Duct Tape In My Hair

Last week the mermaids' cousin Q came to visit and he introduced them to the wonderful world of duct tape. He is a duct tape master and he demonstrated his abilities by making several amazing creations, including a duct tape hammock inside the mermaids' treehouse (mermaids like hammocks!). Q has also made hats, wallets, shoes, boats and many other items. Q has left our home, but his spirit of inginuity has remained and the mermaids are making their own duct tape creations, including some that I am pretty sure that even the amazing Q hasn't yet attempted. 

These, for instance: 

The red mermaid will demonstrate for us how it is done. 
First, pull out two long strips of duct tape and lay them, sticky side up, on your work surface, over lapping one over the other,

 like this:

Then, take a third piece and lay it, sticky side down, in the center of the first two.

Fold the exposed sticky edges over. 

Trim the edges. Now you should have a thick, floppy strip of duct tape with no sticky side. This is your "ribbon."  

Fold the "ribbon" over itself and pinch the center together. This is the tricky part, and it takes some practice to make it look neat. 

 This is how it should look when you've folded it correctly.


Now for securing the bow to the barrette. There are no glue guns needed for this craft! Why use glue when you've got duct tape?
Cut a small, narrow piece of duct tape. This will hold your bow together and it will also hold the bow to the barrette.

Stick the bow, front side down on the sticky side of the small strip. Wrap the strip around the center of the bow to hold the folds in place, but leave some extra.

With the extra, carefully tuck it and wrap it around the barrette, securing it, and making sure to keep everything straight and neat. 

All done.

Duct tape: versatile, useful, creative, strong,

and pretty.

Thanks, Q!

First Craft of the Season

Hello to the three people who read my craft blog! I am so excited that it is summertime again and I can find every way possible to keep my kids from becoming summer screen zombies. 

You, too? 

Good--I knew we were meant to be friends. 

We have a tradition now of making the first craft of the season a tie-dye project. That way they can wear their creation all summer long. This year we had some western visitors (my sister and her three glorious children whom I would gladly adopt if she let me) and each of them got to make their own shirt. 

Here is the before:

And here is the after. 

The whole process is pretty easy:

1. Buy a white t-shirt (if you want your final project to look good, get a quality shirt that fits well) and tie-dye paints 

2. Dampen the shirts by putting them in the washer's rinse/spin cycle

3. Tie with rubber bands. 

4. Paint! There are lots of different techniques.

For instance, this is how you make a bulls eye:

Or, you can make a gradient or "fading" design by painting sections of your shirt with the regular, concentrated paint and then diluting your paint for the next section:

Several of us made spiral shirts by winding the fabric up in a tight pinwheel, securing the fabric with rubber bands and then painting:

Or, if you hate to follow directions, you can always just tie rubber bands where ever you want. The great thing about tie-dying is that almost anything looks cool...although with practice you can make it cooler.

5. Then you put each shirt in a separate plastic sack and let it sit for 6-8 hours to set.

6. After the shirts have set, and before you wash them, you must rinse each shirt to take out the extra dye. This is is an important step. If you skip this and you wash all the shirts together, there will be too much dye in the washer and your colors will be dull and greyish instead of vibrant.

7. Wash in washer on largest load setting and hottest water to help set the color.

8. Tumble dry

9. Wear and embrace your inner hippie. 

See you on the next craft....

Wyoming or Bust

I finished the girls' dresses for our epic trip out West.

Here is Sophia:

And Syrena:

And Naomi:

I was told after I made the dresses that they should wear long sleeves, so I guess my girls are going to be "sexy" pioneers.

The girls are very excited to be out under the big open sky for four days.

The have no idea that they will be hot, thirsty and sweaty. They will get blisters on their feet, sunburns on their noses, mosquito bites on their skins and they will have to eat food they aren't used to. Oh yes, and there will be no riding in the handcarts.

It will be good for them.

Come on, sisters, lets walk across the plains....

....or at least through this chigger-infested meadow.

They look much more pioneer-y in sepia:

See you in Wyoming.

Blossoming Ballpoints

I have a magic drawer in my home. It is the pencil drawer of our computer desk. This is why it is magic:

I toss a couple sharpened pencils and ball point pens in the drawer. I close the drawer. I go about my normal mother-jobs. Then, when all the sudden I need to write something extremely important down--quick--I open the drawer to locate a writing utensil. And what do I find? Broken tipped pencils, yellow crayons and no ball point pen in sight. This happens all the time! Arg! Do you have a magic drawer in your home?

My kids' second grade teachers must have a magic drawer in their desks too, because they make these flower pens.
They had their students make them for Mothers Day gifts, and I can tell you right now it is the best Mothers Day school present I've ever received.

Mothers Day was back in May, now it is July. Do you realize that means I have kept track of my flower pens for FOUR MONTHS now?

Like I said, best Mothers Day gift ever.

(It turns out that we could have been even more creative with this craft--we went to REI last night and they had a pen with a big long fern frond attached to it. )

Thanks, Ms. Benton and Mrs. Cheek!

Calling All Pioneers

Does anyone know where Sophie is pointing?

You are exactly right. It is the middle of nowhere.

But this spot has great significance to my family. It is the place where Scott's ancestors were stranded with their handcarts; caught in an early snowstorm on their way to Salt Lake. They were starving, dying, eating the soles of their shoes and tree bark. But it was at this spot that help finally came. They were rescued. And who rescued Scott's dying ancestors?

Why, my ancestors, of course!

This summer my mom and her husband are serving a mission there and helping to build the new visitor's center. There is also a river there called the Sweetwater, and it is there, this August, that Sophie and Syrena are going to be baptized....pioneer style.

We've been preparing all summer by reading pioneer stories, making pioneer dresses (which will be posted soon) and doing pioneer crafts to help us get into the spirit. Last week we made our own butter by pouring whipping cream and a little salt into jars. Then we went outside and rolled the jars back and forth to each other. We told stories. When that got boring we rolled the jars down grassy hills. It was hot. It was hard. It was grueling. But after about a half hour we had our own delicious butter:

Mmmm.....fat.

Afterwards Sophie proudly proclaimed, "Everything homemade is always better!"

I hope she still says that when I finish her pioneer dress...

Pizza Party, Mermaid Style

I told the mermaids that we were making a pizza for our craft this week and you would have thought I had told them we were going to burn all their toys.

You see, my girls hate pizza, a fact which used to turn every birthday party they were invited to into an absolute tragedy. But as they get older, they are getting better at declining the pizza with a polite, "No thank you. I don't eat pizza."

This, however, gives the impression to the other parents at the party that Mormons don't eat pizza, which of course is not true. Unless the pizza is laced with coffee, tea leaves, alcohol or ecstasy, that is.

You can imagine the relief on my girls' faces when I told them that we were going to making fruit pizza. Ahh...the world has righted itself again. Now this was something they could handle.
I have a wonderful recipe that I discovered years ago which was instrumental in getting my husband to fall in love with me,

and, because you were so nice to stop by and read my blog, I will share it with you.

Fruit Pizza

Crust:

1 c. marg/butter

1 1/2 c. sugar

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 tsp. almond extract

2 1/2 c. flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. cream of tartar

Mix butter, sugar, egg, vanilla and almond extract. Cream. Add all other ingredients. Press into the bottom of a pizza pan or cookie sheet. Bake 375 for 12 minutes.

Pizza "Sauce":

8 oz. cream cheese, softened

1 c. cool whip

1 1/2 powdered sugar

Blend together and spread on cooled crust. Top with fruit (berries, mandarine oranges, pineapple etc.)

PS While watching the credits after the last Pirates of the Caribbean movie I saw that the mermaid (the not-so-scary one) was named Syrena, and spelled the same way as I spell my daughter's name. I did a little research (i.e. googled) and found that there is a legend in Poland about a mermaid who wielded a sword and shield and protected the city of Warsaw. The mermaid's name was Syrena, and there is a bronze statue of her in the middle of the city. Who knew?

A Disgusting Treat

This week we made "pupcicles" for our mer-dog, Jimmer, and our neighbor dogs. This is an easy, easy craft, but quite disgusting.

We used ricotta cheese and plain yogurt for the "base" of our pupcicles,

and rawhide strips for the pupcicle sticks.

Then we had a variety of nauseating mix-ins,

including mini pepperonis, dog jerky and dog food. You could also add cheese or peanut butter.

Mixed with the yogurt and cottage cheese, this craft thoroughly grossed-out everyone.

This photo just doesn't do it justice. You've got to smell it.

We invited our lovely mer-neighbor to join us.

Here she is, showing us what she thinks of this craft:

Here it is, all put together, ready to be frozen.

After mixing their pupcicles, the mermaids and mer-neighbor promptly fled.

I lined the treats up in the freezer:

The next day:

Mmmm....want some?

Let's see what Jimmer thinks.

I think he likes it!

We took the rest of the pupcicles to Jimmer's neighbors: Abby, Ollie, Finnie and Tango. None of them even hesitated scarfing the treat down.

And just in case this makes you think you really would love to have a dog that you could make pupcicles for, read this first.

Until next week!