Using my gifts!

I'm actually the luckiest girl I know when it comes to husbands.  I know other girls may think their husband is great, but I've never been heard of one that beats out the boy.   One of the many wonderful things he does is surprise me with gifts.  One day he found my Amazon.com wish list with me knowing.   He would find things he knew I wanted and buy them during work time at a nearby bookstore, and give it to me when he came home from work.  No special occasion, no particular reason... simply because he loved me.  What a catch, right?  One of the things I got was a book called One Yard Wonders.  It's a pretty awesome book, with dozens of easy projects.  I recently decided it was time to start putting the gift to use.  Here is the result:

A reusable grocery tote (or whatever else I want to stick in it!)!  The book's instructions were very simple, and making the tote would've been a cinch, but my sewing machine & I sometimes don't like each other very much.  I have a lot of problems with bobbins & thread tension.  Nevertheless, after and hour of taking apart, putting together, and taking apart again, the sewing machine began to work again.  And I've got to say... I love this little tote!

No place like home...

My sister-in-law recently moved waaay across the country to Oregon for her work.  All that distance and a tiny Chevy Cobalt meant that there wasn't much room to bring everything she wanted.  That means no couch, no chairs, and basically, no cozy!  To make her new home seem a little warmer, I made this sweet little pillow.   Hope she enjoys (if I ever actually get to sending it!) 

I made the letters by cutting them from vinyl on my Cricut, sticking the negative space onto my fabric & spray painting.  After that was dry, I printed a coloring page of the state, pinned it onto some felt, and cut around the lines.  I then cut a heart shape & stitched it to roughly where her home city would be.  Next, I ironed some wonder-under to the felt and attached it to the fabric.  Then I stitched around the edges of the state.  Finally, I sewed the front & back of the pillow together, stuffed it, and stitched it shut.  That's all!  

Craft Room Artwork (for Cheap!)

I've been wanting to put up a few more decorations in my craft computer room, but I didn't want to spend a lot of money.  Here is what I came up with!  It's really simple to make, too.  All you need is:

• *Elmer's Glue (with a paintbrush for spreading)
• *A decorative paper punch (I used a big circle)
• *A picture frame with a mat
• *A TON of paint sample chips (FREE at any home improvement store)

To start, get the paint chips.  I grabbed the Disney colors because they were the brightest.  I grabbed 3 of each color card.  Next, use to punch and punch as many of your shapes as you can from the sample.   I was able to get 3 circles f

or each sample.   Then, separate your circles by color family (all the pinks & reds together, all the yellows & oranges, etc.).  Finally, glue them down (overlapping) to the frame back, making sure to only place them where they will show through the mat.  Here is a close up of one of my colors: 

Here is another neat way to use paint chips. I may just like it because I'm a teacher, but whatever!  I found it on a blog called Serving Pink Lemonade.  They've got a bunch of really cute stuff there!

Yard Sale Finds

Just a quick photo of some recent yard sale finds.  Can't lie... I kind of love them!!

I out the scale in the kitchen with my basket of fruit on top.  The owl thing is a trivet.  It's nice because I have a thing for trivets, and I have a thing for owls.  Put it together & what have you got?  A find just perfect for me!

Long-term project

I mentioned in an earlier post that I was practicing a pinwheel quilt square with a pot-holder.  It all stemmed from a beautiful quilt that I saw on the blog V&Co (one of my absolute favorites!).  I got some really great charm-pack fabrics called Hello Betty by Moda to create one of my own.  The patterns remind me of 30's era flour sack fabrics.  Here is my start:

What I didn't realize was exactly how much work this is going to be.  I really want this quilt to be in my guest room, but there is no telling how long that is going to take.  What I really need is someone to cut all the white pieces for me while I do the stitching.  Any volunteers? :)    Click here for V's how-to tutorial.

The inspiration:

Super-Belated Mother's Day

I gave my mom a wonderful gift this past Mother's Day.  The gift of knowing that I am just like her.  The was I did this, however, was by not mailing her actual gift in time for it to get there.  It gets worse, though.  I didn't even have the gift finished!   Worse- it's July & the stuff is still sitting in a corner of my craft room!   I decided I would just bring it with me when I got to see her in August.  Nevertheless, here a a couple of pictures of parts of the present.

This is a home-made potholder made with love (see the little hand-stitched heart!).  I was actually practice making the pinwheel quilt square.  More on THAT subject later.... 

Part 2 of the present is a bunch of herb seeds, a trowel, garden gloves, and these cute little seed markers that I made out of goodwill silverware.   I got the idea from a magazine (either Better Homes & Gardens or Southern Living).  

I just hammered the silverware flat (on the basement floor), and t

he used my metal stamps to imprint the names of the herbs.  Finally, I filled in the stamped letters with sharpie marker, wiping away the excess with a baby wipe.  The stamping part is probably the hardest, because the silverware jumps all over the place as you try to hammer the letters into the metal.  I have to have the boy help me because each time I'd try to hammer one letter, it would bounce.  It kind of looked like the word was stuttering (rrrrosemmmmary) !  But most, of them turned out okay.

Showing off a little

The boy's grandparents gave me an old grey metal bench that used to sit on their back deck.  I decided to spruce it up with some sanding and spray paint.  Wah-lah!

Please ignore any evidence of my extremely poor gardening skills.  They dead-looking leaves that stick up on the side of the bench used to be the beautiful blue hydrangeas the boy got me for our anniversary.  It was a wonderfully sweet gesture, seeing as how they were the exact color as the ones I carried down the aisle in my bouquet.  However, it wasn't long after that when the boy went south for a friend's wedding and I forgot to water everything.  Hence- long-shot at putting them in the ground, even though they were essentially dead.  Perhaps they'll come back next year!   Either way, the bench looks great, right?