursday to present our gifts and the cards the kids made. I can hardly wait to give it to her.

The concept is pretty fun, though - it would make a sweet wedding gift (maybe with a sister pillow stenciled with the date?), or a baby gift, or a fun reminder for anyone who holds a special place dear to their heart.

Like the pediatrician's office. Right?

Everybody's doing it.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 04:05:00 +0000

If you're my friend, you're probably getting one of these for your birthday. Or maybe just, you know, for Tuesday:

I am in love with these pouches. It seems like everyone is making them these days - I believe the trendy name for them is a 'clutch', but it just looks like a little pouch to me. This particular version, made from a vinyl remnant that was also on clearance, was patterned after a sweet tutorial on Make it and Love it.

(source)

I don't want to bore you by rehashing all of the directions. Ashley's directions are super clear, and her photography is fab, as usual. This was quick to make, too - I'd say fully half of the total time spent on it involved finding and installing my zipper foot.

I have so much vinyl, I could make a dozen more of these. Easily. Maybe two dozen! And the awesome zippers came in one of the 'vintage sewing notions' lots I won on Ebay. All kinds of crazy colors in there.

I love the juxtaposition of the creamy bone-colored vinyl with the crazy print on the inside, and the bright zipper. Can't have any elegance around here, I say!¹ Primary colors only.

Do this. Make ten. Fill them with candy and give them away! You'll feel better, and there might be extra candy... you never know.

¹I got myself a beautiful - and I mean beautiful - petal pink Coach purse a couple of years ago. It had fabulous brushed rose gold hardware. It was amazing. It was my 'push present' to myself as I prepared to deliver my third boy - something sweet and pastel and feminine. Naturally, an entire bottle of formula spilled in it. That's not covered by the lifetime cleaning plan. Buyer beware.

It's Dangerous, All Right.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 13:30:00 +0000

Have you ever heard of Danger Pie? I honestly don't remember where I saw this recipe, because they were all, "First, you take some sweetened condensed milk and make dulce de leche blah-blah-stars-moons-swoon- drool-faint-fall-over." At least, that's how I remember it, because I have a serious relationship with sweetened condensed milk (SCM, for short), and I stopped paying attention after I heard 'dulce de leche'. Anywho:

Bananas. Cool Whip. Crust of Little Consequence. Sweet, sweet caramel-y goodness.

YES. THAT.

Let me tell you a little about this pie, beginning with making the sweet, sweet Latin American treat known as dulce de leche. Dulce de leche (doool'-chay day leh'-che, for my gringo-by-way-of-Florida friends. No idea how you say it for real) is sweet, sweet caramel-y goodness with a rich milky flavor, and it's made by cooking sweetened milk.

Good.

(source)

Better.

(source)

It seems that many folks do this 'cooking' by ripping the label off of a can of Eagle Brand and boiling it in the can for two and a half to three hours. The longer you cook it, the darker the caramel color and richer the flavor become. Without hesitation, I boiled a big ol' pot of water. I tossed in my cans. I sat back down here to check out some of my favorite blogs, and then I was all:

UH-OH.

(Source. Seriously, go there. Go there now. I'll wait.)

Those things were going to explode. I just knew it. I knew that I was going to have microglobules of sticky half-cooked SCM all over my kitchen, and that one of my children was going to have shrapnel wounds that would be mighty difficult to explain.

So I took the cans out of the boiling water (...with a plastic spoon? Don't even ask. There were first-degree burns involved). I opened them (...without waiting for them to cool! Because I'm the same genius that took them out of the boiling water with a plastic spoon!). Contents being under pressure and all, they splooged (sorry Mom) all over my stove as soon as my can opener punctured the top. So much for avoiding the sticky stove-microglobules.

I poured it into a Pyrex dish set in a larger dish of water (my little suburban bain marie!), and popped it into the oven at 425. About 10 minutes later, a sweet caramel smell wafted through the house. Ah, heaven.

About 2 minutes after the onset of delightful caramel-ic aromas, an acrid burning-sugar smell crawled through the house. #should've covered the pan.

I carefully scraped off the burned SCM and discarded it, tightly covered the remaining gooey-ness, and put it back in the oven for 45 minutes (little over an hour total) without incident. After it was finished, I let it cool, and then went about assembling my:

Danger Pie

Recipe Courtesy of: The Internet

Pie Crust (I used Oreo. Graham cracker is also fabulous.)

10 Ounces of dulce de leche (or the amount you get from cooking one can, then peeling off the part you accidentally scorched)

About 3 bananas

1 tub of Cool Whip (regular, reduced fat, reduced sugar - whatever feels most DANGEROUS)

Grated semi-sweet chocolate for garnish - optional

Slice bananas and spread in the bottom of the pie crust. Glob the dreamy, creamy dulce de leche on top of the bananas, and smear it around with a spatula. Scoop out the ENTIRE container of Cool Whip on top. Garnish with chocolate shavings if you have them. Cover and refrigerate a couple of hours until firm. Serves 1-8, depending on fatness.

Here's a visual in case you're bad with, you know, words:

And one more picture, just because I can...

I think the 'danger' in the name is supposed to imply that the pie is 'dangerously good'. In my case, it was the 'threatening to life and limb' kind of danger. Ah, well. I'd do it again. It was worth it.

Kid Wardrobe Refashion Number 3: The Empire Strikes Back

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 15:57:00 +0000

I love bright colors! I love to wear them, I love to look at them, and I LOVE to dress my kids in brights. This dress was a no-brainer:

Easy peasy - just sewed a shirred skirt to the top third of this Gap tank top:

...which my daughter, sadly, had long outgrown. The best part is that the 'skirt' was made from the bottom of a womens 2X blouse that I thrifted awhile back, so the whole refashion cost $1.99 - and I still have fabric left over!

Here it is on my model.

Here is my model 'handling' some of her adoring fans.

...aaaand here is my model looking at bugs. She's very down to earth.

Since this fabric was already tube-shaped, what with having been the bottom of a blouse, I did my shirring in a spiral - only one long row, in a circle. I also didn't have to hem it! Bonus! I kept the bottom of the tank and the sleeves and neckline from the blouse, and used them in two other projects.

True life: I sewed most of this while watching a P90-X infomercial. I felt much fitter after watching all of those people work so hard. I also had this song in my head the entire time, which I am sharing with you in hopes that it will somehow purge from my brain:

You're welcome.

Kid Wardrobe Refashion Number 2: Flamenco Edition

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 17:28:00 +0000

Obviously, this refashion is my daughter's favorite:

I mean, really?

I want one for myself. This was an old Gap tank top that was getting too short, and had a hole near the hem. I've had this fabric lying around for years, planning to make her something with it, like a bib or a bonnet or a romper. She's six now. Oops!

I used the ruffle cheat to make the skirt (long stitch + highest thread tension = MAGICAL RUFFLES), then serged the three tiers together (after pinning them VERY. CAREFULLY. Took forever.) Attached the skirt to the bottom of the tank, and voila!

At her request I saved the tiny little rhinestone heart at the bottom:

It still seemed to be missing something to tie the top and bottom together. Quick solution!

Needle, embroidery thread, and 10 minutes. Perfect!

Honestly, this felt like it took forever. All of those ruffles! Each tier of the skirt was double the fullness of the layer prior, so the third ruffle was 176 inches long! There was a lot of pinning and adjusting gathers. It was worth it, though - she absolutely loves it!

For kid wardrobe refashion number one, click here!

Kid Wardrobe Refashion - Variations on a Theme

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Tue, 31 May 2011 15:40:00 +0000

School's out! And not just for summer - FOREVER, since we'll be homeschooling from here on out. I weeded out the kids' dressers last week and boy - it took forever! Does anyone have a great solution for managing kids' clothes that you're waiting for them to grow into? It's ridic right now - I have piles of clothes everywhere!

Although I have five kids, I only have one (long-suffering) daughter. The boy stuff gets packed away for the next sibling, but the girl stuff has no obvious successor. I rotate the nice things in with the massive clothes-sharing rotation that my friends and I manage, but that leaves me with lots of nondescript outgrown Target t-shirts and Gap tank tops. What's a crafty girl to do?

If you've never tried shirring with elastic bobbin thread, this is the time to start. It looks really impressive, but it's incredibly easy. You'll need to gather up these things, in addition to your regular sewing supplies:

...plus any embellishments you'd like to use. I received the vintage button as part of a lot of notions and trimmings that I won on Ebay. I think it really ties things together!

I shirred the waistband to give the whole dress a little more definition and shape. Here are the basics:

1. Loosely wind the elastic thread onto the bobbin, by hand. Don't stretch the elastic as you wind, just loop it around. Load it into your machine just like you typically would. This pic was taken before I picked up the bobbin thread (otherwise you wouldn't be able to see it!)

2. I chose to shirr before sewing the side seam on the skirt so that I would better be able to adjust the fit. I've done this quite a few times, and it seems to reduce the fabric width by about half on average quilting-weight or apparel fabrics. The first row of shirring alone won't look all that impressive - just drop your needle and start sewing. Space the lines about 1/4-3/8 inch apart.

3. Keep sewing. I sewed 6 rows, backstitching at the end of each to keep the elastic from unraveling. Both ends of the shirring would eventually be caught in my side seam. If your skirt is already sewn together (coming in another post this week!), you can shirr in a spiral. Just make sure you have lots of bobbin thread! See how nicely it gathers after all those rows?

4. Attach the skirt and top right sides together. I sewed, then serged. Sewing over the gathers can be tricky. This is a good time to use a walking foot if you have one, or lots of pins! You'll also need to finish the hem somehow - I just serged the bottom. It's a little long on her, so I'll hem it up and let it out when she grows. The dress that never ends!

...and we're done!

...and one more of my gorgeous model:

Happy shirring! There are three more summer dress refashions coming this week!

Edited to add: A couple of people have mentioned that this looks kind of like a mini-Boden dress. I don't shop there (no wonder, since that dress is $40!), so it wasn't intentional, but there is definitely a similarity!

For Refashion Number 2: Flamenco Edition, click here!
For Refashion Number 3: The Empire (waist) Strikes Back, click here!

Yup, still a genius.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Fri, 27 May 2011 20:40:00 +0000

Sewing. It's not easy. You have to be kind of smart to sew. It's a big test of spatial understanding: as you sew, you have to understand what's going to be right-side-out and right-side-up while you simultaneously get all the seams on the inside. This is (only somewhat) less challenging when you have a pattern, but can be seriously infuriating when you're trying to figure it out on your own.

Knowing this, and having been on the wrong side of a seam ripper way too many times, I was very proud that my high chair recover worked out as well as it did:

What did it look like before? Well...

I know, right? YUCK. And that was mostly freshly washed.

(mostly. Just keepin' it real up in here.)

So how did I do it? SHEER EPIC BRAVERY. I think this proves that I am descended of the Vikings:

I cut it all up. I used my sharp, sharp dragon-slaying scissors and cut it into pieces. I wanted it in two coordinating fabrics, you see? I cut the big weird puffy thing off the top (planning to eliminate it entirely), and then cut the side pieces. I used the bits and pieces to pattern on my new fabric, adding a little bit of a seam allowance where the new side panels would attach. Once it was all together, I used the front as a pattern to cut out a big piece of quilt batting to serve as the backside.

There aren't a lot of pictures (any, really), of the sewing: just patch it all back together, pinning liberally. I added the piping in all of the new seams, and I LOVE how snappy it looks (almost as much as I HATE my zipper foot. Seriously, are there different types of zipper feet? Because mine is all wishy-washy and not confidence inspiring.)

There was a tricky part on the seat, where the plastic part comes up to keep baby from sliding out under the tray. After a quick Googling, I ended up here, OF COURSE. Because Make It and Love It is AMAZING (but you already knew that). (Spoiler alert: Just sew it all together right sides down, stitch around the opening, and stuff the top fabric through the hole. Topstitch. Remember how I said you have to be smart?)

After I got it all sewn together, I went to edge the whole deal in bias tape. I even did it the RIGHT WAY, opening up the tape and sewing the front first, to make sure that I would catch the back edge since all of the layers of fabric were pretty thick. I've got to say, it looks pretty sharp all trimmed out:

Check out the piping:

Here's the back where it kind of loops over and attaches to the seat so it stays in place:

The seam you see there is the ONLY serged seam in the whole project. So annoying. I get this brand new serger and all I can think of are sewing machine projects. Sigh.

...and that's it! Lovely. I don't know why I chose green and brown; there isn't a lot of green and brown in my house. Luckily, it's not like the previous olive and drab giraffe design (with seafoam hippos!) was a particular design win, so it's still a step up overall.

What do you think? What eyesore in your house are you now motivated to recover? Kid gear? Ottoman? Unfortunate haircut? Tell me about it!

Kids in the Hospital: It's What We Do.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 18 May 2011 16:27:00 +0000

Everybody likes baby feet, right?

They're cute, and tiny, and they have pudgy little toes. Perfection, really, probably part of the grand design that prevents us from eating our young.

I've always liked them, but not especially so - just in the, "Aw, feet. Cute," kind of way.

I have shared here, on the Interwebz, about our son Adam and his miraculous liver transplant. I have also mentioned a couple of times that we have another kiddo with special needs. His name is Joseph, and he'll be two in August. He was born with a genetic defect in his seventeenth chromosome. He's missing a big section of the short end - 3,000,000 base pairs, more or less. That's a lot of zeros.

So Joseph was in the hospital last week. He's fine now, relatively speaking, but there was a time, mercifully brief, where I watched him struggle and gasp for breath. I watched his eyes panic. And I worried that even if we saved him, he might not ever be the same.

There's a certain cognitive dissonance required to cheerfully parent kids who probably aren't going to live long enough. What's 'long enough', anyway? I mean, we all hope that our kids outlive us - long enough to see the jet packs, but not so long that they have to survive whatever the Next Terrible Thing is. Joseph will not live to wear a jet pack. Each birthday, I hope for the next. His mortality is always present, so real and tangible. But nobody wants to tangle with that every day, so it's put aside - it has to be. We take him to the hospital when he needs to go, and blithely look forward to the sandwiches:

My husband and I - we hug each other, we eat junk food, we play video games. We trade off with the other kids, sit for EEG's, weigh diapers, adjust IV pumps, silence alarms. We're super good at this now. I told my husband that we need to replace our bird art with this sign - we should place it over our mantel, just to see how long we can go without a hospital admission:

Ha ha! Funny, right? Right. Kids in hospitals are hilarious.

So why the feet?

Because even when they're sick, their feet still look pretty much the same. No tubes, no needles. Usually. Sometimes a bracelet:

Or tell-tale hospital PJ's:

...but otherwise unchanged. Perfectly recognizable. A brief, blessed reminder of perfection.

I apologize for the lack of posts. I have missed blogging and creating, and all of my awesome internet friends, and I am delighted that things are back to the status quo and I can pick back up with my hobbies. But I'm sure you understand - because for the last week, we've been giving medicine, watching, fretting, holding, cuddling, reassuring. And kissing toes.

Quick and Dirty.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 04 May 2011 04:40:00 +0000

This was the best thing I did all day:

Dear Kids,

Summer is coming. Daddy and I love you very much, but we do not love washing 37 plastic cups every day. Take your cup in the morning, put it on the circle that matches your name, and use it all day long. Yes, even if you had milk. Even if you have to rinse it in between.

If you don't have a cup on the windowsill, you don't have a cup. Live it, learn it, love it.

XOXO,

Mommy and Daddy

Easter Dress, Re-imagined

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Tue, 03 May 2011 02:56:00 +0000

Surely you all remember this little number?

Well, our Easter plans changed. Instead of having a rowdy family Easter, we chose to have a quiet celebration with just our family (...which is still 7. Just sayin'.) Since there was no way I was going to be able to keep my boys in shirts and ties for an afternoon of hunting eggs in their own yard, it didn't seem fair to stuff my pretty girl into three yards of heavy poplin and silk shantung. So we went from that, to this:

Not fancy-schmancy. But yellow! And cotton! And so easy-breezy - with a pocket for stashing eggs.

Her hands are mostly hiding them, but there are some adorbs belt loops just waiting for the perfect belt. I've got to find the right ribbon.

(Oh hi, unclipped threads! Hm. Just look at her pretty face and insane tan, and pretend you don't notice.)

(She came that way; I promise I haven't gone all Toddlers and Tiaras on you guys.)

The un-pattern from this dress came from MADE, which is probably my most-favoritest sewing-related blog in the world. Dana doesn't know that I secretly want to be her neighbor. I had to modify it a little, because I didn't have any wee narrow elastic. That was cool, because it gave me an excuse to try out the elastic bobbin thread that everyone seems so enamored of.

Know what? Me too. That stuff rocks. I can shirr like nobody's business now.

More updates on my bookmark challenge items to come!

Ba da bum bum bum, bah da dah bum bum bum!

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 15:45:00 +0000

That was Get Low. You couldn't tell? Weird, I totally hear it.

My amazing bloggy friend Jen over at Life, Crafts, and Whatever is starting a new linky party! She wants to know about the highs and lows of my week. Ever since she mentioned it, Get Low has been running though my head. Kind of a raunchy song to be humming while dying Easter eggs, but I'm gonna go with it.

High!

Got a new battery charger for our old DSLR in the mail. Super exciting! No more iPhone pics on my blog! (don't pretend like you couldn't tell.)

Low.

I don't really know how to use my fancy camera, 'cept for on 'auto'. A little intimidated my reading the whole manual. Oh, and by LEARNING PHOTOGRAPHY.

High!

It was my birthday yesterday! Since it was Good Friday, the kids were out of school and we got to hang out together. I got super sweet cards like these

(Gongratulations? Maybe that's a low.)

(aw. Kindergarten.)

and awesome presents like these

(birthday pedi)

(I'm not gonna lie. She's a beaut.)

Low.

My birthday was buffeted by two nights of crappy sleep due to a certain teething, crying infant. Woke up grumpy and tired, went to bed grumpy and tired, only to wake up today all grumpy and tired again with considerably worse prospects for cake.

High!

30% off of clearance at Old Navy! Entire outfits to be had for $12!

Low.

Shopping with three kids three and under is no fun. It is so un-fun that there is basically nothing to be done to recover it. I was shopping at Old Navy 30% off clearance and NOT EVEN ENJOYING IT.

High!

To celebrate their 10th anniversary, Signing Time was offering all of their fabulous DVD's for $10 each. They're usually $21.95. We were able to pick up quite a few for our tiny fanboys.

Low.

We did not have enough money to buy every last one. Maybe for their eleventh anniversary? Of course, maybe then they'll be eleven dollars...

One more random low: We have been basically out of diapers all week. We buy diapers at the warehouse club (I mean, honestly - would't you? We have three kids in diapers.) Just haven't had a chance to make it there this week, and was too proud to buy them at Target or Wal-Mart, so we've been scrounging around for diapers in the most pathetic and unbecoming way. "I think there's two in the pocket behind the drivers seat in the van!" "I think there are at least a few in the diaper bag that we were using when #4 came home from the hospital!" "There's still some in the beach bag that we used last weekend! They're a little sandy, but I'll dust them off!" We've managed to stretch through the WHOLE WEEK this way. Some people stash glue sticks in random spots all over the house; some people hide money in their winter coats to find in the spring. We leave diapers all over knowing we'll be grateful to find them later.

Definitely the sign of a well-run household.

I sincerely hope you had a lovely and blessed Easter! Can't wait to show you pictures of The Girl's Easter dress and the sweet bow ties!

Linking it up here, yo!

ChallONGE Number One: Complete!

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 17:25:00 +0000

(you all understand from my phonetic spelling that in my head I'm saying 'challenge' in a whacked-out French accent that one would use when having a duel, right? Just making sure.)

I finished my tea wreath!

Obligatory artsy shot:

And here is is without all of the tea. I couldn't find 'matching' tea. As I mentioned last night on Facebook, I considered running out in the middle of the night to buy green tea and chammomile. Then I remembered that I am not crazy.

I couldn't figure out how to finish the edges. In the original, they wrapped the cardstock over the edges and glued it. On the off chance that someone would want to hang this in a window, I wanted the back to be pretty.

I was sitting at my desk wishing that there was such a thing as bias tape, but for paper.

Obviously there isn't.

But you know what there is?

Bias tape, like, for regular.

So I used that. Hot glued it all around the edges, and in the back. Worked like a charm! Nice and circle-y.

I got all of these vintage trims from Ebay. I would have posted about how awesome they are, but my Silhouette came via FedEx the same day.

(sorry, vintage trims.)

All of this stuff was less than $10, including shipping.

Check Ebay, just saying.

(if kristen*123 is the high bidder, though - stay away!)

My little wreath friend is already gone - gifted to its new home less than 12 hours after I finished it.

Be sure to check out the original tutorial at Kojo Designs if you would like to make your own!

Blame It on the Chub.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 20:29:00 +0000

NO, not MY chub. His chub:

And possibly also his cheeks, and his fuzzy head.

(bonus 3-year-old fuzzy head. You're welcome.)

And chubby hands. Chubby hands holding chubby feet.

My littlest little has been imploring me with his GIANT EYES to snuggle him and smoosh him, squeeze him and smell him. To nuzzle him like a mama lion and smell the back of his tiny neck. Rub his feet, squeeze his legs, tickle his chin - he compels me. And he's just growing up so fast.

So I've lost a bit of time for my

TWO WEEK CHALLENGE

((challenge! challenge! challenge! challenge!))

over the last few days, because I've been soaking up my kids. Not just the tiny milky one, but the others, too - we've been at the beach, and they've been all sunny and cheerful, crusty with salt and sand and happiness and chocolate, running from beach to pool, then back to beach again with strong legs and joyous smiles. We've tucked them in WORN OUT. And now they're back to school, and I'm back to my regular days, but lucky for us we're all a little sunnier, a little browner, and recharged for the last few weeks of school before the soft whispering breeze of summer vacation sneaks in and blows the Final Report Cards off of the kitchen counter.

But back to the here and now.

Fabric for Easter dress: Bought.

That dupioni silk is SOMETHING ELSE. My camera could barely handle it, it was so bright.

Picasa looked at the color and was like, "I can't, even. I just can't."

But my little girl will love it.

The main fabric is poplin. I'm hoping it's not too heavy to twirl...

I'm thinking I'll make the bowties out of scrap if I can, but we'll see...

My girl is a 7 now.

There may not be so much scrap to work with.

Sniff.

And here are the clothespins for the Tea Wreath, all decoupaged and lovely:

Don't they kind of look like candy or something? So pretty, all together.

As if to egg me on, I keep seeing people making The Party Dress all over the Internet.

Just today, over at Less Cake More Frosting:

I'm on it! The two week Blogland Bookmark Challenge continues!

(I'm off to sniff baby heads. Just bein' honest.)

Blogland Bookmark Challenge

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 20:45:00 +0000

Ah, I never could pass up a dare. So when Kyla at Funky Polkadot Giraffe posted a challenge this morning to make something - anything! - that you've recently bookmarked in the next two weeks, I thought: I can definitely do that.

I've also never been one to merely meet expectations, so: I'm gonna try to do ALL of these. In the next two weeks. BOOYAH.

Let's have a look:

(source)

This little number is gonna be someone's Easter dress (hint: not mine). Guess I better get cracking, huh? Especially if I want to make sure I leave time for making four of these:

(source)

All in coordinating colors, of course.

Spring is gift-giving time around here, with Mothers' Day and Easter and a whole bunch of birthdays.

Luckily, I have this in mind for all of my tea-loving friends:

(source)

If you're not following Kojo Designs, you should. They are awesome.

To help me remember all of those birthdays and other spring celebrations, I'd like to make me a more modern version of this:

(source)

Nothing wrong with this one, but 'shabby' isn't really my aesthetic. Wouldn't match my house.

Finally, so I can take awesome photos to share with all of you out there, I'm going to break down and make me one of these:

(source? This came from Pinterest.)

I'm sure you're all really disappointed that there won't be anymore slightly green-tinged nighttime shots taken under the CFL's in my kitchen. Sorry to let you down.

The super-double bonus project?

(source)

I LOVE this. The only hitch is that it requires power tools, which are hard to use at night after the kids in bed without waking said kids in said beds. So we'll have to see about this. That's why it's the super-double bonus project.

One more note: I don't use bookmarks anymore. I keep track of all of my to-do's on Pinterest. If you have a Pinterest account, feel free to follow my boards. If you would like a Pinterest invitation, leave me a comment here with your email address (it's cool to do the myemailaddress (at) email (dot) com thing if you don't want to become a bot-victim). I'll send you one! All the cool kids are doing it!

Also: I fixed my farkled up social buttons at the top. If you were desperately trying to follow me on Twitter yesterday, but couldn't get it to work, you should be all good now. ;-)

Bye Bye Bounty

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 12:30:00 +0000

Three things never to bring up on Facebook unless you want to fight your way out of a dogpile:

That yes, you bought the book and you tried to read it, but ~~you still think the Twilight series is insipid, unreadable poorly-written trash, and that Bella is a simpering moron whom you would happily clobber with a bucket full of 'sparkle'~~ you just didn't think that Twilight lived up to the hype;
Anything about the irrelevance of the USPS in 2011;
Your desire to abolish paper towels in your household.

(If you'd like to un-follow me or close this page in a huff because I Just Don't Get Twilight, please go ahead.)

(The rest of us will wait.)

Seriously, you would have thought that I had said I was going to go without cleaning. (...that is, more than I already do. Keepin' it real, yo - hang enough sparkly bird art on the walls, and hopefully nobody will notice that your floors are inexplicably sticky.) I'm not obsessive about environmentalism by even the most generous of definitions, but I do seriously dislike wasting things. I recycle things because it seems unappreciative to throw something out before the end of its useful life. I am also ~~cheap~~ frugal, and don't like to pay more for things than absolutely necessary.

Enter: The Un-Paper Towel.

(aren't they seriously pretty?)

My issue with paper towels around the house isn't even so much the cost, or the wastefulness per se. It's that they fill up our garbage can so quickly, I find soggy ones in the bottom of the sink, they get left on the counter - they're just too disposable, if that makes any sense. I just got tired of handling them. At first I considered just using cloth napkins, but the startup cost was too expensive. Poking around the interwebs led me to a fabulous Etsy shop that had exactly what I was looking for. Kara (who is NOT sponsoring this post! I get nothing for this! I just think she's great!) at Love for Earth sells lovely un-paper napkins and reusable produce bags, and was a pleasure to work with. She customized a rainbow-stitched order for me, and made me a custom 'wet bag' to hang in my kitchen to collect the used towels until they are washed. The little towels are made of pre-washed birdseye cotton and are serged around the edges to stop fraying. They've held up really well, despite constant washing in hot water and the occasional light bleaching:

Needless to say, I do not iron them. I ordered 60, and in a family of 7 including one baby and one messy toddler, the 60 get us through about a week before we run out if we don't wash them in between. We had just bought a giant pack of paper towels at the warehouse club right before my order from Kara arrived, but I don't think we've bought any paper towels since then - and that was mid-January. Score!

All you DIY-ers can do this yourself if you have a serger. I don't have a serger, and zig-zag stitching is not my favorite, so buying was definitely the better option. (**UPDATE** I messaged Kara of Love for Earth to let her know that I love her shop and am writing about her, and she's offering 15% off anything in her shop to my readers! Just enter ThirstyGiraffe15 at checkout!!) Also of note is that all of the reusable napkins are washed, dried, and folded using about 85% conscripted child labor - no extra work for me.

For big spills, I keep a stash of old washcloths in the kitchen drawer, along with about a bazillion old baby washcloths for wiping faces and dirty hands. We dry our clean, freshly-washed hands on... a hand towel. I know. I'm a genius.

What do you think? Are you convinced? Could you do it? If you've already been guilted into bringing reusable bags to the grocery store, this is the next logical step!

Oh! One more thing! I am tweeting! Twittering! Whatever! I just started a couple of days ago. You can use the shiny button at the top of the page to follow me on Twitter. I have plans to be both indispensable and hilarious.

(if you want to beat me up about Twilight, you are welcome to do so in the comments.)

Pillow Sisters

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 21:21:00 +0000

Quickie note here:

I made my Anthro-PB pillow spawn a new baby sister:

Best part? It's made entirely out of scraps from the first one. Just wove them together. I also did my first ever 'free-stitching':

I'm sure I'll get better at it, right? This was a little more awkward than I expected. I added a few little embroidery details on the front, and then whipstitched the opening for the stuffing...

...because I thought it was cuter that way.

Aw. So cozy. Perfect for smooshing with your butt.

Feature Creature

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 13:29:00 +0000

My little birdies are making the rounds! And they were featured this week on two of my absolute favorite blogs. First up, I made the cut at Knock Off Decor!

This site is run by Beckie from Infarrantly Creative (another consistently inspiring read!) and The CSI Project (one day I'll make the cut!). She rounds up the best of all of the ~~shameless copies~~ inspired projects from around the DIY blogosphere, and links to the original blogs so you can get all of the deets. Some of my favorite projects are this lazy susan art caddy (who couldn't use this?! And so easy!), and of course my friend Jen's Ballard-inspired giant wall art.

Secondly, I was featured in the Making it with Allie Roundup at What Allie's Making Now.

Full disclosure: After I received Allie's sweet, thoughtful comments on both of the links I shared at her party this week, I emailed her to tell her how awesome I think it is that she comments on each (!) of the links she receives. I've been linking with her for a couple of months now, and I don't think I've ever had a project go unnoticed! She is definitely the most gracious linky party host out there. If you're not participating in her Friday party, you should add it to your calendar! Not to mention all the great things she makes, like this amazing Jessie costume from Toy Story:

(so cute! and how cute is that model?)

and these wee little 'lucky bits' that she whipped up for St. Patty's Day:

(I have knock-off plans for these. Because they're awesome.)

I'm sure you crafters out there are already reading these great sites, but if you're not? You should!

If Pottery Barn and Anthropologie got married and had pillow babies...

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 00:09:00 +0000

...I think they might look like this:

I made this little beauty this weekend - the first weekend we've spent at our house in too long - and I am in love! I was inspired by this guy right here:

(source)

It's from Antrhopologie, and it retails for $78. You all know how I feel about overpaying for random crap at Anthropologie, right?

Dude. This pillow is worth $78 in labor alone. It was kind of a pain to sew. If I had used some sort of interfacing before attaching all of the bits and pieces to the front, I could have saved myself a lot of fabric-bias-related aggravation.

Also? I need an acrylic ruler. I don't usually sew home decor stuff; I'm more of an apparel kind of gal. I was hurting for a good straight edge, and had to improvise with a paper pattern made out of one of my kids' discarded art projects. I'm so pro.

The good news is, I really like how it turned out:

I couldn't decide where to photograph it, because I'm not sure where it's going to live in our house just yet. I made this out of the "jelly roll" packages of coordinating fabric strips you can buy at Joann's. I really liked the colors, and how they are complimentary, but don't exactly match. I think it makes for a good balance between Pottery Barn ('Look how coordinated my home decor is! Everything matches just right! None of my 'found objects' were actually found by me!') and Anthropologie ('I am so hip it is painful! I like everything so deconstructed that it's practically falling apart! I paid $498 for this wonky tulip sketch!'). PLUS, it's bright and cheerful and spring-y!

I have so much more sewing left to do this week! Hope everyone had a crafty weekend!

Linking up this post here...

I made capes.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 12:00:00 +0000

I made capes, and I could tell you about how I made them and show your more pictures of my flowered fingers feeding fabric through my sewing machine, but I'm going to skip that part (you can go here if you want to know how). The capes made for a lovely day of giggly harmony, and they totally captured my kids' imaginations. When I first started cranking them out, Adam was the only one home old enough to play dress up.

(we live in Florida. Don't hate.)

(cape in the breeze. action shot.)

As he ran toward the school bus, he was shouting, 'POW POW POW POW POW!!!'

I think he's a hero, but he sure shoots like a villain.

The bigs were really sweet in admiring Adam's new cape when they got off the bus. My oldest was really complementary to Adam, all, "Wow, Adam, your cape is great! I bet you can run really fast now! Can you fly, too?"

Then not ten minutes later he said...

"...mom? Could I maybe have a cape too? If you have time?"

(he's so big! But still kinda little.)

There was lots of heroic action on our lawn this afternoon.

Epic muscle-making.

Blasting off.

Fighting evil.

Saving the world.

Plotting (barefoot) against nefarious villains.

A beautiful afternoon, and a beautiful memory. Imaginations = nourished. I think we'll call the day a success.

Linking here, because this was Jenny's awesome idea!

The Bleach is Making Promises that the Kitchen Can't Keep

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:00:00 +0000

My house smells marvelous. It smells like an army of Merry Maids came in with their wee little aprons and Extendo-Dusters, and cleaned my whole house from top to bottom. It smells like someone took an old-fashioned rope mop and a sloshy bucket of disinfectant goodness and slopped it around on my white tile floor, rubbing and scrubbing until it was spotless and gleaming.

None of that happened, which is sad. My kitchen exists in its steady state of Just Clean Enough. I was using bleach and freezer paper stencils to make organ donation awareness shirts for my kids, and the scent (smell? odor?) is... aggressive. But the shirts? Check it:

Not bad, right? This is for my oldest son, who specifically requested a t-shirt for Donate Life Month. Green is the color for organ donation and transplant awareness. It's also the 'awareness color' for lots of other things, including (but oh-so-not-limited-to!) depression, Save Darfur, medical marijuana, recycling, and 'supporting family farms and rural communities'. So hey, when April is over, he can still... wear it... again? Whatever.

ANYWAY, he wanted a shirt, and I wanted something for him to wear to school that wasn't too... er... graphic. He knows aaaaaalllll about organ donation and how it works (he's just that kind of kid - and he's only 8), but I'm not sure everyone in his class needs to know, ya know? And this turned out kind of cool! Kinda funky, deconstructed, messy-cool. Wanna make one? Let's do it.

Firstly, get yourself a spray bottle with a fine mist that you never want to use again for anything else. I used a bottle from Home Depot that was meant for chemicals, because I didn't want the bleach to melt/destroy the mechanism in the pump. Sadly, my 'industrial' pump put out a lot of volume and had a dripping problem, so it was inconvenient to use for this (more on that later). Fill your spray bottle with a mixture of approximately 1 part household bleach to 2 parts water. Please make sure you are in a well-ventilated place, and please wear gloves, and don't get this nonsense in your eyes. It won't get you out of your algebra test like it did that one time in high school.

You'll also need a colored t-shirt (the darker the shirt, the higher the contrast), freezer paper, an iron, a template of an awareness ribbon, and a craft knife for cutting. I used my Silhouette because it's here and I'm lazy, but this should be easy peasy to trace and cut out yourself.

After you've printed the clip art, cut a generously sized sheet of freezer paper (the size of your shirt, or as close as you can get) and lay it waxy side down on top of the printout. Use a craft knife to trace the shape of the ribbon, including the hole on the inside. Because this is a stencil, we need the negative space, so make sure you save the little hole!

Next, cut another sheet of freezer paper, as big as the first. Turn the shirt inside out, and place the freezer paper waxy side down on the wrong side of the front of the shirt. Iron it on medium-high heat. This is to keep the bleach solution from leaching through the front of the shirt onto the back. Bleach is leachy that way.

(Oh look! Me ironing! Make sure that you iron the protection in the same

space you intend to place the design on the front.)

Next, carefully turn the shirt right-side-out, making sure not to un-stick the freezer paper. Apply the negative stencil (and the little hole you saved!) to the front. Iron it on really well, with a lot of pressure and dry heat. You need a tight seal on the edges to keep the bleach from seeping under the paper and ruining your military edge.

Regular readers of this blog know that the only reason there are two

ironing pics is that I wanted to show off my fingernail stickers.

Next, tuck and fold away any parts of the shirt that are still showing. You want to try to protect the shirt from overspray, so all you should see is freezer paper and the design you intend to bleach. I was wary of my spray bottle, so I rigged up a ~~cheesy~~ brilliant protective shield:

Thanks CVS!

I just wrapped it around the whole folded-up shirt, and then used scissors to cut a hole over the design. Then I taped back the edges of the plastic to expose the target area.

Now it's time to spray lightly with bleach. After you've applied a fine mist, it's time to sit back and watch the magic happen.

(magic in progress, after I took off the CVS bag.)

Once the design looks the way you want it, you can plunge the shirt into cold water to stop the bleaching process. Gently peel back the freezer paper and toss the shirt in your sink. Careful about rinsing; if you move the bleach around too much it will ruin those nice, crisp edges!

(we're gonna talk about those drips in a minute.)

Toss it in the dryer, and you're done! I should mention that I have owned these shirts for 24 hours now. I don't know how the bleached parts will hold up over time. I know that bleach weakens fabric; it's possible for you to bleach a hole right through the t-shirt. That's why I diluted the mixture.

Now, you might have noticed that the sink picture is of a different shirt. I've done this process twice. That's because the first shirt I made turned out like this (the little freezer paper hole is still on there):

(oops.)

So, hey - wonder where the top edge of the freezer paper was? Well, wonder no more! This is why you need to make sure to use a bottle with a predictable and fine mist, and why I recommend wrapping the garment in a CVS-bag sheath. Luckily for me, my son thought this one looked pretty cool after I added a couple more shots of bleach spray to make it look 'distressed' and 'intentional'. Now he has two. All the better for medical marijuana awareness, I suppose.

The edges really are that blurry, it's not my camera.

All in all, this was fun, and I like how the shirts turned out. This is definitely not a kid craft - hot irons! Caustic chemicals! - but it could make for some pretty cute kid shirts. Remember that not all dyes discharge like you might expect! Black, for instance, often turns either orange or purple with bleach. This can definitely be cool, but can be disappointing if you had a specific effect in mind. Test a swatch first if possible!

Oh, Anthropologie. You make me laugh.

noreply@blogger.com (Kristen @ Who's Watching the Baby?) — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 05:24:00 +0000

Have you ever looked at your wall, and thought, "Sad wall! You are so naked! I wish I had $498 so I could buy the perfect pen and ink tulip print to fill your mournful, empty space!"?

Well, Anthropologie wants you to buy this:

It's lovely, right? Wee little tulip, all inky and brown. And it comes with a frame! And glass! And it's generously sized at 20"x28"! That $498 is starting to look like a steal. Right? Right?!?

This is where Anthropologie makes me laugh. As much as I love some of their goodies, sometimes I just have to go all Tina Fey/Jimmy Fallon on them, like: Really? $498 dollars?

I just don't think so, Anthropologie.

Now, this is one of those posts where invariably people post things like, "Wow, I wish I were an artist and I could just draw things like that! Too bad I suck/can't paint/can't draw/don't have thumbs!"

I'm not a talented draw-er. I'm really not. Ask anyone who has ever had the grave misfortune of playing Pictionary with me. But I promise you, you can do this, too. As a matter of fact, I drew this... with my left hand.

I found that it looks more like a 'sketch' and less like a 'halting, insecure copycat of some dead 19th century guy's sketchbook' if I don't use my dominant hand. Sharpie, canvas, left hand: the only materials you need.

I did go back and trace over some of the lines, just because I liked the way it looked better. I'm actually really pleased with how it turned out. There was another flower in the series - violas (aren't those tiny violins?). I might even make those next.

If you wanted to make these really artsy, you could always take a picture of your work, upload it, and add a texture in Picnik:

It's on the back of an old note!

It's on a manila envelope!

It's on fire!

Order yourself a big ol' print of this. Wait it out, and you can get one of those free 8x10 canvas deals that come up every so often. Whatever you spend to have it printed, I bet you'll come in at less than four hundred and ninety-eight dollars.

And since this is craft-blog land, I went one step further:

BURLAP.

(with a frame.)

BOOM.