Birthday dress

Madeline's birthday was a month ago but I wanted to share this dress I made for her because it was just right for the occasion.  We celebrated the first year of her life with a Snowflake party that was sparkly and purple.

 She had so much fun and the dress came together in just a few hours. I ordered the Chevron fabric off of etsy and used the leftovers to make her baby a quilt for Christmas.

The pattern I also got off of etsy and is just a simple peasant dress with an elastic neck and sleeves.  Paired with a. Cute headband (etsy), tights and sparkly shoes she was all set for her special day.

We took her birthday photos shortly before the party and she was not too sure about the cake but was awfully cute for her pictures.

Happy Birthday (a month ago) to our sweetest girl! 

Broccoli cheese soup

Lunch at home today was broccoli cheese soup.  I am loving these days home with my girl over Christmas break.  Last time I offered her brocolli cheese soup she wasn't very interested but I thought we would give it a go today.  She loved it and ate almost as much as I did.  We also had some awesome pumpkin zucchini muffins, recipe on those to come.  Here is the recipe I used for the soup from Weelicious which I think she got from Pioneer Woman.  I modified a little so go to their sites for the exact recipe of you don't like mine. This is a half recipe by the way, which makes enough for our family of 3 to eat twice. So like 5 or 6 servings.

What you need:

1 small onion

Half a stick of butter

1/4 cup flour

3 cups milk

Pepper

2 heads of brocolli chopped into florets

1 1/2 cups grated cheese

What you do:

Melt butter over mediumish heat (I did mine a little lower than medium but not quite medium low)

Chop onions finely and cook in butter for a few minutes until they start to get translucent

While the onions are cooking chop your brocolli

Add flour and stir to combine

Cook flour and onions for about 2 minutes

Add milk and pepper and whisk to combine

Add brocolli, stir together, cost and reduce to low

Cook for 45 minutes to an hour or until brocolli is tender

Add cheese and you are ready to go.

I blend mine with an immersion blender so some of the brocolli is blended and some is still in pieces, you may want to leave yours as is or blend it entirely.

A baby doll quilt

Mr. And Mrs. Claus were hard at work last week finishing up this special project for a sweet little girl.

After finishing Santa's cookie, she quickly grabbed the baby out of the cradle and gave her some love

This was the first thing she went for Christmas morning (after the cookie of course).

Mr. Claus fixed up the old baby cradle that was Momma's when she was little and Mrs. Claus made a quilt and pillow so baby would be comfortable.  This quilt was such a cinch to bring together, some chevron fabric and a fun print for the backing...quilted along the zigzag and it was done in about 2 hours.  I am sure lots of fun will be had by baby doll and baby girl playing with this special gift.

Sewing for baby

I have been helping a friend with some sewing projects for her new sweet girl's nursery on Tuesdays.  We have been having weekly sewing dates during Madeline's morning nap on Tuesdays.  All this sewing has spurred me to do a few projects on my list for my sweet girl.  Today I knocked out two of them and I am very pleased with how both turned out.

This first is a "bapron"  a bib-apron combo, for my girl who is eating now and needs to keep tidy.  This one is reversible and ties on the shoulder and on the back.  Next time I think I would do a button or velcro on the shoulder as the tie is kind of distracting for her.

I also made this t-shirt dress.  I used a old onesie that was too wide when it was her size and now fits her around the middle but was too short to snap.  This dress was so easy.  I just cut two big squares three times as wide as the onesie, sewed them together using french seams and then folded pleats until it fit the onesie.  I cute the onesie off at the bottom and sewed the skirt portion to the onesie top.  I would have liked to do a sash in a coordinating color, but I couldn't find anything in my stash so I used some rick-rack instead and it turned out cute.  This is such a great way to use an old t-shirt to make a quick dress out of scrap material.  I will definitely make more of these when she is a toddler.

Fresh Food and Baby-Led Weaning

We have been all about food around here lately.  Our big girl turned 6 months a little over a week ago and we decided she was ready to start some solids.  This timing is perfect because we are really starting to bring in a lot of fresh foods from our garden and we will be processing some of our meat animals in the next few weeks which means even more fresh food.

Here is our girl enjoying her very first food, sweet potatoes, these were from last years harvest as this years sweet potatoes will not be ready to dig for a little while.  She has been eating broccoli and carrots from our garden as well and will soon be able to try some peas and maybe some fresh pesto on some noodles.

She has also enjoyed some foods that we cannot or do not grow around here.  She has had avacado which she heard is good for a facial, bananas (she obviously can't eat a whole banana so I have been taking some of the left overs and freezing it with a little milk in ice cube trays for banana popsicles which her little teething gums appreciate), and watermelon which is just not something I grow due to lack of space.

Madeline is getting table food not purees or traditional food.  Some people call this method of feeding baby-led weaning.  We just look at it as her eating food.  She doesn't ingest much of what she is given so far, it is a learning process and oh is she learning.  She has had so much fun exploring the tastes and textures of each food.  She gags somethings (not to be confused with choking) when the food gets on her tongue and this is helping her understand how to manage food in her mouth.  We attempt to eat only organic and locally grown food.  Our garden and a lot of the local food we buy is not necessarily organic, but it is from people and places we trust to raise our food without too much unnecessary chemical interventions.  While we do not have a super strict rule about our food, we just try to make good healthy food choices, not all foods need to be organic for us to feel they are healthy and we eat unhealthy foods sometimes too (watch for coming post on cookie dough cupcakes).  However we are trying to instill an appreciation for good food in our child and we want her to be aware of where her food comes from, particularly if we did not grow the food ourselves.  We are a little more strict with what she eats then we are for ourselves.

a note on baby-led weaning:  If you choose this method of food introduction for your baby remember to never leave your baby unattended when eating.  Give your baby big pieces that he or she can handle easily and soft foods they can gum to start.  There are a lot of websites and even books about baby-led weaning.  Baby-led weaning is not recommended until the baby has reached at least 6 months and met some developmental milestones, such as sitting unassisted.  Do your research before you make choices for your child, every baby is different.

Mama made pants

I made some sweet quick change pants for my girl recently.  These pants take less than an hour to make from start to finish.  The first pair were made from scrap fabric given to me when I was collecting fabric for the nursery quilt.  These purple, green and blue earthy prints did not match the color scheme I was going for in our gender neutral nursery, but I loved them so much and knew there would be enough to make something, would our precious baby turn out to be a girl, and she was.  I was so excited to use this material for her and the pants turned out so cute.  They are elastic waist so I hope she can wear them through the summer, even if they get to short for pants they can be capris.  The pair below are reversible.  They took a little longer just trying to figure out the best way to do this.  I wanted to make them long so I could cuff them and see the fabric on the other side.  In all my effort trying to manage the reversible thing I forgot to pay attention to the print.  So now we have upside down owl pants.  At least when she looks down at her pants they are facing the correct direction for her.

A Summer List

Helping Mama in the garden by sitting and playing in her washtub

• Use this blog as a journal and a way to share with out of town family
• Sew for Madeline
• Organize the freezers (yes we have several)
• Garden a lot
• Visit with family
• Spend some time thinking and planning for the next school year, it is sure to be a good one
• Store food
• Cook everyday
• Organize my craft room
• Get a new male rabbit
• Knit Madeline a winter sweater for next year
• Organize my recipe binder/box/stack/loose papers with random food ideas on them
• Babyproof
• Make a cushion, cover and straps for Madeline's high chair (soon!!! she will be ready to eat this summer)
• Organize the basement
• PLAY WITH THIS ADORABLE BABY