May Day

Happy May Day! (tomorrow) 
So give your kiddiwinks some streamers and watch them go twirling,


make some pretty paper cones (see here for a paper cone tutorial) and fill them with flowers,

invite me over when you make this beautiful Springy Earl Grey cake with rhubarb cream,

and join me in trying to track down this vintage lovely of a book, 'Little Grey Rabbit's May Day' by Alison Uttley.


I'm also going to see if my library has 'On the Morn of Mayfest' by Erica Silverman -- I love the sleepwalking kiddo with a bird on her head! I think both of these books would be fun to read all this month, don't you?

Wanted to give you at least a day to get yourself ready to CELEBRATE MAY! Julia and I are going to go leave some posies in paper cones on our neighbors' door knobs.

I love the month of May. The last bits of cold usually pack up and go, and there's the knowledge that summer is just around corner. 




(Image credits: http://jennywrendesigns.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-day-of-may.html, http://english-wedding.com, http://www.raspberricupcakes.com/2011/06/earl-grey-cake-with-rhubarb-cream.html )

Cool Stuff I Like

Spring, Springtime...Julia made a spring chalk drawing last week, please note the 'Bug teader' (she was going for 'theater').

Hey guess what: today you can check out my first guest post over at Pen Pals & Picture Books! Thanks for having me, Robyn and Whitney! I just adore these two darling ladies, they've become great bloggy pals. They feature loads of amazing book and craft inspiration on their fun, fun site. Go see!


COOL STUFF I'm liking this week:

Teeny Tiny Terrariums (I'm on a kick with these) made from spice jars.

Oh Ikea, how I love thee. Especially these owl curtains and this hedgehog and fox duvet.

Candy Colored Bento Boxes.

Spring Quiche with Leeks and Sorrel. This would be lovely for Mother's Day!

Homemade Outdoor Fireflies.

Domo!

Fabulous Play Food roundup.

A pal pinned this on Pinterest. Some of the most fun wall decals I've seen.

Little Cloud Spoonrests.


Cool Book of the Week: 'Spork' by Kyo Maclear and Isabelle Arsenault. I'd been hankering to see this darling little book for ages, so happy to have finally read it with J. Even in the world of cutlery, one must struggle to find a happy niche in which to belong, while also holding onto one's individuality. Cutie cute cute this one, we loved it!

Have a lovely weekend! It's been raining nonstop this past week, but I'm hoping it will stop so we can go plant some veggies. Did I tell you we're going to try and plant a veggie garden this year? We've already planted beets and carrots. I'm so excited to see...if anything grows whatsoever.

~Melissa

Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots

Love, love, love this book! You’re going to love it too! And then we can all love it together! And grow things! With our kids! Unless it rains, in which case we shan’t garden. Instead, I will run inside with my kiddo and we will huddle under blankies and watch ‘Mary Poppins’ for the 100th millionth time.

(Yes, I said “shan’t” just now, you didn’t imagine it.)

I’m a BIG Sharon Lovejoy fan! Her gardening books are enchanting. They are meant for adults, but the pictures can also be enjoyed and shared with the kidlets in your life, and her books will give you tons of ideas and projects for outdoor, gardeny fun. I gave her book ‘Toad Cottages and Shooting Stars: Grandma’s Bag of Tricks’ to my mom-in-law a couple of years ago. That one is AMAZING.

But let’s take a peek at the book I have, ‘Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots: Gardening Together with Children’, shall we?

(I just threw in a “shall”. Just FYI.)







Here’s a recipe for Moth Broth, I know you’ve been looking for such a thing for ages:






I can’t say enough fantastical things about Lovejoy’s books. It would be so fun to sit down with your kiddo and pore over the illustrations, which will just make you freak out and do a happy dance at their delightfulness.

All of her activities are fun, approachable and won’t make you shake your head, thinking “I could never do that…” – I feel that way all too often when I read about crafty things. These gardening activity books will INSPIRE you and make you feel really excited to run out and GET PLANTING, even if said planting occurs in a teeny tiny pot.

Want To See a $9000 Tent?

I had a darling post about baby books all ready to go for today and then I saw this. Can someone explain this to me?

Or more specifically, please explain this to Andrew.

Andrew saw me looking at this and pretty much lost his mind.

As you may or may not know, I have a bit of a love/hate thing going on with Anthropologie. The love bit comes in with the fact that I love every single thing that has ever been, or currently is, or ever will be in the store. The hate bit exists because many of their items are....a wee bit excessively extreme in price.

This lovely tent is just shy of $9000.  Let's not forget the $300 shipping and handling fee. Peeps, if one of you is going to buy this, PLEASE LET ME KNOW so that I can beg, pester, cajole, plead and wear you down with the strength of my whining to be your very best BFF and to please invite me to come sit in this tent with you.

Andrew has very many thoughts on this tent:

"Why is it in the water? It's sitting in the mud."

"What happens when the tide comes in?"

"If you sit in these chairs, you'll just sink into the mud."

"If you can afford a $9000 tent, I guess you can afford to throw it in the garbage, which is what you'd be doing by letting it sit in the water like this."

"I can promise you that this did not cost $9000 to make."

This is what the inside looks like:

I don't believe that the chair, hat, sandals, drinks or table are included. Or the rug.

Just for funsies, I'd like to show you more priced-beyond-most-mortals items:

This 'Monsters of the Household Variety' book, by Ruth Ashton is $1200.

The illustrations are sewn and the book itself is apparently the size of a tiny human. I'm more willing to go with Anthro on the price of this thing because it's art, basically. As least they aren't showing a picture of it in the water!

And then this caught my eye:

'Green Couple', 2011, $998. While I appreciate this cool South African piece of folk art, and I like how they are reading a book while sitting on a purple settee, I personally would have a hard time forking over a grand for a 10 inch high ceramic.

Oh Anthro....

I think Anthropologie needs to get in touch with me and give me one of those tents or books to review and then let me have the BESTEST GIVEAWAY OF ALL TIME. Andrew would then cheerfully place the tent in the water to see how well it floats...

(Image Credits: Anthropologie.com)

Outside

This may not seem like anything to get excited about, but as I’ve said A MILLION TIMES, when you live in a place where it’s possible to NOT SEE THE SUN for a good six months at a time. . . well, when the weather FINALLY starts to get nice, IT’S TREMENDOUSLY EXCITING!

Just being able to go hang out in the back yard...thrilling! Swinging...super fun! Raking leaves...jolly good time! No sarcasm my peeps, it’s been wonderful to BE OUTSIDE and not freeze our booties off or get rained on.

Oh and I tried to make my little point-and-shoot camera take Instagram-ish photos. Didn’t really work but I do like the pinhole setting, it’s kindy fun. I wonder if my DSLR has a setting that can do that? I should read my manual.

Hey. Are you still reading? Thanks for hanging with us. I love that some of you even come to see us MORE THAN ONCE! So awesome. Are you all having a lovely Spring?

Land of Nod Cool Stuff

I'm a big Land of Nod fan and I was super impressed with all the colorful fun in the most recent catalog. I'm really attached to the paper lanterns and the gummi bear nightlights down below...


Distinguished Luminaries Lantern (Fresh Cut), $9.95.



Distinguished Luminaries (Heavy Lifting), 9.95.



Deer Flashy Forest Wall Decal, $32.



And Your Bird Can Sing?, 14.95.


Fairy Tale Poster (Little Red Riding Hood), $99.


Fairy Tale Poster (Princess and the Pea), $99.



Green Gummy Bear Nightlight, $29.



Sukie Iron-Ons, $14.95.

Bullseye Wall Art, $109.



Tangled Up In Blue Bedding, $79-$109.


Take a good look at this last picture. See those art dioramas in the wooden boxes? They aren't for sale, but I'm really thinking of trying to recreate them. I think they are so tremendously fantastic...I wonder how they attach to the wall? If you have the catalog, the picture there shows more detail than the one on the website.

That first lantern is really calling my name. . . and how fun are those iron-on decals?  Although she'd have to leave the ironing part to me, Julia would love designing her own shirts with those!

Cool Stuff I Like

So here we are, looking again at my breakfast. I swear to you, I did not 'arrange' my apple slices. I cut them on the plate and they fell into this arrangement, isn't that cool?? I thought so! I could be perfectly happy turning my site into a breakfast blog, but it wouldn't be as cool as this one, so never mind. I do however, want to point your attention to the butter GLISTENING on my toast. Do you see the glisten?? When you can see that sheen, you know you have smeared enough buttah on yo bread. For Mother's Day, I have asked for some new egg cups.

More springtime COOL STUFF!

"Stir cream and honey into your Earl Grey with gingham-printed spoons." Well OK! I'd love to!

20 Mother's Day Gifts.

Chocolate Powder. (I've had it, it's intense! And very good.)

Bagel Strata with Sausage and Spring Vegetables. (The Williams-Sonoma site has been awesome lately.)

Speaking of Williams-Sonoma, you must see their $800 chicken coop. It's AMAZING. I want to have chickens now. Oh my. Just realized that the COOP is $800 and the RUN is $399. So we are talking the bargain price of $1200! Anyone want to go halfsies? Or 1/200th-sies?

Toasted Coconut Refrigerator Cake.

Lovely DIY Terrarium Tutorial.

A Dumpling Party! I want to have one!

Cool Book of the Week: Julia and I and Andrew have been reading the classic 'Fables' by Arnold Lobel, all together. I've been wanting to read it with her for AGES, I was just waiting for her to be ready for it. I think for ages 6 and up. It's FABULOUS. She loves it! We read the one page stories to her and then she reads the 'moral' of the fable down at the bottom of the page to us. Then we try to explain it to her. 

I really think that of all his work, this is the most amazing Lobel art I've seen, and as I'm happy to tell anyone, EVERYTHING he did was fantastic of the highest fantastic order. Julia has asked for this book to the exclusion of all others ever since we got it from the library. I think we might have to own this one to go into our permanent collection...

Have a lovely weekend!!

~Melissa

(Image credits:http://sarahjanestudios.com/blog/2010/01/fables/ )

A Day at Home

Last weekend the weather was nice again! When the sun comes out even just a little bit at this time of year, kids go crazy and start pulling out shorts. Sixty degrees! Heatwave!


Sorry Domino, but you are the recipient of only the 2nd negative review I’ve given out on this site. Usually I don’t do negative reviews because there are lots o’ things to discuss that I’m totally stoked about. But because Domino has now ripped my heart to shreds TWICE, once by folding up shop in the first place and now by taunting us with this lame rehash of old content, Domino is getting CALLED OUT. Were there really NO new homes to see? None? REALLY?

No one loved you more than I did, Domino. Therefore no one is more disappointed in you than I am. There were maybe 2 things in the whole ‘special’ edition that were fresh content. It was special all right. Special in the sense that it was all stuff that we’d seen in the old magazines AND the Domino book! Go buy the book. The book is awesome. The ‘new’ mag was a huge meh. Boo.

Getting off soap box, exiting stage right.



We are NOT disappointed in the classic Chinese folktale Tikki Tikki Tembo! Or Mad Libs! Here are two fun games: try saying this as fast as you can, it’s totally fun:

“Tikki Tikki Tembo no-Sa-Rembo chari-Bari-Ruchi pip-Peri Pembo”

Say it faster.

And try writing some Mad Libs with your kiddo. Take turns. I’ll bet yours will be funny and silly. I’ll bet your kiddos' will have the words “poop”, “poopy”, “toilet” and “pee-pee” everywhere they can put them. And they will think THAT is even funnier and sillier.

No? Only my kid likes to do that?


Sally is looking at squirrels. She would like to chase a squirrel. Or a bird. Her teeth chatter when she sees either one, it is SO BIZARRE.


See what Andrew is washing out for me? It’s Julia’s Hello Kitty canteen. Sometimes when you go camping, you get thirsty and this amazing canteen comes with a little cup on top. Hello Kitty is thoughtful like that.


Huggies.


Me. Smiling through the pain of knowing that I paid $11 for that Domino mag.


It was an exciting day! It was a day where we didn’t have to go anywhere or do anything! So that made it exciting! Shorts, books, Mad Libs, chattering cats, warmish weather. Domino, you’re on my naughty list.

Happy Kitchen Candy Hamburgers

Ok, lately I think I just want to blog about cute videos I've seen....

Happy Kitchen Candy Hamburgers

HAPPY KITCHEN CANDY HAMBURGERS!!!

You have to watch the whole thing. Did you watch? Wasn't that BIZARRE and COOL??? Did you see the fizzy cola?? Supposedly the taste is like a real hamburger. (I wonder.)

If you would like to try out this magical creation for yourself, you can buy the set HERE.

Spins and Twirls

Sometimes all you need is a twirly thingamabob and a non-rainy day. And then a pal comes to draw sidewalk chalk with you. And. . . it’s a good afternoon.