Finally, the Craft Post

Anja was sick for the past two days, but there's not much you can say about a pukey baby, so I will move on to more interesting topics. Besides, she's better today anyway and nobody else seems to have gotten it (knock on wood.)



Okay, so long ago I advertised a crafting post with a project I'd been working on. Well, the project started out looking pretty good and I got excited about it... until the end. When the final thing was all put together, I was pretty disgusted with my lack of crafting ability. It's so bad, you'll notice I'm not including a picture of the cover/binding because I would be embarrassed to have a picture of it on the internets.



Anyhow, this is the girls' new "Outside" book, featuring felt cutouts of things you might see outside. It was going to be called "Windows" and was going to have little curtains that you moved away to see the picture... but that was too involved. The pages came from those large pieces of yardsale fabric I scored two weekends ago!

This one of the sunrise/set over the mountains is my absolute favorite. I love the 1970'sness of it.

The squirrel is Martin's favorite.

As you can see, there are lots of wobbles to it all. Overall it turned out okay, except for the cover and how it looks put together. I broke two needles on my sewing machine trying to get the blasted thing together. Frustration!

And I just have to say this.... I know that most of the world LOVES Eloise Wilkin illustrations (two of those world citizens being my mom and my mother-in-law) but her drawings totally creep me out. The children she draws all look like they have something seriously wrong with them and their limbs look like they're stuffed with fiberfill. *shudder* Does anyone else share this opinion? And while we're talking about it, (I know I've mentioned this before) and because I had to read it the other night before bed, does anyone else get totally creeped out by "Goodnight Moon"?!? *double shudder*

In Praise Of: VIVA Paper Towels

So at our weekend grocery trip I had a coupon for Viva paper towels. I had never tried them before and they are only about $2 more expensive than the generic brand and OH MY GOSH. Totally worth two extra dollars. These things are like shop towels. You can use them multiple times. AND, I bought a bottle of 7th Generation cleaner (I think they just started carrying these products at Target because I've looked for them before with no luck.) It's a natural cleaner, but it kills the ants as fast as Lysol AND it has a better spray nozzle, so that one spray goes all over the counter instead of just pooling in one spot. This compliments my hardcore paper towels very well! Because instead of getting sopping wet, they wipe up nicely and only get DAMP. I'm telling you, this pair of cleaning products has changed my life. CHANGED MY LIFE.

And Then My Kid Threw Up on the Electronic Polling Station

...okay, that didn't really happen. But it ALMOST did.

Anja woke up 2 hours earlier than usual this morning and was a little off all morning. In fact, when we took a walk at 10:00 she fell asleep in her stroller right away. She slept until noon, and still wasn't all that peppy when she woke up. Didn't eat much.... you know how it is. So then we went to pick Martin up so we could go and vote, and she was acting like she really didn't feel well. We went inside the voting place (we went to the Fairgrounds) and Anja freaked out a little bit, tried to leave, then when Martin picked her up she started doing this "eh... eh... ehh..." thing she does that typically means she's about to puke. Greeeeaaat. We were both expecting it. We were practically humiliated in advance. Luckily, we cast our ballots and got out of there just in time. When we got back to Ivy Tech to drop Martin off, he opened the door to give her a kiss goodbye and --BLUUUUGHHH-- I saw she had eaten more of her lunch than I'd thought! Martin came back home with us to help get pukey Anja and sleeping Greta inside, helped me clean up the car and carseat, then headed back to work once Anja was happy in the bathtub. And now she's fine. I will not be surprised if she has another little vomit episode yet tonight, but at this point she's more chipper than she's been all day (and it's been about three hours since all this happened!) In fact, right now, she is on the couch with her daddy, eating cucumber and reading Beatrix Potter.

But seriously... while we were in the voting place, I was already thinking out my apologies, my plan of action, my blog post... I was convinced she was going to barf of those electronic voting machines and cause a huge ruckus. But, we were lucky.

Across the street they've been paving the library parking lot. Very exciting to watch, and now the neighborhood smells like summer!

And there is officially nothing (and I mean NOTHING) cuter than Greta with a baby doll. She is even more loving than Anja, if you can imagine that.

What We're Doing

Here's a little pictoral view of what the girls and I have been up to lately. We've been taking long walks together with our purses (and collecting rocks and leaves.)

We've been checking up on The Mighty Wabash.

We've been caring for ducks and wearing shower caps. (We don't like to get water in our ears.)

We've been stopping to smell the roses... and the wildflowers growing in the backyard.

We've been twirling!

And we've been reading lots and lots of Beatrix Potter and since blackberries were $1 a pint at Payless over the weekend and today I made bread, we decided to have bread and milk and blackberries for supper.

No Coffee, No Turkeys, But Plenty of Frizz

Oh, Saturday. I spend hours upon hours of my daily life envying Theodore. Look at him. He just lays around all day, sleeps whenever he wants, and demands to be fed whenever he is hungry. If he doesn't want to be messed with, he goes away. If he feels like playing, he joins the crowd. And he has absolutely no responsibilities. He has the ultimate life, in my opinion.

I forgot it was Saturday and forgot it was May Day and forgot it was the first day of Farmers Market. I did go yard sailing again with my mother-in-law, but did not come home with any outstanding finds... just a pair of camo pants for Martin and a few books for the girls. Still fun though. We did this while Martin and John were out turkey hunting. They came home having seen two toads and a turtle. Whoops. Maybe next weekend.

Today is Sunday and I'm pretty sure it's the May Crowning at St. Boniface, so I hope I don't forget that too. I was going to make the girls dresses for the occasion (Martin claims you have to wear blue to May Crownings) but they didn't get made. They didn't even get started. So... maybe next year.

These crazy flowers grow in our yard. We have cut many of them and paired them with our Hairy Vawz, which is one of our favorite wedding presents. They really go well together, and these suckers last FOREVER in a vase. Way better than lilacs.

Man, this rain is not doing anything for my self-esteem. My hair is so frizzy that last night I finally just put on one of Martin's hats. I only went with the hat because he said that wearing a paper bag over my head probably wasn't the greatest idea. And my skin? Ugh, my face is COVERED in zits. Not little zits either... the huge, volcanic type. I short, I am disgusting.

The other big news of the weekend is that we lost an old friend:
It finally kicked the bucket on Saturday morning. We got up really early (for Martin to go hunting and he woke me so I could get a shower) and tried to make coffee but nothing happened. We settled with hot tea, which we drank out on the patio in the rain, and that was very cozy, especially since it was 4:00 in the morning. *sigh* Mr. Coffee did have a hard life, running almost constantly for three years straight. And both of us were more upset than was really neccessary, but you have to understand that we are both stupidly sentimental and this was our first coffee pot together!! It was one of our favorite wedding gifts! (Right up there with Hairy Vawz!) And it's hard to replace something with so much meaning and history (many a night did old Mr. Coffee brew us up a pot to make staying up with a screaming baby more festive.) So, with heavy hearts, last night at Target we added this guy to our cart:

I think it's the same model, just newer. And it's red! That's kinda fancy. Another fancy thing is that it was on sale. So I guess we should prepare ourselves before making lasting memories with this one, since we can count on only about three years together. And maybe NEXT time we'll go with the industrial size.

Doing It All

I think people wonder sometimes how I have time to myself to sew with two toddlers. Well, there's the truth of it: I don't!

This counts as a crafty post, right? The current project is still not finished... maybe tomorrow.

To the Park!

I'd like to begin with the number one man in my life: He deserves some publicity every once in awhile, doesn't he? Gosh, I love him so. And there is just so MUCH of him to love!

As I said in my last post, we went to the park yesterday and it was really cold. Greta really liked the goats, Anja was more interested in the chickens, but truthfully, Anja was most of all interested in the big rocks they have there. So interested, in fact, that at one point she was sitting on a big rock and one of the goats got a little frolicky and charged right up to her and the other little boy who was near. It completely freaked out the little boy, but Anja didn't even notice. I'm glad she's not afraid of animals... even when they are charging her.

We went to the playground for a little while. The slide was really wet but we got to play on all the bouncy see saws and stuff.

...And swing on the swings.

I'm surprised they even allow us to swing on the swings. Look at these weirdos.

Then we tried to go for a walk, but Greta was not having it. We've been successfully taking long walks in the morning, up 7th street and around the block to what we called "hidden 8th street" and back home. Greta has been doing really well riding on my back in the Ergo or in the stroller. But yesterday she was side-wrapped on me and was not as happy... but it didn't matter. It was naptime by then anyway, so we just went home.

When Anja first stopped taking naps I had a hard time with it. She was still really young and needy and that hour of time to myself in the middle of the day was a difficult thing to give up. But now I'm really glad she doesn't take naps! We have the whole day together and she can play by herself whenever she wants but she's also a good little helper and companion. She's so good to Greta [most of the time] too, helping her when sometimes I don't know what she wants. Then of course there are the other times when they spend the entire day fighting over the same toy. Ugh. But the other good thing about her not taking naps anymore is that she goes to bed easily at 7:00 every night and sleeps most of the night through, then wakes up at about the same time every morning. It's really nice. Although last night I got 5 consecutive hours of sleep for the first time in a veeeerrrryyyyyyyyyy long time. I'm feeling good today! Which is nice, since I have so much to do.

My dining room is in a nightmarish state. My next post will be crafty.

And last night ended with Martin and me sitting at the kitchen table with this little end-of-the-day treat. Evenings are the best. I'm looking forward to the fall and winter when we'll have our woodstove in and that will be the center of our evenings rather than the kitchen table.

THE GARBAGE TRUCK IS HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!