R and I are headed to a little kiddie Halloween party this afternoon. I thought it would be fun to bring a little something for her to hand out to all her friends so we made some ghouly cards this morning. I stole the hand-print ghost idea from her very first daycare craft project that she brought home last year at about this time. She loves having her hand traced so it was a real breeze to get a stack of these together. We also had a lot of fun practicing our best ghostly sounds... ooo-oooo-ooooo
I have a costume all set for the little lady to wear, but so far she has refused all attempts to put it on her. I am hoping for at least one photo moment before the day is over. More soon (if I'm lucky).

We have some very good friends visiting us from Seattle this week with their one-year-old son. R absolutely loves having a little buddy around. She chases him all around the apartment and is constantly asking about him when he's out of eye-sight. Actually, she keeps asking for "baby daddy", which for a while we thought referred to his dad, our friend, but we've since realized that this is just the name she's given to the little guy. Who knows why.
We spent yesterday afternoon roaming the cars at the New York City Transit Museum, an absolutely perfect spot for two rambunctious toddlers. The kids had a blast running through the cars, climbing on the seats and harassing the resident cat.

We all of a sudden have an explosion of baby blankets here in the house. Most are from my pile of half finished projects and I am so happy to finally have them done! Who cares that they are all fairly impractical, and will probably be most useful making a colorful stack in R's closet. 

You've seen the granny square before and an almost-done postage stamp quilt, but here they are all together, all finished. The only new project of the bunch is the large grey comforter and that we will use. As the temperatures drop here I knew I needed to get something warm in R's crib. I used a beautiful double gauze Nani Iro print that I bought a while ago and a pink linen with wool batting. It's my first time making anything like this and though I am really happy with it at the moment, I am anxious to see how it looks after its first washing.  So far R is not quite sure what to do with it and I mostly find it crumpled in a little ball in the morning and her sleeping right on top. Hopefully it's still doing some of its job. 

R and I decided to make a mess of the kitchen the other day and made carrot muffins together. I used an adapted version of a recipe from the Martha Stewart Cupcakes book. I feel so silly about these little changes I make to recipes - this one I decided to do without sugar, but kept in the 1 1/2 cups of oil. So, not only are the muffins not really that good for you, they don't taste that great either. Oh well. R doesn't mind one bit

Remember this dying project from a few months ago? Well, the finished project is finally out in print! All that dying and swatching was for this Thanksgiving Banner for the November issue of Parents Magazine. It's made using a super simple & kid friendly version of batik that uses Elmer's Glue instead of wax. Fun, right?

We spent the weekend visiting friends in Philadelphia. They live inside the city limits, yet we felt a million miles away - and R had the time of her life. Not sure what to call out as a highlight - feeding the chickens in the backyard, the trampoline, filling the bird feeders, playing on the pingpong table, chasing the pet rabbit around the house, or riding the rope swing. Everything was a hit. Thanks friends!

 

I don't know where I found the time, but I somehow managed to finish another project in the pile. Now, granted, that little quilt still doesn't have it's bias edging, but this one didn't require that I pull out the sewing machine, so it took precedence. It's basically just an oversized granny square. It was my first real crochet project and both R and I are really happy with it. She likes sticking her toes through the holes and hiding underneath it. I mostly just like that it's finished.

 I received an order for a gold leather link headband last week. It's been a while since I've worked on any leather accessories and it was really fun to pull out all the supplies. I've always loved the way the scraps look for these.