Fun with bubbles

We share our block of units with another family who have 4 children, a set of twin boys who are 1 year older than Ruby and 2 girls aged 5 & 7. Ruby adores all of them and I think she’d give her left leg to pack her bags and move into their place. Being an only child, there couldn’t be anything more exciting than the chaos and excitement at their house.

Nothing seems to elicit quite the level of delighted squealing as bubbles! Got grumpy kids? Kids driving you crazy? Whinging? Take them outside and blow some bubbles, trust me the mood will change. If nothing else, they will usually run around like maniacs trying to pop all the bubbles and will blow off some steam so they’re at least getting some exercise. Now that Ruby is finally old enough to start blowing bubbles herself without either drinking them or just tipping the mixture upside down, its even more exciting!

I bought a giant bottle of bubbles and some bubble wands for all the kiddies for Christmas at a dollar store and we finally had a chance to use them yesterday.   Here are a few pictures of the resulting fun…

Glittery play dough

I whipped up a fresh batch of no-cook play dough today for Ruby with her ‘help’ (which usually makes the job take twice as long but makes it twice as fun!). Thankfully if you use The Imagination Tree’s no-cook recipe, it’s so quick and easy (less than 5 min) that it doesn’t matter if you double your prep time. If you aren’t already adding glycerine to your play dough, do yourself a favour and buy some from a chemist. A few drops at the end of the process really makes it stretch and shine beautifully!

I started adding glitter to my play dough at Christmas for extra holiday sparkle and now I can’t stop! It’s gorgeous! The kiddies love it, I made a couple of batches for play group last week and it was a massive hit.

If you haven’t already, check out the Imagination Tree for all sorts of play ideas, it’s an awesome site.

Cherries & polka dots

My second attempt at a dress was this ruffled polka dot affair using cherry and polka dot fabric.

 

If I were to make this dress again I would definitely make it A-line instead of a rectangle and I would make the straps longer so the ruffle is more pronounced. I didn’t follow a pattern, I just borrowed bits and pieces from various free online tutorials to piece it together.

I still need to take pictures of Ruby wearing her new dresses and post them, she looks rather cute!

Butterfly peasant dress

My next completed item of clothing for Ruby was far more adventurous. I found, and pinned, this lovely tutorial with free pattern for a peasant dress on Scattered Thoughts of a Crafty Mom ages ago and finally got around to using it a couple of weeks ago.

The tutorial is easy to follow and simple even for a beginner. I added a strip of bias binding near the bottom and made a double bow using this tutorial.

My girl loves anything pink, add butterflies & bows and she’s sold! Its funny that she’s otherwise so at home knee deep in mud…

First skirt

Yeah its a really simple skirt, but I finished it! It only took about 45 minutes and I made it while R napped one afternoon.

I used Dana’s wonderfully simple tutorial which made it really easy.

This Christmas I used the same pattern to make gingham skirts for our neighbour’s two girls aged 5 & 7. I added a ruffle along the bottom and a flower embellishment to each (made from an old pair of jeans) with a button centre. I love the way they turned out!

 

Sewing

As I’ve mentioned before, I have an extremely talented mother, especially when it comes to sewing. She tried to get me involved as a kid and even bought me a sewing machine. Unfortunately, I was a complete tomboy and didn’t show much interest.

Over the years as an adult I’ve tried to teach myself to sew with limited success which I’ve come to realise has at least in part been due to bad tools. For a long time I was trying to sew with an ancient second hand machine that insisted on swallowing my fabric and knotting up my thread. No wonder I found it so frustrating and couldn’t finish a project!

Last year I bought a new machine and really started to apply myself to learning to do things properly. I began with some trial and error, supplemented with expert tuition (long distance hand-holding): Skype calls to my mommy in South Africa when things went wrong. What a relief to have a machine that didn’t gobble up all my fabric!

In the past, I found it so discouraging being unable to finish a project but now that I’m able to produce something cute that puts a smile on my little girl’s face, its actually quite addictive!

I’ll post some of my recent projects shortly, watch this space…

 

 

Healthy, toddler-friendly, chocolate-chip cookies

This recipe makes delicious, chewy centered chocolate chip cookies that R absolutely loved. They definitely satisfy the chocolate craving but have a few healthy goodies in them to counteract the naughty stuff…

Dry ingredients

• 2/3 cup flour
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/3 cup chocolate chips
• 2 tbs brown sugar
• Up to 2 tbs raw sugar

Wet ingredients

• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tbsp veg oil
• 3 tbsp milk
• (optional) 1/4 cup LSA mix (ground linseeds, sunflower seeds & almonds)
• 1/4 cup quick oats
• Extra milk as needed

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C. Mix dry ingredients together and then add wet ingredients. Add spoonfuls of dough to greased or lined cookie sheets leaving space for the cookies to spread as they rise quite a bit. Bake for approximately 15 – 20 minutes or until lightly golden and the cookies are firm to the touch. Allow to cool on the cookie sheet for 5 min and then transfer to a wire rack. Avoid eating them all in one sitting and make sure they are stored out of your toddler’s reach (mine stole quite a few while I wasn’t looking). Enjoy!

Whoops…

So, I’ve neglected my blog. What started out as a perfectly understandable short break while we moved interstate and then took a long trip back to South Africa turned into almost a year long ‘holiday’ from updates.

It took a long time to settle into our new routine in Brisbane and by the time we did I’d fallen out of the habit of thinking about updating the blog. As the months passed, it got harder and harder to get back into it.

Well, finally I’m going to bite the bullet (again) and post something since I’d like to put up a new recipe…

DIY chocolate ice pops

What a weird summer we are having in Sydney. Its been the coolest, wettest summer in decades. The hot days have been few and far between. While I don’t love winter, I love the really hot days even less but after a long wishy-washy, rainy spring and summer, it was nice to have a couple of hot days this weekend.
I found this recipe on Toys in the dryer for ridiculously easy DIY fudge pops (ice-lollies or ice blocks depending which continent you live on). I don’t mind little R having an ice cream every now and then but I find that the store bought ones are too big and have too many ingredients that I can’t pronounce in them. This idea simply uses a store bought instant chocolate pudding which is then frozen in individual ice lolly containers. I have cute little Tupperware moulds that are just the right size for little tummies. The chocolate pudding that I bought was fairly low in sugar and I recognised all the ingredients, so although not my first choice I gave it a go. The pudding whipped up in less than 2 minutes and the whole job took less than 5.

Here are some pics of little R getting a go at cleaning out the bowl (a rare treat since I won’t let her near a bowl that has had raw eggs in it):

A couple of hours later after lunch and our playdough adventures they were ready to go.

Little R loved hers, here are some pictures of the resulting delicious messiness:

…but its so easy!

I have a very clever mommy. She is such a talented artist, dress maker, crafter, stain glasser (I’m sure there is a word for that), coppersmith, beader… the list goes on. And I don’t mean she dabbles in each, she is AMAZING at them all. I’m very thankful that I picked up her interest in crafting and sewing although she has more talent in her little toe than I have in my whole body!

For some reason I’m having some trouble blending my interest in crafts into my life as a mum to my 19 month old. It never occured to me until this weekend that I could make playdough for my little girl (duh!) until I stumbled across this amazing blog The Imagination Tree. They feature, amongst a million brilliant play ideas, a recipe for no-cook playdough. I’ve googled playdough recipes and only found versions that require standing over a pot and stirring for ages. Although slightly skeptical, I decided to give it a go. Since everything still ends up in my daughter’s mouth, I decided to just use food colouring and not add a flavour which would only encourage her to eat it. The Imagination tree has all sorts of playdough recipes using glitter, flavour (chocolate, yum!) and a salt dough recipe to bake your child’s artwork into permanent keepsakes (Christmas ornaments!).

This is the basic no-cook recipe:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 cup salt
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 tbsp cream of tartar
• 1.5 cups boiling water
• a few drops of glycering (for extra smoothness, stretch & shine)
• food colouring

Add all the ingredients to a large bowl and stir vigorously until all the lumps are gone and it begins to come together into a ball. Once it has cooled enough t handle, knead until it stops being sticky. I went with green food colouring which was the least appetising colour I have in my baking cupboard (in another effort to avoid playtime turning into tea time!).

Start to finish it took about 5 minutes plus another 10 to be cool enough for little hands to play. I couldn’t believe how fast and easy it was, plus I don’t think it would be possible to muck it up!

Ruby was a little unsure at first because it was still warm and she has a little obsession at the moment with things being hot. If she comes across a food she doesn’t like, its hot (great excuse!). But once she saw how much fun I was having using the cookie cutters she got for christmas in a baking set to cut the dough into shapes, she dove right in. We had a good 25 minutes play and the playdough was put into a ziplock bag to keep for another time. We’ve since used it 3 times and its still as good as new.

Here are some pictures of little R having her first go at my green playdough:

See, I told you all roads lead to the mouth! I think this would make a really nice gift, easy and not expensive. If I find some cute little containers at a dollar store I will make up a batch with different colours for a friend (hopefully they don’t make their own either!)

If you haven’t already, give it a go and check in on The Imagination Tree for lots of imaginative play ideas.