Saturday, August 22, 2009

Pasta Fun

A picture to share.


-- Post From My iPhone

Wednesday, July 01, 2009

iPhone blog ressurection

Our poor neglected blog is going to be resurrected. Since we got our iPhones I've been busy taking lots of pictures and videos, and I finally found an app that should let me make blog posts directly from my phone. Hooray!

We have been doing a lot of camping this summer, we spent a weekend at Oxbow just outside Portland, a weekend at Green Canyon near Mt. Hood with friends, and a week at a cabin in Central Oregon. We'll be camping the next 3 weekends, too. Good times! We've been trying our hand at Geocaching, which is a lit of fun. Max loves this "treasure hunting" hobby. I'll make another blog about it soon, as well as post more details on our camping trips and Max's first summercamp experience.

For now, here are some pictures from our summer so far!




















-- Posted From My iPhone

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Happy Birthday!

We had a great time at Max's birthday party! Our friends Mckay and Sean are photographers and they took some great pictures. I'll share more stories and get caught up on our lives in a post soon, I promise!










Sunday, March 01, 2009

Sunday, February 22, 2009

New addition to our family...

Fish! 3 fish and a frog, actually. Their names are Zoom, Teeny, Pi the Fish and Pi the Frog. Pi is Max's favorite word.

Monday, December 22, 2008

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Snow Day!

It's snowing outside!




Monday, December 08, 2008

Recent happenings...

We went to find our Christmas Tree with Grandpa Bob and Grandma Sue on Saturday- it was lots of fun!This has become a tradition for us. We've been to a different tree farm each of the last 3 years, and it's been fun to venture out to a different area and see what each one is like. This one had a tractor ride around the tree farm, then you pick and cut your own tree. They also had hot cocoa and sweets.


Max, "Spotting the cut"


We had a big fort in the living room that became a hat shop. Max and grandma Mimi took pictures of a few animals modeling the hats.



Max found these sunglasses and told me, "I look cool. " doesn't he?

He also found my make-up bag in the bathroom one day. Dropped a lot of it on the floor, breaking it, but it could have been worse. It was one of those "take a deep breath, and go get the camera!" moments. I should have known better than to leave it on the back of the toilet seat!

He still loves to play with our camera. Here are a few he took recently of his favorite things.

And here's a picture of our favorite thing...

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Creative Handmade Gifts

This is a cross-post from my Panjo Kids blog. Thought you might enjoy reading it, too!

We are taking the Handmade Pledge again this year. This means that we are making many of our gifts by hand, and are shopping for handmade, preferably local, gifts for the rest of our gifts. You might be thinking, "Lame. There are only so many knit scarves and macrame plant holders a person can take." but I encourage you all to think outside the box! Etsy is an amazing place to shop for creative, unique gifts. Here's what shopping for the holidays looks like for me.

"Hmmm, what are we going to get for Dave? He's really into bicycling. Let me do a search on Etsy and see what I find." I do a general search throughout all of Etsy and it yields 2332 items. I add the word "mens" and it narrows it down to 305 items. I can handle that. I also try it with "bicycle unique" and "bicycle man" to see what that gives me. Then I sort by price. Here are some of the cool things I find that I could get for Dave that are handmade:

These pins are $1.50 by lolabot. They also have a lot of other bicycle related items.


Shirt by Vital, $24


Recycled Bicycle Gear Bottle Opener by Foundry Wear $25


Matted and Framed 8x10 print, "The Bike Mechanic" $75 by Mary Williams Photography


Custom Bicycle Headbadge for $120.


Two Bicycle Pint Glasses by Bread and Badger, $28. They have loads of other cool etched glass pieces, and they are located here in Portland.

So you see- cool stuff! You just have to look for it. In the next few days I'll be posting a few of my favorite unique items from Etsy. Check back in for ideas for kids, teenagers, baseball lovers, and crafters!

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Play Kitchens and Play Food

Max loves pretending. Just today alone he was a spy, a circus clown, a robot, a pirate, and a dentist. We've been eying play kitchens for awhile, and I've recently been tempted by the retro one at Costco which is on sale for less than $100. Then I thought, why not look on Etsy? Turns out there are some great ones on Etsy! I should've known. Really, what CAN'T you buy on Etsy?!? These are heirlooms that would be nice passed down to grandchildren.

Palumba has a great assortment of handmade toys including this simple play kitchen hearth for $349.99 (that includes shipping). The craftsmanship is gorgous, it even has a cutting board that slides out!

This one is by Willowtoys for $225 (shipping included!)



This one by Imagine that Woodshop is only $143.50 plus shipping.

And now on to play food! There are many types that you can buy, I'm partial to felt or knit playfood myself. And it's so easy to make! Using felt you can hand stitch or use a machine. Here is a site with lots of patterns for inspiration and some patterns, too. I just knit up a little strawberry the other day and it's so cute! Here's a website that links to knitting patterns for everything from a banana to a cinnamon roll. Apparently you can even buy scented batting to stuff your playfood so the piece of cake really smells like cake. Yum.

Here are a few of my favorite items by Etsy sellers for inspiration:

These cupcakes by CrazyDaisy60are adorable! 3 for $24.95, or you can buy the pattern for $5.50

Clementines by Eternal Sunshine, $9

Pancakes by Harvest Moon... yum! $30

Bug Bites Play Food has so many cute items, it's hard to choose one! This Farmers Market produce Basket is $35.
For the discerning appetite- Felted Sushi by Mango Avocado. This is a custom order and not for sale, but she does take custom orders!

Camping set pattern by BuggaBugs $6


Go forth and play!