Craft Crazy

So this week I taught Anastasia how to wash her hands. She is too small to reach the sink so I made her this little tray that I set on my milk maid stool:


I pour the water from the pitcher to the bowl (eventually I will let her do it) and then she washes her hands. Then we have a small chunk of soap in the little bucket that she rubs between her hands and we rinse again. Then we dry with the little towel (washcloth) and she gets a little dab of Burt's Bees baby lotion in a bottle cap (otherwise there would be lotion everywhere.) She loves the lotion part. I have already used this set-up to tame tantrums. As she gets overloaded I ask her if she wants to wash her hands. I also set up another tray with tissue for wiping her nose, a toothbrush, hairbrush, a wet wipe for washing her face and a towel to dry. It was great because she loves brushing her teeth so I could brush her hair while she was brushing her teeth. Here she is with the cap-full of lotion in her little autumn attire:
I also found last night that if I set up her activities the night before while I am WIDE AWAKE, we are more likely to actually do the things in the morning. So today we did lots of activities from lentil-pouring to painting. We also have a new friend that I call Ruby. She is a hummingbird that frequents our window-hummingbird feeder. She is seriously there like every 5-15 minutes. Today she chased away a chickadee who stopped on a nearby tree to check out the feeder. It was funny watching this tiny bird with an attitude chase away a cute and curious 3x her size bird.

I have been sewing like mad again... and loving it. My mom bought me a bland Moses Basket (at my request) from the Consignment shop.

Here is what I did with it:

I am so in love with this apple and pear fabric that I have seen online quite a bit. I found it at Joann's a couple weeks ago and only bought a half-a-yard since I didn't have a vision for it. WELL I then was inspired to use it for the baby's basket and wished I had purchased even more!!! AH! How appropriate being that we have 2 pear and 3 apple trees and they are autumn fruits like our autumn arrival. I have dozens of ideas for making appliqued items from some of the scraps of material... I know I am crazy. Now hopefully #2 will actually sleep in this thing. A lady from the farmer's market said she would save me a lamb skin (poor lambs) to put in the bottom. Another lady is selling me an entire sheep's fleece for my crafting endeavors (like learning how to wet and needle felt). I don't know how much a fleece is... but I am a little concerned... especially because I have to clean it and then dry it...

I recently tested out a doll pattern for fellow blogger JoEbi and will be uploading pictures of it soon. It was for a cute little mermaid and she turned out lovely. I love all the Montessori and creative activities she does with her little boy in Japan. Then I got picked to test-drive a future WeeWonderful's pattern... the same designer (Hillary Lang) who I made Olive from. I love all the WeeWonderful dolls and items... so I feel so privileged to get to help out... and I get ANOTHER cute doll for me... I mean, Anastasia to play with.

So back to life.... I have dishes from our not so great enchilada dinner (that none of us ate). The only thing worse than cleaning up after a meal, is cleaning up after a gross meal that nobody would eat.