Blog | Sesame Seed Designs

I Feel So Official

May 3rd, 2009 by Casey

I have a brand new website! I decided that I need a more official web presence so I bought my own domain name – ThinkingMamaDesigns.com- a while back. I’ve finally finished building my website (with lots of help from Mike) and it’s actually up on the web! My blog will stay here for now but eventually we’ll get it integrated with the website as well. Please go check it out and let me know what you think! So far only a handful of people have seen it so I’d love some honest feedback. Here’s a screen shot of the home page.

Adding to my feeling of being an official business, Etsy picked one of my baby hats made from a green recycled sweater to grace its front page on Earth Day. I’m in a screen shot mood so here’s a picture of that.

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Tags: etsy, ThinkingMama

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Inspired

Apr 28th, 2009 by Casey

Oh spring, I do love thee. There’s nothing like a walk in the woods, or just in the neighborhood, to find some gorgeous crafty inspiration.

Why not start in my own backyard?’ I do wage war on dandelions each spring but when it comes down to it, it’s hard for the scientist in me to not admire these tough little plants. with their long roots and hardy seeds that disperse far across the yard with the slightest breeze, they seem perfectly evolved to take over the neighborhood.

Then there are the flowers- bright yellow sunbursts. They deserve a little admiration.

Crabapple trees are blooming down the street.

And a neighbor has these cute, tiny blue flowers filling their yard.

I love seeing the beautiful trilliums appear in the forest. I love that their color varies from white

trillium-grandiflorum2

to pale pink

to deep purple.

All of the images are of coin purses/pouches made from recycled wool and cashmere sweaters. Some are available in my etsy shop now and the rest will be added soon.

I’m inspired to go create some more. Where do you find inspiration?

Tags: ThinkingMama

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1 Reason to Not Hate Redding, CA

Apr 24th, 2009 by Casey

Okay, so maybe hate is too strong of a word for a city that I have only passed through on road trips but let me tell you a few things about it.

-It’s hot, really hot. Most of my drives through Redding happen during the summer and I am not a lover of hot weather.

-Redding was the site of our “Worst Pizza Ever” dining experience.

-It’s confusing. The lovely (okay, mostly boring), straight, easy to follow I5 crosses another highway in Redding, making it difficult to get back to I5 if you get off at the wrong place.

-Then there’s this Redding story:’ 7 years ago Mike and I moved from California to Washington. Mike and his brother, Mark,’ (and a cat) drove the moving van and I followed in our car (also with a cat- the one who never shut up.)’ This was before everyone had a cell phone and I didn’t have one. What we did have were cb radios so we could talk to each other. When they worked. Now, you never really notice how many U-Haul trucks are on the road until you are trying to follow one. The one we rented had Arizona plates and a particular scene painted in the side so it was fairly easy to keep track of. Then came Redding. Mike exited I5 onto the other highway, which I thought was strange. Maybe they were looking for a bathroom break?’ But we had recently stopped at a rest area. Hmmm. I tried to use the CB radio to ask them what they were doing but they didn’t answer. I pulled in to the other lane and sped up to get along side of them so I could wave and give them the “where are we going?” shrug. That’s when I saw that the driver of the U-Haul wasn’t Mike. I had been following the WRONG U-Haul on the WRONG highway! I was totally lost and had to stop and call Mike from a pay phone, which, come to think of it, may have been the last time I used one of those relics. I eventually met up with them at a rest stop 30 miles or so north and I kept a closer watch for the rest of the trip.

After so many years, I have finally found something good in Redding! The Turtle Bay Exploration Park (sweetened by the fact that we got in free thanks to our OMSI membership) made an awesome rest stop on our road trip with the toddler! It’s close to the highway and there was no getting lost. We saw lots of cool animals and walked across the gorgeous Sundial Bridge. On the other side of the bridge is a large botanical garden but we didn’t venture that far due to the chilly wind.

There was also a nice outdoor play area for kiddos and a nice spot to have our picnic lunch before getting back in the car for 7 more hours.

My favorite part? The gecko exhibit and this cool one with the equally cool name. I must admit that were I on the naming committee (if such a thing existed) for this guy and I heard the suggestion of Satanic Leaf-Tailed gecko, I probably would have argued against putting such an evil-sounding name on a cool little creature. What’s done is done so I may as well enjoy it now. I don’t know about the satanic part, but his tail sure does look like a leaf!

Tags: travel

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I'm gonna be a spinner!

Apr 19th, 2009 by Casey

Look at my newest toy! I love her already. Apparently so does Sesame.

It’s an Ashford Traveller and I bought it from a really sweet family who used to own a bunch of sheep but they’ve sold their land and haven’t had sheep for quite a few years. They were sad to be selling their spinning wheels but they took a lot of time and showed me how to use it and even gave me a bunch of wool from their sheep.

So I spun some. It’s not great but I’m happy because it’s the fist yarn I’ve spun on a wheel and it’s not completely ugly. (I did take a drop spindle class a while back but maybe I shouldn’t tell you that lest you think I should be a better spinner than I am. I never did it enough to get good at it so I feel like I’m starting all over here.)

I fully realize that what I’m about to say could totally change in the next few months so just bear with me and try not to laugh. I don’t really want to spin wool. My drive for getting the spinning wheel is that I really want to spin the fiber from my angora bunnies. Right now, that’s kind of it. I know, angora is slippery and hard to spin and I should learn to spin with wool first. Okay, I will. But I’ll still try the angora, since I have a free supply and can mess up all I want.

It’s heavenly. I can’t wait until I can spin it well.

On the chicken front: Our chicks are getting big! They are pretty much fully feathered now and I hardly recognized them after not seeing them for 8 days. This is what they looked like a few days before we went on vacation. They were 4 weeks old then. the still had puffs of downy feather around their necks and they were small!

Today they turned 6 weeks old and they got their first outside adventure to celebrate. They were very reluctant at first, what with frightening green grass and all, but eventually I dumped them out of their box and seemed to enjoy it. It was so cute to see them pecking at the grass and flapping their not-so-little wings.

Tags: chickens, spinning

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Easter Adventures

Apr 15th, 2009 by Casey

12 hours in the car with a toddler isn’t so bad. Maybe it’s just my amazing trooper of a kid but I’m tempted to even’ say that the drive from Portland to the Bay Area was fun. I realize that sounds crazy but crayons, knitting and books on CD go a long way- 600 miles even.

Here are some highlights from our Easter and Grandparent extravaganza:

1. We were able to find a happy vegetarian, organic breakfast place when we stopped in Medford, OR on our drive down. I never would have guessed. (Of course, Sesame mostly just ate butter.)

2. Stop #1 was Mill Valley, CA to stay with Mike’s parents and Sesame tried her hand at dying Easter eggs.

A few eggs were smushed in the process and she did taste the dye but we managed to get a bunch of pretty eggs at the end.

3. She got the hang of the Easter egg hunt pretty quickly, though at first she pointed to the eggs and wanted someone else to do the hard work of actually picking it up and putting it in her basket.

She sure spent a lot of time admiring her pretty eggs!

4. Grandma Diane made a fabulous coconut cake for an early Easter dinner.

Okay, the cake was for dessert, not dinner, but it was the highlight. Thanks to Grandma, Sesame got her first taste of cake batter and loved it, of course.

5. We met my mom at Traintown and waded through a sea of a thousand excited toddlers. Here are the 2 grandmas together on the train. The best part was the petting zoo but we were too busy feeding the animals to take any pictures.

6. Off to Napa to stay with my mom for a few days and Easter egg hunt #2, this one actually on Easter.

Sesame got smart this time and didn’t let the basket hold her back. She set down her basket in a central location and then ran back and forth from egg to basket. Yes, I did make her dress. It’s the same pattern as this one and I’ll share some better pictures another time.

7. We visited a friend’s chickens and had fun feeding them pretzels and trying to catch one so we could pet it.