....oooops!

I spilled water on my touchpad on my computer. Everything works except my clicking keys!
So I'm on a bit of a n accidental break from blogging. Will
be trying to solve it and get back here soon!

Making a mini terrarium

I know you are coming here just to see this. Right?
Well, Pappa Starbucks' Mom and Sister came over yesterday.
So I made a terrarium for his sister who is still just a kid. I wanted it to be fun and cheerful and a bit fantastic- like a mini fairyland in a jar. I've been saving glass jars and reusing them a lot lately (because suddenly I'm realizing all the things I need glass jars for!- buttons, q-tips and band-aids, embroidery thread, miniature toys that I keep for things like terrariums,needles,dried herbs, spices, ginger syrup for making ginger ale, candied orange peels that I made so I wasn't wasting the peels...and because they're deeeeelicious- etc)
I'm looking at my photos of this terrarium and a little disappointed. I've been "copping out" a lot lately and using my iphone camera for things I should just use the regular camera for. And I didn't take any pictures showing the side of the jar either and how full it is.
So Little Berry and I went on a walk taking this little jam jar that I had with us. We found a patch of moss and proceeded to find a piece about the size of the base of the jar. We also had a spoon with us and scraped up enough dirt to fill the jar about three inches. We gathered a few tiny grasses and acorns and took this all home.
At home I mixed in some richer dirt from a flower pot that was also much looser. And then we tamped the dirt down for the moss because moss likes firm surfaces. We placed the grass, acorns, and tiny bird next. There's about an inch from the top of the jar left.

Next I placed the polymer clay mushrooms. I got three packages of polymer clay at the check out at AC Moore or Hobby Lobby and made these mushrooms. It baked under five minutes and I chose to leave them unpainted. I would have left holes in the stems for pins if I had thought about it but they're fine without them and haven't fallen over at all.

I will definitely be making more of these. I think they would be really nice for college students or as gifts for young people getting their first apartment. Low maintenance (needs lots of indirect sunlight and occasional watering) and lovely to look at. Also is rather dreamy and I know a certain young girl I want to make one for still.
*I'm looking at you Caitlyn!*
--> on another note, I am looking for a seamless way to round the corners on my photos. I've tried photoshop (I only have 5.0) and can't get it to do what I want, and I haven't found any good online generators. Any tips besides buying a new computer?

Chrunchy new year

**Achoo!**
We are a house of colds. Pappa Starbucks came home last week not feeling well and the cold has brewed since then. Now he's better and Little Berry and I have it. She sounds miserable and acts fine, so I suppose all is well. Just sneezes and sniffles, thankfully, no coughs.
Unfortunately I've been taking care of him and then I caught it, and then she caught it from me so now I'm taking care of her. No one lets Mamma recover. I'll get over it soon....I must!
I've got some things to share though that aren't germs, so you'll be grateful for that!
Okay, this is something I saw before Christmas and never made- homemade cough drops!
Hello!?! I want to make these so badly (even though we don't have coughs!) but alas: we don't own a kitchen thermometer. I know, there isn't an excuse for us.
Someday I will buy one. Seriously, if these as wonderful as they look, they might be worth getting sick for.

What is your new years resolution?
I don't traditionally make one. But this year there is something I have decided I want to accomplish: removing processed foods from our diet. I would love to aim for a raw foods diet but I think a good first step in a house of different dietary needs is to remove pre-packaged and over-processed foods. I know this makes me sound like a crunchy granola Mamma, but I have good reason- Pappa Starbucks is vegetarian, Little Berry is on whatever we eat+ breast milk, and I eat everyone's scraps
(Just kidding~ I only snack on them).
But I have a serious sweet tooth, and I feel like its at a point that I'm putting more bad stuff into my body because I'm not being "conscious" of what I eat.
So more conscious eating is my goal.
First up will be stopping buying cookies/ice cream/cookie dough/candy.. you get the idea. We buy a lot of sweets. And secondly, I want to stop buying refined white sugar. It's cheap, unhealthy, and easy to use a lot of because it's so inexpensive. Switching to organic cane sugar will make me watch what I use it for and use less when I use it because it's pricey.
Living a healthier lifestyle is all about making little decisions. We can all change one *small* thing in our lives. Last night I sat down and cut up an old towel we'd had for years into squares. half went to be cloth baby wipes (because I HATE those disposables with cloth diapers! It makes no sense to fish them out of a dirty diaper and then throw them away when I can just wash the whole thing).
The other half goes into our kitchen for cleaning counters and wiping up spills. Pappa Starbucks is addicted to Bounty paper towels and buys them by the huge packs. we go through about 12 rolls a month. I hate them, but when there is a roll of them on the counter, it's so easy to just grab them. so I made my own dish cloths because I never have enough and I want to change that.
Next up is hanging my clothesline because it's just sitting on top of the dryer with a pack of clothespins. I keep asking *someone* to hang it and getting: "sure, I can do that. later."
So I will do it myself. If I can dry my diapers and dishcloths on it twice a week, it's worth the $2 I spent on it and the clothespins.
Re-usable shopping bags: I love these. They hold so much. They're easier to carry. They're convenient. But I always seem to forget them. What do you guys do? Do you use these? Are you good at remembering to put them in your car before you go to the store? Pappa Starbucks doesn't like to keep them in his car (he's embarrassed) so I have to remember to grab them or else they get left behind. Maybe if I started writing a list and putting a note to myself on top of the list I could remember better. We used to keep a note on the door that said:
Keys, Wallet,Cell Phone, Diapers! So when we went out the door we remembered those things. Perhaps if I reinstated this with an additional *grocery bags!* that would work.

not one, but two

I forgot to share this yesterday. Sunday when we went out to do our regular grocery shopping, I had just given Little Berry a bath. Around here, that's quite an undertaking because she has such dry skin and hair. It's a constant battle to keep her healthily moisturized. She LOVES washing herself in the tub but letting her use soap is problematic. I have yet to find a soap that truly moisturizes her skin, let's not even talk about her hair. If you know of one that is great for biracial skin, especially babies, preferably one that has lots of olive oil in it, please let me know!
Lately I've just been giving her the tub with water in it and a little bit of Mr.Bubbles to play in and then after she's played for a while I get her hair wet and then I rub olive oil on her scalp. About a tablespoon but she doesn't have much hair so it doesn't take much.
Anyway, Sunday right before we left she was getting out of the tub and I decided to try a new hairdo. So far she has only had enough hair for a single little pony tail.

See it there? That tiny little wisp on top of her head?


And Sunday, just when I had given up hope forever,

I was able to wrangle her into TWO piggytails.It was a proud moment for me.

A few little things

Just wanted to stop in and leave a little update over here while Little Berry is napping. The holidays were stressing me out this year, and Pappa Starbucks has had too much going on himself so we've declared it over. Pretty much. We bought little berry one toy (Which I would recommend to anyone, seriously, she has played with it SO much already- but more about it later) and we've gone ahead and given it to her. Pappa Starbucks bought gits for his employer and their children and I made this wonderful, fabulous, fun bows for them out of some felt that my MIL gave me.


I had so much fun making these bows! Instructions over here although I didn't follow these, I just cut and stitched and winged it. They worked out fabulously. The second one I made was a little different, I simply cut circles and then made cuts toward the center of the circle and stacked them on one another to make a poofy effect. He was surprisingly pleased with them- he usually doesn't like the results of my projects too much!
I also made some more babies lately and had my first sale in my etsy shop. This was pretty exciting for me.


We were at Trader Joe's yesterday and an employee came up to us and gave Little Berry a balloon (she calls them blublublub's, seriously, every time that's what she says)...here she is playing with it this morning. She loves it. And I need to sneak down and throw it out while she's napping because we are not exactly balloon friendly over here.
Alright, I'm off to make more things clean. Hope you are enjoying the holidaze.