Holiday Gifts

One of my great joys is creating yummy bath treats!

So... this year a friend and I got together and created a few special treats for our sweet friends. I have a large supplies of all things bathy-crafty so this was another low-cost gift solution. Dawn picked up some salt and jars, the rest I already had on hand.

What we made:

Bath salts. I have dubbed them 'Salty Seaweed Solstice Soak'. A little frankinscence and myhrr, birch, cypress and orange gave this scent a very holliday feel. We added dolce seaweed for added minerals in the bath.

As I was low on jars, I used mini zip locks then wrapped them in parchment paper and use a fancy golden sun seal to make them seem all the more decadent.
Next was a salt scrub... great for winter dry skin!

Salt, almond oil, olive oil then a refreshing blend of rosemary, lavender, pepermint and grapefruit essential oils. I call this one 'Morning Dawn Salt Scrub'.

Next I plan on making some lavender salve and maybe someother salves as well. These are a little time-intensive, but are some of my favorite things to make.

But first I have to finish the kids Christmas gifts!! Don't worry I will post those as well. ;)

Gratuitous pics of Cute Kids

We had some family portraits done in July for Cleo's first birthday, so here is the birthday girl and her big brother, Phelan who is three.

Apron

I often wear clothes that dont' have any pockets
and after years of frustration I finally came up with a solution. An apron! So here it is made from scrap fabric from my long skirts. (Hm... maybe I should put a pic of one of those on here...) I decided to make it reversable as I wanted to line it for sturdiness and this way it was like two aprons in one. Simple pockets, including one for a pen, to keep my cell phone, paper, boogy towels, and whatever else I need, organized. I did a decorative stitch of swans or tulips on the pockets just for kicks. My son loved that part and now every time I sew something he wants to use the swans.

This is a cute apron great for around the house and shopping, but I'm thinking it would have been nicer had I made it to cover my chest as well, so when cooking or wahsing dishes my
clothes get less splatters on them.

On a nother note, Cleo was facinated with the apron and so I tried it on her and it was so adorable! Came all the way to her feet! So, I'm thinking matchign aprons for the three of us might be in order some day and this pattern might make cute skirt for her as well.

Dolly Diapers

Yesterday Phelan and I finished making diapers for Cleo's "baby's".

I used some old quilted flannel that someone had given me for a changing pad and added a bit of velcro. For a pattern I sort of traced a premie sized disposable diaper that the kids have been using for the dolls and then altered it so it would fit the smaller dolls as well.

Cleo is a very good Mama. Every day she wants to get her babys 'ni-ni' (naked) and then asked to get them dressed again. She usually does this by bring the doll and clothes to a grown-up and grunting while placing the clothing on the dolly's head. She also loves to carry them around, often one in each arm (then if she spots another, you can see her trying to figure out how she is going to carry that one too).

Baskets of Homemade Goodness

These are two baskets I made. One for a fundraiser and one as a wedding gift. Both baskets are recycled with bags and coffee filters made from scrap fabrics filled with home canned items such as blackberry jam, pickles, tomato sauce and apple butter.

Thanksgiving

Somewhere within the boogy stained shirts and dirty hair is a craftswoman. Creative & artistic I have sometimes thought myself to be. Dedicated to my children and wanting to stay home with them while they are still small I am trying to get back to crafting again in hopes of selling my wares. So, I have decided to start posting my creations here as a ways of documenting them. Starting with my Thanksgiving table.
This year my sister has just moved North to Oregon and my parents decided to have Thanksgiving there with her in her new lovely place. 160 acres of pasture and woods. So, here at Gormley Keep it was just going to be Hubby, myself, Phelan, Cleo and my two brothers. Mark and Michael.
And thank goodness for that!! Have I mentioned that this household has pretty much beeen sick for the previous two weeks?? So, a very low key holiday was planned.

I had no intention of decorating the table, but when I looked out the window that morning I saw a few lovely roses blooming and took the kids ourside to collect them for our table, then we added rosemary, which was also blooming, and mint... then we saw all these lovely fallen leaves and collected those up as well as some pink peppers. Tossed on the table with the little felted witch my hubby won at a fundraiser and here it is! I am regretting not folding the napkins a little nicer, but all in all it really set the tone for a lovely meal.

What I am grateful for this year..... My amazingly beautiful children, my hardworking husband, my mother and father, my friends who inspire me, love me, support me, and challenge me. The bounty of nature.

Stream of Words

Cleo is yammering in her crib.... wanted her to take a little nap, but it's a wee bit late. Phelan is climbing on my desk 'plugging in' who knows what.

I want to get better at organizing my thoughts into words. I am a visual creature and can't compose a letter with out silence and hours to ponder. So here I am with all my daily distractions seeing if anything can come out with some sort of relative sence.

"Mommy, where is my Blackberry?" (the electronic device, not the fruit) How often does your three year old say that? Mine does daily.

Cleo is silent and Phelan is playing quietly across the room... .hm... now I'm at a loss of words.

So, I've been feeling the need to get out of my domestic rut lately. The housework is never done, so why put off all the cool stuff I want to do till after I get 'my stuff' done. Sometimes I feel like the stero-typical 'housewife', who feels trapped in her house and years to get out and discover who she is, except I pretty much know who I am. I've just had to put parts myself in hibernation in order to become the mommy-housewife I am. I see it not as a permanent sacrifice, but a temporary one. As my kids get older, I have visions of of them tagging along behind me in the woods with packs of thier own upon thier backs.

"Just when the catipillar thought the world was over, she bacame a beautiful butterfly"