KIDS – Finding My Muchness

Gluten free- no eat hamentashen!

Posted on February 25, 2015 by Tova

Yesterday I decided I wanted to bake hamentashen with my kids. Hamentashen are a traditional triangle cookie eaten on the jewish holiday of Purim.
Yay me. Mom of the year.
Only one problem.
I don’t bake.
No particular reason why, I just don’t. (Probably has something to do with the clean-up… And sugar, which we try to not use by the cup full.)
Anyhooo, someone recently sent me a link to an etsy shop that sells tiny polymer clay fake foods and inspiration hit.
I present:
NO EAT HAMENTASHEN KEYCHAINS!

(Like the fruitcake on the goyim, they can never be too hard and they last forever!)

Ingredients:
1- large block of beige polymer oven bake clay. (Also known as “Caucasian skin to the doll making population)
2- small block of red, purple orange, brown polymer clay. Choose whatever colors will work for your “filling” of choice

3- brown piece of chalk
4- rolling pin
5- 1.5″ or so round cookie cutter/glass/Prozac bottle
6- aluminum foil
7- cookie sheet
8- jewelry parts
-I loop (I think that’s what they’re called)
-Jump ring
-Key ring

Directions:
1- roll the skin clay thin but not too thin.

2- use the cookie cutter to cut circles.

Lay them on foil on a cookie sheet.
3- roll the jelly colors and make equal sized little marbles. We used a different cookie cutter to get them sized correctly.

4- form the jelly into a fat lil triangle and center it in the flesh colored circle.

Tap it with a toothpick to add some jelly texture.
5- fold up the three sides and pinch the corners.

6- insert the I-loops into the tops.

7- scrape the chalk into dust and use an old paintbrush or makeup brush to dust an uneven layer of golden baked goodness on your hamentashen.

8- bake according to packaging instructions- about 275 for about 15 minutes.

9- (not shown) after they cool, spray them with an aerosol gloss sealer.

…..oh, shiny!
10- apply jump ring + key ring

KEYCHAINS for the whole class!!

11-remind your kids who the coolest mom in town is! (They need constant reminders. I’m certain by the time they are teenagers they’ll totally believe me, right?!?!

PS- last week I made teeny tiny ones that went on necklaces. Same process, smaller cookie cutter.

Things Molly wants for her birthday…

Posted on October 6, 2014 by Tova

I found this list in her room…

1.Ears pierced
2. iPad
3. Snackees
4. Computer
5. Cat
6. Sneakers that skate
7. I want Sunshine and Daisy to come back.

Easy muchness makeover craft time!

Posted on September 28, 2014 by Tova

Double stick tape + craft store rhinestones + ikea picture frame = totally muchness picture frame! I’ll probably sprinkle glitter between the stones to cover the rest of the tape. You’re welcome.

Oreo Charms, Muchness Craft Time!

Posted on September 9, 2014 by Tova

Two days ago Molly told me that on Monday after school she wanted to make charms. “Quick-n-easy” charms she said, as though this was something we’d done before. (we haven’t) and I immediately thought of a great little video I saw on YouTube when I was binge watching polymer clay tutorials a few weeks back.

So we made them! Quick-n-easy… and a whole lotta fun too!

Step 1:

Buy mini oreos. (big one’s’ll work too but those’ll be some mighty large charms- maybe a key chain??)

Step 2:

Find a nice, cleanly molded cookie. A lot of them have crumbles or broken edges. Dust away the crumbs and pull apart your oreo. Eat the cream and not as pretty half. Cover the pretty half in clear nail polish.
(You’ll notice mine is covered in color-changing teal nail polish. I’m really bad at following directions.)

Step 3:

Cover the dried, pretty half of an oreo with glue gun glue. Do this on a piece of parchment paper so it doesn’t stick to the table.

Step 4:

When the glue is warm and solid but before it cools fully, pop the cookie out of the mold. If you wait too long the cookie will stick and if you do it too soon you’ll burn your fingers or distort the mold.

Step 5:

Make oreo colored clay. (mine is a mix of black + red + this weird mustard color that was mixed scraps left over from a different project.)

Step 6:

Make a ball and shove it into all the nooks and crannies (I know, that is a Thomas’ English Muffin reference. It’s like I’m making a carb salad.) Then cut the excess and carefully remove the clay cookie from the mold.

Step 7:

Do that twice.

Step 8:

Look through your random jewelry findings box and select parts that would be appropriate for a charm. If you don’t have such a box, just find a precious piece of heirloom jewelry somewhere in your house and disassemble it for parts. Sandwich jewelry findings between layers.

Step 9:

Roll some white clay to make the stuffing. Flatten your ball. Make a sandwich.

Step 10:

Bake it.

Step 11:

Line them up with a bunch of real oreos and make people guess which are which. ….and GO!

Step 12:

Blog about it.

Muchness Craft Time!

Posted on August 8, 2014 by Tova

It has been SO long since I’ve shared a craft here. I’ll bet so many of you don’t even know I do crafts. I do. I totally do crafts. Sometimes, I even write horrible poetry about the crafts I do. Because, why not?

Before I share this craft with you I just want to say for the record that when Molly turned 4 I made her an awesome Disco themed party and totally planned to blog all about it and share the pictures of the disco balls the kids made. It was total Muchness. I never shared the pics. She’s six and a half.

OK. That’s been weighing on me. Now that I got it out of my system, maybe I’ll share it… eventually.

Moving right along….

I cleaned out my garage and basement! It started as part of the curriculum of my 8 week Finding Your Muchness After Babyloss program… sort of a “clearing the clutter” part of the program, but quickly escalated to an all-out call-your-uncle-and-beg-him-to-help-you-get-the-shit-out-of-your-house event.

It culminated in this beautiful sight:

Nothing like the feeling of dumping 500 lbs. of trash in one fell swoop.

But during the clear out I found my stash of FIMO clay from back in my college days!

I loved that stuff. I used it to sculpt some masterpieces…. with which to smoke from.

(Nicotine products only. What?!?!?!? —seriously- everyone thought I was a pot head because I…well, I’m not sure why – any ideas? But I totally wasn’t. I thought it was stupid to use drugs in order to act “cool” or”weird”… I was totally those things already! Score! As an adult, I know better. )

Anyhoooo, Molly wanted to do a project and she and Liat were tired of totally ruining my patio while I recorded the horror in parental pride.

So I pulled out my fimo and the pasta maker that went with it and we got to work:

Then, Molly had the brilliant idea of filming us doing it! …but sadly, the mic on the camera wasn’t working… which in one way was good because it saved me the headache of having to edit the whole video for you. I just slapped it up on The YouTube as is, seeing as it was beyond repair anyway.

So, look at the pretty finished bowl!!

It’s missing a “tooth” at the top, but we think that just adds character.

Following this project, Molly asked me to use an entire $45 gift card she received for her birthday to buy an assortment of FIMO clay for her to make more stuff with.

I gladly obliged. So much better that than more Hello Kitty crap to fill my house. Though, she could probably make her own little Hello Kitty Figurine to match the little Kero Keroppi one I made sometime before the turn of the century.

Of course, hers won’t have smoking paraphernalia shoved up its butt.

The Muchness of Muchkins

Posted on September 21, 2012 by Tova

Last night Molly informed me that when she grows up she’s gonna be a doctor like her Aunt Debbie (my sister) AND an artist- like me.
Then she asked me what I’m gonna be when I grow up.
I replied “I am grown up and I’m an artist.”
She looked at me like I was dumb.
“Noooooo!” she exclaimed ” what are you gonna be when you grow up mooooore???”
I just stared at her.
I swear that girl is already smarter than me.
…and perhaps a bit psychic.

A Muchness Coincidence… and also maybe a bit creepy…

Posted on September 4, 2012 by Tova

Last week on vacation the whole family went to a shop on the boardwalk to buy a pinwheel. The girls were really excited.

We’d gone to the same spot last year and Molly picked out a little ducky and parrot.

Last Year:

They were in the backyard all year and got the crap kicked out of them by the winter weather.

I Molly was excited to go buy a new one. This year the girls got to pick one together.

As soon as we got home, Molly got to work installing it in the front lawn.

It looked really fun and pretty… Maybe a little lonely in our less than exciting front yard but those fading flamingos are (temporarily) keeping it company:

If I’m honest, I kinda was wishing I had something else there too, just to balance it a bit. But I don’t. So be it.

Anyway, today I went to work. My coworker, who’d also been on vacation clear across the country, told me she saw something on her trip that made her think of me, so she bought it! How nice is that? I assumed it was some sparkly doodad that’s easy to travel with and screamed “Look at me!! I’m Muchy!!”

So she went into her office and returned with an oversized bag. Inside?

I nearly fell to the the floor. I mean, REALLY? Folks- she didn’t know about our pinwheels. We have NEVER had a conversation EVER about the fact that last year we bought pinwheels on our vacation. I hadn’t posted any pictures or comments or ANYTHING that would have made her brain say “Pinwheel? Tova!” And that is it the IDENTICAL pinwheel…

I don’t know… it’s all just a bit TOO MUCH for me. 🙂

Seriously, the only thing I need to do now is yank out those sad bushes that attract too many bugs and install a flamingo garden like the one I saw in front of the Lewes Public Library.

Could you imagine? My neighbors would absolutely LOVE me!!!! 😀

hahahahahahahahahahah

Muchness Meets Photography! Day 1

Posted on September 1, 2012 by Tova

I SO need this challenge right now. Funny, Beryl and I created it for you- our readers, but I’ve been looking forward to it for weeks! So many people in the last 2 years have told me they want to do the Muchness Challenge but don’t have time. Turns out, I am one of those people. Ha. If I didn’t know how awesome this challenge is and how every time I do some version of it, I am elevated and revived, I’d probably not find the time either. But I also know it can be done in minutes a day.

Todays Challenge had me thinking very hard. It was our last day of vacation and I wasn’t home so I kept thinking how can I take a picture of a place where I spend a lot of time? But then, as I sat in the car and the kids and me and Elie sang the soundtrack of Annie at the top of our lungs, I thought about how, even that, is a side effect of The Muchness. We never did that before. The car used to be a place we used to get from here to there. When I was alone it was a place I thought about my to-do list. A place I used to cry listening to lyrics of sad or sweet songs. As a family it was place where we used to dread putting the kids for extended periods of time and even bought a CD player so they could keep themselves entertained. A place that involved the stress of getting the kids and all their stuff in the car, or the stress of getting it all out of the car.

So, as the weather got less hot and we rolled down the windows and sang our lil’ hearts out, I snapped this “before” pic… It’s not a true before since in it’s way it’s its own after, but I can’t wait to see the after in 30 days from now!!

I am so thankful to have every single one of the challengers on this journey. I built this site for you all to have a place to find your Muchness, but it’s really a selfish thing, because it helps me, helping you. 🙂

Just for fun, I added a video of my kid. Her favorite song from the whole movie.

[youtube_sc url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeiJOgg4vHo”]

The Muchness in Muchkins

Posted on August 27, 2012 by Tova

I was recently in Target looking for shoes for my kids. As I perused the racks of sparkly Muchness, debating internally the ramifications of buying the Hello Kitty ones (personal promise not to slather my kids in licensed characters vs. how much easier the morning dressing routine is when I can I slather them in licensed characters vs. why should I pay more just cuz there is a licensed character vs. ooooh! So shiny!!) I overheard a four year old girl begging her mother for a pair of glittery sandals. Her mom kept saying “No. You cannot pick those. Choose another pair. Those are “gaudy.”

I’m sorry. Did she just tell her kid that the glittery sandals are “GAUDY?!?”

Ya know what’s gaudy? The word gaudy. Seriously. Was is this, 1994? The word she meant to use is Tacky. And tacky can be AWESOME!!

Case in point: when I looked up “tacky kids sandals” on google, this is the adorableness that popped up:

And oddly, when I googled “gaudy kids sandals” this popped up:

My conclusion? Gaudy is an outdated word. Don’t teach it to your kids.
(As an aside- I looove Pegi Bundy)

Back to my point— it made me sad that this mom was subjecting her kid to her own Muchlessness- squelching her Muchkin’s Muchness like a gaudy, glittery bug to be smashed.

So sad. Don’t do this. Not to your kids OR to yourself! If you look at something and it makes you smile, don’t second guess and squelch your Muchness Moments. Embrace them! If you love it, its beautiful. Don’t insert your perception of other’s opinion before you even have time to enjoy your own opinion! Find the confidence to wear the shoes that make your insides happy when you look at your feet! And in the name of all that is good and holy- DO NOT impose some silly insecurities on your muchy kids. Let their imaginations and confidence soar! Lord knows there will be more than enough circumstances in life that will try to steal their Muchness. For the time being, let them embrace their Sparkly goodness!!!!!!