Garden Friends.

Hubs has a few bearded dragons that live in his classroom, but he brought one home for the summer for Gunnar to play with. She went back to school this week with hubs though, and Gunnar was missing her, so I thought we'd do some lizard art in her honor.  I had an idea in mind, but then I came across this blog post from Se7en via Skip to My Lou, and decided we'd make a lizard (and friends!) for the garden instead. Gunnar loved them. :)

Unicorn shrimp.

Let me just say, we love, love, love Asian food. And Asian markets! We had a little free time this past weekend so we headed to check out Asian World Market to get our fix (in Plano, for those of you in Dallas). Our favorite Asian market out here is H-Mart (in Carrolton) hands down for prices, selection and the 'experience,' but it's fun to mix things up every now and again.

Anyhow, hubs offered to make dinner.  (I sure wasn't going to turn that down!) We had Summer Rolls and Scott's make-it-up-as-you-go crab and greens Asian soup. 

Doesn't it look so good?! We totally polished off that tower. Dip those rolls into the homemade peanut sauce and sweet chili sauce and mmmmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmm!
(Hey, see those soup bowls?! I threw those (aka- potter's wheel) when we were dating, and still love them! If I only still had access to a kiln, *sigh*.)

The soup was really good, too. Scott made these crab/fish balls for it (haha, fish balls. Oh, come on, fish don't have balls! get your mind right! hehe), and threw in a mixture of greens (sweet peas, baby bok choy, seaweed), and some other ingredients.. sorry, he was cooking, I just ate it happily. ;) 

And who the heck knew Shrimps were a member of the UNICORN family?!!! Dang!, he could poke your eye out! That horn thing was hecka sharp. (No, we do NOT eat the heads. No way!)

To drink, something coconut of course! We usually buy young fresh coconuts and simply pop a straw down in 'em, but we came across these bottles that claim "Taste Nirvana" and "Happiness in a bottle".. hmm, thats a hefty claim, don't you think?

Um, no, completely right on! Only wish we didn't buy just two of them.. darn!

Posting these pics, I wish we hadn't scarfed down all those summer rolls in one sitting! Must put the husband on dinner duty again real soon. ;)

Pears a plenty.

We've been waiting a few years for the pear tree to give us a good fruiting. Last year most of the blossoms dropped after some heavy wind swept through, so we only got 3 or 4 pears.  Our peach tree consistently is an incredibly good producer; We had TONS of peaches throughout the early part of this summer. And now, finally, looks like the pear tree is beginning to follow suit!

Gunnar gathered a bunch of pears that blew off from a recent storm. These were the little guys, perfect for little hands to eat easily. Small, but really tasty! Still have double that amount growing on the tree, and those are full size.

Here's Gunnar with one of his neighbor friends eating pears they cut up themselves. They pretend the playhouse is their restaurant kitchen and cook us food to order. But even the cooks need a snack now and then!

Nothing like fresh picked, sweet and juicy pears grown at home. Even Logan loves them. :)

And some nice tomatoes and (overgrown, oops!) cucumbers we picked today, too!

Pigs. Really?

My 2 year old's favorite animal is a pig. Seriously.
Really? Yes. How odd is that?
We've asked him over and over again for a few months now, and we always expect him to say a dog, cat, lizard.. something "normal," but nope, its always a pig.
And you might be thinking, 'well pigs can be kinda cute, like Wilbur'. No, no, no.. He's not referring to the Charlotte's Web version of a pig.. nice and pink, with a perfect curly tail.. nope. The uglier the pig, the more fat and wirey and dirty, the more Gunnar likes it.
Like this Warthog above from the Dallas Zoo, that's one of his favorites. But any pig he likes. And he's never seen any tv or movie with pigs in it. Is my kid abnormally odd? Ay!

(I do also have to apologize for the lack of posts lately. We had an obnoxious worm virus on the computer and I've been scared to death to harm our pictures. So I kinda just went MIA. Not that I've had much time to post anyhow! Now that schools out, I've been working 6 days a week while hubby plays mama since he's home for the summer. The life of a teacher, nice for sure! Anywho, hopefully Ill be back up and posting regularly again soon. :) )

A baby shower gift for twins.

One of my childhood best friends from back home is pregnant with fraternal twin girls due this July.  I am so excited for her!  The baby shower was this past weekend. I made sun hats and  burp cloths cloths for the girls.

 The sun hats turned out super cute! I love the little ruffled brims.  

 I know mama really wants these babies to have their own identities, so that's why I chose two different, but similarly themed prints for the hats.

 

The sun hats are also reversible, with the same lining fabric in each in case mama wants them to be a little bit more coordinated. 

 

I had extra fabric leftover from the lining, so I snazzied up some store bought cloth diapers into burp clothes.  Really fast to sew up! 

 I made two with fabric panels, and left two of the burp cloths plain.  Just in cases mama prefers ones that aren't so cute for around the house or whatnot.

To make them (how I did do at least), you measure your fabric to be about an inch and a half or two longer and wider than the center panel of the burp cloth. Fold under the raw edges to be just smaller than the panel and pin in place (fabric right side up since there is no turning needed). Sew using a nice and tight, narrow zigzag, catching the edge of the fabric panel on the zig and the diaper fabric just next to the panel on the zag. That's it!

Here's a close-up of the stitching:

And I had to throw in one of the wristlet key fobs I made a few months back for mama!  See it *here*.  As I've mentioned before, I think the key fob has been one of my most favorite items to have with a baby.  So much easier with full hands (and arms!) to not be fumbling around in your bag for long lost keys.  Especially with twins!

I heard the shower went really wonderful, too!

My mom mentioned a really cute gift idea that a group of friends did, that I thought I'd pass along.  They went in together and bought multiple baby outfits for the girls and strung them up on a clothesline with pink and purple close-pins.  They then carefully and neatly folded the line up and tucked it into a two handled basket with a big flowey bow on top.  It was a really sweet sight to see as everyone there passed along the clothesline and one by one the little outfits popped out of the basket. There was nearly 15 feet of line! I wish I had a picture to share. Oh well.

Well thanks for reading and looking. :)