pink and green

it has been a busy week. i am on my way to photograph a wedding today, eliot's birthday was yesterday and kevin is busy at school. one of those weeks where blogging doesn't get attended to.

we took a walk at the beach where kevin and i got married and saw another couple having their pictures taken in their wedding clothes. it was hard not to sneak up and take my own! so, i distracted myself with the beach fall colors. i have been interested in color shifts in nature lately.

dug up this old relic. a piece of a photo project i did at the end of my college years. i think it was the beginning of my fabric interest.

and we have a multitude of pears falling from the tree in our yard. it would be great if we didn't have lead in the soil!


lastly i want to mention and urge you to check out my friend Heather's new blog http://thecooksnextdoor.wordpress.com/ it is all about family friendly food.

And the Winner is...

Drum roll please....

Michelle at living slowly! Congratulations.

Email me with your address and I will get this package to you soon.

Thank you, everyone, who left comments. It has been fun to look through new blogs and meet people that are living so similar and yet so different lives. Hopefully I, or someone else here, will find another vintage stash and share the love, too.

leaf prints

I have had this idea knocking around in my head for a while. I saw a beautiful tiling of mono print, leaf prints at Eliot's preschool. The artist used different lightly colored papers with white and other pale colored printed leaves and put them on the diagonal tiled about 4 feet across. It beautifully goes from green to red.

I found a maple leaf and tried it out. I used tempera paint. I experimented with both sides of the leaf and different weights of paint. I found that a light touch on the paint on the raised side of the leaf worked the best for the image I was going for (upper left in this picture). I started out using a burnishing tool (back of a wooden spoon) but lighter pressure with my fingers brought out more detail. Now that I have experimented it I think I will go and find some nice rice paper or water color paper and get Eliot in on it.


More Oliver and S Sandbox pants I am working on, too. I made these from an old pair of pants that are a tad too big for me. I think we will be prepared this weekend if it rains.

more doll house

First, some interesting Jack in the Pulpit berries Eliot, my Mother and I found while taking a walk in the woods. They are large and very striking. We took mental notes so that we can hunt for the flower next spring. Spring feels very far away right now.

I have been focusing a lot of my attention on my doll house recently, as I had mentioned earlier. My Father and I came came to the conclusion that it was built after I was born so somewhere in the late 70's. You can also see that we are storing our shoes under it. One of my projects will be to make a skirt around the bottom to hide the unsightly mess.

I want to reupholster this couch. Speaking of reupholstering, I saw a chair today on the side of the road on the way to work, actually, the past 3 days, that I am having a hard time not picking up. It is 70's mustard yellow and probably totally soaked with the rain we have had the past few days but it has a nice shape. If it is there tomorrow you may see pictures. But, shhhh, don't tell my husband!

I am planning to make new linens for the beds, too. It will be a good winter project and a great use for fabric scraps.

lion stencil

I finally got on the freezer paper stencil band wagon and it's time I did! This is such an easy, rewarding, inexpensive thing to do. I bought a roll of freezer paper at least two years ago. I specifically remember packing it through two moves. Definitely time to give it a shot. The hardest part was getting the stencil just right but I found an awesome tutorial online. Eliot has been having some separation anxiety at school so I decided to make him a shirt with his favorite pal, Lion, on it.

This is the picture, portrait really, of Lion I started with.

After tweaking it in Photoshop, printing it on freezer paper, ironing it etc..

The final result! I am pretty happy with it. I learned a few things this trip to make the next one really cool. I have so many ideas for this. The creative juices are flowing around here right now and how good that feels!

yard sale gold

i hit the yard sale crafter mother load today. two boxes (at least 100) of vintage patterns, notions, spools of wooden thread, ric rac etc. i spent more than usual and had to bum a 10 off my mom, but it was totally worth it. there are a few real gems in there. i talked with the woman for a while and there are more than a few that came from her mother ie turn of the century patterns! so cool.

but, there are way more than i need or would ever make. so, i want to give a large portion of them away! ive sorted through most of what i want and i have way more than a shoebox size box full of goodies that i know i wouldnt get around to making, including several cute girls size 10-12. most of them are already cut out and there are some random pieces floating around. they have been cut to size 12-14, which fits me fine at a size 8-10.

comment if you want it and ill pick someone out of a hat next friday.

***Comments are closed the winner is Michelle of LivingSlowly, Congratulations! Email me with your info and I will get this out asap***







sit and spin for 60 cents!

doll house

this is a little peek into my doll house. it was made by my grandfather on my mother's side. i believe it was made before i was born, or at least when i was very little - dad, any thoughts? it has followed me around from place to place and was in storage at my mothers for a long time. it needs a deep cleaning, inside and out but it is still gorgeous. it is large at about 4' wide, at least that tall and 3' on the sides with openings on both ends. it stands taller than me on its stand. my grandfather made most of the furnishings, inlaid tables, intricate chairs, old copper dishware etc.. and my grandmother did the wall paper and curtains. in its hay day it had electricity, too. it needs to be rewired at this point.

i am working on sprucing it up, and cleaning it out. it's a slow process but i will probably talk about it periodically. it is definitely my prized possession.

slow progress

my new favorite dinner companion. let me introduce the silly sir humpty dumpty.

slow progress on the rug but progress none the less. it is about 16X20 inches. the colors in this picture err on the blue side, when i have some nice light i will photograph it again.

busy harbor

eliot and i dropped daddy off at an early class and had a nice early breakfast at the beach. it is amazing how busy our harbor can be for such a small city. it is always a little humbling to see the giant cruise ships pull in. it reminds me to be grateful that i live in a place that people are willing to pay big bucks to come and visit. of course, they are not visiting in the middle of February but, still, i am grateful. the school is on such an awesome campus.
i forgot i hadn't shown a picture of this little guy. i made this from the purl bee pattern a while back. the pattern was a little off but easily fixable. he was fun to make and well received.


i have some pictures of the rug progress to share this week too. i am thinking about a new project related to my doll house that i will share more later, too, once i get going. i want to get cracking on some freezer paper stencils and sewing projects. i have a lot lined up for this fall!

picture heavy

a picture heavy post since i have not shared anything all week. we are still adjusting to the new schedule but the feeling of fall coming makes it seem like we are on the right path. the smell of everything cooling down makes me feel like keeping on some sort of schedule. maybe that is an ingrained response to the old days of schooling.

eliot was dressing up like daddy on his way to school.

we took a trip to one of my old favorite childhood places, cousins island. it is accessible by a long bridge and it is never particularly crowded. it is a small beach that is fun at low tide because it has a large sandbar that extends quite far. it is also, as we found out, a haven for hermit crabs. they were everywhere. eliot was happy staying in one spot so i spent quite a bit of time observing hermit crab dramas. i was completely engrossed.




below are a few more pictures of our last Audubon adventure. we remembered to bring some friends and a frog catching net this time. it was a fun afternoon.



my sewing machine is out and i hope to get to a few projects this week. i am waiting, impatiently, for a new pattern from oliver and s for a winter jacket for eliot. i cant wait to get my hands on it! i think another pair of pants is on the way and i hope to finish some over due ideas i have had kicking around. the rug hooking is going slowly but surely as well.

have a nice weekend!

baxter and a bag

a failed, and silly, family portrait in baxter woods to start off with. we have been exploring a variety of new (to us) trails and woodsy places withing a 10 minute drive from where we live. it has been fun to scope out new places that dont automatically suck you into a play ground.

every time we turned anything over we found a multitude of worms. eliot kept saying 'look at the cute worms'. i started wondering how many worms must populate every square mile. i didnt find an exact answer but i did find this interesting article.
eliot is starting a new 'school' next week. im still adjusting to the idea, rather reluctantly at times, but it is the best of few options at the moment. so, to try and quell my separation anxiety, i made him a lunch bag and a few napkins to go inside.

it is pretty roomy and basically a rectangular box with a button at the top to keep it closed. i used a linen curtain panel i bought and never used for both the outer and the lining. i put fusible interfacing in between for extra sturdiness.

it needs to be trimmed up a bit, and could probably use a handle, but you get the idea...

i wonder if he would get teased for matching pants? i have a lot of this fabric still left...

wild things

we took a family hike/walk in robinson's woods last week. it was a very well maintained public land site that i will be exploring more. we found some fabulous mushrooms, teensy frogs and a salamander.



i notice in these pictures how the quality of the light is starting to change as fall is approaching. it is quite cool now in the mornings and a few stray red and yellow leaves are blowing down from the trees. i am trying to embrace this season with open arms and not feel too slighted by mother nature about our soggy summer. with the beautiful weather we have had this past week the complaints have been pretty minimal.


this week was an extremely busy week that i am glad is now over. kevin's first week was good if not a little stressful and eliot has been shuffling back and forth between babysitters and grandma's and home. i am thankful for a loooong weekend.

a new doll

eliot has been painting outside a lot lately. nice messy fun.

and this is a doll i made from a free pattern at www.thepurlbee.com i dont really love how she came out but i think it is a good workable pattern that could use some embellishments. i made a dress for her but i have no idea where it is!


we are very busy right now. kevin started school today and we are trying to ease eliot into his new schedule. there are going to be some bumps in the road but hopefully all will work out. at least my headaches have been put into some sembalance of submission with a new combo of meds, that helps a lot.

the pants in action

here are the pants i made for eliot in their debut. the pockets are nice and deep, good for collecting things from the woods. he can untie them himself which is good for potty training, bad for public nudity. i am happy with them and definitely will be making some for fall/winter as it seems to feel all to close right now.



here he is with 'the fleet' as it has been dubbed. i have to haul these all out into the backyard when we go to grandmas house. he has a great time entertaining our elderly neighbors and cats that wonder by.


i have some craft projects that i havent shared yet that i will try to post in the next few days. it sounds like we will be inundated with rain tomorow so i might as well wrap up old projects before kevin starts in at school.