The Hard Knock Life

A while ago I went shopping at Marshall's and found a pair of pants for $2 or $3 - can't remember which price it was. My daughter despises pants. For her first two years of preschool she wore pants exactly four days. I purchased the pants knowing I would change it into a skirt for her. I cut the pants and sewed it into a skirt yesterday morning. She loved it and wore it to our outing of the day - Annie, the musical.


And, FYI, if you do choose to attend the touring production of Annie it is about three hours long - my kids were whining that their stomachs were hungry and didn't want to stay for the second act. We bribed them with M&M's and Junior Mints to finish the show. Next time I'll have to remember to pack a larger purse with food in case the theater runs out of pretzels (like the one we were at today did). Overall they had a great time and even my husband was singing about the Hard Luck Life (his version) on our ride home.

In like a lion, out like a - lion?

I thought the motto for March weather was In like a lion and out like a lamb. This year, it seems the March lion does not want to leave. Here in New England I woke up to snow. The yard looked very pretty before I allowed the dogs and kids out to play in the white stuff. The snow was too heavy to lift and make traditional snowmen once rolled into large snowballs so we did the next best thing and made snow animals.

We made a snow unicorn (really, it looks like a caterpillar but who am I to argue with a six-year-old)

and a turtle - or a horse depending on which child you ask. We also tried to use the boogie board to slide down the hill in the yard but the sticks and leaves kept getting in the way.

Oh well. Time to get everyone warmed up with some hot cocoa!

Elixir

Have you ever watched the Powerpuff Girls? The Powerpuff Girls were created by Professor Utonium. He mixed up the perfect little girl potion (sugar & spice & everything nice!). Chemical X accidentally mixed into his potion as well creating - the Powerpuff Girls. My girls have seen this movie a few times and we own at least six Powerpuff Girls books. Recently, my six-year-old has decided that she needs to make Chemical X by mixing all the chemicals in the house together. I banned her from making Chemical X.

Every time I catch her mixing up a new batch of 'soap and water' (it's all she is allowed to use) it has turned into something new - a poison from the Barbie movie Mariposa (TM), a sleeping potion, anything but Chemical X. I have apparently only banned the making of Chemical X in the house. I don't want to squash her creativity but I don't want her accidentally poisoning herself or her sister by mixing something up that she shouldn't or, even if it is only soap and water, having her or her sister drink it and making themselves sick from the soap. If only it was nice outside and I could supervise water play out-of-doors instead of all over my kitchen, living room and bathroom.

Special Visitor

Last year around this time we had a wood duck in our chimney. Over the seven years that we have lived in our home we have seen hawks, turkeys, and turkey vultures in our yard. Today, there was a new bird.

Say hello to the seagull that was on our back deck. I ran up to the third floor to grab my camera and saw him on our roof. I have never seen a seagull around here before - we live near a swampy area, not the ocean. Of course, I opened the window and grabbed a photo before he flew away.

I also made two fabric eggs for the easter baskets. The one on the left was my first attempt at the pattern I downloaded from Sew Mama Sew. It kind of looks like a cross between a ball and a hacky sack. If you look closely you can see the quarter that is in the hidden pocket. The egg with the chicken print was my second (and much eggier) attempt.

Hope everyone had a great easter!

Mud

So - it was over 40 degrees outside the other day. My daughter decided to go out and do ballet on our front lawn wearing a fairy costume. Then, she found a hole our Saint Bernard must have made. She quickly changed her ballet into a muddy feet dance. The joys of Spring in New England.

We just figured out Blue's Clues!

Because we just saw Blue's Clues Live!

And nothing tops off a day at the theater better than - purchasing another 90-gallon fish tank.

Hubby taking care of the easy assembly.

The girls enjoy playing in it while daddy isn't looking.

Future Scientists

For our older daughter's birthday my husband purchased a number of 'kits' at Michael's (the craft store) of all places.

These include:

• grow your own sea monsters (totally cool - it worked - every playdate has to look at our sea monsters)
• grow carnivorous plants (container needs to be placed in the fridge for EIGHT weeks - ummmm - it is in my garage - real estate in the fridge is at a premium)
• grow your own crystals - experiment just started a few days ago - hoping for some spectacular crystals (and for my husband to stop imitating The Dark Crystal characters 'Skekie's bad').

The safety glasses, sported by the older of the two budding scientists, are from the crystal kit. Note - she has the magnifying glass by her tooth that is growing in.

Crayon Roll

I found the link to this crayon roll tutorial from the Sew Mama Sew website. The tutorial is easy and the crayon roll makes great gifts and is a great way to use cute kid fabric that I buy on impulse but never quite know what to do with it once I get it home.

I did change a few things. I actually think making it a half inch wider on all sides would be good since I am doing a decorative stitch around the outside instead of a straight stitch. Also, I close up the gap where the roll is turned inside out with some stitch witchery. When I do it without fusing the seams together I always seem to get puckering or part of the seam just doesn't seem to sit quite right. And, I can't do a decorative stitch.
And fray block on the ends of the ribbon is absolutely needed. The first ones I did for my daughters are all frayed. This will be off to a birthday girl tomorrow - hope she likes it!

Crafty Cooking Kit (TM)

My older daughter received a Crayola Crafty Cooking Kit (TM) as a present. We had a blast using it. It would have been a 'not too messy' craft if I hadn't left my younger daughter alone with the flour bucket (see above image). What I didn't take a photo of was the floor, where most of the flour that used to reside in the bucket wound up.


To make the dough just add margarine & an egg. Mixing up the icing is a breeze. Just add water.


The paint tray. Before the girls completely obliterated the colors to become black, black and you guessed it black.

And - some of their creations. Faces, a rainbow, unicorns and monochromatic themes once the others became too much work.

Here fishy, fishy, fishy...

So, we have a new fish tank. A 90-gallon fish tank. Complete with fish stand and lid on top (to hopefully keep the children from (a) trying to swim in the tank and (b) trying to catch fish when their daddy isn't looking.

Of course, it didn't come home looking like that. It looked more like this:


The joys of easy assembly.