Crayon Drawing

 

I decided to use crayons to make some rough drafts of my next art work. These crayons in the picture are the ones that I was working with. To say, not the finest art supplies, would be an understatement. This piece was inspired by a water color picture that I saw on Pinterest. I figured that I'd have to use colored pencils for the final picture. But, I was so surprised with how nice the crayons worked for my drafts that I decided to go ahead and use crayons for the final picture, too.

I started by very very lightly sketching the out lines for the ducks. Then I added colors. I did 3 practice copies 

This is the final picture!

Close up of the faces.

Close up of the fence in the background.

Close up of the dandelions.

Close up of the feet.

Maybe this will make you consider trying crayons for artwork. It is harder for me to use my good colored pencils because the children use them if I get them out. That's okay, but the pencils are harder to keep track of. They roll around. I have trouble tracking them down and getting them back in the box. They are special/expensive so they require more care. And I have no place to leave them out in-between breaks on my project. Our tiny table doesn't even provide us with an adequate amount of space when everyone wants to draw at once.

With all these barriers to using colored pencils I am glad that I found the crayons to be so pleasing and easy to use.

Sewing Projects In October

 Doll Dress, Doll, and Little Girl Dress

My opportunity came to retrieve Poly-fil from the storage place this month. I was happy to continue progressing on the pioneer doll!

First I finished one of the purple doll dresses.

Then I finished the doll.

The arms and the legs were the first parts to be stuffed. As I always do, I added a second row of stitches to reinforce the appendages. 

These arms and legs are never supposed to come off no matter how much play they endure.

Next to be stuffed was the head and body.

After stuffing, I decided to give her a little wash before sewing the hair on the head. She had accumulated some smudges. It is much easier to wash dolls before they have hair. 

After some cold dunking and swishing she dried in the sunshine. Then I did the hair. Here is a hair tutorial for more details.

I quickly installed some snap buttons on the two doll dresses that I have finished. 

The big question is: how have I fared on the sewing of my daughter's birthday dress?

I am very pleased with the progress that I have made. I was able to finish the pinafore and the dress, barely. I had to publish this post a day late because I wasn't finished yet. I was so close. 

Last night I hemmed the dress. This morning I sewed a button on to the pinafore. Then I went outside and took a couple pictures to show you.

Hopefully, next month I will be able to sew another dress and pinafore. I will try to take more pictures of the process along the way.

Pumpkin Pie Season!

 

We live in an area where a lot of pumpkins are grown. Most are grown for the Libby's brand. Meaning they are not the decorative type, but the really good for pies type. 

I was able to get my hands on this one a month ago. The consignment store in town had a few of these Libby pumpkins out in front of their building with a free sign. I don't know the story of how they got there. I like to fancy that they fell off the truck. Honestly, that is because I have a very poor imagination and can't come up with a more creative story.

Last week I cut the pumpkin up and processed it. I cooked it until soft and scooped out the pulp. Then I blended the pulp in a food processors until it was smooth. I froze most of the pumpkin puree to use laster. With some of it I made a large pumpkin pie. And, I roasted the seeds for a snack.

I am so embarrassed to show this picture because of the aluminum pie pan. Not only is it ugly but someone might think that used a store bought crust- oh, the shame!

I didn't! I didn't! The crust is homemade and the pie pan is salvaged. I wanted to use this pie pan because it is so big. You can't tell by this picture, but this is a 11.5" pie pan. I multiplied the recipe by a small percentage to fill this pan. 

And to bring this post full circle: I used the Libby's pumpkin pie recipe. It is our family's favorite.

Art: Rooting For You Card

 

Here is a little art inspiration. I saw a cute picture on Pinterest that gave me this idea. I added my own vegetables and style to make it my own. 

The message in the card says, "I'm rooting for you!"

It is a pretty easy idea and it will put a smile on someone's face. You can be an encouragement to someone!

Common Buckeye Butterfly

 I have been trying all summer to get a picture of a Common Buckeye Butterfly. They are so skittish, though. Now matter how I tried to sneak up I could never get close enough for a good picture.

I few days ago my son when outside on a chilly morning and found this Common Buckeye Butterfly on the play set. He knew I would be so excited. He was able to handle it and bring it inside for me to see.

Isn't it beautiful!

Common Buckeye caterpillar's host plants include snapdragon and plantain.

Raising Butterflies website has some nice pictures of the eggs and caterpillars at different instars. They say that Common Buckeye Butterflies can be fun to raise. I will keep that in mind. Maybe I'll be able to find an egg to raise next year.

A New Wild Edible For Me!

This is called Autumn Olive. I learned this wild edible from a the website: North East Superfoods. Here is link to the Autumn Olive article on North East Superfoods .com. I recommend that you read their article. They have good pictures and explain how to distinguish Autumn Olive from the poisonous Honeysuckle (pictured below). Once you know what to look for it is hard to confuse the two. They are quite different.

Autumn Olive have one pit. (Like tiny plums.)

Honeysuckle have multiple seeds per berry.

Autumn Olive are speckled.

Honeysuckle have no speckles.

Autumn Olive have red flesh 

Honeysuckle have orange gel.

Those are the main ways to tell the berries apart besides all the differences in leafs.

We liked the flavor of the Autumn Olives. They were tart and mildly sweet. They had a good amount of flavor. They were not bland. If I had to compare it to another fruit I would say it reminded me of a plum, the part of the plum right next to the skin. You know how plum skin has the most flavor? It is like the ratio of skin to flesh on the Autumn Olive lends to it having a more pungent flavor.

If you get a chance, check out the link and hopefully you, too, can try and enjoy Autumn Olive!

 

Sewing September

 Skirt Alterations, Doll Dresses, and A Pattern for a Little Girl Dress

A lady from Church hired me to make alterations on this denim shirt. She wanted it to have less of a flare. It was hard for me to do because I think the more flare in a skirt the better the skirt. So I took a perfectly good skirt and made it inferior, in my opinion, of course.

After I had made new seams I added topstitching to make the new seams match the old ones.

The lady was happy with these alterations.

I couldn't finish the doll that I started working on in August because I don't have any poly-fil at hand. All my poly-fil is stored in another city. So until I get over there to dig out my poly-fil, I have turned to doll dresses as my handwork project. 

I finished this red one.

I can't help myself from sewing in a way that makes the stitches almost like a to-scale model of a real dress. I don't know if you can see these stitches on the sleeve, but this is what I talking about. Tiny stitches that are totally over kill and definitely not necessary in a practical way.

How do I market this? It doesn't make any sense for me to go into such detail for a dress intended to be a child's toy. On the other hand I hate toys who's purpose isn't to be played with, in other words collectable dolls. Toys should be played with. They should bring joy to children. It's just dumb for an adult to have a child's toy just to put in a case and stare at, in my view. I don't want to offend any doll collectors out there. I have an Aunt who collects dolls and I love her. She's a nice collector. She did always give me and my sisters one of her collectors edition dolls whenever we visited. But, she didn't mind that we opened the packaging and played with the dolls. And I can assure you that they weren't collectors items by the time that we were done with them. She was happy to sacrifice her dolls to bring joy to children.

Sorry about the tangent there. I was wanting to ask if anyone out there can tell me if there is a niche for this type of sewing that isn't a collectible?

I finished all the exposed raw edges with a blanket stitch.

I cut out two more doll dresses.......

And marked the seam allowances for easy hand sewing.

My daughter's birthday is coming up in December, which means that I had better get busy if I want to make a dress for her. Like really busy! 

I cut out the pattern.

This pattern only has two views: long sleeve 

And short sleeve.

I have several really cute fabric options so perhaps I can make more than one dress and try both views.

I can't wait to show you how much I can get done in October!

Pecans!

 

I was so surprised and delighted to find this pecan tree down our lane. It is not on our property but it is close to the road on an empty lot.

When I was a young girl my family would travel to Arkansas just about every October to visit my Great Uncle Tony. Down the street from his house stood a big old pecan tree in a Church yard. Uncle Tony knew the people who attended church there. He said they wouldn't mind if we collected the pecans. 

There were so many pecans on the ground. We'd fill a couple grocery sacks in a few minutes and bring them back north to enjoy for a couple weeks.

It was a special memory. Pecans were a rare treat.

I knew there was a variety of pecan that grows this far north but I had never seen one nor did I expect to. 

I could hardly believe my eyes when, as we drove by one day, I looked out at the nut clusters on this tree and thought, "Those look like pecans. Can it be?"

Yes, it can be! I walked over with the children and we picked up a few handfuls. We cracked them and enjoyed them. What a treat!