Thursday, October 13, 2011

October Sewing

Here are some projects I've made so far this month:



Lady bugs!



Gifts for family



Shorts/shirt/hat for a field trip to Fort Christmas



Gardening pants with lots of great details:  Belt loops, clip (from a dog leash!), wrap around pockets, back pockets that overlap the wrap arounds, padded knees, and a roll up, snap up hem.  


Applique detail - freezer paper stencil combined with hand stitching



The Finished outfit! 
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Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Science and color mixing

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Today's Schoolwork:

Go to Mr Science Class at the rec center.

Today we made slime!



Slime:
elmer's glue (white school glue)
borax (find this by the laundry soap)
water
baby oil (other oil will work too, whatever you have on hand is fine!)

Mix elmer's glue 50/50 with water, add food coloring if you would like. In another container, mix some borax with water - the more you put, the stiffer your slime will be, so start with a spoonful and you can add more if needed. You can add food coloring to this too and make it into a color mixing lesson.

Now mix the two solutions together and watch what happens!

Take out the resulting glob and kneed it to make sure everything is well mixed. Add a couple drops of oil and kneed some more. Store in an airtight container otherwise it will dry out.



In Mr. Science class, we held slime races by mixing slime with different consistencies (and different colors to help designate), place each blob in a funnel (ours were made from plastic bottles), and watch which one drips fastest. You can also put globs at the top of a wall, but probably try that one outside....






Other homeschool work for the day:

Cutting, using a Kumon workbook. Levi made a paper necklace.
Tracing letters (l, i, t)
and to extend our science project this morning, I had Levi do a color mixing experiment (I'm watching him do this now)

Color mixing:
small clear cups/containers (I used tupperware)
food coloring (red/yellow/blue)
eye dropper
color chart




Levi's assignment was to mix colors to figure out which 2 colors were needed to make green, orange and purple. We've done color mixing before, so he figured it out fairly quickly, but this is still always a fun experiment. He also had to color in the color chart to show what colors added together to make the secondary colors.

- Hint - at easter time, try this with leftover egg dye!


And now... off to soccer practice!
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Introduction

Welcome to my new blog!

For those who don't know me personally, my name is Leigh-Ann, and I am a single mom to my 4yr old son, Levi. We live in sunny Florida with my parents, right by the beach. I sew just about anything you can think of, teach sewing lessons at JoAnn Fabrics, teach Sunday school at a Unitarian Universalist Church, and homeschool my little guy! We are also part of an awesome natural parenting group, Brevard Natural Moms.


So in the past, I've had a blogs for just updates on my son, and for a homeschool group that never really took off. And I've been meaning to do one for all of the sewing projects that I do!

I've decided to combine it all here, at The Little Sewing Shop. At our house, my sewing room is also my son Levi's homeschool space. Generally, while I'm sewing, he is working on school!

Here on my new blog you will find my latest sewing and other crafty creations including things I've made for Levi as well as in-stock items and spots for custom orders. You will also see posts about what we are doing as far as homeschooling, so I can keep myself accountable, keep track of what Levi is doing, and share my ideas with you!

I'm hoping I'll be able to make this blog look better than ones I've done in the past, the formatting of online information is still a challenge for me, so I'm doing my best.

Welcome to my blog, and enjoy!