two straight lines

from Mi Bandito to yours. 

I tried to get some good shots of Elliot in costume, but it was all silliness, which I suppose can be expected of a 5 year old.  He is going as a Bandito this year, and because his class is learning all about zero (and he has a mild obsession with Zero the Hero who visits his classroom), we decided to call him Zero rather than Zorro.  You can see a zero on his cummerbund as well as the fabric lining his cape (Michael Miller's Clown Donuts is the print).  I used a remnant of black ultrasuede for Elliot's eye mask and sash, and it worked so beautifully.  It's really fun to work with.   I briefly considered Bedazzling his sash, but decided to use metallic puff paint instead which worked great, and was super fast.

 

I had so much fun making my kids costumes this year and only had a little bit of cursing making Lucie's bloomers for her Ponyo costume.  I'll try and post photos of hers later, but right now she is napping and a tiny bit under the weather.

Hope all of you who celebrate Halloween have a fun, safe & dry holiday!

Just wanted to pop in very quickly and show you my finished goody bags.  This is the first project I've done using the Reprodepot Pattern books I mentioned a few weeks ago.  This is pattern 54B from the Folk Book used in conjunction with the labels that I am offering free on my site.  Also, be sure to pop over to the Reprodepot blog, where they're offering three Halloween specific patterns that would also work nicely for this project.  These labels are stapled over cellophane bags that are 5" wide.

OK, back to costume making...

I'm putting together Kindergarten goody bags over here, and thought I'd share the labels I made for the occasion.  Enjoy! (download below the image)

Download halloweenlabel

I bought this bookshelf for $15 at a garage sale early last summer.  It's a sturdy old girl, and from what I can tell it was used to store cans of paint in someone's garage, or perhaps basement?  It has raised rings where the cans stood, and after I painted it black- two coats, after two coats of teal- I sanded it to reveal them.  I like the idea that it stored someone else's paint, as much as I love to paint myself. (before shot here)

I put it into place in my living room on Monday, and went up to the attic storage room to gather some things to place on it.  That, of course, was the fun part of the project.  Now I need to decide what will hang above it.  Some possibilities-- a linen pin board criss-crossed with ribbon to display snapshots and cards from friends?  A set of black and white botanicals I have yet to use?  Who knows.  First I need to remove the photos of fake people from the front of my Kolo boxes.

In the interest of full disclosure, I'll pan out to show you our table littered with my husband's expense receipts and work bag.  See that old bowl on there?  That was my father-in-law's gold pan, as in "panning for gold."  He's a native of San Francisco.

And another view, the armoire where we keep the family's games and some throw blankets-- formerly the hiding spot of the television.

I loved finding this little scene set up by Elliot last night.  Apparently his chalkboard paint covered radiator cover became "craters" for his martians.  There were other little scenes throughout the room, mostly of planets, including one that he "discovered" marked with a little flag.  It's fun to create something for your kids, and then see what they make from it, or even if they find it interesting at all.  Painting the radiator cover with chalkboard paint was sort of an afterthought for me, but he has really taken to it.  Maybe because its just the perfect height?  Unfortunately, it's impossible to plan these things.  It's sort of like buying your kids toys, you never know which ones they'll take to.

Speaking of toys, this is an embarrassing scene (so! many! stuffed! animals!), but I've been meaning to share it with you for a while now.  Both of my kids are lucky enough to have two closets in their rooms, one generously sized, and one smaller one with a sloped ceiling that is tucked into the eaves of the house.  I was having trouble containing Elliot's collection of stuffed animals and then I remembered these shoe and sweater bags that we had in the master bedroom closet of our old house.  We have shoe and sweater storage here, so these were just sitting in a pile in the attic.  I hung them up, and stuffed all the little animals in here, and it's been a great solution.  No more dumping out baskets of animals just to find the one he wants on the very bottom.  I'll make a slight excuse for the excess of animals by saying that Elliot plays with them constantly.  He can rarely be found not toting one of beloved stuffies.

I've shown this before, but this is how we store the dolls and stuffed animals in Lucie's room.  It's a vintage bassinet that I picked up at a thrift store last winter.  This one is more aesthetically appealing (and less embarrassing) than Elliot's, of course.

PS- I wanted to point out that we have hot water radiators, not steam, so they don't get too hot.  Ohdeedoh showed Elliot's radiator cover last week and someone mentioned that radiators can be dangerous.  Please don't make a "toy" out of your radiator covers unless they are safe to touch, as ours are.

We've been cozying in over here, as fall is fully upon us.  There's even s-n-o-w in the forecast for this weekend, which seems totally insane, so I'm just going to ignore it.  I've been thinking a lot about this time last year, right before we packed our family up and moved into temporary housing here and started Elliot in his new school--  all the hope we had that we were making the right decision.  Now, one year later, I can't imagine that we haven't always lived here and I feel like I've come home.  And the people, the PEOPLE!  I find smart and interesting people at every turn.  I'm so happy and connected to our community.  These things don't all come easily for me, which makes it even more amazing.

OK, on to business-- I usually don't do round-ups, but there are a few things I'm loving right now.  First of all, everyone I know is talking about and/or making soup right now.  I made Cream of Broccoli this week and it was delicious, and cheap too considering I used leftover broccoli that we normally would just let rot in our fridge, so I felt super frugal doing that.  My best friend Alicia swears this Butternut Bisque is the best soup ever, so that may be next on my list.

Since the popularity of garlands doesn't appear to be waning, I thought I'd point you towards this acorn garland by the supremely talented Amy Atlas. I thought I'd make one using my new Reprodepot Pattern Books, which are amazing (that's a link to the Flora one, but don't miss the Folk one).  I'm justifying their expense by saying that I will incorporate them into every project I make in the next year, which would not be hard to do.  And also on the book front, Poppy Treffry has a new book out which is wonderful and makes me want to applique every thing in sight.

And a few more things, this time about me-- my second craft for B:Kids will be up today, so get on over there and check that out.  It's a new no-sew project inspired by monsters--both from Halloween and the upcoming release of the film version of Where the Wild Things Are (can't wait!). 

Also, some of you who have been around here for a while might remember that a few years back I offered some leaf prints as a free download from lulu.com (281 people downloaded them!).  I received some requests in the past about whether or not those could be used on products (fabric, rubber stamps, papers) that were for sale and I've decided that this fall I will make them for sale ($12 for all 18 individual leaf prints), which would grant the buyers rights to use them for profit.  They can be downloaded here.  They could also be used in making decorations or gifts for the upcoming holidays.  If you click here and scroll to the second photo, you can see what they all look like printed out. 

Have fun making soup, visiting apple orchards, or whatever your weekend may hold.

XO Courtney

Oh!  I almost forgot!  I'm auctioning some of my kids' outerwear on Ebay, right here.  Check out that Wintergreen boys 2T/3T coat, it's really nice and I don't think it will be a well known brand on Ebay.