Apron String Symphony
Out of Tune with Domesticity
Apple Stampin’
Oct 8th
Just in case you’re not sick of hearing about all the crafts we’ve been doing lately, here’s another one. I read Hip Mountain Mama’s blog and had a childhood reminder: Apple stamping. Does anyone else remember doing this as a kid? You cut the apple open crosswise and the pattern the seeds make is a star. You then either dip the apple into paint or paint the apple and stamp it onto paper. Tons of fun.
We didn’t have any paper to be found, but I did scrounge up some of those sheets that are perforated to make post cards. They’re useful for all sorts of things, just pop ‘em in your printer…or let your kid stamp on them and then rip ‘em apart.
Once again, we just used some good ol’ fashioned acrylic paint and some apples, of course. We even used an apple that Adrien had eaten half of previously. Waste not, want not.
Anyway, it was tons of fun and a great way to pass time indoors — which we’ve had a lot of lately. Between the ensuing monsoon season and the threat of the swine flu, we’ve been keeping to home quite a bit. Crafts are awesome time fillers. More >
Painted Pumpkins
Oct 6th
It’s October. And the weather here has been surprisingly, October-ish. Autumn is my absolute favorite time of year. The weather is cooler, but not yet freezing. You can go to pumpkin farms and you can eat soup without breaking a sweat. This year it’s been a little wetter than usual, so we’ve been trying to find indoor activities.
Since we’ve not yet made it to a pumpkin farm to pick our Jack-o-Lantern pumpkins, I picked up a bag of mini pumpkins at the store the other day. Adrien was quite excited, because every day we’d gone to the store previously he’d wanted to get a pumpkin. Very badly. So to get a whole bag of mini’s was just sublime.
We also picked up some Halloween cookies that day at the store.
What do you get when you take a rainy day and add a few mini pumpkins and paint, then top it off with freshly baked cookies? One happy preschooler…and some Fall decor, of course! This project only requires mini pumpkins (or gourds or whatever) and old fashioned acrylic craft paint…and loads of newspaper to put down.
The best part of this whole thing is that 8 pumpkins came in More >
In all Fair-ness
Oct 5th
This weekend was great! Saturday we went to the State Fair of Texas. We were there a few hours, and I think we must have walked around it a billion times. So much to see and so much to do. It’s a money-pit, but it only comes once a year and I think it’s worth it. The Fair here is sort of known for its obnoxious variety of fried foods…and this year, we’ve heard that fried butter was on the bill. I guess we skipped the over the top fried food section, because we didn’t see any of it. That was the only disappointment of the day. (And believe me, it’s not because we wanted to eat any of it! It’s just, you know, to say we went and saw.)
We did eat some fried food though. You can’t go to the State Fair of Texas without eating a Fletcher’s corny dog. Even Jude got in on the corny dog action. You know it’s a big deal if Jude eats it!
Something else that your visit to the Fair isn’t complete without? A ride on the Texas Star — a ginormous ferris wheel. I am absolutely petrified of heights, so I More >
Crafty Eco Bags
Oct 1st
Luckily enough for us, both my mother-in-law and my Mom have birthdays within a week of each other. Neither of them own any re-usable shopping bags, so we decided to make each of them a personalized one. I had dreams of putting “MeeMaw” on each bag (since that’s what the kids call them), but the iron-on letter kit I bought didn’t have enough e‘s.
I think they turned out great! After taking these pictures, I added the kids’ names by each of their handprints and put the year in the lower left hand corner.
This project cost less than $10 (including both canvas bags, t-shirt paint and iron-on letters). I highly recommend keeping a box of baby wipes close by to immediately wipe paint-covered hands with. It was super easy and turned out great!
