mamaroots

what to say . . .

Have you caught the controversy over the Spanish dolls that encourage teaching breastfeeding?  How can this be a controversy?  Why is it okay for girls to mimic being mothers with dolls but controversial to let them mimic breastfeeding- makes me scratch my head- I say give them a doll that shows birthing and breastfeeding!  This is a lovely one A Toy Garden. 

And just another lovely spot for breastfeeding- we went to go see Ponyo- the newest Miyazaki movie yesterday with the boys and there is a small spot in the movie where a breastfeeding mama talks to the two main character children about how she eats well so she can make more milk for her baby-thank you Miyazaki!

sometimes play is as simple as . . .

friends, huge blanket and clip forts, wagon rides and creating something from the scrap bucket!  A simple glimpse at the joys of playdate and watching these kiddos create!

renew

The simple act of Jasper wanting to make a quilt this week prompted me to go through my fabric, then to my cleaning and organizing the whole studio.  I had an even bigger awakening to my stashing behind doors and drawers!  I spent almost a whole day working on it!  It was a great de-stash, detox week that I celebrated by going and getting Soulemama's new book Handmade Home.  I have not had a chance to dive in too deeply yet, just that initial ahhhh moment of leafing through while the boys looked on asking questions.  They were intrigued by the pictures of the children.  The best was when Jasper asked me if Soulemama had a big soul.  I said I had not ever met her, but judging by her blog and book that she seems indeed to have a very big loving soul!

 

The boys and I also got the opportunity in between projects to head to the flea market to treasure hunt.  I found a fantastic old paper cutting board and pencil sharpener for the art area.  I was on the hunt for some old feed sack fabric for a neat project I am "cooking" up and found some lovely pieces.  The day would not be complete without a couple marbles!  The boys pooled their spending money together for a really neat wood pirate ship light that they are setting up a pirate area. 

So with a newly cleaned studio/art area and some new/old fabric pieces I am feeling very renewed and ready for some crafting!  Hope you are enjoying the new book also, I think our first project is going to be the one world banner.  How about you?  Any of you local mamas needing a copy of Handmade Home you know there are some copies at the University Bookstore that I of course ordered in, and here is a link for on-line with my favorite Independent online shop! 

piece it together

I am going to let you in on a little know magical book to read if you need just another little something either before or after Mr. Potter.  I read this book years ago when I was back in the book business fresh back to Missouri after living in Colorado for a while.  I had been recommended to read Jane Yolen and was intrigued by the cover of Wizard's Hall.  It was actually written about 6 years before Harry entered the world.  It has definite similarities but it's own development with universal themes of young wizards.  The storyline also is not nearly as developed as the world that J.K. Rowling has created for us with Hogwarts, but . . . it really is a lovely story.  It stands on its own merits and style.  We just finished it up the other night and the boys really enjoyed it.  There is a quilted beast that really conjoured up their imaginations in all of the senses, look, touch, smell, sound.  They particularly liked making beast faces!

So what is a mama to do to celebrate finishing such a lovely novel here at the end of the summer?  Well make the boys their own quilted beast that likes to live on the book shelf!  This puppy took me about 2 hours start to finish with the cutting, sanding and adding all of the patches- but they are worth it for sure!  I decided to take it a step further and we talked about how to make quilts which spurred an idea from Jasper to make a quilt for the beasty when he gets cold!  So he picked out the fabric, I helped with the rotary cuts, and he stitched!  So far he has all four rows together and ready to assemble!  Do you want to know the most magical thing of all?  Our neighbor fella friend came over to play and said "oh you are sewing, let me show you this neat, easy stitch.  3 boys sitting and stitching- who needs a wizard's wand when you have magic like that!  

 

I will post the progress of the quilt, piece by piece!

saying goodbye

One of Jasper's good buddies that he has know since starting K at his school is moving with her family to a really great city.  We are very excited for them, but also we were pretty sad to say goodbye.  Friday night Jasper was not sure if he wanted to go to the going away party on Saturday .  It was so heartening to see my child navigate his emotions.  He shed tears, didn't want to go.  We talked about how sad we would feel if we did not go and get to say goodbye before our friends moved.  I suggested he sleep on it for the night and see how he felt in the morning.  

 

Amazing the magic sleep can have, he decided he would like to go and we made a little Snail Mail set for her so they can keep in touch.  I love making these for friends.  Even if you don't like to sew, I think you will like this project.  It is a simple piece of felt the you cut a bit bigger than the width of your average greeting card size envelope.  Make it large enough to fold up from the bottom and then a little bit over the top.  Stitch up the sides, add a button and put in a slit in the top.  I like to use felt since it does not ravel.  The wool blends are nice and sturdy.  I also added a quick little piece of muslin and stamped her name.  Jasper decorated some stationary.  Make sure to go ahead and add the stamps, then we added a tag with his address on it.  She is all set to write her friends!  Of course we had to include a friendship rock!

We were all set and it was just a super sweet party with the magic of some cake, lemonade, and pure joy of the kids running at the park and discovering a hidden fort in the trees.  It was such a simple lovely way for the kids to be together before she moved.  Luckily she is moving to such a fun city that it will be a good excuse to visit!  We will miss her and her sweet family.

Here is a couple resources for you to make your own felt snail mail envelopes:

Wool Felt Squares

Tree Branch Buttons

Personalize Rubber Stamps

**Thanks everyone for your sweet comments- I shared them with Jasper!  It prompted the boys to get out their envelopes and look at their old letters from friends!  Here is a couple more pictures of some of the first ones I made for the boys last year.  Now who wants to write some letters!

brown baggin it

or maybe I should say brown basket!  I wanted to show a quick little snippit of my lunch routine.  Growing up I took my lunch to school.  At the time in my childhood centered world I did not understand why I had to take my lunch when several of my buddies held onto their plastic, rectangle, lunch plates with the neatly divided sections holding the ever enticing square lunch pizza, or grilled cheese sandwiches.  As a parent that chooses the school route for my sons, it all makes sense to me now why my mama packed my lunch.  It is expensive to eat school lunches and it is not your food.  Granted I went to a very small very rural school, K-12 in one building and there were 3 sweet ladies that made the school lunches mostly from scratch every day, I know my mama was still thinking about the same things we think about today.

When I go to have lunch with Jasper at school and see the sack lunches, I am happy that he still totes his lunch everyday.  I am impressed that there is at least some fresh fruit and veges in the school lunches at his school for the kids that eat there, and his school is a partner with the local Slow Food group. 

I guess all that lunch packing influenced me because I take my lunch 99% of the time as an adult.  This is a peak today.  In my basket I have a bamboo fork and spoon, yogart, homemade granola made by hubby, local peach from the market, hard boiled egg (hubby tip- boil several at a time and then just mark HB- keep in the fridge), sugar snaps.  It is also "food day" at work so I did one of my office food day survival stand bys- guacamole and blue chips.  It is a good contrast to all of the cookies! 

I just started using some fabric reusable snack bags, they save on all of the plastic bags and make a good covering for my bolga basket.  I noticed that just the fabric bags don't keep bread or crackers fresh- need to look into the lined ones- but there is the plastic/vinyl delimma again.  I am hoping to make or get some more bags for Jasper's lunch box this year.  My basket came from A Toy Garden just for the heck of it because I just love these baskets!  Of course I adore Bento boxes also-this is a fun book for Bento lunch ideas.  Who's hungry??

got milk . . .or maybe some mushrooms!

 

My boys headed out for another quick camping trip before the school bell rings!  That means some more fun quick little antique shopping after work today.  I could not resist these great treasures- I found a super cute old milk stool  that I have been needing for myself at the art table so the boys can have their chairs back.  I also found a wonderful old milk jar to hold my marbles and I managed to find a lovely old Bennington Marble- pottery or stoneware marbles with a brown or blue glaze.  You will have to bear with me, I am in marble world right now working on the storyline of my next book- I think I settled on the title- let me know what you think  . . .Elias and the Tree Stairs, or Elias' Secret Stairs-

I also set up the ol' cobbler bench ready for the boys when they get home for some good old fashioned cobbler bench learning.  It should not surprise you that it is mushrooms!  I am introducing a new mushroom into the shop- the Citrina Amanita-  a lovely pale green mushroom.  I love mushrooms and could seriously eat them every day- just have to watch out for the poisonous ones!

Some fun mushroom reading for you from the bench:

Mushroom in the Rain

Mushroom Center Disaster

Maybe I can sneak in one more trip to the antique shop before they return! 

food inc.

Yesterday we decided to hop on the bikes and go down to our local theatre and watch Food Inc. with the boys.  Not since the movie Tableland have I seen such a movie about food.  If there is one movie that I think you should see this year- this is it.  It is shocking, depressing, and at parts you even question if this is America we are talking about.  Make sure to take your hankies.  Jody and I were both shedding tears in the section talking about Kevin's Law.  Afterwards the last thing I wanted to do was to think about what we would eat, but I was reminded at the end the we have the power to change.  One part of the movie says it well that you have the power to vote everytime you check out at the grocery store. 

I feel like we do some things well with food, eat 90% of our meals at home, pack lunches, seek out local farmers, but we have so much room in our lives to improve also.  Jasper said as we were getting ready to bike home, now I know why you don't like us to eat McDonalds!  One other thing said was grow a garden (even a small one).  My family has chosen to be urbanites.  We chose this for lots of reasons, but one is we like to be withing biking and walking distance from where we work, go to school, and really do our living.  We live in a small neighborhood within about a mile and half of our downtown.  We have a small house with a pretty small yard, but we are able to have a small garden to try and grow a few things.  Though not perfect, just a start and the biggest lesson- our children can see and taste food and understand how it grows.  Literally our front garden is probably 3 x 10- and it use to be flowers but we converted it to veges, our side herb garden in a bit bigger probably 4 x 20 along our carport, and we have another small garlic bed in the back that is 6x8 (looove garlic)  we are trying to establish raspberries in the back also.  So all in all not too big, but we are enjoying it.  Here are some highlights of pictures I took yesterday

garlic harvest

melons

okra

basil and the basil guardian!

So- we yesterday for dinner- Farmer's Market was closed so I dashed over to Wilson's where I had gotten produce before and scored a lovely eggplant, heriloom tomato, zucchini, green beans, and patty pan squach for 5 bucks and Jody cooked it all up for us.  For my local folks, here are some resources for local food:

Boone County Farmer's Market

Columbia Farmer's Market

Patchwork Family Farms

Root Cellar

Cherry Hill Market

Goatsbeard Farms

There are several other spots in town, but this is just a start- if you get a chance see this movie- hard to stomach at times, but so important.

A little birdie told me

the winner for the August edition for Herbal Roots is Marqueta!  I hope you enjoy the wonderful zine that Kristine has done for August.  I am going to need to see if I can get some Calendula planted as I checked a couple of my local nursery's today and they did not have it. 

If you noticed the sweet critter on the August cover is a barn swallow and that means this sweet little wooden barn swallow in the picture will be flying east to Kristine's farm and be popping up on the Herbal Roots blog as a giveaway- be on the watch and I will announce it here also when the contest is up!