The Miss and Mr Biscuit Competition

Saturday was a rainy day, but that didn't dampen the excitement at the International Biscuit Festival. The kids and I took advantage of the rainy weather and got our biscuit tasting in early, before the skies cleared (a little) and the larger crowds arrived. Then we rushed off to the Children's Festival of Reading and then home for naps (hair and make-up for mommy) before returning to Biscuit boulevard for the Miss or Mr. Biscuit Competition.

Here I am, mid competition, with the other contenders. I seem to be having a good time! We showed off our aprons (mine was up-cycled from a Goodwill dress, blog post coming soon). We demonstrated our poise by walking with biscuits on our heads. (Here it is on YouTube if you MUST see it!) Then it was time for our biscuit themed talents.

I carved the Knoxville Sunsphere, out of butter, in about 5 minutes. Above is my practice carving, made at home the night before. Below is my rushed job during the competition.

And there I am in the middle of butter sculpture madness (photo by Tanner Latham via Instagram)! There's a video of the entire butter carving ordeal, if you really want to see me rub my hands all over a greasy shaft of butter. Yep, it's THAT dignified! Here's the link to the YouTube video. I love the look of concern on Erin Donovan's face!

In the end Biscuit glory was not to be mine. My apron was super cute and we all did equally well walking with biscuits on our heads, so it must have been a question of talent. The winners all had songs and dances about biscuits. Oh well, I had a really fun time, as evidenced by my post loss portrait on Erin's Instagram feed.

It would have been nice to have earned a little "dough" for all my efforts, but I think the winners just got biscuit themed swag. I suppose there's always next year! Perhaps a bacon flavored Power T, or portrait of Pat Summit?!?

Yep, There's a Biscuit on My Head!

It's time for the International Biscuit Festival in downtown Knoxville! I've actually never been to the festival, but I heard about this beauty pageant spoof they do to crown Miss or Mr Biscuit and I decided I wanted in on the action!

Contestants are judged on sportswear (an apron), biscuit knowledge, poise (walking with biscuits on your head), and a biscuit related talent. My biscuit fascinator is overkill, but might prove beneficial in balancing biscuits on my head. Should you find yourself in need of similar food themed head covering, here is what I did.

I started with 2 circles cut from foam. I glued them together and covered them in glue and white paper towels.

Next I painted on some buttery brown texture. Speaking of butter, I wanted a big pat of gooey melting butter on top if my biscuit. So, I mixed a little yellow paint with glue and dripped it into a puddle. I cut a square from foam and also painted it yellow. Then I got some help from gravity.

I wanted a biscuit on a plate for the hat and decided to add some food accessories where a real hat might have feathers or flowers. Bacon apparently is the feather in my cap! To make my fake bacon I just tore some brown paper and glued on red and white tissue paper. Then I wrinkled the strips and let them dry that way.

I wanted a third item, so I made a small orange slice. I cut a half circle out of foam and added some texture with a hot glue gun. Then I added some paint.

I painted a cheap white styrofoam plate and assembled my hat.

It was missing some little finishing touch, so I added a ruffle to match my apron (more on that later) and attached a headband to hold it all in place.

Wish me luck, or better yet, if you can make it to Krutch Park around 3pm tomorrow come out and cheer me on!

Upcycled Shirt Sleeve Button Bag

I saw a list on Pinterest of baby games that were appropriate for each month of baby's first year. Joshua is already 10 months old, so I'm a little late, but I skipped to his part of the list and read about a "button bag" game. The idea is simple enough. Put REALLY big buttons (note: small buttons are a chocking hazard) into a bag. A younger baby will enjoy putting items in the bag and pulling them out. Eventually, an older toddler will enjoy sorting and counting the buttons.

Neat idea, but i wasn't planning on making one today. But then we ended up in the studio this morning because Lydia wanted to craft something. And I was wearing Joshua in the Moby wrap because he still has an ear infection and feels crummy. I was just hoping to clean up a little while Lydia played around when an old t-shirt caught my eye. The shape of sleeve made me think of the button bag game idea.

All I had to do was sew the sleeve shut at the cut edge where it used to join with the shirt. I now had a sleeve sized bag!

Adding a drawstring was as simple as cutting a little hole in the seam at the top of the bag, the part of the sleeve that was once the edge. I needed to be careful not to cut all the way through, but other than that it was easy!

Then I ran a ribbon through the sleeve hem casing and I had my draw string bag!

Three simple steps, a few buttons from my stash, a project so easy that I could finish it even with a cranky baby strapped to my chest!

I think the cranky baby approves!

Enough Already!

It wasn't bad enough that Joshua got his first ear infection a few weeks ago. Or that it took a while to diagnose because it coincided with his vaccination and I thought the fever was a bad reaction to his shot. No, and it wasn't enough for the first antibiotic to not work. The single ear infection turned to a double, and Lydia's face swelled up and her eye turned pink and we got a double prescription for the same antibiotic. And it still didn't fix the ear infection. It wasn't enough for me to get this cold virus from the kids, PJ had to get it too. And between his own illness and all the kids stuff, and the fact that i have no more sick leave, he missed a full week of work. And then, because that wasn't enough, he got the stomach flu, and then I did, and then Lydia did. And because that all wasn't enough, back when Joshua first got the ear infection that seems to have kicked all this illness in motion, we got a notice from Lydia's school that a kid had been found with lice. And I am do grateful that they notify everyone and check heads, and so I had been checking her and of course this week at the height of colds and ear infections and stomach virus, she got "it". And we have been very diligent and I am so glad that i can be so highly detail oriented and have really good eyesight that I can spend an hour or so a night going over and over her head searching for any problems, but now I feel like we've had enough! That and I better get treated like a freakin' queen on Mothers Day!

The Fish Shirt

Joshua has this cute summer button down with fish all over it. Well, actually, it has fish bones all over it. So, really, Joshua has a shirt covered in the remains of dead fish! For some reason this bugged me a little and I decided to add an accent to, literally, bring more life into the design.

I cut a simple fish shape out of scraps of t-shirt fabric.

I played around with a few ideas for the layout. The first two are more of a striped pattern and the last one is more random.

In the end I went with the random layout. I sewed the fish in place and then added a little fishy face. Now their are a few happy fishes in that fish graveyard! Survival of the fittest, I suppose!

NAILED it!

Lets blame this re-purposing post on the fact that my son has been sick for over a week. He's been up half the night, night after night, and I'm getting a bit loopy.

Anyways, my AP Art History students needed to take a practice test and, since it was multiple choice, I gave them an answer sheet to bubble in. It was only AFTER they finished that I realized I could have saved myself a LOT of time grading by actually using a scan-tron form and letting a machine do the work for me. Oh well! I was just settling in to grade each test by hand when a friend suggested a grading template. This seems so quirky, but if you find yourself in a similar situation, here's a solution.

I got a screw (a nail might have been easier, but work with what you've got) and a copy of the answer sheet. I pushed a hole through each of the correct areas on the bubble-in form. Then I laid the template on top of a test and touched a marker to each hole.

When I removed the template, I could easily see if the marks matched (right answer) or not (wrong answer). It still would have been faster with a machine, but this was easier for the kids to see which questions they missed, so it might be better after all.

Ribbon Trim on an Adorable (but controversial) Dress

My daughter and I often have "creative differences". Lately, the disputes have been over her cloths. I just bought her summer outfits at the big consignment sale in town and she isn't as excited as I am about her new wardrobe. The problem is the color pallet. I have started buying her more pink but its mixed with a good amount of brown.

I asked her what was off limits and had to promise to stop buying her brown, black, and grey because those were (in her opinion) boy colors. Blue is allowed because Cinderella wears blue but white (according to my four year old) should only be worn on wedding dresses. I had to pinky promise to change my ways in order to get her to pinky promise to wear the things we already own.

And that brings us to this lovely dress. The dress that I splurged on because it had such cute scenes if Paris on it. The dress that I considered mostly pink, but that Lydia quickly pointed out had too much black!

Good thing she had already agreed to wear the stuff we already owned, but I wanted her to really love this dress, so I took it over to the studio and pulled out my ribbon stash.

A few quick machine stitches and the black binding had a pink ribbon accent. I don't know if I get creative mommy points for this solution or if I'm a sucker for giving in to a four year old fashionista! Either way, I fear this is only the beginning, but at least we will be well dressed for the battles to come!