My Mimi is about to become an outlaw. Or maybe just disappear from the bookshelves and the hands of children.

Happy New Year!

Wishing all of you fun experimenting with new crafts and ideas, the thrill of discovering more wonderful books, and the pleasures of sharing time (and those wonderful books) with young children in 2009!

When my kids were small I saw a cute idea in a magazine (maybe Family Fun?)for kids to send a Valentine to distant relatives. We've since used the "hug card" to send thank you notes, get well soon cards, and simply "I miss you" notes. Have your kid lie down and spread out his arms on a long sheet of paper. (We used the rolls we had for easel painting, but you can also just tape sheets of paper together.) Trace around your kid's hands, arms, head and neck, then cut out the shape. Your kid can add hair and facial features with crayons or markers, and then dictate a note for you to print across the "hug." It takes a lot of folding to fit in an envelope and it's kind of a pain to cut out, but I've never known a grandparent who wasn't ga-ga for a note like this.

And speaking of cute mail, don't let your kid forget to send a little thank you note to Santa! After all, I bet Santa went to a lot of trouble in his workshop or hanging out in those long lines at the mall, not to mention the late night on Christmas Eve and all. Standard mail delivery to the North Pole is a bit iffy after December 25th, but you can rely on Elf Mail to get a miniature note to Kris Kringle promptly. You can get a pdf to print a template for a make-your-own Elf mailbox, plus a cute little Elf-sized greeting card and envelope here. My sample, above, is just assembled from the paper print out, but it does look (and work) even better if you print it on cardstock. You can choose your own color scheme and add whatever decorations/embellishments you prefer.
Assembly is fairly straight forward, but it's definitely a job for grown ups or skilled older kids.

Supplies

• Cardstock, white paper


• Craft-quality glue stick or tacky glue and toothpick; repositionable glue stick


• Scissors, craft knife, chopstick, scoring tool (like inkless ballpoint pen)


• Markers, stickers, whatever for embellishing the mailbox and cards
  
  

1. You can print and cut out the template on cardstock and trace it onto whatever paper or card you want - or make life a little easier by printing a copy on paper, cutting loosely around the mailbox and extra parts (the support piece, the door handle, and the key) and lightly gluing them to your cardstock with a repositionable glue stick or spray adhesive. Then carefully cut out along the dark solid lines and score and fold along the dashed and dotted lines with the template still in place. (If you've glued the template to the right side, just follow the mountain versus valley fold lines as marked - but reverse them if you glue it to the wrong side.) Don't forget to use a craft knife to cut out 3 sides of the lower door (the one for the elf mailman to use to remove the mail) and cut out the keyhole too, because it does kind of work with the key.


2. Remove the template, and assemble the mailbox, using a glue stick or tacky glue applied with a toothpick. First, glue the support piece to the underside of the shelf that connects to the pull-down door (A in my template). The tabs will fold up next to the door (you'll glue them to the inner sides in a minute). Glue the handle to the door.


3. Cut out the little triangle-y parts around the part that curves over the top if you haven't already done so. (It's easier to do the folds before you cut them out.)


4. Fold the main part into a box shape, and secure by gluing the long tab to the edge it meets. You may have to reach inside from both the top and bottom to pinch it or use your chopstick to get it to stick well. Then fold the shelf and door into position and glue the little tabs of the support piece just in front of the pull-down door - this isn't absolutely necessary, but it does make everything more stable when you open and close the door to drop the letters in.


5. Fold up the bottom and glue its tabs in place. You may need to use a chopstick or something to reach in and rub the surfaces together.


6. Rub glue on the triangle tabs on both sides of the curved top piece and position them carefully. This is a bit tricky. Again, a chopstick is useful for reaching inside for the gluing.


7. Cut out some cards and envelopes. Have your kid dictate notes and maybe decorate the fronts with mini artwork or tiny stickers. (You can also enlarge the notes 200%, write them and then reduce 50% to make it easier if you're at the reading glasses stage of life like I am.) Then let your kid post his mail!

Merry Christmas! 

I, um, got behind even more with the advent, but I have some good things saved up for next year, and that will have to do.

My daughter Sara and I made these little mushroom glitter house scenes for the grandmas this year. Here's what one looks like inside a stemless wine glass, which we used for display.

 I'll include directions and templates for making your own shortly, so you can get a head start for next year's Christmas gifts (which is what I should do). Or you could make some for New Year's gifts. (After all, the mushrooms are a symbol of good luck, which works equally well for Christmas or New Year's good wishes.) Sara and I are making some more as New Year's gifts for some special folks since we liked making these so much. (And that's amazing because I have kind of a love-hate relationship with glitter. I love it because it looks so pretty and, well, glittery, but I hate how it ends up everywhere. Forever.)

I'll be back tomorrow too, with some ideas for crafting creative and heartfelt thank yous. And I have some ideas for New Year's greetings, which I'm hoping to send this year, since I never managed to finish my Christmas card.

Hope this finds all of you snug and cozy with your loved ones, whether or not you celebrate Christmas. Thank you all for reading my blog this year, and for your kind notes and the inspiration you've given me. I feel truly blessed. 

Best to all,

Carol

Now that I'm a parent, I have a real fondness for holidays that involve kids bringing me breakfast in bed, which is why I insist that St. Lucia Day is an important element of my Scandinavian heritage that my family must celebrate (even though we never celebrated it when I was a kid).

St. Lucia was a Roman girl who refused to renounce her devotion to God and marry some guy she didn't love, so she was sentenced to be burned and her eyes poked out and whatnot - but because she was a good Christian the fire wouldn't burn her. That's why the poor oldest girl in the family who brings mom and dad special saffron buns (called lussekatter, or cat's eyes) and coffee in bed on the morning of December 13th is supposed to wear a wreath decorated with flaming candles - while balancing a tray with hot coffee and wearing a long white dress. Maybe the custom was intended as a form of population control....

Mimi, above, is wearing a battery operated wreath, (which I could not find for sale online anywhere!), and the coffee cup is empty. Also because she is a bit clumsy at times, it's a plastic cup, as is the plate. But Daddy is being a good Daddy and bringing the real deal for Mommy on a separate tray. That's the most important part of the tradition. Plus, they've all let Mommy sleep in a bit.

I can fantasize.

Anyway, the buns are good. (I think especially good if you substitute some chunks of high quality dark chocolate for the raisins, but you can be all healthy and dried fruit-ish if you prefer.) This recipe is not from my Norwegian mom, but from a friend and neighbor who's a really attractive Hispanic/African-American/Polish mix and an outstanding cook. (Here's a link to a very similar recipe using metric units: saffron buns.)

Helena's Lussekatter

Ingredients

1/3 cup milk
¼ cup butter
¼ cup lukewarm water
1 pkg dry yeast
¼ cup sugar
2 eggs (1 for the dough, 1 for the “wash” before baking)
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp saffron (or just cheat and add a little yellow food coloring)
2 ¾ cups flour
1 T cooking oil (I use canola)
Extra 1 T water
2-3 dozen raisins or chocolate chunks

Preparation

Heat the milk in the microwave or a small saucepan to about 115 degrees. Add the butter (cut in small pieces) and stir until it dissolves.

Pour the warm water into a large mixing bowl. Stir in the yeast and set aside for 5 minutes. (Note: I add a little of the sugar to the water and yeast, so the yeast has some food while it proofs.)

Add the milk and butter mixture to the water and yeast. Then stir in the sugar, one egg, salt, and saffron. Gradually add the flour, stirring until it forms a smooth ball (you will probably have some flour left at this point). Sprinkle flour on a board and put the ball of dough on it to rest, covered with the bowl, for 15 minutes.

Knead the dough for 10 minutes, gradually working in the remaining flour (and more if needed) until it’s very smooth and elastic. Wash the bowl and oil it well with the canola oil. Place the ball of dough in the bowl and turn it over several times until it’s coated well all over.

Cover the bowl with a clean dishtowel and place it in a warm place to rise until doubled in bulk, about 45 minutes to an hour.

Punch down the dough and turn it out on a lightly floured board. Divide it into 12 parts. Roll each piece into a long rope, then coil the ends in opposite directions so it makes sort of a tight “S” shape. Place the rolls 2” apart on greased cookie sheets (I spray mine with Pam). Cover the rolls with a towel and place in a warm place again. Let them rise for 30-45 minutes until doubled in bulk.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Beat the remaining egg and T of water with a fork and brush over the tops of each bun. Decorate the buns with raisins or chocolate chunks.

Bake for 15 to 20 minutes until golden brown. Cool on a rack and then serve to Mommy in bed on December 13th, along with some really good coffee, a little OJ or grapefruit juice. Oh, and bring a copy of the paper. And then go away for an hour or so.

One final note: my drawing of Mimi's wreath is wrong - I should only have put 7 candles on it. Also, I'm big into recycling these days, which is why I did this sketch on the back of a piece of paper with the corrections for my husband's law text (which you can order here if you need an extra (expensive) booster seat for young visitors during the holidays, or if you're really, really hoping to get some light reading on Federal Civil Procedure for Christmas). So those weird little squiggly things that show through aren't really intentional - you don't need to hunt for white fabric with a faint strange pattern if you want to make a St. Lucia dress.

Um, I know, I'm falling a bit behind with the daily advent stuff. Well, maybe I'll catch up with some double posts soon...

Anyway, today's idea is a cheaper, greener - and I think more beautiful - alternative to running up your electric bill with a zillion strands of outdoor lights. Ice luminaria. They do work best in cold weather, but we've largely had that in spades this year in Pittsburgh (not today though - 50 degrees! And all my lanterns melted shortly after I took the photo below. Oh well, I can make them again. Back to snow tomorrow.)
You can find even more details about these in this month's issue of Nick Jr Magazine - I wrote up a bunch of the activities in the parenting pull-out, and there's lots more to like there (like a recipe for figgy pudding, plus the customs that go with it. Yes, that figgy pudding from the song. Turns out it's tasty, and even kind of good for you. Who knew?). As usual with Nick Jr, all the activities are super easy, super good, mostly "green" and fun to do with kids.

Okay, so not only are ice lanterns pretty to look at, they're a blast to make - kind of a cross between a water balloon adventure and a science experiment. All you do is fill up heavy duty latex balloons with water, let them freeze outdoors or in your freezer (but if you have room in your freezer for a bunch of BIG water balloons I am mega impressed), crack a hole in the top, pour out the unfrozen water, put a candle in the middle and light it. Voila!

I promise not to be completely obsessed with mushrooms all month, but I can't help how much I love them. The one above is courtesy of Myra at my little mochi, who has an excellent tutorial here for a super cute felt mushroom. I bought the supplies yesterday to make a few of my own this weekend. (And don't you just love that perky frog?)

These gift tags are just mushroom prints. Cut a white or small portobella mushroom in half and use small paintbrushes to coat the top half in red paint and the stem in white (leave a little space between the colors so they don't bleed when you press the mushroom down). When you print with it, press carefully all over the mushroom so that you don't have high spots leaving unprinted areas. (I also am not above a little "touching up" with the paintbrush.) I added the dots with the non-pointy end of a bamboo skewer dipped in white paint, and the black lines are from a fine-tip Sharpie marker. I printed the grass around the shipping tag example with a slice of potato.

And now onto my super simple, nearly free, but still really beautiful decorating idea: a little food coloring added to water in a clear glass container. The ones above have a mix of red (which looks orange in my bad photo - you need lots of food coloring to get a good red) and green (not even one drop each of food coloring - I poured some water out after adding the food coloring and added even more water).

It's been exceptionally cloudy and gloomy here in Pittsburgh this year, but you can see that with even a smidge of light the effect is pretty magical. Even with my dirty, dirty windows. At night, the glasses look beautiful seen from outside, lit by the house lights.

One of my family's weird traditions is to have Coke in small glass bottles on Christmas. (Santa brings a six-pack, which is a problem because there are five of us. So one of the other quirky traditions is trying to be the first one to "forget" you already had yours and drink the extra.) These Coke bottles were reproductions of ones made in the 1890s, and they're filled with different shades of green. You could add sprigs of greens to look extra festive.

I got the idea for this from the little jars of "potions" my boys used to make in baby food jars and various other containers and require me to store out of reach of their little sister, which meant the jars got relegated to the windowsill. And since the main ingredient in most of the potions was food coloring, they actually looked kind of nice. Since then I nearly always have jars or bottles of colored water in my kitchen windows. I vary the color scheme with the season. I'll do blues and purples in January, pinks and reds in February, and so on through the fall when we have oranges, yellows and reds.

My final suggestion for the colored water theme is an activity/inexpensive gift suggestion for preschoolers. This was a project I discovered when I taught toddler daycare many years ago, and it was hands down the most frequently requested rainy day activities when my kids were small. (I also did it with the kids' kindergarten classes each year as part of science program I taught.) You need:

• Mini ice cube trays, which you can order here if you can't find them in a local store. (You can use regular ice cube trays, but they're more limited and so kids tire of the activity faster.)
• A few yogurt containers or something similar
• An eyedropper or, even better, a pipette like the one in the photo above (we buy ours at Holcombs, a teacher supply store, but they sometimes come with packaged craft or science kits too.)
• Food coloring
• Water
• Soothing music
• A cup of tea and book for mom

Partially fill the cubes with water and provide two (or more) yogurt cups with water and food coloring mixtues, plus one with just water . (The reason to stick with two colors for younger kids is that otherwise pretty soon all you have is lots of shades of brown.) Show the kid how to operate the eyedropper. ("Hold it and squeeze out all the air. Keep squeezing, dip it in the water, and let go so it will suck up lots of water. Then hold it over the cubes and squeeze out little drops. Isn't that cool?")

Demonstrate how adding a little of each color or a little extra water to a color makes things change! They can suck up colored water from the little squares as well as from the yogurt cups and just kind of move things around. Encourage them to experiment with different approaches, like starting with a strong color at the beginning of a row, and diluting it a little more and a little more all the way down.

Then put on the quiet music and relax with your tea and book. You could easily have 45 minutes of peace. I'm not kidding.

This really does make an excellent gift for 2 to 5 year olds (just be sure to include instructions or the kid's parent will question your sanity). And I guarantee NO ONE else will give the kid the same thing.

I have lots more ideas like this in my first parenting book, FussBusters at Home, in case you're desperate for ways to keep your kids occupied so you can wrap and bake without "help."

You have just three more days to get ready! December 6th is the feast day for St. Nicholas, the historical figure many believe is the model for Santa Claus. In some parts of the world, including the Netherlands, St. Nicholas Eve, rather than Christmas, is the big gift-exchanging day. Children put out their shoes (or in some places, put out their boots or hang their stockings), perhaps filled with some hay for St. Nicholas's white horse, and in the morning find their shoes filled instead with candies and small gifts. You can read about St. Nicholas Day customs in many countries here.


While I generally favor any holiday involving chocolate - and in the Netherlands, one of the big customs involves giving children large chocolate initials like these - I celebrated it somewhat inconsistently with my own kids. Keeping track of the advent goodies, gifts for family, friends, and teachers, gratuities for the various helpers in our lives, etc. seemed like more than enough.

But I do wish now that I'd celebrated it after all, a change of heart largely due to reading my friend Julie Stiegemeyer's informative and touching book about the saint, Saint Nicholas: The Real Story of the Christmas Legend.

I apologize for the lousy photos, and I couldn't get my pdf template to work (with luck I'll add it tomorrow) - but I hope you can make everything out enough to follow the instructions.

• 2 pieces of contrasting papers, each at least 2 1/2 inches by 8 inches, plus an extra strip about 1/2 inch wide and 5 inches long or so. (Red and white are traditional colors, but I also made two of the above from recycled papers - newspaper, a page from a catalog, and the inside of a security envelope)


• Scissors


• A little glue or tape

To start, you should cut a template from cardboard or cardstock (I used a box from dog biscuits, as you can see in the photo below, which I forgot to rotate.) My template is 2 1/2 inches wide and 4 inches tall. The lines marked on it show you where to make the cuts so that you'll have 3 strips to weave. I hope tomorrow I'll have a printable template for you, but you can certainly fudge it - I did. It helps to cut the strips fairly long, so you have room to fiddle, especially until you've had some practice. Next fold your papers in half. Place the flat end of the template against the fold and trace around it. Mark the positions of the interior cuts, and then cut around the outside, as well as along the two interior lines. (Sorry for the blurry photos.)

Next comes the tricky part: the weaving. Start by scunching open the uppermost strip on the white half and sliding the upper red strip through it.

Then scunch the second red one open, pinch the first white strip closed again, and slide it through the middle of the red strip.

Finally, open the first white strip again and slide the third red strip in. At this point, you've finished the first row of weaving!

Okay, here's where the how-to photos end - but the rest is more of the same, except for weaving in the second white strip you'll reverse the scunching order. First scunch the first red strip open and slide the second white one through it, then red through white and white through red again. (Sometimes the last top strip will pop out - just work it back into place. It will stay when the basket is done.)

Repeat the order of the first white strip for the third one, and you're about done. Just tape or glue the extra long strip inside to form a handle, add some goodies, and give it to a friend!

In my Merry Christmas, Cheeps! book, the littlest chick can be seen hanging one of these on the tree on the page for "Reach to hang an ornament/Shiny, shiny bright." You can also see one hanging on the tree in the excellent classic book Christmas in Noisy Village by Astrid Lindgren (who wrote the Pippi Longstocking books).

If you get good at these hearts and want to try some more elaborate ones (you can get pretty fancy if you vary the number and shape of the strips, check out this sites for ideas and instructions:

• This interesting Danish site which has both the basic and very advanced directions (but beware, it plays electronic-ish Christmas music)


• Margita Mentorp's papirklip blog (I think I have her name right - but the site's in a language I don't speak). It has lots of cool templates for unusual woven hearts, as well as some little house templates to cut out and assemble and other Christmas decorations to make.
  
  
  
  
  

Happy Advent! This is a very ambitious plan for someone like me who some months can't manage even a single post, but my pledge is that for the next 24 days, I'll do one post per day with:

• holiday craft tutorials (for kids and adults - some with a book tie-in)
  
• recipes
  
• printables (including gift tags, a bookplate and more outfits for the Mimi paper doll)
• thrifty decorating ideas
• suggestions for cheap, high appeal gifts for kids
• descriptions of "quirky" holiday traditions
  
• and a give-away or two (including a personalized copy of my holiday book for toddlers, Merry Christmas, Cheeps! by Julie Stiegemeyer). Send me an email by December 15, 2008 at baickermckee [at] gmail [dot] com with your name and contact info to register for the give-aways, and I'll pick the winner(s) at random and (I hope) mail the treat(s) out in time for Christmas.

• A compilation of TONS of different advent calendars from bella dia at the Crafty Crow
• 3 clever ideas using common objects like matchboxes, assembled by Domestika
• a funny calendar using Altoid tins at craftzine

The way the advent tradition works at my house is that the Advent Elf sneaks in during the night and leaves one little something (a candy cane, a small toy, something practical-ish like chapstick) in the correct pocket. Sometimes the Advent Elf is delayed by bad weather, traffic, etc. and has to slip in during the day when no one's looking. Also sometimes the Advent Elf gets the pockets mixed up, but it's not nice to make fun of him, especially during Christmas season. My 3 kids take turns getting the gifts, and we have an elaborate rotation system of who goes last (for some reason the most coveted position). This tradition is still going on, even though two of the "youngsters" are now in college. (The Advent Elf is not above using the U.S. Mail.) My husband thinks the Advent Elf is insane, and he might be right.

My sister-in-law has taken the Advent Elf tradition to a whole 'nother level. She shares it with another family, and the Elf surprises one family or the other throughout the month with rather more elaborate goodies, like whole batches of home-baked cookies or a jigsaw puzzle to assemble, or something else that makes me tired just thinking about it. But it does seem to be fun for all of them.

It has been positively wintry here for the last couple weeks, with several snows that have accumulated (well, at least more than a dusting). It's snowing now with 2-4 inches predicted today, more tomorrow and still more on Thanksgiving.

On the whole, I am not a big fan of premature winter. I am already yearning for a Caribbean island. The only good thing about this weather is that it does put me in a cozy baking mood. The other day I decided to make some bread by hand, something I have not done since getting a breadmaker about 10 years ago. And oh my God, I'd forgotten how homemade bread is even better than breadmaker bread (which I do think is pretty tasty too). And especially I'd forgotten how wonderful this bread is, though it was my favorite as a teen, the first wholegrain bread I ever liked and the the first bread I learned to make myself (because my mother didn't bake it often enough to satisfy my cravings). I love this so much I made my mother bake dozens of loaves to serve at my wedding reception.

I do not recall exactly where the recipe is from, though I'd guess from one of my mom's old Scandinavian cookbooks. (My mom's dad was Norwegian.) It's a bit of a bother, as any homemade bread is, but it's completely worth the trouble, even just for the way it makes the kitchen smell heavenly. And feel nice and warm.

This is really a test for me. I'm trying to see if I've figured out a way to add a printable pdf file to a blog posting. If it works, I have some more goodies to add soon!

Click on this link here (I hope) to take you to a black and white paper doll of Mimi and friends that you can print out, color, and play with, if you're so inclined. (To print the pdf file, click on the iPaper button on the toolbar and select print.)

Sigh. I struggle so much to blog regularly, even though I always enjoy posting. My biggest problem, aside from being over-extended in almost every area of my life, is that blogging makes me feel guilty. I shouldn't be doing something frivolous like writing about kids' books or crafts or whatever, when there are important things to be doing like meeting deadlines or dragging my daughter to visit colleges. And laundry. (I'm not sure why guilt is so effective in preventing me from blogging when it definitely doesn't stop me from eating chocolate or sprawling on the sofa to watch old episodes of House or Battlestar Gallactica - but maybe it's just easier to hide the evidence of those things.) Anyhow, I have a possible solution for my guilt: blunching, or blogging at lunch (instead of doing a sudoku and the word scramble thing). We'll see if this works...


Today I have instructions for making sweet (and functional!) drinking goblets for fairies. Or G.I. Joes, if your kid's tastes run more that way. My mother-in-law taught my kids how to make these (who in turn taught me); she learned from her grandmother. They're easy to craft, make a good prop for imaginative play or a gift to leave for the tooth fairy - and best of all, give you a good excuse for eating a chocolate that comes in a pretty foil wrapper. So feel free to raid your kids' remaining Halloween stash.

OKAY! Blogger's formatting drives me insane sometimes! I cannot get anything to go where it's supposed to. ARGH. Hope you can follow the steps anyhow because lunchtime is OVER and I must stop. SORRY!

Step 1

Unwrap a candy and smooth the foil wrapper with your thumbnail. This one is a York peppermint patty, which has a nearly perfect wrapper for this purpose. Plus, if you hold the peppermint to your ear and snap it in two, it makes a really cool sound.

Eat the candy yourself, explaining to your young child that candy isn't good for her teeth, so you're doing her a big favor.

Step 2

Curl the wrapper around the tip of your finger with the pretty shiny side out.

Step 3

Pinch and twist the wrapper just past your fingertip. The part left on your finger becomes the bowl of the goblet; the part you're twisting is the stem. Stop a few centimeters from the bottom. (Pretty fancy of me being all metric, huh?)

Step 4

Step Ta-Da!

Admire your elegant goblet.

Then unwrap a few more chocolates and let your kid make a complete set for a large fairy dinner party. Then set her (or him) up with some fairy dolls or other little guys, a child-sized teapot or small pitcher filled with a little lemonade or watered down apple juice. If the weather permits, these are nice for kids to play with in a mossy spot under a tree. Otherwise, opt for some mess-proofish place, like on a tray at the kitchen table or in the bathroom. You get to curl up nearby with a cup of tea and read your novel, while patting yourself on the back for encouraging your child's imagination.

I hope you'll support my guy -- but either way, make your voice heard! And then afterwards let's all work together to make this country an even better place for our children and grandchildren. Thanks!

P.S. I'm ready to resume posting. I promise!
P.P.S. These polling hours are for Pennsylvania -- check your own state's hours.

I got cybersquatted.

And it made me cranky. Very, very, very cranky - but it all worked out in the end. Phew!

So here's what happened. I finally decided to get working on my website that is actually listed on the jacket flap of my book but doesn't exist yet. Oops.

To be fair to myself, this was a crazy busy year, the kind where I didn't have time to do frivolous things like: going to the bathroom (at least not until I was doing the pee dance), sleeping, grocery shopping, cooking meals for my family, shaving my legs, doing laundry, buying new underwear which I desperately needed since I wasn't doing laundry, posting on my blog, learning how to create a website, etc.

But anyway, I went to bluehost.com to buy my domain name and have them host my site, carolbaickermckee.com, which my lawyer husband had assured me could not be used by anyone else as my name is utterly unique, thanks to some Ellis Island goofy spelling plus the magic of marital hyphenation. (I think there are only about 30 people in the entire world with "Baicker" in their name, all related to us, and I'm certain there are only 5 Baicker-McKees and they all live in my house.) And it's against the law to buy someone else's name that you have no legitimate connection to. But someone had already bought my name anyhow! And put up a horrible website that was all links to commercial websites, including from the homepage some porn-ish sights about cheating wives and Russian girls.

I about had a heart attack. Then I called my husband and told him he was in BIG trouble. (Not that I have much leverage as an Angry Woman anymore, not since I gave up stuff like grocery shopping, shaving my legs, and washing the family's underwear. What could I threaten to do? Lose the number of our favorite take out pizza place? Convince Kmart to stop selling him new Fruit of the Looms?)

So then I didn't know what to do! But now I've figured it out, and I'll tell you, in case it happens to you. First, go to a whois site, like betterwhois.com and it will tell you who has registered your domain name and who owns the website. And then use the contact info to visit the owners' websites, in my case a giant buy-lots-of-domain-sites company. And then write them a fierce letter telling them they are violating Section 43(d) of the Lanham Act (read about it here), and that you'd like them to immediately shut down the website and un-register the domain name. Next, get your husband to take out all the inflammatory language so that the email is merely firm but polite. Then wait a few hours for an email that says, "Don't know what you're talking about. We don't own that domain name." And then check and discover your name is now magically available and the horrid website has disappeared and no one has to sue anyone! And your husband isn't it deep doo-doo anymore! Finally, quick, quick, quick, register the name, get someone to host it, and start working away on your site (more on the adventures of that soon).

In more fun news, I'm working on content for my website, including a printable Mimi paperdoll. This is because I have always loved paperdolls. My plan is to have one page to print on cardstock that will have Mimi, Bunny and Frank dolls, as well as other things that work well on stiffer paper, like a yogurt cup that Frank can be inserted into after assembly, a book cover or two, a bowl of cereal with a separate teeny tiny spoon and a banana, complete with smidge, maybe a twinkle star night light, some forks - stuff like that. And then another page that can be printed on regular paper (or maybe a lightweight photo paper - that might be nice) with outfits for Mimi and Bunny (and maybe a collar and leash for Frank?), and interior pages that can be assembled with the book covers on the previous page to make little miniature books, which I also love. Any other great ideas/requests for cool features?

Off to my tree house to work on revisions to my parenting book!

I have always been a sucker for playhouses, beginning with some serious coveting of a cardboard house my older sister got for her birthday when we were little. (To be fair, she was very gracious and let me play in it nearly any time I wanted, but I wanted to own it myself. I'm not sure I'd have been as welcoming to her, if I'd been landlord.) From then on, I was the queen of forts and hidey-holes - under my bed, with piles of sofa cushions and sheets in the living room, in the little hollowed out place in the middle of the forsythia bushes - any place I could squeeze into.

I also think one of my secret motivations for becoming a mother was to have another shot at having a really cool playhouse, which is how I came to force my handy husband to build the one above in our backyard. I think the kids did love it as much as I did. In its heyday, it was well furnished with a little kitchen center thingie, a child-sized table and chairs, and comfy cushions - and outfitted with essential features like a basket attached to a pulley for hauling up snacks, a secret exit to the monkey bars, a double dutch door, and slide.

The years unfortunately, have not been entirely kind to it; it's full of cobwebs, half-painted as the result of an overly ambitious project undertaken by my daughter and her buddies right about the time they lost interest in make-believe and helping with chores (age 11, for those of you at that stage). I can no longer entice anyone to play in it, not even by offering to bring them a super nice snack or promising to leave them alone and not eavesdrop even a little bit. (Okay, not surprising since they're now 20, 18 and 16. But still.) Now it stores the lawn furniture over the winter and shelters chipmunks and squirrels and far too many spiders, but I always feel wistful when I catch a glimpse of it out the window.

So yesterday, when I was moping around after yet another rainstorm (with still another threatening) and fishing around for a way to avoid some little projects I needed to work on, I decided to do what I've been threatening to do for years: I fixed it up as a playhouse for me!

Pretty nice, huh! I rehung the curtains, even though they're very faded, brushed ALL the cobwebs away and asked the spiders and buzzy bees very nicely to relocate, and spruced up the furniture (nearly all scrounged from the garbage back when I could sometimes persuade my tweens to hang out in the house), and added my grown up necessities, like a snack, citronella candles, a small rug, a jam jar of flowers, and a LONG extension cord with a surge protector to plug my laptop into. (I've even managed to get intermittent internet reception, something I can't even get reliably on my crappy laptop when I'm sitting right next to my wireless router. Grr.) And then I was a good girl and worked out there the rest of the afternoon. And in the evening had my glass of wine up there in the rocking chair I lugged up (barely visible in the lower right hand corner). I had to read my book while I sipped my shiraz since I couldn't quite persuade my husband to join me. He had "more important" things to do.

By the way, I'm reading Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth (for my book club), and I'm enjoying it very much, even though I find the writing style and some of the characterization painfully clumsy at times. (Why do writers of adult fiction always seem to get away with faux pas that would brand someone attempting to write for kids as a rank amateur?)

There are still some glitches I need to iron out, such as the dog above, who not only insists on joining me (which means I have to carry her up and down the rickety ramp that is the only access I can remotely manage) but also refuses to vacate the best seat for working. And her attention span is annoying short, plus she drank some of my iced tea when I put it on the floor so I wouldn't risk spilling it on my laptop. And the half-painted look is already getting to me so I'm likely to end up hunting down the rollers and leftover house paint before long. And I need a fan. And some Off! because the citronella candles weren't really adequate. But on the whole, so satisfying. Maybe it will be enough to inspire me to finish the novel I started more than a year ago.

If you're craving a playhouse too, check out this book with lots of cool ideas. I'm already trying to plot how to convince my husband to just "update" my playhouse with a few little things, like real wiring, glass windows, maybe some heating for the winter...

Here's Mimi! She made her official debut last Wednesday, and I'm as excited as a new mommy. Well, probably even more excited since she's very well behaved and doesn't keep me up all night like my human children did or make a colossal mess of the house. (Though now that I think about it, she did make me lose a lot of sleep last summer when I was slaving over the illustrations. And the mess! It was truly epic. Just ask my family - or anyone foolish enough to stop by my house during those last weeks.)

Like any new mom, I'm having a lovely time wallowing in compliments about how cute my little one is. And checking her amazon ranking obsessively - but I figure that's the author equivalent of checking every five minutes to make sure your newborn is still breathing. My favorite review so far is this very sweet one by five year old Kaya Wheatley on cnn.com, who likes the book because it's weird and happy. Okay, in the interest of full disclosure, she also said it had "bad stuff" because Mimi wants her pet bug Frank to get some kisses and you shouldn't kiss bugs because they've been in dirt. And I also got a nice review from someone at Kirkus, who apparently didn't notice about the dirt, but who did say stuff like this that makes me blush and squirm in a happy, embarrassed way: "A satisfying plot, whimsical illustrations and a beguiling main character add up to a delightful treat that even younger preschoolers will enjoy. Baicker-McKee is an author-illustrator to watch.” And there were other nothing-but-nice reviews like this and this and this, (geez, I hope these links work -- scroll down if you don't see Mimi at first and you're actually reading them...) and Parenting Magazine has a nice write-up in the July issue and is giving away 100 free copies (you can register here).

I don't really know any great way to sign copies that people buy (or win). I'm going to see if I can find an independent bookseller that will stock some for me to sign on an as-bought basis and then ship them (man, do I miss the children's bookstore that used to be just up the street from here). But meanwhile, if anyone's interested I'll be happy to personalize a bookplate and mail that to you.

Oh, and I had a request from a blog reader for a Mimi doll. I wish I had some to send you! But the Mimi in the book isn't really quite a doll-- I made each one individually (yes, there were an awful lot of them. The number of limbs was quite staggering) in an insanely time consuming process that involves wrapping fabric around illustration board and pipecleaners, and stuffing it and sewing little clothes and making features from polymer clay, beads and felt, and so on. I am thinking about making a handful of stuffed animal Mimis, if I can figure out how, for gifts (stop reading this Melanie. And Deb.) If I get good at it, I'll make an extra and have a contest for it -- but at this point it's the best Ican do!

Well, enough avoiding the apologies. Sorry I've been away from blogging for so long. I've been struggling to finish a book (yes, that SAME book about the apple pie and Granny) and it's finally nearly done! And dealing with the many obligations of a son graduating from high school, and um, a vacation last week (ah! It was paradise.) But now I'm back. Really and truly. No more excuses. My new theme this year is "Balance." Last year it was "Risk." (I picked that theme after the fact when I realized I kept putting myself in situations where I was over my head...) At any rate, my plan is to set the timer several times a week and just put something down. No more mammoth essays like, well, this one. Short and sweet -- and pictures. Now just pray at least some of my techno stuff keeps working so I can do it.

I leave you with this lovely picture of my messy, messy studio, aka the kitchen table. (I cleaned it up today! There's a tablecloth! And flowers! And already little piles of clutter!) Oops. I'll have to add the photo later. Just remembered it's on my husband's laptop and I forgot to email it here...

Well, I've broken every one of my New Year's resolutions, with the exception of the one about eating more chocolate. Sigh. I know it's been a long time since I've posted, but I'm drowning in work and family stuff, and there's really no end in sight. But I knocked off a couple big items on my to-do list this morning, so I'm rewarding myself by spending my lunch break with a quick post.

Every weekend for the last month (maybe more, I've lost track) we've had crappy weather here. Snow, rain, freezing rain, sleet, hail, thunderstorms, you name it -- but none of it nice. So this weekend, I decided to cheer myself up with food (only a little chocolate though) and a bunch of my other favorite things. The table above, waiting for my sleepy family (though how they can sleep through so many delicious smells is beyond me), is set with lots of things that always make me chipper: a torn but super soft vintage tablecloth from a yard sale, embroidered napkins my parents brought back from a trip to Eastern Europe, an antique bowl that was obviously well loved even before it ended up in my hands, my sunny yellow teapot from my friend Julie, the oh-so-thin teacups that belonged to my husband's grandmother "Big" (and given to me by my kind mother-in-law Macky), cheery orange clementines in a turquoise glass bowl I got for $3 at Marshalls (the color combo makes me shiver, it's that beautiful, plus knowing what a great bargain I got on the bowl is so satisfying), and the banana nut oatmeal muffins I'm going to give you the recipe for! These muffins are fantastic, even though I vary the recipe a bit each time, depending on whether I actually have the ingredients I should and whether I remember how I've made them before (they're based on a mishmosh of several different muffin recipes). In fact, part of the reason I'm putting this up today was that they came out particularly well this week, and I still remember how I made them - so I thought I'd get the recipe on the internet for posterity so I can duplicate them when my memory deserts me again.

Banana Nut Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Muffins

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and grease 12 muffin cups (or prepare paper and foil cups)

1 1/4 cups flour (whole wheat white flour works great -- can substitute oat bran for the 1/4 cup)
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
1/2 cup sugar (I've used brown sugar on occasion and that's good too, but the texture's different)
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon (try one of the excellent cinnamons from Penzey's Spices)
1 cup mashed bananas (could probably substitute apple sauce or canned pumpkin too)
1 egg
1/3 cup canola oil (or other vegetable oil)
1/3 cup milk
1/2 cup chopped or ground walnuts
1/2 cup (or maybe a little more...) dark chocolate chips and/or dried cranberries or raisins (yuck, I say, especially compared to chocolate chips)

Combine the first 7 dry ingredients in a medium bowl. Mix the bananas, egg, oil and milk in another. Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and stir in the wet ones, mixing just until combined. Fold in the nuts and chocolate chips (or whatever), divide among the muffin cups (sometimes I stretch to make a few extras I can hide away for my elevenses on another day). Bake at 375 for 18 to 20 minutes until the muffins are golden brown and smell heavenly.

While they're baking make up some special coffee or tea and set the table with things that make you happy. Maybe some flowers too. Then share the muffins while they're still warm with nice people who won't mind if you whine a bit about the weather and how much you have to doooooo! (But first hide the ones you're saving - because any left on the table will get eaten.)

Happy Valentine's Day, belatedly! And even more importantly, a belated but no less sincere and gigantic thank you to Roz for giving me this great award! It made my day - and the last couple weeks too. I've been swamped with work, travel (for pleasure and work), kid stuff, snow days, and now a miserable virus too (probably inevitable after spending a full day with a class of snuffling kindergartners plus about 7 hours on planes at the beginning of the week, not to mention all the time I've spent standing in snow and slush this week, scraping and chipping to clear paths and vehicles).

Anyhow, to pass on the award, here are the details:
1. Write a post with links to 5 blogs that make me think and/or make my day.
2. Acknowledge the post of the award giver.
3. Display the “You Make my Day Award” logo
4. Tell the award winners that they have won by commenting on their blogs with the news.

It's hard to pick just five (kind of like choosing just five chocolates from the mega-assortment box), so I'm glad I don't have to count Roz's excellent blog as one of them (but make sure you check it out too, if you haven't already, especially if like me you adore fabric illustration). Anyhow, here are five blogs that spark my muse, all on different subject matter:

1. Julie Stiegemeyer of Jottings and Such (Julie introduced me to blogging and is the author of my Cheep books as well as tons of other charming children's books, and an incredibly dear friend and all around kind person).

2. Amy Karol of the much-read craft/mothering/interesting stuff blog Angry Chicken and author of the useful book Break-the-Rules Sewing. She's probably already received this award a zillion times, but it is one of my favorite blogs.

3. Danny Evans of the father-parenting blog, Dad Gone Mad. I recently discovered this blog, and I've been completely enjoying his male take on little people and parenting adventures. Warning for those with sensitive ears (eyes?) - he's a master of the irreverent phrase and creative use of four-letter words.

4. Kitty Griffin of Chocolate Ferrets and Writing for Kids which is a brand new blog (so it doesn't have many entries yet). Kitty is an amazing children's book writer (for all ages) as well as a screenwriter and some-time writing instructor in the MFA program in writing for kids at Chatham College in Pittsburgh. She's an outstanding teacher and mentor -- and she should consider this a gentle nag to post more! We want more! (says the, um, procrastinator/overwhelmed person who hasn't posted in more than 2 weeks....)

5. Susan vanHecke who's the talented author of the folktale I'm currently illustrating. I just discovered her blog recently too (I'm just plain embarrassed to say it didn't occur to me to look her up when I started working on her book), and I've really been enjoying it.

I also owe Susan a big apology (and some chocolate too) because I'm late with the art for her book (but I'm working hard on it! Really! It's just very complex and detailed!), so the pub date will have to be pushed back. I've been late with artwork before - I'm still new enough to book illustration that it's hard for me to gauge how much time I need - but this is the first time (and I hope only time) I've been so late that I screwed up a pub date. I feel terrible - but that just means I'll have to make sure the final art is as near to perfect as I can get it and thus worth the wait.

Okay, back to the drawing table. Well, to the kitchen table, where the sewing machine is parked and calling to me, snuffly nose and all.