Baby Blessing Gown

My oldest daughter wore the gown I was blessed in for her baby blessing, and I plan to hand it down to her for her own children.  For my younger daughter I made her a gown so she'll have something to hand down to her own children if she would like to.

Here's my baby girl wearing the blessing gown I made her.  Unfortunately at the time of the photo she wasn't exactly happy...

 

 

 The body fabric is cotton knit, and the ruffles are white and off-white satin and polyester lace.

 I used this pattern from Sew Much Ado (I purchased the full pattern because I like it so much) and this tutorial for a ruffle dress from Kojo Designs and meshed the two together to make my daughter's blessing gown.  I don't like unfinished edges, so I used my serger to make rolled hems on the edges of the satin ruffles, and I used this tutorial for gathering on a Brother serger to make the ruffling go so much faster.  I also used this tutorial on Make It & Love It to make the flower on her headband out of left over lace.

Look What I Made!

If you've been wondering what I've been up to lately, I've been suffering from pregnancy ADD (or so I call it).  In the end of my pregnancies I just can't focus on anything.  I can't read books.  I can't do a project that takes more than an hour.  But it was worth it.  Here's our latest little one!

Thanks so much to my friend Staci who took some beautiful newborn pics for us.  

Here's her facebook page if you'd like to see more of her work.

T-Shirt into Baby Gown

I've been saving my husband's worn out Soylent Green t-shirt for a long long time, just waiting to find some way to reuse it.  I found a baby gown tutorial from

because every baby needs a Soylent Green shirt, right?

Ha ha ha I'm so excited to try this on a baby!  The tutorial was simple and easy, and except for the whole "sewing knit fabric is hard" issues, I didn't have any problems.

Featured Fish Costume

My son's halloween fish costume was featured over at Lasso the Moon today.
Head on over to check it out!

Crock Pot Apple Butter for Canning

Last year some friends enlightened me to the fact that there is an orchard about 5 miles away from our house that lets you pick apples for only 40 cents a pound (a real steal around here).  My new-ish tradition is using those fresh apples to make apple butter and apple sauce every fall.  This is the week that I went last year, so I gave the orchard a call to make sure they were open, only to have the owner tell me that the apples were almost done for the year!  He said because of the drought and super-hot temps this summer, the apples ripened early.  The only kind left was Empire, which he assured me would be good for applesauce, and Blushing Gold which is a long-lasting variety.  So that's what I got.

My two-year-old and I waded through rows of goat's head thorns (note to self, don't wear flip-flops next time) to pick through the mostly rotten apples and find enough to make applesauce.  I found 24 lbs worth and took them home.

For canning I always follow the National Center for Home Food Preservation's recipes, because, frankly, I am scared I'll kill my family with botulism if I follow the ones on un-official websites.
Here is a link to their Apple Butter recipe.  I use it with my slow cooker.  If you don't know what apple butter tastes like, I say it's like a spiced apple jam that tastes a lot like apple cider.  I like it on toast or even on a PB&J sandwich.

First, if you have a fruit strainer or food mill, just core and cut up your apples, leaving the peels on.  If don't have a strainer, peel the apples, and then core and cut them.  The recipe calls for 8 lbs of apples, and that fills my 6.5 QT crock pot to just barely over-full, which is fine because they shrink up as they cook.  I used Empire apples for the apple butter.

 Add the two cups of apple cider and two cups of white vinegar, as directed, and set your crock pot on low for four hours, stirring occasionally.

After four hours, the apples should be thoroughly soft, and your house will smell divine.  I asked my husband when he got home from work if he could smell the vinegar, and he said no, he could only smell the cooking apples.

Now it's time to sauce the apples.  I have  an awesome mother-in-law that gave me this KitchenAid accessory, the fruit and vegetable strainer.  This thing is pretty expensive, but if you happen to fine one at a good price at a garage sale or something, they are so nice to have.  It removes any peels and stems or seeds that are in your batch, and leaves you with yummy apple sauce.

This is how much applesauce it made.  I think I got more last year.  I should have filled the crock pot just a bit more I think.

 Take the apple sauce and put it back into the crock pot.  Add the spices (cloves and cinnamon), according to the NCHFP recipe, and the sugar (wow that's a lot of sugar!) to the pot and stir.  Set it on low again for about five more hours, or until it is thick enough that you can "spoon a small quantity onto a plate. When a rim of liquid does not separate around the edge of the butter, it is ready for canning."  To help the moisture cook off while it thickens in the crock pot, I used two metal campfire skewers to create a big gap all around the lid.  Keeping the lid on this way prevents splatters and lets the moisture out.  You can try a couple of butter knives or bamboo skewers instead.  I stirred it every hour or two to prevent burning.  At this point you can put it through a blender or use an immersion blender to make it even smoother.  I don't do that though.

Then it's ready to process.  Follow safe canning procedures.  For some reason this recipe says it makes 8 or 9 pints, but I have only gotten 4 or 5 each time.  If it looks like you are a bit lower on the applesauce than what would fill 8-9 pints, you might want to cut back a bit on the sugar and spices.  Remember you're concentrating it with all of the cooking down in the crock pot.

Yum-o.  I love apple butter.

Luffa Update: Mid-August

This has been one of the hottest if not the hottest summer on record in the mid-west.  Temps have gotten as high as 115 F, and we had several weeks with little to no rain and temps in the 100s every day.  To keep the luffa alive, I watered every day or every other day.  The one I grew on the south side of my fence seems to be doing the best.

 All of the fruit from this plant is growing on vines that poked through to the north side of the fence (picture above), which I found interesting.  This one is almost as big as a baseball bat.

 Here's what this plant looks like on the south side of that same fence.  There are plenty of leaves and many flowers, but no fruit on this side.

 This plant suffered and the leaves withered from one day when I forgot to water in 100 degree temps.  It does have one luffa fruit/gourd growing on it, and it was the first plant to start fruiting.  It is growing on the north facing side of a fence.

And one final update:  We got an early snowfall in October that killed all of the leaves on the plant.  I had about 20 luffa, but only 3 of them were ripe enough to peel well and remove the sponge easily.  If I had just a few more weeks before that first snow, I might have gotten 20 sponges from 2 plants.

See the other posts about my attempt to grow luffa in USDA zone 5:
Sprouting seeds
Plants in May

Playing with Water Marbles

Water marbles are often used in flower arranging.  They are a kind of plastic bead that absorbs water, and I've read they are similar to the material that contact lenses are made out of.  They come as tiny pellets, and when you soak them in water they expand.  They are lots of fun to play with!

*Safety disclaimer- clearly these are a choking hazard, so if your kids aren't old enough to play with regular marbles, don't let them play with these either.  They do fall apart if they are played with roughly.  They are non-toxic.  Funny story- my husband knows this for sure because he swallowed one on accident!  We put just one in a glass cup on the counter top with some water so we could watch it expand.  A few hours later, my husband grabbed the glass of water and drank it, thinking it was his glass from earlier.  He didn't even notice that he swallowed one, and they are a bit slippery so I guess that's understandable.

I bought ours from CrystalWaterBeads.com.  In addition marble sized beads, they have many other shapes as well.  To hydrate your water beads, you let them soak in distilled water overnight.  My kids had fun watching them slowly change from tiny pebbles to big marbles. 

We threw them in a big storage tote so they could play without losing them.  They bounce really well and they slip and slide around too.

Imagine filling up a kiddie pool and throwing a bunch of these in there to play with.  They played for a long time today.

When you're done, you can wash them with some dish soap and store them hydrated in plastic bag for the next time.