Life gets crazy

Haven't posted in a while. My first term or quarter back at school in the fall is always like this. I'm on homecoming committee and Superman is too at the school where he works. Not only does he work full time, but he's in school as well (getting his masters), teaches a sunday school class at church, I work full time, I'm the primary president, and the cubmaster. We both have to make sure that we devote time to our beautiful daughter, take care of household matters and be there for each other. I don't think I've had a conversation with Superman that's lasted longer then five minutes in past three weeks or so. I guess what I'm saying is that we're busy. Right now, crazy busy. But, the fact of the matter is EVERYONE is. Just wanted to let you know that I have all kinds of ideas buzzing in my head, and all kinds of things to post about, crafty, artsy, and otherwise. It will just take me a while. So, don't go away. I would miss you. It might be a few days or more but I'll be back. I'm just busy right now with this:

See you in a few days!

Something for Sweet Pea's twinkle toes

I've desperately been longing for my sewing machine lately and sadly just haven't had much time to squelch the longing. I made it downstairs into my craft area today but did NOT get over by the machine at all because I saw these little black tennis shoes sitting there begging to be beautified before Sweet Pea's tootsies are too big to fit in them. (I got them on clearance for 2$.) Sooooo, I did this:

Hmmm...the start of something cute, but definitely not enough. So I got out the acrylic paint and primed a flower motif in white first, they are black shoes after all, then I painted over the white with some nice bright colors. Petals and leaves.

After the paint dried I decided I wanted to repeat the black in the shoe in my design so I took a black Sharpie and added a black outline of sorts to all my petals and leaves. Then I sealed the design with matte Mod Podge. (Gotta love that stuff.) Here are the finished shoes. Now Sweet Pea can have fancy feet!

To keep or not to keep, that is the question

I've been trying to weed out my closet recently. Actually, to be honest, I'm a bit of a clothes horse. (To which I'm referring to my obsession with collecting clothing which at times might border on excessive. None of it is excessively expensive, I just can't justify that, but the quantity could be interpreted as excessive to be sure. And I can't seem to throw things away. And I'm not proud of it. Which is why I want to weed out the closet. Especially if I haven't worn items in over a year.) Anyway, I came across an olive green t-shirt that I've worn frequently over the years. It is soft, comfortable, and well worn. I noticed as I was inspecting it to decide whether or not to add it to "the pile" that it had a big stain on the front. Drat! Guess it goes...

But wait! I decided to keep it and try a t-shirt refashion I've been seeing so much of this past year. I cut out tulle circles, several of varying sizes, and pinned groups of them together assymetrically close to the neck and up towards the right shoulder. Then I cut strips of satin and sewed a straight stitch down each strip gathering the strips and pinning them to the shirt over the tulle clusters. It looked something like this:

I sewed the cream colored satin posies in place over the tulle circle clusters. It didn't take very long. It still needed something so I stitched some beads in the center of each posie. Pretty cute! Drat! Guess it stays...

I'll have to find something else in the closet to add to "the pile".

Title: Wow These are Really Bad Pictures, or, This is Why I Need a New Camera!

Thought I would share what I put in the little birthday package I dropped off at my little sis's house the other day. I'll be brief and beg your forgiveness for the absolutely AWFUL pictures. The camera won't focus anymore and the color quality is LOWSY. Sorry.

I made two cuff bracelets identical to the ones I made for myself the other day in aqua and black. You can find the tutorial here. I also included a small stained glass pendant that I made. (I work with stained glass in one of my art classes at school.) For this particular pendant I didn't use any fancy bezel setting or expensive precious metal. I cut the glass, did a couple quick swipes on the glass grinder, wrapped the glass with copper foil, and soldered it. Then I soldered a jump ring at the top and added a little silver daisy charm (we both love daisies) on a short piece of silver chain to the jump ring and slid the finished pendant on a 18" silver snake chain. I think it turned out well. And she likes it! (At least she said she did...it's her favorite color, yellow, so I can't go wrong.) I also tucked a pretty little journal and tiny pen in the package as well. An inspiration journal. Something small enough to tuck in her bag and whip out whenever inspiration strikes, which could happen at ANY moment.

Thanks Bugaboo!

A couple weeks ago (has it been that long now??) I received a beautiful blog award from Bugaboo, Mini, Mr & Me. It came as quite a surprise as I've only just begun my little blog so we're still very much in the infancy stages of everything. I'm honored, and pleased, and motivated to blog even better, and even more than that, I'm excited to pick some of the incredibly beautiful blogs that I follow and pass the love along. But first I'm supposted to share seven things with you that I haven't told you yet...

1. I am addicted to soda. It's a bad addiction. It's not one particular kind either. It's all of them except Mountain Dew, which makes my teeth curl for some reason. My favs are Grapefruit Splash Sierra Mist, Cranberry Splash Sierra Mist, Dr. Pepper, Cherry 7up, and Coke, all diet. I think it's the carbonation. I really love the fizz. It's a gross habit, I know.

2. I have two different colored eyes. Well, to be very specific, I have two blue eyes but my right eye has big spots of brown in it. Big enough that generally people notice right away.

3. I have a cat named Nani and a fish called Wanda. (Funny, eh? I mean the fish called Wanda...)

4. I love baking. My favorite thing to bake is chocolate chip cookies, and I make killer ones. My second fav, cheesecake. The real deal. I make a killer one of those too.

5. I'm an advisor for TLC at the high school where I work. It's Teens Listening and Caring, and it's a peer helper organization.

6. I LOVE fall. So much.

7. I really want a food processor. Is that weird?

Now to share some of my favorite blogs with you. I present the beautiful blog award to (I know there aren't 10 but these are four of my favorites.):

1. Flower Patch Farmgirl - Her writing is beautiful and so is her story. Her family is amazing.
2. Creative Little Daisy - Her adventures in redecorating are fun. Her pics are great.
3. really quite lucky - Love her photography. Especially when she posts family pics. Her little ones look like angels.
4. 7 Layer Studio - She is genius with the sewing machine. And she's selling patterns now! Lucky us!

So here are the rules as I understand them:
Thank the person who presented the award
List seven things about yourself that you haven't revealed on your blog yet
Pass the award on to 10 (I picked four, sorry!) other bloggers

Thank you so much again bugaboo! You really made my day!

This post's for you

On this day, exactly twenty nine years ago, something pretty great happened. Something I had been anticipating for six long years as an only girl living in a house with two (ewwww) brothers. Don't get me wrong, brothers are fantastic for your "beat up the bully down the street", play "the crayon game", build huge snowmen, play with matchbox cars kinds of occasions. But, what every girl wants at one time or another is a sister. It's true. What I wanted, what I LONGED for, what I needed, was someone to share secrets with, stay up late watching movies with, share a deep and abiding love for chocolate with, be best friends with. There will always be a special, tender spot in my heart for my little sis.

As we grew up together there were many things about her that were typical of a little sister and of the youngest child. She was babied. It's true. (I know you're reading this Bean, and you can't deny it.) She was attention seeking. She was loud. She was dramatic. But there were also so many more things that were extraordinary and wonderful. She was funny, carefree, adventurous, oh so smart, and dramatic. I know, I mentioned that twice. What can I say? That quality can be a plus and a minus at times. She was fabulously dramatic when we would play our "crazy killer pizza delivery boy" game, and annoyingly dramatic when she learned she could cry on demand and get me in all kinds of trouble.

Time has passed. Lots of it. We are both mothers now and it is so incredible to see her as a mom. There are even more extraordinary and wonderful things about her that I've only recently discovered...I never even knew about until now. She is great at being a mom. She is crafty, creative, innovative, patient (who knew?), a good cook (waaaay better than I), musical, a good teacher, fabulous with all little people, a super fantastic writer, and I could go on. I also marvel at how she lovingly cares for my little one as one of her own while I am working.

Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is that even though she is my little sis, I look up to her. She inspires me. I love that she's mine. And always will be. Happy birthday Bean.

Instant gratification

As I was taking a cyber stroll through my google reader not too long ago I came across this post by Mayfly. I really enjoy her blog and this tutorial for a cute cuff bracelet was SOOOO easy I couldn't resist. I tried it first with a thicker belt that belonged to my little sis. It didn't work very well. I decided to search for some belts on my own and found some at a local thrift shop, the genuine leather ones work best, for a couple bucks. I already had the snaps and the leather punch and hammer. Here is what I ended up with. All I can say is that it was incredibly satisfying to make it through a project from start to finish in about fifteen minutes and have something I like and will wear. So nice. Thank you Mayfly.