Life With The Crew

The Making of a $12 Blanket

When we visited Maine in December, I discovered that the Maine Woolens store in Freeport has a scrap bin where you can pick up really nice woven remnants for a really cheap price.  I picked out three pieces for about $12, which was about a pound and a half of fabric.  I went into the store not expecting to buy anything, but this was a great find.  I love that their blankets are woven in Brunswick Maine, not somewhere in China.  

I had two large rectangles of the brown stripe and one long strip of the blue.  I played around with different patterns in my head until I thought I had one that would work and then I just cut.  Of course, since it is me doing this, measurements weren't exact.  Plus, the material was sort of difficult to work with, with some of the edges unraveling.  It didn't help that I had to deal with a cat going berserk while I was trying to pin on the edging or worrying about a rabbit randomly spraying on it or a dog deciding to walk in and make herself at home.  One scratch on the blanket and her nails would have made a pull, so I had to calmly encourage her to move along.

After sewing all of the woven pieces together, I decided to back it with an old sheet that I in my scrap bin.  It is nothing fancy, but I did not want to buy anything new for this project.  Using the part of the sheet that didn't have white paint spattered on it, I spread out the woven blanket on top and cut and pinned as I went, leaving enough extra to turn the edge under and over the raw edge of blanket.  Then I would have been able to complete the edging in one sitting, except my needle broke on the first side.  I never had this happen before and it has made me consider wearing safety goggles when I sew!  I still haven't found the tip that flew off.  (And luckily neither has one of the dogs or cats.)  But it forced me to learn a new skill - now I know how to replace a needle.

Once all of the edging was sewed on, I had to decide how I should stitch the front and back together.  I don't have the patience to hand quilt and when I tried sewing a straight line down one of the stripes, it didn't look right.  So I decided to just tie it together with some embroidery thread.  I learned something else new - how to tie a surgeon's knot - and it only took me an hour.

I didn't necessarily need a new blanket, but with this extremely cold weather we've been having, it felt like the right thing to be making at the moment.  It is now the 5th layer that keeps the little babe and I warm at night.

I shared this post on The Self Sufficient HomeAcre for The HomeAcre Hop.

Ramblings About Television, Toddlers, and Tweety Birds

Last year around this time, the little babe and I made peanut butter and bird seed pinecones to feed the birds and squirrels.  She loved watching the squirrels that sat in the tree only three feet away from her.  (And so did the cats.)  In Springtime we stopped filling the feeders, but since it has been so cold and there seems to be a lot of bird activity already (even though it is still in the single digits), I decided it would be fun to get some birdseed again.  The wildlife show started almost immediately and the little babe was the first one to see the bright red Cardinal.  She now knows the difference between a male and female Cardinal, which she calls a boy and a "gurl".  Now that she can talk, putting together 2 and 3 word phrases, she can make us aware of the many things that she sees before we do!

She loves watching the "tweety birds" outside the bedroom window and she lets me know how many are on the nests or up in the shed roof eaves.  The other day she spotted a robin in the middle of the yard - the first one of the season!  She is always watching the sky when we're outside and loves seeing airplane contrails.  She is normally the first one to notice the moon if we are outside in the evening.  She knows that when the sun goes down, the owls come out to look for mice.  

My point of sharing this is not to brag as a proud parent (although I am of course), but to wonder whether she would know all of this if she had as much "screen time" as a lot of toddlers do.  Can you learn and have something make as much of a lasting impression when you are learning it by staring at a screen?  Just last week we moved the television upstairs into the attic.  We haven't had cable for two years now and we recently canceled our Netflix subscription because it was a waste of money since we never had time to watch anything.  I know that some parents think that children learn things by watching television or educational shows on a computer or ipad.  But even if they are playing an "interactive" game, they still aren't "active".  They are still sitting, probably inside, staring at a screen.  I guess you could argue the same thing about reading, but in order to get something out of a book, you have to actually "activate" your brain.  Staring at a screen filled with bright moving objects doesn't take much brain activity.  

While actual learning from reading, either a book or on a computer IS definitely important, sometimes it is the actual experience that is just as important.  I think the seeing, hearing, feeling, touching, tasting that occurs with actual real life experiences are something that a lot of kids miss out on today.  

I know that it is easier to cultivate a healthy relationship with technology for a toddler who is a blank slate rather than to have to "cut the cord" or severely reduce an older child's desire for/dependence on screen time.  Over at Maxabella Loves, she has been reducing the amount of screen time that her school aged children have and is blogging about the "why" and the "how".  She has a MUCH bigger reader audience than I do, so I am pumped that she is spreading the word about this issue which I think is so important.

 I don't think I'm going to miss that television and I don't think my little babe will be missing anything important on it either.  

 

Thankful Tuesday - 2.24.14

Today I am thankful for...

the luxury to play.  So many people in this world do not have the ability/resources/time/money/access to disappear into a Winter wonderland.  We had two really great ski adventures this weekend.  On Friday evening we took two fellow students from my husband's MBA program into the local gamelands.  Neither of them had cross country skied before and they were really excited to try it.  The one student had actually bid on this outing as a "date" with my husband for a Valentine's Day fundraiser and my husband had promised him a great sunset and "stars shining in inky blackness".  Luckily Mother Nature helped him make good on that promise!  The sun was just starting to go down over the horizon when we started, turning the sky a palette of red, orange, and pink as we watched it lower and disappear in front of us through the trees.  The little babe then made the first spotting of the moon, which was just the sliver of a crescent in the sky, with a planet shining beside it to the left.  (I'm pretty sure it was Venus.)  A little bit later we saw Jupiter shining all alone in the Eastern sky.  By the time we were skiing with our headlights on across a wide open field, the sky was dark blue and full of stars.  

Both of the students admitted that they were a bit nervous about being in the woods after dark and the one asked my husband if he was navigating by the stars.  Flattering, but no.  He told her that he was actually using trees as markers and that impressed her just as much!  Because we're in the woods so often, we just know where to go.  It was interesting to think about it from their eyes - to them it looked like we were randomly skiing through the big dark woods, without a house or road in sight.

On Saturday we got another 3 inches of fresh snow, so we headed out early on Sunday morning.  The temp was actually "warm" in the low twenties and it was perfect.  Since that might have been our last long ski of the season, we decided to be adventurous and take some new trails.  We saw a ton of deer tracks, fox or coyote, and another track that we hadn't seen before.  We even saw the wing prints of either an owl or hawk, similar to this.  It was right at the end of a set of small mammal tracks, probably an unlucky mouse.  I had decided that I wasn't going to get my camera out again, so I didn't photograph it, so you'll just have to settle for my husband's fancy ski moves and a cute Corgi.  Birkie loves racing down the hill in front of him and then falls in line behind him at the bottom.

What are you thankful for today?

I encourage everyone to share what they are thankful for.

 

 

A Chicken Story

There once was a chicken named Mr. Doodle.  He was a boy, therefore he was a rooster.  There once was a chicken named Peggy.  She was a girl, so she was a hen.  Mr. Doodle had a big comb and waddle.  Peggy had a smaller comb and waddle.  They lived together in a nest made of twigs, softened with fleece and dog hair.  Peggy laid eggs and they had a chick called Peepy, who had a pink comb.

They lived with a nice young farmer who took good care of them.  She made sure that they had plenty of food.  She tried to protect their eggs from the dogs that liked to eat them.  Sometimes she put pretty pieces of yarn on them and made them "fancy" so that they could go to parties.  The young farmer spent a lot of time with Mr. Doodle, Peggy, and Peepy.  She carried them all over the house and drove her Mom slightly crazy because she talked so much about the adventures that they were going on and all of the exciting places they were visiting.  Maine, Alaska, and Tahiti being the top picks. 

I think Spring is coming and we need to think about getting more chickens!  Perhaps ones that actually lay eggs!

On a serious note though, I am really happy that she actually does know her basic chicken anatomy.  We only have four hens at the moment, but she has learned a lot from watching them and watching us care for them.  She may not know what the word responsibility means yet, but when she is providing her animal buddies with food, water, and shelter during her creative play, she is practicing it without knowing it.  (Pretend food, because real would cause a dog fight, but real water, which she is really good about not spilling.)

Flashback To The Eighties

When I first started hearing about legwarmers making a comeback, I immediately thought of Jane Fonda circa 1990 (I was only 10 then, but we had to watch her videos in gym class.)  Like this photo:

Or this one:

But you know what I've discovered?  I LOVE legwarmers.  Legwarmers, ankle warmers, boot toppers, whatever you want to call them.  They help keep my legs just a bit warmer when I am wearing tights or leggings, which are way more comfortable than jeans or corduroys and so they're my go-to pants, even in Winter.  I've been wearing a pair of upcycled wool leg warmers that I had made for the little babe last year and I love them, but I wanted something a little bit fancier.  (If big chunky leg warmers can be described as "fancy".)  I found a pattern on Ravelry that used a double seed stitch pattern, which I had never tried before.  I didn't follow the instructions for those exact leg warmers, but just used the double seed stitch pattern and made up my own thing.  Because of this adventurous spirit, I then had to cast on three times in order to get the sizing correct.  The double seed stitch really seemed to expand - it is super stretchy.  I did 5 rows of ribbing at both ends and knitted until I got tired of knitting.  I would have liked them to maybe be a bit taller, but I just wanted to get one finished so I stopped.  

I really like them.  I wore just the one around the house while I was working on the second one.  I can wear them with my bad weather boots or with my fancier ankle boots (that is as fancy as I get) and they look good either way.  (So I think.)  My little babe will probably look back at pictures of me wearing them and think the same things that I do about Jane Fonda's outfit.  But MY leg warmers are for practical reasons!  Warmth is important!  Why would you wear them when you are sweating?  

 

I shared this post on The Self Sufficient HomeAcre for The HomeAcre Hop.

What a -9 F Day Looks Like

We use one woodstove as our main source of heat.  Our house is an old farmhouse with an original small square footprint that has had several rooms added onto it over the years.  The heat from the woodstove can't reach these rooms and so we did invest in a heat pump system two years ago when the little babe was born.  But on severely cold days (below 10 degrees or so), the heat pump just can't handle it and so our house is cold.  The warmest room is of course the woodstove room, then the bathroom only because we have a space heater going almost non-stop because there isn't any other heat in there.  The kitchen was 47 degrees F on Monday morning and the office and cat room were colder than that.  

-Ice on the inside of the windows - not just at 7am, but throughout the whole day.  And not just on the old farmhouse windows, but also on the new insulated front door window.

-Clear liquid dish soap turning thick and opaque.

-A special treat for the ladies outside - hot pasta, along with the regular compost scraps.

-Coming downstairs and seeing my husband looking like he is making coffee and eggs over a chilly early morning campfire instead of in our kitchen.

-Donning my own cold weather uniform for a chilly day inside - hat, scarf, two shirts, hooded sweatshirt, tights, socks, fleece pants, wool slippers.  I had to add another pair of fleece socks mid-morning.

-Cats choosing to remain by the space heater in the bathroom instead of eating breakfast - even missing the wet food!

-All five dogs gathered in the woodstove room, ignoring the rules about personal space.

-And of course the little babe - no hat, her feet only covered because she can't pull off her tights, and claiming that she is not cold. 

So what do you think?  Are we adults cold because we think we should be cold?  If the weather experts didn't loudly announce that it was going to be "bitterly Arctic cold, blah, blah, blah" would we mind it and brace for it as much as we do?  I'm not saying we wouldn't.  It only took 15 minutes of skiing on Sunday morning for us to determine that zero degrees fahrenheit is our limit.  We're okay at 9 degrees.  We're just too darn cold at -9 degrees.  Though I think it is good to feel the discomfort - it makes us appreciate the comfort that we are lucky to have.

I shared this post on The Self Sufficient HomeAcre for The HomeAcre Hop.

Thankful Tuesday - 2.17.14

 

One dark trail leading into the wood, the snow is still falling, the skiing is good.

One little babe strapped on tight, hanging onto her Mom through the cold snowy night.

Two adults taking their places, skis on their feet, grins on their faces.

We swish and we glide through the soft fresh snow; the babe is still warm, so farther we go.

We turned off our lights and stood still in the night; we called to the owls, but didn't hear a sound.

A Valentine's ski, just my babe, husband, and me - it was perfect and I'm as thankful as can be.

 

What are you thankful for today?

 

Valentine's Day Chocolate Recipe Party!!

Thanks for stopping by today to check out some new chocolate recipes.  I hope you're wearing something red!  Back in elementary school, I hated Valentine's Day.  Having to give a card to every kid - especially the smelly one and the super cute one - was too much stress for an elementary school girl.  Just one of the wonderful joys of growing up that I am hoping to prevent my daughter from experiencing.  But now as an adult, Valentine's Day just means a good meal with my husband.  We never do anything fancy, that's not our style, and now with the little babe here, fancy is not even remotely a possibility.  So a nice meal at home is what it will be.  And for a sugar boost throughout the weekend - Dark Chocolate Cookies.

These are super simple.  They are as easy to make as plain old chocolate chip cookies, but they have more of an adult flavor thanks to the dark cocoa powder and the dash of cinnamon.

Dark Chocolate Cookies

1.  Preheat oven to 350 F.  Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

2.  Cream the following:  1/2 cup of room temperature butter, 3/4 cup of white sugar, and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla bean powder.

3.  Add the following to the butter mixture:  1 egg, 1 cup of whole wheat flour, 1/4 cup of Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa*, 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda, 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon, and 1/4 teaspoon of salt.

4.  Mix until smooth.

5.  Add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips** and 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts or pecans.

6.  Place on a cookie sheet about 2 inches apart.  Bake for 12-14 minutes.  The cookies will puff up slightly.  You want to take them out when they are still soft - they will firm up and deflate as they cool.

*Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa is a blend of natural and Dutch-processed cocoas.  It is definitely a darker cocoa than natural cocoa.

**I used Ghirardelli Premium Baking Chips 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chocolate - much better quality than regular chocolate chips.

I'd love for you to share your recipe below!

 

An Upcycled Patchwork Play Rug

The remodeling of my bedroom and upstairs hall is finished, except for painting, light fixtures, and other things that aren't necessary.  We have walls and a beautiful wood floor and those are the important things.  The construction started back in October and since then, my little babe's room (also upstairs) has been the dumping ground for construction supplies and the storage room for our mattress and dresser.  For almost four months, we really only ventured upstairs into her room to get clothes and toys as needed, then retreated back down the plaster dust and dirt covered stairs into the "clean" part of the house.

I spent almost two days cleaning her room and getting it back into order.  We converted her crib into a daybed and now it is perfect for lounging and reading books.  (She has never slept in it.)  I made a couple new pillow covers using the fabric leftover from her birthday quilt.  The room is light and bright, but the bare wood floor is a bit chilly to sit on.  I would love a wool rug for her room, but we can't afford that right now and I don't want to buy a rug that is made in China.  I moved one small area rug from our office, but thought that she should have something more.  

So I decided to make a rug.  I had enough wool leftover from my stash of Goodwill sweaters to make her a small rug that is just big enough for her to sit and play on.  

I am not one for details and measuring, so I just cut the wool into different sized rectangles and pieced them together until they formed a large rectangle.  Even though it was felted, the wool was still pretty stretchy and cutting perfectly straight edges was tough.  I pinned them all together, which really was the hardest part of the whole project.  Then I sewed two pieces together at a time by hand.  That took me about three days.  Then I found some tan organic upholstery fabric in my stash and cut that to size adding about an inch and a half so that I could fold the fabric edge over and then wrap it around the wool.  I tried sewing the edging with the sewing machine, but it wasn't working and I was too impatient to figure out why.  So I sewed it by hand, which I was able to do in one night while the little babe was in bed.  Oh, and I did actually take the time to iron both the wool and the fabric before sewing them together.

It was a fun and easy project, I feel good about the materials used, and it did not cost anything.  It is wonky (I love that word!) and imperfect, but it is soft and fun to touch (important things for a toddler).  Plus, the colors are perfect for my pink loving little babe.  

I shared this post on The Self Sufficient HomeAcre for the HomeAcre Hop.

 

Acknowledge The Moments

Sometimes it is easy to wish that the day was already over.  If you know it is going to be a stressful day with lots of running around or you have a big presentation at work, you just want to get it done.  Perhaps you are getting tired of being stuck inside during the dark cold days of Winter and wish that Springtime would hurry up and get here so that your rambunctious child can stop bouncing off the walls and go bounce around the yard instead.  Maybe you have a big event coming up and can't wait for it to get here and you are tempted to zoom through the in between days until that one special day arrives.  

Remember this.  Each day is composed of hundreds of individual moments, moments that we all take for granted.  Only we can choose how we live these moments.  Do we appreciate them, making them count for something?  Or do we rush through them, lumping them together and writing it off as a bad day or just another day in the middle of a long work week?  

To be honest, I do try to stop and appreciate the moments, but a lot of times it is after the fact.  Maybe one way to start the process of being more conscious of the individual moments that make up our day is to pick one and focus on making it great and appreciating it.  Do that for one week, then add another moment to appreciate.  To get all philosophical and inspirational guru on you:  

Each day really is a gift, with so many amazing things to experience in the daily routines of our lives.  The least we can do is acknowledge it.