My boys are six years apart, so for many years, I only had one school kid. And every year after conferences and when school was done, I dutifully saved his work — by dropping the whole lot of it in some random plastic bin in the basement or basket in the office. Out of sight, […]
How to make baby onesies with iron-on transfers
May 28, 2013 by
One of my younger sisters is having her first baby in July and I had a great time throwing a shower for her with my stepmom just last week. My happy job was to decorate in pink sock monkeys and bring the activities. (There’s very, very little pink in my life, and I’ll take any […]
Placemats and grace: My grandma’s pasta sauce
May 2, 2013 by
I could go on for chapters about how amazing my Grandma Eunie is. I’ll try to keep it brief. When my grandma was a girl, she farmed alongside her dad, mother, brother, and sisters. When the snow was too deep for a horse or the car, she used cross-country skis to get to school. Jeans […]
Farmers Markets without Fear — Reviewing Beth Dooley’s Minnesota’s Bounty: The Farmers Market Cookbook
April 1, 2013 by
Naptime beckoned, and I had just one more email to write before I could answer its call. A few more words, then done — my email to author Beth Dooley sent, and I closed my laptop, rolled over, and closed my eyes as Blythe snoozed nearby. My email echoed in my ears as I nodded […]
Five new ideas for my urban vegetable garden
March 19, 2013 by
It’s March in Minnesota, and that means . . . blizzards, and ice, and windchill. Not always, but at least this year. It’s no wonder, then, that as the garden catalogs start showing up in my mailbox while the snow keeps coming and coming, I start scouring gardening boards on Pinterest and mapping out my […]
Taming the linen closet beast
March 16, 2013 by
The problem with linen closets — at least with mine — is that linens themselves seem to comprise about 20 percent of the crap in there. The rest is first aid, medicine, soap, shampoo, sunscreen, eight million toothbrushes, some toilet bowl cleaner, a few candles, and a couple fake flowers. Small things. Lots of them. […]
How to make black and white images for babies (or how to buy yourself some me-time after diaper changes)
March 13, 2013 by
Feeling crafty and have 20 minutes? Looking to buy yourself some free time while your baby is happily entertained? Then follow this tutorial and make some black and white images for babies. This quick project is perfect for a new mom — quick, easy, and can hopefully be completed during nap time (but if baby […]
How to make the easiest Easter egg garland ever
March 11, 2013 by
Yesterday I made this super-easy paper Easter egg garland while gabbing with my friend Kristen for hours. We both prefer paper crafts to any others (me and jewelry making, hmm not so much), and we think cutting is therapeutic. We actually devised this project so that we could make something with paper that we could […]