A Montessori Morning

I'm switching gears a bit here-- cleaning and clearing out to welcome in the Spring (it BETTER stay around this time. You hear me, weather? I'm warning you....)In my former life I was a Montessori Primary teacher, and we have always tried to keep our home at least friendly to the Montessori philosophy. I ordered most of the infant selection from Michael Olaf, we use 90% wooden toys, things are organzied neatly on shelves in baskets, and so forth. However, in the last few months I've been a bit remiss about getting "works" together for Grady. I find Toddlers to be an odd little bunch-- I had to take a few steps back from where I would have started with a slightly older child. (My first clue? I introduced spooning beans, the quintisential Montessori activity. I gave the lesson beautifully. Grady proceeded to first try to eat the dried beans, then throw them on the floor and yell "here, Charlie. Come eat it!" Charlie is the dog, in case you couldn't figure.)

Here is his little corner of my studio-- simple shelves with a few new activities. Left to right, top to bottom we have: rock painting, finger transfer (moving little eggs from a basket to a deviled egg tray), magnets (using a magnetic wand to find the magnets in a bowl of beads) and sorting (little flowers into color-coordinated cups.)

I just realized that everything is crooked on the trays-- it won't be for long! I love the absolute order of Practical Life activities-- everything is so spare and lovely and perfect. Off to straighten those trays!

Impulsive Crafting

This is my latest impulse purchase. I know, I know, most people buy gum. I, apparently, buy industrial snap presses. So what was I to do with this beohemoeth once it found it's way into the studio? Why, put in inseam snaps on baby clothes, of course. (This was my rationale for buying it. I was going to save all this money making all of John Harper's clothes. Right.)

And so their very first matching set was born. I love the vintage feel of this ticking, and I am hoping to find some off-white linen (or better, yet, a pre-made, inexpensive shirt) for Grady to wear with these pants. They are not quite finished-- still searching for the perfect buttons, and that little front panel on John Harper's suit needs some embroidery, but we are almost ready to sally forth in style!

Today's Gift

This week has been one of real reaching for me-- you know those kind of weeks, mamas. When you are really (REALLY!) trying to love and cherish and nurture and honor your child. But. Yes, you know, so there is no need, really, to say more. And then it rained. Again. So all in all I was really looking forward to the weekend and some child-free hours in my studio. And then I happened upon this little man. My favorite moment in any book I read as a child was any in which the heroine curled up in a window-seat on a rainy day with a book. It was just the most romantic, the most centering, the most right thing I could imagine. And here is my own dear child-- who is just like me in every, single way-- who stretches and pushes me to accept myself, perfect myself, love myself, who, even at two years old knows how to stop, settle in, delve down, enjoy.
Oh, my dear one. You are my heart. I love you so.

Technical Difficulties

Go ahead and exhale-- I know you have all been waiting with bated breath for that tutorial I promised. I'm having some technical difficulties with the tutorial-- specifically, my kiddos are being a bit, um, uncooperative. That little guy-- gaining THREE OUNCES A DAY (over 16 lbs at 12 weeks-- I don't know if I should brag or see if my milk comes in a low-fat version.) So you know what I'm doing with every spare minute of my time (she says with a wry grimace.)

So I decided to share one of my most favorite recipes with you-- their official title is The World's Most Delicious and Versatile Vegan Muffins. Around here they are mostly know as "more!" Thinking about them meant I just had to make a batch-- these are the ginger ones. I always serve some version of these at our playgroups-- a decidedly "goldfish and juice box" set-- and there are never, ever any left over, so even if your kids aren't into whole wheat and low fat and good-for-them, for goodness sakes, they will eat these.

Basic Muffin Recipe (this is pretty good just on its own)

Begin by making your egg replacer. Mix 2 t. baking powder, 2 T. oil and 2 T. water in a small bowl. Let stand 4 minutes before adding to batter. This equals 1 egg.

1 c rolled oats (I use thick cut, but anything will do)

1 c. milk (I've used both rice and almond, as well as cow's milk. Obviously this makes them non-vegan, but it tastes great, especially if you add a T. of vinegar to sour it or use buttermilk.)

1/3 c. brown sugar (I use turbinado)

Egg Replacer

1/3 c. oil

1 c. flour (I use 1/2 cup whole wheat and 1/2 cup pastry flour, but plain white works, too)

1/2 t. salt

1/2 t. baking soda

1/2 t. baking powder

Combine oatmeal and milk. Add Egg Replacer. Mix well. Add sugar and oil. Mix. Sift dry ingredients together and add to oatmeal mixture, stirring just enough to moisten. Fill greased muffin tins 2/3 full.

Bake at 400 for 18 minutes, makes 12. (For mini muffins bake for 12-14 minutes.)

Add-Ins (this list is just a jumping off point. These will really take ANYTHING muffin-y!)

Ginger Muffins: 2 t. ginger, 1/4 t. cloves, 1/4 t. nutmeg, 1 T. molasses

Banana: 1 mashed ripe banana, 1 T. cinnamon

Sweet Potato: 1 mashed, cooked sweet potato, 1 T. cinnamon, dash nutmeg and cloves, 1/4 c. raisins

Pumpkin: 1 c. pumpkin puree, t T. cinnamon, dash nutmeg and cloves

Apple: 1/2 c. diced apple, 2 t. cinnamon, dash nutmeg and cloves

Lemon Cranberry: 2 T. grated lemon zest, 1/4 c dried cranberries

Coconut Date: 1/2 c. unsweetened flaked coconut, 1/4 c. chopped dates

Blueberry: add 1/2 cup blueberries. I've also added blueberry jam-- yum!!!

Strawberry: 1/2 cup diced strawberries

Orange: 2 T. grated orange zest, 2 T. orange juice

Carrot: 1 c. shredded carrot, 1 t. cinnamon, 1/4 c rasins

Zuchini 1 c. shredded, drained zuchini, 1/2 t. nutmeg, pinch cloves, 1/4 c. walnuts

Finally a little crafting

Last week was a little light on the crafting-- we've all been just enough sick (both with illness and of last week's nasty weather) to feel not-quite-into creating. But the sun is shining and there's nothing I can't do-- so this week should be filled with lots of ideas (and a tutorial or two!)These pants take me way, way back-- to Friday night, 1986, to be exact. These sheets were on every single slumber-party bed of my childhood-- did you have some, too? I never did, and I always mourned that fact. So when I found some out thrifting last week I just had to buy them. But the only twin bed in our house is Grady's, and I doubt he'd appreciate-- so they decided to become a pair of wide-leg loungers. Boy, oh, boy do these feel good. Full-fat-mocha with an extra shot and a big cookie good.



I was all excited to teach you how to make a pair of your very own-- but then it came to my attention that a certain Ms. Butler has sold many a copy based on something eerily similar. So I just had to take a quick solo jaunt to the bookstore to make sure I wasn't committing copyright infringement by telling you how I made them. One look at the book assured me that while they might look a bit alike, there is really nothing similar about how they come together (hers have a pattern and multiple fabrics and enough instructions to sink a battleship-- she calls for a buttonhole, for goodness sakes) I promise mine are ab-so-lute-ly nothing like that--an old bed sheet, a couple of cuts and some straight seams. Easy, peasy. So if all goes well, tomorrow you'll be wearing a pair of your very own.

Now all I need is some Madonna, a little Atari and a swig of Tang. Rock on.

What we got up to

Sittin' here....

sippin' these and hearing this (soooo good, by the way)...lazy Sundays. Ahhhhhh.

A date with myself...

A late-night solo run to my favorite coffee shop with my best guy on the headphones=bliss. These words-- some of the most centering I know-- were on my mind the entire time.

I Watched A Snake

hard at work in the dry grass

behind the house

catching flies. It kept on

disappearing.

And though I know this has

something to do

with lust, today it seemed

to have to do

with work. It took it almost half

an hour to thread

roughly ten feet of lawn,

so slow

between the blades you couldn't see

it move. I'd watch

it's path of body in the grass go

suddenly invisible

only to reappear a little

further on

black knothead up, eyes on

a butterfly.

This must be perfect progress where

movement appears

to be a vanishing, a mending

of the visible

by the invisible-- just as we

stitch the earth,

it seems to me, each time

we die, going

back under, coming back up....

It is the simplest

stitch, this going where we must,

leaving a not

unpretty pattern by default. But going

out of hunger

for small things--flies, words--going

because one's body

goes. And in this disconcerting creature

a tiny huger,

one that won't even press

the dandelions down,

retrieves the necessary blue-

black dragonfly

that has just landed on a pod...

all this to say

I'm not afraid of them

today, or anymore

I think. We are not, were not, ever

wrong. Desire

is the honest work of the body,

its engine, its wind.

It too mush have its sails-- wings

in this tiny mouth, valves

in the human heart, meanings like sailboats

setting out

over the mind. Passion is work

that retrieves us,

lost stitches. It makes a pattern of us,

it fastens us

to sturdier stuff

no doubt.

- from Erosion by Jorie Graham

Have the lovliest of lovely weekends, my dears. See you all next week.

Some more baby love

I have to say, I think baby sewing might just be my very favorite kind. Everything is so cute and tiny and colorful, and it's really impossible for a baby to not look cute in/on/surrounded by handmade. I hope my dear friends share my love, because they are all about to be showered by great quantities of Little Stitches for Little Ones.

So far all I've tried is this little kimono set.I like the pattern pretty well-- it sews up so easily-- but I did find it helpful to make some modifications. I found the rise on the pants to be a tad short, especially if you are dealing with a big cloth bummy, so I added a contrasting band to house the elastic. I also added interior ties as I sewed the seams just to make it a little bit easier to keep it closed. The little owl set is lined in flannel-- I just made two of everything and joined them together with bias. I did NOT make my own bias, as Amy recommends-- I am just not that into it. I'm not sure if that makes me a craft freak-show, or if I think that people who enjoy bias-making are the real wack-jobs. Either way, this is the tacky polyester pre-packaged kind, and it worked out just fine, thank-you very much.

And the owl fabric-- we get so many questions about it every time he wears it out (which is frequently. I get such a kick out of saying "oh, I made it" when people ask me where I got somthing my kids are wearing. It just makes my week. So the poor darlings have to wear the same three things over and over to feed their mama's voracious ego.) That, my friends, used to be a bedskirt. We found it at the Goodwill for 80 cents-- the contrasting fabric is a tablecloth I found on the same trip-- it was only 50 cents. So the whole outfit cost about the same as that aforementioned tacky polyester bias tape. And I have pillow shams-- two of them-- with red ball fringe (she sighs)--still to work with. Good times ahead.
This one may not look it in the picture, but it is so tiny (it's the 0-3 month size.) It's heading off soon all the way across the country to dress up a wee little guy-- all six-and-a-half pounds of him. John Harper can't model it for you since he hasn't been six-and-a-half pounds since around 30 weeks gestation, but you get the drift.

I better get this in the mail pronto-- they get big so very, very fast.

Baby, baby

I've got a whole lotta baby love these days-- really, how CAN you resist this? The rolls! That one dimple! Oh, man. And I can pretty much guarantee that cellulite has never graced another kneecap quite so-- well, kissably. Delish. My smiley guy was so good to model these nifty little pouches for me. I'm not really a diaper-bag mama-- I travel light. So I needed a place to store my diaper and wipes and clean, soft surface to lay my babe upon. And so Bums Away was born. I've had so many friends who have either just given birth or are just about to give birth-- so I'm stockpiling the handmade goodies for their gift bags.

Like my labels? We love the owls around here.

Makin' Lemonade

(Yet another) day begins this way: Add to that one Very Runny Nose (Boy), one Very Pink Eye (Mama), and one Very Cranky Baby (Baby) and you have the makin's of a not-so-fun day. But if there is one little lesson I'm learning (slowly, slowly, but I am learning it)-- it is that what we have is what we choose to have.

And I had this.

A circus tent, you ask? No, no, friends. Here we have one of the three maternity shirts that I wore for the last month of my pregnancy. (I feel that I need to here insert the caveat that although I'm kind of a little person when I'm not pregnant, I tend to stay pregnant more or less forever and give birth to toddlers--my "little" baby was 10 lbs. on the nose. So by the end, this is what ya' get.)

Anyway, this shirt. It has a lot of memories tied up in it-- not all of them so great. My pregnancy was long (past 42 weeks) and didn't end as I'd hoped it would (2 1/2 days of labor followed by a cesarian and an almost 11 lb. baby.) My closet was in need of a little mojo-tending, and, as luck would have it, my copy of The Creative Family had instructions for turning just such a shirt in to some seriously fab baby pants. And I do love me some baby pants. So snip, snip Giant-But-Adorably-Striped-Shirt. But then, despite the fact that I've made approximately 9 ba-gillion pairs of baby pants in my life, I somehow managed to sew the legs together incorrectly. On both pairs of pants (one for each boy.) Multiple times.

Crying did cross my mind. But I decided to show some restraint. I calmly folded my sad little pants away and broke out the paint. I made some little angry cross-hatchy thingies. Grady made mauve. And then we washed our plates and put them away. And we both felt better.

Here's to the wonderful possibility that is tomorrow. Happy crafting, chickies.

Small Pleasures

The rain and freezing cold are back-- but we managed to cozy up inside and enjoy ourselves nonetheless.

Vintage Easter decorations-- charicteristically, Grady is in love with this "special chick."
A little studio time with Mommy

Daddy's bread, warm from the oven

Weekends at home. Nothing better.

5 Beautiful Things

1. The gorgeous, shocking blue in these acid-washed copper pieces by local metal sculptor (and one of my most favorite people) Jake DeCola

2. My newly thrifted mug-- and the coffee in it is pretty beautiful, too.

3. Ruben-esque legs and cloth bums!

4. Springtime coming into our home.
5. Grady's little arrangement. He found these dropped blossoms on the floor, filled his "tiny glass" at the fridge and picked this spot to display his work himself. Be still my heart.

Have a beautiful weekend!

I always knew I prefered egg-white omelettes (or why following vintage pattern directions to insert a yoke is not all it's cracked up to be)

Would you believe that I dislike puns? I guess I'm just a little punchy today with the rain and cold temps returning to spoil my spring. Let us get our yuk-yuks out and move on, shall we.

Vintage patterns. Yes. I know I went on the other day about how much I love them. But I am not of the home ec generation-- and this one really had me stumped. I still have no idea if I did it "right" but the yoke on this dress if finally in-- and it is straight and the seams look good, so we are going to call it a job well done.

Again, I take heart in the fact that it's not just me. For those of you who follow the very talented Amanda (and in my set, asking is somebody reads Soulemama is just as silly as asking if she likes chocolate or breathes air or something) apparently I'm not the only one baffled by how, um, concise, these instructions are. Shall we just say that the swearability factor on this little number was quite high. And that gorgeous (but SO unforgiving to picked stitches) fabric-- Joel Dewberry's Chocolate Orchid Ginseng--right up there with my husband and really good coffee on my list of lasting loves. The price on this stuff seems to be creeping up as it becomes just a tad bit harder to find. Better stock up while I still can.

337th times a charm...

This project was--seriously-- a year in the making. I don't know if you've ever tried to get a 14 month old to hold their hand per-fect-ly still and dip it into some wet, gooey stuff, but I'm here to tell ya', it ain't easy. Nor is it all that much easier to get a 20 month old to do it. Or a 23 month old. But 25 months-- ah, yes. Success.



But I didn't want just the impressions of his wee little hand. Oh, no. That would never do-- a cast it had to be. We tried several methods-- I won't bore you with our failures, but will move straight on to our success. Fine, fine sand-- I bought this stuff in the florist section of our local craft store-- made just damp. Make a layer a few inches deep in a large, flat pan. Press the hand ever so gently-- but firmly-- into the sand, and c-a-r-e-f-u-l-l-y remove. I then used my own fingers to deepen the impression all around so that it would be deep enough to accept the plaster. Pour in a very, very watery mixture of Plaster of Paris and let dry overnight. I found it's best to use a spatula to remove the hands, and then gently rinse them under running water. Watch those little fingers-- they snap so easily! Make extras. Lots and lots and lots of extras. We mounted ours in a shadow box using the two-sided hook-and-loop included with the kit, and mailed in an ever-so-well-cushioned mailer off to Grandpa in Florida. Hope he didn't notice that last year's promised present was, oh, about 364 days late...

Who's Afraid of the (Invisible) Zipper?

Did you know if you Google "afraid of sewing a zipper" you get 27,100 hits? I'm comforted by the fact that I'm not alone in my fear of these tricky little devils. I'm pretty new to sewing garmets-- but after making my first pair of baby pants last summer, I'm totally hooked. And there's nothing like promising the sweet and very pregnant Mommy who is relying on you to provide the perfect birthday/Easter dress that you are all finished with it to really get the adrenaline pumping. So between a trip to my awesome local sewing shop, copious study of the little instructions printed on the zipper package and (thank GOD for!) Youtube, I got it. This one took about 5 hours to get in there. The second one I set-- about 30 minutes. Yeah.

And here's this sweet frock all finished up! I'm so in love with these zaggy stripes on the inset panel-- I spend a good portion of my (very limited!) free time trying to dream up new patterns where I can insert just one more placket or panel. Yum. Yum. Yum.

Planning and Planting

We made our first pilgrimage to the Curb Market this morning, and came home with the world's best pimento cheese ( from Real Catering-- studded with thick-cut bacon and with a hint of worcestershire!), some trailing rosemary--something I've never seen before--and a new Provence lavender. With temperatures in the 70's and a spring wind blowing, I set out to do what I've put off for too long-- mapping out the garden in my sketchbook. This past autumn's pregnancy kept me from spending much time in the garden, and I had to think very hard to remember what lies beneath the dried remnants of last summer's mulch.


Our garden is filled with pass-along plants-- some with their roots as far back as my great-great-Grandmother's garden. When we sold our old house two years ago we actually dug up more yard than we left, and many of those plants have found their home in the garden of the new house. These bearded iris-- white with pale-purple hearts-- were rescued from a thick layer of undergrowth at the old house. A climbing pink rose-- grown from a clipping my own mother took from a wild bush while she was pregnant with me-- that has grown on the fence of every home I've ever lived in is putting out its first growth of the season. And peonies from my grandparents' farm are peeking through the earth. My mind is filled with plans and my hands are deep in the dirt. Life is good, good.


Not just a talented poet and a brilliant attorney-- he builds fences, too! A corner of one of Adam's beautiful creations.

Outside: Inside

Outside my workroom: Vestiges of this week's big snow linger on the North-facing porch

Inside my workroom:

Spring! I cannot tell you how excited I am about this project, made up in Heather Bailey's Pop Garden line. This dress-- vintage-inspired from that sweet pattern-- is for a special little girl who will soon be two. And let's talk about that pattern-- I love vintage patterns (and not just because they usually come already cut!) They all tell a story--this one more detailed than most. Yum.

And while we're talking shop, let's talk about one of my favorite places to spend my virtual time---Fabricpalooza. Karen Gray is opening a real, live store just up the road in Winston-Salem any day now--my silly husband has already started talking to me about remembering my fabric "budget" when I go. Fortunately, he's a very forgiving man, because I can already sense some serious forgetfulness welling up inside of me. "In sickness and in health, in stash-heavy times and lean...." n'est-ce pas?

Little, tiny baby steps

In the midst of days filled with two little boys, two large dogs and too many loads of laundry, I do my best to carve out little spaces for myself. Each little niche is filled with some small passion-- writing, gardening, sewing, creating. My effort to live up to the challenge of one of our favorite books-- to make the world more beautiful.
My greatest creations:


Exhibit one-- yummy baby dimples

Exhibit two: Dreamboat eyes

This shot is by our amazingly talented photographer friend, Cophia Lee.