a dress for Charlotte

For the past four nights, Clover and I have been working on a dress for Charlotte.




We had so much fun. I'm still learning many new things about sewing. It was fun to see Clover jump right in and use the sewing machine. I'm still a little scared of it! We had a hard time with the elastic in the neckline, and some of the stitches are quite crooked, but I think that it turned out very nicely!



Thanks for the faery fabric, Carrie! It was immediately chosen as "the perfect one" for Charlotte's special dress!!

hurray warm weather!

My first sweet tiny bouquet of the season... (picked by Indigo)

Violin practice outside in the sunshine....

Bare feet and a snack outside!!!

Hurray!!!!!!!

Friday co-op

Our beautiful late Winter (hurray its almost Spring!) candle...

Yoga...



Crayon drawings...




Play in the woods...





The first sweet little blue flowers are already coming up!!

sewing day!

Today we visited my sweet friend Colleen. She generously offered to show me some of the basics of sewing doll clothing. I ended up with a beautiful new outfit for Nova's doll Peter!! Can everyone see that his little pants have a Squirrel Nutkin (Beatrix Potter) theme? There are mushrooms, squirrels, owls, berries, and hedgehogs on there! My friend Carrie gave me the fabric! Love it!!



We also took some time to visit with the horses. Nova got brave enough to feed one!! And the sheep ran over when Colleen put out some sweet feed.




There was also some swinging and some bubble blowing! And lots of fun running around in the beautiful sunshine...



Colleen~ if you're reading, thank you so much for having us over! We always enjoy spending time with you and your sweet kids!!!!!

snow!!!!

Tim taught the kids how to roll a little snowball into a HUGE snowball! They had so much fun!





We built lots of snow people with carrot noses & fig branch arms!




And Nova made this sweet little snow house all by himself with the teeny tiny little snowman inside!

snowy day book list

What to read on a snowy day when you're not busy watching snow fall or playing in the snow or eating snow or talking about the snow or.......



* The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
* Ollie's Ski Trip by Elsa Beskow
* Owl Moon by Jane Yolen
* Winter Days in the Big Woods (from the My First Little House series)
* Winter by Gerda Muller
* The Winter Child by Wendy Froud & Terri Windling
* The Tomten by Astrid Lindgren
* The Big Snow by Berta & Elmer Hader
* The Story of the Snow Children by Sibylle von Olfers

sprouts & a little craftiness

I just love to start seeds inside! Clover started all of these - lots of herbs and some marigolds! I'm so excited about the gardening season.



We have been working on macrame and beading, too, since it is still too cold to play outside for longer than an hour or so each day. This is the present that we made for our friend Blake - a rainbow crystal with shells and friendship bells: