sheppard girls

Brought to you by the letter "A"

Is it really cool or really quite sad that the little one was spelling out letters with fabric strips from the headbands?

And best of all

A bag of poker chips, because, as you can see from this kindergarten drawing from the big one, when our family is together, we like to "pla poc".  True, embarrassing, but true. 

Glass half full

Things you find when you have to empty your entire basement and everything gets wet:

High school yearbook pictures of your sweet geeky husband trying to look cool.  "Just because you were the sports editor of the paper, it does not make you any less of a newspaper nerd."

High school yearbook pictures of your sister to which to the big one replied "seriously?"

A number of Easter dress options for the little one in boxes of clothes from the big one.  Aqua gingham and white eyelet among them.

Long ago purchased vintage towel bars that are perfect for the newly remodeled bathroom.

Boxes and boxes of infant to 12 twelve months clothes for a sweet baby niece.

A pair of never returned grey wool pinstriped pants that are a much welcome replacement for the grey wool pinstriped pants the dry cleaner lost, along with four carefully collected size 15/34 dress shirts, which are nearly impossible to find and therefore replace, unless a person wants to spend $190 a shirt.  I am more along the lines of "look, I found this shirt in your size for $14."

Piles and piles of fabric that had nearly been forgotten.  I do have more of the beloved pink and blue floral!

Sigh

Excuse my absence, our basement flooded.  Back in a few days.  Lisa

I heart church cookbooks

I've wanted to make Snickerdoodles ever since the big one picked them at D'Amico and Sons a few weeks ago, but I couldn't find a recipe that didn't call for Crisco.  In nearly 15 years of having my own kitchen, I have never once thought "I wish had some Crisco".  But it comes in sticks and is yellow now, so it didn't seem quite so icky. 

I am using a recipe from a church cookbook from the little country church near the dad's family cabin.  I love the recipe names: Kraut Salad, Exotic Chicken Salad, Chicken Curry in a Hurry, Filled Cookies, Favorite Bars, Aggression Cookies (which I think I should make just for the name!) Dream bars, Delicious Cookies,  And people probably know exactly the cookies someone is talking about when they say "Ferne Skog's Delicious Cookies".  Here is Cheryl Stauter's Snickerdoodle recipe.  Thanks Cheryl, they are just what I was looking for.

Snickerdoodles

Cream together:

2 C Crisco

3C Sugar

4 tsp cream of tartar

2 tsp soda

1 tsp salt

4 eggs

Add: 5 1/2 C flour.  Roll into small balls. Roll in sugar and cinnamon.  Place about 2 inches apart on an ungreased (I had to grease mine) cookie sheet.  Bake at 400 degrees for 8-10 minutes ot until lightly browned, but still soft.  These puff up at first then flatten out wtih crinkles on top.

Like a fly to honey...

   

I am drawn to aqua blue.

Dishes,

 

lampshades,

vintage fans.  Vintage fabric and seambinding.  You put some aqua ricrac on something, and I am right there.  Friday I made a special trip out to one of my favorite antique stores - Buffalo Nickel, for local gals - specifically to buy magnet boards for the big one and the little one's bedrooms.  I have one of these boards already, and I love it.  The woman, Tamara Nygren, who makes them has a booth there, and a talent I cannot get enough of.  Each time her booth(s) are arranged around a different color.  This time white and lilac in one and red and yellow in another. 

I came away with the pile you see here with the plan to use the other frames and the metal trays to finish the picture wall in our upstairs hallway.  I have been hesitant to put a bunch of pictures up in the big open hallway, because I thought it would be too "cluttery".  But let's face it.  I like cluttery.

Where did I go wrong?

When presented with the following catalogs,

         

(from top to bottom)  MiniBoden 

Growing up Garnet Hill 

Olive Juice Kids

the big one said "I'm not really that into shopping." 

**Edited to clarify, I do most of kid clothes shopping at Old Navy, Lands End and Gap.  I'm not crazy!

No longer 21

 

Do you think the fact that  I bought three shirts at Forever 21 today was more a source of:

A: alarm - well clearly we won't be buying anything that woman has in her arms, or

B: pity - oh, look, the poor sweet, older lady has lost her way

A Love/hate relationship

LOVE:

The way these headbands look now

How they coordinate with my bibs and burp cloths

Mixing fabric.

Not so much:

Getting the pattern perfect

How making that covered elastic is going to turn my hands into stiff, tired little stumps.

I am hoping someone out there has a tip for turning fabric right side out after stitching.  There must be a secret I am missing.  A special tool.  Seamstresses?  Crafter?  Softie makers?  My current tool choices of a tweezer and a chopstick is just making me sad.

Signs of spring

My flowering quince didn't.   

So I took matters into my own hand, using my last scraps of one of my very favorite fabrics of all time.  When I first starting making bibs about a year and half ago, this was one of the very first fabrics I bought.  It has since become burp cloths, head bands, fabric flowers, notecards and barrettes.  You can still find it occasionally at a Joanns.  But not where I shop, because when I find any last bit on a bolt, I pick it up very quickly and put it in my cart before anyone else sees the treasure I have found.  I see it is still hanging on here and here too.

I also couldn't resist these sweet little pails at Target.