Playsilks

 A playsilk was one of the first toys I purchased for Eoghan.  I drapped it over his basinet, let him grasp it, chew on it, played peek-a-boo, and covered him up with it,  and even tied little knots in it to fashion a doll.   His "silkie" quickly became his favorite toy.  Almost 2 years later we still play with that "silkie" daily.  There is something luxurious about playing with silk. I love watching it float down as we spread it out over the table to set up for story time,  taking a few minutes to pause and watch it flutter really sets the tone, for the magic of our story.

Our silkies have been used as landscapes and backdrops to our stories,  soups in our play kitchen, blankets and carriers for our dolls.  They have created forts, provided curtains for puppet shows,  have been fashioned in to all sorts of clothing for dress up,  and even become mighty rivers in our movement journeys!

I really believe playsilks are one of the best investments one can make in a toy that will provide years of entertainment for a child.  There are so many beautiful playsilks available on Etsy and I too have begun offering them for $5 in my Etsy Shop for those of you who don't want to have to deal with boiling pots of hot water and dyes all over your counters!

 You can however easily make them yourself and I think watching the colors come out is half the fun.
  I purchase the undyed silks from Dharma Trading Company and have tried a few different types of dyes, from Kool-aid to coffee beans all of which creating wonderfully beautiful silks! There are some great tutorials online on how to use different dyes with playsilks so I won't bother to post the step by step process here.  But my most recent batch I did a little differently than I have seen suggested online. I dyed with Coffee first  allowed them to dry fully then gave them a second dye bath in water tinted with food coloring.  I really love the way the colors came out a little more earthy with the coffee base.  I think on my next batch I may reverse the process and do the bright dyes first then give them a coffee bath and see what the difference is.

Shared on Friday's Nature Table at the Magic Onions.

A Birthday Craft Exchange

My little man will be turning 2 next month!  I simply love sweet little handmade toys, I hosted a holiday handmade craft exchange in December with a group of local moms and it was so much fun seeing what everyone created, and the toys my children received are among their favorites.  I thought it would be fun to host an online craft exchange in celebration of Eoghan's Birthday.

Here's how it will work, if you want to participate Email me with your address and leave me a comment on this post so I know to look for your email (incase it goes into a spam folder).  Your address will only be shard with your craft swap partners so they can mail their crafts to you. Please sign up no later than, January 18th so I know how many participants we will have and I can get everyone their craft partners names quickly.


You will make three handmade toys and send those to the three addresses sent to you no later than February 14th, and you will receive one handmade toy in the mail from three other crafters.  Please send me a photo of your crafts so I can include them in a gallery of our craft exchange.

Some examples of what types of toys that we had for our holiday craft exchange included Peg dolls with a story, Knit animals, felt food, hand sewn balls and beanbags, vegetable dyed playsilks,  nature table figures, needle felted animals, felt angels, wool animals, wool dolls etc etc.  Be creative these are just a few examples but seeing what ideas people come up with is part of the fun!

Oh I just cannot wait to see how excited Eoghan will be when we find special packages in our mailbox for him!

Here's a few photos of what I have been having fun, crafting recently, they are listed on my Etsy shop.
One of my New Year's resolutions is to try to maintain a little handwork shop on Etsy this year to help off set the cost of craft supplies, namely my addiction to yarn.

Happy Crafting!   Shared on The Magic Onion's Friday Nature Table and Waldof Wednesday at Seasons of Joy Blog.

Handmade Holiday Toy Exchange

A few photo's from my Handmade Holiday Toy Exchange on Saturday.  

I wish I had remembered to take photos of all the beautiful toys that were crafted but I got so excited in seeing what everyone made, I forgot all about photos.  I did take a few photos of the gifts I received the next morning as you will see below, but there were so many amazing crafts I really wish I had documented them all!

Our Advent Wreath and Gnomes welcoming friends our table

Some beeswax snowflakes and holiday greenery the littles and I collected on a nature walk

Clementines and Pomegranates

a few sugary treats and gluhwein

Sugarplums (thanks to Sparkle Stories for the recipe).

Goodies waiting to be opened

Homemade sparkle play dough scented with doTERRA oils

Walking blocks

A sweet little ball

This darling little gnome featured in "A Little Farm Story" about protecting the hens.

The gnomes and trees I made for the exchange

It was such a lovely evening filled with great conversations and such creativity, we have decide have one of these every season.  I already cannot wait for our Spring Exchange.

Keep Calm Craft On

Linking with Nicole at Frontier Dream's Keep Calm Craft On, here are a few photos of what I completed this week and what I have started.  I finished up Eoghan's Yule blanket.  

I am not sure why, but this blanket took me over a month to complete.  Its just a simple pattern: cast on 40 stitches, knit 80 rows bind off then whip stitch the squares together and trim with a blanket stitch around the edges. Easy peasy!  However it proved to be one of the slowest moving projects I have undertaken in knitting.  

As with most homemades the amount of time invested and the money for the materials far exceeded the investment of a store bought blanket.  However I love that I will be wrapping my sweet baby up in a blanket where each stitch is infused with Mama's love, warmth, and protection.  I had originally planned on doing 16 squares, but due to feeling the holiday crunch I opted for 9 squares, which I think worked out nicely as this yarn is actually quite heavy and I do want him to be able to carry the blanket around with him easily.

Here it is all wrapped up and ready to go under our Yule Tree.

Here are the beginings of the same pattern blanket in shades of pink for Kiera, i was able to almost complete two squares yesterday so I think this one will be a little faster going.



Now off to check out all the wonderful links at Frotnier Dreams to see what everyone else is working on.

Keep Calm Craft On

Linking with Nicole at Frontier Dream's "Keep Calm Craft On" linkup.  Here is what I am currently working on:

 A few little holiday gnomes to tuck inside little stockings.  I am thinking these will make cute little Saint Nicholas presents to tuck into the children's shoes on December 6th. 

One of the things I really enjoy about handmaking not only gifts but our seasonal decorations, is I tend to feel the spirit of the holiday or season longer, although my days are spent celebrating Fall, my favorite season of the year, and the house is decked out in Fall's beauty. Today we made leaf wands with fallen leaves tied to string on a stick and sang, " The Red Leaves are Falling Down" song Meanwhile my evening has been spent knitting by the fire thinking about decorations and gifts for our Winter Holidays.  

Here a few of the knitting projects I've been working at by the fire: the cream colored square will be added to a patchwork blanket I am making for Eoghan, after this square I only have two more to go, then I am going to whip stitch them all together with a blanket stitched border.  I had planned on making both of the littles a blanket for Yule this year, but I am already feeling the holiday crunch.  Kiera's might be a little late, luckily at 2 years old I doubt she will mind too terribly.

 The grey knitting is the body to a backpack for Madeline, that will match the little felted iPhone case I just finished for her.  At 17 she is less than thrilled about the idea of handmade gifts this year, but I think she will actually like and use these.

Slowly but surely I am marking things off of my list.  I am glad that I have figured out what to give everyone, I just need a few more hours in the day for handwork!  Perhaps next year will be the year I actually start early enough to not feel stressed about getting everything done in time.  Oh well, I do what I can do, and enjoy the process.

We are the Wintertide Gnomes

Meet my dear friends Adalbold  Crystaldrift, Varick Frostshine, and Arnulf Twinklesnow who are currently cosied up in their little pouches, resting before their work with Father Winter begins.  You see these gnomes are charged with gathering up little crystals of sunlight during the summer and keeping them safe until Father Winter covers Mother Earth with his beautiful blanket of snow.  Once she is aptly covered my dear friends here sprinkle the crystals of sunlight on top of the blanket, so whenever you see the snow shimmer in the Sun's rays or twinkle under the Moon's light you will know that the magic of these gnomes is afoot.

Shared on The Magic Onions' Friday's Nature Table.

Homemade Holiday Toy Exchange

Although I am very tempted to do a 100% handmade holiday this year, there are simply a few things we need to replenish our supplies on such as stockmar beeswax block crayons and watercolors, and a few holiday books I would like to add to our collection, so sadly we won't be 100% handmade this year.  Although I do want to focus heavily on handmade items which inspired me to host my first Handmade Holiday Toy Exchange.   So far I have nine other Mamas signed up, we are going to split up into groups of 3.   Each Mama will craft 2 toys to exchange with their group mates.  

I started working on my toys today.  I needle felted some pine trees and made a little winter gnome.  I think I am going to either knit a snowflake pocket necklace or make one from felt for the little gnomes to hide in.  I'll post more pictures when I am done, but could not resist despite our 78 degrees today setting up a little winter scene for my gnome to play in.

Waiting for his dwarf friends to arrive

Enjoying the company of the dwarfs.  (and a back view)

Thank you Wee Folk Art for the pattern that inspired my wonderland gnomes.

A few more gnomes came to join the party

I wonder what the topic of conversation is....

Handwork for the Soul

Are they not just too sweet in their handknits? It truly does warm my soul to know my handwork is warming their little bodies as the weather turns colder this season.

I've always believed on a spiritual level, you create your reality, what you send out, what you focus on is what you receive etc etc, you see that thought in many world religions and philosophies and I think there is much truth to it. Because of this belief I feel it is very important for young children to see adults crafting and creating the things in their world, from simple meals, clothing, to

ys etc... Watching something transform into a beautiful useful handmade item is very exciting for small children and it gives them confidence that they too can create and an appreciation for the work it takes to craft things.

 The children’s
 Sprouts teacher was talking about Rudolph Steiner's thoughts on the importance of handwork. He believed children’s' souls do not entirely inhabit their bodies yet and people that work with small children's ether bodies are constantly being tugged upon by the children.  Thus Explaining why after spending a lot of time with little children older people tend to feel drained although they have not done much physical or mental work. Steiner believed handwork gave back and grounded the adults' spirits after being subjected to the tugging of small children all day.

 I have experienced this grounding and recharging without giving it much thought as to why I feel the need to knit or stitch at night after a full day with the littles, not only is it relaxing in an odd way it is invigorating.  I think having something tangible to show for your work at the end of the day is always good, and often times are work with children does not yield tangible results.  Pictured below are a few of this season's handwork:

A few Milo Vests I made this Season for Eoghan

Dresses, Mismatched Knee Sox and a Shawl for Kiera

Matching Milo and Plain Vest for Eoghan and Kiera

Purple Plain Vest for Kiera

Creating Light in Darkness

The photos of the damage is nothing short of heart breaking I do hope everyone is doing well, safe and sound and has everything they need.  My heart really goes out to those hit harder than us.  We have had a candle lit for you all day.

While we waited for the Storm to hit, we busied our hands making these lanterns a friend of mine had posted on Facebook.  I thought it was a fitting activity given the impending power outage.  Here in the deep deep woods, we are lucky if a tree doesn't fall every time someone sneezes taking the power out with it for days and often times blocking our path out of the woods.

   I so love our old trees especially this time of year but I have to admit I do suffer from some post traumatic weather stress after watching one level our shed just a few months ago.   I needed something to keep me focused and not thinking of all the "what ifs" with the trees looming precariously over our home.

My friends tutorial could not have been more timely even though she was posting it as a group craft for a group of us to do for another dear friend's upcoming wedding.  Isn't it wonderful when things like that happen.  Serendipity!

The lanterns were very easy and fun for even the littlest albeit glue covered hands, I just mixed some craft glue and water until it was slightly runny, tore up sheets of white tissue paper and applied them to balloons blown about 1/2 way up.  I did about three layers of tissue paper around the bottom 1/2 of the balloon and then glued on some leaves, applied a few more layers of tissue over the leaves, then left them to dry turning them every hour or so.  Once they were dry I cut the tops of the balloons off allowing them to deflate, trimmed the rough edges and lit beeswax tea lights (in glass candle holders just to be safe).  Voila beautiful little lanterns!

They cast such a beautiful warm glow in the room, they were a perfect way to bring some light and warmth into our home on a dark and stormy night.

Drying Lanterns

All Lit Up

We have been gearing up for the littles' first celebrated Halloween all month, practicing "trick or treat" on our bedroom doors, playing "trick or treat" with our farmhouse turned haunted house, and doing a the "Five Little Pumpkins" finger play from Little Acorn Learning.  The climax of the rhyme is "Whooo!  Went the wind and out went the lights (clap)" So as brother wind was whipping about we would repeat that line, they both thought the storm was great fun and much to my surprise the lights never went out!  I was so glad we were able to craft something beautiful and have fun in what could have been a very stressful situation.  Isn't amazing how children's energy can be so calming?

Our Ooky Spooky Haunted Farm House

Although we escaped any emotional stress during the storm and maintained our electricity, we were not completely unscathed , apparently the rain softened the ground so much that our oil tank turned over despite the feet being cemented into the ground.  Sadly spilling 268 gallons of heating oil into our soil.  As a result we are not only out all the money paid for our winter's heating oil, we also have to have the entire contaminated area dug up and fresh soil brought in to reduce the environmental damage by a certified environmental team.    I am heartbroken to see our lovely earth dug up, hauled away and discarded.  I hope the damage is just in the yard and did not make it into the woods.  Although the trees cause me some fear in such heavy storms they really are what makes our property magical and I would hate to lose them.  although it is late in the season I am planning on sprinkling some sunflower seeds in the area the new soil is being brought in, I have heard sunflowers are great soil cleaners, and to me such a symbol of summer's light, I do hope they grow and bring a little more light to our darkness.