Achieving Perfection

A Woman's Journey in Life: Motherhood and Parenting, Balancing Life, Crafting, Photographing and much more~

Sep 3

I didn’t sew over my hand! I sewed! Really, I did! Woo-hoo!

by blewis85

Okay so that was kind of a long title. Ha!  Can you tell I’m excited?!?  I sewed!  On a sewing machine!  Me!  :)  :)  :)  It was my 2nd project.  In two days.  My first project?  It took me 8 hours to sew a bib.  A bib!  Ahhh!  8 hours!!  But hey, I used a sewing machine for the 1st time, learned to (kind of) read a pattern, cut out fabric (very badly), use bias tape (again, very badly – and btw, I HATE bias tape.  It is an evil invention.), and sewed it all together into a magnificent bib that my child cannot tear off of her body.  Wanna see?

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Well, it needs some work.  I’ll probably attempt to sew another one next week.  But, it is reversible!  And I like the fabric.  I feel like we need to be belly dancing on a beach somewhere when I see it.  I don’t know why.  And may I say again that I HATE bias tape!  Probably not the best pattern to pick for my first attempt at something.  But it is held together and I’ve been inducted into the sewing world rather harshly.

Anyway, enough about my hatred of bias tape.  I actually think I will avoid it at all costs.  Ha, I immediately drew a pattern for another bib, with similar lines (think: this bib will hold this baby and she will not be able to tear it off her body) that was without bias tape – so we’ll have to see if it works and if I have any pattern drawing capabilities next week, or this week.  Whenever.

Oh, I said I was done ranting about it.  Let me continue.  My second project was a REVERSIBLE dress!  Notice a theme?  I LOVE reversible.  Twice as many uses out of a singular object?  I’m in!  Why don’t adult clothes come with the option of being reversible.  If only we could all dress like we were 4.  Why can’t we?  Maybe when I master sewing a straight line I’ll have to fix that problem.  I might look ridiculous, but I can cross “successfully make a reversible piece of adult clothing” off my bucket list.  Well not my bucket list.  My goal list.  My bucket list is another matter for another post.

So back to what I made: a reversible dress for my baby who is 7 months old.  It’s a little big.  But it’s beautiful.  Most likely it’ll fit her for a very long time because of the way it is made: now as a dress, later on as a shirt.  I’m estimating until she’s at least 2, maybe even a little older.  It’s way cute.  I might even have to make a pair of bloomers to go with it!

So this is the first pattern and the front of the dress (disregard the button holes, I need to fix those).  Then the next picture is the back of the dress.

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Now it’s time for the reverse side!  This is pattern #2 and the front and back of the dress!

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So what do you think?  It’s not perfection, but I think I did pretty darn well for my first attempt at sewing a piece of clothing.  Leaps and bounds better than the bib.  Once I “perfect” it, I’ll offer it for sale in my shop, along with a whole line of clothes, toys and dress up stuff.  Or at least that is the plan.  It’s always been my dream to be able to actually make my sketches.  So if I work hard enough, maybe I can make it happen!

Next week (well, this week, why do I still feel like it is the weekend?) I’m going to tackle making a dress for Peyton. I don’t want her to feel left out.  And I’m super stoked about it!  Yay!

Happy Labor Day!

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Sep 2

Finger Paint!!!

by blewis85

Who doesn’t love a good craft?  Anyone, anyone?  With 2 kids around and a new next door neighbor with 2 kids of there own, our house is in a constant state of “go, go, go”!  How to keep 4 kids busy?  Well 3 kids.  Addison (the baby) is still far to young to participate in any of there “fun”, but she sure loves to watch!

So the other day, the kids wanted to paint.  All of them.  We have this awesome wooden easel that we bought for Peyton for Christmas two years ago from One Step Ahead – similar to this one (http://www.onestepahead.com/catalog/product.jsp?productId=537743&parentCategoryId=85185&categoryId=85231&subCategoryId=117610), but ours is all wood, with a dry erase board on one side, chalkboard on the other, two shelves of storage and a small tray to put your paint, chalk, etc. on.  I think it’s discontinued now.  Oh well, I’m glad we nabbed in when we did!

Well Peyton has a habit of leaving the tops off the paint unscrewed and I have a habit of letting her.  My new motto: Do As I Say, Not As I Do.  I think I wanted her paint to dry up.  Not to be mean, but to have an excuse to try a homemade version.  Well lucky us, it did.  So I went over to handy pinterest and looked at my ever growing roster of crafts on the ole to do list and tada!  How to make paint.  Yes!

When I read it though, I thought I was making actual paint, not finger paint, so I was a tad bit disappointed, but it worked well for our purposes.  I wish I would’ve taken pictures – but if you search “finger paint” on pinterest, you will come across this picture, which I think leads to a blog with more recipes!

So I gave each kid a bowl with all the ingredients which I let them scoop out and mix themselves (ingredients and instructions are on the picture) and I put it on the stove and let it get to the desired consistency.  And my massive collection of saved baby food jars came in handy.  Each recipe filled like 4 baby food jars and I did 3 colors (1 per recipe) so we ended up with 12 jars of finger paint!!

The kids loved it.  It’s all homemade, non-toxic, from kitchen cupboard ingredients.  They got messy.  Real messy.  I wish I had a picture!  They had it all over them, the table and a load of paper.  I think the consistency of it was the most fun for them.  It kind of comes out a little like gelatin, think “jello”, but a little less solid.  But it’s fun to mush around in your fingers and rub on the paper.  And the best part: it was free (minus a few kitchen ingredients) and it cleans up easily AND it was easy fun!

I will caution one thing though.  If you make a bunch like I did and don’t use it all at once, then store the extra in the fridge.  We left ours on the counter for a few weeks and I noticed a few jars had started to mold.  It makes sense but it hadn’t even crossed my mind before that.  It is made out of “food”.

Once Addison gets a little bigger, I’ll even let her participate in this craft.  It might taste bad, but it won’t harm her if she gets any in her mouth.  Ha!  And she can squish and splat until her little heart desires.  :)

I think I may have to whip up another batch…pictures next time, promise.  :)

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Feb 28

Monster Tissue Box!

by blewis85

This weekend, I found an empty tissue box hidden behind a table at my parent’s house.  I was about to throw it in the trash and for some reason, I find it very difficult to throw anything away.  I’m all about reusing and up-cycling as much as possible.  So, instead, I decided to allow Peyton to make a “monster box”.  I covered the box in copy paper (all my parents had in the house) and cut out some teeth from paper and taped it to the inside of the box.  They don’t have any “craft” stuff, so we used what we had on hand.  Then I let her and her Nana have fun coloring it.  What a wonderful Sunday afternoon craft!

Ours isn’t as “pretty” as some of the other ones I’ve found out there, but I think my 3 year old did a pretty good job!  :)

Here is ours:

And I found some links via pinterest that led to some other “monster box” creations out there.  Take a look around.  Enjoy!

http://gigglesgalorenmore.blogspot.com/2011/08/tattle-monster.html
http://adaywithlilmama.blogspot.com/2011/05/monster-first-birthday-party.html
http://honeybeebooksblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/tissue-box-monsters.html
http://funfamilycrafts.com/tissue-box-tattle-monster/

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Feb 27

BEST Playdough EVER!

by blewis85

So I have FINALLY found a play dough recipe that is absolutely amazing.  Really.  Seriously.  Better than the store bought stuff and better than any other homemade recipe I’ve ever tried.  I’m so excited about having discovered this recipe and I can’t wait to share this with you.  So try it, for sure!!

Ingredients:

1 Cup Flour

1 Cup Water

1/4 Cup Salt

2 Tsp Cream of Tartar

1 Tbsp Vegetable oil

Food Coloring (about 4 drops – however much you want to get the desired color)

Instructions:

Mix all the ingredients in a pot.  Put the pot on the stove and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until it firms into a ball.  (Note = it took a while for it to do this.  I almost added some more flour and I’m glad I waited.  It formed into a ball after about 15 minutes of pretty continuous stirring).  As soon as it joins into one big glob, take it off the heat and dump out onto the counter (or wax paper or a cookie sheet – just whatever you have).  Wait for it to cool and then knead it a few times until it is nice and soft.  I started kneading it after about 5 minutes off the heat and it turned into a really soft, perfect play dough consistency.

See?  Perfect purple play dough!

Make sure to keep the play dough in an airtight container.  I’ve been using a freezer ziploc bag and it’s worked great.

Peyton has been playing with this play dough all weekend.  For Christmas, she received a “clay center with play-doh” kit and she has been making shapes and creating all sorts of fun stuff.  Seriously, hours and hours of fun!  Here is a link to the kit: http://www.cptoy.com/cgi-bin/pf.sh/2.0/product.htm?pf_id=CPX-555L.

If you have any questions, let me know.  This is really amazing play dough and my daughter can’t get enough play time with it.  It’s already lasted over a week and as long as you keep it in an airtight container so it doesn’t dry out, I’m sure it’ll last quite a while.

Happy playing!

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Feb 25

Salt Dough Hand/Foot Prints!

by blewis85

Yesterday we finished making the salt dough hand and foot prints we had started on the night before.  I had been looking for a kit to do hand and foot prints for Addison, but they were all pricey.  I remembered back to when Peyton was an infant and the kit that I was given then was pretty terrible.

So as an avid do-it-yourself person, I decided that I could come up with something on my own that would not only be inexpensive, but be fun and easy to do with my girls.  Then I flipped through my idea book and glanced on pinterest for something to spark my creative eye and realized that salt dough was an easy solution to my problem.

So how do you make salt dough?  The recipe for salt dough is:

2 cups flour

1 cup salt (I’d recommend table salt)

Cold Water (start with 1/2 cup)

Instructions:

Mix your ingredients together until it has the consistency of play dough.  I started with a 1/2 cup of water and probably added in less than 1/4 cup more.  Then, I added a significant amount of flour in addition to the 2 cups called for in the recipe.  The salt dough will be sticky at first, so you need to add in enough flour to make it like play dough and to get rid of the stickiness.

Then roll out your salt dough on a cookie sheet.

Since I was making hand and foot prints, I wanted my salt dough in circle shapes.  So I used a small plate to get the right size of the circles I wanted and then a pizza cutter to cut the shapes out.

 

Once it’s cut out in the right shape, make your hand and/or foot prints in the salt dough.  If you plan on hanging it like an ornament, use a straw to puncture a hole in your salt dough at the top.  (Disregard the coloring that you see – I had food coloring on my hands when I started this project.  It wasn’t a problem since I was planning on painting the finished product anyway.  Also, the specks that you see are from the salt.  When we made this batch of salt dough, all I had on hand was sea salt, not table salt.  It works the same and doesn’t make a difference as long as you paint it.  If you are not planning on painting it, then be sure to use regular table salt).

Once you have made the hand and/or foot prints in the salt dough, leave the salt dough on the cookie sheet and place it in the oven.  Bake it at 250 degrees for at least 2 hours.

When your salt dough comes out of the oven, make sure it has a hard, rock-like feel.  It needs to be completely cooked through.  Once it cools, you can paint it.  Our daughter had a lot of fun helping painting these creations!

Here are closeups of our finished products:

After you are done painting, make sure to seal the finished product.  You could use a sealer or even mod podge.  Seal both sides and it should help your creation from ever falling apart.

If you have any questions, let me know.  Has anyone out there ever done anything with salt dough before?  If not, it is super easy and you can make absolutely anything out of it.  Simply mix up the ingredients, create, bake and paint!  Ta-dah!  Easy crafts for kids (and adults) of all ages.  Happy crafting!

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Feb 24

Bathtub Paint!

by blewis85

So today as an incentive/surprise for my daughter to get in the bathtub, I made bathtub “paint”.  I had purchased bathtub paint for her in the past and it was runny and not up to my standards as far as child-friendly products go.  And it didn’t last long.

So….as a surprise to her….ta-dah!  Easy bathtub “paint”.

 

I bought a can of shaving cream for sensitive skin.  I sprayed some shaving cream in a six section cupcake pan and then I added a drop or two of food coloring to each section.  Easy, right?  It works really well.  It spreads nicely on the bathtub and on my daughter.  :)

Here is a picture of the final product and of the ingredients I used:

 

 

 

I think any kind of shaving cream would work.  I chose to use Gillette Foaming shaving cream for sensitive skin as to prevent any possible skin irritation with my daughter.  And I used the food coloring I had on hand.  Use whatever you have – it all works well with the foaming shaving cream.

I would have posted a picture of my daughter, but seeing as she is 3 now, I thought posting a bathtub picture might be inappropriate.  Ah, they grow up so fast!  Happy bath tub!

If you decide to try this out, let me know what you think and how it works for you!

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Feb 19

Make an Instrument?

by blewis85

My daughter is enrolled in a local Kindermusik class.  It’s wonderful and she’s been doing it basically since birth.  (For more info on Kindermusik, check out there website: http://www.kindermusik.com/about/).  Thursday night, in class, they left for the first time with “homework”.  They have to create an instrument to bring to class next week.  Hmmmm….

Sounds like a fun challenge for Mrs. Mom and Peyton to tackle together!  I’m sure we’ll make several instruments together this week, but we started tonight with 2 simple instruments that took less than 15 minutes to make.

First, we gathered an old coffee can, put some raw rice in it, then mod podged the entire can with pretty scrapbook paper.  We talked about the sounds the rice made in the metal can and came up with a name for it.  It almost sounded like rain.  Peyton named this particular instrument the Spinning Wheel Instrument – she’s on a Sleeping Beauty kick, if you don’t get the reference.

Then we made a second instrument from an old glass alfredo jar I had just cleaned.  We mod podged a little bit of pretty paper on it and added some raw pinto beans.  Peyton named this her Animal Instrument.  I guess to her it sounded like an animal sound.

So this week, our goal is to listen for sounds and try to understand how different sounds are created.  Why does rice in a coffee can sound different than in a glass jar?  How does drumming on a pan sound different than drumming on a plastic container?  Try collecting a few toilet paper rolls and adding different things into each container and covering the ends.  For example, add beans in one, rice in another and maybe sand or rocks in the third container.  You can cover the ends with construction paper and a rubber band or foil and a rubber band.

For toddlers, everything you encounter is a time and a chance to learn.  Take this opportunity to use household items to start teaching your little one about different sounds and how to make them on their own.  Have a fun week!

 

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Feb 8

Homemade Brown Sugar Body Scrub

by blewis85

I made a few homemade items (actually dozens) as Christmas presents this year.  I have since had rave reviews about my Brown Sugar Body Scrub.  I gave them to friends and family.  I even gave some to acquaintances, just for the heck of it.  I was definitely in the Christmas spirit this year!  Ah, how I can’t wait for the holidays to come back around.  The Christmas lights and the tree.  I could stare at those lights forever.  And I digress…

Since Valentine’s Day is coming up next week, I thought I’d share one of my recipes.  No worries, more are to follow.  :)  They’d make a great gift for Moms, Daughters, Sisters, Teachers….get my point?  I haven’t met a single person who hasn’t loved and more importantly, used them, yet.

So let me get started.  The Brown Sugar Body Scrub.  This recipe is very versatile, simple and easy.

What you need:

A bowl

Spoon to mix

Jars (I used 4 ounce Mason Jars, but you can use any style and size)

Brown Sugar

Honey

Oil (EVOO or another oil of your choosing)

The basic recipe is:

1 cup brown sugar

2 tablespoons honey

1/3 cup EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)**

I’ve used sunflower oil instead of the EVOO and it has turned out great too. Sometimes the smell of EVOO can be overpowering, so in some instances, depending on the recipe, I’ve substituted sunflower oil so it doesn’t have as harsh a scent.  In this recipe, the brown sugar and honey calm the EVOO scent down, so it meshes nicely.

Instructions:

1.  In a bowl, add the 1 cup of brown sugar and the 2 tablespoons of honey.

2.  Add in the oil SLOWLY!  This is important: mix with your hands as you add the oil in.  I usually do not use the entire 1/3 cup. Keep adding the oil in and mix until you get the desired scrub consistency.

3.  Dab a little bit of the mixture on your hands, rub in and then wash your hands.  If it has the right scrub “feel”, then you are finished.  If not, either add in more oil or more brown sugar, depending on what it needs.

4.  Spoon the mixture into your nicely decorated jars.  Ta-da!  Now you have a nice, homemade gift that your recipient is sure to love!

Do you need to know how to decorate your jars?  Decorating a jar can be as simple or as complicated as you make it.  Keep your eyes open for a how-to simply decorate a glass jar in the next few days!

If you decide to try the recipe, let me know what you think.  I’d love your opinions!  Happy Valentine’s Day!

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Dec 1

Peyton’s 3rd Princess Birthday Party!

by blewis85

So we had Peyton’s birthday party a few weeks ago – my little darling turned 3!  We had a princess birthday party in our backyard and a few of her friends from school and church came over.  As a pinterest inspired addict, I made SOOOO many of the decorations and gift bags for the kiddos.  Here is a slide show of the party!

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We made the pom pom balls decor out of tissue paper and hung them from a string in our backyard.  I made swords for the little boys and wands for the little girls.  Also, each guest received a crayon roll up pack in there gift bag.  :) Anyone interested in how-to instructions?

Great party overall!  Looking forward to planning another one for next year!

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Dec 1

Play dough!

by blewis85

So I have been addicted to pinterest – and who hasn’t that has actually used it and given it a chance?  I have done so many crafts that were inspired by pinterest and have many more on my to do list.  Something I did tonight was make play dough for my daughter’s school.  We signed up at the beginning of the year – one parent signs up to bring a new batch of a different color each month – and we signed up to bring green, homemade play dough.  The school gave us a recipe which I used and well, it didn’t work very well. It’s usable but I’m not sure for how long.  :(  It’s kind of sticky even though I added a BUNCH more flour.  So I’ve hit pinterest and found a few more recipes.  I’m going to stock up on supplies tomorrow – flour, salt and kool aid (possibly food coloring too) and make up some new batches to see how they turn out.  Hoping it all goes well!  If it works this time, I’ll post pictures and how-to steps!

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