Denim ruffle skirt

 I have had the fabric to make this skirt FOREVER. It seems like I haven't done any projects this summer at all. I guess it is much harder with little ones around. The strange difference is that I haven't even had time to think about projects. Usually I get quite consummed with an idea until I can see it to fruition.
Anyway, I found this pattern via Pinterest from From an Igloo blog. The tutorial was great. Travis took the kids swimming one night (I put Felix in bed) and I sewed the whole thing. It was lovely.

 Super pleased with how the skirt turned out. Not so much with the pictures.

Painted rocks

We had fun gathering rocks then painting them. Zoe and her friend, Alexis, then took the rocks and annonomously left them on people's porches. My kids are always wanting to paint, so this was a great project.

Science Experiments (or Killing Time and Making a Mess)

The other day I realized that everyone was super bored and starting to get on each others nerves. It was early afternoon and I refused to let them turn on the T.V. I started my "I feel like I am cheating you out of your childhoods when I let you watch T.V. on a beautiful summer day" lecture, then decided to actually temp them outside.
We did the standby cornstarch and water experiment. Always a good one. Heck, I could play with it for hours. "It's a liquid, it's a solid, liquid, solid" etc.

We also made "slime", using up all of our Elmers glue we had bought for school supplies.

Lydia "sneezing" out green slime. Also, last year we found out the slime makes awesomely awful noises when sqeezed into a cup. Zoe has quite a knack for it.
We also did some vinegar and baking soda eruptions.
We did this little color wheel experiment where we started out with only the primary colors in water then placed paper towels going from the cup into the secondary cups that were empty. This one did take awhile. The kids were not excited about sitting around watching the colored water get sucked up into the paper towels.
We had some neighborhood friends stop by. They chose the right day to visit. Where we were having lots of fun keeping busy instead of the normal day where I am yelling for them to "go outside and enjoy your childhood!"

Melted crayon art

I had seen this project awhile ago and loved the look of it. While going through the art drawer, I looked at all the old broken crayons and remembered this project. Since it has been dreadfully hot lately I knew it would work well.
I hot glued the crayons to the top of a piece of paper, but they kept falling off, so I used good ole Elmers to reapply them. I used very heavy white paper and put a sheet of very heavy black paper underneath. If you try this project make sure to cover all your surfaces! It can be messy!
The kids were really excited about the process and we all kept rushing outside to see how it had changed. I love the way the colors mixed and moved. I think it would be fun framed, or just propped up somewhere. I do think I will cut off the crayon wrappers at the top, though.

beautiful growing things

 For Mothers Day I go to the nursery and buy some garden starts and a bunch of flowers. It makes me so happy for months and months to watch my plants grow.
I was going to get an overall picture of my back patio covered with flowers and delicious herbs and vegetables, but these triple digit temperatures are making everything look a little parched.

 Tomatillos for the first time. Looking good! Something I found out is that the husk grows first to the size of a billiard ball (maybe a bit smaller, what kind of ball would that be?), then the tomatillo grows inside. By feeling the husk, it seems that the tomatillos are about the size of grape tomatoes inside. What a little treasure. If you have never had a tomatillo, they taste like limey tomatoes to me. They are great in salsa!

 Look at these Tigerella tomatoes. I got a start from my brother who bought heirloom seeds a few years ago, then keeps the seeds and grows starts each year. That is dedication. I just bum the starts off of him.

This is a lovely flower that I found this year that is called Ice plant. It flourished squished into a large pot with Snapdragons, Violas, and Veronica. The greenery is succulent and the leaves feel like cow tongues. Kindof textured and squishy. I LOVE this plant.
I will have to remember to look at these pictures during the long dreary wintertime.