Craft Resolution

Tissue Case

2012-01-03T09:32:00.006-05:00

Happy New Year! I thought I'd share with you this cute little tissue case that I made as a Christmas gift to go with the makeup bag. In case you want to make one of your own, I found the tutorial here. The fabric was from Jo-Ann's.

Happy 2012!

Banner Makeup Bag

2011-12-29T11:17:00.004-05:00

I made the cutest makeup bag as a gift from this tutorial on Just Another Hang Up.

The directions were super easy to follow so I suggest you go make one too!

Scrabble Piece Trivets

2011-12-13T16:19:00.007-05:00

I made a (kind of late) apartment warming gift for a friend. Scrabble piece trivets! I based mine off of the scrabble coaster found here.
I didn't have any random scrabble pieces lying around, but Michaels Arts and Crafts sells them. Sadly without the point value in the cornere, but they're still cute.

I'm crossing my fingers that they don't burst into flame or something when you place an actual hot dish on them. I'm sure they won't..... Probably.....

Family Portrait Session

2011-12-06T10:42:00.008-05:00

I got hired to do a family portrait session! It was my first, so I'm exited to share a few of my favorites.
It was the day before Thanksgiving, and pretty chilly out, but they were all good sports about trampling outside to get a few shots.

I guess they have an inside joke about all being a bunch of nuts, so they asked if I could make an image (as a surprise to their father) of all of the girls sitting in nut shells. I think it came out really cute!
I'm hoping to do more of this sort of thing in the future. It was a ton of fun!

Crocheted Cascading Scarf

2011-11-18T11:50:00.005-05:00

I just crocheted myself a new scarf to get me through winter.

If you want to make one for yourself, here are the directions!

Ch 200 (or until you're at the length you want your scarf to be.)

Row 1: Sc in second chain from hook. Sc along to end. Ch 3. Turn

(I did a second row like this thinking it would make the scarf a bit wider, but I don't think it's necessary.)

Row 2: Dc in stitch at base of turning chain. (1 dc in next sc, 2 dc in next sc.) Repeat to end. Chain 4. Turn.

Row 3: Trc into stitch at base of turning chain. (1 trc in next dc, 2 trc in next dc) repeat to end. Chain 5. Turn.

Row 4: Dtr into stitch at base of turning chain. (1 Dtr in trc, 2 dtr in next trc) repeat until end. Chain 1. Turn.

Fasten off. Weave in ends.

Done!

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T11:22:00.001-04:00

Our extra cheap Halloween Costumes this year.
Happy Halloween!

Monster Birthday Party

2011-10-17T13:39:00.006-04:00

This week is Brian's 30th birthday! So naturally I had a monster themed birthday party for him. My friend and I made him this awesome pinata.
I went to Party City to get monster themed supplies, but it turns out Monster isn't really a theme that they carry. So I went to the dollar store and got plastic green cups and googley eyes, and glued them on with some Elmers glue. A few eyes were lost during the party, but surprisingly, most of them stayed on.
Last, but not least, Brian requested german chocolate cake, so I added some green food coloring to the frosting, and turned the cake into....MONSTER CAKE.
And that's how you have a monster themed birthday party for your 30 year old husband.

Camera Strap Cover

2011-10-11T10:26:00.006-04:00

As I mentioned, I just got a pretty new camera. So to make it even more pretty, I sewed it a Camera Strap Cover followingg this tutorial.

It was pretty easy and could be made from a fabric scrap you have laying around, so I highly suggest making one for yourself!

Camera Bag Purse

2011-10-10T16:31:00.007-04:00

I just purchased a new (to me) Nikon D700 camera. Naturally I'm paranoid that something is going to happen to it. It will get stolen, or, I'll do what I always do and throw my purse on the ground with my camera inside. While my other camera survived such abuse, I didn't want to take my chances with this camera, and after deciding that I couldn't spend over $100 for a jill-e camera bag (it wasn't that hard...I did just buy a new camera...), I looked up tutorials for camera bag purses online.

I came across this tutoria l from Tales of a Wife and thought I'd give it a go. I found a cute purple bag at Burlington Coat Factory for just under $20. I was due for a new purse anyway, so I didn't feel too guilty about that.

I would have followed the tutorial exactly, but that's when I realized that my purse wasn't big enough for the 1" foam padding that I had bought, AND my camera. So I did a modified, much quicker version. I simply put padding in the bottom of the purse (covered in some left over fabric), then made a padded divider which was attached with some self-stick Velcro. Very easy.

Not quite as protected as in a regular camera bag, but at least there's some protection at the bottom, and everything else in my purse won't be attacking my poor camera. Plus, it's hidden well and zips right up so no one even knows I'm carrying a camera!

Photo Lightbox

2011-10-07T11:00:00.007-04:00

I've been wanting to try some food photography lately and I thought the best way was to use some sort of lightbox. But for some reason, they're ridiculously expensive. So I thought, I wonder if I could make my own? It's just a white box...

So off to google I went. Turns out lots of people have made their own lightboxes. I based mine off this one (and various other ones on other blogs).

It's pretty much just a cardboard box I found laying around the house, with three large squares cut out of it, and white fabric duct taped over them. High tech? Maybe not, but it did the trick and it didn't take very long to make. I got 3 lights from home depot, which were the most expensive part of the project. I think they cost $20 total.

Here's how it looks.

And my first test shot of the piggy bank I painted for Brian a few years ago.

Not bad for a cardboard box. Here's the fried tofu we had for dinner.

Bet you wish you had some. But you don't. Because you haven't built a lightbox yet have you? Well build a lightbox, and the tofu will come.

Family Room Renovation

2011-09-01T15:54:00.008-04:00

When we moved into our new house a little over a year ago, the family room looked like this.

You know, that nice old wood paneling, worn down carpeting, popcorn ceiling look? Was that ever a good look? I have my doubts. Anyway, one day we took a sander to the ceiling and starting tearing down that paneling. It was an epic battle that you can see from my selfportrait here.

There was drywall underneath, but Brian put a good amount of effort into patching and making sure it was all smooth before I painted. He and my father also installed some nice new windows. Unlike the old windows, these windows open AND close. And even lock! I know, fancy right?

We had a new carpet installed, purchased a new fan/light, and hung some white curtains that I found at Target for about $30 for both panels. The curtain rod is also from Target.

The bookshelves we actually salvaged from our neighbors curb. They were a wood color before, but I painted them black. Because I like black and after the whole wood paneling thing, I can't say I'm a fan of fake wood. I also bought a couch cover from Walmart which makes our old, hand-me-down couch look pretty awesome. With all that, plus my piano from my parents house, our family room actually looks lived in! And not by crazy, wood panel loving people either.

Garden

2011-08-25T09:57:00.004-04:00

It's been a busy but awesome month! Two of our best friends got married, and I got to be the matron of honor! Also, we have just a few finishing touches left, but the family room is mostly renovated, and I will post photos soon.

In the meantime, our garden finally started going CRAZY so here's a photo of it from my selfportrait project.

Chalkboard Paint Jars

2011-08-09T09:29:00.009-04:00

Remember how I said here that I bought a whole bunch of jars and filled them with lemons for centerpieces at the wedding? Well I did. Surprisingly, quite a few people walked off with them after the wedding. I guess they wanted their own jar filled with lemons? I did have a few left over that I hadn't used, plus a few that no one took.

When I was at Pier 1 Imports a few weeks ago, soaking up inspiration for these pillows, I saw quite a few glass objects that had chalkboard paint on them. So I applied the idea to my jars, using some chalkboard paint I purchased awhile ago from Home Depot.

First I took painters tape and tore it down the middle to create a torn edge, and placed the tape around where I wanted the chalkboard paint applied.

Then I painted. Most of the coats I painted on horizontally, but I added a layer or two that were vertical, just for texture. It took quite a few coats, but each one dried pretty quickly.

I peeled the tape off, filled the jars with different foods, like cornstarch, sugar, chocolate chips, etc. And labeled each one in chalk.

I'm displaying them on the bakers rack we purchased recently from Amazon, next to a few cookbooks.

Pretty AND practical!

Second Ruffled Pillow

2011-08-08T13:28:00.005-04:00

Using the same idea that I used in this pillow, I made a second pillow, this time in black and white. I also made a larger plain red pillow and plain black pillow.
Here's how the couch looks now with the new couch cover and pillows!

Ruffled Pillow Tutorial

2011-08-01T09:57:00.013-04:00

We finally got a slip cover for the old couch we have. It went into our newly renovated family room, so I thought it could use some new pretty pillows. I saw some ruffled pillows at Pier 1 Imports that I thought were cute, but they were almost $30 each on sale, and I thought, psh, I will make our couch FOUR pillows for that price.
I decided to do two small pillows with lots of ruffles, and two plain larger pillows to sit behind them for when Brian started complaining that he couldn't put his head on the giant ruffles. You can see the plain black one behind it, and here is one of the ruffle pillows I just finished. The next one will be a little different, but it's not done yet. So that will be posted later.

We purchased drapes from Target awhile ago for the bedroom, and I ended up shortening them quite a bit. So I used the left over material for my ruffle. I cut off the ends of the drapes, which was already folded over and hemmed for me.

After reading a few tutorials online, I learned that if you turn the stitch length and tension on your sewing machine to the highest numbers, the sewing machine will gather the material as you sew.

It looked like this once I had done that.

I then cut out a large square of felt.

A normal person who wants their pillow to go through the washing machine in the future should probably sew this part. I went the lazy route and got my glue gun out and began gluing the fabric down to the felt, starting at the outside, and working my way around and in.

Each round overlapped the one before a bit so the felt wouldn't show, and then I just tucked the material in at the middle and glued it down.

Again, a smart person would probably sew the ruffle to the pillow.
I glued it...

It looks pretty dandy though!

Wedding Love letter Ceremony

2011-07-25T09:19:00.007-04:00

Instead of unity candles or having a sand ceremony, we opted for a love letter ceremony. I found the idea here, if you'd like to read more about it. The idea is to write each other love letters, then seal them in a box on your wedding day. The letters should contain the reasons you chose to marry, so if you ever face tough times during your marriage you can read the letters and hopefully they will get you through. On most of the websites I found, they suggested getting a larger box and putting a bottle of your favorite wine, and two cups in it, and drinking the wine while reading your letters. Since Brian isn't a wine fan though, we chose to skip that part, and get a smaller box to just hold the letters.

Our best man held the box for us and presented it when the judge marrying us asked for it. He was also holding the rings. He is a very talented man. Unless you want your best man holding three things though and trying to juggle all three, perhaps giving the box to someone else might be a good idea. It did create some laughs though.

This is what we had the judge say for this part of the ceremony.

"Kathleen and Brian have chosen as a couple to perform a Love Letter ceremony.

They have each separately prepared an envelop for the other that contains a letter they have written. The letters describe the good qualities they find in one another, the reasons they fell in love, and their reasons for choosing to marry. The letters are sealed and they have not seen what the other has written. Kathleen and Brian will place their envelopes in this box and intend to keep the box in a place of honor prominently displayed in their home as a constant reminder of their commitment to each other.

As with any aspect of life, marriage has its cycles, its ups and downs, its trial and triumphs. Kathleen and Brian, should you ever find your marriage enduring insurmountable hardships, you are to, as a couple, open this box and read the letters you wrote to one another when you were united as a couple in marriage. By reading these letters you will reflect upon the reasons you fell in love and chose to marry each other here today.

Kathleen and Brian, you may place your letters in the box and close it."

We then together tied a ribbon around the box.
Currently the box is sitting on our bookshelf in the living room. I'm sure it will move around over the years, but hopefully we will remember it if we ever need it.

Wedding Blurb Guest Book

2011-07-22T13:18:00.008-04:00

My maid of honor took lots of awesome engagement photos for me and Brian over the two years that we were engaged. I'm all for making things serve more than one purpose, and I love making photo album books, so I used the images to make my guest book double as a photo album.

I put the album out on a table at the wedding with this sign that I designed and printed on cardstock.

The book was about 25 pages, with anywhere from 1-3 photos on each page. I used a few different layouts for the photos, and added lines for people to sign on.

I added full bleed images on a few of the pages to mix it up. Love those!

I had the book printed at blurb.com where I've printed all my other photo album books. Overall, they do a really nice job. The colors are great and I love the gray first page that they recently added to all of their books. If you sign up for their emails, they will occasionally email you coupon codes for a percentage off or something like that. They also have a variety of options, and are great for people like me who want complete control over the design of their books. I just had to upload my PDF and they do a check to make sure everything is print ready.

Now instead of having a photo album of our engagement photos AND a guest book, they're all combined into one! We got plenty of compliments on it at the wedding too!

Bachelorette Party Wine Glass

2011-07-21T09:27:00.006-04:00

Just for fun, I decorated a giant wine glass for the bride-to-be to drink from throughout the night of the bachelorette party. I'm not sure decorating a glass with lace and rhinestones is practical for everyday wine drinking, but it sure did make a fun cup for one night!

Bridal Shower Games & Sign

2011-07-20T08:55:00.009-04:00

I forgot to take good photo documentation of these, so you'll just have to put up with digital files. At the shower, we filled one table with little random things. It held two framed photos that I had printed of the couple and a 'congratulations' sign with their names and date of the wedding. The design matched the invitations that I posted here.

There was also a vase filled with taffy and an olive oil bottle filled with yogurt covered raisens, both from the dollar store. There was a 'Guess How Many' sign in front of them with little sheets of paper to write your name and your number guess for each. Note my oh-so-helpful hint.

About a half hour into the shower, we had the bride disappear outside, and each of the guests had to draw everything they remembered about what she was wearing. The more details the drawing included, the more points you would win. I unkindly included more unhelpful hints at the bottom of these like "Hint: Elysia has a nose" and "Hint: Elysia is wearing clothes (mostly likely)."

One of the bridesmaids bought some pretty awesome prizes for the games. You can see the number guessing game, one of the framed photos, and the album for the postcards in the background.

Bridal Shower Centerpieces

2011-07-15T09:26:00.012-04:00

For the bridal shower, I wasn't terribly sure what to do for centerpieces. I had a vague idea for something bouquet like, in a vase that wasn't real and was extra cheap, but I hadn't really pinned down how it would look until I went into the dollar store and saw these stick like things.
I bought three packages of the sticks, and 6 vases while I was there. I also used some white and black ribbon that was laying around my house from my wedding, which had also come from the dollar store. I used the ribbon to make the flowers in the bouquet using a tutorial I found online. For the life of me, I can't refind that tutorial, but if you google lace flowers, or ribbon flowers, a lot of really nice tutorials come up. I might just have to try making some of them for myself later.

I wrapped really wide, black ribbon (which was also laying around my house for some reason) around the base of the vases and kept them in place with a small piece of double sided tape between the ribbon and the vace. Then I made another flower using this tutorial. It required a piece of felt that I cut in a circle, a bunch of lace, and a button in the middle. The best part of all these flowers was no sewing involved! Just hot glue. Good thing I have a ton of that left over from college!

I thought they needed something more, so I stuck a feather in each one that I had left over from the lace corsages I had made.

And here they are on the tables! Cute, cheap centerpieces!

Bridal Shower Favors: Origami Fabric Boxes

2011-07-14T08:40:00.007-04:00

For my friend's shower, I made little cloth black and white boxes filled with chocolate as the favor.
I used this tutorial from How About Orange, except instead of using store bought fabric stiffener, I made a cornstarch/water mixture in the microwave which seemed to work fine and was extra cheap to make.
I tied ribbon around them that I purchased from the dollar store.

Ta-da!

Bridal Shower Invitation & Postcards

2011-07-13T13:30:00.007-04:00

I designed some pretty cute (if I do say so myself) invitations for my friend's shower. I had a whole lot of old watercolor paper laying around that I never used from high school, and figured it would be the perfect texture for the invitation design. I was surprised how easily the paper went through our printer and how awesome it looked when it came out.
The bride-to-be collects postcards, so in addition to the invitation, I found a website with scanned images of old (as early as 1900) postcards from different locations that I could download. All I had to do was type in the city/town that I wanted and it came up with a whole variety of images. So I downloaded images from all the locations the guests were from, and printed them on the same watercolor paper, with the image on one side, and the bride and groom's name, address, and a placeholder "stamp" on the back.
In their envelope, each guest received their invitation, a postcard from where they lived (every postcard was different), and a little slip, also printed on watercolor paper, that read "Send your well wishes to the happy couple! Bring this postcard with a personal message for the bride and groom to the shower or mail it after. Whatever you do, don't give up the surprise!"

Bridal Shower Corsages: Flower Power

2011-07-12T12:59:00.010-04:00

I get to be the matron of honor at my friend's (who was my MOH 2 weeks ago) wedding in a month and a half. So I had some fun doing shower stuff over the past month. Ok more like the past two weeks because I had to get my wedding out of the way first. But in an effort not to procrastinate toooo much, I did put the corsages together quite awhile ago. I made one for the bride, everyone in the bridal party, including the cute flower girl, and both the mother of the groom and the mother of the bride.
I got the directions for the flower part here, and then added a black feather, a paper leaf with the person's title, and a pin on the back. Good thing I have a surplus of hot glue left over from my college days.

I'm pretty proud of my handy work. So cute!

Wedding Decorations & Cake

2011-07-11T09:55:00.010-04:00

To make fairly low cost centerpieces for the wedding, I purchased a whole lot of jars from the Christmas Tree Store and filled them with lemons. I sewed some gingham squares to tie some blue into them.

I printed out table numbers I had designed and had them displayed on very cheap easels I had bought on ebay.

I love desserts, so instead of having one big traditional wedding cake, we decided to have 3 smaller cakes, each with a different flavor. The top cake was lemon, the middle one was carrot (Brian's favorite) and the bottom cake was chocolate. We kept the decorations simple and to a minimum and placed a K&B caketopper that I purchased on etsy.com on top.

Mmmmm...

Photos by Robinfoxphotography.com!

Wedding Favors & Placesettings

2011-07-08T13:52:00.005-04:00

For the wedding, we decided to do favors and table place cards all rolled into one. I'm a big fan of favors that can be eaten, so I baked giant chocolate chip cookies on sticks, and then my maid of honor and I spent an afternoon dipping them in chocolate and wrapping them up. We tied tags I had designed and printed onto each that said the person's name and table number.
I didn't want them just laying out on a table when you walked in, so I purchased 4 cheap wooden planters from the Christmas Tree Store and painted them white. I then bought large rectangles of that foam stuff they sell at craft stores, cut them to fit inside the planters, and then covered the foam with some green moss, also purchased at JoAnn Fabrics.
We stuck the lollipop cookies into the foam so they would stand straight up and ta-da! Cute favors/placesettings/decoration when you first walked into our reception!

Wedding Flowers

2011-07-07T11:45:00.007-04:00

I went to Wegmans to order flowers for my wedding a few months ago. I went there with a dollar amount in my head that I hoped the flowers would be less than. When the total was about $150 above that I was a little sad. And also a tad embarrased when the woman said I had unrealistic expectations. All I needed was a bouquet for me, one for each of my three bridesmaids and a few corsages. How hard is that? I had no intention of leaving the fate of my bouquet in my own unexperienced hands, and the corsages weren't terribly expensive to order, but I thought perhaps we could handle the bridesmaids bouquets. So I told the florest not to bother with those, and when we went to pick up the flowers that I did order, my bridesmaids and I went through the floral section and picked up a few cheap-ish bouquets.

(photos by robinfoxphotography.com)

Right before we put our dresses on before the ceremony, my maid of honor and I spent about 20 minutes wrapping the flowers we had purchased with floral tape and white ribbon from JoAnn Fabrics.. For all 3 bouquets I think I spent about $35. Not too bad. And they came out great!

Wedding Jewelry

2011-07-06T14:18:00.007-04:00

I wanted to tie the yellow shoes and blue dresses that my bridesmaids were wearing for the wedding into their necklaces. When I didn't find anything I really liked online (at least not for a good price) I headed off to a beadstore nearbye and my maid of honor and I watched a girly movie while stringing necklaces.

I purchased a necklace for myself online, but two weeks before the wedding I tried it on with the dress and it just did not go at all. It was way too chunky...So back to the bead store we went. I have to give my maid of honor the credit for stringing that one. At that point I had quite the to-do list so she took pity on me and took that project over. But who would have thought I'd end up wearing a necklace that cost about $5....

I didn't get a chance to pull out my camera much the day of the wedding, so these last two photos are from our wonderful photographer Robin Fox (robinfoxphotography.com).

3D Lemon Wedding Invitations

2011-06-29T11:30:00.007-04:00

Brian and I both love blue, so I wanted to use that as a wedding color. But after seeing countless blue wedding schemes, I decided we needed a little something else. I saw lemons used for decoration on some of the wedding blogs out there, and said, lets do blue and yellow!

When I went to do the invitations, I told Brian I was going to make them pop out. Literally. So I made these fun invitations with elastic bands inside. They lay flat in the envelop, but when you take them out, the elastic pulls the edges inward, making them pop open so they can stand on their own.
We also decided to save a stamp and envelop by making an RSVP email address included on the invitation. We included a phone number too, just in case, but almost everyone used the email address.
Cute huh?!

Married!

2011-06-28T16:58:00.004-04:00

We got ourselves married! More on all the details later.

Wedding Photog

2011-06-21T14:48:00.006-04:00

I got to photograph a lovely wedding a few weeks ago. Since I was just the second photographer along for the ride, I didn't think I should go plastering the bride and grooms faces on the internet without their permission, but since rings don't have to sign model releases I thought I'd at least share that. The colors make me happy.

The constant lookout for interesting new foods

2011-06-07T15:30:00.004-04:00

Apparently these are Kumquats.
Hello Kumquats!
I found them in Wegmans and since they were little and cute, I decided to try a few. Not my favorite, but aren't they photogenic?

Wedding Save the Dates

2011-06-06T08:59:00.004-04:00

I haven't posted anything in forever, not because I haven't worked on anything, just because I've been extra busy! With both wedding stuff and house stuff. Since the wedding is in (ack!) less than three weeks I thought I'd start posting updates for that. Here was our save the date card!

365 Days of Self Portraits

2011-02-23T09:25:00.003-05:00

I've decided to do the project 365 Days - a self portrait a day for 365. I got the idea from my friend Jenn over at Art Seven Days A Week who did the project for a year and loved it so much she decided to start over and do a second year. I'm about 2 weeks in and loving it! It's nice to have a set reason to take a photograph every day. Here's the link to my photos!

And also a photo just for good measure.

I give you my hearts

2011-02-16T11:45:00.004-05:00

I'm a little late, but Happy Valentine's Day (week)!

My friend Elysia and I put together some fun little valentine's for the occasion.

The House: Master Bedroom

2010-12-30T08:16:00.015-05:00

Who puts orange carpeting in a house? Apparently the people who built our house. When we first moved in, the carpeting in our master bedroom was a lovely shade of orange. Great for Halloween. And hiding who knows what. But not so great for sleeping and relaxing.

So naturally we tore that out before putting any furniture in the room.
And got a pretty new gray carpet. Here's our bedroom now after a few coats of paint, a new carpet, and some nice new decorations.

Window Frame

2010-12-29T09:23:00.008-05:00

Along with the ties, Brian's aunt also gave me this awesome old window frame.
Isn't it cool looking?
I sanded it down a little and filled in some holes. Then I painted it and filled it with fabric and photos taken by me and my two awesome friends Jenn (of Art Seven Days a Week) and Elysia. We took them for this project.
It's now hanging on our dark gray wall in our master bedroom. More pictures of that later. Maybe even tomorrow!

New Purse For Me!

2010-12-27T09:16:00.003-05:00

I spent a little of my holiday time off making myself a new purse. Merry Christmas to me!

Merry Christmas! Chai & Hot Cocoa

2010-12-23T09:55:00.008-05:00

Know what makes a good Christmas present? Anything food. Also beverage. Also homemade because it can be amazingly cheap yet still look all pretty and impressive and everyone will say, "Did you really make these?" And you will say, "Why yes I did," and feel all smug about it because you are awesome. So this year I made homemade chai and hot chocolate mixes. Not mixed together because that would be kind of weird tasting, but perhaps it's an experiment worth trying... or not. I got the recipes from allrecipes.com here and here so really someone else did all the hard work. I found the mason jars at the Christmas Tree store for 59 cents per jar. Then I designed some labels to put in the lids.
And bought some ribbon to tie home-made (a.k.a. lopsided) bows.
And bam! Christmas presents!

Pouch from a Tie

2010-12-23T09:34:00.007-05:00

Quite awhile back Brian's awesome aunt gave me some ties that belonged to Brian's grandfather. I wasn't too sure what to do with them, but then I came across an idea to make a pouch out of a tie on the Dollar Store Crafts website. I never bookmarked the page so mine might look a little different (in probably a more sloppy way), but I thought our GPS could use a home. A home made from a tie. I even added a snap. Which never look pretty by the way, but hey, at least it closes.

And here it is in front of the tree just to be festive.

The House: Bathroom

2010-12-20T10:21:00.005-05:00

I've been meaning to put this up for awhile. Here was the bathroom when we move in to our splendid new house 6 (has it really been 6?) months ago.

We, as always, tore down the wallpaper and primed and painted the walls. You might not be able to tell from the photo, but the cabinet used to be an icky wood. So we painted it black and gave it new shiny handles. We also replaced the mirror and light and painted the doors white. By the way, who puts a hand towel right next to the toilet where the toilet paper should be? Weird. That was moved.

And ta-da!
Much better!

The House: How to decorate your hallway cheaply

2010-11-29T16:24:00.011-05:00

1. Buy cheap looking 2'x2' squares of wood at Home Depot.
2. Paint squares turquoise.
3. Hang squares in apartment.
4. Stare at squares.
5. Start questioning why you would choose that color.
6. Ignore color for 2 years.
7. Buy house covered in ugly wallpaper.
8. Tell significant other that he is not to hang tortoise squares until they are repainted.
9. Let squares sit in box for 5 months.
10. Peel down wallpaper. Curse wallpaper. Curse glue under wallpaper. Curse house and all the world. Cross fingers that you won't fall off the ladder and die.

11. Paint. Curse the paint. Curse the wall. Curse house and all the world. Cross your fingers that you won't fall off the ladder and die.
12. Wait a month. Spray paint outsides of squares a new ugly color that looked much prettier on the can but for some reason is all muddy looking when you use it. Let the paint dry. Tape it off to make a border. Start painting again. Realize the paint nozzle has broken and you can no longer use it. Go to store to buy a new bottle. Pass McDonalds on the way home. Go into McDonalds. Get free caramel mocha with coupon that came in the mail.
13. Paint inside of squares white. Let dry.
14. Choose desired image to put on squares. Cut out at full size while drinking caramel mocha and watching tv. Tell significant other that image is cute, not stupid looking. Ignore doubtful stare.
15. Lay image on squares. Attach with little pieces of rolled up tape. Paint one last time with 3rd color. Let dry and remove cut out images. Decide you don't like one of the squares and banish it to the garage.
16. Tell significant other to hang remaining squares on wall.
17. Wish you had more caramel mocha. Curse McDonalds for hooking you with free coupons.
18. Return to step 4 and repeat.

The House: Kitchen

2010-11-15T10:54:00.007-05:00

We've been putting some work into our kitchen. Since we did just buy a new house we didn't want to do anything that would be too costly, but there was no way we were going to leave this lovely wallpapered room alone.
So we tore down the wallpaper and painted the walls. Buying new cabinets would have been a little too pricey for us, so we painted them black and bought some new non-ugly, silver handles. We spent a lot of time staring at hardware in Home Depot and were pretty sad to discover that replacing the gold hinges with silver ones would cost about $100 for the whole room. So I said, why don't we just paint them silver! $3 worth of spray paint later, we have "new" silver hinges!

Our biggest cost was the counter top (which we found for 50% off on clearance at Home Depot) and sink. The old counter top was yellow, and that's just wrong... We also decided to go from a 2 basin sink to a one basin sink to save a little counter space and because I just plain like them better.
Here's the kitchen now. We still have a little work to do, but at least it's functional again! We want to replace the yellow floor, but that's a project for another time.

The House: Pantry

2010-11-11T09:43:00.003-05:00

In addition to papering the kitchen drawers with this awesome polka dot paper, I also lined the pantry. I don't have a before picture, but you'll just have to use your imagination and picture dark and floral. I also gave the whole thing a fresh coat of white paint. It seems brighter and happier to me now.

Some gauze named Francis

2010-11-10T09:49:00.006-05:00

Meet Francis. Francis happened when I tried to cut a straight edge on some contact paper with an x-acto knife in order to line the drawers in our kitchen.
Francis is angry at the x-acto knife. Bad x-acto knife.
The drawers were lined anyway the next day. Not by me. I refused to touch them after that.
This made Francis happy.

The House: Half Bath

2010-11-08T14:19:00.009-05:00

I've been busy working on the house and I keep thinking I should post photos of rooms that we've worked on, but then decide that they're not 100% done and how can I post something that's unfinished? I'll have to work on that, because nothing is ever finished. Except for the half bath! We finally hung a photo in there this weekend, and now I feel it's finished. For now...

Here is what the half bath looked like when we moved in.
Excuse the awful photo. I took it while we were looking at the house with the relater.
It was covered in wallpaper, and had a lovely yellow floor. We didn't want to have to replace or paint the cabinet or mirror, because they seemed fairly new, so we decided to choose colors that complimented the wood.

Here's our bathroom now!

Here were our changes:
- Painted the top blue and the bottom a light tan
- Put in a chair rail that we discovered in our basement and painted dark brown (everyone likes free things!)
- Laid different floor tiles down that the future inlaws had laying around from when they put in the same floor (more free!)
- Put in new molding at the bottom

- Painted the light switch cover to match the rail
- Painted the door white (we've painted almost all the doors in the house white, we're not quite done though)
- Gave those doors new silver knobs

- Tore out the old ceramic towel hanger and put in a shiny new one

- And hung an awesome photo that I took for this project.

And there's our new, significantly more awesome half bath!

The first vegetables from the garden!!

2010-08-17T16:54:00.001-04:00

Awww, look. They love each other.

The Box

2010-07-20T10:09:00.013-04:00

Remember my bathroom closet. Well somehow the funny old person smell has seeped back through the paint. I don't know how, but old people are just stronger than paint. Even so, I started to put all of our stuff in the closet, and my stuff kind of formed a giant pile. Front Row: things I used. Back pile. Things I don't. Mostly makeup like stuff that has just accumulated. Why don't you just get rid of it you ask? Because I've already gotten rid of the stuff that I NEVER use. This is the stuff that I use once a year. And why would I get rid of something I use so frequently. However, Brian looked at my pile and suggested I get a box for some of it.

So the next day I went for a walk and thought very hard about this. A box, a box. How could I make a box. I could make it out of cardboard. After all, we just moved, I have plenty of cardboard. I could modge podge pretty fabric on this cardboard box. Of course I'd also have to figure out how to make a lid. And with my luck the fabric would look funny with modge podge on it. I could sew a cover that slides over my cardboard box instead of using modge podge...

As my ideas grew more complex and I thought harder about this box something happened. Sitting on the side of the road, was a box. I'm pretty sure it was trash because it was sitting next to other trash. So I quickly picked it up and kept walking, pretending that I wasn't stealing someone's trash.

Here's the box:
Cost: Possibly the life of one ant which I flicked off the box. It might have survived the flick though. It's hard to say.

So I took the box home, cleaned it up a little, painted it and ta da! Mess hidden. Now you have to open two doors instead of one to find it. And no one bothers to do that.

De-oldpeople-tising the house

2010-06-23T13:44:00.004-04:00

We finally closed on our house. Say hello to our house.
(Sorry for the old photo. I should really take a photo where the trees have leaves on them.)

Closing took way longer than expected because some people are slow, but we finally have it and the first thing I realized the first night we went there was that it was filthy. And smelled like old people. So we spent way too long scrubbing grime off, well, everything. We've gotten quite a bit accomplished, tearing wallpaper out of the bathroom, painting the bathroom, painting the bedroom... But no room is really finished yet. Hey, it's only been a week and a half. So in the meantime, I present to you the only thing that's finished. The inside of the bathroom closet!

The bathroom closet was a nice shade of brown. Just like everything else in that house. Brown wallpaper. Brown carpets. Even the rooms that look recently painted - brown. Also the shelves had this brown and blue flowery wallpaper on them. It also smelled funny. I'd say like old people. Others might say it smell musty. Apparently I associate the two.

I painted the closet white. And the shelves white. And then I bought some shelf liner at Target.

I'm pretty pleased with the outcome. And you can even see the color we chose for the rest of the bathroom. Don't look too hard though, it's not finished. Hopefully I'll be able to show it off soon though!

Strawberries & Cream Pie

2010-05-10T09:00:00.001-04:00

I made some pie.
It was tasty.

Slipper Sandles

2010-04-30T09:06:00.004-04:00

I love my slippers. But about once a year I realize, ewww, these are getting kind of old. And it always seems to happen around now, when I then remember that stores don't really sell slippers in the spring. At least they don't at Target, and I'd rather just wear the old ones than go on a really long hunt for a new pair.

I had this satin like material that I hadn't really figured out what to do with, so I thought, hey, lets try making a less warm version of slippers. And here they are, the SLIPPER SANDLES!!

It turns out when you make slippers without thinking really hard about it first, that they turn out kind of like pillows for your feet. But hey, who wouldn't want to walk on little pillows. It also turns out that satin is slippery, so I have slippery slippers! Hopefully I don't fall down. I think eventually the bottom with kind of smush itself down and it will be ok.

One more of my icky feet (don't look too close, I really had to post it).

Next time I think I'll try regular slippers, with some leftover fabric that isn't so slippery.

Project Don't Kill Off The Plants

2010-04-14T09:08:00.002-04:00

We'll be moving from apartment to house soon! I really want a vegetable garden so I started some squash, zucchini, tomato, pea, and green onion seeds. They're growing faster than I expected, which doesn't say much since I really don't know what to expect when it comes to plants of any kind.
We close on the house near the end of May, so now I have to keep my little plants alive until they can be planted. Good luck plants, I'll try to remember to water you!

Purse

2010-04-05T08:24:00.003-04:00

I put together a new purse this past week. I put a zippered pocket in the inside. It was a pretty proud moment.

Crocheted Bookmark

2010-03-16T13:08:00.009-04:00

I've been looking for books to read and recently came across this list of best loved novels, compiled by the BBC. I'd read quite a few of them and thought I'd make the others into a reading list for myself.

On that note, in hopes of using up some of the crochet thread sitting in my closet, I made this bookmark to aid in my literary goal.
Unfortunately, it barely made a dent in the thread so it looks like I'll have to keep crocheting.

Cleaning Out the Closet

2010-03-09T14:35:00.002-05:00

I hope to move from apartment to house in, well, however long it takes to find the perfect house, put an offer in on the perfect house, have that offer accepted and pack up all our worldly possessions. I thought I should celebrate by finding a use for that crochet thread that I've had since around the time I learned to crochet 10+ years ago. It's been sitting in the closet taking up space. So my next challenge will be to make it into something useful so it doesn't have to move from one closet to another.

Eat Your Vegetable Muffins

2010-03-04T09:10:00.000-05:00

I've been toying around with making desserts that have vegetables and other good for you things in them. So I used a recipe I'd found as the base and made some alterations. I thought it was fairly successful.

Ingredients:
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup ground flaxseed
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup carrot puree
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Spray 12 muffin cups with cooking spray. Then combine all the dry ingredients, minus the chocolate chips, in a large bowl.
It's kind of pretty looking. Now add the wet ingredients including the carrots.
Not quite as appealing but not bad. Mix it all together and fold in the chocolate chips. The consistancy isn't quite as smooth as normal muffins. Now divide the batter into 12 muffin cups.
They don't rise quite as much as normal muffins, so don't worry if they look a little full. Not stick 'em in the oven and bake for 25 minutes. And bam! They turn into muffins.
I'll admit that they're not quite as chocolaty as normal muffins, but they're still a pretty tasty snack!

Makes 12 muffins.

Approximate Nutrition Information Per Muffin
Calories: 209 | Total Fat: 7.0g | Cholesterol 17.7 mg | Protein 6g | Dietary Fiber 5.9g

Cloth Envelope Magnets

2010-02-22T11:26:00.000-05:00

I cut coupons. Until this weekend I had been keeping my coupons in a plain old envelope and using a giant magnet to hold it on to the refrigerator door. The envelope looked like this.
You can tell it contains coupons because it's labeled "coupons". It's been torn and has had a few things spilled on it in the last year that it's lived it's life as a coupon envelope. I thought about just replacing it, but decided to create something more durable. And more magnetic. And also prettier.

To do this I needed:

The desired sized envelope to use as a template
Fabric at least as long as the envelope - I used 3 different colors
Interfacing
Magnet strips
A hot glue gun
Iron
Thread and needles and all that good stuff

First I tore open my paper envelope to study. It looked fairly simple. I put my interfacing and fabrics in a pile and traced the envelope shape onto the top fabric, adding an extra 1/4" or so to account for future seams. Then I cut the fabric out.

I wanted my envelope to be 2 different colors on the outside when folded up, so I cut apart 2 colors and attached them as shown above. That wasn't entirely necessary but when you're inventing as you go, you might as well get creative and make sure there are plenty of opportunity to mess up.

I ironed the interfacing onto the wrong side of the fabric (the piece that would become the inside of my envelope), then, wrong sides of the fabric facing each other, I sewed the two pieces together, leaving an inch or 2 open. Before turning it right side out, I got out my handy dandy hot glue gun and glued the magnet strips onto the center rectangle of the interfacing. I used 2 strips to make sure they would hold a whole lot of coupons without the whole thing sliding down the refrigerator door. Then I turned the envelope right side out and sewed up the opening.

From there all I had to do was iron the flaps down to look like this.
Then sew the side flaps to the bottom flap. I made two and they came out looking like this.

They're now hanging on to my refrigerator door, holding plenty of coupons for future money saving opportunities. And they're nice and pleasant to look at too!

Sock Animals

2010-02-15T15:56:00.000-05:00

Whimsy Loft had a tutorial for these cute little Sock Owls. They're adorable and pretty quick to make, and I was invited to a one year olds birthday party so it seemed like an appropriate gift. Plus who doesn't have a random sock sitting in the drawer who's partner was eaten by the drier. My random sock happened to be black, so I turned the owl into a penguin. Of course right after making the penguin I found the missing sock hiding in a corner of the closet. Guess I'll just have to make a second one...

Happy Valentine's Day!

2010-02-14T09:35:00.001-05:00

Valentine's Day Chocolate Chunk Cookies
6 tablespoon butter
3 tablespoon apple sauce
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 egg white
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup of flour
1/4 cup ground flaxseed
1+1/4 cup oatmeal
1 tablespoon wheat germ
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1.45 oz chocolate Hershey's bar, chopped
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup chopped almonds
Pink, red, and white Peanut M&M's

Preheat over to 375 degrees. Blend oatmeal in a blender until forms a fine powder. Set aside. Cream butter, applesauce and both sugars in a large bowl. Add egg white and vanilla. Once combined, add flour, flaxseed, oatmeal, wheat germ, baking powder and baking soda. Mix well. Fold in Hershey's bar, chocolate chips, and almonds. Roll into tablespoon sized balls and place on a lightly greased baking sheet. Press 1 M&M into center of each cookie. Bake 7-8 minutes in preheated oven.

Makes about 26 cookies.
Approximate Nutrition Information Per Cookie
Calories: 108 | Total Fat: 5.4g | Cholesterol 7.1 mg

It's Almost Valentine's Day

2010-02-10T07:57:00.000-05:00

Will you be my valentine?

Crocheted Cradle Purse

2010-02-08T14:08:00.001-05:00

I had one of these when I was little and thought it was pretty cool. My mother asked me to recreate one for a little girl who's turning 2 in a few months. First it's a drawstring purse, then when you turn it inside out.....
It's a cradle!
Pretty cute if you ask me. All it needs is a little doll to sleep in it.