The Lady Beekeeper

Wow, well, last week was not great!  Will and I both ended up with pneumonia, and finally got rid of it at the end of last week.  Talk about unpleasant!  I don’t recall ever being that out of it, except maybe when I had mono in high school.  Enough unpleasantness, let’s talk about the costume that won me second place at our work costume contest!  (I was beat out by a hilarious “fat Thor” costume from the latest Marvel movie.)

Since Julius went as Bowser, you may have guessed by now that I went as Princess Peach!  I’ll talk about my dress next week, but for today let’s discuss the headpiece.  I got A LOT of compliments on my blonde hair!  I never thought I could pull off blonde, but I may have to rethink that…  The wig was from Arda Wigs (Luthien Classic in Champagne) – where my friend Jess gets all her cosplay wigs so I knew they must be good.  It was very difficult to style, but a curling wand on high heat and lots of hairspray yielded the best results.  (According to my friend if you dip the hot curlers in an ice water bath immediately after rolling them you will have even better results.)  And the bangs…  let me just say that I will never be a hairdresser.  Hair is so difficult to cut!  All things considered I’m pretty happy with how it came out.

Bowser and Peach together at last

The crown was super easy to make.  I’m pretty happy with how it came out but I originally bobby pinned it onto my wig which meant that even though it was light it kept sliding around.  By the third wearing of the costume I was finally smart enough to sew the crown directly onto the wig.  This made the crown work PERFECTLY.  I wish I’d done it from the start.

DIY Princess Peach Crown

• a plastic soft drink cup
• 2 blue 1.5″ jewels (I got a bulk pack of cheap jewels from Michaels)
• 2 red 1.5″ jewels
• scrap Peltex fabric interfacing or other stiff fabric
• gold spray paint
• sharpie
• hot glue gun
• E6000

1. Cut off bottom of cup.
2. Along the top of the cup mark 4 points on the cup, dividing up the cup’s circumference in quarters so each point is equidistant from its neighbors.
3. Place another dot halfway between each of those dots and 2 inches below the others.
4. Draw a line to connect from low point to high point to low point all around the cup, forming 4 points. 
5. Cut along lines.
6. Place a jewel below each point, and mark around it in sharpie.
7. Use a glue gun to glue all along the line you marked.
8. Place a square piece of painters tape in the very center of each of the glued areas.
9. Spray paint the entire thing gold and let dry.
10. Remove the painter’s tape then glue on gems over the bare spot alternating blue and red,  using E6000.
11. Finally cut a strip of peltex to the diameter of the bottom of the crown plus 3 inches.  Glue the end of one strip to the inside side of cup.  After it dries, pull the strip taunt so it would sit flat against your head then glue the opposite end of the strip to the inside of the cup on the other side so bottom of strip remains taunt.
12. Sew to wig through strip of Peltex.

Julius went to TWO Halloween parties last week and had a grand old time!  His daycare held a fun event with “trunk or treat”, the tumble bus and a spooky pumpkin patch!  Julius had a great time.  Then a couple days later we went to my work party where Julius got to trick or treat from cube to cube, do some pumpkin arts and crafts, get a balloon bunny, and watch a magician!  He had lots of fun!

My little guy went as Bowser this year or as Julius calls him “King Koopa”.  We thought it would be a cute costume to pose as Mario, Princess Peach and Bowser, though we pictured Julius as the tiny Mario.  When we asked him which he wanted to be he chose King Koopa, which honestly made for an adorable costume.  The costume came out great and it really didn’t take me that much time to put together.  Plus it was ridiculously cheap!  For all the fabric and accessories it only cost me about $20 after coupons from Joann Fabrics.  And of course I bought way too much material, so I could have made two or maybe three at that price.  Don’t be daunted by the large amount of steps!  You can do it!

Toddler King Koopa/Bowser Costume

What you’ll need:

• 1/3 yd green fleece fabric
• 1/3 yd off-white fleece fabric
• 1/4 yd orange fleece fabric
• 1/3 yd white fleece or sweatshirt material
• 1/3 yd white quilted fabric
• 1 sq foot yellow flannel fabric
• 1 sq foot of peltex 70
• 1/2″ white bias tape
• 6 inches of 2″ velcro, cut into two 3″ strips
• 1 orange boa
• stuffing & quilt batting
• yellow shirt and pants
• pattern here
  

1. Cut out all pattern pieces, adding seam allowance as indicated (add to pieces that say NSA/No Seam Allowance).
2. Take the spike pieces and fold in half to form a triangle with a curved bottom.  Stitch along the unfinished edge. Turn right side out and stuff.  Repeat for other spikes.
3. Fold small orange fabric rectangles in half and stitch to form a loop.  Fold loop in half so the loop is now a double layer.  Repeat for other rectangles.
4. Fold a hexagon in half and quarters and then snip 1 cm into each fold to create a 2cmx2cm “x”.  Repeat for other hexagons.
5. Insert an orange loop over a spike.
6. Pinch the bottom of the spike and gently insert bottom first through the hexagon from front to back.  Hand stitch spike to hexagon being sure to pass needle through all layers: orange loop, spike and hexagon.
7. Make rows of hexagons, 3 together, 4 together, 3 together.  Stitch hexagon rows together by placing right sides together and stitching a single side, then placing right sides of next hexagon together and stitching along the opposite side.
8. When three rows are formed, pin 3 row on top of the 4 row, right sides together.  Stitch in a zig shape along the end to attach the rows to each other.  Repeat for the other row of 3 along the bottom of the row of 4.
9. Cut 4 more hexagon pieces and cut in half.  Attach on half hexagon to all the sides of the shell so the finished shape has mostly straight edges without any zig zag edges.
10. Pin the hexagon shell to the oval piece of quilted fabric, right sides together.  Stitch, leaving a hand sized gap at the bottom.
11. Stuff stuffing through the gap and hand stitch closed.
12. Take white fabric and cut into strip 37″x6″. Fold in half width wise, right sides together and stitch along the unfinished ends.
13. Pin the white fabric loop to the green side of the shell, right sides together.  Stitch along the edge.
14. Add rolled up quilt batting to the white loop and fold the white fabric over the stuffing so it reaches the quilted side of the shell.
15. Tuck the unfinished edges of the fabric under and hand stitch.
16. Fold the puffy white shell outside away from the green shell.
17. Stack the belly pieces: quilted material, quilt batting then offwhite fleece. Stitch around outside of the belly.
18. Stitch straight lines across the belly, 3″ wide.
19. Open up bias tape and pin one of the folds along the stitching on the outer edge of the belly, unfinished edges matching.
20. Trim close to the unfinished edge then fold bias tape over the unfinished edge, unfinished edge should be folded under.  Pin and stitch.
21. Cut 6 7″x6″ rectangles of yellow fabric. Fold each one in half to form a 3.5″x6″ rectangle. Stitch across long end.
22. Turn tube right side out and insert a 3″x5″ piece of peltex 70 inside the tube.
23. Fold edges of each tube under and stitch closed.  Attach hook velcro to two of the finished tubes and loop velcro to two more unfinished tubes.
24. Hand sew the strap to one shoulder on the shell side.
25. Sew the other end of the strap to the shoulder on the belly side, stitching to the inside.
26. Repeat steps 24 & 25 on the same side of the shell, underneath where the child’s armpit will be.  
27. Hand stitch the strip with the hook side of the velcro to the shell side, equidistant from other strap, velcro side up.
28. Hand stitch the strip with the loop side of the velcro to the belly side, equidistant from other strap, velcro side down.
29. Repeat steps 27 and 28 underneath where the child’s armpits will be (across from other strap).
30. Follow instructions for pussy hat, omitting ears (step 1, step 4-6).  I made it slightly smaller with a 20″ hat band, and moved the hat band slightly closer to the crown.
31. Pin two curved horn pieces together and stitch across the curved side.
32. Add the horn insert piece inside the curved horn and stitch.
33. Turn horn inside out and stuff.  Repeat steps 31-32 for second horn.
34. Follow steps 3 and 4 for larger orange rectangles.
35. Repeat steps 4-6 for horns instead of spike and onto either end of the front hat panels instead of the hexagon.  Stitch through each horn to keep the stuffing in place.
36. Hand stitch a piece of orange boa down the middle of the hat forming a mohawk.

As we already knew, Julius is a little ham.  We had our babysitter over last night so Will and I could have a date night.  Before she left she told us how he was being such a little ham, making her laugh all night.  She said he’s developed such a cute little personality now.

There is one little girl at daycare who is about Julius’ age but until recently has been cared for at home.  For the last few weeks the poor thing cried whenever a parent left after dropping off their child.  Last week it looked like she turned a corner.  She seemed much more cheerful and even said ‘bye’ to me all week without crying.   Then Friday, when I was putting Julius’ clothes in his bin, I heard the unmistakable tears start again.  Julius walked over to me from the next room, looked me in the eye and said “Hailey” and then walked away.  He put the emphasis on her name as if to say “yep that’s Hailey, what are we going to do with her”.  I almost died laughing.

I am completely inundated with projects.  Between Halloween and Julius’ birthday I have once again over committed.  I probably mentioned that I’ve been working on a play kitchen as Julius’ birthday gift, but in case I haven’t, I’m making a play kitchen from an old cast off child’s dresser I picked up off the curb.  Actually, to be precise, I finished the play kitchen last Monday!  I don’t want to toot my own horn, but I think it came out pretty great.  The problem is, since it took me a very long time to finish, it is also going to take me a very long time to write it up.  So don’t expect a post on that until I’ve got some down time.  (Read: after Julius’ birthday.)

Since I still have to finish my own costume, I’m going to leave you with a fun little project I did with Julius last week while we were home potty training.  My work is pretty awesome, and composts and recycles.  99% of the items from the cafe are compostable, which is awesome.  The not-so-awesome part is that my site is full of people who are not used to composting.  This means my site is now also full of fruit flies.  When they first started composting (about 7 years ago, wow) my co-worker would leave his food scraps on his desk until the end of the day as a form of protest.  This earned him the office name plate “Lord of the Fruit Flies”.

While I am all about composting and definitely not protesting it, I am also lazy.  I don’t feel like making a trip to the compost bins every time I eat something (which for me is like once an hour).  Sometimes I’ve even forgotten to empty my bin into the compost bins until the next Morning!  To avoid the scorn of my co-workers and a new office name plate, I’ve been using an old yogurt bin as my compost bucket.  It works GREAT.  It doesn’t smell at all, and I’ve had no fruit flies in my cube at all since I started using it a month ago.  One time I even forgot to empty the compost after a whole weekend and no one was the wiser!  I think it would work great as a home compost bin for food scraps too!  I know most compost bins (like mine) actually are not completely sealed to allow some air flow and prevent anaerobic bacteria from building up, but if you take this out every couple days or keep it in your fridge I don’t see how that could be a problem.

Recycled Compost Bin

What you’ll need:

• 1 2lb yogurt container
• acrylic paint and spouncer (make sure to choose colors that don’t mix to brown unless you desire that color combo)
• stickers (my adorable ones were $1 from the dollar tree)
• clear topcoat spray paint (make sure it is safe to use on plastic surfaces)

1. Clean and dry yogurt container thoroughly.
2. Let your child decorate the container with acrylic paint.  Julius decorated mine with pink, purple and white paint that blended nicely when he inevitably mushed them all into one color.  Let dry completely.
3. After paint has dried let child apply stickers as desired.   Press the stickers down firmly.
4. Spray lid and container with a couple coats of clear topcoat (don’t let your child by anywhere in the vicinity for this part).

This was a year ago today.

These photos have absolutely nothing to do with anything but aren’t they cute?!

Well this is it.  Will and I decided to try and start potty training Julius this weekend.  We’re sick of washing diapers I guess.  Plus he really hates diaper changes and that has lead to more rashes lately.  Poor guy.  We’ve told him that this weekend he gets to be a “nunu” (naked) while he potty trains.  He seemed excited at the prospect. Who doesn’t want to run around pantsless all day?

For the last few weeks Julius and I have been making muffins on Sunday or Tuesday mornings.  We’ve made chocolate chip zucchini, chocolate chip banana, blueberry and apple muffins.  They are all delicious.  I’ve been trying to make them slightly healthier (picture me saying that in air quotes) by using this cool article from King Arthur Flour on how to cut down the sugar in muffins.  It’s a great article, and very scientific.  The gist is that you can usually use half the weight of flour in sugar (maybe a bit less if you have other sweet things flavoring the batter) without compromising the texture of the muffin.  Julius can’t tell the difference when we lower the sugar and is constantly asking for “muthins”.  We’ve been reading If You Give a Moose a Muffin the sequel to If You Give a Mouse a Cookie which he refers to as “Moose a Muthins”.  It’s my current favorite word in Julius’ vocabulary (maybe second favorite to “tutu”).

Here’s my muffin man, mouth full of muffins.

I’m feverishly working on a present for Julius’ birthday.  I decided to make him a play kitchen and some play food.  When I decided this (about 6 months ago) it seemed like I had plenty of time.  Unfortunately, several months of procrastination later and I’m starting to run out of time!  You may be thinking, “but you have a whole month!”  You’d be right about that, but this particular month is filled with Halloween, the medieval party and all the planning for Julius’ 2nd birthday party!

Despite my busy-ness (or maybe because of it) I’ve still made time for a few quick crafts.  This one was inspired by Julius who was constantly taking all my earrings out of the drawers and losing them.  He motivated me to reorganize my jewelry cabinet and add another earring rack.  The earring rack I made earlier has completely run out of room, and has gotten me frustrated, because there is no way to use earrings with backs on it without taking it off the wall.  This new holder made entirely from scraps, has worked amazingly well and it only took me about 30 minutes.  I wish I’d made one years ago!

Tapestry Earring Holder

What you’ll need

• Medium/Heavyweight woven fabric (I used upholstery fabric with a wide weave)
• 1/2″ single fold bias tape
• 1/2″ Dowel (mine was 5″ long)
• 2 – 1/2″ wood dowel caps
• 1/4″ ribbon (mine was 9″ long)

1. Cut fabric into a rectangular shape sized as you please.   You’ll want to add 2.5″ to the length for the dowel pocket.  For me this meant my rectangle was 23″x3.75″.
2. Cut the bottom of the rectangle into a pennant shape, by finding the middle and measuring up the same distance on both sides to find the hypotenuse of the triangle you want to remove.
3. Starting at the top side of the pennant, Open out bias tape and pin the back of one edge of bias tape to the edge of the pennant.  The right side of the bias tape should be touching the wrong/back side of the fabric.  Pin along the fold line.   Top should not be covered.
4. Stitch.
5. Fold bias tape over the unfinished edge of the pennant and pin to form a finished edge.  Stitch close to the edge of the bias tape.  Iron. 
6. Fold top of pennant over by 1.5″ onto the back of the pennant.  Fold 1/2″ under again, so the unfinished edge is hiding.  Stitch through 3 thicknesses of fabric. 
7. Drill an 1/8″ thick hole into either end of the dowel.  Sand dowel including the edges. 
8. Wood glue dowel caps to either end of the rod. 
9. After dowel has dried, insert rod through dowel pocket in pennant and insert ribbon through one end.  Double knot.  Insert through other end of dowel.  Double knot.
10. To use, simply push the earring wire through the weave of the fabric and secure with earring back. 

Never do woodworking when you’re pissed off.  I feel like this should be the number one thing someone tells you when you buy a saw.  I was working on Julius’ birthday present last night and was in a bad mood over a particularly crappy router I purchased from Home Depot.  The thing was so horribly made that I spent a solid TWO HOURS trying to get the base to move above the collet and bit.  That is not an exaggeration. Anyway, I digress.

After being grumpy that I wasted my whole evening (and one of my drawer faces) I decided to cut off the portion of the drawer face that the router had ruined.  Problem was I didn’t want to remove the face from the drawer itself so I couldn’t cut it on my chop saw or band saw, and I decided the circular saw was too dangerous for this task.  Ultimately I decided to use my handsaw.  It was hard.  Repairing the side of drawer I had ruined meant I was ripping the wood by hand.  I also don’t own a rip saw, so I was using a cross cut saw (clearly in addition to forgetting to tell me the number one rule above, my saw benefactors also forgot to tell me about rip saws vs. cross cut saws).  I was about 3/4 of the ways through the wood and somehow the piece I was sawing broke off.  This did not deter me.  I lined the saw up with the broken edge and applied the same very firm pressure I had been using.  Unfortunately since I didn’t have a divet for the saw to follow the saw jumped the tracks and I got about 12 lacerations on my left hand.

The best part of the story is that I woke Will up for his ‘professional’ evaluation because I don’t trust my opinions with blood and guts.  I very quietly said “I don’t want you to freak out because it’s really not that bad, but I cut myself with the hand saw.”  I thought that was a very logical way to put it.  Will asked me to show him (which frankly I was impressed with because he doesn’t have the best track record with medical things) and when I did he exclaimed “you need to go to the hospital”!  So I went to the hospital (which is only 3 minutes from our house), and in the nicest way possible they told me that I’d probably be waiting all night for something that lame.

Another dose of realism for the day is that I’m a toddler push over.  I put Julius to bed 4/5 days last week because Will had to work late, and not once did I get Julius to bed at his bedtime. Honestly the closest I got was half an hour after his normal bedtime.  But really, how can you rush a little boy when he’s playing a ukelele while pooping on the potty?

If you feel like all you do is clean up poop all day I’ve got the perfect craft for you!  This is a little holder for your dog poop bags that you can clip onto a leash or stroller!  Will and I reuse the produce bags we get from the grocery store as dog poop bags while we’re on walks with Dany.  While we’re at home we use a giant pooper scooper to clean up the poop so we don’t waste bags.  You can fit about 15 produce bags in this little holder for when you need them.

Julius likes to show as much of the inside of his nose as possible now when saying “cheese”.

Waste Bag Carrier on the ready

Julius likes to pull out the bags for me… even when I don’t need them…

Doggy Waste Bag Carrier

What you’ll need:

• 1 square foot of fabric
• 1 small carabiner clip
• Pattern here

1. Cut out fabric following pattern.
2. Cut a strip of fabric 1.25″x2″.  Fold in half length wise, pin and stitch.  Stitch along the 1/4″ mark.
3. Using a chop stick turn right side out.  Press.
4. Fold rectangle in half width wise (right side on the inside).  Pin the long end forming a tube.
5. Fold small rectangle from step 3 in half width wise to form a loop and sandwich inside the pinned edges of the tube in step 4 about 1.5 inches down the tube.  The folded portion of the loop should be inside the tube and the unfinished edges should match the unfinished edges of the tube.
6. Take the circle of material and place on one end of the tube, right side facing in.  Line up the edges of the circle with the edges of the tube, pinning where the circle meets the tube without any folds.
7. Stitch.
8. Take one of the half circles of fabric and fold the flat edge under 1/2″ and stitch.  Repeat for second half circle.
9. Place finished edges of half circles on top of one another, overlapping slightly so they nearly form a circle.  Repeat step 6 using the circle you have created.
10. Turn the whole thing right side out.