All Children, Except One, Grow Up.

"So come with me, where dreams are born, and time is never planned. Just think of happy things, and your heart will fly on wings, forever, in Never Never Land!" -Peter Pan

Peter Pan sock monkey was created as a very special custom order. This sock monkey will never be duplicated, making it a genuine one of a kind creation. The story of Peter Pan is very special and offered a lot of inspiration.

"You know that place between sleeping and awake, that place where you can still remember dreaming? That's where I'll always think of you." -J.M. Barrie

Thank You, Melanie!

Yesterday I had the pleasure of spending the day with my boys. We spent all morning and the early afternoon at the kitchen table working with polymer clay: working, rolling, shaping, stacking... CREATING!

I had read Melanies blog (one I enjoy and look forward to reading) and one this week was a tutorial on these little Chick Photo Holders she makes for her Etsy shop. SO STINKIN' CUTE!!! I thought that would be a perfect project to make with the boys.
Of course they liked it, sure it was cute, but Super Mario Bros. took priority in their minds and we ended up with Princess Peach and Yellow Toad for the boys to play with.

Garrett DID make a little chick. He didn't want his to be a photo holder and he wanted bead eyes (he LOVES poking beads with a toothpick and inserting them!) It was his, I couldn't tell him what to do with it... and he's proud of it (just as I am proud of HIM!)
I made a baker's dozen and if I can bring myself to parting with them, they will be given to family with the boys' pictures on them as spring gifts.

Melanie uses a permanent marker for the eyes but I created a blunt end to a toothpick and dipped that into black paint to "dot" the eyes on. Later I went back and used an opaque white scrap booking pen to add the highlight and a fine black pen to add the detail. My little chicks seemed a bit wobbly on their feet so I glued circles of cardboard (discarded cereal box with a penny as a template) to circles of green felt (using a quarter as a template) to make a little base for them to stand on. I love combining different textures!

Do check out her blog and print the tutorial. Bring out your polymer clay and have fun!!! Come to think of it, this would even be fun for little ones to make with play dough! What a fun rainy-day Easter project...

Green Eggs and Ham

This is the last week of Reading Olympics at my son's school. The kids are invited to dress up based on a daily theme. Today's theme: Dr. Seuss! We love Dr. Seuss! We pulled out all of the books we had and chose "Green Eggs and Ham". (I think it was chosen simply because he liked the mouse!)
I thought it would be a neat and simple project to draw one of the illustrations on a t-shirt with Sharpies. It went really well! My husband and I (fortunately) have some drawing abilities and it was convenient for this project. We shared the responsibility of inhaling icky fumes to create this one-of-a-kind t-shirt for our kiddo to wear for participation.

Everything was going so well! The image looked good for mostly free-handing it with a permanent Sharpie marker... or so you would THINK a Sharpie was a PERMANENT marker. We let it sit over night and heat-set it in the morning before washing it. (I surely didn't want to send my kiddo to school reeking of Sharpie markers!) Here's what happened in the wash:

RUINED!
There's no saving this shirt... it will be a yard/play shirt now.

Time to start again! I've got a few hours and luckily (for this project) he's in the afternoon Kindergarten class.Success!

The shirt is finished and is as good as it's going to be for such a last-minute project for school today.
Time to air out the house and get ourselves ready to go...