school days

my hat is off to all of you who manage to post to your blogs everyday. or even regularly, for that matter. though i love this space dearly, it is a real commitment to sit down and spend the time uploading photos, editing them, and managing to actually write your post. i can not tell you how many times in the last two weeks i have taken pictures, uploaded them, and written posts in my head (only the writing was taking place in my head, the rest really happened!). but i am letting all that go and just jumping back in there.

to my credit, there were chicken pox, the passing of my great uncle, several days of unexplained fevers, a trio of nasty head colds, and darned pollen allergies that piled onto my normal mommy/ teacher/ business owner workload. out of 15 hours normally spent at school during a *regular* week, last week i made it there for three! i know that many of you manage to post through all of this.....how do you do it?!

here are some bits from our week at school. due to childcare limitations, jasper got to join us in class on wednesday. i like having him around, but i can't say it went that well really. he is not used to being in a room full of 14 children with 5 of them being highly spirited boys (he was one of those)! he really fed off the energy and got a little feisty at times. he is also so much smaller than the rest of the kids (due to his age and his size) that he got a bit trampled during some of the transitions.
tuesday is bread baking day. here you see what happens when you turn your back on the kneading. they really wanted to be sure their dough wasn't going to stick! wowsers that's a lot of flour.
she is still adorable with flour all over her face. ;)
wednesday is our craft/ handwork day. this week we started our mother's day project (if you happen to be a mom from class cover your eyes now). we are painting wooden frames with our watercolor paints. next week we will decorate them with seeds and add pictures of the kids. they will go home as gifts for mom. jasper spent a long time with this. he really loves painting wooden things with watercolors lately.
proudly displaying his finished paint job. love, love, love the visible wood grain!! also loving seeing him in this kimono handed down from his sister. we scored it in brooklyn while visiting uncle scotty when sienna was jasper's age.
some of the other childrens' frames.
my blue eyed boy.
thursday is painting day. we have now *graduated* to all three colors...red, yellow, and blue. we started the year with one color at a time, then moved on to two colors, and now three. at this point, most of the children know how to mix their colors on their paper and make some amazing works of art!
you can read more about watercolor painting in our classroom in our interview here.
our nature table. there are actual bits from nature there just out of shot that the children have collected. the branch piece pictured holds a thinner branch that is our seasonal tree. with bits of wool attached to the tiny branches, it changes as the season does. at the moment, the green *leaves* are filling out and there is a lovely parent made wool felt butterfly hanging from it.
my outdoor challenge photo for today. soaking up some sun.

hope you all had a lovely week! i will be back asap as i have several things to wrap up (one small change and outdoor challenge). love to you all!

chicken pox. round two. day one. sienna's got them now. she has a LOT of spots for day one. we'll see how this goes. matt and i both had them when we were six and had a pretty rough case of it. i am wonderfully optimistic that it could go much better for her. she was a trooper today.

it was a gorgeously sunny spring day. there was certainly no keeping her indoors. in an effort to encourage mellow, shade play, i helped her make some little hideaways under the forsythia bushes. her and her brother and her dearest babies picnicked there together.

*special baby* thought it a lovely spot for a nap.

children and nature awareness month

the lovely lisa at 5 orange potatoes has brought my attention to *children and nature awareness month* spearheaded by richard louv, author of *last child in the woods* and chairman of the children and nature network. lisa has challenged us all to get outside with our children everyday this month and to post a picture on our blogs. now, those of you who read my blog know that it is not likely i will post everyday, but we WILL be outside!

in fact, since the weather has warmed up a bit, i am struggling to get my kiddos to have any inside time! sienna has always preferred to spend us much time outdoors as possible. at our school, we go outside in all weather. the kids keep rain pants and rain boots at school and unless the conditions are extreme and dangerous (rarely the case) we venture outdoors at our regularly scheduled time every day. our motto is *we weather the weather, whatever the weather, whether we like it or not!*

won't you join us? and just because i love this jason mraz video and i just learned how to imbed videos on my blog, i copied lisa to share it with you here. go have fun outside!

potty party!

it was the wildest potty party i've ever been to, i must say. what? you don't know what a potty party is? it's the day that you celebrate saying goodbye to diapers. there are festivities and lots of potty talk and diapers go away and trainers come out and together you just make the leap! it was successful with sienna, we shall see with jasper. hopefully today was not an indicator of our new routine.

anyways, back to the party...sienna insisted they dress for the occasion....princess style, of course! jasper so willingly allows her to dress him in all sorts of get-ups. he truly seems to enjoy it and loves to come and show me his latest attire.
we had our first cook out of the season. burgers on the grill and fries in the oven. that means a table full of condiments, including a giant jug of pickles, and i do mean giant. sienna can be seen munching one here. also on the table were a gallon glass jug of water and mason jars to drink from, five place settings as my mom was visiting, and our wheatgrass centerpiece.
the picnic table we were seated at is massive and solid. it was built by matt's father and his father many, many years ago. we are so thrilled to have it and treasure every meal that we spend together here.
some of you might see where this post is going by now. sienna set our places at the table. adult side, children side. now it must be noted that bakka (my mom) did say from the beginning that that might not be so wise. it was fine until......
first i turned the camera on these two. as you see, i was met with scowls initially.
then when they decided to start posing, sienna thought it looked fun and ran to join in, subsequently climbing on top of sweet bakka.
what happened next could not be captured on film, too bad really. you didn't think jasper could be left out of a group photo did you? of course not. the littlest one comes barreling over and before anyone could process what was happening, climbs right up there and then it happened! the entire picnic table went right into the air sending us and our entire dinner in a heap on the ground! i would love to see that moment again. the kids started wailing. the adults were in shock and had to struggle to process what happened for a few seconds. jasper, bakka, and i were completely soaked.....bakka was wearing the jug of pickle juice! there were broken plates and glasses and half eaten dinners all in a great big pile and the camera there with it. i whisked my potty party guest of honor up to the bathtub to strip him down and console him. if only i had snapped a photo....

alas, we were all able to move on. no serious injuries. sienna took the worst of it, i believe. she says a glass hit her on the head and she had a huge splinter in the top of her foot. yikes.

desert was served on the back porch. i made another pavlova. it was devoured. if you haven't tried this yet, you should!
here's hoping the rest of our potty training is much less eventful! ;)

wip wednesday

my main work this week has been taking care of this little guy. he has had the chicken pox. i suppose he had a moderate case, but still managed these sweet smiles that keep me going.

i recently purchased a wood burning tool and have been having fun with some wooden eggs. i acquired said tool at the craft store, but i am told that i should spend a bit more and get one with a dial and i would have better results. any suggestions?
i painted them with our beloved stockmar watercolor paints and then finished them with beeswax polish, much like mamaroots describes here. aren't her story eggs stunning?! my wood burning skills aren't quite there yet. ;)
i made some of these for a friend's children and they are actually my favorite, i think. i like the way the colors turned out on them. no pictures for you though as she has not received them yet (hopefully any day now though!).

polka dots are so much easier to pull off than lines! ;)

my yummy box of wool from west earl woolen mills arrived! hooray for this soft fluffy goodness.

i have been knitting linda's snail pattern. admittedly, i got a little carried away knitting those i-cords for the bodies! i couldn't help myself. really. the noro yarn i used was lovely and every tube came out completely different. it was so fun. now i am due to have quite a swarm of these little cuties! several will go off to a spring nature table swap at bits of goodness. two are for my kiddos easter baskets. looks like all my friends will be getting a snail this spring! ;)

sienna's has recently learned to knit! i have taught several girls now in a little class that i am starting. sienna could not be more proud of her new skill. she promptly found a basket for her work and declared that she was ready for the next road trip because she has something to do in the car (don't know where she gets that from).

my sweet friend, cait, watched jasper today while i was at school and she brought us all these treasures (and more!). eggs from her chickens (which jasper adored), freshly plucked onions, and the sweetest little bunny book ever. i am so in love with the pictures in this adorable vintage richard scarry book!

of course i love this page! ;)

we had a gloriously sunny day here and are hoping for another even warmer day tomorrow. hope spring (or fall) is treating you well wherever you are my friends! ;)

egg monsters

last week i took a lot of pictures to share my wips (works in progress) with you.....and that never happened. so, this week i will just share a little project i have just finished up and will be starting another round of in the next couple of days.
last year i made a big batch of wet felted eggs pictured above. my mom came to visit for spring break and we retreated to a dear friend's cabin in the north georgia mountains for a few days. i carried my eggs with me and when it came a blizzard outside as we perched high on the mountainside i snuggled up on the couch and absorbed myself in blanket stitching the openings of these eggs. as i stitched each one, i couldn't help but think of them as cavernous mouths on little egg heads wishing they could look back at me as i stitched them up. after returning home, my dear friend lorilee posted the creations that her sweet sons came up with when doing the same project. i fell in love!
flash forward one year. i was making up a batch of these eggs for an easter swap at bits of goodness. i spent some time blending together these lovely shades of spring to make a nice marbling effect (still visible in the openings above). when i pulled them out of the dryer (yes, it's true!), they were just too thin. so, more layers had to be added. instead of taking the time to do the lovely marbling again, i just wrapped some single colors around the outside hoping that my previous work would show through. no such luck! this time they came out nice and thick, but just so, well...plain. that would never do! i began stitching the openings and was struck by their mouth qualities yet again. i remembered lorilee's post and ran to get my roving and needlefelting needles. within minutes these little creatures were born. we have all fallen in love with them here. the kids had so much fun watching each one come to life. jasper fell in love with one that has a big orange spike coming out of his head...i have yet to get a good picture of it as it has been so well loved. sienna made her usual request....blue egg with blue stitching and blue hair and blue eyes, please (also no picture as it disappeared immediately).
other than the two we kept, the rest went to the swap. i will be making up some more for our own easter celebration. if you would like to make some too, you should start with nicole's tutorial in this season's edition of *rhythm of the home* here....but grab a cup of something good before you head over because the spring edition of this online mag is chocked full of great projects and inspiring articles!

i will tell you that when i mass produce these babies, i cheat and use the washing machine. put them in an old pair of stockings and tie each one off like sausages. you can put them in the dryer, too. the kids LOVE peeling back the stockings to reveal the felted eggs!

each one of these little guys has his own personality!

after your eggs are felted, you just need some roving and some needle felting needles. i used some curly rainbow locks that i had on hand (originally purchased here), but you could use any roving you have. i just used some wool yarn for this little guy below which was pretty fun, too.

hope my swap partners and their kiddos enjoy them as much as we did! ;)

picture of our sweet bunny kitty for hillary. ;) spring cleaning the living room included giving him his own little perch lined with a felted sweater that he had already claimed.

spring goodies

sometimes all it takes to make a celebration special is a tablecloth and a lovely centerpiece.

beloved treasures from many of my favorite artists and friends came out of their box this weekend. these beauties bring such joy to our days and a smile to our faces. we have had an interesting first few days of spring.....sat was a gorgeous, sunny day and the last two days have been cold and dreary. we have had snow and slush off and on all day today! ick. i am all finished with that for now, mother nature. thank you very much for understanding.