Wood Toys

We're trying to convert as many of our son's toys as possible from plastic to wood mostly to reduce the number of toxins our family is exposed to on a day-to-day basis. I found some really cool wood toy kits at Michael's and had fun putting them together while watching Downton Abby on Netflix streaming.

They turned out really nice but a little bit small for a one year old. I used regular wood glue instead of the glue the kits came with (I trusted it better) but some of the pieces are small enough that they could be choking hazards if they ever broke off.

So I'll be selling them at the Fat Dog Farms spring garden and craft sale coming up next month (which, by the way if you live in or near Portland, Oregeon, I would love for you to come to! Click the link to see the details.)

Spotlighting Awesomeness: My Five Favorite Bloggers!

Thanks to Trop50 for sponsoring my writing about fabulous bloggers. This year Trop50 is granting 50 Fabulous Wishes. Click here to enter for a chance to win $1,000 to celebrate a friend with a refreshing attitude about looking and feeling fabulous!

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There are so many awesome bloggers out there that sometimes it's easy to get lost in the shuffle.  If you aren't already following these fab ladies and their blogs make sure you fix that today!

Heather Mann of Dollar Store Crafts

(photo from DSC)

Heather is the mastermind behind not only Dollar Store Crafts but also Dollar Media Network which includes rad sites like Dollar Store Mom ("frugal fun for families"), Decor Hacks (genius home decor using items totally meant for something else), Craft Fail (crafters laughing about the blunders that sometimes happen on the road to fabulous) and Crafterminds (a resource to help improve the blogs and business of craft bloggers everywhere).

I found Heather through a reference from a co-worker. After showing a knitted Apron pattern I wrote to said co-worker she said "it's too bad you didn't start here when Heather was on staff. You guys would have loved each other." And I think she's right. Heather and I missed meeting each other by just a few months. A couple months before the hubster and I moved to Portland, Heather and her family had moved about an hour away. I do love the stuff Heather does, though, and in addition to loving her blogs, I follow her on Twitter.

I love Heather's resourcefulness and ability to repurpose stuff into something way more awesome than it was originally destined to be. She's also super friendly and loves building others up (hence Crafterminds).

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Jennifer Hadfield of Tatertots & Jello

(Photo from CSI project)

Jennifer is the creative genius behind Tatertots & Jello (a crafting, decorating and cooking blog full of awesome) as well as one of the main organizers of the The CSI Project (a different theme for each week features 3 awesome tutorials and chance for bloggers everywhere to show off their stuff and win prizes).

I'm not sure how I managed to not know about Jen's blogs for as long as I did. Some of my favorite projects that she's done are upcycled and embellished clothing items (my current fave is this embellished cardigan).  She also does a Weekend Wrap Up link party every Friday which is a great way to both share what you've been working on as well as see tons of other bloggers' projects and get inspired by them.

I love Jen's fresh style and all of the different projects and blogs she constantly features. Plus there are always tons of giveaways happening. Make sure you stop by, or consider following her on twitter.

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Crystal Paine of Money Saving Mom

(photo from Money Saving Mom)

I started following Money Saving Mom about two years ago and learned a lot about couponing and how to match sales with both manufacturer and store coupons in order to score awesome deals for just a fraction of what you'd pay full price.  She also features free items, giveaways, great deals (I usually find out about the awesome deals happening at Shutterfly or Snapfish from her site) and a list of great-priced items at tons of local stores.

You can subscribe to her site's main feed, or personalize and get individual feeds based on deals from certain stores (for example, I get e-mailed the deals each week for Fred Meyer, Target and Trader Joe's which are the local stores I shop at most frequently).

If you are interested in learning how to live on less cash, definitely follow Crystal. She puts out a lot of content, but you will learn a lot as well.

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Maggie Brereton of Smashed Peas & Carrots

(photo from SP&C)

Maggie doesn't just blog about her awesome ideas, sewing, crafts and recipes but she runs her own etsy shop as well. And that makes me love her even more. She fearlessly shares projects and tutorials on her blog despite running a handmade business on the side, too. I love her spirit of sharing instead of hoarding.

Follow her on twitter and check out her blog (or even jump right into the awesome tutorials here)

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Nancy Sleeth of Blessed Earth

(photo from Blessed Earth)

I'm not sure how I first heard of Blessed Earth but I remember being so glad once I had. As a Christian and someone who also cares about good environmental stewardship, I have tended to feel a bit lost or written off by others in my faith movement as "the hippie girl from the Northwest." But the earth we live in is God's earth...the one He gave to us to care for. It breaks my heart then to see many (usually republican) Christians flaunting their wastefulness and lack of good earth stewardship as a way to stick it to the Democrats on political grounds rather than owning up to our God-given jobs as earth stewards.

I'll cut myself off and leave the rest of that rant for another day, but when I found the people at Blessed Earth, I felt like I had finally found "my people." People who got it. People whose heart song and desire to transform the world we live in and the attitudes of those who should be caring the most about it. Nancy co-founded Blessed Earth with her husband, Dr. Mathew Sleeth and they together they blog about "Serving God and Saving the Planet."

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Don't forget to enter the 50 Fabulous Wishes contest for a chance to win $1,000 to celebrate a friend with a refreshing attitude about looking and feeling fabulous. I was selected for this Tropicana Trop50 sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do. I received compensation to use and facilitate my post.

Panda Bear Books

In case you haven't noticed, we've been on a bit of a panda kick over here. Birthday pandas, Panda Ears, a Panda Party....we sure love pandas! Which is why I was really delighted to get a copy of Thank You, God, For Mommy by Amy Parker through Thomas Nelson's BookSneeze program.

The book follows a little panda and his panda mommy. He thanks God for her and how she's such a good mommy who cares about others, gives boo-boo kisses, takes time to be silly, sings him to sleep and takes such good care of baby panda. It's a sturdy, padded cover board book and is a favorite of my one year old son, Kaypha. He loves to flip through the pages looking at the beautifully done illustrations. We've definitely made it part of our every day routine and usually read it before bedtime. The rhyming words and storyline are sweet...plus there's at least two pandas on every page! It's well done and I'm sure will continue to grow with Kaypha. This book would make a great gift for moms and young kids.

Panda Party Wrap Up

We had so much fun at our panda party this weekend. Thank you so much to all of our awesome friends who came out to celebrate one full year with our sweet little panda.  Here's a wrap up of what we did:

Invitations

I made this invitation using a panda graphic I found online. I made them a 4 x 6 size so I could take advantage of online deal for "photos" and print them as a "photo" from Walgreens (there are always promos running on photography websites so check the usual suspects like snapfish, shutterfly, etc.). Custom invitations for the price of generic fill-in-the-blank ones from Walmart?  Winning!

Panda Bear Wear

What are all the stylish pandas wearing to birthday parties this season? Panda ears!

Way better than party hats and a more useful party favor than a bag full or candy or small plastic dollar store toys.  They took a while to make all of them but were pretty easy to do.

My Panda Bear is One! (and birthday panda shirt)

One year ago this week, my precious son Kaypha was born on Mother's Day.  He was three weeks early but weighed in at a hefty 10 pounds, 5 ounces! We've been so blessed to have this sweet, snuggly, mostly laid back kiddo in our lives. We had a family day at the zoo on Monday and we'll be having a Panda Party this weekend (we got the great idea from Heather and since Kaypha's nickname lately has been "Panda Bear" we thought it was perfect!)

Here's Kaypha at the zoo with his daddy:

Funky Plant Markers (and mini-tutorial)

Silverware plant markers are by no means an original idea, but I sure love how they look!  I'm getting ready for a Spring Garden and Crafts fair on my family's farm next month and I've made a few of these both for my garden and for the fair.

I've got some "serious" ones for actually labeling plants:

And some fun ones that say more clever things:

Read the rest to check out how I made them:

Adventures in Juicing

Inspired by my cousin who always has the inside track on all things healthy and nutritious (and have I mentioned is stunningly beautiful? I'm sure there is a correlation.), I've decided I wanted to try juicing. I was generously given a second hand juicer the first owner had graduated from and we have been juicing crazy over here.

My favorite recipe so far goes about like this:

Apple, Carrot Ginger Sunrise

Ingredients:

• 2 organic apples
• 2 skinny carrots (or one large one)
• 1 wedge of lemon with peel
• 1 inch chunk of ginger

Freschetta Giveaway Winner

And the Freschetta giveaway winner is...

Commenter #10: Cynthia

I sent you an e-mail. Just get back to me in the next 3 days with your address and the prize is yours!