week 14

duke's hideaway

Take a simple little cubby on a boat...

add a sad looking Duke...

some thrift store fabric/shower curtain (complete with canoes, moose and fish), Target sale finds, tiny Singer that fits perfect in the Camp and crafty goodness from a great friend...and VOILA!!!

Duke loves his new hideaway - it was a perfect place to hide from the fireworks!

my weekend

Based on how my weekend started, it could only go up.

Nothing like waking up, putting in a load of laundry, going about my business when an unfamiliar sound startles me from the other room.  I quickly jumped up to see what it was to find water, spewing EVERYWHERE in the utility room.  Remember those pictures of all the snow and stuff?  Well, I guess I had a frozen pipe, so there was nowhere for the draining water from the washer to go except on the floor.  After having a freak out moment (and a calm down from some friends) I proceeded to clean it up.

The ShamWow is AMAZING in these situations.  I will never go back to a regular towel in these circumstances again.  If you don't own one - get it NOW!  (I have not been compensated for this shout-out.)

Do you have one of these...

- a big pile of clothes needing SOMETHING - a button, a hole sewn - anything?  Mine has been growing for years so I decided to finally do something about it.  I found all the buttons needed too - TOTAL BONUS!  It was like getting a whole new wardrobe!

There was also a lot of this going on, too...

I capped my weekend off by sitting in first class sipping a cocktail during the Super Bowl.  Bummed I missed Christina - love her - but heard she totally messed up the National Anthem.

Just when I thought things had turned around...
I got called "sir".  Oh well, tomorrow is a new day!

shopping bags

So I bought some oil cloth almost a year ago in hopes of making my own reusable shopping bags - you know so I don't have to continue to accumulate all those plastic shopping bags.  Amy had bought one in Canton that I really liked the size of.  She so graciously agreed to measure it for me.  I made four and learned some tricks with each.  These instructions include all the "best practices" I learned.  Based on the measurements Amy gave me I came up with this pattern (I had a 1 yard piece of fabric).

A - These are the two bigger sides and the pieces you sew the handles to

B - These are the two smaller sides

C - This is the bottom

D - These are the handles

This is very beginner sewing so if you've never sewn anything before you could totally do this - here's how.  Cut out the pieces according to the diagram above.  It should look something like this...

Sew the handle pieces (D) in thirds and fold under the raw edge.  Run a zigzag stitch down it.  Fold over each A and B piece 1.5 inches and then turn that under .5 inch.  Make sure to pin the handles in place before sewing.  I pinned them 1.5 inches from the edge of the A pieces.

Sew the smaller sides (B) to the bottom piece (C) making sure to put right sides together.

Sew the larger pieces (A) to the smaller pieces (B) and then sew the remaining pieces to the bottom.  Turn your new bag right side out and voila - you have a handy shopping bag ready for your next trip to the grocery store or Target or wherever you want to take them.

Since there's only two people to shop for in this household, I don't think I'll need all four in Texas so I've already placed two of them with the pile of stuff to go to Maine.

one down a lot to go

So I've been in my house for 7 years already and decided it was about time I put up some curtains.  But you know me, I can't just run to the store and pick some up - I have to take the hard road.  Remember the fun girls trip I took with Tamara and Amy to find fabric?  No?  Well you better get caught up and go read about it (here's the link).  I finally used one of the fabrics I picked up.

I decided to start with the easy ones - my office.  You know the drill - sew the seams (yes, I'm sewing on printer paper - the backing I chose had a little stick to it under the presser foot)...

cut the holes (that was the absolute scariest part - thanks to Tam and Lizzy for the support) and add the grommets.

Add a curtain rod and voila!

Don't you just love this fabric - I SURE DO!!!

Notice the little window on the side?  I want to add a venetian blind like the one I made for the kitchen (check them out here).  Should I make it with the same fabric as the curtain I just made or a fabric that matches the wall color?  Thoughts?

finding just the right fabric...in sketchy land

One of the other places I like to shop at is the fabric warehouses.  It's in a sketchy neighborhood but you can find great deals.  If you can't find the fabric you want here then you probably won't find it anywhere.  I was having issues finding just what I wanted.  Luckily I came equipped with all the necessary items - wall color, rug, pillow cases, etc.

I pretty much found one of the fabrics I wanted within the first 5 minutes and the other one I only found after I "gave up".  These are the ones I went home with.  Can you guess what I'm making?  Projects to come after the new year - stay tuned.

All that fabric shopping made us work up an appetite.  I figured this place...

was going to be a great option to take care of that hunger.  I was completely wrong.  If you ever see this place - do not stop, do not pass go, do not collect $200.  You should just run...and run fast...in the opposite direction.  And if you have a friend that tells you it will be alright - do not listen to her - tell her she is smoking crack or something and suggest the "two daughters" place instead.

Notice the TV - you know it's a great place when they have the wrestler guys playing in the background.

When you find things in your food you cannot identify...I think Tamara's face says it all...

What's the sketchiest place you've ever eaten?  What made it sketchy?

hawaiian scarf

I recently participated in a blog Halloween exchange.  We were paired up with someone and you could pick/make anything you wanted related to Halloween or fall for under $20.  I started this endeavor while in Maine.  Sean and I headed to the Grasshopper Shop to see if they had anything seasonal - nothing.   Don't get me wrong, they had tons of cute stuff I wanted but nothing that fit for someone living in Hawaii.

Yea, I'm with you.  I just don't think of fall or Halloween when I think of Hawaii.  This made it even more difficult.  While in the store I came across a REALLY cute scarf.  It was beyond the dollar limit for this exchange.  So, of course, I gave it a good look over and decided I could make it myself.

I headed to the store to gather up all the supplies I needed. I tried to pick rustic colors that were still bright and beach feeling.

Sew on the stem…

Then add some flowers…

Hem up the edges and voila, you have a scarf!

It was so fun to get my own package in the mail.  Look at all the great stuff that was in it.

Check out all the other great packages the other Halloween exchange peeps got on Susan's blog "Five Great Kiddos".

Valentine's Day

This is our first Valentine's Day as a married couple and started a new tradition - you must make the gift.  This is probably an easier task for me then Sean so I can't wait to see what he comes up with.  After giving it some thought and coming across some awesome fabric online I came up with a great idea.  I'm going to make Sean some pajama bottoms.  I've never made any before and didn't exactly have a pattern but I went for it anyway.

First step is to get all your supplies out.  The supplies needed are as follows:

• Fabric
• Parchment paper
• Pencil
• Thread/Sewing Machine
• A pair of pajama pants you know fit your man

Lay out the parchment paper and trace the pajama pants you want to make a patern after.

Make sure you ultimately draw your pattern larger then you drew in the step above to allow for a seam.  A helper is a must, too.

Sew all the seams together, put in a hem and elastic waste band and voila, you have pajama bottoms.

Wrap them up and give them to your honey.  Look how cute he looks in them!

Sean has been bugging me to make what he calls his favorite meal - Hawaiian Chicken.  I never have made it for him but I decided to make it for Valentines.  I got the recipe from his mother so it would be just like he remembered it.  He LOVED it!  He was like a kid in a candy store.

Sean's favorite dessert is Rice Krispy Treats.  I made him a batch of those but cut them out in heart shapes.

I couldn't do all this without taking it one step further and making the card, too.  I leveraged an idea I got from Martha.  Start with your supplies.

Fold the part that will be the card in half and afix a fancy strip of paper onto it.

Cut out three matching hearts and sew them on with waxed thread.

VOILA!!!  You have a really cute card.  But you're not allowed to see what is written inside - that's just between my honey and me.

Kitchen Curtains

So when we had the inside of the house painted last month I had the painters take down the old shades that were in the kitchen window. This quickly became my motivation to get the curtains done that I had always wanted in there. We started to feel like fish in a fishbowl.

When I was younger, I was in 4-H. I know what you're thinking but our group was called City Slickers. I didn't do anything country or that had to do with animals. Instead I did the crafty, sewing, cooking type activities. For the activities that were sewing related my Aunt Janelle helped me learn how to read a pattern and sew clothing.

Now fast forward say about 20+ years and I get an urge to sew curtains for the Texas house. Maybe it's being married and feeling domesticated or something. So I drug Sean to the fabric store to look at patterns with me (he probably wouldn't want me to tell everyone that). I ended up finding a pattern to make a Roman shade and found the most awesome fabric so I was ready to go.

First you start out with all the necessary items to make your curtains.

Even though I had a pattern, my windows were bigger then the pattern allowed so it took a lot of measuring and general math to figure out how much fabric was needed, etc. Well, on top of that I ended up picking a fabric with a pattern. Since all four windows are together the pattern had to match. All of that takes a little trickiness to make sure they all match up. Plus, there was one window that was a different size then the others. This made making the curtains harder but at the same time better because I could customize them. After sewing on the decorative piece and the front fabric to the black-out shade it was time to sew on the tube tape that makes the Roman shade work appropriately.

I pinned on all the strips at one time making sure all four curtains lined up so when they were opened they would be level.

Now it's time to get your handyman. I chose Sean for this (I could have done it myself but it makes him feel useful and manly!). Measure twice and cut once please! Speaking of...I asked him to cut the 60 yards of cording into 12 pieces. For those math whizzes out there that's 5 yards per piece (or 15 feet). I was busy tacking down some pieces and finishing up some other stuff with the curtains. I got up and headed to where he was cutting and found 5 feet strips of cording. I quickly told him to stop as those weren't even as long as the curtains. I was so afraid we weren't going to have enough cording now but we ended up measuring and making the pieces the necessary length and actually had some left over. We laughed pretty hard about this. His excuse? "You said 5 and the tape measure is in feet."

Yes people that's Sean using something other then a computer!

So the other thing I found out about my windows is they aren't square. I had to staple and restaple the fabric to the piece of wood so many times before I was finally pleased with how they were hanging (yes a little OCD there).

So the long awaited reveal!!! Here's what they look like all the way down.....

and in their up position.....

I really enjoyed sewing these and I'm already planning my next project. This is one of my goals for this year; to do more things I enjoy doing!