I was doing Tree Pose, so that's what Monkey Boy tried:

"grow your tree"

"look up and close your eyes"

"return to heart center"
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It wasn't a 'perfect' tree....but he was giggling and having so much fun that I don't think it matters. LOL
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Posted at 04:45 PM in our everyday life, small ones | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
This year's Memorial Day block party was supposed to be 'low key'. We didn't pull out the waterslide, we didn't rent a jumphouse, we didn't put out a pool....we just sat around:

BBQd (lots of delicious tri-tip!):





Posted at 10:20 AM in biking, celebrations, cooking, food, our everyday life, small ones | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Well, I've finally gone and done it: I've opened an etsy shop! In an effort to move out some of the MOUNTAIN of fiber that I've dyed in the past few months, I put some handpainted rovings and yarn up for sale on etsy.
Here are a couple of rovings I'm in the process of listing:
"Mango Me"- 4.2 oz of corriedale
"Petunias" - 3.2 oz superwash merino
"Finn McCool" - 3.6 oz corriedale
I will slowly be adding more rovings and yarn over the next few days. I'm not out to make huge amounts of money selling fiber...dyeing is a fun, relaxing hobby for me. I like the whole process of visualizing colors, painting them on the fiber, and seeing how it all turns out. Unfortunately it takes A LOT longer to spin up the fiber than to dye it. So the only thing I could think to do with all this extra fiber is to put it up on etsy and hopefully sell it!
While I was busy photographing and sorting fiber to list, the small men were doing some painting of their own:

Little Man found the face painting set and started with a tiger face for Monkey Boy. I think LM did great!

MB was quite pleased with the finished product. He insisted that I take a photo of him and his big brother.

Then it was MB's turn to do some painting on LM. First off was a 'flag':

Then MB made a pirate's hat and a patch for LM. Can you see it?

The face painting kept them busy for a long time! I was able to do a lot of work on the computer before MB finally asked me for some help 'washing his face'...he had tried to do it on his own already:

Posted at 09:17 PM in crafty, our everyday life, self-promotion, small ones, spinning_ | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
yes, we felt that earthquake....if you were anywhere in So.Cal. at 8:39pm Sunday, you prolly felt it too! I was sitting in the office and the Dearest was watching TV upstairs, waiting for the small men to fall asleep (they go to bed at 8pm).
My neighbor, Mrs. J, was supposed to come over and pick up some photos I had printed for her. So when I heard a rumbling noise, I thought it was Mrs. J knocking on my front door. A few seconds later it sounded like the small men were jumping up and down in the room above my head....then I realized that no one was in that room, and the windows started to rattle, and I could hear the rumbling a LOT louder...
Now usually I stay put when there's an earthquake. Usually the quake is over before you even have time to start thinking "should I get up?"....but this shaker? It lasted a LONG time...I hate that feeling of "is it over? is it going to get worse?"
After a few seconds, the shaking hadn't stopped- in fact it got stronger. That was it: I jumped up and ran into the hallway, away from the windows (don't want that glass falling on me!). I had my hand on the doorjamb and could totally feel the house moving.
Finally the shaking stopped and I had a chance to holler up at the Dearest- who had run across the hall during the quake to check on the small men. Thank goodness they slept through the whole thing!
Me? I had to do some deep breathing to steady my hands and slow my racing heart down. LOL The Dearest and I then played the normal Californian's after-quake guessing game: "How strong was that quake?" I guessed 4.5.
The USGS originally said it was a 5, but downgraded it to a 4.7 this morning. It was centered in LA, about 60 miles from here. The worst part about this quake was how long it lasted...it felt much longer than any quakes we've felt recently! It's amazing how fifteen seconds can feel like an eternity when the ground under your feet is moving like the deck of a ship!
Posted at 08:59 AM in Current Affairs, no fun at all, welcome to my life | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Yes, I know we already have a cool cargo bike....but how fun would it be to have two?!? Then the Dearest and I could go grocery shopping together!!!
Madsen is giving away one of their bikes in July...all you have to do is click think link and I get entered into the drawing. Copy and paste it to your blog, and let me know...I'll visit and click thru for you, too!

Posted at 02:41 PM in biking, self-promotion | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)
This year the small men and I made little sachets for the grandmothers for Mother's Day. We cut some muslin into squares and used fabric paint to make handprints on the muslin. Evidently, for the small men, the best part of making this craft was spreading the paint on their fingers. I wanted to take a photo of the process but I was so busy trying to keep the paint from getting *everywhere* that I only got to take a few shots.

After the paint was dry, we glued the squares together and filled them with lavender.

I've seen this idea around on several blogs, but I really liked how cute the finished sachets turned out. And the lavender smelled divine! I got 8oz of great-quality lavender from this Etsy store- not only was the price right, but she shipped super quick and refunded me some $$ because the shipping cost wasn't as high as was originally quoted. Great Etsy seller!
The grandmothers (and grandpas) came over today and we had a lovely Mother's Day Brunch. I made fresh waffles, a crustless spinach quiche, and of course, the famous fruit tart. Little Man and Monkey Boy must have eaten four or five whole waffles between the two of them! Not to mention all the bacon!
Once we finished up brunch, the small men gave the grandmas their sachets. I also got a very sweet card from the small men and the Dearest. And of course, there were the cutest little Mother's Day crafts from both LM and MB.
We spent the rest of the afternoon just hanging out- I even got to take a nap! Then we met up with some neighbors and had a casual pizza dinner. There were plenty of margaritas and funny conversation during dinner, then it was time for us to head home since LM has school tomorrow.
All in all, a great way to spend Mother's Day. I hope my other momma friends had their own wonderful Mother's Days, too!
Posted at 09:35 PM in celebrations, crafty, Food and Drink, our everyday life, sewing, small ones | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Yesterday was "Mommy and Me Tea" at MonkeyBoy's preschool. We mommys were invited to the social hall for a cookie and juice snack with our preschoolers....MB was very excited to have me eat snack with him. He said they usually only get crackers, but because today was special, they were going to have big cookies. Here we are, waiting to eat our cookie:

MB looks grumpy because he really wanted to eat his cookie! LOL He did get to dive in a few minutes later:

It cracks me up how sweaty he is! The kids had come in straight from the playground, but MB was the only one who looked like he had just taken a shower.
After the snack, it was time for us to visit the classroom. Monkey Boy wanted to show me the new 'game' they had gotten.

Remember these? MB spent quite a while trying to get all the little balls into their proper slots. He even spent a few minutes explaining the game to me, just in case I didn't know how to play.

The kids also got to do a craft.

MB then took me to the play carpet and showed me how to make a X-Wing fighter out of blocks. I think it's pretty clever-

Posted at 08:59 AM in celebrations, our everyday life, small ones | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Tomorrow is Little Man's teacher's birthday; luckily Mrs. M. is a knitter so LM came up with the perfect gift for her: some of my handspun. LM and I went stash diving for the perfect skein of handspun, and I discovered something troubling....
I have A LOT of handspun yarn.
Obviously some of my handspun has been knitted into sweaters, hats, scarves, etc., but there are a lot of single skeins in my stash. Many of the skeins are in the 200-400yd range...just enough for a small project, so I'm thinking of thinning my handspun stash by selling some.
Obviously I'll have to figure out how much to sell the yarn for...and maybe set up an etsy shop or something. I'm not going to try to make money off the handspun- just free up some stash space and pass the yarn off to someone who will actually use it! What do you think? Will people buy my handspun?
Oh, in the vein of ever-growing handspun stash:

"annaliese"
352yds of sportweight merino/mohair- spun from rovings purchased at Capistrano Fiber Arts.

Posted at 09:06 AM in crafty, self-promotion, spinning_ | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)
Little Man's two upper front teeth have been loose for quite a while now, but about ten days ago the left one became very tight, and the gum got quite purple. Sure enough, within a couple of days we could see LM's adult tooth coming in at the gumline, while the baby tooth scootched back and hung out...but refused to fall out!
We took to calling LM "Sharkboy" since he looked like he had a double row of teeth. We also went to the dentist, who recommended some agressive flossing and a lot of wiggling of the baby tooth. In the meantime, LM's adult tooth continued to grow in and he continued to freak people out by showing off his half-grown 'big tooth' and the barely-hanging-on-but-refusing-to-fall-out baby tooth.
Then LM and Monkey Boy were playing Legos on Sunday and they bumped noggins...and guess what? LM's crazy baby tooth just fell right out! He ended up spitting it out into his hand and bringing it to me with much excitement. We put it under his pillow that night for the Tooth Fairy to find; the next morning he was very happy to show me the two golden coins that the TF left. Then he generously gave one coin to his little brother, since Monkey Boy had "helped" the baby tooth to fall out.
Now Little Man is walking around whistling through his new gap-toothed grin...


Posted at 08:51 PM in celebrations, our everyday life, small ones | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Posted at 11:53 PM in our everyday life, photography | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)