Kleas

Living Craft

Over the weekend my spring issue of Living Crafts magazine arrived in the mail.  In it, there is a pattern for a Playful Seal. I wasted no time in stitching up this sweet little guy.

The perfect hand work project to work on while I sat on the floor playing scrabble with Peanut.  The pattern for the seal said to enlarge it by two hundred percent, but I prefer to work small, so used the pattern as it was.  As you can see, it's pretty little. 

Another project from the magazine I'd love to try is this beautiful felted scarf.

Maybe one day.

I had such a lovely Mother's Day yesterday.  Peanut made me orange bread (his specialty) for breakfast and then I enjoyed a beautiful afternoon outside with my boys.  We got into a dialogue about moms, and their moms and so on.  To try and help explain I took out this old locket that belonged to my great grandmother.  In it she carried these two photos of my mom.

 

Funny thing trying to explain to my almost four-year-old that "yes...that is Grandma".  Seems he had trouble wrapping his brain around the idea that she was ever such a little girl.

I hope all of you who are involved in mothering had a relaxing and peaceful day yesterday. 

Three Sneaky Bugs

In honor of another blog friend meet up, I decided (after more than two years with this blog) to try and figure out how to add links to my side bar.  I'm far from done, but hey...it's a start.  It took me three days to get this far, but I think I'm getting the hang of it.  In Green Kitchen style, I'm going with a list of friends I've met and one of friends I hope to meet someday.  My entire blog could use a face lift, but I'll get to it when I get to it.

Anna and I met last Friday.  We braved the pouring rain and masses of people at the museum to get the chance to put a face to the blog.  It's funny how lines blur with blogging.  I'm not exactly clear when I was first introduced to her site, and when we first began exchanging comments.  It happened so naturally, this online friendship, that it seemed to have always been there.  And maybe this is just how it is with Anna.  We had a meeting spot in the museum, what we weren't expecting were the crowds. When I first arrived I wondered how I would find her.  We thought it would be easy as we each had a babe in a stroller and an almost four year old by our side, but this described about twenty other women there.  Then we saw each other and knew right away.  As with the blogging relationship, our real life friendship came with the same ease and comfort.  I loved reading her entry about our meeting, especially the part about our boys.  They couldn't have been any cuter together.

This is Anna's photograph of the two of them struggling to walk in the rain while each keeping both hands on the umbrella.  It was quite precious and they got the doting attention of every onlooker. 

I couldn't be any happier that just a few miles separate us...hopefully there will be many more outings to come.

Happy May Day

We were able to find a little something blooming in our garden this morning.

I'm not even sure what they're called, but they're tiny and sweet.

For a May Day activity today we (or rather I) made little baskets (while Peanut built a fort out of the sofa cushions).  We have no flowers to fill them with, so instead we embellished this one with some felt ones using Mimi's wonderful tutorial. 

These tiny roses are quite easy and addicting to make.  Before long I had a little pile in front of me.  A good craft fix if you want to make something but have little time.  (Thank you Mimi!)

Earlier today while blog hopping I read about Shona's visit from a garden fairy.  I fell in love with the idea and so I copied it.  This was a perfect activity for Peanut.  I'm not sure how Shona's were made, but here's what we did:

• we added enough water to one small bucket of garden soil and mixed it with our hands
• then we added one package of wild flower mix and thoroughly combined the seeds in the soil
• next we rolled them into golf ball sized balls
• we let them dry a little then packaged them up

Since I had so many of those little felt flowers made it was the perfect way to prettily package them up.

In case you can't read the instructions, they say:

1. Find sunny spot in garden
2. Dig five small holes six inches apart
3. Place one cookie in each hole and cover with dirt
4. Water
5. Enjoy wild flower blooms all summer

These are going to our not so green thumb friend who is sure to appreciate them.

I have high hopes of going to my favorite May Day Festival this weekend, but rumor has it, it's supposed to snow.  Darn.  And as we speak we have tornado warnings.  Crazy spring we're having. 

Happy May Day! 

Day Thirty-End of Macro Challenge

It was a fun run participating in Karin's macro challenge. 

Her lesson in photography has been a great learning experience for me and I'm pretty sure many more macro photos will be seen here from now on.

The even bigger challenge for me this month was trying to commit to posting every day.  Which I didn't. But twenty-five out of thirty days is a record for me.  Where before, I was averaging maybe five or six posts a month.  I certainly won't be able to keep up that kind of pace.

And the photos?  As I was walking about my house this month with a camera in front of my eye, I discovered I have a habit of leaving little beads and things in clay dishes around.  These I found on the kitchen windowsill, my night table and on the fireplace mantel.  Funny.  I never really noticed I did that before.

Day Twenty-Nine - My Friend Chelle

To some it may sound like bragging.  "Look what I got!"  But to me, it's an important and well deserved recognition of the nice things people do in this community.  That's why I've been dedicating some of my posts lately to the women and their wonderful gifts they have sent my way.  I was very much surprised by a package I recently got from Chelle.  Surprised because we first met in a swap that happened well over a year-and-a-half ago.  Take a good look here to see what she created for me back then, you'll be impressed by her attention to detail crafting such tiny works of art.  I immediately fell in love with her blog not only because of her creativity and sensitivity to her work, but because I always learned something new from her. 

There was no announcement that this gift was coming, in fact, I'm quite impressed she's hung on to my address all this time. 

Her embroidery is perfection.  (Oh how I love macro shots of stitch work)

Two beautifully embroidered onsies for baby.  Not only that, but she made the most darling linen shorts to match.  Here's the entire ensemble.

How cute is that robot fabric on the shorts?  And ever so thoughtful, she even included a shirt she made for Peanut.

She shares how she made it here (scroll down). 

I have been truly blessed with such gifts.  Thank you so very much Chelle.

Day Twenty-Eight - Mosaic Monday

Peanut has become fascinated with letters and words lately.  His almost four year old brain is starting to grasp the concept that stringing certain letters together can create a word.  Being bilingual, he's got double duty.  We have a new game we play at the dinner table.  Peanut chooses a word for me to spell in English, then he turns to Papa to get it in Spanish.  He never tires of playing.  To keep his interest, I found an old Scrabble for Kids game at the thrift store so now he is able to put the words out as I spell them for him. 

Another Monday mosaic I put together from photos from the Flickr Macro Pool. 

Letters&Words

Macro Photo Challenge

Last weeks shift back to cloudy skies and dark days (and yes, even more snow) left me completely uninspired to keep my posts up for the photo challenge.  Looks like the sun is trying to make a breakthrough today, but we still have a drab week in the forecast.  Yeah.  Enough of my boring weather report.  It's just that it sure gets me down...I never realized before how much it affects my mood.  On to some photos.

Day Twenty-Four - Sea Salt

Day Twenty-Five - Silk Ribbon

Day Twenty-Six - Coins

Day Twenty-Seven - Beadwork

Yesterday Sistah and I went to Craftstravaganza.  We were brief as the building was not heated and it must have been 25 degrees inside.  Those poor vendors!  Braving it out in the freezing cold all afternoon.  Anyway, I was thrilled to see blogging friend Lisa again.  She makes the most beautiful bibs and burp cloths. 

There were so many wonderful things to look at but I had the attention span of a three-year-old.  One thing that did catch my eye was the cutest and funniest crochet piece I think I have ever seen...Monster Pie

This piece just cracks me up.  Made the the lovely and talented fuzfrenzy.  Etsy shop here.

More craft fairs coming next weekend...now if only we get some decent weather.

Day Twenty-Three-Happy St Jordi's Day

Today is one of my favorite holidays.  St. Jordi's Day or La Diada de Sant Jordi.  If you are ever in Barcelona on the twenty-third of April, you will understand why.  The streets are packed with vendors selling roses and books.  Similar to Valentine's Day, it is a holiday to celebrate love.  The tradition is, a rose and a book are given to your loved one.   

How did this tradition begin?  Legend has it that in Catalonia, there was a fire breathing dragon who had an insatiable appetite.  He ate all the animals in the small kingdom and was still hungry.  So to keep him happy the King decided to feed him one of the people in the town.  A name was chosen by lottery and it so happened the King's own daughter's name was drawn.  As she faced her doom and went off to meet the dragon a charming Prince came along to slay the beast.  When the dragon's blood spilled a rose bush grew and from there the Prince plucked a rose to give to the Princess.

Thus the rose.  And why the book?  It just so happens that Barcelona is the publishing capital of the Spanish-speaking world and as a way to honor the nearly simultaneous deaths of Miguel Cervantes and William Shakespeare on April 23, 1616, the tradition of giving a book was born.

For many years I traveled to Barcelona for work and had tried, in vain, to find a children's book celebrating this sweet holiday.  Imagine my pure joy when Papa came home from his trip and my new dear friend had sent this book for the boys. 

Happy St. Jordi's Day!!

Day Twenty-Two-Earth Day

It's amazing how much junk mail two adults can get in just a couple of days. 

We've tried with no success to get less of it delivered to our home.  We do recycle it, but is it enough?

I may be the last to hear of The Story of Stuff.  If you haven't seen it yet, check it out. 

Happy Earth Day!  We're heading to the river to explore and celebrate our beautiful earth.

Day Nineteen, Twenty & Twenty-One

It was a glorious two days.  We had friends stay the weekend, there was an art gallery opening and an Earth Day celebration.  The weather was even nice enough to go outside for walks.  I completely forgot about the computer and my thirty day photo blogging challenge.  It was a nice break.  But now to catch up. 

I am once again combining Mosaic Monday with the photo challenge and had fun finding common threads in the Flickr group.

SEW

DRAW

EMBELLISH

That was fun!  Peanut is busy making us sandwiches for a picnic.  How I love this outdoor weather.  We're off to enjoy the day...hope you are enjoying yours.