Ah, the week after Thanksgiving. The crazy shoppers, the constant pounding of early Christmas carols blasting from every radio station, and the people whom have had their Christmas lights up for a month finally get to turn them on.

So since my last post, in which my declaration of not letting my sister and mom out do me went up in flames, I have been sewing sewing sewing. October was a randomly crazy sewing month! I made 4 costumes and 2 flowergirl dresses, all which had to be done by the same weekend. You would think I would have learned by now that procrastinating does absolutely nothing good for you. :) After the crazy rushed weekend was over, (Maddy had a beautiful wedding by the way) I decided that I was swearing off sewing until after Christmas! Right. Like I kept that vow.

I started going through my mountain of fabric scraps and concluded that they were only big enough for doll dresses. Yes doll dresses. Here I am, 20 years old, living on my own in a big city, and I'm playing with dolls. I always did have such a wild imagination. But the girls I take care of have American Girl dolls, and my younger sisters have 18in dolls as well. So here we go. Doll dresses.

This pink dress is the first one I made, with rose lace and a black ribbon. As of recent, my mom and I have been fascinated by fascinators, which are small artsy hats that are fun and whimsical. A certain princess (her name starts with a K...) has been wearing quite a few in public lately.
I have posted pictures of some more dresses that I have made. All of them have special handwork that makes each one unique. It's amazing, the diffference in quality between something handmade and something assembled in China.

So here's my favorite part. To make my ensembles have that "couture" feeling, I have made garment bags and hatboxes to protect them. Most doll clothes you get come on cardboards hangers and are wrapped in plastic. My color of choice, of course, is blue. I didn't want to search and search for enough of one shade, so I decided to use various shades. They turned out better than I expected. I will post a picture of the garment bags later.

So that's what is going on in some nutshells, I am having so much fun with this!

Henny Penny Knew it All

Well it has been a while, and I have decided I will not allow my mother and sister completely out do me with the blogging thing. So here we are.

I have been getting the hankering to do some bread-baking here recently, as that is one of Cody's, as well as my, favorite foods. So I started out last week with just some plain white bread, and my desire evolved to try to make some sourdough. As you well may know, sourdough takes a starter to make it sour. So I rustled up a crock, some flour, water, and yeast and got my starter going. The photo above is my crock with a floursack towel on top so nothing with get in it,(So cute!) but the gases made by yeast are allowed to escape. The mixture i used, by the way, is 2 c. flour, 2 c. water, and 1 tbs. yeast. Mix it all together with a wooden spoon (The Joy of Cooking says not to use metal!) and let it sit out for 4-7 days. Mine got all bubbly not too long after I mixed it all together in my crock :) The texture is a bit like glue,but it smells delightfully like bread rising. (The yeast of course!) I will make a loaf friday out of it and see how it goes.

In other news, there has been a random calico kitty cat that likes to sit on top of my car at night. She is really pretty and very sweet. I must stay away!

After visiting home, and mom's general store of awesomeness this last weekend, I came home with whole white wheat, cinilla canned pears, canned peaches, and a whole mess of home-made stuff. (And some pinto beans for Cody!) He and I had alot of fun seeing my family. I must say, ping pong with Katie looks to be a promising new family tradition! Grandma inspired me to make some fancy tea towels, and of course, mom set me up with a hand-grinder so I can make my own flour. (Those blog posts yet to come)

On our way home on Sunday afternoon, Cody and I stopped at Gloss Mountains State Park scenic hike thing about 30 miles west of Enid. I remember going up there once as a kid, although I think I had more fun this last time because I actually had a choice :) Gloss (or Glass) Mountain got its name from some British explorer guys who saw the sun sparkling off of the selenite that the mesas are full of.

Here is the website I took the picture from:

www.shopoklahoma.com/glassmou.htm

So good weekend, not too bad of a week so far. I had to take care of a sick kid yesterday, but he's al good now. Let's just hope the rest of the kids, or I don't get sick! It was just one of those one day stomach viruses, and he didn't have a fever, so I think everyone will be alright. Today was dance lessons, so after school was a big rush, but we made it. Well, that's all for today, no telling what tomorrow may bring!