SNOWMAGGEDON 2011

I am stuck at home while the Georgia General Assembly Session starts today. I have been working as best I could at home, but its difficult. Its a little surreal watching all of this from home as I am usually there.

Anyway, there has been a "weather event" here in Georgia this weekend. Snow, ice, and freezing rain has covered the Southeast. I am trapped at home.

Toby is having a little trouble doing his business.

Mama’s Holiday Wish List Meme

TodaysMama and GameStop are giving away a sleighful of gifts this holiday season and to enter I'm sharing this meme with you.

1. What is your holiday wish for your family?
I hope that we can come together as one and celebrate the Season with humility and graciousness. To love one another and help those in need.

2. What is your Christmas morning / Hanukkah Nightly tradition?
Parents get up and make coffee and maybe, breakfast. Kid must wait upstairs with his stocking stuff until coffee and/or breakfast is ready. Then its presents time. We usually sit around the tree and play with toys and put stuff together most of the day. Fun, Fun! Love it.

3. If you could ask Santa for one, completely decadent wish for yourself, what would it be?
A vacation anywhere...but just me, no one else. I love my family, but sometimes I need a break.

4. How do you make the holidays special without spending any money?
We (I) cook and make crafts and we like to ride around the neighborhood looking at all the pretty lights.

5. What games did you play with your family growing up?
We loved Yatzee! Later on we had Pictionary and that was hilarious!

6. What holiday tradition have you carried on from your own childhood?
I loved opening one present on Christmas Eve and it was always new pajamas. We have kept that one up. I love it, but I don't think the boy really likes it, he wants toys.

7. Where would you go for a Christmas/Hanukkah-away-from-home trip?
If I was going on a trip for the holidays, I would love to go to a snowy, country place and have an old fashioned Christmas.

8. Check out GameStop and tell us, what are the three top items on your GameStop Wish List this year:
I would love a Wii and Playstation 3 and a Nintendo DS with LOTS of games!

My First Quilt(ette)

Here is my first "EVER" quilt. It is a doll quilt with doll. The quilt was supposed to be a baby quilt but I ran out of brown and pink fabric and it ended up being a doll quilt. It measured about 20" x 20", great for a doll quilt. This was for my neice, Christina, for her second little girl. I had so much fun making this. I worked every night for a week before the shower to make this and had the time of my life. These pictures are after I had gifted them. I didn't have time to take pictures before I wrapped them. I was still wrapping it while driving over to their house.

The doll is the Black Apple Doll and it was so easy.... and can I say its the cutest thing I have ever made. She matches the quilt. I made her with some muslin and left over fabric from the quilt. I love her embroidered face. She has a little smirk.

The binding was premade quilt binding and it was so easy. My mitered corners worked out the first time and I was so STOKED. I wish I had taken pictures during the process (I didn't because I was afraid it would be a disaster). I was dancing around the living room and my husband thought I had lost my mind and had no idea what I was talking about.

Here is the back. The pink fabric I had was too small so I used leftovers of the front to make a stripe in the middle and used some brown on the sides. I noticed in the bright sunlight that the brown binding didn't quite match, but in the house it looked fine. I machine quilted this with a diagonal. I was going to make a diamond, but after I did the quilting one way, I thought doing it the other way would be too much. After washing, the quilt was perfect and had that wonderful puckery (is that word?) quilted goodness.

Mama loved it! That's all that counts. I talked with her earlier about the colors of her nursery and she said Brown and Pink and that worked so well for me. I had a nice stash of pink and brown fabric and really only had to buy the binding.

I cannot wait to do this again and I am sure I will as we have about 4 more "mother's to be" in our family.

Valentine SNOW!

It's snowing! again. We here in Georgia don't get alot of snow, but this year is a banner year. This is already our 3rd snow event. I say "snow event" because when it snows here, everything stops. This is our back yard only after 2 hours of snow.

This is the boy at the basketball goal as the snow was initally falling.

This is our side yard while the snow was falling. Its pretty, but its cold.

Here's Toby trying to do his business. But its too cold and he doesn't know what to do.

Bucket of Monkeys

I have made a little gift basket for the my neice's baby shower. I made a flannel baby blanket with 3 matching burp cloths. I then made a fabric basket to put them in. I included a little monkey bib I found at the Dollar Store.

Isn't it cute?

The basket is a pattern from thestitchinkitchen.com and was made from a cotton dishcloth and I used cotton batting to stiffen it. I thought she could use this in the nursery to put diapers or other baby stuff. I have to make me one now. I think its so cute.

The blankets and burp cloths were just two pieces of flannel sewn together with cute stitching.

I'm loving this! I hope she likes it.

Homemade Christmas

Ain't it cute. I made this little sweater last year and it is so cute. There are matching mittens, hat, and a stocking on the tree also. I just haven't gotten any pictures of those.

This year I made all my gifts. I made this rice bag pattern from V and Co. blog. I made about 10 of these, but I forgot to get pictures of all of them. Here are a few.

I have also been working on these little magnetic paper dolls that I found at One Pearl button blog.

Heartfelt Thanks

I have spent quite a few hours (shhhh, don't tell anybody) going through the Sew Mama Sew giveaway blogs today. Oh, my goodness, there are so many inspiring blogs out there to see. You must go and see them, even if you don't join any of the giveaways, just look. Such inspiration, creativity, and just all around wonderfulness (is that a word?).

I have personally entered many of those great giveaways and have actually had some responses from some of the wonderful craftspersons(?) from those blogs. I am excited and humbled by their comments. Me and my elementary skills are thankful for the responses and good will that has come from them.

Thank you to all of the great people having the giveaways and for Sew Mama Sew for sponsoring.

I don't think I can ever find enough time to go through each and every blog that I have seen today, but I tell you, I will do my best. And there will be lots more buying handmade and from these independent sellers from now on. You can't buy this stuff in stores it comes direct from the heart. I think the thing I love the most is the little peek I have into their lives and homes and the new perspective I gives to my own life and home.

Sincerely, I thank you.

When they say Flash Flood, you better listen!

This is the creek by our house during the flash floods over the past week. I live in Douglas County, GA that got a good brunt of the worst of the flooding. My son took these pictures as he was walking the dog. Yes, I know he is close to the water and yes he got in a lot of trouble and was grounded. This creek is usually just a little lazy small creek and he fishes out of it from time to time. This little creek took out two roads of our subdivision leaving only one road in and out. There are over 100 roads that are impassable in our county and the major interstate from here to Atlanta was closed for almost three days as the flood waters from the Chattahoochee River and Sweetwater Creek took it over. Now that the interstate is open it takes forever to get anywhere as that is the only way in and out of our county now.

We were very lucky as we had no flooding in our house but we do have some new leaks in the roof. We just fixed some about two weeks before the floods so that was great. Others in our county and the surrounding counties were not that lucky. There are many people in our community with no home or belongings and 10 people lost their lives. I have lived in this area for 44 years and I have never seen anything like this before. My banner is a picture of Sweetwater Creek State Park here in Douglas County. It was completely flooded and I have seen aerial shots but you can't get to park to see it now as the roads leading to it are impassable.

Unfortunately, its raining again. Pray for us here.

Reuse and Recycle

I have been using the sewing machine as you can see. I am just doing some small things to learn as I go. This is the Kokeshi Stuffie from Melly & Me.




Cute and very easy. I have to work on sewing around the curves as these didn’t turn out as neat as I would have liked. I also ran out of stuffing material and it isn’t stuffed as much as it should. But overall I really like it. The embroidery was fast (as its all backstitch and few lazy daisies) and simple with minimal sewing. I am getting better at the ladder stitch to close up the turning holes.

This will show you the backing material I used.

This was my next project. These are crooked coasters from thelongthread.com.

I learned machine quilting and changing the feet on my sewing machine. I had to use the walking foot with the thickness of the material and batting. The linen set is some linen material from a shirt that I don’t wear anymore (the kokeshi doll was made from this shirt also). The white set is just some white cotton material I have had for a while to use with embroidery. I absolutely love these. I have a linen and white coaster on my desk at work. I haven’t washed these yet so they don’t have that quilted wrinkley goodness yet, but they will.

This set of coasters comes from a pattern from foofanagle.wordpress.com.

These were very fun to make. I learned to piece for quilting with this. The first few I made didn’t match up in size with the backing and batting and I realized I was using too large of seam. I changed that and they worked great. So, so fun. These were made from that linen shirt also with some scraps from some fat quarters I had.

These have been great to work on and have gotten me comfortable with my sewing machine and even hand sewing. I want to start a small quilt now.

As for the title of this post, I have used one linen shirt to make all of these projects and I still have more (I think I may make another Kokeshi doll). I have been going through my closet and the kid's closet for good material of things we don't use anymore or are stained or torn. I don't have a big budget for material so this has been a great way to reuse things that are old and really no one would want to wear. I have a closet full of acid wash jeans from my skinny days. I think I might make something from those.

Meet Hugo!

My first stuffie!

I know its hard to tell in these photos but its a frog. I got the pattern from the Purl Bee. I used some jean material that I had from cutting my son's jeans off for shorts. My sewing really blows though. There were a few areas that I didn't sew very well and all I did was just top stitch them closed after I turned it right side out. I think as it ages and the seams start to fray it will be so cute.

I added some beads for the eyes and stuffed with dried beans for a bean bag effect.

When I sat him up for pictures he reminded me of Hugo from the Lost TV Show. So his name is Hugo. I may try some embroidery to spruce him up a little.

It was so fun and only took about an hour and I'm a newbie sewer. So for someone who can really sew it should just be a really fast, cute gift.

Hugo is going with us on our trip to Key West next month. I hope he enjoys it. I'm sure there will be pictures.

Another New Obsession

Well, I have finally caught my breath and have a new crafting obsession. I am so excited. Its a Brother CS-6000i computerized sewing machine with 60 stitches.


I'm still learning. I haven't touched a sewing machine since I was in the 7th grade. My mother was a very accomplished seamstress and she tried to show me how. I just wasn't that interested. I wish she was still around now to show me. But I'm sure she would be very proud.

My first project was a very easy purple pin cushion. You can see it in the foreground of the picture. I have now started with the fabric stash. Another expensive hobby. My husband is still shaking his head. I told him he better let me do this or he better start paying for therapy. All this crafting keeps me sane.

I haven't really been doing too much crafting lately. Just a little doodle embroidery and some knitting but nothing to really show yet. I want to start a small quilt and have been surfing blogs and the internet looking at all the wonderful quilts others have made. Wow, there are some wonderful quilts out there in blogland!

My Friend

I lost my best friend last week. She had been very sick and lost her battle with Interstitial lung disease. I am still in a state of shock as we thought that she would be okay once she got the lung transplant. But in the end, the doctors decided that the transplant wouldn't even save her. So she was taken off of life support.

I just want to put this out into the universe: I love you, Dawn. I will miss you. I know that I will see you later. Just please forgive me for not being there for you this time.

To everyone that sees this, all I have to say...Don't let your friends get away from you. No matter what you have to do. I learned my lesson the hard way.

'Shrooms

My new obsession has really taken off. I spent Thursday night and Friday night finishing this cute little mushroom.

I found the pattern at The Little House by the Sea blog. Isn't it just the cutest thing.

I think that I have mastered the french knot. Ha! Its made with felt and the original is sewn on the sewing machine, but since I don't have a sewing machine I stitched it all up by hand. I am quite proud of this. Its definately not perfect, but is soooo dang cute. I have started to make the second one in the pattern and I think I will make more in different colors. This one is going on my desk at work just so that I can look at it. But I think I will make a few for gifts. My oldest step-daughter just got a new sewing machine and I think one of these will make a great little pincushion.

New Obsession

I have a new obsession. I found some old cross stitch that I had done years (and I mean years) ago and realized I wanted to learn embroidery. I found an easy pattern and started.



I mostly used back stitch and stem stitch. Its done on an old white linen I had for my cross stitch and never used.

Here are my first stitches in stem stitch. I had so much fun with this. I only did an outline version of this pattern. I hope to do some more with more advanced embroidery stitches. I might even find a use for this on my knitting. Here is the final version.

I got this pattern at http://zuill.us/andreablog/2008/01/04/gnome-the-embroidery-pattern-for-january/

I think its cute as a button. I hope to do more of this. (Sorry for the crappy pictures, no sun today.)

Aren't these just the cutest?

I made some mini ornaments for the tree while watching the Atlanta Falcons beat Tampa Bay. It kept my hands busy while the game was on, even though I probably should have chosen something a little bigger. My hands were shaking so bad it was hard to work those little stitches for the mittens on 3 double point needles.

These were a little fiddley but they are so adorable when finished that I must make more.

Cute, cute, cute, cute, cute. I can't quit saying it.

I made a mini sweater last year for the boy's teacher, but it wasn't anywhere close to this cute. I used a worsted weight yarn with bigger needles and they came out a bit larger. Then I put initials on with duplicate stitch.

I Won! I Won!

Wow, this is exciting. I won a copy of Adobe Photoshop CS4 from http://thepioneerwoman.com/. I don't know how to use it, but I can't wait to learn. I will have to learn how to take better pictures too. Maybe I can make my knitting look more professional. Anyway, I can't wait to get started. Thanks again, Pioneer Woman.

Save Pushing Daisies!

Please save my favorite show! I love this show. Its original and funny.

Please visit the petition.

Also see ljc fyi for some creative ways to send a message to ABC.

I think this is one of the best shows on television. I don't like reality or law/medical/jury shows either, they are all the same. Please help us save this show.

Let's Roll!

These are some crappy pictures, but I had to share. I tried something a little different with the Challah recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. I had some of the Challah dough in my fridge and saw a recipe on thepioneerwoman.com and saw how she made rolls and decided to try this method. LOVE IT! It was easy peasy.
And it made great rolls. I will be bringing this to our Thanksgiving Dinner this year. Its easy and makes spectacular rolls. Warm from the oven with butter, mmmmmmmmmm.

Are these not the best looking rolls?

Yes. Yes, they are.

All Hallow's Eve

We did the Halloween thing this year. Of course. But we did the "what's in the house" type of costume instead of the bought costume of earlier years.

The kid decided he wanted to be a Hobo this year and of course I have quite the resources for that! We found an old tweed jacket of mine from 15 years ago (still dusty from the closet; all the better). I sewed patches on the elbows from some old window treatments; and some old holey jeans, fingerless gloves, an old handkerchief, an old knitted hat, and some makeup work (dark eybrows and some dark eyeshadow for a 5 o'clock shadow). As you can see, he has his bindle. The kid ruled!

Way too much candy. It was either "Must give the Hobo more" or "Look at this great home-made costume, must give more candy". He totally scored! Now we have to eat all this candy (mostly chocolate).

As you can see, there are lots of empty candy wrappers, LOL.

Happy, All Hallow's Eve!

Its Here, Its Here

I finally got my book, Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a day. This weekend I tried the Challah recipe and it was beautiful and also DELISH!Everybody loved it. Its sooooo good. My Husband said it tasted better than the Ryan's rolls, and that's saying alot for him. We had butter, honey, jam, everything mmmmmmmmmmm.

We stuffed ourselves on bread. The next day I got up and made two more loaves for our family reunion and it was very well received. I have one more loaf to make and I will be making that tomorrow.
I'm still going to make the cinnamon rolls. I can't wait. I have to get a rolling pin first. Plus I have to get more large containers to make all the different doughs in the book. OOOOhhhhh, I'm so excited.

I LOVE this book. My husband loves it too as I have bread baking while he cooks dinner and we have fresh baked bread for dinner. How Great Is That!