We had a weird spring, so the strawberry crop was a little weak, but that didn’t stop us. We (I) picked a bunch and we (they) ate a bunch, then we came home and cooked a bunch. Strawberry jam was of course on the docket, but this year I also made strawberry fruit roll ups and strawberry syrup. The fruit roll ups were fantastic! I used this recipe, but cut the sugar down to a few tablespoons.

The strawberry syrup, though, that’s where it’s at. Last year I checked out the book Canning for a New Generation so many times from the library I finally just bought the damn thing. Canning books usually put me off because the recipes are super labor intensive. This book is different. The author, Liana Krissoff, doesn’t assume you have any fancy canning supplies, only a big pot and some jars. She even tells you how to make some equipment–throw rubber bands around your tongs and you have a jar lifter!  Also awesome is that all of the recipes are for small batches. Some people are into sweating at the stove canning all day, I’m not really big on sweating.

The recipes in the book go from basic to slightly more adventurous. She also includes recipes for using all that stuff you canned, which is always helpful.  What I’m saying is, the book is good, check it out! Now back to the strawberry syrup. It is crazy sweet, but I didn’t want to mess with the sugar content because I was canning the stuff.  We used the tiny bit that didn’t fit in the jars for strawberry soda. You only need the littlest bit, because again it is super sweet, and it is also super strawberry-y.  Holy crap! Mixed with pamplemousse sparkling water, this is hands down the best soda I’ve ever had.

Strawberry Syrup

adapted from Canning for a New Generation by Liana Krissoff

• 4 lbs strawberries, washed and hulled
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice

Makes about three 1/2 pint jars, or two with some leftover to make sodas right away. The book doesn’t say, but I’m guessing these are good for 6 months or maybe a bit more.  Cheers!

Color coded egg carton scavenger hunt before:

Color coded egg carton scavenger hunt after:

Summer is in full swing here and our days are full up to the top. Around mid afternoon I come up for air (thank god for quiet time) and then I think of you and this little blog. Then I feel guilty for not posting something–anything! Instead of feeling crappy for not writing long meaningful (ha!) posts, I thought I’d keep a kind of slap dash summer journal: most pictures will be from my phone, there might be links to crafts or recipes, or there might not be any words at all, but they will all be a little window into our summer days.

Desperate for a first day of summer activity, I ran into Walgreens for some cheap kites. I chose the not quite so dirt cheap ones and they work out pretty well. I got one big one, but it wasn’t windy enough for it to fly. There were mini kites for sale too–3 for 5 bucks–that I bought on a whim. These tiny kites worked out the best. The kids could control them and when the wind died down they just ran to make them fly.

If you like the idea of a simple, summertime blog I would love it if you joined in. If you have a blog, use summer journal as your title. If you are more of an instgramer/twitterer/tumblrer type use the #summmerjournal hashtag. Leave a comment if you’d like to play along, so I can follow your summer journal!

It seems a little show off-y to have a tour of my own home, but really what are blogs for but to be show off-y? You’ve seen bits and pieces already: too many pictures of my kids’ room and my bathroom even! So why not show you the rest? I get a little annoyed when other sites have home tours and then all you get are photos of little vinettes. I tried to take pictures of the big picture, well really the small picture: our house is only about 900 square feet (85 sq meters). It will be changing in new and exciting ways soon, but for now it suits our little family of five quite well.

If you came over to my house, this is where you would come in–just to the right of the mantel. My dog would probably try to eat your feet (she is old and weird).

If you’d been playing in the mud before you came over, you’d probably have to sit down and take off your shoes.

Oops I got a little vignettey. Well, that’s what mantels are for anyway.  On ours are some doily cover rocks, fake grass, beautiful candles I was given, a bit of art, and my straw garland.

Hey, I am sitting on this couch right this very minute! Yes, we have two green couches in our living room. After the couch I bought in college hit the dust a few years back I went a little crazy on craigslist trying to find the perfect couch. Many months went by and finally I found that vinyl beauty (in the first picture of the post) for not too much. Two days later this lean, green mamajamma was listed for 50 bucks. I snatched it up. They not only delivered it, but threw in a matching chair (which is in the basement because seriously, we can’t have any more green furniture in here)!

Our living room opens up to the dining room slash library slash office slash play room.  No, actually every room is the playroom with three kids in a little house.

Most of our toys are stored in the credenza in the living room, but I also carved out a little play area under the windows in the dining room. The photo of Maya’s play room inspired this space.  Remember the rolling toy boxes I made a while back? This is where they live.

The dining room is also our art gallery, which at the moment is overflowing with end of the year school work. It is a little more edited in this shot. We converted the linen closet into a tiny office that you can see in this post. And the other door leads to our bedroom…

…which is very green.

We updated our kitchen a little this year and hot damn! I love it now. It needs a coat of paint, but it is still pretty.

That’s all! It’s not always so tidy, but we live in it for goodness sake! And we do live in every little bit of our house. And love it too. I hope you enjoyed the tour of our home!

For my contribution to Skirt Week 2012, I made this little tutorial for turning an old, rather boring skirt into something a bit more interesting. Sometimes you don’t need to make a new skirt, but you need to liberate one from the back of your closet. I had planned on doing a tutorial for a button placket, but then I saw this picture and could not stop thinking about it:

These pants are from a shop in New York that specializes in super awesome Japanese children’s clothes. The idea is so simple and so effortlessly cool that I had to steal it.

painterly skirt tutorial

materials:

• 1 unloved skirt
• a bit of cardboard or freezer paper
• paint of your choice, fabric or acrylic or even house paint*
• stamps
• very small paint brush

directions:

1. The first thing I did was carve some starts out of an old eraser. If you’ve never done this before it may sound hard, but I assure you it is not. I carved two stamps from a big eraser and two from the tiny erasers on a pair of new pencils. It took me all of 10 minutes. There are many good tutorials for carving stamps from erasers out there (this one and this one for example). The stamp you make should be quite small, so stick to a simple shape–stars work well!

2. Put a piece of cardboard under where you will be stamping, or you can iron a bit of freezer paper to the back. You need something under your design, so the paint doesn’t bleed through to the other side.

3. Start stamping! You can be as fussy or as messy as you want. The look we are going for is paint wiped on the side of your skirt, so there aren’t too many rules you have to follow. It looks nice if the stamps are concentrated a bit in one area and then fade out towards the edges.

3. After you have stamped to your heart’s content, take a very small paintbrush and go over some of the stamps with more paint. This will make some of the stars stand out better and give the design a little more dimension.

4. Let the paint dry and go over it with an iron to set it.  Waalaa! a new skirt! One that will be loved and worn again!

*a note on paint: I don’t paint on my clothes very often, but when I do (like here and here) I like to use a product called fabric meduim. You mix the meduim with any acrylic paint and it makes it into a fabric paint. A good friend of mine turned me on to it. Another good friend told me to get out of the not-so-great craft acrylic paint aisle and go to the actually-an-artist acrylic paint aisle: the colors and the quality are better.