soother and shaker bottles

I really like these. They are small (made from my mom's Boost nutritional drink bottles--about 5 and 1/2 inches tall). So far they are just sitting on my kitchen windowsill waiting for more. They are soothing to me! I've been fighting lots of tears these days with my daughter moving far away... and these are helping. Just staring at them and watching the glitter settle is calming. These are going to be for me until I figure out how to seal them so they won't come off in little babies' hands. I have a bottle with little cars in it that one of my grandsons enjoyed shaking. He's almost a year. So I think these bottles will also make good shakers for them. They are just the right size to grasp and not heavy at all.

I saw this idea at my daughter's house. It was a bigger bottle, and swirls of fine glitter. I saw several blogs that showed how to do this. I explored it on Pinterest:

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/calming-bottle/

Anyway I just experimented. I have some perler beads, but they didn't work because they floated. I found some other beads that sank as well as some small gems. I used the glitter I had, some from my mother in law. In the jar on the left, there's large green glitter, medium pink and tiny clear snow glitter. The water ended up tinted pink. When you shake it, it's dark green, which gradually changes to blue (?) then pink. I stuck a few things in there but they are hard to see. I did discover that some of them sank in just water but floated when I added the glycerin. I'm thinking some tiny plastic creatures would be good but I don't have any at the moment.

The other one has red glitter in two sizes as well as gems and a few beads.

I used mostly water and added glycerin until I liked the way it floated. I think it ended up 2/3 water and 1/3 glycerin. There's all kinds of recipes to explore.


June 7
This one for today is my favorite. I started it with black sand and I hated it. So I strained out the sand, found Grandma's gold glitter from way back... and added some ultra fine gold, and a little multi color ultra fine. I scrounged around for shells and found enough. A drop of liquid watercolor in blue... a bit of glycerin to slow it down... and yes I love it. Here's a closeup. Now to work on lid glue. Saw one blog that used duct tape. I have some pretties so might do that.

July 3
I ended up gluing AND taping. Gave to Baby M. She loved them. I still have the shell one, I needed one for me. Am going to make some more for the Other Babies. I think Baby C. would love them. And then there are still two Unborn Babies coming up.....

Babies and babies.

This doesn't really look like anything, but it's a nursing cover. Liv and I made three of them today, two for Chandra. and one for her. I also made three baby blankets, two for unborn Jasper and one for JP. Once I figured out the secrets, the blankets were pretty easy, although NOT a 10 minute project like the video said. I do want to make a few more. I have to hurry up with one project for Wyatt, because at the rate I am going it will be summer before it's done. I wanted to be done sooner but oh well.

It felt good to sew. The last blanket was made while sitting on the floor with the sewing machine-- I don't recommend that. But sometimes you just do what you gotta do.  

Sweetie

My main creativity for the last few days involve singing silly songs, making faces, dancing with and otherwise being occupied by a certain sweetie. I have been zentangling, but nothing noteworthy, or worthy of being shared. I have also spent a bit of time at my son in law's keyboard, making bad music. It was limited to trying to sight read stuff I used to know. Very sad, but inspiring to get back to regular playing.

Going back home tomorrow, sadly, will miss my daughter and my son in law. And the sweetie. As every grandma knows, mostly the sweetie.

Nothing against you, darling daughter or spectacular son in law. But there's nothing better than snuggling with your sweetie...

Pictures! I took lots of them. This one's my favorite. For now.