I worked at a baby fair today promoting breastfeeding for the hospital I work at.  I love promoting breastfeeding, sharing what I know, answering questions and soothing worried soon-to-be mamas.

I made these little flower brooches for me and the other lactation nurse to wear. They are made out of long strips of fabric, a bit of fancy yarn, paper and some stickers we had in the office.I used my cool little flower loom to make them. I really want to make more. They are really quite fun.  Maybe next time with some buttons in the middle instead.

oh, and the little book is by Amy Spangler. It’s one we give out for basic info on breastfeeding.  I love that squishy little baby face on the cover and had to get it in the pic.

front

I made this bag for my hubby so that he could carry his bike gear when he goes riding. He’ll sometimes have to drive a bit before he can get somewhere to ride. This helps keep all his stuff together, which he likes.

back

I love, love, love this fabric–don’t you? I just couldn’t resist it when I saw it.  The colors are just too perfect for my guy.  He’s been using my eggplant tote, which just isn’t his style.

There are two pockets inside and two on the outside. One of them for his water bottle.  I think he could probably use another water bottle pocket. I might try to add that on later.

We are back from our weekend getaway. It was so so much fun. The weather was perfect and we ate ourselves silly. We just had such a great time being together. Bike riding, walking around different parts of town, a movie, some dinner and wine–things we don’t normally get to do. We even made it to a craft supply shop that I really liked and of course that was really fun.

I made those two little felt owls above, for my two little fellows, before we left on our trip. We sure did miss those boys. We’d often find ourselves saying, “oh, the boys would love this” or “I wonder the the boys are doing right now”.  But, they had a great time with their grandparents and cousins. I think we should make this an annual thing, don’t you?

I had to share this funny picture of my guys.  It totally cracks me up. They wanted me to take a picture of their lego creation (a constant around here) and we chanced upon this funny head eating lego creature. Now we are on a mission to do more trick photography.  We tried a few in Oregon that I will share later.

I’ve also been working on a project that involves a bit of embroidery.  A nice meditative project to do after a busy vacation.

I’ve been whipping up a few beauty concoctions that I thought I’d share.

* The Queen of Hungary’s Water. A blend of soothing herbs made into an astringent for your face. I use it after I clean my face. It is very refreshing and smells lovely. The recipe is from this AWESOME book.

* Homemade deodorant ~ Amy’s recipe.  This is my 4th batch. Each one lasts about 6 months.

* Magic tooth cleansing solution. Also Amy’s recipe from her last mailorder issue. It’s not bad.  It took a little bit of getting used to, but now I almost prefer it.

***Hair Update*** It’s been 2 months now since I last used shampoo in my hair.  I’m just using the baking soda and water rinse and it is STILL magically working. I really can’t believe it. With the hot weather and me exercising almost daily, I’ve been having to rinse a little more frequently, but that’s okay.

And check out our pretty little tomatoes. We’ve been happily eating a little handfuls every other day or so. My inverted tomato plant is just HUGE!

Only 2 days of school left.  What am I going to do all summer, stuck in the house because of the heat, with two active little boys?  Wish me luck, or even better, send some ideas my way!

We just finished E’s teacher gifts. He has one teacher and an assistant which helps out in his montesorri classroom.  They are both awesome and we are so lucky to have spent time with them this year.

We painted little clay pots with chalkboard paint and inside we put a packet of basil seeds with a special note stuck onto it that reads, “Thanks for helping me grow”. Then we put in a felt flower and felt leaf topped pen, a couple more pens, some chalk (to write on the pot with), a painted rock bug and a chocolate bar.

Once these next two days are over, that means my guy will be a 4th grader!! Can you believe it? I sure can’t.

What’s on the table besides food?

I wanted to fancy up the table a bit since my roses stopped blooming. I really do miss having them on my table for the last 4 weeks. Rocky is missing his rose petal salads too. So, I had to make some paper ones, at least for the color.  I made them from a Martha Stewart video. They were fun to make while watching play-it-now movies on Netflix.

After I made them, I needed vases to put them in so I spray painted some bottles from the recycle bin. I followed Blaire’s advice for the painting.

Well then, I couldn’t just place the bottles (now vases) on  a plain, bare table, now could I?   So, then I had to paint a table runner. I have a huge roll of primed canvas that I cut, hemmed and painted (copying my pillow design). Then I sealed it with a few coats of matte gel medium.

Now if we (I) could learn to keep the table cleared and clean.

When we moved in this house, almost 3 years ago, there was an old bird bath in the yard. Concrete, painted white with a squirrel, it’s not something I would have picked out, but we would clean it and put water in it frequently for the birds.

Over the weekend we bought some native flower and grass seed mix for Rocky and spent a good amount of time pulling weeds, trimming the roses and looking at this awful bird bath.  Then I got to thinking about changing it.  I didn’t like it already so what was the worst that could happen.

I cleaned it and got out my crafting acrylic paints, probably not the best paint for an outdoor piece, but it didn’t matter.  First I was just going to paint yellow petals on the bowl, but then I got out the green, the red, the blue and well, I just got a little carried away. Then, the hubby suggested that I make the squirrel into a lizard. I scoffed and said that it couldn’t be done.  Then he chipped away the squirrel’s ears, making it look a little more lizard like which gave me no other choice then to go with it.

I think it’s fun and colorful, the kids love it, the birds love it and our back yard is better for it.  It goes nicely with the rose blooms and hopefully soon, some native grass and flowers.

My last class at artfest was with Misty Mawn.

I am so incredibly grateful to have been able to get into her class. I’ve admired her work for so long. Initially, I signed up for her as first choice for all three days and didn’t get into any of them. So I asked to be on a waiting list, which put my other classes in limbo.  Just two weeks prior to Artfest, I found out that I would finally be in her class.

I learned so much in this class. Misty is amazing. She can pull something together so easily, and her many different techniques are ones that I can definitely apply to my own work–things that made me go, “ahhhh!”.  I watched with complete awe and wonder, and was extremely inspired and refreshed.

We worked on collage and then used different techniques to paint and alter.  I really enjoyed playing with my paints this way…so freeing.

Sorry this picture is so fuzzy, but you get the idea.  I am still working on these at home.  I worked on them a bit today and still want to do more. I will show them when they are all done.

And am I a dork or what?  Just had to grab my chance.

Onto workshop no. 2 of Artfest 2010…

My second class was with Catherine Witherell making precious metal clay (pmc) pieces and earrings. Catherine is extremely talented and passionate about the precious metal clay process.

Since I am newly again wearing earrings (no more young babes pulling on them), I had to do this class.  It was really fun, but a little harder than I expected.  I had no idea how many steps were in the process of using pmc.

I was able to make 8 pairs of earrings and one pendant out of the teeny 25 grams of clay.  I made sure to use every little bit.  We used stamps to make the impressions onto the clay, cut out shapes, then carefully sanded the edges to make them smooth. The drying time of the clay was quicker than I had imagined and it was a little difficult for me to get an even pressure with the stamps.  Didn’t matter though, since I’ll be the one wearing them and I don’t care!

Because we were running late, we just barely got our pieces out of the kiln before class time was over. So, I wasn’t able to make any earrings out of my pieces.  Fortunately for me, the lovely Tally O. came to  my rescue making me some earring wires with my supplies.  Awesome!

I spent today, finishing up my earrings adding beads and wire and now I have eight lovely new pair plus a little bird pendant that needs a necklace.  I probably won’t go out and buy a kiln (though I’m tempted), but I sure did enjoy the process and truly appreciate those amazing jewelry artists out there.