Paper Pie

Found While Reorganizing

* Baby photo of myself c. 1977 (looks like Rylie, no?)

* A new "toy"

* A new spot

*A Giveaway . . .

Magic

Hello and welcome to anyone new visiting from Vickie's Spun Sugar Quilts blog. I had such a nice time doing a little interview and giveaway over there. You can win a stack of 8 fat quarters from the Sugar Pop line if you head on over and leave a comment letting us know your favorite city. Vickie will randomly select a winner on Monday, March 28. Best of luck!

There has been a lot of hubbub around here lately as we are switching bedrooms, moving fruniture, decluttering, reorganizing and getting ready for an upcoming garage sale. Just typing that made me a little tired. It is exciting though, and with a few tweaks, we kinda feel like we live in a whole new apartment. I will share our progress on all of that very soon, but right now things are kinda in shambles. That's why yesterday was total magic; bliss of the best kind. An unexpected day of fun right smack dab in the middle of the week. Ryan had the day off and we made the most of it instead of running around frantically trying to maximize the amount of work we could get done.

It all started with doughnuts! Ryan has been perfecting his recipe and with a lot of patience and trial and error, he made these treats. He is still working it out, and is learning quickly that baking is an exact and delicate process.

Rylie reminds us everyday that she is minutes away from crawling and it may be a good time to remove the glass from the bookshelf. Have I mentioned here that we have been calling her Doodles? It's her nichkname and it fits her to a tee.

Around noon, Ryan said "Hey, let's go for a walk to the park before it rains. And we should really stop at the French market for more coffee, don't you think?" Umm...Yes, definitely.

At the park, we introduced Rylie to sand. Her and sand got along brilliantly, that is, until she wanted to put it in her mouth.
  On the way home, it started to rain. The drops were big and fat and they darkened the sidewalk fast.

But, in Southern California, the sun is never gone for long, and by the end of the day everything was glitzy as Hollywood. And then look what happened...

The Family Creative Workshop

Last weekend, we were in our neighborhood thrift shop picking out treasures. After convincing Ryan that, yes, we did need a miniature root beer mug and a cute, Made in Japan ladel, I dropped all of that stuff and went slack-jawed when I saw these on the bookshelf.

What? Craft and creativity books published in 1974?
Yes please, how much?
$10 for all of them?
Sold.

Let's start with the covers, shall we? The big, bold color photography drew me right in. But listen to some of the topics covered: hooked rugs, baby foods, ant farms, hibachi, canoeing, dried flowers, cheeses and churning, and the list goes on and on. Every time I look at them I get all giddy with a rush of craft aspirations. Could I really cut an old pickle jar to create canisters for beans, grains and spices? Is there a way that I could turn the garage into a workshop and get a welding gun? But I actually think I could start with the familiar and that would keep me occupied for several months, if not years. And I don't even have the complete set of books. Viva the 70s!

Yellow

The other night, after her bath, Rylie was wrapped up in her yellow towel, with her yellow rubber ducky in hands, being held by her daddy who wore a yellow t-shirt, all while standing in the yellow kitchen.

I hope your day is sunshine and yellow!

Another Giveaway

::GIVEAWAY CLOSED - Congratulations to Dinkwerks Quilts with comment #6.

Please email me your mailing address and I will get your copy to you right away!
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Look what came in the mail a few days ago:

Issue #2 of the Craftsanity Magazine! I have long been a fan of the Craftsanity Podcast, I used to cue it up and listen on my headphones while I was working away in my cubicle. Craftsanity creator, Jennifer Ackerman-Haywood, writes, broadcasts and crafts from Grand Rapids, MI which is about 40 minutes from my hometown of Muskegon, MI. So, I've always had a fondness. Jennifer is a journalist by trade and it is very apparent in her excellent writing and interviewing skills. Plus, she is funny, warm, curious, honest and open. She asks great questions and her podcasts are detailed and meaninful. All in all a very good listen and a great way to lift your spirits and get inspired. One word of caution: they are highly addictive! I have listened to most all of the 123 episodes that she has put out so far, some of them twice! It is also pretty neat to hear the voices of the crafters and bloggers that I admire most. To hear instead of just read, ya know?

The magazine is jam packed with projects and, just like the podcast, it is super interesting and irresistable. Here are a few of my favorites from this issue:

I love these cute Bunny and Chick Egg Cozies by Ana Paula Rimoli. This project has me thinking about crochet again. Remember last time?

I love the book review section. I am somewhat of a craft book collector, rather than a craft book user (there I said it.) Admitting my habit does not change the fact that I really want to go and get this one. Liesl has a fabric line with Moda as well, have you seen City Weekend?

Basketweaving? Don't mind if I do. I would love to try my hand at this one, it is so adorable. There is something so charming about a bike with a handwoven basket. I need more of that in my life I think. I can't wait until Rylie is big enough for a bike seat. Actually, I can wait. She is already growing so fast.

This little tutorial about curling kid's hair with rags is really interesting. I love the long ringlets it creates, but also love the look of an updo tied with rags. Rylie has a little bald head that I can not stop kissing. However, my own hair has sort of taken on a life of its own and I would love to try this out. Little curly low pigtails on each side, uh huh.

These flowers made with a fork are sweet and might be great in this vase of mine. I feel a little spring spruce up coming on!

Have I mentioned that I have two copies sitting here beside me? One for you and one for me. All you have to do is leave me a comment telling me your favorite thing about spring and on Monday March 21 I will randomly pick a winner. Good Luck! Which reminds me . . . Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Fabric Giveaway ** Sugar Pop! Two 1 Yard Cuts

::GIVEAWAY CLOSED - Congratulations to Carol in E TN with comment #29.

Carol, if you could please email me your mailing address I will get the fabric to you right away!

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Now that Sugar Pop! is out and about in the world, I think a giveaway is in order, don't you? This time it might be nice to offer up a meatier cut, like a full yard. And because two yards are always better than one, I'll offer up two 1 yard cuts in coordinating prints. How about Mod Buds and Summer Flowers in the pink colorway?

Sometimes the pinks and plums get lost in the collection because aqua and chartreuse are such camera hogs. But I love the pink color way with the plum and orange accents. Just think of all you could cook up with a yard of these. Maybe a simple spring-y summer-y frock for you or a little girl in your life. 

Ryan told me this morning that he likes my fabrics when they are applied to projects for kids. There you have it—from a husband of a fabric designer, and a dad—these prints work well for the wee set too!

I will be giving away 1 yard each of Summer Flowers and Mod Buds both in the pink colorway to a randomly chosen commenter. And from now through St. Patrick's Day, I will be offering 15% off at the WonderFluff shop. Just enter "paperpie" in the notes to seller at checkout and I will refund the discount via PayPal. Oh, and I think I will keep the comments open on this one until St. Patrick's Day too. So check back at this post on March 17 for the winner.

Legwarmies

I started these legwarmies a while back when it rained and rained for days on end. I know it was a while ago because I knit the majority while Rylie sleepily nursed. Nowadays, I would not get away with knitting while nursing. She would definitely be grabbing my yarn and needles the whole time! I do remember looking down a few times to see her gently holding my yarn as I knit away and my heart would melt into a giant puddle of raindow kisses.

The legwarmies are from this pattern and I have lots of the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino that it recommends, which knits like a dream. They are so cute and so soft, I would love to knit Rylie a set of these in every color. And I just might do that considering they help keep her legs warm while she is scooting around the floor these days. I can easily pull them down from her knees so she can get the extra traction as she is learning to crawl.

Plus, they look darn cute with her cloth diapers. I have been asked a lot about how it is going with the diapers and here is an update:

We love cloth diapers. It has taken us a little trial and error to find the process that works best for us, but now we feel like seasoned pros. At first, it was a bit of an adjustment because the cloth diaper feels much more wet to Rylie than her disposable diapers. So we had to get used to changing her more often. Which I am all for. I would hate for her to sit in a wet diaper too long and get a rash. Because she is able to feel when she is wet there is a chance that she will be ready to use the potty earlier and leave those diapers behind altogether. That would be awesome! Nowadays, she wets way more than she used to in terms of volume. This is completely logical considering her bladder is now bigger than it used to be and can hold more. So if she wakes in the night, I will change her diaper. But just in case she doesn't wake, we have been putting two of the microfiber inserts into her diaper cover instead of one. This gives her extra back up absorbency. Rylie is not keen on being disturbed during the night.

And since she is growing so quickly these days, we have gone up one size on her diaper's adjustable snaps. This is precisely the reason that the one size adjustable diaper was so important to us. We did not want to have to buy a whole batch of new diapers every time Rylie outgrew the last one.

The most notable change in our regimen of late is the handling of number twos. Since Rylie began eating solids about a month ago, the number twos have changed - big time. We are no longer able to just throw those dirties into the laundry, now the poo needs to be removed from the diaper and flushed down the toilet. This whole process has become loads (hee hee) easier after we purchased this diaper sprayer which has proven to be a game changer. It is super simple to install and it allows us to easily rinse the diaper contents into the toilet. No mess—no worries, and I assure you, it is not as gross as it sounds.

Not quite up for the challenge of traveling with cloth diapers, we used Nature Babycare disposables and wipes when we went to Michigan this past January. They worked well and held up to Rylie's epic dirty diaper that she had on take off during our flight back to LA.