Quiet Book #3

Are you getting tired of my quiet book pages yet? I've got bad news, I'm only half way done!

Here are 4 more pages. The first I came up with on my own, the 2nd I found the idea for somewhere in blogland, and the last 2 are pretty standard.



The buttons are strung on sparkly rubber "string," and slide back and forth as you count them.

 Velcro the shapes.

The flowers snap on and off, and the cloud and sun button on. The grass serves as a pocket.

I partied at 

Thrifty Finds

Look at the goodies I found at the thrift store yesterday!

Brand new notions, still in the package, and alphabet stencils! Each of these were between 35-99 cents. Yay for 50% off!

I found this leather bag for $3. It's not my style, but I have a project in mind for it coming soon.

This is my favorite find of the day. A Haiku By Sharon Eisenhauer City Satchel Bag for $3! It is in nearly new condition, the only flaw being this:

a missing zipper pull. It came with a twist tie pull, but I "upgraded" to this matching paper clip.

This same bag is sold on Zappos.com for $75! Holy Moly! That's a $72 zipper pull! Score!

Kindle and Case

What do all electronic books need? An accompanying home to protect it from crushing textbooks, pens, and whatever else floats around that bag of his. Enter part 2 of my husband's Annivers-itines Day gift.

From the outside it looks like any other boring money management book that lost its dust cover (or is it called a dust jacket?)

But on the inside- a secret kindle case!

It does a great job protecting the kindle, and I'm thinking that the chances of someone knowing it's a kindle and stealing it are slim. An added bonus is that in order to carry around his fake book, he has to carry around a real book! Hahaha I'm sure these electronic books are the best thing since sliced bread, but I just don't like the idea of them at all. I guess I'm just old fashioned. :) He likes it, irony and all.

Spring has Sprung? Potty Time!

I love days like today. The sun was shining, it was 40' outside, the snow was melted, and the birds were singing! I know it is just a little spring tease, but a taste of spring is all it takes to boost my mood! I insisted that we go for a walk as a family to enjoy the weather, and despite the cold wind, it was nice! My wee one really likes being outdoors, just like his Mama. In fact, after we came home and ate dinner he went to the door and kept trying to go back out. He cried and looked so dejected when he couldn't get the door open, so I took him out onto the deck, and he was happy as could be!

On a completely different topic...I have to brag. For the past month or two we have been sitting on the potty and on occasion he will happen to pee or poop while he's sitting there. Well, yesterday he signed "potty" to me for the first time, then tooted in the potty! It may not sound like much, but I was thrilled! Today, he again signed potty, and then he peed in the potty!! It's one thing to happen to catch a pee/poo, but he initiated it himself! He realized he had to go, then he went! I'm over the moon excited! My little 16 month old is growing up so fast!

Doesn't he look fancy? He loves wearing those beads! Please note the jazz hand. I'm pretty sure he's going to be a star! : D

More Quiet Book Pages!

Round 2 of quiet book pages!

Boys need to know how to braid too, right? My husband said no, but I assured him that if  trapped on a deserted island, he would need to know how to braid rope. Besides, teal hair makes it less feminine, right?

The apples snap on and off and store in the pocket. What do all trees need? An owl hole of course.

Visit: tatertotsandjello.com for the weekend wrap up party!"

Quiet Book Pages

 My pet project right now is a quiet book for my son's 2nd birthday. I read that it's super time consuming, but it's really not been that bad. I've really been enjoying coming up with different ideas for pages and making patterns for them. Here are some of the pages I have completed so far. Notice that the edges are still rough. They will be finished when I bind the book.

       The door opens, letters slide inside the box, and the flag goes up and down. I think I might sew a button on the door as a door pull. I think it looks a little naked right now.

                                      

This page is made of an up-cycled pair of baby girl's pants. I intend to put a few goodies in the pockets, including a pad of paper and pencil to write letters to "send" in the mail.

The W isn't crooked- I promise.

This z page has the zipper of course, and also the snap closure (it's a faux button), plus the pocket on the pants. In order to attempt to keep the pieces of this book together, I made the pants on this page into a giant pocket that can be accessed at the waist band. 

I've already shared the H page, but I finished the inside last night. I added the plastic sleeve on the base heart to hold a family picture. The top is open so the picture can be changed over time.



That's all for now. I'll share more pages tomorrow.

Visit tatertotsandjello.com for the weekend wrap up party!

Tot School

I've started doing "tot school" with my wee one. It sounds daunting, but it's not. Tot school is just the idea of providing activities that are fun and help them learn or practice a skill. There's no pressure or specific class time, I like him to discover the activities and do them on his own. Here are some activities we've been doing.

We have started to learn how to scribble, so putting the colored pencils into a juice bottle was a fun way to clean up. This kept him busy for several minutes. He still bit a couple of the pencils, but at least he couldn't eat them like he can crayons. We talked about the colors of the pencils while he transferred them.

Buttons! I have a large button collection and he's been eyeing my jars for awhile. He dropped an old mason jar the other day and spilled out the buttons and he didn't eat them! After that I figured it was safe to pull them out to play with. He liked to pick them up and look at them then put them back into the jar.

Nope, this balloon weight doesn't fit!

He still brought a few buttons to his mouth, but he didn't put them in. I watched him like a hawk anyway. We talked about the colors, the appearance (sparkly, shiny, etc.) and I did some color sorting. He couldn't have cared less about the color sorting, but he seemed to love playing with the buttons. He's been bringing me a jar to open and explore every day now.

These activities worked on hand-eye coordination, fine motor skills, and colors.

Breastfeeding in Public?

In case you didn't know, I'm a big supporter of breastfeeding. Breastfeeding infants, toddlers, in public, at home, along with supplementing if necessary, baby led weaning, I'm a fan of it all. In my opinion, feeding your lo in a bathroom is not acceptable. Having to drape a blanket over you to nurse? Um, no thanks. I don't hide under a blanket to eat, why should my baby? Ok, ok, unless baby is easily distracted and it helps- that's fine. Anyway, despite my support of BFing in public, I've only been able to/needed to do it a handful of times. Between my tig ol' bitties, and the need to supplement lo for health reasons, it just didn't work so well/wasn't necessary in the past. Well, I'm proud to say that at playgroup this week, in the middle of the mall playground, I whipped out a boob and fed my little guy ! He wanted to nurse despite having snacks and a sippy available, and after my initial hesitation, we did it! I was a little shy at first and wanted to hide my stomach and breast with a nursing cover one of the other moms offered me, but wee one wasn't having it, and I don't blame him. I got a few people who couldn't stop glancing at us, but oh well. It's like they've never seen an 8 year old nursing before! He was sitting on my lap and doing a good job of covering me, so no worries. I have to admit, I'm proud!

By the way, just kidding about the 8 year old thing. Wee one is only 15 months. ;) Hehe

Sew-Along week 2

 
Week 2 of the Sew-Along is here, and this week's project is either pajamas or something V-day related. I'm big on practical projects, so I made a quiet book page that is kind of V-day related.

The skills this page works on are hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills. The heart flaps lift up and inside I intend to put a picture of my husband and I, but I didn't have one handy that's the right size.

I started sewing the one on the right first, but it turned out horrible (as you can see), so I did another one.  I've never sewn knit before, and I was getting way too close to the edges. I got the idea for this page from another blog, I'm sorry I don't remember which. If it was your idea, let me know and I'd be glad to give you credit. :) Everything for this page was on hand except for the muslin and the felt letter H- both of which I bought for this quiet book project. The pink fabric and ribbon were both upcycled, and the lock originally came with my gym bag. The package of felt letters/numbers were on clearance at Michaels.

Crafty Sewing Mamas' Sewalong Kickoff

Hi everyone. I am a member of a community on http://www.babycenter.com/ called Crafty Sewing Mamas! and a bunch of us are doing a weekly Sew-along  challenge in our blogs to try to motivate us to get some sewing projects done. I've really been slacking in the sewing department since Halloween. I got a new machine for Christmas to replace my sad broken one, and until today it has remained in its box. Woops! It is in its box no more! The first project was either a sewing machine cover or a crochet needle case.  Here's my cover.

The fabric is darker irl. It's part of a very lightweight shawl that I bought on our honeymoon. I always loved the fabric, but haven't had many opportunities or outfits to wear it with. Now I get to look at it every day and put it to use. :)

As a bonus, here's a little finger puppet my babysitting charge and I made last week. It's a cat- clearly.