Beat the Winter Blues Treasury

Now that the holidays are all officially over and everything has settled back down to normal, we're left with just... winter. Its definitely been a colder-than-usual winter out here in California, and I have been on the lookout for ways to beat the winter blues!

I always find that it's little things that do the best job of cheering me up. Here a few of my ideas - all around $20 or less, so they won't make a huge impact on your wallet. Hopefully, though, they'll help you shake those blues!

Tiffany Blue Chevron Infinity Scarf ModLux $19.50	Robins Egg Blue-Teal-Turquoise Mug juliaedean  $21.00	Aqua Tissue Paper Pom Pom PartyPoms $4.00	Graphic Art Print  YellowHeartArt $10.00
Snow Day Body Cream  DressGreen $12.00	WINTER SALE Wild Blueberry Tea ChibiNaturals $5.75	Arrested Development Eye Chart ThePressingPig... $8.99	1 handmade cotton linen pillowcase linxge $22.00

As you can tell, I am in love with making these etsy treasuries... I'm not affiliated with etsy or with any of these sellers,  but I do love curating these lists! To see more treasuries or make your own, go here.

Embroidered Constellations

I have always loved learning how to identify constellations and finding out the stories behind them. I had a minor in Ancient Studies in college, and all the old myths have always just really resonated with me... especially when I can look up and see the same groups of stars that the stories were centered around. There's always been something magical about it to me.


My husband also shares this love of constellations, to the extent that when we were getting married, we designed our own constellation wedding rings and had them produced by a seller on etsy.com (Christine Bossler, who was wonderful - I'd highly recommend her). The rings are difficult to photograph because the silver is so reflective, but my ring has Ursa Minor drilled into it, and my husband Russ' ring has Ursa Major.

Recently, we were looking for something new to hang on the wall beside our bed. It had to be something light (because of the risk of earthquakes), so anything framed was out, and we didn't want to go for the dorm-room poster look. In the end, I remembered that I had several old canvases that we could use, and decided to embroider them with different constellations that have significance to us. I decided to start with Ursa minor, and this is what I came up with:

I like that the end result is subtle, and I'm going to make a few more to hang, gallery style, on the wall beside our bed. If you would like to make one, they're super easy to do, and all you will need is a canvas, paint and embroidery floss in colors that you like, a permanent marker, and a needle.

First, paint the canvas (I used one that was 8"x10") with navy blue acrylic paint, and while that paint is still wet, add a dollop of pearl acrylic paint in cornflower blue (find the kind I used here). Use a clean paintbrush to blend it in with the navy. This helps to add some depth and dimension to the color, instead of it being a flat blue. Make sure that you also paint the sides of the canvas for a finished look. Let the paint dry overnight.

Once you are sure that your paint is dry, turn your canvas over. Use your marker to sketch out a mirror image of the constellation that you'd like to use. Make a dot where each star will be on your finished piece, as in the photo below. 

Get your needle and embroidery floss. Thread the needle and tie a knot in your thread, and then embroider french knots where you marked the main stars in your constellation. If you're not sure how to make a french knot, check out this video, which will show you how.

Once your constellation is embroidered, tie a knot in the embroidery floss and cut it. Divide a new piece of embroidery floss in half (so that you have two strands of floss, each with three threads). Thread one of these strands on your needle and make small, random stitches around the canvas to represent other stars in the night sky. Continue making small stitches until you are satisfied with how your piece looks, and you're done!

I hope you are having a wonderful day - and enjoy making your own embroidered constellation canvases!

Oatmeal Breakfast Bars

My husband recently started a new shift at work that requires him to leave the house at 5am a few times a week. While he doesn't mind getting up early, in his rush to get out the door, he'll often skip breakfast on these days - which totally throws his day. We typically have muffins or scones around the house, but those aren't exactly a full breakfast...so I started brainstorming something to make that would be quick, filling, and nutritious. These breakfast bars fit the bill, and are easy for him to grab on his way out the door!

The oatmeal base means that these are filling and give you a good amount of fiber. And the add-ins mean that you can jazz them up any way you'd like - they can be made with super-healthy dried fruits, nuts, and seeds, or you can add in chocolate chips or substitute jam for the honey if you want a sweeter or more fruity-flavored twist. This is a recipe that definitely invites experimentation!

Dense, chewy, and packed with flavor

Oatmeal Breakfast Bars
*2 cups cooked oatmeal, cooled
*1 TB unsalted butter, melted
*1 egg, beaten
*2 TB all purpose flour
*1/2 tsp vanilla
*1/2 tsp cinnamon
*1/2 tsp salt
*1/4 cup honey
*optional add - ins; I added sunflower seeds, slivered almonds, sesame seeds, and raisins

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and prepare an 8"x8" square cake pan by either buttering it or lining it with parchment paper.

Mix oatmeal, melted butter, and egg together in a medium bowl. Stir in flour, vanilla, cinnamon, salt, and honey until combined. Add any add-ins that you like - any kind of nut, seed, or dried fruit would work well, so play around with it!

Bake for about 55 minutes (I know, doesn't that seem like forever? This is how long it took in my oven, but as soon as they are firm and slightly browned, they are ready to go). Let cool and cut into bars.

Makes about 8 bars.

Grab one on your way out the door!

Hand-stitched Felt Baby Shoes

One of my closest friends recently announced that she is expecting a baby this summer. She's the first of my friends who live locally to be pregnant, and I am so very excited and happy for her! Since I found out, it feels like I am seeing baby-related crafts everywhere on Pinterest and on other blogs I follow, and finally I couldn't resist trying my hand at making something for this newest little one. 

Then I found these wonderful, hand-stitched felt shoes on the Purl Bee (find the tutorial and free pattern here,  on the Purl Bee Blog). They are sweet, simple, and stitch up quickly - and they'd be easy to modify in dozens of different ways: add additional embroidery, add a felt applique, lace them up with faux mini-shoelaces. 

If you're a parent, what gifts were the most helpful to you when your children were young? 

Top 3 Books of 2012

Growing up, my family wasn't wealthy - not by a long shot. My mother, however, never let that stop her from finding things for us to do. Every single Saturday, while running our errands, she made sure that we stopped by the public library. It was one of the best things she could have done for me: I was an avid reader and would devour the books I got each week.

That tradition instilled in me a life long love of reading. So this year, I decided to keep a list of all the books that I read. It was entertaining to do - in the end,  I read over 100 books in 2012, and looking back over the book list is a fun sort of year-in-review for me. I thought I'd share three of my favorites here with you.


1. The Real Minerva, by Mary Sharrat: Focusing on three women living in the small town of Minerva, Minnesota in 1923, this novel is simply riveting. Its written in a simple but poetic voice, and the characters are not only believable but so realistic that you can't help but ache for their troubles. I loved the details of small town life in the Depression, and the way that the three main characters all break the mold for women living in that time and place, and are forced to live with the consequences of those choices, both good and bad. If I had to pick just one book for the year, this would be it.


2. Bee Season, by Myla Goldberg: This novel gets off to a slow start, for me at least, but once it gets going, it REALLY gets going. It is meticulously plotted, and the author reveals aspects of each character  poignantly and compellingly. I didn't imagine that a book centered around a spelling bee could pull me in so completely and be so absorbing, but my heart was actually racing while reading the last climactic scene. I really enjoyed how Goldberg explores family dynamics in this book, and the shifting perspective really helps illuminate how each family member views the others and views their own place in the family. I just found out (while googling the cover image) that this has been turned into a movie - has anyone seen it? Was it any good?


3. 11/22/63, by Steven King: I was pretty suprised by this book, I think at least partially because I always wrote Steven King off as a trashy horror novelist. I was dead wrong on that front, and this book blew me away (although I hated the first chapter). I love how King re-imagines the past again and again, and incorporates aspects of a traditional horror novel in with a book that is really about the dichotomy of intentions versus results, the importance of human connections, and the lengths to which one will go to preserve them. I also read The Shining this year (right around Halloween), and had nightmares for weeks - proof of some pure, great storytelling.


I haven't lived with my mother now for 10 years. But I still do go to the library when I'm out doing my errands, and I'm so glad she instilled that habit in me.

What books have you been reading lately?

Lemon Pomegranate Scones

light and airy, these scones are delicious!

Every weekend, I drive out to Green String Farm to pick up our produce for the week. I try not to buy anything that's not on our grocery list, but their farm store is just set up so beautifully, and prominently on display last week were tons and tons of fresh, juicy pomegranates. I couldn't say no, so we brought home 2 of the best-looking ones in a paper bag... and they've sat in our cupboard for a solid week now.

Now that it's somehow already the weekend again, I decided I had to use the pomegranates in something. After a failed attempt at pomegranate oatmeal muffins (which turned out waayy too dry), I decided to move on to scones. Now, I've already talked about how much I love scones; they're pretty much my default thing to bake. They're sure to impress and they're nearly impossible to mess up; what's not to love?

So without further adieu, here's my take on some pomegranate scones.

Lemon Pomegranate Scones
adapted from Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Food

*2 cups all purpose flour

*2 1/2 tsp baking powder

*1/2 tsp salt

*1/4 cup sugar, plus more for topping
*2/3 cups pomegranate arils
*1 TB lemon zest
*1 1/3 cups heavy cream, plus more for topping
* lemon curd (optional) for serving

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar together until evenly blended. Stir in the pomegranate arils and lemon zest. Add the cream and mix until evenly combined. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead very briefly, until dough holds together.

Form into a 8" circle (no need to be exact here), and cut into 8 triangular pieces. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, brush cream on top of each piece, and sprinkle with sugar.

Bake for 17-20 minutes, until scones turn golden brown. For an extra indulgence, serve warm with a dollop of lemon curd. Enjoy!

Make Your Own Shuffleboard Set

As I mentioned in the last post, my husband and I love playing games. On our anniversary a few weeks ago, we went to one of our favorite bars in the city where we met and found out that our regular table had been replaced by a Snapback Shuffleboard table. Of course we sat down to try it.. and didn't get up again for an hour.

Having never played the full-sized version of shuffleboard, I'm not sure how the table top version compares. I do know, however, that we were laughing and having so much fun playing that I immediately started brainstorming ways to make our own set to play at home.

I was trying to make this in time for his Christmas gift, so it was a little hurried, but here's what I came up with:

Making your own version of this would be very simple - what I did was tape off three lines at one end of a wooden board I had lying around, paint them, and stamp numbers in each of the resulting sections. After the paint was dry, I put several layers of Mod Podge over the whole board.

For the pucks, I went to the hardware store down the street and found the heaviest round bearings that I could. I then glued felt to the bottom of each bearing to make them slide more easily down the board.

To play, shoot a puck from the bottom of the board. If you get it in one of the numbered sections, you get that number of points. But if you overshoot and the puck goes off the board, you get no points.

(We keep track of our total overall points in sharpie on the back of the board to add some extra competitiveness.)

Hope you're having a wonderful day!