Mostly Friendly Monster

Have no fear, the mostly friendly monster is here.
Can you guess what this is? It's my No Fear "mostly friendly monster" for the third week of the Whip Up! competition.

I thought the mostly friendly monster would make the baby have no fear of the dark 'cause he's a nightlight and will scare all of the other monsters away!
Sorry for the bad photography!
I covered the old nighlight with white tissue paper for the whites of the eyes then covered with green fur and embellished with felt in the eyes and mouth. You can switch the light off and on through his mouth.

Picnic Day Aftermath

Surly before coffee

I had so much fun last week with the Whiplash competition! (congrats to the very deserving winners)

I promised myself I'd enter every week and use the competition as inspiration to get stuff done.

I've had one side of a duvet cover done for, oh, about two years and never could decide how to finish it off. The front is an ivory eylet I cut into squares and then put back together with a bit of detail in the seams (you can sort of see it below).

Yesterday I realized that it's the BACK of a duvet cover, who cares what it looks like! So I took my inspiration from the Whiplash theme, "your surly side" and made a surly side to my duvet.

After all, I'm not a very surly person except when the alarm goes off and I don't want to get out of bed (read, every morning).
Here's the final product:
Mostly green to match the walls with a smattering of pink to go with the nightstand I painted.
Other inspirations

• Freezer paper (except I used letter stickers 'cause I'm not patient enough to cut all that out of freezer paper and screen printing ink because it's all I had on hand)
• Use what you have month (I didn't buy a single thing for this project except the stickers)
• The random checked fabric I bought for a baby quilt and love but never used
• The idea of a surly SIDE as in a 2 sided object (eleleo had the same concept with much better execution)

P.S. After seeing this I thought everyone would make placemats with one surly side and one girly side. So far no placemats....

You win some, you lose some

So I didn't win the Whip Up! competition. Oh well.

After seeing all the entries, I wasn't expecting to win anyway. There are some very crafty folks out there! In any case, I told myself I'd enter weekly just to inspire me to get some projects done. I've been mulling the (challenging) new topic, "your surly side" and I'll let you know what I come up with. Leave a comment with your ideas about surliness, I've only got 2 days to get this done.

Glad to be an American (baby)

Beyond the whole stable democracy and availability of cute baby clothes, the munchkin should be glad to live somewhere arranged marriages just aren't the norm. If I could, I'd have her married off already to one of the wonderful little boys we know (based solely on the qualities of their parents). There are some great options out there:
Kyson
An older man by 12 months. If he turns out half as nice as his parents, our baby would have a very kind and generous husband.

Ryan
Older by only 2 days. They'd be able to celebrate their birthdays together every year and, if he inherits his sense of humor from his parents, Ryan will be a riot.

Corey
Younger by 2 months but quite a catch. If he takes after his (adopted) older brother, he'll be smart as a whip. Everyone likes a boy with brains.

Matthew
(no picture of Matthew right now)
Another older man by 6 months. He's an active little fellow and given his mom's athleticism he's got pro athlete written all over him.

And finally, Sid
Believe it or not, he's the product of an arranged marriage and look at those curls and those eyes! He'll be a looker.

So maybe it's lucky I can't arrange her marriage. It'd be too hard to choose among all these adorable little boys. Plus, who wants to save for a dowry anyway?

And when is one of my friends going to have another little girl??

Whip it!

...and whip it good. Do you remember that song? Takes me right back to junior high school.

So anyway, discovered another crafty site and it turns out the name is Whip Up! (not Whip It!) but I've got the song in my head anyway. Whip up! is sponsoring Whiplash which is a crafty competition. I really want to win the prize so here's my entry:

The theme for the week is "Everyday Creativity." I've been mulling this topic for the last 12 hours (many of them in the middle of the night with the baby who never sleeps). I wanted to enter a creative and crafty solution to an everyday problem.

My problem is ongoing rainy/cold weather and a baby who is outgrowing all her cozy footed outfits. (see the toes poking out?)

No point in buying a bigger size because soon it will be warm but I need to get a few more weeks out of the ones she's got. Here are the solutions I devised:

For more spring-like weather, the hemmed cut offs:

And in case it rains forever, the extended legs:My original design didn't work out but I still managed to whip up both outfits during a one hour afternoon nap. Thanks for the inspiration, Whip Up!

Homework procrastination reaches new levels

I have grand plans for updating the links on this blog to include all the fun crafty sites I've been discovering like this and this. But I've barely had time to post, let alone accomplish anything worth posting about. My postings may be infrequent for the next 8 weeks until I graduate (!) but don't abandon me, loyal readers, I'll try to stay in touch!

Mr. H has been consumed with a paid project he's working on in the garage but he did find time to hang the medicine cabinet so the bathroom is more or less done (other than the lingering water pressure issue) You can't really tell but the knob is a cool starfish.

I have managed to avoid homework by working on baby's scrapbook. Sactownkid's pages put mine to shame but I'm more about quantity than quality at this point. Here are some highlights (sorry about the glare):

Thanks, Kristy for the cool babyfood paper. I've been waiting for her to eat solids just so I could use it. That's definitely my favorite page!

Baby Bundt Cakes

Taking a quick blog break from writing a paper on agency relationships for my "Managers and the Legal Environment" class. One week into this class, I can tell you I made a wise decision when I decided not to go to law school (not that I was ever even considering law school).

Just before the blog break, I took a break to freeze another tray of baby food. I've been on a baby food making kick now that baby is eating solids. My mom made all my baby food for me (liver and carrots!) and for some reason I always thought it would be fun to do for my baby.

Of course I probably never would have gotten around it except that, in a not so subtle hint, I was given a baby food grinder and a baby cookbook for Christmas from my mom

Now I've been having fun cooking and mashing produce and forming it into little cakes in the oddly shaped ice cube tray I bought at Ikea.

Here is a lovely display of the nine flavors I have created to date. Can you guess what they are?

Here are the answers (front to back; left to right): sweet potato; pear; spaghetti squash; green beans; carrots; asparagus; apple; potato; cantaloupe. So far, baby likes sweet potato, pear and spaghetti squash for sure. She's reserving judgement on green beans, carrots and potato and hasn't tried the others. I'll keep you posted. Feel free to submit additional food ideas. I'm planning strawberries and bananas soon....

Where is spring?

Our patio is ready, I've planted trees, I'm all set to relandscape the front yard in flowers but where is spring?? Apparently this is was the rainiest March since 1849 here in Sacramento! Now it's April 2 and the rain continues.

On the upside, it's nearly 7 p.m. and still light out and baby has taken up napping again (hence the time to blog). What I should be doing is homework, not due until next Saturday but I just realized I have to work almost every night this week so I'd better get on it! Instead I think I'll scrapbook.

Anyway, the real point of this blog, I wanted to show you, loyal readers, my homage to spring and to Easter.

Used a pot I've had sitting around for ages and filled it with moss from the front flower bed. Cute, eh? I was inspired by Thriftcraft to do an Easter scene.

Ok, off to take advantage of the rest of this random nap!