Making + Listening

December 6, 2013 by Summer

MAKING: We’ve been very busy creating, making, elving, whatever you want to call it. Ellie has been working on some gifts for family members (shhh!) and I have been using any and all napping time and sleeping time to try to get this advent calendar finished before advent runs out.

LISTEN: As for music, we’ve had the record player sweetly playing The Carpenters Christmas, John Denver’s Rocky Mountain Christmas, Tony Bennett’s Snowfall and a slew of other Christmas favorites.

-joining Dawn with Making and Listening.

So Much To Be Thankful For

November 29, 2013 by Summer

Whew! What a day! Our twenty plus Thanksgiving, hosted in our little house went superbly well. It was threatening to rain for a little while but we only got a slight sprinkling. I am thankful we live in California. Jeff, my wonderful husband and Lindsey, my sister-in-law were rock stars in the kitchen, cranking out turkey’s and broccoli bakes and apple pie and home-brew (that went over exceedingly well). We had Thanksgiving Mad Libs and a sensory table full of birdseed for the little ones and a thankful tree as well. I contributed a sweet potato pie but most of my time was spent putting together the event, tablecloths, centerpieces, all that crafty goodness. All of my family came (on my Mom’s side) and it was just an all around good, busy, fun, nice Thanksgiving day. I am SO thankful for this life I live. It truly is wonderful.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Good Wednesday Morning

November 27, 2013 by Summer

I’m over at Anchor and Plume Press this morning with a little poem on “giving thanks”.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Preparing

November 26, 2013 by Summer

The Christmas music has been turned on (much earlier than ever before), crafts are being worked on here and there, beer is brewing, twinkle lights are making their way inside, Turkey Day menu has been gone over ( and over) and many more preparations for Thanksgiving at our house are underway. Hoping you all have a lovely week!

making + listening

November 14, 2013 by Summer

MAKING : Sneak Preview of a special softie that’s getting the final touches for a good friend’s daughter’s first birthday party this weekend.

We did some work with watercolors for the first time a few days ago for some lantern making to celebrate the seasons and light changing to colder and darker.

Normally I would never cut up children’s art work like I did with Ellie’s watercolor (that’s a whole other post about respecting children’s art, something I’ve studied and implemented in all of my classrooms when I taught preschool- I touched on it briefly here), but because we had set out to create lanterns and the fact that this was less of an art project and more of a craft project, my conscious didn’t feel as bad, cutting into the painting to create something else with it.

the finished product!

Add a LED light and we had ourselves a lantern!

We took a little walk the other day with the lantern in the dark right before bed and Ellie seemed to think the whole experience was pretty cool. She didn’t want to go inside! (If you want more information about celebrating Martinmas, and how you can make lanterns, you can find some great info here, here and here. We’re not quite sure if Martinmas and it’s religious aspects are something we necessarily want to practice celebrating, but I really like the idea of lighting the darkness and celebrating the seasonal aspect of welcoming autumn and winter).

LISTENING: We’ve been hearing a lot of banjo tunes around these parts these days, some by this guy, some oldies and mostly from Daddy. He’s getting pretty good.

-joining in with Dawn over at Simplethingsnotebook.

An Experience with Art

October 9, 2013 by Summer

Okay, so I love art. I love children’s art. I’ve been waiting so very long to introduce Ellie to painting and making art and hoping beyond hoping she would enjoy making art. I didn’t have to wait any longer. Yesterday I picked up some finger paint at a local school supply store and thought she might be ready. This morning I set her up at her table, put her in an apron that was ten times too large for her (she didn’t seem to mind after she watched me put on my, yes that’s right, Wizard of Oz apron), and we got to painting. It was as if she had always been finger painting. She went right to work, smearing her hands across the paper, trying out different strokes with her fingers and really staying focused on the task at hand. She seemed to thoroughly enjoy her first experience with painting. And that makes this Mama very happy. There will be more art in this home… that I am sure of!

“The Art of mothering is to teach the art of living to children.” – Elaine Heffner

*thanks to Jeff for taking many of these photos today, helping me to document the fun stuff!

Making + Listening

October 4, 2013 by Summer

MAKING: I just made another Zucchini loaf in a bundt pan this week. Boy are we enjoying this zucchini bread. We’ve had a few zucchini’s from our own garden and a plethora of zucchini from our CSA share rolling in every week. This is the only way I will eat zucchini and Jeff and Ellie don’t think it’s half bad either. I thought I’d share the recipe. It’s full of sugar, but I’ve cut the sugar in half and it’s still pretty sweet and I’m sure substituting honey or another sweetener of your liking would work just fine as well.

Zucchini Bread (or muffins)

adapted from Smitten Kitchen

yield: 2 loaves or 24 muffins

3 eggs

1 cup olive or vegetable oil (I have also substituted coconut oil)

1 3/4 cups sugar (you can swap the sugar out with any sweetener or reduce the amount of sugar by 3/4 and it’s still pretty sweet)

2 cups grated zucchini

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3 cups all-purpose flour

3 teaspoons cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)

1 cup dried cranberries, raisins or chocolate chips or a combination thereof (optional)

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Grease and flour two 8×4 inch loaf pans, liberally or line 24 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs with a whisk. Mix in oil and sugar, then zucchini and vanilla.

Combine flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder and salt, as well as nuts, chocolate chips and/or dried fruit, if using.

Stir this into the egg mixture. Divide the batter into prepared pans.

Bake loaves for 60 minutes, plus or minus ten, or until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Muffins will bake far more quickly, approximately 20 to 25 minutes.

I’ve also been working on some autumnal inspired coasters with some scraps that were begging me to do something with them. Almost done with number one and I’d like to make at least a set of four.

LISTENING: We’ve been listening to a whole slew of things lately. A lot of banjo. A lot of Raffi. And a little John Mayer, a little John Denver and a little classical to keep the moods steady.

-joining Dawn over at SImple Things Notebook.

Making + Listening + Soulful September

September 26, 2013 by Summer

MAKING: Inspired by a friend’s fireplace turned felt board, I realized it was high time I made a felt board for Ellie. We don’t have much space for an extra-large one at the moment, but I came across a piece of lightweight wood that fit perfectly in Ellie’s toy corner in the living room. I staple-gunned the felt to the wood and nailed it to the wall. Easy peasy. However, I have become obsessed with making little felt story people now. Any extra time has been devoted to coming up with new little felt guys. I started with “slippery fish” (an old preschool tune perfect for toddlers to follow along) and I’m working on the characters from Polar bear, Polar bear, since Ellie is very into these stories at the moment. It’s been a fun new project and I’m excited to start using the felt board for new ways to stimulate and entertain my busy 13 month old!

LISTENING: Ellie and I took a walk to our local record store this week, in search of some inspiration for Daddy’s new-found love for anything Banjo. We’ve been enjoying a lot of new (new to us) bluegrass these days and looking forward to hearing Daddy play more tunes as well.

As for Soulful September... this is the last week of my soulful september. I’ve learned a lot about balance and what I can and cannot fit into my days right now with a 13 month old at my heels. I do want to do more of these types of challenges. I think it keeps my soul healthy and even though at times I found it frustrating that I couldn’t get everything done in a day, it was helpful to have a goal in mind to keep me motivated.

Reading: Jeff passed this piece along by Steve Martin about his banjo playing journey which I found an interesting read.

Moving: Never got past the walking every day and doing my physical therapy exercises (almost) every day. But I’m calling it a success, because I did get outside moving.

Writing: I think starting Amanda’s writing course on the 30th is definitely a good move. I’ll be keeping my writing going even after Soulful September and learning and growing through this anticipated course.

Meditating: This is the one that has fallen by the way side more times than not. It’s just so very difficult to get any “quiet” time when you are caring for a toddler all day and night. I want to work on this and as Ellie get’s older, I’m hoping I can even get back to my yoga practice outside the house every once in a while to really focus on my meditation practices.

-joining Dawn for Making and Listening (and ending my own Soulful September).

A New Dress From Gramma

September 23, 2013 by Summer

My mom the quilter made Ellie’s first birthday dress, after I showed her a picture of one I had pinned on Pinterest. It was such a great all around dress, easy to get on and off, easy for Ellie to move in and just all around adorable… I told her it would be so very nice if Ellie had more of the same dress. This weekend, my wonderful mother whipped up another one for this walking girl of mine and of course there had to be a little photo shoot and of course, I have to share it here…

Thank you Gramma!

Making + Listening

September 12, 2013 by Summer

LISTENING: We took a mid week lunch time visit to the Wednesday antique market here in town and came home with a few new (old) records for our listening pleasure. Karen and John have been singing non-stop in our home ever since with a bit of Johnny thrown in as well from last weekend’s yard sailing. I’m still loving playing records in the house and Ellie will even go over and pick one or two out as well, almost daily. She’s been liking Raffi’s Everything Grows and Ernie and Bert’s Rubber Duckie Album (how could she not?)

As for MAKING, I finally got around to making a new batch of granola. We’ve been on a toast and peanut butter breakfast binge for a while and I was itching to get back to my yummy yogurt and granola mornings but couldn’t find the time to get it together. Yesterday was that day and now we have plenty of granola for a couple of weeks at least.

I’ve also been keeping up with a wabi sabi practice I had read about a few months back. The recommendation was “whenever a pebble or small stone catches your fancy, pick it up and put it in your pocket. ” The chapter goes on to talk about arranging these natural treasures inside your home, moving them around and arranging them in an aesthetically pleasing way thus cultivating a passion for the little, everyday, seemingly mundane things in life. It really makes me feel good to find that perfect rock or piece of wood on my daily walks and give it a new life on my windowsill. I’m finding this practice brings me back to my childhood where everything natural was sacred and interesting and it helps me to truly see the beauty in the everyday. I feel a calm, zen come over me when I roll that special rock around in my hand after finding it, examining it over, feeling the grooves and seeing the patterns. And it’s nice to bring a little bit of nature inside and display it like I would flowers in a vase or a picture of our family. A simple yet meaningful practice to include in our lives.