Embroidered dreams

My embroidered Siamese cat with a bow tie came in the mail this week!! He is just as perfect as I thought he'd be. The skinny bright blue plastic frame was awful, but how fortuitous that I just so happened to have THE perfect frame to replace it. TA-DA!

We have too many cats in the bedroom as it is (is that really such a thing?) and the living room wall real estate is filling up, so it found its home in between the Friendly Yeti and my Sewing for Victory poster. Love him.

Elsa sagging her drawers, LBC style.

Happy Independence Day!

Pictures from the Fourth of July party at Andy & Kim's! 

Nonni sent a little package of patriotic fashions from Osh Kosh the week before so she rocked some of that. The top in the picture above is MY FAVORITE! So dang cute. The dress below is great except the ties are supposed to be bows over her shoulders but they were too far apart so they kept slipping down her arms so I jerry rigged it:

Andy & Kim set up their pool for the kids which was a hit. It was hard to keep Elsa out of that thing. And any excuse to put her in that swimsuit is one I will jump on.

Mandy and her patriotic babies! I love Elsa's possessive hand on Shalom's head, and Shalom's look at me like "Do you see what your kid is doing right now?"

Parties at A&K's are the best. They set up all these play areas for the tots, they go nuts for them.

 Daddy diaper pit stop!

 And back in the pool...

Eating broccoli. For about 1 second. Then she discovered the cookies and fruit chew snacks Kim laid out.

Another little girl brought this toy camera that Elsa was enamored with. And I use the term "toy" camera loosely. It was a digital camera, just with simpler buttons and settings and big grip handles. Might have to get her one of these for Christmas...

FIREWORKS! It was so fun to watch her because she was all over the place with her feelings about the fireworks. She was blasé in between them being lit and would stroll over to the launch pad, then high tail it out of there as soon as one was put down to be lit. She alternated between looking at them with awe and smashing her hands over her eyes and ears and hiding behind her dad. These pictures that Mark took capture the moments pretty well. :)

 AMERICUH!!

Gran jefe no caca Thor

Poor Thor couldn't poop this week and so we paid $1200 to clean him out. Cat enemas are NOT cheap. If anyone knows of reasonable cat health insurance, hit me up. Our boys are around 5 years old (we think) so we likely have about 16 more years of vet visits to fund. Long story short- give your show cats more wet food (no gravy and sauces if you want to keep them svelte) than crunchies and make sure they are brushed and drink lots of water. Drinking water was never Thor's issue (he guzzles it like he's a pro athlete) but we shopped around with different crunchies because they didn't care and ate anything so the vet thinks it was the new food that plugged him up. Anyways, after one overnight visit to the emergency vet and one visit to his regular vet, and several x-rays and enemas later, Thor is flushed out and back to normal, just with a little arm haircut to show for his troubles. Thank the God of Show Cats.

Is it weird that I retouched this photo to take out his eye boogers?

Little Sprouts!

Happy birthday Jude!! It's Jude's 2nd birthday today (!!) which means Elsa's is just a few weeks away! Mama's got a party to plan! Anyways, I made little Jude a gift thinking of the business Jerod and I have been talking about since they were fetuses. It's called Little Sprouts and they'll be in charge of planting, watering, caring for and loving seeds into seedlings, which they will then cart around in their Radio Flier wagons all around the neighborhoods to sell to all the suckers neighbors. They'll probably spend all of their earnings on Pink Panther popsicles from the ice cream man, but we'll try to encourage them to split their profits into savings, capital for continuing and expanding their business, charity, and mad money for popsicles.

The babes are already showing an interest in gardening (Elsa likes watching us tend to the garden, and enjoys pulling all the jalapenos off the plant as we scream at her not to) so we might be starting this LLC pretty soon. As such, they need little uniforms so I made Jude a little logo'd apron. It's waterproof plaid fabric (a Quiksilver remnant- thanks Mandy!) on one side, and Ikea navy gingham cotton on the other. I printed Little Sprouts and the leaf on printable fabric (kind of the best thing ever) and sewed it up into a pocket for the front and BAM! Baby work apron.

I kind of freestyled this pattern, using one of Elsa's overalls for a sizing guide. I tried to put it on her midway to see if it was working but the little turd threw a fit like I was trying to put acid on her and not a piece of cotton. Sigh. I did pin her down though to make sure the neck strap would fit over their big old baby noggins.

So it's basically just the shape you see here cut out of two fabrics with the right sides facing and the straps pinned in place and sandwiched between the fabrics, pinned, and then sewed along all the edges, leaving a few inches on the bottom open so it could be turned right side out with the straps on the outside. I topstitched the bottom closed and ran the topstitch all along the rest (in neon green thread!), then sewed on the pocket and badda-bing it's done. How's that for a tutorial??

And for more fun, I'm including a few seed packets from the Hudson Valley Seed Library (you can get these cuties at West Elm) to get him started.

Ultimate Salad Bowl, Rainbow Chard, Sparkler Radishes, Kaleidoscope Carrots, and of course, Lemon Cukes! I love the illustrations on the packets.

Hope the little man likes it! I think I'll make Elsie a coordinating apron of her own for her birthday...

Yessss....

Thank you Urban Outfitters, for fulfilling my embroidered Siamese cat artwork dreams. How did this not sell out immediately, but instead stick around long enough to go on sale!? Thank God I found it in time. I can't wait to get you in the mail friend. And then immediately change that ugly frame.

Elsa updates

 

It's been awhile since I've written about Elsa's milestones and random every day stuff that she does. I'm going to try to list as many as I can think of here:

• She learned her ABC's several months ago from a vintage ABC book from Jeff's childhood and a set of ABC flash cards. I tried to keep them in order but that lasted about 30 seconds so we always went through them out of order, which apparently is the way to teach them. She knows them all now (well, W is still "duuuh" to her, but we give it to her because it's a tough one) and even knows the letters in lower case and upside down which impressed me. She can spend a good 20 minutes on her own saying the letters of the alphabet magnets Brooke got her as she pulls them off the fridge and puts them in a bowl, and then reverses it putting them back on the fridge. Smart baby!
• Whenever she drops something (or chucks it across the room) she says "OH NO! IT FELL!" 
• Whenever she trips and falls she says "I SIPPPED!" (slipped)
• When planes or helicopters pass by overhead, she waves and says "BYE PANE!"
• She loves her friends, and asks us about them all the time. Shalom is "SHOAM!", Jude is "JEW!", and Henry is "HEN!". I can't wait for her to meet Eisley and see what she calls her. EYE I'm sure. 
• Her sweet tooth has popped up, big time. When we cave and give her candy (mini m&m's usually) she grins and gasps and knots her hands together in gleeful anticipation as we shake some out for her. 
• She loves brushing her teeth and flossing. Seriously. Every time she's in the bathroom she wants to dig through Jeff's drawers to look for his flossing sticks and when she finds them, she grabs one and moves it all over her mouth sucking on it. I think she likes the mint flavor of it because she's a nut for Altoids too. Weird, right?
• In the morning when we get her up, she's always in a good mood and says "MORN KEEETY!" to Thor who likes to get up with us and follow us into Elsa's room. 
• She just started to get embarrassed, and cries and covers her eyes with the backs of her hands when Jeff and I laugh at something she did that she did not intend to be funny (like fall off the sofa, while obviously not hurting herself).
• She gets pissed when we laugh at her dramatic tantrums over something ridiculous. She'll try smacking us or will stick out her bottom lip and take the tantrum up a notch. 
• She is learning so many words to say, and understands so much more now too. Every day it's something new that surprises me. I talk to her like an adult all the time not expecting her to understand but sometimes she does and it startles the crap out of me! I asked her to get me a pen the other day and didn't even point to where one was and she runs out of the room, and runs back to me with a pen! We tried it again tonight asking her where the Apple TV remotes are (she lost both of them) and she ignored us. So I guess it's selective. 
• She knows the cats names! She can't tell them apart (no surprise, even I can hardly tell them apart) but when I ask what the kitty's name is, she'll alternate between "SORE" for Thor and "TEEE" for Tyr. It sounds pretty close when she says it. Sometimes she combines them and calls them THEO. 
• She asks for us a lot. When Jeff leaves the house, she asks periodically "DADDY?" The other day when she was upset and constipated, she asked for me and said "MAAAA!!!"Awesome. I get the poop cries. 

That's all I can think of right now, but I guess it's a list. My little baby, not so little anymore...

From this morning:

 

Play kitchen

For Elsa's 2nd birthday coming up in less than a month (!!), Nonnie wants to get Elsa a play kitchen which she is going to go berserk over. She's already obsessed with making soup, or SSSOUP! as she calls it. She has a little bowl with a ladle and a frying pan with a spatula that she "makes" soup and eggs with. The Mieulis got it for her for Christmas last year and my mom taught her how to play with it and she picked it up right away. I think a play kitchen and food will be hours of fun for her.

So of course I started hunting around the internets for the coolest play kitchen out there. Some are ridiculously expensive (lookin' at you Pottery Barn Kids), others are terrible to look at, some are too simple, and some have way too much going on in them. The one that Sue picked out by Melissa and Doug is super cute, but I'm disappointed there isn't a fridge with it. I think the fridge is kind of key for a play kitchen because you can store all the play food they need in it.

This also is going to either go in Elsa's room or my sewing room/office so it needs to look cute and not be obnoxiously colored. Some of them seriously have like 18 colors on them. I just can't deal. So I think the one I like the best is this one:

KidKraft Vintage Play Kitchen:

It has really good reviews so I think it's quality. I like all the doors on it for Elsa to slam repeatedly, I love that it has a phone on it so she can call Jude and Shalom and Henry while she's cooking, the water dispenser on the fridge cracks me up, but I like that they made it look kind of realistic and not so cutesy poo. 

And look how gender neutral it is! Even boys will want to play with it!

So what do you think Nonnie? It's a little more than the M&D kitchen but we'll split it with you! Or Marmie and Grampa will. :) 

While I was looking at play kitchens, of course I had to go shopping for play food. Etsy has THE CUTEST play food! I feel a new craft obsession coming on... the felt play food is so creative and most seem pretty easy to make. Maybe in my copious amounts of free time I'll make some. Or better yet, I can post pictures and the links here and Elsa's retired crafty grandmother can make it all. :D

Felt Macaroons:

Frozen veggies:

Crochet patterns for amigurumi fruits and vegetables:

Felt avocado (about the same price as a real avocado from Whole Foods):

Felt tea bags, for tea parties!

Cookie dough baking sets:

Felt salad sets:

Felt fruit salad!

Felt pasta:

This is SO Scandinavian. A felt salmon plate set!

Cookware set:

Bakeware set:

This is going to be the BEST BIRTHDAY EVER!! For Elsa I mean, not me. Pssh. 

Daddy's Day

Happy Father's Day to all the wonderful dads out there, especially the two big players in my life!

 

I was remembering the other day the skiing trips to Dodge Ridge that my dad would take my brother and me on. We'd wake up early in the morning, he'd drive us the four hours there, get us all suited and geared up, take us up and down the hills a million times, feed us and make sure we were wearing our sunscreen (no doubt he was remembering the thousand reminders my mom gave him to MAKE SURE THE KIDS WEAR SUNSCREEN!), then stop for pizza on the four hour drive home. Of course we'd ask way too often how long until we got home, but he always came up with a time and more than once we'd pull up to our street at the exact minute he predicted. I thought it was a superpower of his, but my mom thinks he either sped the last hour or took a round about way of getting home to make it at his predicted time. Thinking about it now though, that took real Dad skills to pull off trips like that and not lose it.

Jeff does the same with Elsa, packing up her Kanken and a lunch and her riding backpack, and taking her to Disneyland for the day. Granted it's 30 minutes away and they usually just stay for a few hours and it's the happiest place on earth! But still, it takes Dad skills to pull that off. He's much more brave than I am about taking Elsa on adventures. It's a Dad thing.

 I'm so thankful to have these wonderful dads in my life, love you guys!