christmas and a few crafts

santa was good to us this year! i didn't get any pics of christmas morning (too wrapped up in the moment) but here is how it looked for aiyden's 2nd christmas...

along with christmas came more toys to store so i hung some floating shelves and fashioned pocket storage out of leftover felt to hold markers, puppets, etc...

the new bike trailer from oma and opa is a huge hit! i think we biked 20 miles over christmas weekend! and elmo goes everywhere with us!

aiyden experienced his first tummy slide with the help of a big kid who gave him a little shove!

some felted items from the holidays...

Felt Playhouse

i've been wanting to make a felt playhouse slipcover for our kitchen table ever since I saw it on homemade by jill, one of my favorite blogs. so, today i was determined to get it done in time for christmas morning. it was actually much easier than i thought it would be. it's not as elaborate as some others that i've seen but it will do the job and how perfect for a two year old who loves to play under the table already!

it's all wool felt, which doesn't fray so no sewing required! (except to attach the panels). everything was adhered with wonder under, hot glue, and velcro!

the front door opens and has pipe cleaners inserted around the edge to keep it's shape

the apples are velco'd on so they can be picked.

and the flowers can be plucked from the window box. pipe cleaners help keep them standing.

i really think aiyden is going to love hiding out in his playhouse!

christmas stuff...

i've been doing a lot of christmas crafting lately. last weekend we watched our neighbors 9 year old daughter so we made some salt dough ornaments, a really fun project for a 9 year old... and a 30 year old as well! i've had a lot of success with felting some knitted bowls but i can't post those pics yet because many are going to be christmas gifts.

needle felted mittens and aiyden's silhouette. the silhouette was really easy, a wooden disc, craft paper and print out of his profile, topped off with some modge podge...

salt dough cristmas tree...

salt dough snowman...

aiyden in front of the tree with his rudolph shirt that i made for him...

posing with mikey doll! aiyden picked out our tree. it's a 3.5 foot charlie brown tree which worked out perfect because the place didn't net it or have twine so we had to fit it in the back seat. i set it on top of a milk crate for some height and covered it with some extra material rather than buying a tree skirt.

we got a pub table for the kitchen which has been perfect for his high chair, now he can can play with his aqua doodle while i make dinner...

apartment is finally coming together! i love our new curtains from ikea. was going to make some but these are lined and buy the time i bought material, i figured it would cost just as much!

needle felting

so, i discovered needle felting last night and tried it out today. i really thought it would be instant crafting gratification but of course, it proved to be more difficult than i thought. so i started with some felt mitten ornaments that i saw on another blog recently. white wool, and my felting needle and sponge

my first row ended up being way to thick ...

stab the crap out of it...

and that's how it's done. apparently i didn't take a pic of the finished product. they turned out alright for being the first project.

i've seen needle felted bowls that are awesome so i really wanted to try it. much harder than i thought! this bowl is tiny, i can't imagine making a bigger one. i think it would be much easier to knit a bowl and then felt it ad add embellishment with the needle. so i made sort of a circle for the base and started a long row for the sides of the bowl...

i used to different greens and wanted a swirlier effect but again...harder than it looks.

putting the base on was easier than i thought. the sides were the most difficult. i think i need a much larger sponge.