Harry Potter House Knitting and Crochet House Cup: DADA Homework

I searched my soul and found my deepest desire to be peace. The end of war and strife, the lion lying down with the lamb, dogs and cats living together, oh, sorry that was Ghostbusters. Anyway, I tried to find a pattern for a Lion and Lamb, but nothing jumped out and screamed make me woman! So, I made then next best thing: a hippo and a monkey.

OK, yes, not a perfect analogy I know. They are both mostly herbavores, hippos don’t actually eat monkeys. But monkeys have a tendency to fling unmentionable things and hippos are rather irritable, so if they were to just lie down together and try to hang out and not fling stuff, it would be rather indicative of my desire for peace.

OK, OK, OK, they were just sooooo cute I couldn’t help myself.

Harry Potter House Knitting and Crochet House Cup: Charms and Potions Homework

For Charms my dear Daughter K, home for the summer and resting up for middle school next fall, designed and created her own Bellatrix inspired summer fingerless gloves. They are fingerknitted in black so her skin shows through, creating a rather cool light dark contrast. She thinks they are just the thing for the premier in November.

She is casting lumos with our Potions homework, a custom made wand, much like Harry’s Hawthorn wand, though this wand has a Bamboo core (think skewer. :) )

We had such fun on these assignments, though my dozen attempts are Ginny’s twisted wand were not good. I’ll figure it out one day. picks up hook with determined look

Harry Potter House Knitting and Crochet House Cup: Herbology Homework

Having searched the local yarn emporiums for edible fiber yarns and and found nada, except bamboo, which seems to be good for everything from food to flooring, I decided to go with my heart, or rather stomach and make what I was having for dinner. A lovely Aubergine, fried, and covered with pure maple syrup. Yum.

New Camp Half-Blood Gear

There was a Percy Jackson Party last evening at the library. K was all excited, except for her Camp Half-Blood shirt, which was a total fail when we made it. She's worn it proudly ever since, but it's looked worse and worse with every washing.

So we made a new one, with a freezer paper stencil and fabric paint.

She made a few extra beads for her necklace and added my Moms class ring.

She had a lot of fun, won a hardback copy of the first Charlie Bone book, answered almost all the questions in Percy Jackson Jeopardy and did not dive into the pile of children when the Medusa head pinata hit the floor. She went home happy after a snack of blue corn chips, blue stuff Oreos and blue Hawaiian Punch. She passed on the blue nacho cheese, good call. All in all a good time had.

Father's Day Fun and Crafting!

I hope you all had a wonderful Father's Day! We really enjoyed our day with Mr. Man and he loved what we made him.

K made him a card inspired by one we saw online

I love the pen in the pocket. She was going to put a spot of red on the pocket, but that was a bit too Sean for the occasion. Instead, she made the tie blue and brown, because Mr. Man is her favorite Doctor. Mine too. :)

My card was an origami tie and shirt

When he saw it he said, "Hey, Dilbert! Cool!"

One of our gifts was an original creation designed by K and I. Mr. Man has a rather extensive collection of tie and tie accessories, mostly given to him by his Mom over the years, many from his Dad after he passed. He's wanted a place to store/display/easily access his accessories for years, but not a jewelry box. Something that could hang in his closet. So K and I put our heads together and designed a tie accessory hanging storage/display thing:

It hangs from and OLD wooden hanger his Mom gave him yeas ago. We found the material on the scrap table at Hancock's. The buttons came from the found button drawer in his grannie's sewing machine. K drew the design sketch and determined dimensions, then drew, tweaked and cut the paper pattern pieces. I helped cut out the fabric, cause that nylon was slippery. K sewed the long seams on the machine, I did the tricky bits and we both finished the hand sewing. It hangs a bit crumply when it's weighted down, but I think a little tie at the top center will fix that. Mr. Man loved it and we all had fun looking at all his tie clips and pins. Now we just need to add about 2 dozen button holes for all his cuff links.

Did I mention, Mr. Man only wears a shirt and tie about once a week? Too Funny.

Happy Father's Day!

Orchestra camp rocks!

K went to orchestra camp last week and her orchestra got to play...

Coldplay is now, of course, one of K's favorite bands.

What my little girl taught me.

Cool!