All craft and thrift action these days is geared towards occupying two preschoolers without noisy toys or heaps of sugar (okay there is some sugar, but not much). This cute little typewriter showed up on craigslist at just the right time and thankfully it wasn’t 200 bucks, which it seams most (out of date, pretty much useless, but indie rock stylish) typewriters are going for these days. The ribbon was immediately destroyed–thank you, son number one–but they really don’t know how it is supposed to work anyway, so mostly it’s about finding letters and numbers and making it *ding*.  And really it will always just be a toy for them. The other day, my daughter asked me what this toy was. We’ve had it since she was a baby! And she never knew it was a telephone! To her phones are little clam shell things you carry in your pocket. I am from a totally different world than she it, which reminds me of this list: 100 things your kids may never know about. I’m sure every generation has a list like this, ” back in my day…,” but it’s shocking to suddenly be the person saying, “back in my day…”

Okay, I need to stop now before I make myself feel geriatric. Onto happier things.

It’s starting to feel like fall here and though I haven’t been swearing at the heat all summer (the weather has actually been pleasant this summer, especially for a ginormous pregnant lady) fall is too lovely not to be excited about. So I thought I’d host a fall color week: a picture or two a day that captures a color of the coming season.  The color week thing has been done a thousand times, so I thought I’d use Crayola colors this time, mostly because burnt siena was my favorite (second only to cornflower blue) and because it is the color of fall to me (I’ll decode the colors for all those who grew up crayloa-less). Leave a comment if you want to play along and I’ll list a link to your blog (or flickr) when we start on Monday.

Monday: Brick Red (deep red)

Tuesday:Burnt Siena (a reddy orange, like the rooftops of Siena)

Wednesday: Goldenrod (warm, deep yellow)

Thursday: Chesnut (dark, warm brown)

Friday: Plum (like a plum, duh)

See you Monday!

I made oreos this weekend. Now before you go off on the whole “how do you do it all?” rant, let me just say I don’t. My husband has been off work for a few weeks now and he takes the big kids (just like that, they are big kids!) when the baby goes down for a nap. It’s been absolutely amazing to have him around so much. This is how it should be: two parents taking care of the kids, maybe a nanny thrown in to take some of the pressure off. Oh to be ridiculously wealthy….some day. That comes to an abrupt end today and god knows how I’m going to deal with these three whiny, crying, poopy bundles of love all day long. I’ll probably make more oreos, because I bake when I’m stressed.  Mostly because I know I can make whatever recipe you throw at me or if I can’t there will be enough sugar and butter in it to be edible anyway. These cookies were most definitely edible.  I’ve made oreos before and they were kind of a pain in the ass–well it was a martha stewart recipe so what do you expect–but they were really good and crunchy too. These were more to the moon pie end of the scale. The cookies themselves were super easy and super delicious and I would make them on their own again (and again), but  I just wasn’t down with the filing. It is technically correct: crisco and butter and sugar. I assume that’s whats in real oreos (minus the butter) and that’s what martha puts in her oreos, but I just can’t bring myself to eat raw crisco. I’m no natural food freak, I have eaten my fair share of crisco and continue to have a can of it in the cupboard, but I can’t just stick my finger in it and eat it. ugh. So next time I’ll make a thick cream cheese frosting and slap that between the two cookies instead.

And there is a half done project under the cookies, see? ooop, and there’s the baby. So it’ll stay half done for another day.

peach and creme fraiche pie to be exact. It was made and already eaten–pie is just so good for breakfast. Though this pie wasn’t quite as good as I thought it would be. It was pretty damn tasty, don’t get me wrong, but the streusel didn’t really do it for me. There should have been more crunch to it. Next time I’ll add some chopped almonds or something else to give it more dimension. Because as it stands this pie is all creamy and softy peachy goodness, which sure as hell ain’t bad.

It goes without saying that not much is getting made here. What with a newborn baby (and a crabby one at that) and two crazy preschoolers wreaking havoc from the first moment they wake up and a blanky blank holiday–we need all the school time we can get. I have somehow managed to make some pies, mostly because I want to eat them. This one is pretty damn good (and all gone) and this is on the docket for today. But I did get to sneak down to my studio for all of ten minutes to sew up this little curtain for the fireplace. I’ve been wanting to do this for a while now and had grand visions of appliqued castles and little pockets for little friends. Finally I just said screw it and cut and hemmed this pretty piece of fabric (a bedspread from urban outfitters that was destined to become something at one point, I just forget what).  I saw the idea in Cookie magazine, but I can’t seem to find it anywhere online. The kids call it their secret room and though the novelty has worn off for them already (two days later) I still like it.

boy!

He was 5 days late, 5 excruciating days, but now he’s here and part of the family. This second son of mine is modeling his “if I make it the baby will come” outfit that I made in that last week of pregnancy. I stole pants and hat idea from Made by Rae, because I literally could have no other thoughts that week besides, “it’s it time yet? now? now is going to happen?”The hat reverses to a pink stripe because we didn’t know if it was a little man or a little lady. The pants are from an old tank top that is  super lightweight because it’s August and should be hot, right? The Midwest has decided what the hell let’s have fall early this year.

The booties I actually started when I was in labor and finished up this past week. They’re from the same pattern I made for a friend’s baby and they are just so stinking cute. And now I have a whole Von Trapp matching family!