Look Who Arrived!

Milicent arrived at my house today! She came wrapped beautifully in vintage pattern paper and jute rope. Milicent's story was typed on a card using an old typewriter. Have you ever seen such a sweetly wrapped package? If I didn't know the cuteness that lay within I might not have been able to make myself open it. Thank you Apryl for such a beautiful package!!!

Inside the beautiful Milicent was waiting for a hug from Nature Girl. Nature Girl gushed over her just like I did. Nature Girl said "Mom, she really is cute. Milicent the little vampire is a good name." Apryl included this beautiful bracelet for me too. It reminds me of rose quartz. Apryl makes gorgeous bracelets and monsters!!

Milicent has a new home on the fireplace mantle. Nature Girl just moved her over on the mantle as she thought Milicent would like to be next to the sheep. She does look cute next to the grubby prim sheep. I guess she won't be lonely after all, she already has a pet.

Lucky Day!

I consider myself a lucky person because I have all the things I need in life but when it comes to contests I don't usually win. Last week was an exception. I'd been drooling over Milicent the Vampiress over at Meridian Ariel's giveaway when low and behold I got an e-mail telling me that I won her. I can't tell you how excited and giddy I was!!!! Yes, I even did a dance in my kitchen when I read Apryl's e-mail. Milicent is coming to live at my house!!! I already have a spot picked out for her to sit when she comes. Of course I'm a little worried that she may get lonely but if that happens Apryl has more monster's in her Etsy shop.

As if winning Milicent wasn't enough, the same day I got a surprise package in the mail from Betty. I had answered some questions about our wonderful swap mama Val over at the Hot Mamas Apron Swap. I didn't know I was one of the winners until the package showed up. Betty sent some fat quarters, needles, thread, a thimble, warm and natural batting and some cute quilter's magnets. Thanks Betty this was a great surprise. I already have a project in mind for the fabrics but I have a few other things to finish up first.
Talk about a lucky day! I haven't won a blog giveaway in two and a half years, since I won Barb's wonder wallet and tissue cover(which are still in my purse.) Then in one day I won two giveaways, I can hardly believe it. Maybe it's time I share some of the luck!

Cat Lady

Someone LOVES cats, can you guess who? Nature Girl, of course! She has always loved cats and stuffed animals. We were cleaning up the playroom the other day and decided to separate all of the cats from the other stuffed animals to see just how many cats she has. Want to hazard a guess? In the picture their are eighteen stuffed cats and one little cat lover, however, we discovered three more stuffed cats afterward that were apparently a little camera shy. That brings the grand total to twenty one cats. So now my question is how many stuffed cats does it take to be a cat lady? I'm not sure but at least these kitties don't smell or ruin the furniture.

Delicious!

From this,

To this,

To this,

Then finally this . . . DELICIOUS!

Fairytales

As you know I signed up for the Fairytale swap. Our partner Victoria choose a Snow White theme. Based on my current apron obsession the wheels in my head started to turn and I thought about a way to make a Snow White apron. Victoria recently moved to her own flat. Every girl with her own place needs an apron so here's what I came up with.

Of course no one wants to dress like a princess all the time so I made the apron reversible.

I went with red with white polka dots because red is my favorite color and Victoria has red and pink appliances in her kitchen. I had fun creating this fairytale apron. I just love fairytales! Don't you?

Now that the Fairytale swap is finished it's time to move on to another fairytale. Val is hosting an Alice in Wonderland apron swap over at Hot Mama's Apron Swap. I've already got my ideas, the fabric and I just received my partner info so I'm off to work on an apron. Before I go I wanted to share a few pictures I painted to add as tuck-ins for the swap. Apryl at Meridian Ariel makes the most gorgeous pictures using old book pages and sheet music. I just love them so I thought I'd give it a try. Stop by Apryl's blog and etsy shop to see her creations. While you're there don't forget to check out her amazing vintage monsters. Lillian & her Slightly Sinister Strawberry and Dexter are my favorite monsters so far but they are all awesome! I love the unique little story that comes with each monster. I hesitate to tell you that she's doing a giveaway featuring one of her monsters, because I want to win. Now I'm acting like Dexter the imp, of course it's not very nice of me as I should spread the monster love and give you your chance to take one of these little cuties home. So hurry over to Apryl's blog and enter before July 23rd. I'd leave a comment everyday if it didn't seem like cheating!

Back to the painted pages . . . no project is complete without a little help from Nature Girl. She painted the caterpillar and mushroom and drew the Red Queen's soldier for me to paint. I love how they turned out! How cute is that Red Queen's soldier?!! Now I'm not sure what to do with them but something will come to mind.

Blueberries for Sal or Nature Girl

Blueberries for Sal is a classic book. We always pull it out when we go berry picking in the summer. What can I say it's the teacher in me, I have to included some type of educational link in each activity. As you can probably guess, we went blueberry picking this week. The berries were big, juicy and YUMMY! We planned to go early in the morning to beat the heat but didn't make it to the blueberry farm until noon. It got pretty hot standing under the sun picking berries. Nature Girl and her 4 year old cousin M. helped me pick. The two kids ate and picked before getting too hot to pick any longer. They ended up sitting under the blueberry bushes for a break. I picked as fast as I could trying to fill my bucket. Here's the tally of pounds picked by each of us; M. - 1/2 pound( I think he ate more than he picked,) Nature Girl - 1 1/2 pounds( she also ate a lot of berries as she picked) and me - 7 1/2 pounds. So what does one do with almost ten pounds of blueberries?

We made blueberry pancakes of course! They were so delicious!!! We also made a blueberry crisp which looked a little funny because the crisp part was blue but tasted wonderful with vanilla ice cream. Of course blueberry jam is in the works today. Let's hope it turns out.

Artful Moments

Here is a picture Nature Girl drew of Wall.e. She drew Wall.e then created a background for him. He's riding on Eve's spaceship. I love that part of the movie when he see's all of the stars and wonders of space for the first time. I love that she tried to capture that.
This dragonfly is a that Nature Girl painted. It's hanging on the wall in our entrance. I love dragonflies. I especially like the flowers on her dragonfly.
Lastly this is what a creative little girl makes while her mother is busy packing for a family vacation. She used a hamper, cowboy hat, slippers, barrettes, paper, makers, plastic bags and scissors to create this sculpture.

First Concert

We took Nature Girl to her first real concert this week. When my husband surprised me with tickets for John Mayer last winter Nature Girl's nose was a little out of joint that she wasn't invited along too. So when Jack Johnson tickets went on sale this spring my husband bought tickets for the three of us. We thought this would be the perfect concert for her as it's family friendly music and he runs a green tour which is an idea near and dear to Nature Girl.
She was funny when she saw all the trash and broken bottles in the parking lot outside of the concert. She kept commenting on how these people weren't taking care of the earth and that was bad. We got to the concert early and took our seats. Nature Girl and I began reading a book(Where the Mountain Meets the Moon) until the warm up bands came on. Jack Johnson didn't get on stage until 10pm. Nature Girl was excited but shortly into the concert she began to be bothered by a smell. I should note that Nature Girl has an especially sensitive nose and doesn't like smelly things. Not that I like that particular smell either and it's illegal. Anyway, we got through that just fine and she was thrilled when Jack Johnson played Bubble Toes, it's her favorite song. Overall it was a great concert. Jack Johnson is one of my favorites. I usually listen to his albums when I'm sewing. I find it to be very relaxing to listen to his music and sew. I told my husband I felt like I should have brought my sewing machine with me to the concert. Of course I didn't really bring it!!
We arrived back at the hotel at 12:30am. After eating a bunch of gummy bears she settled into bed and finally went to sleep at about 1:15am. Here she is snuggling with Puffy(her down blanket,) her new travel pillow(from Barb) and four stuffed animals.

Meeting A Blogger Friend

I have to say one of my favorite parts of our vacation was getting the opportunity to meet my blogger friend Barb. Barb lives in Florida. We've been blogger friends for years now. I was so excited when she offered drive up to meet with us at the airport.

We had a very long wait after getting off the cruise ship. I had no idea what I would do to entertain a six year old in an airport for eigth hours, but Barb came to the rescue. She met us in the airport, then took us on a tour of all the wonders the airport had to offer. Barb even brought her daughter Julz along. We joked because Julz had reminded her mom that you aren't supposed to meet in person with people you have met on the internet. While Julz is 100% right, meeting with Barb was like meeting with an old friend. It felt like more like I hadn't seen her for a few months instead of a first meeting. It amazes me that just by reading each others blogs and e-mailing that we could form a friendship that was so easy and enjoyable. I was thrilled to spend the day with Barb and Julz!
Here is a fountain located in the center of the airport. We walked, shopped, chatted and had lunch together. Barb and Julz even got to meet my husband. As most of you know he is elusive and blog shy so he's never featured here but alas he does exist!

Barb was too kind, she brought handmade goodies for each of us. She made a tea wallet for me with a beautiful green mug(same color green as my kitchen) and one of her famous wonder wallets for my husband. We greatly appreciate her kindness and even better it's ironic. Barb and I became blogger friends when I won one of her wonder wallets for leaving a comment on her blog. I still have that very wallet and a matching tissue case in my purse! I've always been impressed with Barb's craft talent. She has an ETSY shop here and makes beautiful bags, wallets and goodies. She does custom orders too.
She made this wonderful travel pillow case so Nature Girl would have something to remember Florida by. Nature Girl loves it!
Since I started blogging a few years ago I have been in contact with many bloggers. I have been constantly amazed by the kindness and generosity of my fellow bloggers. Until last week I have never had the opportunity to meet in person with a blogger friend. I have to say it was a great experience!! Meeting Barb in person was even better than I expected. She is the kind of person anyone would be happy to call their friend and I'm glad we got to meet in person. I hope that this is the first of many more meetings with Barb and family. So Barb if you ever want to come up North you'll always have a place to stay.

We're Back!

We're back from vacation! We enjoyed a four day Disney cruise in the Bahamas. We visited Nassau and Castaway Cay. This is a picture from the island in Nassau where we participated in a stingray adventure. We got to snorkel with, pet and feed the stingrays. Nature Girl was not a fan of the salt water as it tasted bad and hurt her eyes. I was not a huge fan of the stingrays. They felt a little slimy. I would compare them to mushrooms, harmless but a weird texture. The fish we feed them were smelly and gross. They flocked around the feet of Nature Girl and I when they realized we had food. They almost knocked us over and I had to hop on one foot to avoid stepping on and possibly injuring them. It was definitely a different experience.


We enjoyed the water and the beach. It was hot and humid but very enjoyable. Nature Girl bought a big conch shell and has been practicing blowing into it. She's getting better at it.


One thing that amazed me was the color of the water. I think you hear everyone say that but it's true. It's so much more blue! If you are looking for a fun family vacation I would suggest a Disney Cruise. The food was great, the shows and movies were fabulous and we enjoyed ourselves!

Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July to you! Nature Girl drew this picture and said "Happy America Day!" It seemed like the perfect picture for this post. We hope you have a wonderful holiday.