Photo Challenge Smiles

I took this while at a playground where we live.  I love the sheer joy she has on her face.

I'm participating in I heart faces photo challenge this week.   Go on over and check out all the other great photos.

TV Dinner Seed Starters

I like to eat Lean Cuisines, Smart Ones, and Healthy Choice meals for lunches.  It's an easy quick lunch for me and I keep all the containers from them, usually to use for my paint palette.  But I have another use for them now.   Seed starters.

I enlisted the help of my little ones who are always ready to play in the dirt.  First I poked a few holes in the bottom of them for drainage.  

Easy enough but be careful.  Then comes the fun part, at least to my girls, fill it with potting soil.

We decided these were big enough to start six plants.  

We covered the seeds and then watered them.

And of course we labeled them.  Once they come up and are ready to plant in the garden we can recycle the containers.  Yum!  I can't wait for all the fresh veggies later this summer.

Chirp, chirp, peep

I've had this idea rolling around in my head for a few weeks and I have finally got around to executing it.
I'm really into birds, maybe it's just because of spring, I don't know, but I wanted to make a bird to go with my nest I made a month or so ago.

I started by sketching out a bird.  I cut it apart to make it into a pattern.

I made a copy of the pieces and drew cutting lines around them.

Amazingly enough this is all by someone who doesn't draw well at all.  I'm really good at stick figures.
I pinned it onto three different fabrics.
Once I had it cut out I pinned and sewed the three pieces onto a 12X12 piece of muslin, but I left the edges out.  I washed it so the bird's outline would rag.  I had to cut the edges down a bit before I washed it.

Not bad but it needed something.  Of course a beak, which I embroidered on.

It still needed something.  So I started playing with ribbons.

I thought I had some stitch witchery around but I couldn't find it, so I cut thin strips of heat n' bond and attached the ribbons.
I could've stopped there but no, I didn't want to make feet for this bird.  Nest? Perfect.  I just picked up a remnant of burlap at Jo-ann's the other day.

I hand stitched it on with a few gathers and stuffed with the burlap strings.  I then used my distressing ink on the nest area for a contrast.  I trimmed the muslin to fit my frame.

Lastly I thought I would pull the burlap over the bottom of the frame to add a bit more dimension.

I had originally wanted to bring the burlap up the entire back of the frame and make a bow at the top with it, but it was way to bulky to do that.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.

Here is the pattern.

Pink, Green and Black Challenge

Here is my entry to My Pink Stampers pink, green and black challenge.

I used the Paper pups cart for the tree and Plantin Schoolbook for the flowers.