crafting with children

Yesterday the girls and I spent our morning making play dough. Jonny and the big boys were snowboarding, and with the big kids gone it’s always a little hard for the littlest ones and I to find a rhythm. I try to plan projects that involve simple mixing and making. Play dough is not something that we keep on hand at all times, so it doesn’t lose it’s fun factor. As the girls kneaded their first batch I overheard Larkspur tell Beatrix, “It’s the making part that’s the most fun.” To which Beatrix responded with an emphatic, “Yeah.”

Beatrix and I also mixed up a batch of sugar scrub this week. It was oh so easy, and a great little project for the two of us to do together. I found that there are an overwhelming number of recipes on the internet so I took a general formula and then improvised with what I had on hand. Many of the recipes I saw called for an oil to sugar ratio of about 1:2. I combined 1 cup of olive oil with enough sweet almond oil, shea butter, and kokum butter to equal 2 cups (I placed the oils in a glass measuring cup in a warm water bath on the stove to melt the shea and kokum.) Once all my oils were thoroughly melted, I added essential oil for fragrance and then poured the oil into a big bowl. Finally we added about 4 1/2 cups of sugar and mixed with a spoon. Beatrix spooned some of our final product into a small tin for the bathroom and the rest into a quart sized ball jar which I will keep in the refrigerator.

Once we were finished Beatrix asked to taste the sugar. I said “sure, just a little.” She tasted it and with chastisement in her tone, told me, “It’s pretty good. You should’ve made food with it.”

Speaking of making, I realized today that I don’t have any easy knitting projects to work on while I am giving lessons, so I am going to remedy that with a skein of this, and this shawl pattern (it starts out nice and easy and stays that way until close to the end.)

This evening, Beatrix called me to the window to show me the “pink sky.” She was sitting on the back of the couch watching the sun set with a smile on her face. That last photo is for her, my little lover of life.

p.s. I received a gift this week with no way to give a proper thank you. So, Bronwyn, I hope you are reading (because I don’t have your email address!) Thank you. You made my week.

p.p.s. The toy that Silas is holding in the photo above is from this shop. Hands down, my favorite baby toys. Silas agrees.

p.p.p.s. Play dough recipes abound but I love this book (I’ve been referring to it since Seth was a baby!) and often use the play dough recipe it contains but add glitter and essential oils.

{ 21 comments }

Recently I found myself in need of a quick project. I chose a skein of bulky handspun yarn from my shelf and started searching for patterns on Ravelry. At some point during my search Beatrix climbed into my lap, grabbed the yarn, and asked me what the tag on the skein said. I replied, “Oh, it just says that this is bulky yarn.”

Later, I found her sitting with the skein in her lap, the attached card open in her hands. She was “reading a story” aloud. It began like this: “Once upon a time there was a bulky yarn….”

She never said what happened next (probably because I burst into laughter) but as you can see, that bulky yarn was wound into a ball, hugged a few times, and then knit up into a pair of fingerless mitts for me. The project took me all of an hour and a half or so and was just what I needed. I’m pretty sure that Beatrix had fun as well.

p.s. I am truly loving the yarn swift that I got for my birthday. I very much prefer it to my umbrella style swift whose bolts stripped out after a few uses. I am not affiliated with the shop that sells these, nor do I know the mama who owns it. However, I did meet her at our local fiber festival last fall (she wouldn’t remember me, but I didn’t forget about her handmade swifts when I was ready to buy one.) I believe she has ten kids, and she and her family run the hand dyed yarn and notions shop together. The bottom line is that I love this swift and find it so much easier to use than my old one. A perfect birthday gift it was.

p.p.s. I can’t thank you all enough for all your feedback on Seth’s post yesterday. Seth (and I) read every single comment and he was pretty darn thrilled. You made his week!

{ 35 comments }