New Passions

I mentioned before that I had a new project I've been 'poking' away at. Well, I finally finished the little present I was making for Muffin's Easter basket, and thought I'd share. ;) First the explanation of why I made what I did, then we'll get to the how.

Little Muffin is enthralled with eggs. I know, of all the things, right? But she loves to eat them, play with them, crack them, and hold them. (Don't worry, the ones she carries around all day are the play kind, not the ones from my fridge!) Also, when Muffin plays with... well, anything, she does this little narration or story telling thing. You know those bead maze things they have at doctor's offices? We have a small one, and when she plays with it, it goes something like this:

(Imagine a high-pitched little two year old voice)

"Come on Baby Marcus, you need your hat on. We have to go to Nana's house. Let's go to the market. Oh, don't push Paisley. Let's go get Madelynn.....OH! Daddy's home...." and so on. In this scenario, each bead on the maze is a person. She does this with anything she plays with. The other day she had a bendy straw named Uncle Marty. I digress.

So after being inspired by an article in Martha Stewart, and an etsy shop (link to come later, her shop is currently closed due to orders she has to catch up on for easter, so I can't find her) I decided to combine these things and make Muffin a family of egg people! Our family, that is.

The method? Needle felting. It involves poking a barbed needle into wool roving thousands of times, binding the fibers together until it becomes the shape you want.
This is the roving before anything is done to it. That' the needle on the left. The green and yellow tool is 5 of the needles in one, so it makes the process go much faster, but I've found it doesn't work well until you have at least some structure to the roving. The roving and needles can be found online, or possibly in your local quilting fabric store.
I house our family in a six pack egg carton. I know she will love putting them into the carton.
This one is the Mommy egg, of course. I gave myself a bun after several very strange attempts at a pony tail.

New baby girl, Mr. Baby, and Muffin. The lady who sells these on etsy has you send her a family picture, and she will make them for you. She sells a set of six for $70.00!! I can understand, since it is very labor intensive, but what else do I have to do while watching Dora and Wonder Pets? Side note: you know your child watches too much Dora when she can count from one to eight in spanish and you didn't teach her. ;) She actually does that better than counting in english! Should I be worried?

I will admit, I think they are pretty cute!

Daddy Man and doggie Bee. Daddy has a gotee, not giant lips. The little pink lips are hard to see in this picture. I am hooked on needle felting! It is repetitive and pretty therapeutic, until I jab the needle into my finger. Must get some gloves or something.

I tried a new bread recipe this week- no starter needed! I know, the starter is probably really good for you, but I can't even remember to water house plants....how am I supposed to remember to feed the starter? I got this recipe from one of my favorite blogs (can you tell? I've mentioned her like 4 times) called MADE. For the recipe, go to her tutorials section. I did half wheat flour, instead of all white like the recipe calls for. Isn't it beautiful? And soooo yummy! We couldn't help but dig into it before I had a chance to get a picture.

This week Daddy Man turned 26, and Muffin gave him some special cars for his birthday present.

He liked them a lot. (Bit of an understatement) I came home from garage saleing Saturday morning to this:
The goal was to launch the car off the coffee table and get it to land on the cereal box. And, of course, to slide down Daddy Man's ramp. I love watching Daddy Man and Muffin play together.
One last thing. (I really should post more often to avoid these mega-posts.) I made Dana's 90 minute shirt for Mr. Baby. It turned out pretty good.
Transform a men's shirt into a kid's shirt, with added contrast ribbing on the neckline. I need to make the neck smaller next time, but it worked out. I LOVE making clothes for my kids. Not only is it inexpensive, it is sentimental. It reminds me of the outfits my mom used to make my sister and I as kids. Mind you, they were not quite as cool ;) (It's ok Mom, it was the 80's. It's not your fault) but I love those outfits! I think the one with the crayola fabric, with the crayon buttons was my favorite. I am happy to make a little piece of history for my kids.