The Story Blanket (Part I)

The birthday girl: Eliana

Eliana's favorite past time: Story-telling and reading

Favorite stories: Fairy tales

Favorite fairy tales: Princess ones

The twentieth of December is coming quicker than I ever dreamed it would back when I purchased these vintage fairy tale panels in July. I had no idea what I was going to do with them, but I clicked on the "Purchase" button so uncharacteristically fast that I knew something wonderful was going to materialize.

The idea for a Story Blanket came alive as I carefully cut around each scene in the panel, envisioning strips of complementary fabric lining them in a sort of quilt-like fashion, with a cozy, fluffy chenille backing. My sister, Maddie, and I took my mission to the fabric store and I tell you, when we found the black-patterned fabric with the mustard-gold and red wreaths... well, I think the entire store heard our gasps and squeals of delight.

So, the plan is this: to piece the panels together with frames of the two gold fabrics, then take the final piece and outline it with the black background fabric, and back it all with the furry brown chenille, zig-zag stitching the outside edges and perhaps running some red yarn through to tie at the corner of each panel.

And the plan after that? To read as much as we can, just so the Story Blanket can be unfolded and admired as it wraps around little shoulders, or holds long, sprawling limbs as imaginations soar.

I better get busy. Stay tuned!

Family Tradition: Placeholder Turkeys

The day before the day before...

Nature Swap Delights

The beautiful handiwork of this year's autumn nature craft swap...

Fruits of the spirit twig coasters

Autumn leaves votive

Autumn leaves batik banner

Mulling spices and cinnamon applesauce ornaments

Melted crayon "stained glass" autumn leaves

Pieces of the hearts of friends and their families... we are so grateful.

2nd Annual Autumn Nature Craft Swap

The season: Autumn, of course!

The cast: A group of seven sister-friends, six localish, and one dear wife and mama ministering with her husband in a farther-away place that sometimes seems to skip fall altogether.

The hope: To create a craft for each family in the swap, inspired by autumn nature, making an effort to choose handwork that welcomes even the help of little ones.

For last year's swap, we rolled red and orange yarn into apples and pumpkins, with brown and green pipe cleaners for stems and leaves! My children loved holding the cardboard rectangle and rolling to their heart's content. (They especially loved when Mama would lose her grip on the ball of yarn when they rolled a little too fanatically and it tumbled about the house. Hmmmm.)

For our offering this year, I was inspired by this Etsy shop- her dear little nursery twinkle lights in pastel hearts and circles got my creative juices flowing- I immediately pictured autumn leaf twinkle lights!

While adorable and so fitting in theory, I quickly realized it was quite the undertaking; with seven swappers in our group, I needed to keep the twinkle-light strands at a lower count or the sheer amount of cutting might very well be my undoing. Happily, I found some strands of ten lights, so this meant we only had to cut out 140 different leaf pairs! Gorgeous, autumn-colored felt and easy printable leaf shapes helped make quicker work of the task. (And cutting while listening to my husband read the final chapters of Lord of the Rings to our boys sure helped, too!)

The running stitch required to close the leaves around each light proved to be a more difficult task for the male hands in our house; a delighted Eliana sat and stitched five leaf pairs by herself, but both of my big boys drew the line at one. Ha! No matter- evenings spent re-watching Lark Rise to Candleford transported my stitching to a hamlet cottage in front of a crackling fire. (Dear Queenie, what words of wisdom have you for me tonight?)

And so they trickle in, the handwork of my friends and their families finding homes on window panes and barren walls and tabletops... and I am grateful for the hands that made them.

More pictures to come...

Happy autumn, sister-friends!

All photos by my sweet sister, Bethany, who has both great talent in photography and an amazing camera, of which I have neither.

Recipe for a Delightful Evening

It's nearing the end of the day.

Take one part tired-but-resolved Mama*, one part perky five-year-old who has been excited all day at said tired Mama's promise for an evening surprise, one part printable dollhouse furniture, and mix them all together.

What follows will be, I promise you, a lovely evening.

We decided to start our decorating with a couple of rugs, an antique map, and an old-fashioned radio.

Spur of the moment, we decided to dress up the antique map a little bit with some painted popsicle sticks. (Princess sleeves must be tucked up for this task.)

While the frame dried, we began to cut out our accessories and furniture. Princess sleeves may be untucked, and candlelight is a happy must.

We spied this tiny frame in Eliana's bedroom and decided to stamp a picture to be displayed in the girl's room of her dollhouse.

Lots of glue, lots of giggles as fingers got covered with glue, and now here's our finished work and a (very)reserved Eliana. (Don't let her fool you- she just wants to start the decorating process.)

And here's the boys' playroom in the attic- they love their new map! (The treasure chest was made the day before by Mama, as a practice run.) And Eliana wants you to know that she's tried combing Joseph's hair, but he likes it that way.

Mama has escaped to the attic as well, to listen to her favorite inspirational speaker on the old-fashioned radio. She really needs her Quiet Time.

Here's a quick peek into the nursery- no new accessories here, but there's the Queen, sitting with her babies, Gideon and Alice. They're twins.

And the girls' room! *sigh* It's Eliana's favorite, of course- Lily and Rose are currently playing with two dollhouses that were also made by Mama the day before, on the beautiful rug Eliana cut out, the room brightened still more by a new mermaid picture on the dresser. The girls are very pleased.

And the living room, with its new rug. Everyone is happily ensconced in their favorite rooms, though, so it's awfully quiet in here.

This was such an easy project with really happy results! A quick printoff of a few new pieces and accessories for the dollhouse, some scissors and glue, paints and candlelight... it was just really, really fun.

*I am finally learning that I will never regret giving up some me time to draw nearer to my children. It definitely helps, though, to be purposeful about it well in advance- my husband knew I was weary and urged me to start shutting down for the evening, but I told him I had promised her, and I must follow through because it would be so good.

And it was.