Mommy to Bee

My friend and coworker just had a darling baby girl! So I took the opportunity to throw her a baby shower. Right as I was trying to decide on a theme, my friend from high school, Alison over at The Handmade Shindig, posted these adorable Bee decorations. I took the idea and ran with it!

 

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Busy Summer

Wow. It was a busy summer. My mom recently purchased a new condo, except it's only new to her. It's actually about as old as I am ...and so were all the appliances.

We spent most of the summer on small projects around the house which I will catalog here.

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Odes to the 8th Grade

When I was student teaching at a junior high, my master teacher had the students doing a poetry unit that ended in Odes to the 8th Grade right as the school year was ending. I thought that was really genius. It gives students a chance to reflect on the last year or so and to create an art form most don't attempt on their own. So I've used it at my final project the past two years. Last year I meant to post it, but never did, so I'll share examples from both years.

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Ignorance of CCSS

Ignorance is bliss! Right? I'm pretty sure, right now, that other people's ignorance will cause me ulcers.

I believe in the Common Core Standards. And I believe that a lot of people who are against them are so due to ignorance. The internet is a vast and wonderful place where people can find an article that says anything they want to hear. But journalism requires fact-checking and citing of sources. So does a good English paper.

I recently came across this article, "Listen to the Fools," on Facebook.

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Continued Inspiration

A while back I wrote about my former classmate Timmy. While he was in India, he was asked to speak at a TEDx Talk. I've imbedded the video below. He talks about making connections and his experiences in finding ways to be connected to people. Through his travels, he was able to get a sense of what it feels like to live in the moment, where connections truly take place, but he was able to synthesize the information into a set of guidelines he can bring back to his life in the Western world, and he shares them with us, here.

TARDIS Quilt

This summer I took up quilting. My first attempt was a baby blanket for my cousin's darling. I detailed the quilted sunflower here, but at the time of that post I hadn't done the actual "quilting" part.
 Making the fronts of quilts is complicated and requires much more than just creativity (there's this thing called measuring that I'm kinda horrible at...) but quilting the finished product to the backing and fluff is a-whole-nother project in and of itself. Especially since prior to this experience I'd only ever hand-quilted. And by that, I mean I really just randomly tacked down corners.

So after finishing the front of the sunflower baby blanket, I attempted quilting with my sewing machine for the first time. I bought some fuzzy flannel and some medium stuffing and went to work.

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Costume Inspiration: SciFi, Comic Book Characters, and Evil Villains

I realized I never posted photos of my Halloween costume. Also, I had an Evil Villain themed birthday party this year. So here are some costume inspirations for ya!

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