What I Did On My Summer Vacation.

While we spent half the summer here in Los Angeles - doing those L.A. summer things (beach, camp, beach, swimming lessons, beach), we spent the other half at the cottage up in British Columbia.

Our favourite activity is always beachcombing - and the beaches of "our island" are ripe for this sort of thing. As we continued to collect rocks, driftwood and shells we pondered what we would do with it all. We started with jewellery. And windchimes. Then settled on mobiles.



The challenge of balance and movement added to the activity. And I am quite pleased with how they turned out.



The process wasn't complicated. We drilled holes in the wood, and shells at the positions we wanted things to hang. (The big kid loved this.) We then tied hemp twine onto the wood, hung the piece from a hook, and worked attaching shells to obtain the desired weight distribution for the mobile to work. We needed some extra weight on one side so added a rock, wrapping it in twine to attach. Balance and Motion. (Ahh! Science!)



We liked it so much, we made another to bring back to Cali - a reminder of wonderful summer days gone by, but not forgotten!

Rainy-Day Salt Dough

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup salt
about 1/3 cup water (to desired texture)
a tsp or so of vegetable oil

Mix

Play

(You may add food colouring if desired. Or we bake for 4 hours at 250F then paint. Unused dough may be stored in an airtight container / plastic bag for a couple of days.)

Carded

Lots of other great handmade Valentine's appearing...

Love these by over at all buttoned up with the pretty fabric hearts.



And a riff on the same at uniform studio - this time using paper hearts.




more inspiration to be found
purlbee
angry chicken

happy heart day

We are falling for the old stand-by again this year.



Crayon hearts. Wrapped up in brown-wax paper bags with doily closures a la little birds

Crayons based on the instructions over at MSL

make it new

I have been very inspired for a little creative redo as of late.

Loving this dress refashioned from a button-down shirt by cathy (from a tutorial she found via moki and her school of craft, originally on crafster)





(another shot here)

and this skirt



by melissa of all buttoned up.

It feels like time to spring-clean our closests and outfit the girls for summer at the same time!

"A Simple, Un-padded Tube-Style Sling"

Both my girls spent a lot of time in the now ubiquitous New Native Baby Carrier. They both seemed to find comfort in its snuggness, and it didn't give me the mastitis side-effect that I suffered when wearing a front carrier.

I noticed lately quite a few slings being made by crafty moms, and was led to this pattern on the web by Fanja's beautiful interpretation.



You can check out Fanja's other creations, and find a link to purchasing her work by visting her blog Le Train Fantome.

Bottled Up

With all the concern over plastics I love the idea of a return to glass baby bottles. Melissa over at all buttoned up had these ready for her little one's arrival. So good! {Would be a great shower gift too...}

Lunch-A-Go-Go

This was my big gift giving push last holiday. I made lunch bags for each of my neices, nephew,and friends' littles and partnered them with a cute Sigg water bottle ($15 and up at reusablebags.com) You can find how to make your own, and other lunch bag ideas here along with other great gift ideas as part of Sew, Mama, Sew!'s Handmade Holidays: 30 Days of Gifts to Sew.

Building.Blocks

By gochi at chigo

{I first spotted these over at hoping for happy accidents - then a beautiful "did-it-themselves" version at ~~ . they are now on my d.i.y. holiday gift giving list.}