Taggie Blankie

I just made this new taggie blanket for a friend who's due any day now with her third baby. She already has two little boys at home, so I think a lot of people have their fingers crossed for a girl ;-). In any event, the colors were so lovely and the texture so soft, that I made one for my sweet baby boy as well. He loves it and has now become a "blankie" baby! Now, neither of my boys took to either the pacifier or their fingers. Bottles were a no-go also. Robert does have a softie dog that he sleeps with, but he's not particularly attached to it and never takes it out of his room. However, Matthew has fallen for the blankie. It now comes almost everywhere, and when he is sad or tired he clutches it. So sweet.

Whew!

Can you say "overwhelmed" five times fast? I feel SO frazzled and overwhelmed these days. School is really challenging me in many different ways - philosophically, as I make decisions regarding my belief systems with natural healing; intellectually, as I struggle to memorize loads of Latin terminology; and emotionally, as I try to balance missing my babies and not being able to put them to bed two nights a week. I miss them terribly while I am at class. My beloved's aggressive travel schedule has also been wearing on us (it's coming up on a year now). So - we are delighted to be heading off to a family vacation in Orlando, Florida! A friend had a condo available to be rented, so we snatched up the opportunity and cashed in some free flyer miles (M's got a lot - guess that travel is finally paying itself off!!).

Here's to a few more naps in the sun....

Winter Wonderful!

Winter is REALLY here! This is the snowman that we built this week. According to the weatherman, he'll be around for awhile!

Have fun in the snow with your loved ones :-)

Baking Day

We are planning to go visit my beloved's aunt tomorrow for a little lunch that she is having. She is 83 and is also his godmother. She really knows the secret to long life, and one of her favorite sayings is "Life is short - eat dessert first".
Hence, cookies were needed! These tasty ones are so delicious and we love them very much. The recipe makes quite a bit of dough, so I usually bake two sheets worth and then freeze the rest. Here's a tip - if you spoon the dough on to a cookie sheet and freeze it for an hour, you will be left with frozen individual cookies (just like the ones you can buy in the refriegerated section of your grocery store). Store those in a Ziploc bag, and then pop them directly in the oven as you'd like them! Warm, fresh baked cookies whenever you feel the urge. Just bake for an extra minute or two.


Minnesota Munchers
Makes about 48

1 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2/3 cup toffee bits
1 cup chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease two cookie sheets. In a medium bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Beat in eggs, one at a time, then stir in vanilla. Combine flour, baking powder and salt; stir into creamed mixture. Fold in milk chocolate and semisweet chips, toffee bits and pecans. Drop by tablespoons onto cookie sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes in preheated oven. Cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to cool completely on wire racks.

Let's go watch something!

It is COLD here. Seriously chilly. What that means, is a lot of time inside; and hence a lot of time in front of the television. I absolved myself of all TV guilt a couple months ago, and gosh, does it feel good! What I mean by that, is I no longer lament the time our count the hours that the boys are in front of the tube. I released all the guilt I was harboring about the baby seeing the TV before he was even a year old, or the fact that the big boy can recite certain movies line for line. Overall, I think I am pretty good mom. My love and I put our kids above everything else, we feed them well, purchase mostly organic foods, co-slept when each of them were babies, breastfed, practice gentle parenting (usually), we shower them with love and affection, and spend an awful lot of time playing with them. So, I've released the TV guilt.

But in addition to watching Toy Story three times the other day, we also made this fun fort our of sheets. Both boys loved it. We snuggled under there with pillows and read stories from the library. See, some non TV time!

Roman Shades

We recently painted, and so I wanted new window treatments to go along with our "new look". So I sewed these roman shades. I used flat sheets from WalMart which made the project really affordable. They are lined in the back with a white flat sheet. I used a tutorial to help me with the measurements, and the entire project took only a few days. Overall, not bad for a starter home decorating project!

These are the folds of the shade.

Thinking Ahead.

I'm starting school again this Friday, and I am really, really excited about it! It will be pretty intensive though, as I am enrolled in a two year course and I'm planning to finish it in only one. There's a reason for our time crunch, one that I'll get to another day. Anyway, in additon to that, I also got hired to facilitate a series of parent workshops (Lunch N Learns, per se) at a local children's playcenter. I'm also making a delivering meals to three new moms over the coming weeks. Oh, and I'm running a meeting for the local MOMS Club (I'm the co-president) and will be forming playgroups for the entire club. This is adding up to a real "EEK" on my part...I wasn't planning to put quite so much on my plate at once!

One of my bigger concerns, apart from just keeping the house running, is how will I get to any crafting during the next few months? I'm finding more and more that sewing, stamping, scrapbooking...it really has become my therapy and method of release. I'll just wither if I can never get to it.

So, in the spirit of planning ahead, I spent the snowy afternoon today preparing these little craft bags for myself...I made about 5 so far. Each one includes a pattern, and all the material already cut to complete it. In a few I also added the matching thread, buttons, whatever embellishments I might want, etc. This way, when the mood strikes, my babes are sleeping, my studying is done, and the stars are perfectly aligned, I can just take out a bag and whip it together quickly. I'm going to try to do the same thing with my scrapbooking, and set up a few layouts ahead of time so that I can put them together at a later date.

What do you think?