Schoolwork Display

Update (4 September 2012):  It's on the wall!  I chose to put it in the playroom above her toy cubby-shelf thing.  It was even motivation to get the playroom picked up so that I could take a picture.

My oldest starts Junior Preschool on Tuesday!  I can't believe that I'm sending Melodi, my two-and-a-half-year-old, off to school two days a week.  With preschool comes cute little art projects to enjoy, and with the start of school Pinterest has been teaming with beginning of school projects to do.

Here is the finished project, inspired by several pins that were rolling around in my head.  The artwork is my own, the "Melodi" was my first cut using Design Studio after getting my Cricut almost two years ago, and the alphabet pages are the contributions I made to an alphabet book swap on the Cricut Community Message Board.

How I Re-Purposed the Frame (inspiration 1, inspiration 2, there may have been more that I saw but didn't pin)

Raise frame on pushpins (inspiration), sand and paint.  Sand and paint some more.  Cut cork.  Adhere cork to glass from the frame using spray adhesive.  Trim cork.  Adhere second cork layer (wanted it thicker than a single layer).

Set cork/glass into frame.  Tap finishing nails into frame and bend over.  Add enough to secure firmly.

 

How I Made My Clothes Pin Push Pins

Take apart push pins and paint (inspiration) at the same time as the frame.  Put pins back together.  Hot glue the push pins to the clothes pins (inspiration).  Hot glue buttons to clothes pins.

I love how this project turned out, so now to figure out where to hang it and wait for Melodi to bring home her first piece of artwork from Junior Preschool. 

Family Painting Time

I was finishing up my glove box folders and Melodi was wanting to do something with me.  On trips to the craft store sometimes I pick up little things for Melodi so I had some wooden shapes to paint.  I pulled out three and let Melodi pick the one she wanted to paint, she then assigned me one and my husband one, so her little project turned into family painting time.

Melodi did pretty well for the first time painting.  Sure she got it all over herself (almost right at the beginning) and mixed the colors (only once she got bored), but we had fun and got to spend time as a family.  The first part she had to paint was the inside of her basket, not sure why, but that's what she wanted to paint.  We'll see if it ever drys, as there is quite a puddle inside.

 

Glove Box Clean Out

Sometimes the most simple projects take a little bit of time.  But, what can I expect, with an active two and a half year old and a nursing three month old.  I think this is probably the quickest project I've completed after finding it on Pinterest, but since we got the registration renewed on the car yesterday the state of paperwork in the glove box was at the top of my mind.

This car documents folder by Elementary Organization had been pinned by one of the people I follow.  First I started by creating my list of documents, but I didn't feel like digging out the documents in the middle of the night.  I knew I had some of the folders laying around, and I came across them as my husband I and worked to clean out the office, making this a FREE project.  Yesterday after I got the girls down for a nap I emptied out my glove box, took my draft document list, and sat down to sort through the paperwork.  I made a number of changes based on what I had and the order I wanted stuff in.  When my husband got home he brought me everything in his glove box.  Then the girls were up and I was off to try to corral them, at least a little bit. 

This morning I was finally able to finish up the project.  I printed revised lists, changed found some matting paper, and attached the "table of contents" to the folder using packing tape.  Finally, I added the stickers to the tabs and using my matching Sharpies to write the numbers (I would suggest writing on the stickers before putting them onto the tabs).

The final step to this project is going through the extra stuff that was in my husbands glove box.  It's amazing how much more stuff he had in his than I had in mine, but considering that we've had that car for two more years which included two moves and a extended road trip, it really isn't surprising.

Next I hope to make another folder like this to corral the paperwork that comes from a military move.

Busy Bag Storage: Gallon Ziplocks

When I started putting busy bags together the first ones I did were the felt board pieces.  With so many little pieces I needed a storage solution right away.  Looking around the house at what I had and wanting some uniformity in storing the various activities I decided to use gallon ziplock bags and a Homz plastic hanging folder tub that I have had for 6+ years.

Mozzarella from a Gallon of Milk

WOW!  This was so fun to make and absolutely delicious to consume.  A couple weeks ago I came across this pin on Pinterest which took me to Simple Bites post about The Best Party Trick Ever: How to Make Thirty Minute Mozzarella.  I'd like to share some notes about our first two attempts to make this.

#1.  Our first attempt turned out a little tough and dry.  We used 2% milk, and think that it was heated and handled too much.  It was possible to shape it into a nice log to cut.  Sorry no pictures, I was having a rough day.

#2.  The next day our mozzarella turned out amazing, it was nice and soft and gooey.  This time we used whole milk, and heated and handled it much less.  This time it was hard to get it to shape into a log, but if we let it cool a little it probably would have been possible.

I'm working on editing the video so it's not 30 minutes long.  There are some really cool points in the video that you can really see stuff happening.

Finished Caprese Salad.

Even my 2 year old ate the cheese!

My hubby did some research on what to do with the "leftover" whey after our first attempt because he didn't want it to go to waste.  He found The Prairie Homestead's post "16 Ways to Use Your Whey" decided that he would try to make ricotta (using this recipe from Fias Co Farm/Dairy) with the second batch.  While we didn't do anything with the ricotta it turned out well, although it needed some salt and a lot of the cheese got stuck in the cheese cloth.

Ricotta Cheese.

We got about a pound of mozzarella each time even with the changes, and between a quarter and a third of a cup of ricotta was produced from the resulting whey.