It’s the free pattern Everlasting Bagstopper from Knitty, and is seriously easy.  So easy.  You can knit this bag in a day if you’re a superstar knitter.  If you’re not a superstar knitter you can knit most of this bag in a weekend, then get to the last 10 rows and put it in a basket.  Then move it to a bag.  Then back to the basket.  Then the bag.  Several months later pull it out and look at it.

Put it back in the bag and wait a few more months.

Then pull it out and finish it in half an hour.  Now put it back in the bag.  A month or so later, take it out of the bag and put it in the basket.

A year past the the Christmas you were originally going to wrap it up and give it to your friend, take it out of the basket and spend 15 minutes sewing the handles on.

to market, to market

Then keep it because you love it.

ANYWAY.  It knits up super fast (if you’re normal).  My handles are a thrift store find from a few years ago - embroidered fabric ribbon that was in this huge $3 bag of lace and ribbon and whatnots including the owl and bird ribbon on the kid’s nature bags (which are still in heavy use, I need to make one for Anna).  I love how that thrift store ribbon is perfect for the color and style of this bag without any planning or forethought on my part.  It’s like the hippie universe aligning.

to buy a locally raised, grass-fed, free range chicken

tag-a-licious

Last Christmas I did one Craft Sale.  I’m hard core like that.  Especially when you consider the fact that it was put on by my friend so the extent of my research into craft fairs and all that jazz was bar none.  Assuming bar none means having coffee with said friend and handing over $15 for the table.   oh!  And I showed up the day of the craft sale with crafts!  To sell!

I even sold stuff.  In fact, I made more money at the craft fair than I did at my paying job (I was on maternity leave, but WHATEVER.  STILL COUNTS, STEVEN.).

One of the things I had at the fair were mini chalkboard Christmas tags.  I thought these were brilliant.  Only one other person shared my passion for the brilliance, though, and bought any.  The rest were doled out to family and friends as Christmas presents.  I’m thoughtful AND hardcore.

The other day another friend inquired if I had any tags leftover because she was hoping to use them to label some mason jars.  That first batch of tags all had Christmas designs painted on them, so they wouldn’t have been very pratical for mason jars, unless you’re storing Christmas Food, then they would be the most practical.  They were also wood and I was having a hard time figuring how that would work on a mason jar without being annoying.

Since I can’t sleep these days I spend a lot of hours lying in bed thinking about random shit.  During that time I came up with the idea of painting chalkboard paint onto cereal boxes, and then using an elastic to put it on the mason jar.  Cereal boxes are like perfect cardboard.  Stiff enough to be sturdy, but not so damn thick that they can’t be flexible.  Cereal boxes would win gold in the cardboard olympics.  I was also confident that a cereal box would hold up to being spray painted with chalkboard paint.  I was so right.  I AM A GENIUS.

if you were a genius, you would have thought of THIS.

Yes, I know normal people just slap a sticker on their mason jar.  The girl wants a chalkboard and I want to make things.  It’s win-win.

It wasn’t until after I spray painted the cardboard did I bother to do a google search.  Turns out you can buy chalkboard contact paper.  OF COURSE THERE IS CHALKBOARD CONTACT PAPER.  But that’s still a sticker.  A fancy-ass sticker with a lot of glam and sparkle, yes, but still a damn sticker.

Besides reusing cardboard helps save the planet.  We’re going to conveniently ignore the paint in an aresol can and the fact that I bought the elastic at The Dollar Store.  I REUSED CARDBOARD.

Here’s a tutorial so you can make your own!  Because I know how complicated painting cardboard can be!  Very Complicated.

Step 1: Paint the cardboard.  I did this outside.  In a $70 skirt.  Without first testing the direction of the wind.  Be ye not so stupid.

Step 1: paint

Step 2: Cut out your desired shape.  I tried a few on for size, and prefered the oval.  I don’t have a fancy cutter so I went old school.  Those in the know will recognize the Creative Memories Cutting System.  That makes me Super Cool.  I ended up with 30 tags from 1.5 cereal boxes (the other half had a $5 coupon for gas.  I wasn’t so stupid that I painted over free money!), two granola boxes and a fruit rollup box.  What?  We went to the lake this weekend.  That’s weekend food.

step 2: cut

Step 3: Measure 0.5 cm in from each end for the elastic holes.  Don’t be banging those holes right away if its the middle of the night.  The rest of the family doesn’t find that amusing.  Not even for Genius Tags.  They’re no fun, those guys.

step 3: measure

Step 4: Jazz up those labels!  For my dots I used the end of the toothpick, and then had to redip in paint every second dot.  How’s that for detail?  It ain’t perfect, but it did the job.

step 4: pizzazz

Step 5: Go to bed.  In the morning, pound out some holes.  I have this fancy eyelet kit with a handy tool for hole making.  I used it, despite the fact that getting this box out is a guarantee to having three children suddenly appear out of no where and be deeply interested in whatever it is you’re doing and desperate to help. My kids really like hammers.

step 5: hammertime

Step 6: Tie on the elastics.  I have no pictures of this.  The first 5 pictures were boring enough.  I used a dollar store roll of clear jewelery elastic, cut to about 10″ which gave me a generous length to tie with, and then I cut off the excess.  I did a triple knot.  Safety first!

oh yeah, that looks slick.

oh yeah.  Steve and I went to Niagara Falls.  It was lovely.

The list of things I need to do is long and tedious and boring and all adulty but the rain is making me heavy and lazy.  Adulty is fun when it is just you and your lover doing adulty things, but not so  much fun when you’re paying bills and grocery shopping.

Recycled leather cuffs are fun, though.  That sentence sounds dirty in the midst of the above paragraph, but it isn’t.  Recycled leather cuffs are just pretty.

recrafting leather belts. well, one was leather, the other was vinyl.

I lie, the decorative belt was vinyl, but it is still pretty and summery and makes a pretty cuff.  Clearly I took this picture when the earth used to rotate around a sun.  ah, sun.

I made four cuffs in total, two for me and one each for the kids.  I was wearing the leather one last week while putting Callum to bed and he lost his mind demanding I give him the cuff because it was his.  Except it isn’t. IT’S MINE KID.  His had gotten lost so he just decided he’d claim mine.  He’s still small and I can totally take him, so the cuff has remained in my possession and all his yelling and screaming did nothing for him.  Take that kid! ha!

If you’re itching to make your own leather cuff, here’s how:

1. Go to the thrift store and find yourself a leather belt you dig for $0.50.

2. Go home.  Leave leather belt in a box in your garage for a few months.

3. Buy snaps.

4. Add snaps to the box in the garage and leave for a few more months.

5. Clean up garage and remember that you have leather belts and snaps.

6. Stop cleaning the garage to cut leather belt to appropriate length and add a snap.

7. Voila! Leather cuff!

oh,  I wasn’t a total slacker.  She got a present on her birthday.  well, the weekend following her birthday.  The actual day of her birthday was busy so we just pretended it was just another day and did the birthday thing on the weekend.

She was one.  I have three children.  Shut up.

On the Mother’s Day weekend I made a little doll quilt that I had meant to make in time for Anna’s birthday and then didn’t because I was making wedding favours.  See?  That’s a very reasonable excuse if I needed to provide an excuse to the one year old, but I don’t so I’ll stop looking for excuses.

This little project was made entirely from odds and ends in my stash either left over from other projects or repurposed.  The backing is an old crib sheet that ripped, the binding was thrifted, and most of the fabric on the top was from a bundle I bought for the other doll quilt I made.  I’m really pleased and I’m starting to dig quilting, at least in minature.  Like I need another hobby.

pinky patchwork

an old sheet = perfect backing

That little cradle was also thrifted – $3!  I had big plans to have it painted by her birthday, but that didn’t happen.  I gave her that cradle for Christmas and had also planned to have it painted then, too.  Maybe by next Christmas.  This also just reinforces the awesomeness of 1 year olds.  I’m pretty sure 13 year olds would not dig a $3 Christmas present that I didn’t even bother to fix up.  Of course, there is no way of knowing if the 1 year old digs it either, but the 1 old year isn’t complaining.  Yet.

suzy, the dollie, isn't complaining either.

We had a little party with a handful of Callum’s friends from school.  I was going to say we also invited a couple of friends who aren’t from school except that I’ve convinced all of my friends - or rather, the two that I had Before Preschool - to send their kids to the same preshool.  That means Callum’s birthday was a little like going to preschool, except at my house.  And there was beer, which well, makes 14 children running around underfoot a little more tolerable.

Oh, I tease.  Sort of.

It was a super sweet, super casual little gathering.  We had the fixings for burritos ready and everyone made their own, a monster truck cake as per Callum’s request, and a bonfire on the go because Callum associates having his friends over with a bonfire.  The kids didn’t really have anything to do with the bonfire, but after almost everyone went home we sat around it for a while with some good friends.  Can’t beat a good bonfire.

Not too much else to say, and really I’m just here to show you the cake and the party favour (of course).

orange with a truck body, as requested.

we're four!

ah, the party favour.  Have I mentioned that I LOVE making the party favours?  Beacuse I do.  My favorite job would be “party favour maker”.  Does that job exist?  It should. 

the party favour

I’m pretty proud of these, they’re a little restaurant game!  You leave them in the car and then when you have to sit around and wait, you can bring out your little traveling Pirate Game!  Cool, yes?  You want one, yes? 

ready for travel

I drew a pirate map and game board, colored it and then scanned it into the computer and printed it out on that printable fabric.  The original plan was to draw the map and then have Callum color it, except that while I was getting it copied onto the proper paper from my sketches, Callum showed up and wanted to do his own drawings not color the thing I drew.  Then he realized that I really wanted him to color my drawing and at that point, I was shit out of luck.  He’s his father’s son, let me tell you.

After it was printed, I sewed it to those old canvas curtains that I still have kicking around (an old curtain can have oh so  many other lives!) to make it into a little carrying case although the game you see here is Callum’s special game, so he got a special fabric.  Then I added a pocket for the little men and a di.  The little men were left blank for the kids to color themselves and I had intended to have them do it at the party but everyone was having fun without me trying to force them to do something crafty so I didn’t bother.  Plus, I’m lazy and there was beer to drink.   Tasty, tasty, tasty cold beer.

Callum's dudes

ready to play

 The game itself is Candyland because I am not clever enough to dream up a new game.  Instead of using cards I created a di with colors on it which I’m considering using in the real Candyland game on Family Meeting Night because that might make playing Candyland a little more bearable. hmmm…. beer might help in that situation too.

Sadly I didn’t have any velcro on-hand when I sewed these (at midnight the night before the party because we wouldn’t want to be too ridiculous and actually do these things ahead of time) so I ended up tying the pocket closed with a ribbon and that was less than ideal.  I have no doubt the di and men will soon fall out of all those pockets and get lost in the corners of several cars and several Moms will be swearing at me under their breath sometime soon. 

um, sorry?  Come on over and I’ll give you a cold beer!  It’ll take the edge off!

The game was definitely a hit with my own kids, plus I love that they don’t have to play the game, they can just use it as a playmat for their pirates!

One day I’ll write a nice post that I can actually print off and give to my children.

And like oh-so-much about parenting let me give all you non-parents a little insight into the crayon.  Crayons break very easily and leave little crayon lint everywhere.  Crayons get their wrappers torn off bit-by-painfully-little-bit and all those damn bits of crayon wrapper end up in every corner of your house.  Crayons are very easy to bite into and then spit out.  Not that I have a child that does that (I’m looking at you, CLAIRE).  Crayons get dumped onto the floor in a giant heap so the bucket can be used as a helmet.   And also, Laura informs me that some crayons DON’T WASH OFF.  What the hell?!

The one thing kids don’t do with crayons?  Draw a picture.

Anyway one day I had a fit.  A huge, giant, child-like fit because once again an enormous pile of crayons was in the middle of my living room getting kicked around.  Crayons were flying under the couch.  Crayons were being thrown about.  Crayons were leaving their nasty little crayon lint everywhere.  I got mad and I picked up all those damn crayons, chopped them to bits in my mini chopper (oh, that was a bad, bad, bad idea) and then melted the shit out them.

choppy, choppy.

melty, melty

oopsy, oopsy.

pretty, pretty.

So now I have a small basket of pretty little crayon shapes!  The kids love them.  They feed them to their dolls, they line them up, they pretend they are little people, they trace them, they put them in their car/train/tractor and drive them around. 

The one thing they don’t do with the pretty, little crayon shapes? Draw a picture.

looks like he's going to draw, but he doesn't draw...

At least they aren’t leaving crayon lint behind anymore.