One Scarf Lost

It's true. And sad. We lost last year's scarf. I really liked that scarf. It was my first foray back into the crochet world for many, many, many years. And so now I embark on scarf deux ... here it is so far.

Textured Collage Neighbourhood

First we gathered variously textured items around the house such as a wood laminate sheet, a bamboo mat, some plastic mesh used as veggie packaging, for example.



Next we made rubbings of the textures onto white paper. Then we cut out squares, rectangles, triangles and semi-circles, each of which we used to make up various sized and shaped buildings.



I also found some earlier work of Spuds [white crayon and blue water colour], which was perfectly textured for clouds. I managed to talk him into letting me cut it up.



We made a road, divider lines, and a patch of grass with 3 different colours of electrical tape.



Finally, we added a few flying creatures to top it off.

Urban Scavenger Hunt

HONING OBSERVATION SKILLS

And now I have an Urban Scavenger Hunt photo list to add to my collection of beach, forest and park. UPDATE: I have these pdfs available at wee printables. Help yourself!

Miga and Spud

Hanging out with the Vancouver 2010 mascots yesterday.

More Scavenger Hunts

HONING OBSERVATION SKILLS





Well, I've been meaning to do this for almost a year now. And finally I've finished two more scavenger hunt photo lists: one beach and one forest. I'm happy to shoot over the pdf to anyone who is interested but it may be that the images are too regional for some [i.e. no palm trees on my beach!]. Anyway, if you are interested in these or in my original park one, send me your email address and I'll set you up.

UPDATE: I have these pdfs available at wee printables. Help yourself!

Happy hunting!

Tooth Fairy So Soon?

Our little bub lost his first baby tooth! With no warning whatsoever. He handed something to Hubs early this morning and said "What is this?". Sure enough, it was his tooth. But he's not even 4 and half yet. Well frankly, I had no idea when this was supposed to happen so I went to google right away and found some answers on the topic. It seems that most kids start losing at age 5, 6 and 7 but that some kids start losing at 4 and 8. OK, so he's not a total freak of nature. Good to know. Just checking.



Oh. Sorry. You probably didn't want to see that.

Anyway, I was a little bummed by it all. I didn't feel prepared [he's growing up!]. And either did he. He was a bit teary about it at first. I think he thought he was to blame "I played with it too much" he noted twice. Of course we were able to spin the situation but I feel bad that we didn't have the opportunity to talk it up more, over time, and make it an exciting milestone. It just snuck up on us.

On top of it, we got home pretty late this evening, so I was scrambling on what to do with the precious little enameled nugget. This is what we whipped up while eating a late dinner, right before bedtime.

And, a couple of hours after he fell asleep, we just slipped in and replaced the tooth with some cold hard cash. As tradition would have it. Phew.

SOME LINKS I FOUND
A little song on the topic.
A funny little story.
Some poetry.

And finally, this list of related books has inspired me to get to our library, asap.

What are your traditions at tooth fairy time? How did your parents deal with you losing teeth?

Urban Harvest

Spud and I had the best time today after work, filling our bowl with the bounty from our middle-of-the-city deck; 4 types of apples and 3 types of tomatoes. "I know!" Spud exclaimed in such a way that said he just had the greatest idea in the whole world "We could be farmers!". Hmmm. Made me want to reconsider this urban living thing.

Dutch Oven Dumpling Stew

DUTCH OVEN COOKING | CAMPING



1.5 lb. beef, cut into 1" cubes, browned
2 packets gravy mix
1 can beer
2 C. water
2 carrots, peeled and shredded [can prepare ahead of time]
2 cloves garlic
1 onion, finely chopped
1 stalk celery, finely chopped
2 tomato, chopped
1 C. green peas
3 T. finely chopped parsley

2 C. biscuit mix
3 T. fresh basil, finely chopped
S + P
3/4 C. milk [or as much as it takes to make batter moist]

Heat Dutch oven with 12 briquettes underneath. When warm add beef and sprinkle with gravy mix. Add garlic and onion and sauté for 5 minutes. Pour beer and hot water over meat. Stir in all the veg except the peas. Cover [with 8 or so briquettes on lid] and cook until meat is tender, about one hour.

In small bowl, combine biscuit mix with basil and seasoning. Stir in milk with fork until mixture is moist.

Stir peas and parsley into stew. Drop dumpling mixture on top of stew with tablespoon. Cover and cook on for 30 minutes [or until dumplings are done all the way through] with 12 briquettes on top and 8 underneath.

Dutch Oven Choco Cherry Goodness

DUTCH OVEN DESSERT | CAMPING
And yet another dead easy camping recipe, not unlike the Cherry Pineapple Dump Cake I posted about earlier this camping season. Here's how it goes:

1 box chocolate cake mix
1 can cherry pie filling
1 large chocolate bar



Pour pie filling into pie tin and sprinkle cake mix on top evenly. Break chocolate into pieces placing on top. Cook for 35-45 minutes with 12 briquettes on top and 8 below.



I didn't get a picture of it when it was done. It was too dark for a decent shot anyway. The top seemed a bit powdery but I fluffed it all around with a fork and it turned out fine. Fine as in warm, rich, dense chocolate cake, surrounded by sweet cherry goodness. It would have been a bit of heaven if it was visited by a scoop of vanilla ice cream. But that just ain't camping food. Next time I might bring some whipping cream.

Painting in the Woods

We remembered to bring paint brushes on our last outdoor painting escapade, but we thought it would be fun to find other things to paint with as well. The straw worked really well. As did the stick that Hubs carefully frayed at the end with his pocket knife. We didn't get around to checking out the rest of the forest floor; pine cones, tree needles, leaves, all also would have had interesting effects.

Bubble Painting

I like painting outside because I worry so much less about making a mess. This notion led me to bring painting supplies on our last camping trip. Bubble painting is one of our favourites. Spud loves to blow bubbles and I love to take photos of the prettiness. And for awhile there our site housed a pretty sizable exhibition, drying beside our hanging tea towels.



MATERIALS
· Fairly watered-down paint [if it's too saturated you won't get as much bubble definition in your paintings]
· Dish soap [several drops in each cup]
· Cups [fill each cup, about 1/3 full, with a different colour]
· Straws [one per person, per cup]
· Paper



It's a good idea to remind the young participants to blow and not to suck. Our little guy made the mistake of taking some of the soapy-painty goo into his mouth and then insisted on retiring his straw, for good. We talked about "getting back on the horse" which worked quite well, after some coaxing. Needless to say, non-toxic paint is a must here.