Hands On

Years and years ago I was amazed by the process of getting a manicure with "tips". Now the only tips I am interested in are steak tips. I think I was fascinated by the process of instant nails-- but over time realized that I certainly didn't need them and was pretty lucky to have nails that looked just fine with plain old polish.

Nowadays, my resistance to polish is the short life span. Washing hands 47,324 times a day means that a manicure lasts about two days before it starts chipping, and I'm much too obsessive/attentive to detail to ignore the chips. Once that starts, I just want the polish off.

In March I tried the OPI shellac polish. Since I was heading out to enjoy a few days away from kids and housework, I was willing to try it out. Whether it was the product or the application I'm not sure, but after about two weeks I was ready to take it off. It was starting to chip around the edges. I didn't think that was a bad outcome, though. Two weeks of pretty was pretty good.

So a week and a half ago I went out with a girlfriend just to get pedicures, enough of a luxury in itself, and the ladies at the salon showed me their own nails and said that they'd had the same "Gelish" polish on for three weeks. Except that you could tell their nails had grown, they looked perfect. I was sold.

I took these photos last night-- day 11. No signs of chipping or peeling. I keep re-examining because I'm waiting for it. Again, not knowing whether it's the product or the application, I'm definitely more impressed with this round. I was just looking at the cost of the supplies to do it at home. Not cheap unless you had some girlfriends to split it with, but it's lasting sooooo much longer than regular polish would for me. And I've spent the last 11 days doing all sorts of glamorous dish washing, laundry, kid washing, yard work... lots and lots of hand washing and soaking.

This is a little more of a close-up than I'm generally comfortable with, but this is a high-priority life-saving Public Service Announcement, so I'll suck it up.

I only took about 3 dozen photos to come up with two that didn't look completely awkward. Hand modeling is way harder than I'd have guessed.

More Travel T-Shirt Pouches

I've made another small dent in my pile of thrifted tees. After I did these for Adrianna's girls, I decided I wanted to do two for Stacey's boys. Well, she has three boys. But I figured the littlest would forgive me for adding some things for him into the middle brother's stash. Here's C's bag-- please note how Spider Man has yanked my zipper off to the side a bit. He's THAT strong.

Here's S and K's bag. I love that with just a couple of small finger puppets in it it looks like Spidey is grabbing for them. And the shark is fighting back. And the frog looks like he has accepted his fate but isn't sure whether it'll be at the hands of Spider Man or the shark.

With these versions I used twill tape to bind them-- which made them quicker to complete and a bit more masculine in feel. Just a bit.

Here's one all loaded up. Since the back panel stretches, you can fit quite a bit in there. And since I've filled it with all sorts of inexpensive entertainment, mom and dad don't have to worry a whole lot about whether the loot actually makes it back into the bag. Because crawling around under airplane seats is just not worth it when you're ready to evacuate the plane after hours and hours. Or minivan seats. Or wherever these end up being employed.

Stacey, Adrianna and I were able to get together today to play and visit before Adrianna heads out at the end of the week to her next locale. Far, far, far away. I don't even want to think about it, much less talk about it. My move last year was hard, but this one will make it even more difficult for us to find time to talk because of the huge time difference. Ugh. 

The upside is that blogging can happen organically. And it's something we can connect about even when the daily details of our lives are pretty different. When we have time we can create. And when the rest of life is busy, the blog gets quiet. As it should.

Tools of Engagement

I had a remarkably fun weekend. An engaged friend AND my brother and his fiance came to visit, AND I realized that we might be able to schedule and plan for M's long overdue baptism during our upcoming trip to the friend's wedding. So add that to a Saturday Katie visit and we were talking about celebrations allllll weekend long. And my kids were beside themselves since they had so many people to talk to and play with.

For the friend that's getting married on a North Carolina mountain farm in September, we experimented with mason jars. She loves the look of the vintage Ball blue glass jars, but as a teacher-- the cost is less than loveable. Especially when you multiply that by the number of tables she wants to dress for the reception. You know the ones I'm talking about, right? They look like this (and the image on the far right is a DIY! It totally fooled me for a minute):

via                                                 via                                                 via

Since the vintage blue ones cost $5 and up each, and clear jars can cost $1 or less if you're going for the "Ball" brand, we played around with tinting jars ourselves. She had already tried painting the finish on with a brush and felt that it was too streaky. 

For the first one we used Outdoor Mod Podge, water and a bit of blue and green acrylic paint. 

We stirred that up in a bowl, put one hand inside the jar and used the other to tilt the bowl as we turned the jar.

Definitely not perfect, but a step in the right direction.

 It's still wet in the photo above-- and the dry version in the photo below.

Attractive, we thought, but not quite what we're going for. Too opaque for our use.

So we tried again the next day. Hard Coat Mod Podge, a little water and some gel food coloring in "Sky Blue" because that's what we had on-hand.

Liquid food coloring would have worked just fine if I'd had any in the cabinet.

This was as fun to photograph as it was to make.

Dip and twirl...

Then turn upside down on wax paper, use a brush to smooth out the drips and coat evenly around the rim.

The first one from this round didn't have enough color to it, so we added more to the second. You can see the first in the background and the second in the foreground.

And here's the final version, all dry. Well, not the final final. But we're happy for now. Now it's time to identify sources for mass quantities and possibly test the efficacy of a spray-on sealant, since this finish is rather delicate. 

There are tutorials for using glass paint, too, of course. I'm trying to picture my friend running dozens of these through her oven. Nope, not going to happen. I think this way will serve her purposes. And leave her time to do the other 37,000 things on her list.

A Nearly Accidental Garden

This spring we had a fence built in our backyard. What a tremendous relief. After just a few months with it I can't imagine NOT having it. I love the general idea of wide open space and not having fences in-between neighbors in theory, but with a 4- and 2-year-old, their play dates and our proximity to a busy neighborhood street, the backyard was nearly unuseable without a sophisticated assembly of lumber and the lock at the top of the gate that they can't reach. I love that part the best.

While the fence guy was doing the fence, I asked him to build a planter box, too. I had him put it in the part of the yard that I thought got the most sun for the duration of a day. I dumped a whooooole lot of garden and potting soil in there and planted some stuff. That's about how much thought I put into it. What do I think my kids might eat? What do I think might grow? Okay, let's make a hole in the dirt and drop it in. Did I pay any attention to how much space things needed in-between? Not really. Just dug 'em and dropped em. Here's a photo from June 1, when I really wondered whether any of this would amount to anything at all.

Clockwise from top left, dill, peppermint, two tomatoes, cucumber, green beans, watermelon, more green beans, strawberry, squash, red pepper and squash.

Here's a photo from June 30. Please note the great care I took in straightening those cage-y contraptions.

I've had a great time staring at the tiny little leaves and those curly grabby parts emerging. And the girls get excited over searching for anything new in there.

And here it is on July 15. So far we've eaten squash, cucumbers, dill, peppermint and green beans. And there's one watermelon growing somewhere under there, all the way on the left, as far as it can get from where it's planted and still be in the planter box.

Not only have I learned that next year there's no point in planting aaaanything in the middle, I've learned that cucumber plants are rather unpleasantly spiky AND that cucumbers themselves have spikes. I had no idea. I just thought they grew bumpy. Not spikey. Here they are before a quick wash with a kitchen towel...

And after:

I'm sure you girls who've grown cucumbers before are bored out of your minds and are scrolling to find whatever's next in your reader. But I was completely surprised. After I picked the first one I actually went to the grocery store and somewhat creepily manhandled the cucumbers, looking for spiky bits. None to be found. And then I wondered whether I'd not noticed a sticker on the original cucumber label that said "we grow up to be scary and spiky!" Since I'd saved the label, I checked it. Nope, no indication of freaky cucumberness. Finally friends with gardening experience confirmed that it was normal. Phew.

I see this as a city-girl-gardening public service message. Don't let spikey cucumbers scare the pants off of you.

Unrelated:

I know some of you are looking for a Katie update. All continues to go well. More on Katie crafting soon! 

Dog Bone Burp Cloths: A Tutorial

When Rae posted this tutorial it made me think about what I wanted to make for Katie. Once she chose the nursery theme, how I'd make burp cloths became obvious. They had to be shaped like dog bones.  Simple enough. And a good project to help me put off working on the quilt and the bumper. Because I have to do a good bit of hemming and hawing before I dive into those. Yes, this is a great, simple place to start.

I began by drawing a quick pattern and testing it. Yep, easy enough. And K got to draw all over the muslin. She's quite proud of her contribution. This was just scrap fabric, but I chose flannel for the real thing. I loved flannel burp cloths with my kids. Soft, warm, absorbent and great for an the autumn and winter months.

I digitized it to share. I know it's not a complicated shape, but I know that there are plenty of people out there who'd rather sleep on burlap sheets than try to draw something freehand, so here's my template. If you double-click it you should be able to enlarge it to print. If you can't get the 1" square to print at exactly 1", no worries. I printed it a bit smaller and that works, too.

I decided to make a set of three, with a stripe on one side and a solid on the other. So I cut three pieces of each fabric on the fold. I started with one yard of the striped flannel fabric, and after making three of these I think I could still make two more. 

So that's 6 pieces total.

Pin each set, right sides together.

Stitch almost all the way around with a 1/4" seam allowance, leaving yourself enough room to get a few fingers in there to help smooth the curves from the inside after you turn it right-side out. Snip the corners and curves a bit so that it'll flip nicely.

Flip it, noodle with the curves and press it, and that'll give you this:

It's looking done (and that was fast, right?) but you've still got this to deal with.

 I used contrasting thread on the solid side. Stitch all the way around your cloths with a 1/4" allowance, backstitching a few stitches where the beginning meets the end.

And that's it! Press it if you're going to give it as a gift. Be prepared to press it again if your 2yo gets her hands on it and wants to march around with her baby dolls. And maybe wash it again, come to think of it.

 So fast and fun to make, you might as well make 3, while you're at it.

As always, if you make some, we'd love to see them. Add 'em here or add a link below.

Unrelatedly:

- Did you know that Crafterhours accepts sponsors now? We do, we do! You can check them out on our sidebar. If you'd like to become one yourself there's a link at the top of the sidebar that makes it easy peasy. We just approve your ad to make sure it's appropriate for our blog. Our idea of "appropriate" includes chocolate, BTW.

- Have you checked out Birdiful Stitches? I was just thinking the other day that I need to make something to put my extra camera lenses in when I'm not using them. She has a pattern for that. Easy peasy. On my list.

Cheating Isn't Always a Bad Thing

The other day on Pinterest I found a cookie recipe. It looked aaaawesome. But... there was an obvious shortcut to be made. Let's look at my results first. Here's a cookie. But not just any cookie. It's sort of thick in the middle, right?

That's 'cause there's an OREO in there.

I can't even describe the yumminess in writing. I can only tell you that they were gone almost immediately. My 2yo was particularly impressed. The original post gives you a whole lot of lovely fresh ingredients to combine, but, come on-- it's an Oreo in the middle. There's already a whole pile of additives in there. So why not do it this way? (Although if any of my friends wants to volunteer to make it from scratch, I'd be happy to taste test it for you.)  I'd suggest letting the dough soften at room temp for a bit before you attach a ball of dough to each side of the Oreo and sort of squish it together around the edges. And if you want a nice, clean cross-section you should probably let it cool before slicing. I didn't. I wanted to eat it.

I guess you can tell I'm in comfort food mode around here lately. And I'm posting this most urgently because a) you might need an idea for dinner and b) someone I know is running around enjoying America right now and should probably try this before she boards an airplane bound for... not America.

Happy weekend!