Amigurumi Love

We had a lovely, lazy weekend here. Yes, I needed to paint/clean the house. But, instead, I chose to make my little ones some new toys and try my hand at amigurumi. The itch came after these patterns showed up in my inbox. They are egg cozies but I chose to stuff them and finish off the bottom.

After them I was "hooked", (pun intended) and went searching for more sweet little critters to work up. how could I resist this guy?!

I found these on the Lion's Brand site, and they have so many more I can't wait to make.
Now I'm off to do something productive. Happy Monday!

What I'm Loving Today

I am so excited to see this! Kaiya just loves this book and I love reading it to her (I think I may even love reading it more than she does). And the trailer looks amazing. I can't wait!


And this play tent tutorial over on the Sew, Mama, Sew blog.
How fun!

And last but not least, this sweet little game from Mama Roots. Which, I am wishing I had right now. We've been stuck in the house for the past couple of days. Rain, rain, go away......

Happy Thursday, everyone!

Paying it Forward-Handmade Style!

I got this from Alisa. What a sweet idea! Here's how it works; the first three people to leave me a comment on this post, will recieve an item, handmade by me, in the mail within the next three months. One day, out of the blue. What could be better than that?
Only catch is, you must post this on your own blog (which means you do need to have a blog to participate)and give three items yourself. And don't forget to leave me your mailing address, you can contact me by email (in my profile).

Getting Our Hands Dirty

I had abit of help in the garden today.

We've had a streak of excellent weather and the girls are just eating it up. If only I could convince them not to drench my poor flowers. Oh, and we have puppies!

Show and Tell Sunday

This is my new favortite website. I found it the other day while I was searching for a tutorial for making Waldorf inspired dolls. It has so much; how to make different types of slings, dolls, wooden toys, clothes, food!

I am scared to use any type of saw but I think that even I could make these.

I am on a mission to de-plastic my house, right down to (gasp!) the kids toys. Replacing them with with as much handmade as they can possibly stand. I hate plastic toys and like most idealistic new moms, wanted none of it for my kids. Then came birthdays and Christmas and quick trips to the $ stores and now we have plastic coming out the whazoo. Well, I'm not so new new anymore, but I think (or would like to think) that perhaps it's better I got that out of my system. I only wished I would have before we amassed so much junk. Now we are paring down and looking for quality and made with love, not to mention natural materials.

Now the hard part, convincing my girls to "trade in" their plastics......

Why go plastic free?
No More Junk Toys: Rethinking Children's Gifts
Toxic Toy Story
Life Without Plastic

Everyday Fancy

There is never a bad time for shiny red shoes. Even when playing in the dirt with one's cousin.
Here's hoping you have a fun and fancy weekend!

Hello Again

I went to the grocery store late this afternoon. When I got back I was greeted by the sweet scent of wild onions. The girls had been running around outside with Tait while I was gone and had apparently been pulling them up in the yard (hmmmm...perhaps time to break out the mower?). I love this little sign of spring. The trees have already begun to bloom and I started planting the garden last weekend.


Perfect days for going to the park with our new group.


I've started a little spring knitting project as well.

A cotton cardigan, with raglan sleeves, of course. Is there really any other way to go? Who knows, I may even keep this this little ditty for myself.

Snow, Yes, Snow

Yesterday we got a piddeling amount of snow in the afternoon. Zoe chose to stay inside with me but Tait took Kaiya about for just a few minutes. Then, later in the evening it really started coming down good and we woke up to a nice amount to play in. (The yard is so up and down, I won't give you a quote on the inches.)Now, I have been thinking all season that the girls really need some nice, new woolen mittens but, honestly, I didn't think we were going to be getting any real amount of snow at all this year. So, here is the snow and no mittens, because, of course, I want some nice woolen mittens, not icky acrylic, store-bought mittens. And this brings me to this morning, knitting two little pairs of mittens just as fast as my hands would go, as the little ladies were so eager to get outside. Whew! My hands are tired. But they are the proud owners of new woolen mittens, lovingly (and speedily) knit by their mother. Blue for Kaiya (her favorite color), and red for Zoe.
And off we went, sliding and stomping through the snow. And here in NC snow means no school and no work so it was so nice to have hubby home to play with us.

Show and Tell Sunday

Happy Sunday, everyone! This weekend I saw the documentary from Ricki Lake (yes, the talk show host) and director Abby Epstein, 'The Business of Being Born'. This was such a beautiful film, if you are expecting or have any interest in natural birth I highly recommend you watch it. It explores natural and homebirths and the devastating turns that are occuring in "traditional" hospital births. I talked about it a little more in depth on my Natural Family Living blog.

This films does show actual births and can get a little graphic, if this type of thing bothers you. To me it doesn't. I watched it with Kaiya, who is almost 4 and she loved watching the birth scenes. I think it is so important that our daughters see women birthing naturally and without fear as opposed to the way childbirth is typically depicted on mainstream television and movies.
Btw, I know you can tell where my head has been lately. You may not know this about me but natural childbirth and parenting is something I am quite passionate about. But, I promise we will get back to crafting next week.