sold out

So big sister told Santa (in NOVEMBER) that she wanted this unicorn doll in the Magic Cabin catalog. I ignored it, of course, as I didn't really want to spend $60 on a felt unicorn doll handmade in Latvia. Or $80 on the unicorn's felt fairy, handmade as well. No doubt they are lovely toys but generally, we are of the cheap nature when it comes to Christmas gifts. Not in quality, but in total $. The girls get a few small, needed items, generally not more than $40-50 total. O.k, last year big sister got a bike but we would have purchased her one in the spring anyway, so that actually saved us money. We do make a big deal out of Christmas, but mostly in the 'what can we do for others' way.

So I hoped that the wish for the unicorn and it's fairy rider would be forgotten and we could move on, but alas it was not. She still wants it, still believes that Santa (her Santa) will grant her wish. See, this was the first time she was brave enough to actually go up and talk to Santa. She has some expectations that the interaction with Santa will result in her finding a magic unicorn and fairy on Christmas morning.

It's sold out.

Yep.

So Jane has convinced me to make a unicorn. I can do this. I may break down and order the (also sold out but will ship in January) fairy and write a note on the unicorn that says something like "take care of my unicorn for me, I will be coming when I am done helping Santa with all the presents-love, the Fairy." That should work, right? She's four. The only thing I need now is about four hours of interrupted time to make a unicorn doll. Geeze, I need some magic for that.

family dinner

We had family dinner tonight. Our weekly family dinner group is composed of four families with young children (eight children under six and one more on the way) who get together weekly for dinner and play and conversation. We have been doing this for, um, let's see, just about two years. At first it was intimidating; think about having a dinner party for eight adults let alone eight adults and their children! But then when you realize that you get to skip making dinner on Tuesdays for three weeks as payment for your one night of recipe quadrupling-wahoo! It's a vegetarian meal and we all try to make something the kiddos will eat, so there's lots of edemame, and bread and butter, and cut up fruit and then we also try to make something the adults will eat up. I make soups a lot. One family does planned out meals with lots of involved crock pot cooking. We eat sitting on the floor, around tables in dining rooms and on porches. We have matching plates and fancy silverware or mis-matched cups and tye-dyed napkins.

We have a great time. I wish every night was Tuesday.

Yes, you should try this yourself.

felt tote bag tutorial

Whoa! This was so much fun...here is the tote bag I made on Sunday in about one hour. I made it from four pieces of the new felt sheeting we just received from Nepal. Each green side is one whole sheet (about 11x17), the narrow orange sides are one sheet cut in half lengthwise (to make two strips, about 5 1/2 x17), the bottom is one sheet cut across the end the same width as the orange sides (about 5 1/2 x 11) and I cut a pocket from the extra.
Here is the side with the pocket stitched on. This project was perfect for me because there really is no measuring, you just fold the sheets in half and cut. No pattern pieces either! Here are all the ingredients laid out, you can see Nora in the background, she's hard at work, too.

These pictures show the way I stitched the ribbon in one continuous piece. After I had the ribbon handles on the bag I sewed the seams on the long sides of the bottom panel about 5/8 of an inch wide. I then sewed the short side seams on the bottom panel and then sewed the side seams up. The seam selvage is all on the outside of the bag, which I think looks fine with a felt tote bag.
I used this tote bag for our gift exchange at the store. We all make a handmade gift and exchange them. Everyone works really hard on their gifts and the competition is pretty fierce. My tote bag went to Ndidi so I will (hopefully) get to see it again, but I am going to make another one. Maybe with striped felt sheets!

NOTE: as of 12/20/2008 we no longer sell these felt sheets. Sorry, they were swell but we had to import them in giant quantities from the Kingdom of Nepal and they just didn't sell very well. We no longer have any in stock. Try sheet felt from high-quality upholstery stores.