Thursday, November 21, 2013

Cute Little Lunches

If you are a Mom and have access to the internet, you have seen them.  You don't even have to be a Pinterest addict to know what I am talking about. 

Those cute little packed lunches with star shaped veggies and heart shaped fruit intended to prove you are the better Mom lure your little darling into consuming healthy food. 

This is not a discussion about the merits of such food preparation.  What I want to know is this :  What becomes of all those little leftover bits of meat, cheese and veggie after you have carved Mt. Rushmore from a cucumber??

Sure you can sometimes use the bits in a quesadilla or quiche or something.... but on a daily basis. Seriously?  I have a enough trouble coordinating dinners and turning leftover roast into soup etc.  If I also had to mentally track what my lunch leftovers were going to be and how to use them efficiently things would get crazier than they already are.

So what do all of you cute-lunch making moms really do with those extra bits?  

~ Christina 

Monday, September 30, 2013

Last Day!

This is the last day to enter the Cherry City Kids drawing for a $30 gift certificate.  Some of you have "liked" posts but you must go to the facebook page and like the page to enter.  The drawing is at 9 pm tonight and I will post the winner Tuesday morning.  So fun!

~ Christina 

Monday, September 23, 2013

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Making "Oops!", "Awesome"

A few weeks ago I sketched a dress silhouette on a post-it note and showed it to Miriam as we were walking out the door to school.  She immediately decided that the bias strips on the dress should be in an ombre/ gradient in various shades of pink.  It was a simple sheath dress so I used a trusty bodice pattern I had made for her already and lengthened it.

I got a roll of medical exam paper in the mail this week and I am using it as pattern tracing paper.  Works great!


Finding a nice gradient of solid pinks in the same weight fabric proved difficult so I decided this would require busting out gloves and dye.  Here are all the pieces lined up before the dye-bath. 


This is where we go "oops!" - Pink is a Miriam color.  Purple not so much....  and this came out pretty darn purple, more purple than this pictures shows.  This gives you an idea of how the dress would have looked.


Thankfully shretch knit is forgiving, and stretches.  A bit of cutting and what would have been a dress for little sister becomes a stylish and comfy skirt for big sister (who happens to like purple just fine).






This shot has the color most accurate, the other are a bit light and pink.  The long sleeves of the dress became a hem band to make this is long enough for Abigail.  Awesome!  

~ Christina 

Thursday, September 05, 2013

First Day of School

The kids' official first day of school was Wednesday but I am just getting a couple of pictures up now. 

David protested that I had taken his picture the day before, but this was his actual first day of class.  He had to badger the office to get his schedule changed so that he could take the required PE class.  They suggest he put it off until his Sr. year - um, no.  
It looks like this will be a challenging year but he likes most of his teachers.  By the end of the year he will be ready for the AP Chem exam and the AP US history exam. - Go David!


This is me piggy-backing on Adriel's beautiful pictures.  Despite not having any classes with her best friend, Abigail likes most of them and is excited that she will finally have a challenging math course.  She is taking a slightly accelerated class that will have her doing Algebra in 8th grade so she can move straight into geometry as a freshman.


Miriam had a great day, likes her new teacher and is super happy to have her best-buddy Autumn at her table group.  Her teacher, Ms. Hopkins, has traveled extensively and Miriam loves all of the stuff from Paris around the room. 
 This year part of Miriam's homework is to receive and respond to notes from family members and friends.  These notes and emails will be placed into a notebook all year-long.  This helps to improve her letter writing skills and acts as a keep-sake for her.  All of you grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins out there - get writing and help Mim with her homework.  Short notes are just fine and asking questions is a great way to give her something to respond about.

Thank you!

~Christina