Where does the time go?

Soooooooooooo, a short 6 months later and here I am again. What?! How does that even happen. Time passes so quickly. Sheesh!!!

Instead of a New Year's resolution, I went with a focus word for this year once again. For 2019 I've decided that my focus is going to be 'DONE'. I have so many things in progress (crafting and everyday life) that I just want to get some of them done. Wish me luck!!

What even got me moving in that direction (craft wise) is a piece I had stitched years ago. It was a Christmas piece and over time had gotten loose in the hoop I had used to finish it. For years I had been telling myself that I needed to fix it. For years! I finally decided that enough was enough and I needed to just get that done.


So I did.

Here's the piece from before....

It was getting all loose and stretched out in the frame. Not to mention that over the years it had also gotten dirty.

I had glued that baby in place and, to be honest, I did one heck of a job doing it. I had a devil of a time getting that piece out. I didn't want to just cut it because I didn't have all that much room around it. In the end, I had to break that hoop into pieces to get the stitching out of there.

After all of that, it deserved a little time at the spa.

After a good soaking, drying, and pressing, I put it back together in a new finish.

I bought a package of cloth napkins and used them to make a pillow cover. I stitched the cross stitch piece near the edge and then covered my stitch line with some gold trim that I hand stitched on so that I could hide the stitching.

The napkins are sewn together on three sides. The white you can see is some ribbon used to tie the bottom closed after I put the pillow form inside. This is a great way to be able to store the pillow cover instead of having to store a hole bunch of fat pillows.

So, that's one thing done. Now on to many others...........or at least that's the plan.

Better this year

Happy New Year!!!

I'm so sorry that I was mostly absent last year. I did stuff.....I just didn't put it here.

Soooooo, this year, once again, I have chosen a focus word for the year rather than setting resolutions that will be broken and forgotten by the end of January. My focus word for 2017 is 'Better'. Keeping up with this blog and my other one are both part of my goal of being better. And there are only a million other things that I need to be better at also, but anything I do better is an improvement.

Awhile back, I had seen a picture in a catalog of a sweatshirt with a lace heart on it. The price on it was outrageous, and especially so since I knew I could make one. There wasn't anything special to it.

I took a sweatshirt from my son (he never wore it) and got a lace curtain panel off of ebay for a couple of bucks.

 

 I cut the shape out of my lace. Used iron on bonding to attach it to the shirt, and wallah.......

 

If you decide to make one, a word of caution though.  Because lace is, well......lace, make sure that you have some wax paper, or freezer paper, covering what would be the exposed part of the lace so that the bonding stuff doesn't melt to your iron.

If you try it, let me see some pictures. I'd love to see yours and see what other shapes people might choose to go with.

Thanks for stopping by. I'm going to try to be BETTER about posting this year. And I hope that everyone has a year that is better than last year..........even if you had a great year last year, I hope that this one is even better.

See ya soon!

Kid crafts

Last weekend was Dax's birthday. All three of the girls made him something for his gift. None of them had any coaching from me what-so-ever. As a matter of fact, I didn't see any of the gifts they had made until they were done. I'm really proud of the things they came up with (they did do some searching on the internet) and so was Dax. Gifts from the heart are always the best!

Addison made this with popsicle sticks.

Abigail went a little crazy with the crafting and couldn't stop. lol She made all kinds of things.

She made this pop-up card.

This camera out of construction paper. It's folded into a triangle so that it will stand up on its own.

I suspect that for the lens she used the baking tin from her easy bake oven. :0)  This picture of her and her Dad when she was little sure makes me miss my babies. They grow up sooooo fast.

And she made him this 'beer'. The mug is filled with his favorite Lindt white chocolate truffles and topped with large marshmallows. By the way, have you seen the new jumbo marshmallows they have out now? They're huge!!

And Kirsten drew this picture for him. I thought she did a great job of drawing. She found a picture online and looked at it while she drew this one. I couldn't even trace it this well. I have no talent for drawing or painting at all.

I just love to see them be crafty and creative. It does my heart good that they have an interest in it.


However, someone doesn't have any interest at all. As you can see, there is no homemade gift from our son. He couldn't be bothered. LOL

Perfect for a cold drink

Two of my girls are bead crazy. They love to make the designs with those plastic beads, then you iron it and they all stick together.

Like these:

Well, I had several of those sitting on  my island waiting to be melted together. I just felt like I HAD to do something with them other than get them all stuck together so that they could just get lost in the other piles of junk that my kids love.

Sound familiar to anyone?

Then it hit me....coasters!!

For these I traced the shapes onto some cotton batting scraps I had.

Then I cut those out, placed them on top of the design (while it was still on the holder) and ironed it until the beads melted enough to stick together and to the batting.

The girls had made a few designs and we've actually been able to use them as coasters. My husband didn't think it would work, but so far they've held together.

They've made up several more. This time I think I may iron the beads together a little before I put the batting (or felt for that matter) onto them and then continue to iron until it sticks. I'm just wondering if that might strengthen them even more.

So there you go. Give it a try. If you have as many of these around your house as I do, you'll probably be thrilled to actually turn them into something useful. lol

A new site to love

I know we've all had those moments. You know the ones. You've got a great idea for a craft. You've either found the perfect pattern or you've spent countless nights in bed, unable to sleep, putting together the perfect plan for your craft.


You finally get everything together, attack your craft with gusto, and in the end, much to your surprise,






Well have no fear! Today I was hopping around looking at new (to me) blogs and happened across Craft Fail. It's an absolutely wonderful site.



In looking through I saw several things that had me saying to myself, 'Oh my gosh! I did that too!!'



Go check it out. It will make you feel so much better about the things that have gone wrong.

Made my own Fireworks!!

I decided to make my own firecrackers for 4th of July.






Sound scary?

I have some fabric that has flags on it - I don't know why I have it or even where it came from, but I have it. lol Anyway, I cut the fabric into pieces to fit around the cardboard tube at the center of toilet paper rolls. After it had dried (actually it was weeks after it had dried) I mod podged it onto the tubes leaving a little room at the bottom to tuck the fabric up inside the tube and a lot of room at the top. I put a rubber band at the top to hold it all close together and then cut the fabric into thin little strips.


I thought they came out cute. I made three of them and put them on the red pedestal plate that I had made along with some other things.

(please ignore the computer and books on the table)

There are three wooden stars stacked at the back of the plate. One each of red, white, and blue, the firecrackers, and a couple of pictures of very important soldiers.

The picture in the foreground is my Grandfather. The picture in the back is my Great-Grandfather and was taken in Paris, France during the war. I thought this would be a great time to set them out. Although, these aren't the originals, just scanned copies that I reprinted. I wouldn't want the originals to get destroyed. :0)

My sweet daughter....

A couple of weeks ago I had to put my 13 year old St. Bernard to sleep. He was my baby and it was (still is) very hard on me. To help make me feel better, my dear sweet daughter, Abigail, made a little clay figure for me. It's only a couple of inches long and about an inch tall. I think she did a fantastic job (and she's only 10!) Of course I'm not a bit biased.






(oh, and sorry they're so blurry. I tried and tried but it's the best I could do.)

Before + After

Today I was in Hobby Lobby (if you know me, that's no surprise) and they have a lot of things on sale for 50% off. I found a bunch of these:



Well, they actually had all of the letters. LOL


Anyway, I like it but didn't like that it's just glass. So I headed over to the scrapbooking section and picked out some paper. That turned it into this:



I like it much better. I also bought a couple of other 'v's that were also 50% off. I think I'll keep my eyes open for others to make a whole little collection of them.

Here's what I have so far.

Sundaes

This week is teacher appreciation week. They have been doing things all week for the teachers. The kids all wanted to take something special to their teachers so last night I made 'sundae's' for them to take.







I used hershey's kisses inside the sundae glass. Then I glued tootsie roll minis to 1/2 of a styrofoam floral ball. I stuck in a pixie stick for the straw and one cherry life saver on top. The kids were quite pleased and so excited to take them to school today....and as long as they're happy, I'm happy. :0)

Matching game

My niece's birthday is on May 10. She'll be two. I never know what to get her and at this age I want her to have something to open. I'm sure later gift cards will be what she wants but for now she needs a present.


I saw on another site where someone had made a matching game using two inch chipboard squares so I decided to give it a try. I used scrapbook paper on one side. I made sure to get something that would look the same no matter where I cut the squares out from. I used a 1-7/8 inch punch so that all of my paper pieces would look the same. I also used a tea stain ink pad along the edges to cover up the chipboard and give it some interest. For the matching part I used pictures of my niece. There are some with just her and some with her parents or grandparents. And through it all, mod podge is my friend. :0)





I made twenty squares (ten matches) because I was afraid too many would be overwhelming. Heck, I don't even know if she's ready for these at two but I figure you've gotta start sometime, right? lol



I also found a little wooden box at Goodwill that I decorated to put the game pieces in.





(Her mom is really into the big flowers with the gemstone in the center) Anyway, it was fun to make and I'll probably do it again when the opportunity arises. I hope she likes it.

More Dollar Store Design...

Okay, I've already shown you the cake stand made with the dollar store purchases. I bought 4 things that day. Well, I guess 5 if I include the glue. lol Here's what I bought...




This time I used the glass bowl and the ashtray. (yes, an ashtray!!) I turned the ashtray upside down to make the base for the bowl and glued them together.




Then I decided that the bowl needed something to bring out some of the design so I painted part of it.



I haven't decided yet if I like it or not.




But, the great thing about it is that I just used cheap craft paint so it wipes right off with a little glass cleaner. If I decide for sure that I don't like, I can get rid of it. AND, if I want to, I can change the colors to go with particular decorations.

Mostly I have to say that I'm loving trying to look at things a little differently when I'm out and about. It adds a whole new dimension to shopping.....like I needed that. lol

Spring flowers

I saw these cute flowers made with pipe cleaners on a blog somewhere. Unfortunately, I play around going through so many that I have no idea where I actually saw it now. Sorry. I'd love to give credit to whoever's idea it is. They're so easy and quick to do.

Anyway, here's mine...



I showed the kids how to make them also. Abigail is the most artistic of them and it just comes to her so naturally (makes me sick - lol). She headed off and made one like I had shown her. And then made a variety of other flowers too.



She even made a bee to buzz around the flowers.



I know I'm her mom and all and but I think she has such imagination and ability at only 10 years old. Don't you agree? (only yes answers relevant - *giggle*)

Bunnies

I just love looking at blogs out there that are done by people with so much creative talent. I'm learning so many new things, but I'm most excited by learning how to look at things differently. I made up these little framed prints for Easter decorations.



I got these little frames at Target awhile back. (I bought several packages. There were three in a pack for only $2.50 - I think.) I just bought the Benjamin Bunny book a couple of weeks ago for $1.00. I flipped through and picked out the pictures that I liked best. I thought they turned out really cute, especially for the price. lol And I still have the book to use for other things that I want to try too. Woohoo!

My New Flock

My birds from the Birds of Change Exchange have arrived!!! Woohoo! (insert woowoo dance here) It's so much fun to get goodies in the mail. Here they are:

Aren't they great?! I just love them all. Thanks so much to Regina for putting this all together. What an undertaking!!

Heading west

Well, my little flock has been sent west to be assigned to their new homes. I hope they're happy with their new friends.



I wonder what's got their interest. They all seem to be staring at something. hmmmm....maybe if I can get a picture from a different angle without scaring them off....




...looks like it must be lunch. lol

It was a lot of fun participating in Creative Kismet's Birds of Change Exchange. This is the first one I've participated in and to make it even better, everything came from my scraps. Woohoo! I hope to do something like it again sometime. I'm usually a little hesitant about what I feel I can accomplish since the kids keep life so hectic. lol Of course, now the kids have all been through my scraps and picked out the fabric they want their birds made out of. lol

Too Busy

It's been so busy at the office that I haven't had time to craft on much of anything. That tends to make my life pretty boring and the same for this blog. lol This morning I ran into the girls bathroom real quick like and took this picture.



Their bathroom is painted pink and because of this little goodie it's now got lots of butterflies in it too. This was a shirt that they had outgrown. The bottoms of the white sleeves were too stained to be able to give it away but it was so cute I hated for it to be wasted. I went to the craft store and bought the pieces for the frames used to stretch canvas, cut the shirt up and made this wall hanging. I thought it turned out really well (if I do say so myself, lol) I like it enough that I've got another shirt that I'm going to do the same thing with for Wyatt's room...one of these days. ;0)