Paul and Cori

Things we love: cooking, photography, crocheting, reading, math and board games.

Thursday, January 29, 2015

Handmade House: chair slippers

Useful, fun, and cute. They protect the floor we put in ourselves, and add another little handmade cute to my house. Plus a great stash buster, and cheap. 

We have a lot of different dining room chairs, from thrift stores and sales. Keeping costs down for a stay at home mom family is important sometimes. 

Anyway, I love these cute chair and floor protectors. They just slide on the foot of the chair. Easy and effective, made just like teeny tiny hats!

And I got the yarn from my sister who got it from her friend's friend who couldn't use it because she had a ba reaction to the fiber.  Yes, I ran on and on that sentence on purpose! 

These little guys whip up quickly, and don't have to be perfect to look good, or fit on! 


What's next?  A little outer space. 



Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Toddler fun: Snow Paint!




Coming up with fun, cheap things for my crazy kid to do (2 years old) is both fun and challenging! I've had dried out markers sitting in a drawer for months waiting for an idea. Kat commandeered the lids for monster fingers. 

So when I thought of snow paint, I got very excited! It's simple, washable, non toxic, and fun! Oh, and cheap!
Just soak old markers in water until the tips turn white. I left mine for about a week because I was gone, they don't need that long- probably over night would work just fine! Or you can leave them there until the next snow. 



Transfer to old water bottles with a hole stabbed in the lid. I used an awl tool to poke one hole in the center of each lid. 

Then paint away! 


Of course the best part is jumping on the colored snow! 


I had 3 bottles and 5 colors, so when 2 ran out, I reloaded with a new color. Easy! 

What's next? Homemade play dough! 

Friday, January 23, 2015

Funny baby pants: monkey




I couldn't help but laugh (and need to make) these pants when I saw them on Pinterest. What I found was just a photo, so it was time to figure it out. 
I hope my guessing of size is close enough to actually fit a baby at some point in it's fast growing life! 

I made the waist band first, then worked in rounds. 


Through the monkey head, and added the legs one at a time. 

I hope they are not too short, but I figured better too short than too long for a little baby. Or a learning to walk toddler. And if they are too short, they can be easily folded up as capris. 

The front looks a little silly, but it's worth it for that monkey butt! 

What's next? Chair socks, slippers, shoes. Whatever you want to call them. 

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Handmade House: 4th Doctor Scarf Rug

Almost 2 months in the making. My super thick and cushy library rug! My library isn't a library yet, that comes later, but the rug is done. I'm super excited about his rug. It is pretty small, not like the Doctor's scarf, but it has the right colors, general pattern, and I crocheted it to look knit, just like the real scarf. I learned the camel stitch to make this rug. It is a front post half double crochet stitch. It makes a ball of yarn go only about half as far as a standard stich (or even a fpdc) but also makes it about twice as thick. This is a heavy rug! I know my cats like it. 
Anyway, I'm a big geek and I'm scattering Dr. Who all through my house. This rug is my latest addition. Love it. 





What's next? Funny baby pants. 

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

Life gets more complicated all the time.

As you may or may not know, Paul is a bubble boy. Skin problems (eczema), breathing issues (asthma), and lots of allergies (medical and food related). 
Today I did something I've never done. I contacted the Rice Dream company about their rice milk ingredients. 
I've contacted numerous restaurants and looked up ingredient list for tons of food choices. We never buy anything without reading the label- we always ask, "did you read that?" Companies change their ingredients all the time, with no warning. 
Today I actually inquired about a change in ingredients. Here's my email:

My husband has anaphylactic reactions to all animal milk, as well as all nuts. And more recently has developed an allergy to sunflower seeds and sunflower oil. This one has been particularly annoying because sunflower oil is the new fancy, more healthy, latest trend or whatever to put in everything. Rice milk is my husband's go to milk, and it is listed as an "and/or" oil in your rice milk. This makes us sad because this basically takes it out of the running for options for us. We make pumpkin pie with rice milk, and pancakes, and tons of other things too. But now, we can't use it. 
I was wondering if there are any plans in the works to simplify or change your ingredients by choosing just one oil to put in your rice milk? Of course, preferably not sunflower oil in our case. 
Almond milk, which doesn't work for his nut allergy either has already basically taken over the dairy free shelves in our stores (where there is one shelf of rice, one of soy, and 1/2 of coconut, there are 5 shelves of almond milk). And now rice milk has been stolen away too. Not from a change by your company (I'm pretty sure it's always been labeled and made that way) but by my husband's irrational body.  He doesn't like the taste of soy, and coconut is actually bad for his particular case of cholesterol issue. Rice was our perfect option. I was just inquiring and letting you know this issue exists in the world. Thanks for your time, looking forward to your comments. 
-Cori 

Hopefully I hear something back. Well, hopefully something positive, but anything at all would be nice. 

It is annoying to me how much almond milk has taken over the dairy free market. And how vegan anything means pretty much nothing, given vegans eat as many nuts as possible- and for good reason. It just doesn't help our unique case. 

Sunflower oil is in everything from chips and frozen fries to raisins and cereals. It's a hard thing because it is always an "and/or" oil, which means it may or may not be in any given bag or box, but we still can't get it. Sunflower is also not a top allergen, so it's not listed at the bottom or in bold letters, like sometimes allergens are. Now we have to carefully read every ingredient. And it will not be included in the processing warning with the other allergens. So when it could be a risk in the facility, we don't know. 
Ah, the life of an allergy family. 

Saturday, January 10, 2015

Here we go again!

Ok, my life is toddler crazy right now. Many days I don't even touch my computer. Good thing there's an app for this. It's easy to post pictures to Facebook, but much harder to actually write a blog post. Challenge accepted. Here comes my life to the blogosphere: food, photography, crochet, crafts, projects, funny toddler, family...
What's next?
A 4th Doctor Doctor Who crochet rug.