mommapalooza

spin and fly

I read something on the web the other day that I meant to bookmark so that I could blog about it, but I seem to have forgot to bookmark the article, and thus, I have no idea what to say here tonight! So ... maybe I'll post a photo of Madeline in her new tutu in an attempt to make the lack of insightful and witty writing less obvious. Is it working?

Julie and I made this tutu a couple of weekends ago, actually. I'd seen a similar one with a $28 price tag at one of those baby boutiques. I spent about $7 on this one, for three yards of tulle (I already had the elastic for the waistband in my sewing kit). I borrowed the super-easy technique from this post on the Baby Bargains board. I didn't even have to set up my sewing machine!

I don't want to think about how many Fridays have gone by without posting some nifty links. I have some today, though, from The Silent "I" - truly, a blog after my own heart. It's all about traveling with young children. I haven't gone back through all of the archives, but I do have to recommend the posts about navigating through airports with babies and toddlers, and then the inflight experience with babies and toddlers. The next flight I will be taking with Madeline is a doozy: Calgary to Bangkok. Something like 26 hours ... the only thing I am exciting about is trying out her Gogokidz Travelmate wheels ...

Visions of Gingerbread

Madeline's first homemade ornament
Originally uploaded by goingdomestic.

Faux gingerbread people ornaments were the craft at Little Learners this past Thursday. This little person is Madeline's first homemade Christmas ornament, and I think she did a great job (though I did help her with the glitter-glue outline on her gingerbread person's hair). Madeline showed more restraint with glitter than the rest of her classmates did. I didn't ask Madeline's teacher where she found the foam gingerbread people, but I suspect it was at Michaels ('cause it's the only place in town, pretty much).

This is Madeline's third Christmas, but it's the first one where I'm trying to explain the "Christmas" concept to her. She really likes looking at the outdoor lights when we are driving to pick up her dad from work after the sun goes down. We were going to take her to our community's children's holiday party yesterday, but she elected not to go (well, she elected not to get dressed, really), even when I explained that there were cookies and a present involved. She generally thinks that reindeer are moose, but in her world, all antlered creatures are moose (she's done a lot of growing up in Newfoundland, after all). We've bought her two Christmas-y books to read (Merry Christmas, Curious George and the delightful Bear Stays Up for Christmas), and she likes them, but I'm not sure how much she truly understands yet. But it's okay; she's still quite little, and I'm sure that next year she'll be too excited to go to sleep on Christmas Eve.

The Great Homemade Playdough Experiment

Over the past few months, I've tried out three different recipes for homemade playdough. Madeline has two cans of the authentic stuff, but it has become rather rubbery, and frankly, the residue it leaves on surfaces and hands is kind of icky. I began my search for easy-to-make soft playdough ...

The first recipe I tried out was this one for no-cook playdough. It was really easy to make, and what really caught my eye was that it didn't call for any fancy ingredients - just water, salt, and hot water. The resulting dough was maybe a little glutenous, but not particularly sticky. I didn't have anything to colour it with, so it stayed Boring Beige. It dried out pretty fast.

The second one I tried is called The Best Play Dough Recipe Ever, though I didn't have such a spectacular experience with it. I am not sure if I over-cooked it (though it says to cooked until formed and no longer sticky), but it was really really doughy and I couldn't get the lumps out. When I first went shopping for the ingredients, I accidently bought alum instead of cream of tartar, as well. Oops!

My most recent recipe is this one that I found via Kiddley. I am not sure that it's considered no-cook, because a person does have to know how to boil water, but it's takes less than ten minutes to make. I got to use the rest of my cream of tartar, too. At first pass, I was really pleased with this recipe - Madeline's new dough is very soft and smooth. It's getting stickier by the day, however, and I'm not sure I can simply fix it by working in a little more oil.

I haven't decided if I'll stop my experiments with this recipe. It's pretty good, but there is a recipe for microwaved playdough on Kiddley here in the comments that sounds kind of intriguing. Maybe that one should should wait until I have access to a microwave with a setting besides "super-hot", though ...

not-quite-cinderella story

I've written before about how pleased I am with those flexible-soled Pedoodles shoes we have for Madeline. Just imagine how excited I was a couple of months ago when a half-dozen or so new designs were unveiled on their website! I didn't hesitate to order Madeline a pair of the orange runners for her birthday.

Fast-forward six weeks, and a few days after Madeline's birthday, I try to put the orange runners on her feet for an outing. Visualize my confused expression as the shoes refuse to slip on. I ordered them in the same size as her current pair of Pedoodles! I sent an email to the company, asking if the toe box on the runners are indeed narrower than they are on the shoes that Madeline currently wears, and they did confirm that the runners were narrower and fit smaller. Bummer. I then thought of replacing them with the fabulously cute red mary jane style, when I went to look them up at the retailer I would order them from (free shipping to Canada!), I noticed that they have started to post feedback about the sizing of the new styles on the site. And the Ruby Janes were noted to fit narrower and smaller as well. Bah!

On a more positive note, the stitching on Madeline's current pair of Pedoodles just gave out last week. This pair lasted a lot longer than her first pair with the decorative stitching. Instead of sending them back, I picked up a curved sewing needle and have stitched them up with strong thread. It worked pretty well, even though it took me forever to understand how the moccasin-style stitching worked.

Meow!

Madeline turned 22 months old over the weekend and happily modeled the kitty hat that her grandmother knitted for her. The kitty-ear hat is something of a tradition in my family. Both my sister and I had one as well. I am not sure if my original kitty hat was handed-down to my sister. I remember her wearing a pale pink one, but I seem to recall a pastel multicolour kitty hat - so perhaps that one was mine ...

I've already mentioned that Madeline has really been increasing her vocabulary, but in the last month she's also become really good about bedtime. Lately, we'll be plodding through her bedtime routine, and she'll suddenly point to her crib. I'll lay her down, she'll say "night-night", tap her aquarium on, and roll over. That's it. She almost puts herself to bed, really ...

there's a shivering sheep somewhere

I fell out of the habit, after Madeline was actually born, of posting all of the lovely handmade gifts she receives.  The other day she wanted to wear this ensemble that her nana knitted for her, and I remembered to take a photograph.  A hat, sweater, and mittens. Lucky girl.

squishy

Part of my master plan for Madeline was keeping her ignorant about the existence of playdough until she was old enough not to be messy with it or try to eat it, whenever that happened to be. As the evidence shows, I've failed in that endeavor. She was introduced to the fun of playdough in the open playtime that the local YMCA has every weekday morning, and she did okay. I made her a batch at home (using this recipe), but she seemed to really like the assortment of tools that were provided at the Y to use with the dough.  I left all of my cookie cutters and things like that back in Calgary, so when we were out at Toys R Us last week I picked up a set of special playdough tools that included two cans of the authentic stuff. Did Madeline try to eat it? Yes, but only twice, and I'm not really worried about any further oral investigation. I tasted a wee bit myself, and frankly, the salty-soapy flavour just isn't appealing.

The homemade playdough at the Y is really nice - it looks and smells like cherry bubblegum. I was chatting with the lovely lady who makes it for the preschool playtime and after-school programs, and she promised to pass along the recipe to me. She revealed that her secret ingredient is Kool-Aid.

Phew - done with my own projects!

Finished up my final baby sewing project today - one of those nursing pillows! I can't seem to find an authentic Boppy here in Canada, and I'm not sure how the ones by Jolly Jumper compare (and they're $40!), so I made my own. Materials were less than $15, so I'm not out much if the baby decided that it's the most uncomfortable thing ever!

The fabric I used is kind of cool:

I'm tempted to make another cover in a leoppard-print velour, if I ever see something like that at Fabricland.

I had three sewing projects, didn't I? I've posted about the sleep sack, and here's what I'm calling the last project. The second project is a pouch-style baby sling, which I won't post photos of until I have a baby to stick in it and less of a tummy. It doesn't look right with one-day-short-of-40-weeks tummy :)

There's a chilly sheep somewhere!

Yesterday my mom gave Chris and I some dear little baby sweaters that she's saved since my sister and I were infants. I wore the yellow one home from the hospital, and now it's in my possession again in case we want our own little person to wear it home from the hospital, too.

The story behind the green sweater? Well, I don't know. I was between six and seven pounds when I was born. I guess that the green one is there in case there's a baby the size of a large turkey!

Chris's mom has done a lot of new knitting for the little one - there would be one for every day of the week, except that they're in an assortment of sizes! Wow!

More Showing Off

I've gotten into the habit of posting photos of all the handmade goodies that the little person has been given by our friends and family, so here are the newest items, both from my mom:

A flannel receiving blanket backed with cotton:

Why couldn't I find flannel as nice as that here in Calgary? Firstly, I love plaid, and secondly, the colours are nice without being to gender-specific!

A large fluffy bath towel - hopefully the baby tub will be outgrown before this towel is! I love the colour - it's not pastel!!!