Felt Dolls

Yesterday in a burst of creativity, I finally made some felt dolls for Ingrid.  I'd seen on mamasmiles and it looked super cute.  Ingrid has the magnetic ones from Melissa and Doug, but I have so many felt scraps that she loves to play with, I thought I really should try to make some of these dolls.

They were a hit!  I drew out a shape onto cardstock paper, along with shapes for pants, shirts, and dresses, and then we used those as templates for the felt.  I made different hairstyles, bows to put in the hair, and we had random scraps that Ingrid used to add to the shirts and dresses.  It was super easy, just took some scissors and a bunch of felt.

 Of course I couldn't just have them sitting around in a ziploc bag, nor could I have Ingrid putting them on another scrap of felt.  I had to make a little carrying case, with a pocket for the clothes, right?  Of course.  So I put two pieces of cardboard in between two pieces of felt.  I'd put on a name tag on the front, then a pocket on the inside first, then I sewed everything up into a little folding book.  Portable and functional! 

 They do not look as fancy as some I've seen on Pinterest, but Ingrid loves them anyway.  She has seriously been playing with them nonstop since I made them yesterday while Otis napped!  And that, my friends, is a thumbs up in my book.

Homeschooling After All

Ingrid is home right now, playing with fabric and her stuffed animals.  We just did puzzles together and read in bed while Otis is napping.  She's not sick, it's not a day off.  We just didn't send her back to school after the holiday break.  I couldn't be happier.

The past month or so has been very trying.  Lots of temper tantrums and crying, lots and lots of yelling on all of our parts.  I felt a real disconnect and was just not happy.  I didn't understand why my daughter was acting out, why our house felt so stressful, why my life felt like nothing was getting done. 

And then we had the holiday break, and after our travels to MI and the kids getting over sickness (more or less) things calmed down.  We had our nice slow mornings of coffee, breakfast, playing, reading, games, and happiness.  Otis' naptime was time for Ingrid and I to spend together, or for her to have rest time and me to get things done.  There was peace in the house, there were so few temper tantrums I've almost forgotten how horrible they were.  Tears are still there sometimes, but only when it's time to eat or rest. 

So when school started back up again, we just decided not to send her back.  Instead, we painted.

And then threw the kids in the bath with some shaving cream to "paint" with.

And did more puzzles.

And went to story time, which Otis LOVED!  He thought singing songs and clapping hands was pretty okay. 

We'll try again in the fall, but if it gets back to being that stressful, forget it.  I used to wonder if I could be a homeschooler, if I had the patience, or could follow through with it, but now I know I can do it if it's what's right for us.

Berry Picking

A neighbor has a few strawberry plants along the sidewalk and has encouraged us to pick ones we see are ripe and look good.  Ingrid has been obsessed with this, and loves to walk by there.  I decided we should go to an actual farm and pick strawberries, ones that I'm pretty sure have never been peed on by a dog.  We met up with friends today and picked nearly four pounds of berries!

Ingrid and Ben had fun running through the plants.  I felt bad at first but after seeing how many other kids were doing the same thing, I'm pretty sure the people at the farm wouldn't allow kids if they weren't expecting a few trampled berries.  Jami and I tried to wrangle the kids to picking the ripest, best looking strawberries, but all Ben wanted to do was pick the green ones (he thought they were golden raspberries!) and Ingrid always picked the muddiest ones, which she would bite once and then throw in the box. 

It didn't take long to fill up our box.  I could've gone on for awhile longer but I knew I'd end up with all these strawberries and not know what to do with them.  Plus we'd just gotten a pound each of blueberries and raspberries, so we have berries coming out the wazoo right now.  Luckily, I have my trusty allrecipes.com to go to and find great recipes to use them all up.

The one I tried today was a berry cobbler.  Yum.

Here's the recipe:

1/4 c. butter, melted in baking pan or pie pan
mix together 1 c. flour, 2tsp baking powder, 3/4 c. sugar, 3/4 c. milk, 1/2 tsp. vanilla, 1/2 tsp cinnamon
Pour batter over melted butter, then add about 3 cups of fresh berries on top.  Do not stir, it bakes over the fruit and gets all golden brown and yummy looking.  Oh, and I topped the fruit with a little brown sugar.  Because I can, and I wanted to!












I'm envisioning some waffles and berries tomorrow for breakfast, and perhaps making some more jam.  Again, yum.  I love summer fruits!

Painting, Picnic, and Puddles.

We got a watercolor book at Target yesterday.  It was funny to watch Ingrid try it.  She's used to regular paints, so watching her figure out how to get the brush wet and then get the paint wet and then try to get the paint on the paper was interesting.  It's so amazing when you can watch their little brains working to unravel a new mystery!  She did well with it, and I like that watercolors seem to be less messy than regular paints. 

After painting we went for another picnic.  This is Ingrid's new favorite thing to do.  We take some snacks and a blanket down to the field, let Cody run around, and enjoy the sun.  The other day I wanted to go home so I stood up and started to take the blanket to fold.  Ingrid yelled at me, "No, Mama!  Lay down!"  I guess she wasn't ready to go home...

Post-picnic was puddle time.  I honestly did not think the puddles would still be there, as it hasn't rained in a few days.  But, down by the lake they hung on.  And Ingrid won't let me bypass them, she has to run straight to them with the look of greatest joy on her face!  I caught a pretty good splash shot here!

Her feet were so gross and dirty when we got home, and I hate to think of what was in that puddle!

In other news, we're packing slowly but surely and should have everything ready to go in a couple weeks.  The first of May cannot come soon enough.  Our 20-something neighbors were having a nice fight all day yesterday, with slamming doors, swear words, and much yelling.  And our other neighbors' washing machine was unbalanced and making the loudest noises above us all day long.  It sucks living in a complex!!    

Great Family Weekend

I got a hyacinth plant a couple days ago after seeing people talk about spring coming to their parts of the world.  I want spring!  But we have snow and ice, so I had to buy my piece of spring.  It smells so good!

Saturday we woke up and decided to get breakfast.  While we were there we remembered the Kiwanis sale was going on, so we checked it out.  It was packed again, and with Ingrid there with us it was kind of crazy.  We found some really good things this week!  We got a Charlie and Lola pop up book that I'm not letting Ingrid touch for a long time.  She ripped something off right away and I got mad.  How stupid is that--what else is a kid going to do with a pop up book??  But this is so cute, I want it to last!

I also got some great vintage fabric.  I sewed some things up tonight with it:

Brendan got an original Trivial Pursuit game, which we realized has the most ridiculous questions...Luckily we have a box of questions from a different version, with questions we could actually answer.  So, game night was on!  We should do that more often.

For Valentine's Day we got Ingrid a balloon at the grocery store.  I was going to pick out a pink or red one, but she demanded a yellow one.  

Then today we ran some errands, painted pictures, and played with Play Dough.  We just spent lots of time together and it felt good.  I like my family.

Numbers and Colors

It's snowing like crazy here today. Brendan wanted me to drive him to work so he wouldn't have to but I declined like the selfish wife I am! I don't want to get in the car with Ingrid today at all. Especially after I heard from my friend who was stuck on the highway for two hours trying to get to my house for a playdate. Apparently there was a bad accident and the highway was closed...People drive like maniacs around here and then can't handle it when they have to go slow for bad weather. Thus, they don't go slow and there are lots of accidents. And I don't drive on bad weather days. Instead we were supposed to have a playdate, but one friend was sick and the other, as mentioned, never made it here. So we baked banana bread, played with blocks, the train set, and crayons. Then I got the paint out. Ingrid was in heaven--she painted lots of pictures and got herself covered in paint. Green in her hair, yellow on her forehead, blue in her ear. It was messy. But fun.


And this sweet video is from yesterday. Yes, Ingrid is wearing a skirt, and no, we did not go out in the snow in a skirt! She changes bottoms about three times a day and this is what she found in her closet. She is constantly amazing Brendan and I by picking up things like numbers. She can count to ten, and the other day I was doing eleven twelve and thirteen. When I said thirteen she said "fourteen?" How on earth did she know that came next??


And that's about it. Brendan's sent out some resumes so hopefully we'll know more about our future soon. Until then, it's the same old same old. Which isn't bad.

A Messy Fun Day!

Today we changed our tunes!  It was a fun day, no crabiness and no yelling at all :)  So much better that way.  I had to clean up the kitchen and wanted to bake some stuff, so I gave Ingrid some stale cereal in a bowl, a wooden spoon, and a measuring cup.  She always has so much fun making a mess and eating it!

Then we made cookies.  I had to let the butter soften, so I scooped everything out ahead of time and it looked so neat and organized.  I pretended I was on a cooking show when we finally made the cookies.  They turned out amazing--whole wheat flour, oatmeal, craisins, raisins, and chocolate chips.  I had a little left of everything so we just threw it all in.  I put lots of cinnamon and cloves and they taste pretty darn good. 

We've been talking about getting a twin bed for Ingrid, getting her out of the crib.  Not sure if we're ready for that but we talked about it.  I took the side of the crib off today and Ingrid climbed up, brought all her stuffed animals, and sat talking and singing all morning.  Forever!  It was great.  She looked so cute having all the stuffed animals talk to each other and making the penguin waddle. 

We got some paintbrushes at Ikea yesterday.  Our friend Jami said her son did better with brushes than finger painting.  I think we can say Ingrid does better with them, too!  She went on for almost an hour painting by herself.  Fingerpainting had lasted ten minutes max.  Yay for cheap paintbrushes!

Little Gymnast

This morning we took Ingrid to a gym that has a toddler play program. Our friends had gone there a few weeks ago and let us know they were going again so we joined them. Ingrid had so much fun! They just have all the soft squishy stuff out for the kids to run and jump on, trampolines and jumping boards, cones and hula hoops and exercise balls.

As soon as Ingrid got her shoes off she went full force the entire hour we were there! She ran from one thing to the other, and of course found the bin of chalk for the uneven bars and had a chalk butt the whole time...She loved the little ramp mats and kept going up and down, up and down.



I just love how liberal Ann Arbor is, because whenever I get around a group of moms and their kids I see breastfeeding toddlers and other cloth diaper users. One woman was a nanny but pregnant for twins and was asking me about Ingrid's cloth diapers and where I got them from, which kind were the best and how do I wash them. It's really nice to have a rational conversation about that instead of people asking me how much poop I get on myself and how smelly they are, how crazy it is to be using them in the first place. Ahhh, liberal oases, may I always live in one :)

Anyway, Ingrid ran the whole hour, ate a snack in the car, I blasted Yo Gabba Gabba music to keep her awake, and then she passed out as soon as we got home. I am off to lounge and read the book I got from the library yesterday--Water for Elephants. So far it's gotten me hooked, we'll see how the rest goes.

The Neverending Weekend.

I am thoroughly enjoying having a four day weekend!  So much has gone on and we still have one more day!  Our Christmas was so much fun, I was all excited just to see Ingrid's face when she woke up and saw her presents under the tree.  She was very into opening presents, but she really wanted to play with everything right away.  We had to remind her there were more to open and she'd have plenty of time to play.  She got her tricycle, which she LOVES, and a baby stroller, and a talking Lola doll, some books, a toy toaster and microwave, a bag of blocks, and a little boat that you wind up in the tub.  I had found tons of stuff shoved up in my closet that I'd gotten way early and then forgotten about until I cleaned my closet three days ago, so she got more than we'd planned on getting her...

After play time and bath time, we headed out to my brother's house.  It was a rainy drive, but Ingrid slept and watched a dvd and we made it in good time.  I have a huge family, three siblings with their spouses and they each have two or three kids.  So the house was filled and Ingrid was a bit intimidated at first.  Then she found the kid's play room in the basement and we didn't see her all afternoon!  I had to chase her down to see if she wanted something to eat.  After a lot of begging by my four year old nephew, it was time to open gifts.  And not a moment too soon--Ingrid got really overwhelmed and tired and wouldn't sit in the same room as the whole family.  She begged for her blankie and wanted to go sit with only me, she was so tired, poor girl.  We quickly opened gifts and then she started saying bye bye to everyone, a good clue that she's had enough...

The ride home took forever, but alas, we made it in one piece.  We all passed out right away, at 9pm!  Long day.  Good thing Christmas is only once a year, it's exhausting.

So today we got to play with all our new toys!!  Ingrid got finger paints and a big roll of paper so we laid out a vinyl tablecloth on the floor and went to town.  I think Ingrid still needs a couple more months of maturity before we try this again, though, as her fingers went from paint to mouth a few times...That kid eats anything.  She didn't seem to into it, I had to keep showing her how to smush the paint around and she just kept giving me this look like "why?" 

Then later we were hanging out and I looked over to see this:

My little acrobat.

And now it's time to rest away the evening and gear up for another day of playing (and picking up) blocks, listening to talking Lola say the same six phrases over and over, and hoping Ingrid doesn't decide to climb any higher than the tricycle.  

I am Such a Copycat!

Another day, and another activity I snagged from Fiona.  I love that Ingrid likes to color, but those damn crayons get EVERYWHERE!!  I'm constantly picking them up, piece by piece since I step on them and break them all the time.  So, when I saw Fiona's post on melting broken bits together to make big crazy crayons, I knew we'd eventually try it.  Today was that day!

First we peeled the crayons, which is harder than it sounds.  My hand cramped up quite a bit, but we managed to get them all peeled. 

Then of course Ingrid dumped all the wrappers and rolled in them.  They stuck to the drool on her chin...

Then we broke the crayons into pieces small enough for the muffin tins.  We lined the tins, put the colors in, and put them in the oven. 

I did 225 degrees for about 15 minutes.  We took them out just before Ingrid's nap and by the time she woke up they were cooled and ready to use.

Ingrid thought they were pretty cool!  They are huge and make cool multi-colored squiggles.  And an added bonus for me:  there are only eight of them to find!  For now, I'm sure they will break and then I'll be right back to square one...But for now, eight huge crayons are much easier to keep track of than 24 little ones.