Oh, What Do You Do in the Summertime?

Oh what do you do in the summertime

When all the world is green?

Do you spend 7 hours building a swing set with your husband 

for you kids to play on all summer long?

 Is that what you do? So do I.

P.S. And there was much joy and rejoicing in the backyard!

Happy Easter

I figured this year was my one ONLY chance to go full matchy-matchy Easter attire, so I ran with it. It took some work to convince Carter that wearing a pink and white tie was cool enough for him (Look! Zig-zags! Just like an Easter egg!), but I had him convinved by Saturday night. :)

I also realized on Sunday morning that the perfect picture of all three kids will probably never happen. Of the ones I took, I got closed eyes, crazy eyes, hair in eyes, and baby eating the dress. And in this one, three of four.

For Allison's dress I used Simplicity 2460 with an added collar and contrast hem band (don't be fooled by the drawings! There is no contrast hem band peice!). Lindsey's is from McCalls 4351 (which is out-of-print... I bought it when Allison was a baby and had never used it!). The collar and midriff sash are added. I liked both patterns, but had to make changes to both of them to make them work with the fabric I used. The pink satin taffeta was in my stash from when a JoAnn's location liquidated nearby (just $10 for a 4 yard bolt!) and I was determined to use it. I love how they turned out with the pink and white... I was concerned that they pink would be too much "wow, pepto bismo puke!" but I like how the white contrast toned it down. Still very pink, but not so pukey.

For Carter's tie I used my favorite online tutorial and pattern and appliqued white chevron's onto the pink. Its pretty thrown together, but I figured it will only get worn once... maybe twice if I can get him to put it on for portraits. But it held up surprisingly well in the wash, so I was pleased. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter and were able to take time to remember the amazing gift of our Savior, His saving, atoning grace and the miracle of the resurrection that we can all look forward to.

Bow Board

Two little girls and so many bows! Allison's old bow holder wasn't nearly big enough, so we needed something new. I was going to do something like this...

Photo via Pinterest

But a trip to Pottery Barn Kids (where we only go for story time and to let the kids play... I rarely actually buy anything there) gave me another idea. Here's what I ended up with:

Total cost: under $10

It was $5 for the plywood base (the buy at Lowe's marked a $15 2'x4' piece down for me cause it had a lousy corner), $2.79 for a spool of grosgrain and a little more for hardware to hang it. The fabric and batting I had on-hand from other projects. Its 18x24 and fits so many bows! They're not even all on there, in the picture, but I *think* it will fit all of them. Maybe... if I quit making them...

I'm using this project to audition for American Crafter over at Naptime Crafters... wish me luck!

Bean Bag Chairs

Remember how I said I would really like to be able to find the time in my life to do a project every week?

Well... I have a newborn... so I'm sure I wasn't really thinking quite so clearly when I said that. But in the last 9 weeks I have accomplished a thing or two outside of nursing, laundry and cooking. I just haven't had the time or motivation to take pictures and blog them. But finally, you get some proof.

My kids got beanbag chairs!

I made both out of upholstery micofiber. The pink was off of JoAnn's red tag table during a 50% off sale (I think I got it for $4.50/yard) and the tan is leftovers from when I reupholstered a recliner something like 6 years ago. I still have bunches of leftovers (I initially bought enough to slipcover a couch that we no longer own... I never got brave enough for that project), so when I get around to recovering the glider, you'll see that fabric again.

I used this tutorial and generally liked how it turned out. I put zippers in instead of velcro, however, which I liked a lot better than the way the velcro behaved. Someday, if I'm really ambitious I'm going to dye Carter's dark brown and put ribbon on it to look like football threads.

The kids like them, and I like that these provide a cozy little reading spot... it makes me feel like a good mom to be encouraging them to read. And once I get some book slings up on that wall behind Allison she'll have a great little book nook. Carter doesn't get books in his room yet (not until he can be responsible enough to not read at 2 am, which is what happened last time we let him have books in his room), but hopefully soon.

Oh, and in care you're wondering, I found the bags of fill at Target during back-to-school time. 100 L bags were $5, and I used almost 3 bags to fill both chairs.

Wanna Do's

New Year's Resolution time, right? I'm not very good at resolutions, but I have been thinking about things that I would like to do this year. More like habits I would like to establish. Here are just a few thoughts about things I wanna do this year...

Read more
A few books on my list are:
*Book of Mormon at least once
*10 Habits of Happy Mothers
*Love & Logic Magic
*Parenting with Love & Logic

Anyone have good fiction recommendations for me?


Sew & create more
I have a HUGE list of projects that I want to do... the things below are just the projects that I know I have supplies for off the top of my head. Its kind of scary long if you ask me... I would really love to try and tackle one project per week. Thats seems realistic enough without being overwhelming.

*Beanbag chair (Carter)
*"PLAY" canvases (playroom)
*Book slings (girls room)
*Drapes (master bedroom)
*White Button-up (Allison)
*Red Wool Dress Coat (Allison)
*Angelina PJs (Allison or Lindsey)
*Rapunzel PJs (Allison or Lindsey)
*Covered Art Supply boxes (Carter and Allison)
*Rapunzel dress-up (Allison)
*Sleeping Beauty dress-up (Allison)
*Winter yarn wreath
*Herringbone pencil skirt (me!)
*Yellow summer dress (me!)

And the sewing projects listed here probably don't even encompass a third of the fabric I have stashed away. Oh... and the girls are absolutely going to need some matching summer wardrobe something. :)

House projects
We've lived here nearly 2 years and are still in the process of making it "ours." Just a few things I'd like to see done by the end of the year...
*Paint away the pink!
*Hallway photo gallery
*Dining & living room drapes
*Recover dining chairs
*Finish a craft room in the basement (okay... this is a honey-do really)
*Paint master bedroom

And, of course, I have the ever ubiquitous goal of eat healthy/exercise more/lose weight/get in shape. I'd love to see my pre-Carter body again by summer. We'll see if I can find the energy or will power to make it happen. :)

What about you... what do you want to do this year?

September

For starters, what happened to September? Out here in NY September seemed to have a bit of an identity crisis (it thought it was July... 85 in September is just unacceptable!), and then it was just over. We did manage to do a few things around here, however.

First, I got my house mostly deep cleaned. I never did manage to tackle a major mop of the floors, and the master bed and beth got generally neglected. But the rest of the house did get a nice clean. And I managed to get Carter's room painted, with Brian's help. I'll take pictures of both kid's rooms when they are (hopefully) completely done later this month. I didn't get my craft room (aka the girls' new shared room) painted, but the color is picked and I think Brian and I might tackle that one this next weekend or on Coloumbus day (which he has off... silliest holiday ever). So, yay for goals mostly getting done!

I took the kids apple-picking again this year, which they thouroughly enjoyed. I can't believe how big they've gotten in a year.

And I potty-trained Carter this month. Yes... I am that crazy mother who decided to potty-train her 2 and half year old. But he was ready, and he took right to it. He is largely accident-free and will tell me when he needs to go... I'd call that venture a success. And now I have a few months of no diapers!

I finished a few sewing projects for Allison: a jumper using Manhatten fabric (pattern is Simplicity 2574 ) and a fleece jacket (McCalls 6430). The jumper is cute, but too big. The little jacket is about perfect, and fills a gap in her fall/winter wardrobe too!

I got inspired about our living room, and how have a whole vision for a make-over. Its involves a different furniture arrangement, new couches, and a new TV, and a new cabinet to hold our DVDs and components. Apparently I don't get inexpensive inspiration, so for now I'll go with a new paint color, slipcovers and maybe a TV on Black Friday. Do you think Black Friday could put me into labor? Becuase that would be kind of awesome.

I love this pallete for the living room, except without the dark greys, and add in cranberry. My carpet is cranberry, I'm going to go a light grey-beige on the walls, chocolate slipcovers on the couches and light blue and green accents. Still hunting for the perfect fabric for window treatments to pull it all together.

What did you do this September? And what are your plans for October?

My October? Paint the girls' room. Finish projects to finish the kids' rooms (roman shades, theme-y painted canvases and bean bag chairs, off the top of my head... I know there are more!). Paint the living room. And halls and stairwell. And I should probably get started on Christmas sewing and crafting projects... hopefully the nesting instinct kicks in hard. :)

Can you picture...

Can you picture my dining room AS a dining room? Not just the mostly empty, often cluttered dumping ground/playroom annex that its been masquarading as for the last year? But AS an actual dining room?







How about now!

Its a terrible picture, but I just snapped one really quickly before dinner. I found this 7 piece dining set (there are 2 more chairs, and 2 leaves) at a gargae sale this morning. "Luckily" our van wasn't actually ready to be picked up yesterday even like we'd been told, so I was taking Brian to work again this morning and we passed the sale on the way to work. I turned onto the street to look closer on the way home (thinking that maybe I'd find a small dresser for baby) and saw it, disassembled, sitting on the porch with a big price sign... $50!!! Done and Done! The chairs could use a reupholstery (mostly because they're a little dirty and stained, not torn up), but thats easy enough. And the top has some scratches and could use a refinish, but its not in desperate need of it. It really just looks like its been used in a house with kids... some wear and tear, but nothing terrible. So we'll probably just leave it be until our kids are past the stage where they're climbing on the furniture. :o)

The lady selling was even nice enough to offer to deliver (since it was only about 2 miles from home and our van is STILL having its A/C issue worked on by the dealer...) later in the evening if we came cask to help her load.

And now I'm really excited to actually finish the room. I'm thinking roman shades or bamboo blinds and curtains for the windows, a fun fabric to reupholster the chairs, and some art on the big blank wall. Oh, and some non-carpet flooring, eventually. That one may be a few years. :o)

Farewell to Pinks

Or at least, farewell to the pink in the dining room. I finally picked a color and painted my dining room. My friend Natalie helped me out getting the first coat on, but I had to put the 2nd on by myself. The corners still need to be touched up a little, but otherwise its done.



I like how the colors turned out. The cream color is nothing special, but I love the chocolatey color on bottom. It looked like chocolate milk going on the walls. I was relieved to start painting to bottom and realize that I like it... I was terrified that I wouldn't since I skipped the samples this time around. I also straighted up and reorganized our bookshelf... its possible that some books that we've (ahem *Brian*) owned for at least 5 years and never touched did not make it back onto the shelf... we'll see if anyone noticed in the next year...

Oh, and by the way... I NEVER want to paint around crown molding and chair rails ever again! Even with an edger, what a slow, painfully annoying process!

An "Everyday" Dress

Allison is a girly-girl. In fact, she is such a girly girl that she has recently decided that pants are out. Especially jeans. If she must wear pants they should be pink sweats if at all possible. She'll consider other varieties if you ask very nicely, but no promises... espeically if they're not pink!

And since pants are out, dresses and skirts are in. She has several skirts that are fine for playing in, but no play dresses. I made the mistake of asking her a few weeks ago if she would like to have some "everyday" dresses, which she apparently took to mean that she should ask me everyday for one.

She was finally able to stop asking yesterday morning.

I found the pink tree fabric last week before leaving for Manhatten for $3/yard at JoAnn's, and Allison picked the green to go with it. Took me two good evenings to put it all together... I think sewing for kids is a good way to ease myself back into it. Whaddya think?

UFO 10: Hemmed jeans

These jeans have been on my list since late last September. And they only took me about 30 minutes to finish, so what the heck have I been waiting for? Especially since these jeans will serve me much better now that I can wear them instead of just letting them take up space in my drawer... especially since my favorite jeans have now official been relegated to "work only" jeans (you just can't save them after they've sprouted holes in the side seams and knees).

I found them for $9 on clearance last September. They were a nice color, a good fit (at least directly after washing... the joys and downfalls of stretch denim...) and you can't beat $9! But being only 5'5", I'm on the short end of the "normal" jeans length range, which means that these things were nearly 4 inches too long.

No before photo, but here's the after photo

Can you tell they're hemmed? If you look closely you can see the fold... I used a method that keeps the original hem intact. You can find a tutorial for it over here at Sew La Tea. Worked well... I haven't trimmed the extra off yet, but I'll probably take it off with my serger. Easy, peasy, done. :) What have you finished or gotten off your list lately?

UFO 9: Quiet book

Let me preface this by saying that this was 75% done before I started finishing it up last week. I organized a quiet book page swap in my ward last fall, which is where all the pages in the before picture came from.

Before:


After:

This has been a UFO since mid-December. It took me about 12 hours (major guess... I didn't really keep track and I worked on it pretty distractedly when I did work on it) to finish it up.

And can I just say that if I ever add more pages or do another book, I will DEFINANTLY do it with heavy-weight non-fusible Pellon and not felt. The pellon elimates a lot of steps taken to keep the felt from getting destroyed quickly. The pellon was SO easy. I found mine at Walmart for $1.77/yard. You draw on it, color with crayons, cover with absorbant paper and run your iron over it. The iron and paper will remove the wax from the images leaving only the color behind. Cut it out and use it! Velcro glues to it beautifully and it doesn't require any extra stabliazation. I used the pellon for the make-a-face and counting snake pages (see them below).

Love this page! :) Not all the pieces are showing, but you get the gist...

UFO 8: Grapevine Wreath

Its about time I got the Valentine's wreath off my front door! :)

Before

After

This hasn't been a UFO long... maybe a month or 6 weeks? I got the grapevine base fairly recently and have just been waiting for I don't know what to get it done.

It took me about 3 hours to do, that that included a lot of time fiddling with the placement of everything to make sure I liked it before I glued anything. I wasn't sure it the felt butterfly was too... something. Too much? Too big? Too whimsical? Too "doesn't go with the flowers"? But, looking at it from the end of my driveway, I acutally like it a lot... what do you think? Is it too... something?

What are you workin' on? Finished anything up lately?

UFO 4, 5, 6 and 7...

I've been working...

UFO 4: Pink stripe skirt

Before

After

I spent about 3 hours finishing up this skirt, but SO much longer trying to find the rolled hem plate for my serger so I could roll hem it. I never did find it and I got tired of waiting, so I resorted to a machine blind hem (I'm lazy). And can I just say that my machine's blind hem is completely backwards from what I think it should be, which drove me pretty crazy. Just one more drop in the "I want a new machine" bucket...

This skirt has been a UFO since before Allison was born. I'm gonna guess about 5 years. Amazing that the thing still fits me! Acutally... I had to take it in, which was way nicer that how my other skirt turned out...

UFO 5: Red slinky knit skirt

No pictures. Why? It was an epic FAIL! I got this 90% done and decided that there was absolultely no way I was ever going to like this. It had been a UFO for a little over 7 years now. I started this skirt before Brian came home from his mission. And my body now doesn't even begin to resemble my body then. So, I delcare it to be finished... even if finished means it hit the trash pile. Because at least it no longer physical and mental clutter for me to sort through, right?

UFO 6: Fit Allison's black skirt

Again, no pictures, but you wouldn't even be able to tell what was done if I had taken some. I had this cute skirt for Allison which would not stay on her behind-less body. I took two little darts in the front and now it doesn't fall down. Success! It was a UFO for maybe 3 months. Took me all of 10 minutes to do, and that included convincing Allison to stop what she was doing long enough to try it one... twice. Its done, and she's worn it 2 of the last 3 days... and has it laid out to wear again tomorrow. I think she's pleased...

UFO 7: Line Carter's Curtains

Before

No white lining...

After

Pretty, white, light-blocking lining! Yay!

This one has been a UFO about a year, but its been a low-priority project. We have a (ill-fitting, girly) black-out drape up in his bedroom, but these ones fit the window and are much more boy. It took me about an hour to line them... 90 minutes if you count pressing time.

How about you? What are you working on?

Indecision Part 2

So I got some color samples... Brian and I picked 2 colors that we liked together and yesterday I tossed some more color squares on the walls (never mind that there are already THREE... Five is totally better, right?).

Here's what we ended up with...

Carter insisted on being in the picture (Want say cheese, Mommy!). While both colors are nice, the grey reads really far to the blue end... even almost purple in our space. And the pale creamy yellow I think is just too much of a non-color. So I started looking again and found a combination of two colors that I like and I think would be fine with the carpet, but the swatches are TINY, since its in one of those interior colors brochures. And they don't make chips for these colors in any other format. And, since I'm so sick of buying paint samples and FAILING with them ($12 in on paint I don't like already...), I went to Behr's website and played around with the colors I've been thinking about. Here's what it looks like.

This is obviously not my dining room, its one of Behr's sample rooms online (read: no paid subscription required). I picked this room because it has a chair rail like my room. And I would love to put beadboard up on the lower half of the wall someday. Anyway, the floor is an approximation of my carpet color (not too far off, right?) and I picked the trim color to approximate the current wood-toned trim in the house (which we will eventaually paint or replaced with white... another someday).

I figure that with this scheme its neutral while still being enough of a color to satify me. And when we get around to replacing the carpet I'll have more leeway to play with the colors from the light fixture in the accents of the room.

So... what do you think? How's it look?

UFO #2: Peeps Wreath

This project fell into "I bought the stuff and haven't touched it" category and was major mental clutter. I'm glad its done... turned out cute!

Before:

After:

I love that its silly and whimsical. I roughly followed the tutoral posted by Gerbera Designs on Tried and True. I opted for glue in addition to the toothpicks

This went unfinished for either 3 or 11 months. I bought the peeps on clearance after last Easter, but I didn't get the wreath form until around Christmas time. Take you're pick. It only took me about 90 minutes to finish it, and that included indecision about where to put the bow. :)

How about you? What have you been working on?

Indecision

Ever wonder what indecision looks like? At my house, this is what it looks like right now...

I've GOT to get that pink painted over, but I have NO idea what color to go. We have this deep wine colored carpet that we're not changing right away, so it can't clash with that, and that probably limits me a lot. What color would you paint? Do you like any of those paint chips?

Edited to add: this is my dining room, but I also need to paint over these same two pinks in the hall, stairwell, upstairs hallway and living room. And here is a picture of the light fixture in the dining room that I do like and I don't think we'll replace... might help you give me some ideas. :)

And here's the darker pink of the wall under the chair rail and the carpet. Its pretty close to the acutal color... not quite since I'm working in artificial light with a flash, but not too far off. I also want to paint or replace the trim throughout the house (white), but that is a project for another time.

UFO #1: Nauvoo Temple Cross-Stitch

Here's my first finished project for the month!

Before

After

*Wow! Its amazing to look at the before and afters! I was never sure this would end well before the detail backstitching was in!*

Getting it framed will be another project (maybe someone should host a "get it framed and on the wall" challenege. I can't tell you how much stuff I have that needs frames...).

This was a UFO for nearly 8 years. I don't remember when I started it exactly, but I was 20 and in Nauvoo when I bought it and I'm pretty sure I started it around that same time (I must have been tired of crocheting). 8 YEARS!

It took me maybe 10 hours to finish it. I worked on it during prime time TV mostly. Made me feel less useless during that time... haha! Looking at the picture I realize that I forgot the put the words in at the bottom... I'll do that during Grey's tonight.

What have you been working on? Happy finishing!

A completion and too many UFOs

Wanna know what football and crafting have in common? Completions are good, incompletions are bad.

Here's my best completion for the month of January: a t-shirt quilt!

I (and my mom) have been saving t-shirt for years. I mean, YEARS. There are lots of t-shirts from junior high and high school on here, but theres more: one from a progam at school in the 4th grade, one from going to Disney when I was 8, one from a play I did in the 2nd grade... this quilt is packratting put to good use, I guess. I think that this quilt (or something like it) was really the purpose of saving all these shirts. Its was a someday project for my mom that became my project.

This thing is huge. Like, twin sized wide, but half again as long as a standard twin. But that makes it great for cuddling on the couch, which is what we'll be using it for most, I'm sure. Our kids love cuddling under quilts to watch movies and read books.

Sadly, for every crafting completion, I have 2 or 3 UFOs. This t-shirt quilt spent a good 3 months in UFO status. Do you have any UFOs? Need some clarification? UFO... UnFinished Object. I know that I have TONS of them. Off the top of my head:


*painting the playroom
*ABC wall for the playroom
*Grapevine wreath for front door
*Quiet book for Carter
*crochet baby blanket for Carter (that I started while pregnant!)
*white dressy shirt for Allison
*tweed Easter dress for Allison (with that fabric that spoke to me...)

The only projects I've already purchased supplies for count as UFOs in my mind. Which is probably good, becuase if I had to count all the things in my head that I WANT to do... thats a much bigger list...

So I was thinking maybe I needed to have a challenge month. Anyone interested in an "Out With the UFOs" challenge? Let me know... I think, even if no one else needs to, I really need to challenge myself to get them finished. But really, all I want to do is start on something new.

The problem with knowing how to sew...

If you know much about me, you know that I'm cheap. Maybe frugal's a better word... but whatever you call me, it means the same. Part of me being frugal means that I buy my kid's clothes a year ahead of time when they're on clearance. I aim to get things 75% off or better. I don't like to pay more than $2 for t-shirts, or more than $4 for jeans. $5 an item it about where I put my cap for kid's clothes, and if its $5, it'd better be a darn good item. Like this adorable dress that I found in store for $5 today...

Old Navy runs a great sale this time of year where I buy a lot of my kid's stuff for next year... so does Target, since they reset kids & baby stuff in January so if you can be patient enough, you'll find 75% off markdowns. But this is really all background information.



While shopping Old Navy clearance, I found this little skirt...

Cute, right? Allison loved it too, so I bought it. And this weekend, as I was going through my purchases trying to make sense of what I over-bought (and need to return) and what I still need, I realized that I don't have a shirt to go with this cute skirt. Or the cute little silver one I found at the Carters Outlet. So I start thinking... what would I like to go with it and I come up with an idea of what I want for this skirt: a cute little white (winter white, I think) button up shirt, out of a satiny fabric... or maybe a shantung... either mandarin or classic collar, with puff sleeves and some pink ribbon rosettes on the upper chest one one side.

Can you see it? Yeah... so can I. And now that I have in my head what I want, its what I want. And, I'm more than certain, it doesn't exist. And certainly not at a price I want to pay.


THATS the problem with knowing how to sew. It gets you in trouble and you start thinking about what is possible, and perfect, instead of just shopping for something that exists and would work. So now, I have to make it. Sewing and I have been a little at odds for a few years now... so I'm not sure how this will work out. Maybe it will be good for me. Luckily, I was able to find a toddler girls button-up pattern. I was pretty afraid that those wouldn't exist either.



Oh, and the other problem with knowing how to sew? Fabric starts speaking to you. Wanna know what this piece said?

"Look at me! Wouldn't I be an adoroable little dress or jumper for Allison? And I'm on super sale... only $2.50 a yard! You know you want me... I'm even pretty Easter colors!"


It bewitched me... so now a dress/jumper is on my list too... as if I didn't have enough on that list already. :)

Allison's dream house...

Or Barbie's, rather. The only thing Allison asked for at all this Christmas was a Barbie doll and a Barbie movie. I don't think it gets any easier than that.

She got more than she bargained for. The Barbie house that my dad built for me some 20 years ago is something that my parents hung onto. We brought it with us out to NY last January. I spent most of the December rehabing the house with fresh "carpet" (upholstery velvet and wood looking contact paper), wallpaper (scrapbook paper and wallpaper mod podged on) and paint. I think it turned out pretty cute!

Here's the before (sort of... this is after Brian ripped out the old carpet the the mice in our rental here loved so much... ick!)

And here's the after.

And here's my cute little girl...

Now... I wouldn't decorate or paint my house this way (although the green on green stripe in the kitchen is pretty nice...), but I think its okay for Barbie.