Friday, December 31, 2010

Happy New Year

★˛˚˛*˛°★Happy 2011!!!★* 。*★* ˛.*.★*.˛* .˛。*.★.*˛.¨*.★
˛°_██_*.。*./ \ .˛* .˛。.★ **˛HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011**
˛. (´• ̮•)*.。*/♫.♫\*˛.* ˛_Π_____.!!! FROM MY HOME ★*.★
.°( . • . ) ˛°./• '♫ ' •\.˛*./______/~\*. ˛*.。˛*★*TO YOURS *(...'•. .) * ╬╬╬╬╬˛°|田田 |門|╬╬╬╬╬*♥ LOVE ♥.*.*★*.★**PEACE*



Monday, December 13, 2010

Happiness is...

finding 5 Cashmere sweaters at Goodwill and one really fuzzy Angora sweater all for $3.99 each! Three of these babies were size 3x; the Holy Grail of sizes for sweater felting if you ask me. I will be making wool mittens and the Cashmere will make such a soft, luxurious lining for them. The angora sweater is going to be made into one of these for my daughter for Christmas. The one I am making will just be a really fuzzy version of the bunny and I'm going to do the lining of the ears with a small holiday print fabric and give it a holiday bow around the neck.



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Friday, October 15, 2010

In Loving Memory...

: Nelda Sue Halboth:
December 16, 1937 ~ October 14, 2010
In just 3 days I went from believing that we had
at least few years with her to just coming to terms
that it would only be a few months at best - to being
told she only had hours or maybe a few days to live.
My first thought this morning was to call her and tell her
something funny that had happened yesterday.
{I will miss her}
My mom:

A sarcastic sense of humor
A funny little snicker when she was tickleing my cats feet
She was an awesome cook
Was a registered nurse, but told me that if she had not passed the
test to get into nursing school that she would have been a hair dresser
Married to my dad 47 years
Loved her grandchildren - Nick, Grace and Hank
Knew how to give the best gifts
Loved to work in her flower garden
Was kind
Liked to shop and was good at finding bargains
Loved going to garage sales
Liked antique pottery
Liked toffee
She will be missed by so many people.
I would like to thank Jeanne for being with her and my dad
every step of the way.


Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Vacation ...From a Year Ago

Just starting on scrapping our vacation to Mesa Verde from a year ago. I am so behind I think I'm ahead!
This page completely scrap lifted from a kit I got from an Archiver's scrapmania night - The Cricut font for the word vacation is Alphalicious and the Mesa Verde font is Songbird.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

This one was supposed to be titled Sleeping Beauty but I couldn't make it work so I just went with Sleeping.





Sunday, September 5, 2010

The multi-hour layout



This has got to be one the longest lay outs time-wise that i have ever done. It took most of the afternoon. Of course I did get side tracked on the computer while journaling but still....

The basic idea came from The Paper Orchard. I love her pages. I pretty much scraplifted this one right down to the title because it was a title that actually worked for this layout. In stead of sticker for the title I used an alphabet from www.LetteringDelights.com - an alphabet called Hodgepodge, I did add more photos because I just gotta cram as many on a page as possible - thats just how I roll.
Anyway, it makes me kind of sad when I look at this layout because my mother is no longer capable of getting out and doing fun things like this and I hope my kids will remember the fun times when she was able to do stuff with them.



Saturday, September 4, 2010

Stalking Good Will

Lately I have become a fan of all the blogs out there that take a used piece of furniture and paint it and turn it into something new and fantastic. They have inspired me to do a fiew pieces myself. I started with my daughters head board and dresser then on to a shelf for the kitchen. About a month ago I found this china cabinet at Salvation Army for $95.00. Well, I'm cheap {frugal} and I didn't want to pay that much. I got on the good side of one of the sales people there and she clued me in about when the next 50% off sale would be - I got there right as they opened that day and whoopeee the china cabinet was still there and I got it for $47.50. It's worth that. So the drawers are sanded and primed and now I need to decide what color to paint it. Twice Lovely just posted a hutch that they painted Celery by Krylon and then rubbed a glaze over. I love it and I am doing that to my China Cabinet only using Wythe Blue at Benjamin Moore. Its really not as dark as it appears on their website. I'm just not sure if I am adding too much color to my house but it really needs to be jazzed up its getting boring to old lady looking.
Wish me luck on getting it all done this weekend! Oh, and it's solid wood and made of cherry {I think} and very heavy. My dad will have a cow when he hears that I painted cherry wood instead of just staining it. Yep - I'm living dangerously!








Friday, September 3, 2010

How to Make Corn Cob Jelly

This recipe was on Suzanne's blog today - just sharing in case there is someone out there in blog land who likes to make unusual jelly! I'm going to give it a try. I'll let you know how it turns out :)


How to Make Corn Cob Jelly -

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Granny Square Love


It took me all winter and most of the summer to make this blanket. I don't really crochet that slow but I only worked on this blanket while waiting in the car to pick up my daughter from kindergarten for a total of 15-20 minutes each day. It's all wool and very heavy. Not too bad for my first try. Some squares turned out somewhat larger than others so I just sprayed water on the larger squares and threw the blanket in the dryer to shrink up a little bit. Worked like a charm! Gotta love wool.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Furniture Projects

Our church had a "Really Really Free Garage Sale" today and they had so much cool stuff. I got this love seat for FREE! There was a matching one but someone else snagged it before I could so I made sure to get this one. I plan on painting it either white, black, Celery green or a light teal, I have not decided yet and I will also cover the custions with a much more modern fabric with celery green, tan and a teal print. I want to try and sell it but I know I'm gonna want to keep it for myself. I do not need more furniture in this house!
And about a month ago I bought this oak shelf at good will - $14 bucks plus $10 in spray paint = a much needed shelf for my kitchen. While painting this I did figure out why I never see painted oak pieces - oak is a real pain to paint and seemed to just soak up the paint even with primer on it. Its not the best painting job but it came out ok.


Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Floor Pillow

I found a tutorial to make these floor pillows HERE at Living With Punks. Since this was a trial run I just used some sheets I found at Salvation Army. I made two and my kids love them. I think they need to be stuffed a little tighter and they look lumpy but I think that is because the material I used is thin. Probably if I used decorator fabric the lumps from the stuffing would not show up as much. The 4 year old girl that I watch everyday wants me to make her a skirt out of the striped material. The stripes are totally her and I will post a photo when I get it done. :)


Friday, August 6, 2010

Fall Skirt



I made this skirt for my daughter - it's corduroy with a very fine ribbing so its not too bulky. There was no pattern just a mish-mash of ideas from different tutorials that I found on the internet. Very easy and fast to make. She looks too cute in it but she refused to model.

Fabric love

I house sat for a friend who was lucky enough to be able to spend the summer in Australia - and looky what she brought me! Half yards of Japanese shirting fabric!!






This one {below} is my favorite!










Friday, July 30, 2010

Foodie Friday

My mom is a master at taking left overs and making them into something quite tasty for the next meal and when ever she makes something I make her write down exactly how she makes it. This includes the ingredients and the process - I do this because I never paid attention when she was trying to teach me how to cook when I was in high school and because she has her own way of cooking food and it almost always comes out great! Here is her recipe for Pork & Chili:

PORK & CHILI BY NELDA

INGREDIENTS:
Left over pork loin - cut into cubes (about 1 lb cooked)
Approx. 1 cup canned tomatoes or tomato sauce
1/2 onion - diced medium fine
1 can Rotel
1 can mild chilies (or hot if you like it spicy)
Tortillas

PROCESS:
Cook all ingredients together (except tortillas) - probably will need to add some water 1/2 - 3/4 cup.
Let simmer; salt and pepper to taste.
Mix 1/2 cup flour with 3/4 cup water (she uses a tupperware shaker) and stir into chili.
Let simmer to thicken up chili some. If the chili is too thin add more flour mixed with water and if the chili is too thick add just a little more water (no flour).

Taste and adjust hotness to suit.

Serve with flour tortillas, shredded cheddar cheese, sour cream.


Thursday, July 22, 2010

New "old" furniture for Gracies Room



The headboard came from Goodwill and it was $24.99, the posts and top part are wood and the center is laminated wood. It is a very heavy piece and is stamped "Made in America" on the back - you rarely see that statement anymore! I forgot to take a before photo but trust me, it looks much better painted antique white. The dresser I got about 5 years ago at a garage sale for 20 bucks and it has been setting in Grace's closet and it was funky blue color with red painted knobs - quite ugly. And finally the mirror above the dresser is something I picked up at a garage sale about 16 years ago for $5.00. I'm not an expert at painting furniture but I am learning fast and even though some of the paint bubbled when I put the protective coating on - I was able to fix it somewhat and I think it came out pretty good for a first try.


Sunday, July 18, 2010

Another Tunic



I like the color combination on this one better and I like the ruffle around the neck and no ruffle on the bottom. One more top to go and it also uses a tank but it is much different.

Saturday, July 17, 2010

A Girls Tank Tunic

Made this for my daughter today. I think it turned out cute but I'm not sure she thinks its cute and is just humoring me. No matter, she will be wearing it anyway :)
I found the tutorial on how to make this HERE
It's fairly easy to make and the tutorial is a good one, but you kinda need to fill in the blanks on some of the steps on the Tutorial. I will be making a couple more of these in different colors and now that I know what I am doing I will be adding some ruffles around the neck; I did not on the first one because I was feeling a little intimidated by the whole process.