Category Archives: Likes

Balloons

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

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Bringing home the giant balloons for Josie’s party.  Her favorite part of the day may have been the stroller walk with balloons above her head.  I found these 36″ giants at Bargain Balloons for cheap and then Party City filled them for $2 each!  This is exciting because everyone else in my area was quoting me $20 per balloon to fill.  (Sorry for all the prior bad-mouthing Party City).  We did have to walk a mile with the double stroller, but Ada helped look out for pointy gates and low hanging branches.  Josie got a lot of smiles and birthday wishes on the way.

Prism

05 Monday Mar 2012

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In college I audited the most magical class about women and domestic space.  The professor asked if any of us had ever sat in our house for the day and watched the light change.  I didn’t understand what, or why she was asking at the time.  Now that we are settled in our house, I get it.  The right light was that illusive something I searched for when we were house hunting.  I nearly drove Chris insane when after a year and a half of looking I couldn’t explain why a building just wasn’t quite right.  Now I realize it was the light all along.  It was the question that Professor Tarbox asked us to consider.  How will the light look in the space where you spend your days?  How does that light make you feel?  How does it change with the seasons?  Will your mornings be bright in your space and how will the shadows change with afternoon?

The light is why I fell in love with our house, despite its list of 1000 projects.  The light is beautiful here.  It thrills me every day to watch it change.  I chase it from floor to floor, searching for the perfect spot to photograph.  I wanted Ada to see it too, so we found this big prism from an old chandelier at the Brooklyn Flea.  (The Hot Wheels guy has a bunch if you happen to go).  Now Ada can watch the light bend and move around her room.

Invitation

02 Friday Mar 2012

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Josephine is almost one already!  I am not sure how the year passed so quickly, so we are celebrating for more than one day.  I’ll share some of the birthday ideas in more posts.  Here is the invitation:

We used photo corners to attach her picture and a custom stamp for the inside.  The stamp shipping is cheap if you buy a few, so we have a stockpile for upcoming birthday years.  The square envelopes are from here.

Happy Birthday Josie-bean!

Wooden Fruit

01 Thursday Mar 2012

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I love these ingenious wooden fruits by Haba.  They are a knotted simple string and two wooden beads.  I like the idea of making some of our own versions of fruit.  I wonder what others we could come up with…

Food

29 Wednesday Feb 2012

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One of our favorite additions to Ada’s play kitchen are these colorful wool felt balls.  They have been served as everything from blueberries to soup to tea.  It is also easy to make your own felt balls if you would like a simple project.  You can find beautiful felting wool here.

The dishes are a lovely ceramic children’s set from Ikea.  (I much prefer living with a few broken pretty dishes than ugly sturdy ones). The fabric “pancankes” are pieces of vintage prints that Ada requested from the sewing box.  We found them long ago at a flea market and they were meant to become a quilt.  A few stitches and stuffing made them into food.  I love watching kids invent from beautiful, ambiguous materials.

Flight Pack

24 Friday Feb 2012

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We have yet to try flying with both kids.  An upcoming visit to the West coast has me excited and a bit worried about how to entertain two on the road.  So I filled up Ada’s dog backpack with activities and fun stuff for the flight.  (Top secret to her until takeoff).

*Little Packrats bags are adorable and made in the USA.

*Maurice Sendak’s Nutshell Library– four tiny, poetic stories with detailed illustrations.  We traded their cardboard for a softer pouch.

*Organic fruit snacks from Target.  A rubber band keeps them under control in the bag.

*Sticker and magnet books.  Small enough to fit in a child’s backpack.

*Wild Animal Baby Magazine from the National Wildlife Federation.  Ada gets as excited about a new issue in the mail as I do about my magazines.  This one is small enough for little hands.

*A pristine blank book to fill up with drawings, paintings and stickers.

*Clementine art supplies.  They are non-toxic and come in sweet little packages.

*Pipe Cleaners in Brown Bear Colors.

*A Rabbit and a Mouse.

This should get us through the flight with minimal IPod time.

Super Magnets!

23 Thursday Feb 2012

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These Imaginets are one of those perfect toys:

1. They are super fun for kids.  (Ada plays with them for hours at a time).  The cards provide patterns or kids can come up with their own ideas.

2. They are made of wood and painted bright colors.  The magnetic shapes are smooth and substantial and thoughtfully designed.

3.The sturdy case contains all the cards and magnets and has a handle to carry.  When the case is closed, (which can be accomplished easily by a three-year-old), the whole thing fits nicely on a book shelf.

4. The magnetic surface can also be used as a dry-erase board so kids can add habitats for their magnet animals.

Happy kids, happy parents.

Clean

22 Wednesday Feb 2012

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Dr. Bronner may have been a bit nutty, but his liquid soap smells lovely and is the best for getting fresh stains out of clothes.  The colors and graphic appearance of label rantings look great on the shelf and give me something amazing to read if I ever find myself alone in the bathtub.  The soaps have been made using socially and environmentally responsible practices since 1948.

Squirt some undiluted liquid soap on a food spills and throw clothes into hamper.  The soap won’t bleach out colors and the whole hamper will smell nice until laundry day.

Felt Raindrops

21 Tuesday Feb 2012

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We were tired of the rain last week so we decided to hang felt raindrops on the curtains to cheer ourselves up a bit.  The colors looked really pretty against the gray sky.  When the sun came back it made the colors so bright!  The felt chains are really easy to make and are good for a little cheer wherever you need it.  You will need:

*Felt

*Scissors

*Sewing Machine

1. Cut circles from felt.  We did various sizes, free hand.  Wool Felt Central is my favorite felt source.

2.  Line up one felt circle behind the other and do a running stitch through with contrasting thread.  Repeat until you have desired length.

3.  Hang up the rain!

Stamps

16 Thursday Feb 2012

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I love a beautiful stamp.  It completes an invitation or thank you note and stamps are little works of art. I am still amazed that a letter can get all the way across the country in a matter of days for such a small price.  Unfortunately, my over-worked post office staff seems less enthusiastic with the quest for stamp beauty.  (The boring American flag sheets do not count as interesting in my book).

I discovered you can buy stamps online directly from the USPS site (duh).  There are a ton of stamp options that have never seen the inside of a Brooklyn PO and they deliver them for free!  You can even coordinate custom stamps to match your events.  Aah, the beauty of technology and old-school together on an envelope.