Repurposing Project #8: Pillowcase dress

What a personality! She certainly has some spunk! Here is Chili's dress from the same sarong skirt. Now I just have to do some adjustments so that it will stay tied and in place - 3 year olds are always on the move! Stay tuned, Nena may get one too...

Raising Bilingual Kids - The Challenges

Raising bilingual kids is no easy feat! I have to admit that since pregnancy with Nena, the amount I speak Spanish has gone down. Sometimes my plate is so full, or my patience is so low, that the first thing that comes out of my mouth is English. I have to constantly remind myself to speak Spanish. Then there is the fact that Chili watches shows on Netflix a little every night, in English. I wish they would put some kids' programs in Spanish on there! So now she is talking increasing amounts of English(ok, almost exclusively English), although she understands 100% of what I say in Spanish. I am hoping with the move that she will be exposed to a little more Spanish. We continue to try every day to increase language exposure with the goal of acheiving fluency in both languages. Poco a poco...

Two Beauties

Aren't they precious??!!!

Sitting Up and More

Repurpsing Project #4: Backpack

This was one of Chili's Christmas presents, just never got around to posting. I used some leftover fabric that I was going to make into a dress (but THAT never happened. If you are a crafter/sewer/knitter you probably know about those projects.) and part of an old mattress pad that doesn't fit anyone's bed (used to have a bed that fit it, but no more). It's not anything fancy, but she has a good time playing with it. It needs some sort of closure, but I haven't decided what would be best, and so it is eternally propped open.

La vaca Lola

Thinking about cows today. We went to pick up a fourth of a cow from the meat locker from a local farmer. Mostly grass fed, but finished on some oats. Excited to have the freezer stocked up with local, natural meat! Chickens and beef! Won't hardly ever have to buy any meat at the store!

However, this is what Chili was thinking about. She's also had cows on the brain. There's a couple of kid songs on Youtube that she's been watching. This is what she thought we were going to get today. I think she was kinda bummed. La vaca Lola seems a little more fun.

Happy "Hallow-ember"

Okay, so I've been meaning to post these pics for awhile, and somehow we've made it well into November...oops! Here are my little ones in their Halloween duds!

Ice Cream!

And someone REALLY enjoyed it!

Bubbles

"Grandma's hankies" dress

Here is the dress I just finished for Chili. The fabric was called "Grandma's hankies." I love the dainty vintage look of it. It took me about 3 days to do. I'm sure an expert sewer could have whipped it out, but an expert sewer I am not. I made quite a few mistakes, and learned how to do a few new things (pleats, how to make a slip/liner, and how to attach all of it), but with the help of my ever-so-skilled sister-in-law, it is finally done. I absolutely love how it turned out.
Cute as a bug.
Dancing to some music on the radio.

A New Way to Eat

Repurposing project #4

This came from an old denim shirt of mine, and a small piece of fabric I found at our church garage sale. I got a lot of ideas on this one from my sister-in-law, who is much more advanced at sewing than I am. I cut same sized strips for the bottom, and used a pattern for a general guide on size. I top-stitched on the green fabric to make it look nicer. And the green trim on top, I just folded a strip and adjusted it to make it work. Well, what was going to be a quick and easy play dress, turned into an all day project, but I learned a lot, and really love the result. I will have to do something in the back to make it a little more snug, but hey, you learn as you go.
Doesn't she look cute?!

Repurposing project #3

Was a stretched out dress from my niece...
Tah-dah!
New play dress made for free!

A picture speaks a thousand words

Interpreting my daughter's speech

I finally figured it out. The mystery of why my daughter was calling lobsters "granolas." She kept telling me, "shop Hyvee - granola" but then made the little lobster claw movement with her hand that helped make her meaning clear. But...granola? What does granola have to do with lobsters? First, the word in Spanish for lobster is "langosta" (lahn GOS tah) and my daughter also knows the word for crab "cangrejo." (cahn GREH hoe), but neither of these words sound like granola. So they other day we had a talk about "granolas." I said "langosta." She said "granola." Langosta. Granola. Langosta. Granola....but before I decided to "call the whole thing off," I thought to myself "Well, there are a few consonant blends there that she can't pronounce." So let's just pretend for a minute that I took those out. Lagota? Then I thought, "well, what if she can't pronounce a few of those sounds?" Gagoga? Well, she doesn't pronouce all the sounds in granola either. It sounds more like ganowa. So, I listened again. Langosta was somewhere between ganowa and ganoja (spanish j is like h). So there it is. My daughter was saying langosta all along. Who knew?

Getting Creative When Homebound

We received a Christmas present in the mail the other day. Not only was I super excited to get a case for my sewing machine, but the unexpected surprise was the filler in the box. Paper! And lots of it. So on day four of being shut-in, we are happy to have another activity to occupy our time. I'm surprised when I look at this photo, at how much Chili is looking like a "big girl."

Our "work of art." :)

That was one big sheet of paper!

Now what to do with the other 9 hours in the day...

Homemade Christmas

This year, I wanted to save some money and make Christmas even more special by giving as many handmade gifts as possible. These are the bags I made for my niece and nephews, I will fill them with cookies when I see them this weekend, and hopefully get a drawstring inserted into the blue bags, but I need a little help from my sister-in-law to do the buttonholes on the sewing machine. Hats galore this year. Actually, a couple are missing from this photo because I sent them out of town before I took the picture. Whoops! I was pulling my hair out with a couple of them. It took me a while to perfect the pattern, and I used an acrylic yarn for one of them which I will never do again. It was not fun to knit with!

Potholders for my sister-in-law.

Chili's monkey robe. This material was a pain to work with, but the end result was well worth the effort!

Had to get creative this year for the "tree." In all the moves of the last couple of years, the artificial tree was lost. We talked about getting a real tree, but have been busy, and that plan never materialized. This was what I engineered to hang our ornaments.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!

Snowy Day

Chili enjoying some fun in the snow with Papi!
Oh, and this is the hat Mami knit her for Christmas. I love how it looks on her!

Funky Santa

Wishing you and your families a Merry Christmas!

Obsessed

No, not the Mariah Carey song...but toddler obsession. Once a toddler gets something in their head, there is no stopping them. It can be something they want to do or something they like, but whatever it is, the feelings that come about are extreme. They do nothing in moderation. Our recent experiences with toddler obsession have to do with a pair of pink Dora sunglasses and a dilapidated thrift store dog. Wherever she goes, she must have them. Glasses on, dog in arms, she heads about her business. That is until, inevitably, she lays them down to do something, and absentmindedly leaves them behind. Then we hear screams of "wow, wow"(what she calls dogs) and "dentes"(lentes, Spanish word for glasses), as she adamently demands that mami find her lost items. She will not rest until they are found and returned to her. The lentes only come off to sleep, and the wow, wow accompanies us on most of our trips. But everything goes "to the dogs" if during the trip she realizes he's not there. Ah yes, toddler obsession. We know all about that.