Problem Solving with Craftiness!

With Baby J, comes a lot of stuff.  I have finally gotten his play area under control, but there is always things that want to get out of control.  For example, we have these adorable little alphabet books we got from one of Boom’s co-workers:

Problem is, if they don’t have a place to go, they go everywhere!  Or else I would just hide them away and we didn’t get to enjoy them.  Well, I was looking around my mud room, and found this:

An empty container that once held baby wipes (got them as part of a shower gift).  The books fit perfectly inside of this container (with the top off), but the label wouldn’t come off (I didn’t try all that hard).  I had been playing around with my Mod Podge and recently became the proud owner of a brayer (after perusing this excellent blog, if you ever want to get into Mod Podging) so I though, Ah ha!  I will try my newly acquired techniques out.

Getting advice from an expert is definitely the way to go.  I got my paper wet, then Mod Podged it, then went over it with the brayer.  Here is the finished product:Now it looks adorable!  And I love that I am upcycling something that otherwise would be taking up energy to be recycled or space in a landfill.  I know my pack rat ways kind of bug Boom, but when I can reuse items and make solutions for problems I have, why not?!

So I continued on my Mod Podging ways – we finished this last week:

(which Boom now refuses to buy as he claims it is way too expensive)

I took the label off (it came off quite easily):

cleaned the inside and them Mod Podged some cute scrapbooking paper to the outside:

Now I have an adorable lidded container to hold stuff (currently empty), but I am sure I will find a use for it soon.

Another issue is corralling Baby J’s books in his play area:

I made him a couple  round storage bins, and started using one for book storage, but it didn’t work well for a few reasons – 1) it is round and books are not, 2) too floppy, and 3) not big enough.

So I got a white rectangular storage bin for his books, but it looked way to plain to me.  I thought I would do a freezer paper stencil to add a decoration, but turns out, freezer paper doesn’t iron onto non-cotton type fabric.  Onto Plan B – doing a contact paper stencil to add my decoration.  I designed what I wanted to go onto the bin, printed it out, traced it (backwards) onto the contact paper, cut it all out, then stuck the design onto the bin:

This was somewhat more difficult than I had thought it would be, as I had to get all the negative shapes in the correct place.  and there were lots of bits and pieces that were just floating out there.  But I did my best.  Then I painted:

Here’s the finished product:

And now I love it!  I think it looks adorable!  I think the bin probably cost me less than $5, and with just a little elbow grease, I was able to make it into something cute!

Am I nesting?  I dunno, but I have been getting a lot of projects done lately!  I guess I know in less than 10 weeks I will be in pure survival mode.  So I am taking advantage of this time now to indulge my crafty side.

And here is a picture of the most adorable baby (banker) in the world:

Um, me…

Yay!  I am using my new baby food maker for the first time today!

(Image from Giggle.com)

Baby J has been eating organic whole grain rice cereal for nearly two weeks now, so I think he is ready to try some sweet potatoes!

I have some mommy friends who feed their babies organic baby food from a jar.  Which is much better than the old pesticide filled baby food.  and they can see that the only ingredients are, say, carrots and water.  My argument for making ones own baby food (if one has the desire and time) is that if I wanted a carrot, I wouldn’t open up a can of carrots for myself.  I’d peel a carrot and eat it.  So for Baby J, I fee the same way.  Fresher is always better.  Just like you wouldn’t give your family frozen meals every night because it is convenient.

And yes, the Babycook is a little expensive, up front.  But I hear those little jars of organic baby food aren’t cheap either.  So I bet it evens out, and maybe even becomes cheaper to make your own baby food.  Lucky me, some of my friends in VA bought the Babycook for me as a shower gift.

Before I could use my Babycook this morning, I had to deal with Baby J’s diapers.  Meaning, pre-cleaning them (me) and then washing them (washing machine).   I then came to the realization that I am becoming that mom.  Hopefully I am not too annoying or preachy… and I guess my thought on it is that right now my “job” is to be the best mom to Baby J that I can.  So, since I do have the time and inclination, I will do anything and everything in my power to make sure he is the healthiest, happiest baby he can be!

Earth Day

Happy belated Earth Day!

I like to think that Boom and I are very green – we recycle everything (as in sometimes I fish things out of the garbage to put them into the recycling), we use cloth napkins and dish towels, we have reusable bags for groceries (and errand running), I try to upcycle (like gallon cartons into storage containers, and glass jars with spray painted tops to match one another) to keep using items and not having them have to go into the recycling pile, and now that we have Baby J, we are a cloth diaper family.  Personally, we use bumGenius one-size diapers.  And we love them.  Very occasionally we will need to use disposable diaps for one reason or another, and we are always cursing them!

Sometimes I wonder if I should try another type of cloth diaper, but I am hesitant to do so because we already have a stash of bG diaps… anyway, I found this blog where she gives away different types of cloth diapers.  Currently she is giving away Tiny Tush Hemp Trim Fitted – maybe I’ll win!  Or maybe someone will win who doesn’t currently use cloth diapers, and they will be a convert!  That would be the best, I suppose.

Winner!

I posted a comment on the Green Bag Lady’s blog when she was doing her “A Freebie for 50 Sweeties” giveaway.  I usually never win anything – but lo and behold, I got an email indicating that I had been selected to receive a handmade bag!  and guess what came in the mail today…

I love it!  I am quite good about using fabric bags for groceries and am getting better about remembering to bring my own bag when I go shopping (retail), so this pretty little bag will help me that much more!

Green Bag Lady – thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous!  Be sure to check her out here.

Last Opening Night…

Friday was the last opening night for us in the 2008-09 season. I love opening nights as there is a lot of excitement and anticipation! Boom got to have dinner with me and some of my young donors, which was so fun!

And Yarbs brought a bunch of her friends, which was awesome! Loved seeing her and her peeps during intermission. Greg’s white jacket was so fabulous!

Aren’t we adorable?! I like wearing bright vivid colors! They look so good in photos! and I think they look good with my dark hair.

EK and Tanimal also came to the performance, with some friends. Very sweet of them to do so!

After the performance, our night was not over yet – not even close!

Our new friends, PC and BC, wanted to go out – so we checked out Anvil, a new bar.  It was pretty cool – had some dragon shirts, but I guess most bars in H-town do.

We had a great time – but were out LATE!  Can’t remember the last time we were out until 1am!  Clearly we are getting old, and a little lame.  But it made for a really, really long day / night.  I was still kinda recovering on Saturday afternoon!

Veggie Dog

I got Ruby some veggie dog food yesterday:

One of the benefits that is actually written on the back of the food bag is “Lover Lower Stool Volume” – too funny!

Last night I thought Ruby liked it – I am mixing it in with her meat based food (no byproducts, though) until the meat based food runs out. She ate her bowl of mixed kibble lickety-split. But this morning, I can actually hear her stomach growling, and she refuses to eat her mixed kibble.

She was begging me to get her veggie dog food – not wanting to contribute to the suffering of her fellow animals and to do her part to help save the environment – and now she pulls this?! I am not going to worry, once she is hungry enough, she will bust into the mixed kibble. She is so moody…

Red Sisters

For an additional $200 and no added features except making me smile every time I see them, we got a fire engine RED! washer and dryer set.

When we were at Best Buy purchasing them, I was really fine with white. It was the cheapest and who really cares about the color of your washer and dryer, right? But Boom convinced me to go with RED! since those were the ones I was initially drawn to… and I am glad that we did! (I think and add’l $200 didn’t seem so bad to Boom ’cause the really pretty stainless steel ones were an add’l $2000!)

I love looking at them and seeing them in my lovely mud room makes me smile. Yarbs came over today and saw them and she was all, they are so cute! and I was all, I KNOW! Her theory is that Boom is hoping the RED! will entice me to do laundry more often. We’ll see about that…

I did do my first load this morning (sheet) and used the steam setting (on both washer and dryer) – and the sheets do seem to be cleaner than they ever were in the Ric. That is probably all in my mind.

But the steam dryer setting did really cut down on static electricity, like it said it would. I have stopped using dryer sheets (ran out of the in the Ric and didn’t want to get a new pack since we were moving) and sometimes static cling can be an issue. I went to Whole Foods to see about getting some enviro-friendly dryer sheets, but they all had major essential oil smells, so I couldn’t do it. With this steam dryer setting, it seems that I won’t need dryer sheets ever again (which is the most enviro-friendly, to not use dryer sheets at all)!

Wow, I can’t believe I just typed that. Seems that my life is pretty boring these days, when I am getting excited about not using dryer sheets. Sorry, will try to find more exciting fodder for this blog!