Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from our family to yours!



Isn't that the most adorable photo up there of my grand baby? Photo was taken by a photographer in our area that my daughter connected with. Her photos are so beautiful as you can see and she has a client for life in my daughter. Visions Photography....we have been telling every one about her. You can find her on Facebook.

Bye!

Thursday, December 22, 2011

peanut butter ball play

Every year at Christmas time I make my husband peanut butter balls. They are his absolute favorite Christmas treat of any thing else I make. I have experimented with them over the years and he always says he prefers the originals and not so much the ones I play with. Well how could I possibly let a year go by with this idea for changing the balls up a bit and not try it out? So I did. I made my same recipe as always from my trusty Betty Crocker Cook book and instead of going as normal from there I dumped a small box of chocolate pudding mix in with the powdered sugar. I wanted chocolate peanut butter balls. I also decided to dip them in white chocolate instead of dark chocolate.



Here are the balls layed out drying for a bit before dipping. I did a batch this new way and a batch of the regular style.





Done! And guess which ones are getting reached for first??? That's right, the ones with the pudding mix in it. Can you really go wrong with adding pudding mix to some thing?



Give it a try next time you make these and if you don't make them go and make some! Right now! They are so easy and delicious.

Bye!

*edited to say I am linking this post to Mommy by Day, Crafter by Night's link party. Click the button on the side to get to her blog.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Epic fail!

You heard me. A crafty failure has happened here. This is not uncommon but don't you just hate to see blogs where every thing is la la la perfect and no one admits to failure?

So my mom gave me this glass ornament a couple of years ago so I can try to do some thing with it. With the new grand baby this year I thought it would be great to cut out a stencil on the silhouette sd and paint Alec's First Christmas onto it. My first mistake was thinking it would be simple *ppffftttt*.







That was hard trying to get it placed decent on there and then to keep it from over lapping and making sure you can see the words still. Sheesh! I finally got it to where it looked just ok and then the glitter paint I used was almost non existent! I could hardly see what I did so I had to switch to a regular paint first and then do the glitter on top. I ended up doing 5 layers I think. Then to top it off when I pulled off the stencil it pulled a bunch of my painted letters off too ACK!!






So in the end I had to scrape every thing off and put it aside to decide on what to do with it now. I have a few ideas and when it is finished I will of course share what I decided on. It will still be an ornament for Alec I'm just not sure how I will go about doing it yet.

Bye!

Saturday, December 17, 2011

working with vinyl

So I've decided that with the coming new year that I should blog what I am doing more. Maybe no one really cares but I think it's a lot of fun to go back and see what I've been working on and with what products I've used. Also, maybe I'll work on some of my stuff a little more and not be so, ummmm.... lazy. It's kind of shameful how few posts I have done in the last couple of years. That's ok though.

For Christmas time this year I had all these grand plans of making pillows for my couch and for gifts and a Christmas lap quilt and some sewy gifts, blah blah blah....then I got sick, and when I say sick I mean really sick. I can't even remember the last time I was so ill. My voice was completly gone. I could not sleep for a week and the coughing was so bad. I got lazy, and I mean real lazy so nothing got done. When I started feeling better I decided I wanted to do some of the stuff that I had planned so I axed the pillow ideas because I just did not feel like sitting down and sewing and chose to work with my silhouette sd. I love this machine. Who knew one could love a machine so much. It does so many cool things, the customer service is awesome...even calling me to help me figure out how to open my software on my new Macbook Pro. They also offer a free download once a week and through Christmas right now they are offering a free design a day! Oh happy day! They did come out with a new machine that looks very cool but I am so happy with the sd that I have no plans for the new one unless this one were to ever give up on me.

I had bought a bunch of vinyl in Christmas colors from Pick Your Plum and wanted to use that in some of my Christmas decorating this year so this is what I have done.






The nice thing about the silhouette is it will use the fonts on your computer! I also put snow flakes on the walls all around. I did forget photos of those but they are the same as the photo that says joy to the world.

Well I've gone on enough about this. No affiliation with the silhouette company, just one very happy customer here!

Bye!

Friday, December 16, 2011

Dresser re do, not quite done.

So I mentioned the dresser re do. Here's a little background on this dresser I decided to paint. It belonged to my great-grandfather. He bought it when my grandmother was a child if I remember correctly. Normally I would not paint some thing like this and I would let it be but in my younger days I had decided to sand it and try staining in only to find out it was not a wood you would really want to do that with so it has sat in my closet in shame for years holding some of mine and Dans clothes. The quality compared to todays furniture is superior but back then this was not quality furniture. So when we re did the house and finished every thing but our closet we sat for like 2 years with it unfinished. Finally I was searching Pinterest one day and saw people painting old furniture and it just clicked, I could do that with that dresser and paint it my favorite color! Blue! I love blue, most of my house is blue, almost my whole wardrobe is blue. I have decided to paint all my bedroom furniture different shades of blue, except for my bed of course. This is my solution to the horrid wall color I painted. I thought I would like it and I do not but with these blue pieces it will be cool. So this is the first piece I have done, my great-grand fathers dresser. The rest will be done in the spring because I am not freezing my butt off anymore for this, just saying. I am so pleased with the turn out. It needs some major touch up, or some sanding to distress it but I have all winter to decide.
So, did I get a before picture, you betcha, did I get one with all the drawers in it...of course not, only a normal person would think of some thing like that and as you know I am far from normal. So here is a before of the dresser and the drawers already outside getting ready to be roughed up for painting.







Here is it in place in the bedroom. As you can see it still needs drawer pulls that I will order. I will put some vintage ones that are similar to what was on it before. I think I found some I will like. We really like how it turned out. I love the color and it looks good with the wall. Who knows, by spring I may decide to repaint the walls but for now I am pleased.



I hope you like it!

Bye!

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

A total treat for you!

Ok, so maybe just my excitement to share with you what I have found buried deep, deep, deep with in my master bedroom closet.
Here's the scoop. Me and Dan started some major home remodeling a,most 3 years ago...(yes honey, as much as you would like to say it hasn't been that long, it totally has!). You know how it goes...you work your butt off and get tired and right when you are almost done you decided to stop and get back to it later...meanwhile 2 years has passed. I finally decided it was time to empty out master bed room closet and get the new floor in there. We went through every thing and took a lot to Good Will and gave a big box to our daughter of sheets and things she will need eventually and organized. Here is every thing we took from the closet.






I am not joking with these photos. I didn't even know we had that many clothes between me and Dan.

So on to the exciting part. I was going through a box and saving Dan's old baseball shirts and basket ball jerseys for when Alec is older and totally found this!!






This is a quilt I started about 16 years ago! Before I even knew what a quilt was and at this point I had only ever attempted to sew an apron at the age of 9 and a t-shirt in home ec in high school. I do admit that Dan wore that shirt while we were dating. He's such a good man!
I just took some clothes scraps and knew I wanted to depict my family and our first garden in our new house. I do not remember what I wanted in that other blank white block. I even started hand quilting it! Can you believe it! I am going to finish this. I think I will pull the layers apart and put a better backing on it. I'm not sure what is on the back right now. Seems like a cheap muslin to me. I'm thinking of using the white block to show off what I can do now but to toot my own horn I'm pretty pleased with how it is put together! So this is on my list for 2012 and I'd like to hang it in my room when completed.

I have more to share on the room finishing but will do that in another post. Here's a hint...I'm painting and it involves furniture! I have before pics and I should be done with the painting today.

Off to work on some Christmas ornaments just for fun. I have been in such a dumpy slump lately so I've been trying to get in here to work on some things and have been some what successful. I'll share that later as well!

Bye!

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Belated post

Hi!

I'm sharing a post on the pillows I made for *ahem* Halloween.... I know! We are way past Halloween and into the jolly Holiday season now. I'm behind, nothing new there. In fact, if it were on time you may question weather it was even me posting correct? Anyways I made 2 of these as gifts for my mom for her October birthday and 1 for Susan and 1 for myself just because I enjoyed doing them and they turned out very cool. I used my silhouette sd to cut the designs and bought the designs from the silhouette store. Can I just gush about how awesome the silhouette is? It is fantastic and a must for me now. So much fun to make things using it and it cuts so precise it is amazing. So here are my Halloween pillows.





These 2 above were the gifts for my mom. She really liked them as did every one else that saw them.





The 2 about are ones I made for my living room couch for lounging on. Nothing special about them. I just picked a fabric that I really liked and wanted to showcase. By the way, these are still in my living room and it is 2 days until Thanksgiving....just saying...

I apparently forgot to take a photo of the 2 I made for me and Susan. Oh well, they are almost identical to the ones I made for my mom. These will be getting put up on Thanksgiving when I decorate the house for Christmas. What will take their place you ask? well Christmas ones that I plan to make soon of course. I have every thing ready to go except I'm having trouble finding a Christmas fabric I want to use so hopefully I will find some soon. (Should i mention I haven't really looked that hard yet?...nah) I will try to share those before Christmas.

Lastly I do have an outfit I made for the little guy to share. Sadly he has already outgrown the onesie and will only be able to wear the pants for another week or two a the most. The next pair will be made 2 sizes larger so he doesn't grow out of them so fast. It's amazing how long he is getting and how fast. He is now in 9 month onesies and is not yet 4 months old.



Adorable right!

I don't have a photo of him wearing it but I do have a adorable photo of him to share.



Alec's first snow! Taken on November 4Th.

I have been terribly unproductive on my projects lately. I don't know if it's the weather or what but my get up and go got up and went a few weeks ago. Let me know if you've seen it!

Bye!

Monday, September 26, 2011

The Very Hungry Caterpillar....

Hi there! Surprised to see me 3 days in a row? Yeah, me too. I have 2 finishes to show you today. That's ok....I'll wait while you pick your jaw up off the floor.....

When my daughter told use she was pregnant I, of course knew I would be making a baby quilt for the little bundle but I had no idea what kind. I looked through my baby quilt books but nothing really caught my eye so what's a girl to do? Well this girl went to the fabric store and started looking around and what did I find but the coolest Very Hungry Caterpillar fabrics. I loved them and purchased a little of all of them. I then spent weeks looking at photos online of what others have done with the fabrics. I saw nothing inspiring and nothing I liked so I decided I needed to come up with my own idea. I bought the book, because if you can believe it, I had never even seen the book before. I picked a line from the book and opened my newest favorite quilting book Word Play Quilts by Tonya Ricucci. It's a great book! I had a lot of fun making this quilt and I love how it turned out. It's a little busy but then the fabric is and it should really catch the baby's eye.







The other project I finished is a baby body pillow. I first made one for a young friend who had a baby girl about 4 months ago. She told me that the pillow was a god send and that the baby will not sleep with out it by her side and with it she goes right to sleep so I thought my grand baby should have one too. Yes I am about 6 weeks late but it got made today and turned out cute!





And of course a photo of it in use!




Bye!

Sunday, September 25, 2011

I just don't get it!

Maybe some one can let me in on the secret.

I have been spending some time this spring and summer helping my mom do some craft shows to try to sell her home made cards. These cards are beautiful! Each one hand made even down to the papers on some of them. They are creative and each one is a little work of art. Unfortunately she has not been selling well at the craft shows but I think she needs to be at art shows. Her stuff is just too high end for a regular craft show. Anyways, back to what I don't get....

The last show we did, in the booth next to us was a woman who knitted and crochet wash clothes, sweaters, slippers, baby blankets and these


(source)

These things sold like hot cakes! People were crawling all over her booth buying these in huge stacks!

I just don't get it. I find these to be some of the ugliest things ever. Maybe some one can shed some light as to why people love these. I must be missing some thing!

Bye!

Saturday, September 24, 2011

It's been awhile....

I know. It's been quite awhile since I've posted but I have a good reason.



Isn't he precious?! I've been spending all of my extra time with him. Our first grand baby. He's so awesome, we just love him. I have not gotten any sewing done these last few months. I haven't even finished his quilt yet. Bad grandma I know. I do need to re pin the quilt sandwich together because of a large wrinkle that I thankfully found before starting the quilting. I will fix that and get it quilted soon then I have a whole list of things I want to make. The list should keep me going for awhile. In the mean time I just wanted to post these photos to share how beautiful Alec Daniel is.







The happy family.





Soon I will share some finished projects.

Bye!

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Hello!

Hello! I wanted to do a post on decorations I made for Susan's graduation party. Yep, you heard me correctly, Susan had graduated high school! Now in a few months she will move into the next phase of her life, motherhood. In the beginning of August she will have baby boy Alec Daniel and can you believe I am blocked on his quilt..... I know! I really need to get moving on it. I didn't even get Susan's graduation quilt done yet.....I know! So here is a picture of the beautiful graduate.



This is Susan with one of her closest friends Katie. We just love Katie and she has been such a good friend to Susan. I made her a quilt for her graduation gift and she loved it! I was so glad too.



So on to the party decorations. I got these from a tutorial on the blog Made. I love this blog and check it every day. These decorations were a big hit! I even made some ruffled streamers for our friends that live across the street for their little girls 5th birthday party.









I love how it turned out. Susan took all the decoration pictures and she did such a nice job. She takes great photos!

Here are the streamers I made for the birthday party.



I love the color combo on it. they loved them too and they were perfect for her rainbow theme.

Here are the photos we put out for Susan's party.





So that is it! We did it! Ummmm, I mean they did it YAY!



Bye!

Sunday, May 1, 2011

Sewing along......kinda

Well, I have been reminded by my dear husband almost daily that I have not yet blown him away on my blog with a list of sewing I have done. Yes, he's a smart alec! There is a reason though. I've been working on a graduation quilt so have not been able to make any baby items yet. I will share some photos on what I have been doing though.

I had a baby quilt to make for a friend who is due in the next 2 weeks. I got it done in time for the shower and was able to make this super adorable pillow to go with it.



This kid has such a long name it turned into a baby body pillow!

This is the quilt I made. It's one I designed myself. Pretty simple really.........
Well darn. It would seem I forgot to take a photo of that quilt. I don't know how that happened!

In between those quilts I did finish 2 ufo's from my pile. They were pinned and ready for quilting so why I put them away, who knows.





I'm very happy with them. They turned out great!

I did take time out to make some thing for me to go with the cute new retro rocking chair I bought.





These are front and back views.

Easter around here was just lovely. The weather was beautiful. Dan and Chris spent the day outside, I cooked and Susan made these.





Yes, it's a boy and his name is Alec Daniel. Susan loved making these. I showed her how to work the Cricut. How to make a stencil and how to work with the fabric paints and she was off and running. I'm sure she will make more in the next few months. In the mean time she is graduating in 4 weeks!

Well, I'm off. There is more to share but this is long enough so it will be shared in another post.

Bye!