Tree Rings Embroidery Art

Awhile back I saw a cute free embroidery pattern at Wild Olive, and I knew that with a couple of modifications it would make a perfect homemade anniversary gift for my hubby. I added a few more rings to symbolize our 10th wedding anniversary and used a slightly different color of floss to symbolize the years in which our kiddos were born.

It came together pretty quickly since the stitches are so basic, and it looks really sweet hanging up on the wall in our room (if only the wall were painted a different color so there's more contrast!) ♥

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Outdoor Chalkboards

I've been wanting to make outdoor chalkboards for the boys for a very long time, mainly because I wanted a designated "chalk area" in our yard instead of allowing them to draw all over the patio. I wouldn't mind artwork on the patio so much, but the baby inevitably ends up crawling through piles of "fairy dust" that Suton insists upon creating by grinding his chalk down to dust. No bueno.

The back corner of our yard is the boys' rock pit/digging area. We intended to turn the corner into a kids play garden with a bean teepee and sunflowers, but weather and sickness derailed us this year...maybe next year! Honestly, they probably enjoy digging in the rocks even more than they would have liked the teepee, but at least we got a few sunflowers planted in the corner! I figured that the corner would be the perfect home for the outdoor chalkboards.

We got a 4'x8' standard sheet of plywood from the hardware store (check to find the smoothest one you can get), and then we filled the knots and blemishes with outdoor wood putty. Sawyer loved helping with that part. After the putty was dry we used the electric sander to create a smooth surface. I reserved a 2'x4' piece of plywood for another project I have in mind, and then Mitch cut the remaining piece into two 3'x4' pieces and gave it a coat of primer.

I had seen a recipe on Martha Stewart for homemade chalkboard paint and since we had a half gallon of dark blue paint sitting in the garage, we decided to make our own. The basic recipe is 2 tablespoons of non-sanded grout to each cup of paint. We gave our boards three coats, but two would have probably been sufficient - I just made way too much paint and didn't want to waste it!

(He's trying to model his new mama-made pajama shorts here LOL!)

It works great, and the chalkboards were a {HUGE} hit with the boys!

The 3'x4' size worked out really well. It's a great big canvas to let your imagination run free, but it's also big enough that there's plenty of room to share when friends come over to play.

It seems like every time I turn around this guy is back out there making new masterpieces.

This guy loves his too, but he's been a little bit distracted by the empty garden bed that has turned into digging area #2...and digging in mud is even better than rocks!

I added a couple of hooks to hold a bucket full of chalk, a rag and a spray bottle for erasing. It does erase dry, but a light spritz of water works even better. I'm SO pleased that my patio is no longer a giant canvas, and Simon is even happier that his knees aren't constantly covered in chalk dust any more! :)

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Flashback: Everlasting Sandcastles {Tutorial}

I'm still recovering, and things are a little slow-going around here. I finally got a good round of antibiotics in me, and I'm starting to feel better so hopefully things will be back to normal here soon. In the meantime, here's a look back at one of our most favorite activities from last Summer. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

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When I got this month's issue of Family Fun Magazine, one of the summer activities was a RECIPE for air-hardening Sand Clay, I knew right away that the boys would love it, especially just coming off of our beach vacation!


They got to work right away mixing up the ingredients: sand, cornstarch and water (we didn't use alum as called for in the original recipe because we didn't have any on hand). We also added some gold glitter to our mix to give it a little extra sparkle. NOTE: Be sure to use an old pot to mix up your clay, as the sand will scratch the heck out of one of your nice pans!


Cook it over the stove for a few minutes until it reaches a Play-Doh-like consistency.


Now play, shape, squeeze and mold to your heart's content!


We let our clay air dry, so it took about three days for it to completely harden up, inside and out. If you want to speed up the process, you can also bake it in a 225 degree oven for a few hours.

I especially like Sawyer's Word World fish :)

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It's been a quiet week around here. Well, at this blog anyway, since home is rarely quiet! I just wanted to say a quick thank you to everyone who has stopped by and commented this week, to all the wonderful blogs who have featured our projects this week, and to the couple of people who emailed me when they noticed that I had been absent on Blogger/Facebook/Twitter for awhile. I greatly appreciate all of your sweet words and support, and I was completely surprised that anyone even noticed that I was missing!

For nearly two weeks I've been busy fighting the-stomach-flu-that-just-won't-quit, and it now seems to have spawned an evil partner in crime in the-migraine-that-just-won't-quit as well. So, needless to say I've been a little preoccupied, and I haven't even responded to most of those lovely emails and comments that everyone has sent me. So, please accept my sincere mass apology...I promise to try to get back to everyone soon! In the meantime, I'm going back to bed :)

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Freeze Pop Holders

Do your kids complain about cold hands every time they try to hold a frozen ice pop? Here's a quick and easy solution that doesn't involve wasting paper towels! I've seen this idea loads of times in Blogland over the past few months, and I'm not even sure who to give credit to anymore. All I know that I didn't think of it myself (duh, why not!?!), but it's ridiculously easy and {totally} genius!

We used some scrap fleece, folded in half, with a quick seam sewed up each side and trimmed with pinking shears. Problem solved! Seriously, it's so easy that my 5-year-old made several completely on his own! These ice pop holders are a great way to use up scraps of felt and fleece or to repurpose old sweaters and sweatshirts. So, stop reading this right now and go make a dozen to have on-hand for frozen Gogurts (our favorite) and ice pops (for those times that you send Daddy to the store!). You'll thank me for it later. Easy peasy!

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Beach Treasures

Last weekend Mitch and I celebrated our 10-year wedding anniversary (and 13 years together!) at the beach in Bodega Bay. My parents graciously kept all three boys overnight so that we could get away for the day, and when we came back to pick them up the next day they had a special anniversary present waiting for us!

The boys had each painted a wooden shadow box and filled it with treasures that my parents collected on their many trips to the shore. My dad has a big collection of shells, sea glass, rocks, sea life, etc, and he let each boy "shop" his collection for enough goodies to fill up a pie tin. After they finished their shadow boxes, they painted and decorated a matching picture frame, and my mom included a photo of them creating their projects.

Sawyer's frame is decorated entirely with sea glass with a few extra special rocks at the corners. He strategically placed all of his shadow box objects so that they would work well with the photos that he included (waves, sunset and the cliffs). He was especially proud of his intact crab shell in the upper left box. He couldn't wait to get home to arrange his new treasures on our nature table!  

Sutton chose to decorate his frame with nothing but seashells. He was especially fond of the starfish and the teeny seagulls that my dad crafted from Sculpey clay specifically for this project (because he couldn't find any starfish that would work well for this, and he knew the boys love them!). Sutton took much more precise care in choosing which items to include, but when it came time to glue them down he didn't pay as much attention to what he was covering up on his photos. He is SO proud of the pinecone that resides right in the middle of the sunset photo!

Sawyer arranging some of Mom & Dad's newfound treasures from our Bodega Bay trip in front of his shadow box. He is incredibly pleased with our Summer nature table, and now it looks so nice and enticing that we're having a tough time keeping Simon away from it too!

I {LOVE} the gifts that the boys made for us, and I {LOVE} that my parents took the time to set this project up for them (you should have seen how teary I got!). I know that I would have had a tough time parting with some of the unique and beautiful ocean treasures that they let the boys use! Thank you SO much! ♥

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Rock Candy {Tutorial}

Rock candy is always a fun favorite of children, and it's a fantastic way to disguise a Summer science lesson as a sugary treat! All it takes is a few simple tools, lots of sugar and even more patience!

Rock candy ingredients & supplies: Wooden skewers (cut in half), water, sugar, clothespins and glass jars/drinking glasses. The amount of water and sugar you need depends on how many pieces of rock candy you would like to make and the number of jars you have available (I recommend no more than 2 pieces per jar) - the standard ratio is 2 cups of sugar to 1 cup of water, but we found that we had to add a bit more sugar than our recipe called for. In the end, we used 10 cups of sugar to 4 cups of water.

To make our batch of rock candy, we started with 4 cups of water and 4 cups of sugar. Put it all into a large saucepan, because once you put it on the stove it will expand while boiling. I let Sutton mix up the first bit of sugar before putting it on the stove. He was fascinated with watching the sugar dissolve, and it was especially interesting for him to see that we could dissolve even more sugar with the addition of the heat from the stove. Once your pot is on the stove, bring it to a low boil over medium heat, and continue to add sugar one cup at a time until you can no longer dissolve any more of it (making a completely saturated sugar solution).

Turn off the heat and allow it to cool for 15 minutes.

While your sugar is cooling you can prep your sticks. Soak them in water and roll them in a coating of sugar to give the new sugar crystals something to "seed" to. Be sure to let them dry all the way! If they are still too wet when you put them into the hot sugar solution, all of the sugar coating will fall off, and the new crystals will have nothing to grow on.

CAREFULLY pour your sugar solution into your glass jars. If you'd like to add food coloring or flavoring to your rock candy, now is the time to do so. We added color, but we kept the flavor all natural (what kiddo doesn't like the taste of plain sugar?).

Slowly insert your sugared skewers into the solution. You can use a clothespin as shown to keep your sticks in place. Smaller mouth jars/glasses work best, but only allow room for about two sticks per jar. Be sure that your sticks are not touching the sides or bottom of the glass or each other! They need room for the new crystals to grow!

Set them up in a warm, sunny location where they won't be disturbed, and wait...

...and wait...and wait...and wait (still with me?)...and wait some more...

After about a week you will have made yourself a batch of sparkling sugar rock candy!

Yummy!

So pretty, so tasty and sooooo worth the wait! These would make fantastic holiday gifts to go along with tea or coffee sets (is it crazy that I have Christmas on the brain in July?)!

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Grilled Pizza {Recipe}

We grill a lot in Summer, and one of our family favorites is grilled pizzas! The boys love playing around with different toppings, and Mitch and I like to use whatever is fresh from our garden to top ours. We make our pizza dough from scratch (and it's sooooo yummy!), but if you want to save time the store bought pizza dough works just as well.

When your dough is ready {recipe below}, divide it up and roll it out on to a lightly floured surface. It doesn't need to be a perfect circle...the natural shape just adds to its rustic appeal! 

Toss it on to a lightly oiled grill and be ready to keep an eye on it - they cook quickly! It takes about 4 minutes on a medium high heated grill to get nice light grill marks. If you don't want it to bubble up like this, use a fork to poke a few holes in it before you toss it on the grill to allow steam to escape. My kids love picking apart "pizza bubbles," so we keep ours as-is. You will only want to grill it one side for now. The other side will get cooked after we add our toppings and put it back on the grill.

Perfect! Now it's time to top it! Keeping the semi-raw part on the bottom, put your sauce and toppings on to the side with the grill marks.

Let the kids be in charge of their own pizzas - they'll {LOVE} it!

This is how I roll...fresh zucchini, a few onions, grilled chicken and bacon bits. If you want to use a strong topping like onions, I would suggest grilling them ahead of time to cut down on the harsh flavor since they won't be on the grill for very long, just long enough to melt the cheese and grill the underside of the pizza dough.

Toss them back on the grill until the cheese melts (ours took about 5 minutes).

YUM! Nothing says Summer like dinner from the grill!

HOMEMADE PIZZA CRUST RECIPE  

Yields: (1) 14-inch thick crust pizza or (2) 12-inch thin crusts or (6) individual thin crust pizzas  

Ingredients

• 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour, (more as needed)
• 1 envelope Active Dry Yeast
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup warm water (100 degrees F to 110 degrees F)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon Italian Seasoning
• 1 tablespoon Garlic Powder

Directions

·         Place 1/4 cup of the warm water in large warm bowl. Sprinkle with yeast; stir until mostly dissolved and let sit for 5 minutes (it will be kind of foamy looking). In another bowl, mix together the flour, salt, garlic and Italian seasoning. Add remaining water and flour mixture to the yeast/water bowl; stir well. Stir in enough additional flour to make soft dough (mine was kind of sticky at first, so I think I added about ½ cup more).

·         Knead until smooth. Place dough in greased bowl and cover with a dry dish towel; let rise in warm place until doubled in size, about 40 minutes. Punch dough down. Remove dough to lightly floured surface. Shape pizza crusts, add toppings and bake as desired.

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