Making Meat for the Babies

The girls started meats almost 2 months ago.  I started with the jarred meats but don't want to continue much longer.  Eventually, I'd like to completely transition to homemade and natural foods for my children (over jarred and pre-made meals).  

My ingredients:
  -Natural ground turkey
 -Organic spinach
 -Onion

According to my online source, the best way to cook meat for babies is to bake it or boil it.  Use the juices so you don't loose any of the nutrients!  

I probably should have used chunks of turkey but had already purchased the ground.  Oh well.  The ingredients were boiled on the stove.  After cooling a bit I blended them up with all the juices.  

It turned out a slightly grainy and the girls made faces at the new food.  I ended up feeding it mixed with fruit.  That technique seems to work for us.  I offer the new "yucky" food.  After they refuse a second bite I mix it with something they already love and keep feeding it to them.  Eventually, they get used to the new food and can eat it by itself. 

Steps to Finish the Petal Bag

After sewing the petals together, they must be attached to a lining square.  Pin the 2 raw edges of the petal to 2 sides of the lining square.  Sew 1/8" from the edge.

Next, I have to sew them together into rows.  I learned during my first petal bag to pin up the petals as they will catch in the seams.

I pinned the petals up again when connecting the rows.

Here are the rows sewed together.  This ends the most time consuming and difficult aspect of making this bag.  

Here you can see the bag sewed together into a tube.  

Bottom of bag is gathered using 2 rows of basting stitches.


It took me a few days to finish the second half of this bag but only because I had to play with various measurements: casing strips, bag lining, and handle.  It should go faster now that I have all the measurements down.

I decided to made the handle.  I made a long tube of fabric (right sides together) and turned it inside out with a safety pin.  For some reason this took me a long time to figure out and a lot of good fabric thrown into the scrap pile.  This technique should have been obvious but I guess I was really tired because I was doing it the hard way. 

I was trying to make binding instead of a tube. You know, 2 raw edges turned in to the center, fold it, and sew it together to make a long 'string'.  It looked horrible and was very time consuming.  At least I didn't waste too much time as I didn't finish it, just too much fabric. 

TA DA!!!!!  The final bag.  It looks great and ended up bigger than I thought it would be.  Definitely purse size and not handbag size. 

My Big Petal Bag

My petal bag is FINISHED!!!  I set out to make my own version of the magazine bag (a horribly written pattern!) and I did it!  It's so difficult for me to blog on a daily basis.  Recently, it seems, I've been binge blogging every 2 weeks.  But let's just pretend that we're in the moment.  I'll post a bit of my petal bag experiment at a time.  As it's past my bed time, (I have to get the babies up early) here is a picture of the petals.  More to come!

Fabric for the Craft Show

Wouldn't it be fun if I sold fabric as well as my finished projects at the craft show?!?  I have been keeping my eye out for good deals at Joann's fabrics.  According to my calculations I could spend up to $4 per yard on fabric (preferably $3) and sell for $6.50 - $8.00 per yard.  

I recently found out that actual businesses do this for their fabric stashes.  I couldn't believe it.  Why would a store with a business license and everything not go through a wholesaler?  Is it the cost of shipping, I wonder?  Does anyone out there know?

Anyways, I found these fabrics on clearance/sale.  The packaging is pretty basic.  I'll have to experiment a bit to get it looking amazing.   

Petal Bag Pattern of my Own

I'm ready to make my own petal bag pattern using the magazine pattern as a guide. This is my first attempt and out of my comfort zone.  In the past this is something I would only dream and plan .  Doing it would never come about.  Now, after having twins and seeing all my free time practically disappear, I realize how precious time is.  I'm trying to better myself, DO more instead of just thinking about it.  Wouldn't it be sad if I sent my kids off to college and said, "Oh, what to do with myself; I think I have a sewing project from 18 years ago that I could work on.". 

Well I'm DOING it!!  I was going to start with scraps because I was afraid of ruining good fabric if I messed up.  But I could only find blue-ish fabric scraps that were big enough.  After much deliberating over the "good" fabric I almost gave up for another day but at the very last second I thought...RAINBOW!  What color combo always works?  Red, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, & violet! 

I added one inch to the size of the petals and I'm doing 8 rows instead of 7.  I'm not going to over think this; my plan is to get the rows together and make the end templates from there.  It's hard for me to visualize the end result as this point but I keep telling myself, "It's just an experiment.  Any mistake is correctable.  If it sucks, I can redo it."  And you know what?  If it just doesn't work out I can reuse the fabric in something else. 

Growing Potatoes for the First Time

Earlier this year I had a bag of potatoes sprouting in my pantry.  I did basic research on how to grow potatoes and ended up planting a few, using the garbage bag method.  It involves planting in a garbage bag and rolling down the sides.  As the plants grow, add soil around them and unroll the bag little by little.  At the end of the season I'm supposed to be able to just cut the bag open and take out my potatoes.

I've never grown potatoes and certainly have not tried this method before.  Crossing my fingers that potatoes are actually growing in there.  If I do it again next year I'll definitely try a different planting technique.  So far, I've noticed 2 problems with this technique...

1. The bag is splitting from the weight of the soil.  Although, I could double bag or use industrial strength bags next time.
2. It has gotten so hot at one point that the rolled sides of the bags have melted to each other in various places.  Of course, this causes more bag tearing as I try to up the sides of the bags.

Potato updates to come...

Garage Sale - BUST

The garage sale was today and it RAINED!!  Everything was perfect too...

• Family stayed the night to help
• We got up early
• Baked muffins to sell
• Made 3 pots of coffee (I borrowed a 3 gallon cambro from work)
• A mini fridge was packed with pop and water
• Everything was out and priced
• The books were displayed on a bookshelf

It was beautiful, artistic even.  I'm sorry I didn't get any pictures of the set up.  When it started to get lighter we noticed the clouds.  We crossed our fingers that it would hold off but at 9:15am it started sprinkling and soon after, pouring.  We shoved it all in the garage and went back in.  (Why wasn't my sale IN the garage you ask?  Well, it's a one car garage and has too much in it already--2 lawnmowers, snow blower, some storage, etc.)

I took the opportunity to drive around and look for kid toys.  Noticing that many people were still out shopping, I went home and we tried one more time after the rain stopped.  What do you think happened?  As soon as we get everything out and people are browsing, it starts rainning again! 

I made $29.

Cat Mice Project

Our cat, Alucard, loves to play fetch with milk rings and little mice.  These mice range from 75cents to $1 a piece.  It's a high price when you consider that Alucard hides/looses the mice within days of getting them.  So I decided to try making my own. 

I've made 7 so far--4 for the cat and 3 for my craft show.  This will be a continuing project--mice for both causes.  It's actually a project I can do downstairs while watching the girls; sometimes they completely ignore me and just want to play with themselves.  It's the perfect moment.

They are made completely from scraps.  The front is cotton fabric and the back is scrap batting.  My teeny tiny scraps are used to stuff the mice.  I've been experimenting with different tails--ribbon, yarn, fabric cut with pinking shears. 

Short tails definitely work best for throwing.

Jeanne's Quilt is Completed!

DONE!  This was soooo very long in the making.  I procrastinated way to long.  I'm finally beginning to learn not to make things so difficult.  If you procrastinate things you have that project in your head, worrying you, bothering you, eating at you. I'm trying to live by the motto--Just Do It.  Don't make things difficult.  Just Do It.

I will be passing this quilt along Saturday when my In-Laws come to visit.  Before starting, I wasn't too fond of this pattern.  As time progressed, as I put time and love into making this quilt, I fell in love with it.  Goodbye, Jeanne's Quilt; you're going to a good home.

Almost There

This is a recap of Jeanne's Quilt towards the end.  Here's Alucard enjoying the comforts of the just quilted quilt. 

After Mr.Kitty took a nice nap on my quilt I began pinning the binding.  I used a new technique discovered in one of the blogs I read.  Previously, I would iron the binding in half and then fold it again so it was like the binding purchased in the store.  Not only is it a lot of work but it is difficult to sew on the quilt without looking uneven or just yucky. 

The new technique...I cut a 4" binding and folded it in half once (didn't even iron it).  It was pinned in place and sewed on.  The fold just flips over to the back.  Then I quilted in-the-ditch on the front binding.  It was attached in just the right place so I could sew in-the-ditch and catch the back binding. What a perfect technique!  When I remember where I saw it I will give credit to the artist.  

New Etsy Listing

I am listing another painting on Etsy.  It is a piece of my Grandpa-in-Law.  He is a wonderful artist (if I haven't already mentioned it) and I love listing his work because I get to take the paintings home while I do it! 

There are five lovely paintings for me to sell.  I've been a bit lazy about it and have only one listed.  The pictures for the second are now edited; they were a bit washed out during shooting.  If only Etsy would let me sign in but the site is down!

My Etsy name is chariot71226 and I call my shop Chariot's Crafty House.  Stop by sometime=:)

More reflection on Table Bumper (cozy)

One more addition to the Table Bumper blog posts... I knew this was something I would not use forever.  In a couple of years the babies would not need this item.  And it is not something to pass on unless another person's coffee table is an exact match to ours.  Because of this I made the effort to reuse materials.  The backing is cut from old sheets and the batting is a re-purposed Harry Potter blanket. 

I don't know what I will do with this when I am finished with it.  Maybe I'll transform it into pillows or a doll quilt.  Or all of the above because it's so big. The End --for now. 

Table Bumpers DONE!!!!!!

Hey!  I finished another project!!!  If you can not tell I'm super excited about having this project done.  It looks great.  I know why they don't sell these things in the stores...it was a pain in the behind to make.  It was super long, hard to make exact cuts and measurements.  My original plan was just to wrap the table but the bumper did not stay up. 

So I added the center piece of cloth and sewed the ends to it.  Now it's a table cozy!  You can see the way I decided to attach the ends together--sewing in 3 ties along each side.  Before adding the center, the fabric was stretching and made the bumper too long.  After sewing the final piece, it was too short.  (sigh). 

Even with its imperfections the bumper/cozy is working out really well.  The girls can't pull the end down, get to the stuff on the shelf, or hit their heads (too hard).