DIY idea: make a mini biography for the baby in your life
The favorite little person in my life (not mine, but a friend’s) is turning one soon, and I really struggled with figuring out what to get a one-year-old. When it comes to gifting for people, I generally want my gift to be purposeful, pleasing, and personal.
DIY jersey maternity dress: an easy way to deal with summer heat during pregnancy
If you’re pregnant this time of the year, especially in the early stages, you probably are wondering what you can wear during the summer. When I was pregnant last year, jersey dresses sounded like the best way to deal with heat — they’re cool, comfy around the waist, and stretchy enough to last until late pregnancy. However, I had a weirdly hard time finding the jersey dresses I envisioned in stores — most dresses had waists that were a little too low, or they were long and heavy maxi dresses, or their fabric wasn’t stretchy enough.
A Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday party you can totally pull off
Oooh how I love the birthday party that Elle recently threw for her now one-year-old daughter, Penelope. The decor, food, and attire were inspired by Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and unlike a lot of birthdays you’ll see, this one is TOTALLY pull-offable. You basically need cardboard, yarn, paper streamers, and some fruit and you have a insta-caterpillar birthday success.
Six tips for creating awesome care-packages for children away from home
While I was growing up, I spent a lot of time away from home. I can tell you now, whether I was away for school, camp, high school summer jobs or even when I moved on to university, nothing helped my homesickness and general well-being better than when I received a care package from home. I was recently helping a friend put together a package for her high school aged child studying abroad when I realized that not everyone was in situations growing up where they were receiving care-packages.
A Merry Prankster-inspired bus birthday cake that looks so bad it’s good
My son has spent the better part of his almost three years on the planet totally head over heels for any kind of vehicle that has wheels and can move. Cars, trucks, bicycles, and… buses. So last year for his second birthday I set out to create something perfect, sweet, and wondrous: a bus cake.
Let’s talk about making your own not-so-perfect crayons
Imagine my surprise when I come downstairs one night to find that my husband, who is so far Pinterest-free, has embarked on his own crayon-making adventure. He basically took all of our son’s broken and worn down crayons of similar shades, melted them, stuck them in the fridge, and VOILA: new crayons were born.
Three kid-friendly, non-consumerist ways to use toilet paper rolls to decorate for the holidays
These cardboard tubes are really useful during the holiday season especially if you have them scattered about the house in every toybox and under the couch. This year we are 1) on a holiday budget and 2) trying to be more eco-friendly in our celebrating, so we’ve found fun ways to use this everyday item to our festive advantage.
Making your own playdough: it’s as easy to make as everyone says it is
So it turns out that playdough is actually as easy to make as everyone says. Who knew? Well, OK, nearly everyone. Despite frequently being told that it was super easy to make, I always thought it would be hard to get it to turn out just right. This is probably because I have a vivid memory of my Mom making a disastrous attempt at playdough when I was a kid. I’m not sure what we did wrong back then, but whatever it was, I was able to avoid it this time.