Create!

Is Snow-Proof Safety Cone my alter-ego? My inanimate object best friend? One of my many whimsical distractions from the reality of life? Who knows…probably all of the above. What I DO know, is that Snow-Proof Safety Cone went on his first road trip, from New York City to Pittsburgh, a 7-hour drive through the winding hills of Pennsylvania and inclement weather of winter, with the proverbial truck stop in the midst of it all. Want to read about said road trip?

I hereby give you, Snow-Proof Safety Cone’s Road Trip Adventure.

It’s Snow-Proof Safety Cone, drying off after his first bath! He gets kinda dirty bopping around everywhere so I gave him a little bath with a washcloth, soap and water. Now it’s radiator time! Dry, Safety Cone, dry! So I can play with you again. But you do look pretty adorable drying on your side like that.

Christmas (his first!) came early this year for little Snow-Proof Safety Cone in the form of a carefully thought-out mix for safety cones and humans alike: <) < 3 (2008). It would take one creative person to make such an apt collection of music! (It wasn’t me–I’m not tooting my own horn thank you very much!)

After his mama stared dumbly at iTunes for a good two minutes, she finally saw the “import cd” button and imported away, because Snow-Proof Safety Cone is all fancy-pants and uses an iPod. A “vintage” one at that, but that’s the hipster in him, I guess.

He really likes Jack Johnson’s “We’re going to be friends” because it’s about his safety cone friends, how they “safely walk to school without a sound” and the “teacher marks our height against the wall” and “we sit side by side in every class.”

Yes, I can tell that we are gonna be friends.

Snow-Proof Safety Cone realizes that he is not mentioned at all in the TimeOut article, nor is his picture there, so he quickly loses interest and decides to pose for the camera instead. I fed him the line that your parents feed you when you don’t get the lead role in the school play or your science fair project doesn’t win anything: “It’ll give you something to work towards in the future and it was still a meaningful experience.”

Let’s take a time out from all of the Safety Cone a Day posts for just a moment. Did I just say “time out?” What I meant was TimeOut! (I think that was a clever transition?) Anyway! I’ve written about Crafts and Crumbs, the sporadically-held crafting and eating afternoon I have at my apartment, but this may mark the first time someone else has written about it. (Don’t quote me on that–I’m a space cadet!) And that someone else is none other than TimeOut New York, a publication I’ve subscribed to for many years. They paid us a visit a few weeks ago and crafted a wonderful article about it for their Holiday issue. Behold, Saturday, 3pm at Crafts and Crumbs. Or take a look at the scanned version of the “real thing” on my Flickr. (Click on All Sizes to read!)

Switching gears, I’ve been taking some time out (okay, last time I swear!) to make my handmade holidays happen. While I’ve been making gifts for other others, i.e., via Etsy and boutique sales, I’m gradually working on gifts for MY others. Crochet- and soap-wise, let’s just say that I’m a bit tapped out. Averaging 15 items a day can do that to you! Have I mentioned the craft thing is a side gig? Yeah. I’m going almost exclusively the edible route this year, specifically teaching myself how to make candy–toffee, taffy, caramels, pralines, peanut brittle, fudge and divinity–and maybe crafting up some containers or wrapping for everything. I absolutely LOVE the process of making candy because it is so precise when it comes to time and temperature. I have always been fascinated by the “science of food,” the hows and whys of meringue, bread rising, cornstarch thickening and the list goes on and on.

After the jump is my English Toffee recipe. My rule of thumb for candy-making and pie-baking is this: don’t look for shortcuts, be patient and enjoy the process.
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