I made my first apron to bring to out neighborhood holiday auction for charity and this is an apron to match for a little girl. Loved the first one so much.

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we spend so much time at the library and on-line looking for new books. as i have mentioned before we love to read. lately we have been looking at books to help us find new things to create and some of our favorite books from the past. here are a few.

joseph had a little overcoat by simms tabak

our dear friends gave this book to helen for her 2nd or 3rd birthday. it has beautiful, colorful illustrations that make you want to find all the colored pencils and print intensive magazines and collage all day. the story also reminds to continue to reuse...one of my favorite lessons to share.

the quiltmaker's gift by jeff brumbeau and gail de marcken

also a christmas gift when she was very small. this book has beautiful illustrations a great story of a woman who makes the most beautiful quilts for those in need and how a king in his desire for the one possession that he cannot acquire learns where true happiness comes from.

the paper princess by elisa kleven

we found this book at the library it was our first introduction to elisa kleven. we have given this book for countless gifts. we love the illustrations and collage. the story is very sweet to. a girl creates a doll out of paper and it flies away and the paper princess tries through her adventures to return to the girl who created her.

the apple doll also by elisa kleven

story about a little girl who makes a doll out of an apple to come with her on her first day of school. the kids at school make fun of her, but in the end they all learn how to make the doll. very sweet story. directions to make the doll included.

the wheat doll by alison l. randall ; illustrated by bill farnsworth

we found this book at the library. sweet story about a pioneer girl that loses her best friend, a doll made from wheat in a storm. the mud near where she lost the doll begins to sprout wheat, she cares for the wheat and makes another doll. we read this over the summer and plan to use some of the cedar chip stash that we have from the addition to make a doll. we have also been wanting to make some sachets for valentine's day (given that the moth's think my sweaters are the tastiest in the house) the cedar just smells so yummy and looks so pretty most of it was from the plainer so it is shaved post to follow soon.

plaidypus lost by janet stevens and susan stevens crummel

this is one of those books that we read endlessly when helen was very small and i did not mind. the cadence still continues in my head whenever i hear platypus. this story was one of the reasons that i really wanted to take the create a character class from marisa haedike creator of creative thursday last year at the squam art workshop. we have wanted to create a sweet "plaidpus" from a few of the many plaid shirts that belonged to my father-in-law who helen sadly never had the chance to meet, but shares a birthday with.

mirabelle by astrid lindgren and pija lindenbaum

i feel so redundant but here is another great book about doll, this one grows from a seed (scary that the seed came to the little girl from a stranger when her parents were not home, i have always altered this while reading the book).

quick crochet huge hooks by sally harding - i have been taking this book out of the library every few months for over a year; i really want to make the rag rug out of fulled (the word used for repurposed wool sweaters that have been "felted" per my class at squam last year with the amazing betz white). i have been putting off the rug because i wanted to make it round and i was having trouble finding a book with good instructions on how to crochet in the round...i think that i finally found a few...details in another post. i decided to try to just crochet a rectangle or square rug for the first try.

a few cooking books too.

sweet pea loves her historic american girl dolls...i try not to do things that are typically so commercially driven, but i have found these dolls have much to offer in peaking greater interest in handmade and history. we now have molly from 1944 and kirsten from 1854, she is also fond of felicity from 1774. we have been getting many books from the library and the bookstore on these three characters. the most fun i think are the cookbooks, they offer recipes and history of how these girls would have cooked, what they would have cooked and how the family would share in the meal together.

last week we made a recipe from felicity's cookbook: a peek at dining in the past with meals you can cook today (american girls pastimes) we made almond tarts. it was fun to make, we both think that the recipe would be better with almond paste instead of the chopped almonds. also overload on the butter and i am typically with julia child when it comes to butter.

for christmas helen received molly's cooking studio. i think that we are going to try the applesauce cupcakes, the victory garden soup and the nut and raisin bread which seems similar to a recipe that my mother made at christmas time when i was a kid. she backed them in coffee cans then wrapped them in colored cellophane. i just always remembered how tasty they were and how pretty they looked.

she also received salad people by mollie katzen for her birthday and we did not have a kitchen at the time and now we do so we need to start some recipes from there. we have tried the recipe for chewy energy circles a few years ago when she took a food science course. they are quite yummy.

sun bread another book by elisa kleven i think that santa brought this book a year ago, but we did not have an oven, there were many gray days last winter when i thought a little sunshine bread would brighten up our day...we will be trying this on the next gray day. recipe for bread included.

one last book for today is everything on a waffle by polly horvath.

this is about a girl named primrose whose parents are lost at sea and everyone thinks that they have perished but primrose is certain they are trying to return to her. she befriends a women who owns the local restaurant called the girl in the swing (is that the greatest name for a restaurant) and she serves all of her meals on a waffle. very fun story with recipes interspersed in the story.

soulemama had a great post a few days ago about books her family loves to read in the winter, i am going to be spending some time looking them up tonight and i am sure having some that i cannot find at my library transferred over.

why is't that night time seems to be when i feel most creative? i'd think the sunshine and the light that i love so much would bring more inspiration to me...i am guessing it's because i'm not feeling the pressure of the time constraints and family obligations (which i love).

maybe it's just the wine and lack of sleep because i'm now on the late night create spiral. hoping good things are coming out of it.

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i have been wanting to do this daily blog for over a year.

everyday i plan to post and go through the day planning each post to the point of taking the photos and writing the post in my head.

i came to a realization the other day after getting upset with myself once again. i had promised myself that in the new year that i would do a post every day. needless to say this is not happening.

here is the realization:

i have a fear that i will fail...i know that many people have this fear. i have just let it win. i can accomplish goals if i think that something is not permanent, or out there to be judged on a grand scale. i have been like this for as long as i can remember. i am committing to this as the beginning of the end of the fear. i promise myself to move forward and to stop wasting time with fear...to push on and make mistakes! i have put it out there. let's see if that does it.

thank you to all who inspire, support and have patience with me. i hope to have today be the beginning of a new adventure.

SQUAM Art Workshop is online today. what an amazing offering this year. 5 options...how to choose? i had such an amazing time last year and met so many creative, warm and nurturing women. i can't wait to return this year.

i have been wanting to make an apron for a very long time. i wear them a lot, but have had other priorities since i learned to sew.

i'm going to an auction tomorrow night and needed to bring something to auction. so i thought this was the perfect excuse to try.

this apron is made from re-purposed fabric. the base is a sheet, the bottom embellishment is a curtain valance, the waistband is the top of the fabric that holds the rod from the valance, the pockets are fabric samples from a design center, the rick rack i did purchase last year, just because i've always loved rick-rack. my grandmother used it often when she made us clothes. rick-rack and that ball fringe reminds me so much of the 70's as does this apron, the colors and the fringe.

sorry the picture is so dark. i couldn't wait to upload it. helen would like to model it again tomorrow when it is lighter out.

my niece taught my daughter how to finger knit when she arrived for thanksgiving, then they could not travel without yarn all weekend. they were so cute, we went to see their cousin in a christmas story playing at Geva Theater they knit through the whole show. laughing and knitting. love this. we had a really great weekend. wonderful food and company.

It looked like we should rake this morning but it was so beautiful and what is Halloween without leaves to slosh through?

We had a really great day. We decided with all that we have been doing on the house that we should take the day off right after we took a trip to historic house parts annual tent sale. Sweetpea did not want to join us but that was the plan. In the end we did not get anything big for the house, we did find twist locks for the spice cupboards. Yippee!

But the real winner was helen. i have been casually looking for a manual typewriter for her for a while now and we found one there. she was beside herself. we came home and she typed her little heart out. daddy was very excited too. he spent a long time online trying to figure out what type it was and looking to order some fresh typewriter ribbon for her. so it is a royal 10 he thinks from 1935. we all love it whatever it is!

we also had not been to the movies in ages. we decided to surprise our girl so we blindfolded her and put her in the car. she kept peaking with just the bandanna on so i had to put my scarf over that too. this was fun. we took her to our favorite local independent theater, the little to see where the wild things are. i am sure that many of you have also heard that maybe not the best movie for smaller children. there were some intensely emotional scenes and some frightening scenes and some very sad scenes too. we all really enjoyed it. we think also not so great for younger kids we did have some discussions with our daughter after the movie to talk about all the emotional issues. i think she understood some and not others. i think that maybe she could relate to many of the emotions too. this was a very well done movie. i can't stop thinking about it 3 days later.

so this day did not seem to want to end. we had our neighborhood halloween parade then mexican buffet at our friends then finally trick or treating.

it was such a beautiful night here. it was a little crisp, clear and still. the moon was just perfect too. hope that you enjoy your day as much as we did.

here is our hermoine granger.

My mother and step father left after a nice visit. It is so hard to see them go. We all enjoy there company, how mom makes every meal so special and sweetpea loved playing peter pan with them in the morning, even if it was just oncce this time. They also really helped keep the house in order and also helped with a few projects.

I have been getting a good deal of painting and other projects done around the house. I am really enjoying the process and the progress. Looking forward to the time when I have more time with my sweetpea, to create and to work on posting to the blog and sales. For now I am working on spending more time with my daughter and enjoying the transformation of the house

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I had an appointment with my oncologist on Tuesday. She said that everything looked great. This is the first I had seen her since my new gyn told me that he thought I had started menopause. We talked about how sad I was that we were not going to have any new additions to our family. It just seems so surreal sometimes.

It has been 3 years now since I first met her. I had been six months out from the completion of the chemo and radiation and she was telling me that I needed to delay pregnancy 1 more year to do another round of drugs to prevent reoccurence. I have been holding on pretty well lately, but tonight for some reason I am feeling really sad and cheated. I know that I couldn't be luckier than to have a dream sunshine like I do, but I always planned to have a sibling for her. We have been sharing a twin bed for the last few weeks of the remodel and I guess all of this snuggling has brought me back to all her time in bed with us when she was a baby. I don't know how I am going to get her back in her own bed. I am just enjoying her warmth and closeness so much. I guess the fact that when she is awake she is so independent, but when she is asleep she is so clingy. That is so sweet. Sent from my iPhone