Sewing Chick

Thrifting a Third Birthday

2012-01-22T08:13:00.007-05:00

I cannot believe Joel is almost three. Wow, how time flies. He has turned into this little person with his own wants and likes and dislikes! One of the things he really likes is construction equipment. (I have an old thrifted "Bob the Builder" VHS tape that he loves to watch ~~for hours on end~~ on occasion ~~because of course we don't let him watch that much tv.~~ Oh okay, you got me).

I was actually going to go with a John Deere party because that's his other love, but I hit the thrifting jackpot with construction party stuff, so construction it is. I found 50c construction cups, bulldozer thank you notes, and 90c Bob the Builder favor bags all still new in the package... I already had yellow streamers and napkins leftover from last year's Curious George party... coupled with some awesome cakes I saw on pinterest, I can do this!

I'm trying to decide what to do as favors. I like the idea of yellow/black M&M cookie mixes in a mason jar, but black M&Ms are super expensive since they're not one of the normal colors. Can you think of anything to substitue that would be black, or do you think the brown ones would be okay to use? I also like the idea of these little frames, painted yellow and black:

Source: kellehampton.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Source: parenting.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Source: fredellicious.blogspot.com via Jodie on Pinterest

I love me some bokeh

2012-01-21T09:19:00.008-05:00

Merry Belated Christmas! Ever since my maternity leave ended and I went back to work in the beginning of December, things have been a blur. I had some free time today while the toddler is still asleep, and the infant is napping in my arms, so I thought I'd share a few holiday photos with you.

I got myself a new lens for Christmas. If you have an SLR camera, and you love the blurriness of these photos, I would highly recommend getting a 50mm lens.

My brother and his wife with my kids :)

Awesome Things to Hang on the Wall, Part Deux

2011-12-08T20:59:00.000-05:00

When I saw these online, I knew I wanted to make one for my hubby's birthday. I had the perfect square frame (thrifted of course, and painted white), scrapbook paper for the background, a fiskars heart thingamabobbie, and tons of old maps that we don't use anymore thanks to GPS.

Here was my inspiration for this project:

Source: google.com via Jodie on Pinterest

I love how mine turned out :)

Awesome Things to Hang on the Wall

2011-12-04T11:00:00.009-05:00

I love this. I made three, one for my hubby for Valentine's Day, one for my sister-in-law for her birthday, and one for my friend for Christmas! I used Bighugelabs.com to make the mosaic, and this Flickr group for the photos (Totally awesome!) I wanted mine to be in black and white; that's an easy fix using pretty much any photo software. I use Digital Image Pro 9. Now all I have to do is find some square thrift store frames, paint them white or black, and voila :) Yesterday I actually did find a small silver square frame (opening is 5x5) while out thrifting, still new in the box and bubble wrap, for only 90c. Score!

Of course, I can't take credit for this idea. I saw it on pinterest, of course! Here are the ones I found on pinterest for your viewing pleasure:

Source: shanty-2-chic.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Source: bystephanielynn.com via Jodie on Pinterest

And here are two more that I made.

Thrifted Candlesticks on the Mantel

2011-11-26T13:34:00.000-05:00

I'm addicted to pinterest, people. It's like inspiration central on that website. When I decided to decorate my mantel for the holidays, pinterest is the first place I visited for ideas. (Actually it was the only place I visited)! This one from Pottery Barn is one of my favs. I love all the candlesticks of varied heights.

Source: potterybarn.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Unfortunately, I did not have any pretty white candlesticks for the mantel. Scratch that. Fortunately I didn't have any candlesticks because that meant I got to take a thrifting trip to hunt for some :) I found five candlesticks, three of which were brass or painted gold, one was black, and one was hideous 70s wood. Nothing a coat of spray paint can't fix. I wish I had taken before photos because it really was quite the transformation.

Meat and Potato Cupcakes

2011-11-24T21:33:00.010-05:00

When I saw these TV dinner cupcakes all over the internet, I knew those would make good Thanksgiving/Birthday cupcakes for my hubby :)

Here's my version:

Instead of cornflakes, I used graham cracker crumbs, and instead of using a donut hole to make the turkey leg larger, I used an Oreo. I like how they turned out :)

In case you're really interested in my beastly cake-decorating skills, I'll leave you with pictures of from my husband's 30th birthday (2009). Can you guess what the green part of the pumpkin is? I'll give you a hint. It rhymes with mice dream phone :)

2 1/2 Pillowcases = a Handmade Swaddler!

2011-11-22T22:11:00.009-05:00

Alida over at I Make Stuff is flippin' awesome. She came up with a tutorial on how to make swaddler blankets! I had bought three on clearance that supposedly last up to 14 lbs, but seeing as how my son is about 12 lbs and I can barely fasten the velcro around his broad shoulders, I figured it was time to buy some new ones.

But wait! Alida to the rescue! Why buy when you can sew some for free, using fabric I already have on hand?! Stash-busting, that's what I'm talking about!

Before I decided to whip up some of these bad boys, I did find a The Miracle Blanket Swaddler which gets very good reviews online. It costs $30 at Amazon... it cost me under $2 at a thrift store :)

For my first attempt at a swaddler, I decided to use three pillowcases that I had thrifted for their fabric (technically you need 2 1/2 pillowcases for this project). The plain brown one was 75% off for a total of 15c, and the two sock monkey pillowcases were 40c and 60c. I actually found them on two separate shopping trips, one right after the other. I believe that's what we call good thrifting karma :)

Alida uses minky fabric for her swaddlers, however I don't have any of that and certainly don't need to go buy any new fabric when I have a fabric breeding ground in my basement. Instead, I used flannels, t-shirt fabric, or regular pillowcase fabric.

Also, a quick word about the velcro. Last night when I was sewing the velcro on, my two year old asked me what that stuff was. When I told him "velcro," I think he misunderstood and thought I said, "Hell no," because he said, "Mommy! Don't say that! Say, 'Oh my peas!'" Our son has a swearing problem, and whenever he says something bad, I tell him to say, 'Oh my peas!' Now he's taken to correcting ME when I say a bad word... Not that I ever say bad words, ahem :)

Anyway, back to the swaddlers! The first two swaddlers have black velcro, which I actually cut off of a baby carrier that had been recalled. That velcro is awesome because it's much wider than regular velcro. The last one I had to use regular white velcro, so I doubled up on it so that it would be wide like the black velcro. I also didn't place velcro on the swaddler in all the places that Alida did in her tutorial. I only have so much velcro, and I didn't want to run out and have to buy some, since these are freebie swaddlers. My son has slept in it for two nights now, and so far, he hasn't busted out of it (knock on wood), so hopefully it's okay that I skimped on the velcroing!

Back in '09 I thrifted several yards of this red and black lumberjackish flannel for only 50c. Paired with a cut-up black shirt of my husband's, I think it makes quite a nice swaddler. The best part is, I still have enough to make my older son a pair of pants, and maybe even a matching pair for my husband. That's a lot of mileage for only 50c! (My husband has ripped two pairs of lounge pants in the past couple weeks, and one pair he actually ripped twice. I'm getting tired of mending his pants! I'd say that new ones are definitely in order).

My third and final swaddler is made with 50c race car flannel, thrifted last year, and a green pillowcase from my college days. As that was over a decade ago (wow, I am getting old), and the dark green no longer matches any of our bedding, I decided that chopping it up was no biggie.

Whoops... the velcro didn't quite line up because it shifted while I was sewing. If I had to do it over again, I would have used white thread to sew two strips of velcro together before attaching it to the swaddler. Then I could trim the edges to make sure both strips were exactly the same length.

Second Time Around Tuesday

Menu Planning Monday: birthday week

2011-11-21T10:15:00.010-05:00

So I haven't really menu planned for a long time. I've been pregnant for what seems like forever, and when I'm pregnant, I don't cook. When I want something, I want it now, and there's no time for cooking. Then after the baby was born, I started cooking again, but it was more like popping a ready-made frozen lasagna in the oven.

I think I'm ready to regularly start cooking from scratch again. I can do this. It's a short week, right? I really only have to cook and menu plan for five days, since Sunday is already over, and Thursday for Thanksgiving we'll be at my husband's family's house. My parents are coming over Friday and staying for the weekend, and my mom is a diabetic who is also on a low sodium diet. That greatly impacts what I'll be making for the weekend. I found a website, Dashing Dish, that specializes in light recipes, so I'm going to make some things off there that my mom can eat. Also, did I mention that this Saturday is my husband's 32nd birthday? Ok, here we go.

Monday/Tuesday: burgers and brats! Both the burgers and the hamburger buns and the bratwurst buns were marked down for quick sale. Too bad the brats weren't though! Side dishes will be blueberry muffins and pasta salad (don't get too excited; they're from a box!)

Wednesday: stir fry. A can of stir fry veges was marked down for quick sale, plus I have a bag of frozen stir fry veges in the freezer. I also have several bags of asian style noodles on hand already.

Friday: Low Carb Ground Turkey Lasagna, complete with low sodium, homemade spaghetti sauce, since my mom can't eat jarred spaghetti sauce due to its high sodium content. This will be a real treat for her, because come on who has time to make their own spaghetti sauce?

Saturday: For breakfast, crustless quiche in a cup, leftovers for lunch, and for dinner, we'll surely go out for my hubby's birthday. I will be making these awesome turkey leg and mashed potato cupcakes for his birthday :)

Source: momlogic.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Source: cookingwithmykid.com via Jodie on Pinterest

Join the party at orgjunkie.com

Handmade Stocking Love

2011-11-18T22:46:00.005-05:00

One of my most favorite things that I've ever made are these stockings. Using only fabric, bows, ric-rac, etc. that I already had around the house, I created several stockings for our mantel. The toile one on the left is my favorite. The white bow was off of my high school prom dress :) Or maybe the green one with red and white stripes is my favorite. On second thought, I really like the white one too! I can't decide. I love them all :)

Christmas Ornament Wreaths

2011-11-17T11:28:00.008-05:00

Has anyone out there ever made Christmas ornament wreaths? And if so, what kind of glue did you use to adhere all the ornaments together? I made three of these wreaths several years ago and used hot glue, but every year I have to reglue many of the ornaments back onto the wreath because they've fallen off or are barely hanging on. There must be a better way!

Anyway, I do love my ornament wreaths :) I started with a styrofoam wreath form, wrapped it in garage-sale green and white gingham ribbon (I think it was 50c for a huge big box of ribbon!), and then painstakingly hot glued bulb after bulb onto the wreath. (The bulbs were of course thrifted also!) In the end, I took some blue ribbon I had on hand and tied it around the top of the wreath so that it could hang on the wall, and voila!

Here they are hanging above my mantel this year. (And in case you're wondering, I don't normally decorate THIS early... Santa Claus is coming to our house for a photo shoot on Sunday, and so I needed a nice backdrop so the pictures turn out cute!)

{Note to self: if ornament wreaths made with hot glue are hung over candles, do not light them! Doing so will heat up the glue, causing the ornaments to come crashing down and shatter all over the floor. Then the glue will cool again, and the shards of glass wil adhere to the floor. Seriously.}

And here they are a few years ago, hanging above my couch.

I also made the blue background thingies that the wreaths are hanging on. It was a really quick and cheap project that adds a lot of pizzazz to the wall. (For the other 11 months out of the year, I hang photos on them). I could totally see making some of these with red and green fabric, or perhaps thrifted vintage Christmas tablecloths... the possibilities are endless!

Here's how I made mine in case you're interested. I went to Lowes and bought the cheapest thing I could find, which happened to be that brown pegboard stuff. I covered it with some of the heaps and piles of quilt batting that I have laying around. (Isn't it the best when you find some brand new batting at a garage sale for next-to-nothing?!) Then I stapled on my fabric (I think my staple gun {and my glue gun too} are extentions of my right arm...) and finally attached a hanger-thingie on the back so I could hang it onto the wall. Then I hammered a nail into it so that I could hang something on each panel, and viola, there you have it!

This is a photo of how they looked at the old house. At the new house, I've decorated in a more contemporary style, so I changed out the frames and am now using pictures of my husband and kids rather than my ancestors. Here is how it looks now (Sorry for the dark picture; I took this at night)

Help Me - I can't choose!

2011-11-15T16:37:00.007-05:00

I have two Christmas outfits for the boys to wear when they get their pictures taken, and I just cannot make up my mind which one to use! Both outfits were completely thrifted :) What do you guys think; which one should they wear?

This Old Navy fleece "Peace" romper was 50c. The blue dress shirt and the dress pants each were 50c, and the sweater vest was a quarter.

This white dress shirt and black dress pants each were 50c, as was the Baby Gap sweater romper. I forget how much the tie was, but it was surely about 50c and it was still new with tags!

Perhaps we'll just go get their pictures taken twice :)

Bridesmaid Dress Tree Skirt

2011-11-11T16:04:00.002-05:00

When my first son was 3 months old, one of my close friends got married. I was still carrying around a little extra baby weight. (Okay, it was probably more like an extra 50 lbs).

What a perfect time for me to have to buy a bridesmaid dress right? The bigger the dress, the more fabric to work with when I cut it up after the wedding :) There's a silver lining to everything!

I knew I would never wear the dress again, mainly because I was never planning on needing a size 16 again. (Wrong! I had my second child a month ago, and I am in a size 18. Mostly I'm still sticking with maternity clothes!)

Since the dresses were a beautiful shade of red, I figured I could make something Christmassy with it. And since my tree skirt was one of those small, el cheapo dollar store felt things, making a new tree skirt seemed like the obvious choice. I got the idea from Chica and Jo.

Basically, my friend and I cut out triangles, and then sewed them together into a circle. When we were done, it was not as big as I had pictured it, so we made it larger by adding a large ruffle to the circumference of the circle. We also cut out a small circle in the center so that it would fit around the tree trunk.

Voila! Happy Holidays!

Calendar Towel Onesies

2011-11-10T19:42:00.002-05:00

Besides my little newborn, there was also another baby born on my street a week before mine, and another neighbor gave birth on November 2. Three babies born to three friends all within about one month of each other! Wowser!

After I saw this onesie on pinterest, I knew I would be making these for the three boys! Yes, that's right, they're all boys! AND, we all already have toddler boys about the same age. Crazy, huh?!

We're working on making an entire Buckeyes offensive line here on our street :)

Making one of these calendar towel onesies is really quick and easy to do. Here's how. Take an old calendar towel and cut out the appropriate month. Take some floss and back stitch around the date the baby was born. Next take some fusible web (mine was thrifted of course!) and adhere it to the wrong wide of your calendar applique with your iron. Iron it onto a plain onesie, and then use your machine to zig zag around the outside of the applique. You're done!

Kids in Thrifted Clothing!

2011-11-03T10:09:00.006-04:00

The sweatshirt was a gift, but the jeans were thrifted :) ALL his jeans are thrifted, in fact. He has 8 pairs of jeans for a total of $3. And they're all in good condition with no holes or signs of obvious wear, and are good brands like Gymboree, Old Navy, Wrangler, etc!

Here Joel is wearing a totally thrifted outfit. I sewed down the skeleton tee from a thrifted adult tee, and the thrifted orange onesie underneath goes well with it to keep him warm.

The romper Jonas is wearing here was a bit of a thrifting splurge at $1 but it sure is cute :)

Jonas's romper was a gift, but Joel is wearing a thrifted outfit. At 40c, this shirt was a steal!

Cookie Monster Sleep Sack Costume and a Newborn!

2011-10-23T08:56:00.013-04:00

I would like to introduce you to the newest member of the family.... Jonas Alexander!

At 9 lbs 4 oz, he was a hefty little newborn! He was born two weeks ago via c-section, and we're both doing quite well. I'm so glad he was born in time for Halloween... I do love Halloween :)

Proud big brother!

Now let's talk Halloween. To save money (hey, we are now diapering for two!), I decided to have my older son be Elmo because we already have an Elmo costume. My mom got Joel one for Christmas last year. And who goes great with Elmo? Cookie Monster, of course!

I started with a thrifted sleep sack pattern, and a bunch of other vintage stuff that I already had on hand. The fabric was from my great-grandmother's stash. When she passed away, I got her fabric. The zipper and bias tape were thrifted too.

The cookie is made of felt sandwiched together with batting in the middle, and attached to the sleep sack with velcro.

Then for his head, I decided to make a baby bonnet using Prudent Baby's awesome tutorial. I left off the ruffle for obvious reasons! I bought a six pack of ping pong balls for $1.29, hot glued two of them on top of the baby bonnet, and then drew some googly eyes with a permanent marker.

Is he not the cutest baby Cookie Monster you ever saw?

Long Sleeved Raglan Tee

2011-08-27T15:57:00.008-04:00

Even though my son is only 2 1/2, I decided to go ahead and sew him a special long sleeved tee for his birthday. I don't have a lot of time to sew during the school year since I'm a teacher... and this year we'll have a newborn on our hands too!

The yellow fabric was a polo of my husband's that had some stains on it. The green fabric was thrifted tee that I scored for only a quarter. The number three iron-on applique was also thrifted... still new in the package for only 30c.

Awesome. But I don't really want my toddler wearing those words!

Before beginning this project, I should have checked around online for a raglan tee tutorial like this one over at Craftiness Is Not Optional. Lesson learned. Her tutorial looks great, and it would have saved me a lot of headaches rather than just winging it like I did.

By the way, the number 3 is supposed to look like that. It's the tattered look apparently!

I'm not very happy with the neckline (and hope it's big enough to fit my son's head!), and I completely messed up the sleeves. Twice. Ok, more than twice. The sleeves don't go all the way to the neckline like they're supposed to... *sigh* The sleeves also turned out pretty skinny, so I added a third strip of fabric to make them a little wider, which of course made the seams pretty strange. But I salvaged it the best I could, and I'm not too upset because after all, it was my first try at a raglan tee! Now I know what to do for next time :)

And anyway, I'm sure the only thing my son will notice is that it's green and yellow (John Deere colors). He's in love with all things John Deere. He even spotted a pair of green and yellow scissors at the thrift store the other day and exclaimed, "I want John Deere scissors!" They were actually children's pinking shears, and to tell you the truth, I should have just gotten them as they were only 50c.

Getting off my Duff and Sewing a Romper

2011-08-27T11:28:00.013-04:00

I have just four days left of freedom before we go back to school. It has been a nice, long relaxing summer! This past month I've been pretty lazy as my nesting phase ended and ushered in the phase of laying around, doing nothing.

I decided that I would use my sewing machine today and whipped up a 12 month romper for Jonas for next summer. I haven't added the snaps around the bottom yet because I am still holding out until I find a thrifted snap-making tool.

Using Sugar Bee Crafts' tutorial as a guide, I turned this thrifted men's large Gap tee into a baby romper. I bought it originally for my first born son, because he LOVES hockey, and because my husband grew up on the south side. Whenever I see something that says "South Side" while I'm out thrifting, I pick it up if it's cheap. But seeing as how my son's closet is bursting at the seams with clothing, I decided that little baby Jonas could have this one!

If you make baby tees, basically you do the same thing to make a romper, except make it a little longer with two leg holes and reinforce the upside-down-U part in between the legs with a strip of "bias" tape (though since it's t-shirt material, you don't really have to cut it on the bias) before adding snaps. I used a 12 month romper of my first son's as a guide. It was really very easy!

I'll also show you a t-shirt and shorts set that I reconned for my older son awhile back. It's nice when kids are small; you can make multiple items of clothing from one men's tee! We usually use this outfit as PJs since t-shirt material is so soft, but sometimes he wears it outside too! Here he is playing with his cousin :)

A Precious Toddler Conversation about Sewing

2011-08-25T10:28:00.004-04:00

Today on TV, Curious George was learning about spider webs. George decided he was going to build a monkey web and used thread to weave his web.

My 2 1/2 year old got very excited when he saw the thread and exclaimed, "Mommy uses fred on the sewing big 'chine!" and he ran over to the dining room table and pointed to my sewing machine.

And I said, "I do? What do I make with my thread?"

And he said, "Uh.... shirts!" :)

33 weeks pregnant and a t-shirt

2011-08-24T11:12:00.006-04:00

I haven't posted in about a month because I just have been too pooped. Being pregnant while you have a crazy two year old running around really wears a girl out! I just had an ultrasound yesterday, and the doctor said the baby is quite big for his age. He's estimated to be about 6 lbs already, so I'm on par for a 9-10 pounder. Good times! They scheduled a c-section for Oct 7 due to the fact that I had third degree tearing with my first son, and apparently it's easier and quicker to recuperate from a c-section than third degree tearing. I can tell you that the months (year!) after having Joel was the most painful thing I had ever suffered through in my life, and I still have problems from it.

I haven't really done anything crafty lately. My sewing machine is just sitting here collecting dust except for the few things that my sister-in-law wanted me to mend and sew for her.

We did take a weekend vacation up to Lake Erie last weekend and visited Put-in-Bay. A long time ago I had thrifted a Put-in-Bay adult t-shirt because I knew at some point we would take a trip up there. I sewed it down to fit Joel a month or so before our trip. Here he is on the "beach" behind the Perry Monument.

And let me leave you with a chocolate ice-cream covered two year old in a thrifted shirt :)

My big belly (28 weeks) and some griping

2011-07-29T09:20:00.006-04:00

I have a few things I've been meaning to craft, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I thrifted a white dress shirt for 50c, and I want to make another dress shirt onesie with it; maybe I'll get to that today. I've been very busy finishing up some scrapbooking (I thought I was all caught up, but I keep thinking of pages I want to make...), and making this ~~giant beast of a~~ swingset for my son.

We got a good deal on it, so I couldn't pass it up. I went to the store to buy tea and bread, and came home $670 poorer. My husband said he's going to stop sending me to the store. I ended up getting about a hundred dollars in groceries, diapers, etc., the swing set (which was on clearance for $479 and was originally 8 or 900 dollars), and a patio table with six chairs and a umbrella on clearance for $250. I already had a coupon for 5% off my entire purchase, and then I decided to go ahead and apply for their credit card (this is only my second credit card, so it's okay!) to get the additional 10% off.

Since the stuff was on clearance, if we didn't get it now, we would have to wait until next year! As we're getting a patio poured in a couple weeks, I didn't want to wait a whole other year to get a nice patio table set. I'd been looking on craigslist, but I wanted something more contemporary looking, and I just wasn't finding what I wanted. Sometimes you just have to buy things new!

Oh, I can't forget that our CENTRAL AIR WENT OUT. Grr. We had to spend two nights at the in-laws because it was about 90 degrees in the house. It was pretty miserable, especially since I'm pregnant. It cost us... brace yourselves... $1600 to get it fixed. Of course it had to be the compressor, the most expensive, important part, that went out. And of course this had to happen just a couple days after I spent almost $700 at Meijer... and just weeks before we're scheduled to spend $3100 getting our patio poured...

Anyway, enough griping out of me! Here's a cute pregnancy photography idea that I've seen all over pinterest. I loved it so much that I made my husband photograph my tummy. And when we were done, my two year old must have thought that it looked like we were having a blast, because then he exclaimed "Do me! Do me!" I love two year olds, don't you? :)

Puzzle Pockets- Genius!

2011-07-28T14:36:00.000-04:00

Cluck, cluck, Sew came up with the best idea ever when it comes to toddler puzzles, to corral all those stray puzzle pieces that end up all over the house.

Puzzle pockets!

She used fleece; I used felt because I have tons of it on hand. She used velcro, and I opted to use snaps and buttons (once again, because I'm running low on velcro, but have dozens of snaps and millions of buttons). Because of the snaps, the button is actually not functional. I just sewed it on to hide the ugly snap.

The way she did it also uses less fabric than the way I did it. She's smarter than me... I should have reread the post before I started! I ended up sewing a large envelope, and then hotgluing it to the back of the puzzle. Either way, it works!

Kiddie Table

2011-07-25T09:54:00.001-04:00

At our old house, we used this little side table in the sunroom. It used to belong to my ex-boyfriend's mom, but she gave it to me years ago. After a crisp coat of white paint, it fit into my decor perfectly!

At the new house, there is no sunroom, and so this little table has been in the crawl space for the past year. I got the idea the other day to get it down and use it for a kiddie table!

I already had these three adorable Mexican chairs too. Can you believe I actually thrifted them on three separate occasions?! At the old house, I had them hanging up in the den on a peg rack. Here at the new house, they've been sitting in the basement.

I'm so glad I brought them upstairs. My son l.o.v.e.s. them! They've made quite a nice little nook in the family room :)

Kitchen Table Transformation

2011-07-24T04:36:00.001-04:00

This table was the one we had in our kitchen growing up. My mom gave it to me in college when they upgraded. Unforunately, my rabbit chewed on the legs, and so I still have some repairing and painting to do.

The first thing I did to spruce this up and add some color to the room was add a fitted tablecloth. Very cheery!

For Mother's Day, the hubs and my son made me a hand print. He calls it his "hand cake" because they made it in a pie tin :)

I started with two matching kitchen chairs, found one for free sitting near a dumpster, and then bought one at a thrift store for two or three bucks. They don't exactly match, but they're close. Armed with four cans of spray paint and some primer, I coated them all with this funky blue paint. (My husband says it looks like chairs from a Mexican restaurant. I'm not sure if that was a compliment or not. I don't think so!)

I found four seat cushions on clearance at Meijer for $6 each, and that completes the sitting area! I'm not so sure about the competing patterns, however since the tablecloth won't last all that long (it's already tearing!), I figured it didn't really matter. I already have a new clearance tablecloth waiting in the wings... Meijer has really cute teal with large white polka dot tablecloths, and I snatched one up :)

Vintage Cart Before and After

2011-07-23T09:07:00.001-04:00

I've been meaning to fix up these old, rusty, ~~ugly~~ vintage carts. I finally got around to it :)

Before (I forgot to take a photo of the red one before my husband disassembled it):

And after! (Ok, the other one isn't done yet because it's too dang hot to spray paint...)

Keep Calm and Ride On (And Other Nursery Printables!)

2011-07-22T07:17:00.002-04:00

{When I printed mine out, they had white backgrounds... I didn't figure out until later how to make the background colored! Oh well!}

Until the newborn babe is born and I can take tons of pictures of my fat little baby and plaster them all over the house, I have a lot of picture frames that need filled. With the help of Microsoft clipart, some cool fonts, Microsoft Word, and Paint (the computer program), I created some free nursery art that I thought I'd share with y'all. I couldn't figure out how to add a pdf file in blogger, so I uploaded them into google docs. Just click on the photos below, and it will take you to the big version.

This is the part where I tell you that these free printables are for your personal use only, so please don't sell them (unless of course you want to give me half the proceeds)! Thanks!

This one is my fav:

By the way, these are centered in the pdf file...
I cropped them and made jpgs out of them for the links.

$10 Photo Ledges. Heck yeah!

2011-07-21T10:54:00.007-04:00

I'm still here! I just took some time off for a very ~~hellish~~ intensive week of scrapbooking. I hadn't done a page since my son was born in Feb 2009. I am now caught up! I completed three scrapbooks in just over a week! Hip hip hooray! And yes, two of the three scrapbooks were thrifted for about $2 each, as well as three packs of extra pages. Each pack had five sheets (or ten pages) and was 69c. Woot, woot!

Anyway, can I just say that Ana White is seriously my hero? I found some instructions on her website, showing how to make your own photo ledges, ~~and I was all over it.~~

Okay, my husband was all over it.

I sat in the driveway, eating popsicles, and talking to my neighbor while our boys played together.

The best part about these ten dollar photo ledges is that they actually cost me less than ten bucks! All the wood I bought was $20, plus the cost of paint and stain (which I already had lying around), plus a couple dollars for new screws. That's about $23, but when you divide that by three, that's only $7.66 for each eight foot section!

We bought enough to make three 8-ft ledges. That's six 1x4x8s and three 1x2x8s. We had the man from Lowes cut the 8 ft sections in half, so that we could make six 4 foot ledges instead after we decided that 8 feet sections were just too long.

After the hubs made them and I painted/stained them, we decided to do 2 ledges in three different rooms rather than 3 ledges in two rooms. (All this math is confusing, isn't it?)

I used some frames from storage in the basement, which received the royal spray paint treatment, and then I went hog wild at thrift stores and garage sales, buying up frames for 50c to a dollar. I bought 27 frames for a total of $15.50. (I use about 6-8 frames per shelf, and remember I had six shelves to fill up!)

So for under $40, I have decorated three walls in my home :) Not too shabby!

Two ledges are up in the family room (the "lodge")...

two are in the master bedroom...

and two are in the nursery.

{Keep Calm and Ride On}

In the nursery, I made a bunch of little printables to put in the frames. I'm trying to share them with you... stay tuned! My computer program is not cooperating!

Dresser Redo

2011-07-09T14:10:00.002-04:00

Remember this dresser? The green wasn't really working for me.

Now it looks like this! Much better :)

I'm really digging the two toned look right now.
So much so that I also painted this little side table the same way.

Both the dresser and side table were second hand finds. I think the side table was $5 or $10 but I forget for sure. I've had it since college.

The dresser I won years ago at an auction (why do they call it "winning" when you have to pay for it?). It was ten bucks but was in sorry shape. The previous owner had painted it black.

I painted it light blue. Then I painted it white. Then I painted it light green.

~~I can't make up my mind.~~
~~I change my mind a lot.~~
I'm indecisive, okay?

I added some cute thrifted baby block knobs to it and used it in my first son's nursery. Now I've given it some clear crystal knobs I had laying around, and I'm going to use it as my bedside table :)

More tees please

2011-07-06T08:38:00.002-04:00

I think I need to go to thrifting rehab. I swear I just can't stay away. I was perusing the newspaper the other day, and I saw a couple ads for local thrift stores and their 50% off sales. I wrote it all on the calendar, so that I wouldn't miss it!

I hit up the men's tee aisle, as well as the kid's clothes. This particular store doesn't have a wide selection of knick-knacks or homegoods; it's mostly clothes. I was able to find a package of four fitted sheet straps to keep the sheets from coming off the mattress all the time. I hate that, don't you? They were 50c :) That was the only non-clothing item that I bought.

Here are the men's t-shirts that I scored the other day. They were 50c unless noted.

Another St. Patty's tee.

I bought one last time I went thrifting too,

but I'll eventually need one in every size, right?

I'm thinking Father's Day for this one!

Do kids even know what GI Joe is anymore?

As a band director, I couldn't pass this one up, even though it was twice what I like to pay for kid clothes. It was $1. *Gasp* Breaking the bank, right?

I do hope that Joel chooses to play something other than percussion though!

This one is a Columbus Clippers tee.

Every little boy needs a special Clippers tee to wear to the games!

And here's the little twerp wearing his Clippers tee to his very first Clippers game.

Not sure what he's doing with his hand ....

Dress Shirt Onesie. Genius!

2011-07-05T12:04:00.017-04:00

So have you seen this tutorial yet over at Sew, Mama, Sew!?

Yeah, it's pretty awesome.

What makes it even more awesome is that this men's shirt was originally thrifted so that I could cover a cork board in my son's room. I figured I had enough extra fabric left to make a onesie out of it also, especially since I had not used the button plackets for the cork board project. So this onesie cost me no additional money :)

Because I never fully follow a pattern and end up winging it at some point, mine is a little bit different. First of all, I didn't want to mess with putting the button hole foot on my machine, so I opted to hand sew on snaps at the bottom of the onesie.

I sewed matching buttons on the other side of the snaps to make it look like it buttons, but they're really not functional. Fooled ya :)

Secondly, I didn't want to mess with elastic, so I just used some extra t-shirt scraps to sew a bias binding (even though it wasn't really cut on the bias), and then just finished off the bottom with that.

Lastly, I think I screwed up the collar somehow because it just didn't seem to reach around as far to the front as I think it should, and so a clip-on tie wouldn't work with it like I had planned. Instead, I made Prudent Baby's super easy and super awesome bow tie :) I opted to make my tie smaller than hers because mine is for a ~~super large~~ 3-6 month old. (Ok, it's supposed to be 3-6 months, but when I hold it up to his other onesies, it's really more like 9-12. Not sure why it came out so big!)

The dimensions I used for the main part of the bow tie were 9" x 2.5" whereas hers were 12.5" x 3.5". I actually used her dimensions first, and it turned out pretty ginormous. Cool for my toddler, but too big for an infant.

I didn't photograph it, however here's how it's attached to the onesie. I made a tube of the same fabric as the bow tie, pressed it flat to make a strap, and slipped it through the "knot" on the backside. On the left side of the onesie, under the collar, I stitched the strap directly to the onesie. On the right side, I used my handy dandy snaps again. I sewed the snap onto the onesie, under the collar, so it's hidden out of sight. No one will ever know that the strap doesn't go all the way around the neck!

Love it!

Independence Day Fun, Food, and Family

2011-07-05T11:43:00.010-04:00

I saw this awesome fruit kabob idea on pinterest and decided, "Hey I can make that!" The original photo used bananas instead of marshmallows, but I thought that they would brown too quickly and chose something else white instead. You could use mini marshmallows, but as you can see, I opted to use large ones cut in half to match the size of my strawberries.

Mmmm... the toddlers loved it!
Don't poke your eye out on that sharp stick, kid.

Enjoying a kabob in a thrifted top and super-clearance el cheapo shorts

Joel's cousin loved the fruit kabobs too!

Was this outfit thrifted too? You betcha. So were the flags the kids were waving and the quilt we laid on while we watched the fireworks :)

Two Toned Baby Sleeves: the tutorial

2011-07-03T08:11:00.007-04:00

Seven handmade shirts just wasn't enough. I felt the itch to cut up just one more of my hubby's old tees. I. just. can't. stop! And seriously- how cute is this appliqued Scrabble tile? The number 8 was a little fiddly to cut out, but I love how it turned out :) And the baseball... I was worried that I was going to have to hand sew (ugh) the red stitching, until I discovered that my awesome new machine already had the perfect fancy-schmancy stitch built in! Sa-weet!

Anyway, getting on with the tute.

Because the design was pretty small on this particular shirt, I was able to make T.H.R.E.E. baby shirts out of this one shirt! (The third shirt is not complete yet, though all the pattern pieces have been cut).

I also took photos along the way of the process of making the two-toned sleeves, so that you, my dear sweet readers, can make these too!

Ok, let's get started! Visit the awesome tute at This Mama Makes Stuff to print out the pattern. Gather up an adult tee. The bigger, the better.
Cut it apart and open it up like so, and place your pattern in one of two places.

If you want to use the picture on the front, center of the tee, place the pattern up there. If you want to utilize the bottom hem of the t-shirt as the bottom of your baby shirt, place it along the bottom like I did here. I do both so maximum the shirt's potential, but please note that if you place the pattern up around the neckline in order to use the picture already on the adult tee, you will need to make the shirt a little longer than if you use the bottom hem of the adult tee. This is so that you will have a little extra fabric to fold under to create your own hem.

Notice the little green cheerleaders at the bottom of my pattern. I need my patterns to cheer me on as I go :)

Here are two photos of where I placed the pattern in order to end up with a shirt just like the husband's originally was, only smaller :)

My pattern is only half, so I have to fold the fabric in half before I cut. Cut a back and a front, and another back and front if your shirt is large enough. (If you're wondering what's up with the bottom of my patterns, remember that these were originally baby gown patterns. I fold the pattern in order to make it the correct length for a shirt).

Here it is, all cut out but still folded in half.

And unfolded! Notice on the back where it says "Nike" is a little off-center. I had to do this because of the fabric available. I can fix it later by adding an appliqued Nike swoosh or something on the left. Then it will look centered :)

Now we're going to use the sleeves off of the adult tee. Here they are cut off, sitting pretty next to the baby sleeves pattern.

Take the sleeves and open them up. If you can fit it, make two short baby sleeves from each of the adult sleeves. Place the pattern along the hemmed edge of the sleeve. Notice the dotted line that says "short sleeve hem." I added that to the pattern because the original pattern was only for long sleeves. There's also a "short sleeve cut." Use the "hem" line when you're using the existing hem on the adult tee; use the "cut" line when you're not using the original hem, and you're going to have to hem the bottom yourself. (That's why it's a little longer... to give you extra fabric for the hem). Make sense?

Notice all the mumbo-jumbo that I've written on the pattern. You'll want to do the same. I've marked on my pattern where to cut fabric #1. Remember that the second half of the baby sleeve is going to be made with a second fabric, and so we're not going to use the entire pattern on fabric #1.

(If you can't quite make out all that I've written on the pattern, you can click on it, and it should take you to a larger version of the photo).

Then cut. You might need a John Deere tractor and a three foot tall helper with this part. I know I did.

And repeat.

Pfew! You're over half way done :)

Now take fabric number #2. If you're ~~lazy~~ smart like me, make sure you're taking a piece that is already hemmed.

Notice the "long sleeve hem" and "long sleeve cut" lines. Once again, the "hem" line is for when you're using an already-hemmed piece. The lower line, or the "cut" line gives you a little bit of extra fabric so that you can hem the baby shirt yourself. I just want to be clear, because this is important :)

Now you're ready to cut the top section of the second fabric, where it will attach to fabric #1. Just make sure you leave enough fabric at the top so it will overlap a little bit with fabric #1.

I like to lay the top part of the sleeve on the pattern, just to make sure they're overlapping.

Then cut and repeat!

Pin together like so. Simply lay fabric #1 over fabric #2, remembering to overlap a bit. Sorry I'm not more precise with my measurements. I don't get to use my measuring tape because my son always wants to play with it.

Here's what the inside of the sleeve will look like. It's not finished, but of course if you're a perfectionist, you could make the second fabric a little longer, leaving enough room to turn it under and make it look all professional. I am not a perfectionist, and so I'm totally fine with unfinished edges on the inside of the garment :)

Now let's sew! Finally getting to the good part. I hate the cutting and pinning part, don't you?

Place your needle directly over the stitching that already exists (if you're using an existing hem). Make sure you use matching thread so that it blends in with the original stitching. I sew slowly so that I don't go left or right of the original stitching.

Here's what the sleeve looks like when the two parts have been joined. Feel free to snip the jagged, uneven edges.

And here's a shot from the back. (This sleeve's secondary fabric is black because it's the second set I made).

You are now ready to get back to the tutorial over at This Mama Makes Stuff, because the ~~tricky~~ awesome two-toned sleeves are ready to be sewn into the shirt! Woohoo!

Upcycled Baby Shirt Goodness

2011-07-02T08:53:00.018-04:00

Nesting? Yes, most definitely. Over the past 24 hours, I have made seven baby shirts for the little guy. One for every day of the week, of course.

Update! Want to make some of these yourselves? Between this baby gown tutorial over at This Mama Makes Stuff, and my tutorial for the two-tones sleeves, you can make these too!

This "I Rock" tee is the only one of the seven made from a thrifted tee. (The rest were free from the hubby! The hubby bought a few new t-shirts the other day, and you know what that means.... adding some of his older ones to my fabric stash!)

Before I knew him, my husband was really into "No Fear" apparently. He has about eight of these "No Fear" shirts. They sure do make some bad-@ss baby shirts though :)

A men's XXL shirt is big enough to make two, count them two size 3-6 month shirts. Woohoo! For the first one, I utilized the print on the front of the shirt. For the second one, I made it out of the plain back side of the shirt. That enabled me to do some decorative applique on the plain ones :)

This first applique was store bought... Joanns clearance for 99c. I figured I would use the image to create a Valentines shirt for my first son, however since he was born on Valentine's Day, that didn't really pan out. He gets cute little number shirts to wear instead, declaring how old he is :)

Excuse me while I drool over these next baby shirts. I love me some red and white polka dots. And in the shape of the best state in the nation? Just an added bonus :)

Every little boy needs a necktie shirt! No need to reinvent the wheel, so you can check out this tutorial on how to do it over at Crap I've Made

Just a side note about the appliques... Make sure that you make a mirror image of your print before you draw it onto to your fusible web. Yeah, I forgot to do that. Every time. Seriously. It's really easy- here's how I do it. I find a picture online that I would like to trace (something simple!), and then I print screen on my computer. You do this by hitting control, alt, and print screen simultaneously (at least on my laptop that's how it's done). Then I open up the program "Paint," press "control, V" which pastes your picture into the paint program. There's a feature in there to flip the image horizontally. I do that, hold my fusible web up to the laptop screen, and trace around it. Voila!

You might have noticed that all of these shirts have two-tones sleeves. This is for two reasons. One, I like the look :) Two, I utilized the sleeves from the men's tees that I was upcycling, however, as they were all short sleeve shirts, there simply wasn't enough sleeve fabric to make long baby sleeves.

I could have made the long sleeves out of a different portion of the shirt, however I really wanted to utilize the hem on the original sleeves. Luckily, I have enough t-shirt scraps lying about, that I was able to turn all these men's sleeves into baby long sleeves! (Are you sick of the word "sleeve" yet? It's one of the words that the more you say it, the weirder it sounds. Sleeve. Sleeve. Sleeve....)

So in case you are interested (is anyone still reading this??!) in making some long sleeved baby shirts, here's how I did it. First of all, visit This Mama makes stuff for her tutorial on how to make a baby gown from an adult sized tee. I simply made the baby gown shorter and didn't do the elastic bottom, and you've got yourself a 3-6m tee. I laid a long sleeve shirt on top of the pattern, added a bit of an allowance for the hem (which you don't need to do if you're using the hems from the bottom of the adult tee), and then marked on the pattern with a dotted line where to cut.

When it comes to the sleeves, I used two coordinating men's sleeves to make one long baby sleeve. The part of the sleeve that connects to the shirt itself is made from the same color as the shirt. The part that goes down to the wrist is made from a coordinating color. I utilized the hemmed part of the sleeves for both the upper and lower parts. Less work, baby.

Are you still following? I really should have taken photos along the way.

I always cut out the top portion of the sleeve first, and then lay the bottom portion on so that it overlaps the hem of the upper portion. After cutting the bottom portion out so that the total sleeve is as long as the pattern, pin the two parts together, and then slowly sew over the existing thread lines from the hem on the upper portion. This creates one long sleeve with two pretty colors! Hopefully. If you understood all that mumbo jumbo. I know pictures to look at would make it easier. So sorry! Maybe I'll make another one and take pictures of the process this time. If you want me to, let me know and I will! (That's a good excuse to make one more baby shirt, right?)

Other than that, I think using the baby gown tutorial should get you through! Good luck! Oh, and let me see if you make one too :)

My husband, the stripper

2011-06-30T11:22:00.013-04:00

It's a good thing my husband doesn't care about crafting, sewing, or thrifting, and so he never checks this blog. I'm pretty sure he would not approve of the title ;)

The hubs is a very patient person. Way more patient than me. I do not like to strip furniture. I like to slap another coat of paint on it and call it done. He felt that this dresser needed stripped before it received another coat of paint.

Note the detail on the dresser drawers.
Lots of details equals lots of angry four letter words if I were to do the stripping!

I might mention that this is the fourth time I've painted this dresser, and it was painted once before I got it too. It was black when I got it at an auction years ago for $10. I painted it a light blue but didn't like it, so I painted it white. It stayed that way for a while, and then when the first bun was in the oven, I painted it light green to go in the nursery.

Pfew. That's a lot of coats of paint.

It's hard to tell in this photo, but the knobs are made to look like blocks

It's no longer needed in the nursery as we've gotten a bigger, better dresser, and so I'm painting it white again to go back into the master bedroom as my bedside table.

Stay tuned!

More thrifted goodies in the big boy room

2011-06-28T08:08:00.011-04:00

Just when I think I'm done with a room, I go and run into more thrifted cuteness that I can't pass up!

I picked up a plain black frame for under a buck. When I got home, I filled it with a page from one of my son's firetruck books. My husband spazzed out when I told him it came from a book ... he said that was his book when he was little. Oops. I tried to calm his nerves by telling him that it was just the title page, and the book is still totally readable, but he was still a little miffed. Sorry babe.

The ~~el cheapo~~ 59c plastic antique car frame was pretty hideous when I saw it sitting on the shelf at the thrift store. I actually didn't even give it a second glance the first time I walked the aisles. Luckily for me, I tend to take a second pass through the aisles!

And that's when I saw it. I'm pretty sure I heard angels singing in the background when I picked it up. It was perfect for Joel's room, so I snatched it up.

Ugly, no? (And believe me when I say it was even uglier in person.
And did I mention it's plastic?)

Much better with a fresh coat of red spray paint! Have I mentioned that spray paint is my BFF right now? I don't know how I would get along without it!

There was also a fire station picture on a canvas that I had seen the past couple times I went to that thrift store. I picked it up and set it back down about eight times over the past week or two. I finally decided that it was fate that it was still sitting there, so I scooped it up and made it mine. It was $3.

Last but not least, I have been on a corkboard kick lately. I had one already that needed a new fabric covering and a fresh coat of paint, and I found another one on that thrift store outing for a whopping 90c. I thrifted a couple of long sleeve button-up shirts ($2 and $1) to give the corkboards a facelift. I figure when the boys are a little older, we'll hang their artwork from their special corkboards. I don't trust Joel with pushpins just yet!

Fitted Tablecloths are all the Rage

2011-06-27T15:08:00.008-04:00

Aren't these a good idea?

Fitted tablecloths! Who'd a thunk it? ;) This tute over at smashedpeasandcarrots is for a square or rectangular table. Let me tell you people, it is much simpler to sew a tablecloth for a square/rectangular table than a round table! (And I know this because I made one of each).

Kris over at Resweater made one too; her table is round like our kitchen table. For round tables, elastic is the key to keeping the tablecloth snug. Snug as a bug in a rug!

I had thrifted this vinyl tablecloth a long time ago because I loved the fruit motif on it, especially the cherries! It was large enough that I could cover our round kitchen table, as well as cover the little table that our son sits at :)

Voila! Matching tablecloths!

Thrifted Toddler Clothes Fashion Show

2011-06-25T08:14:00.007-04:00

This plaid button up shirt was 50 cents!

He was very proud of himself for walking up the slide and then going down the steps :)

Picking pumpkins! This football tee was 40c

Still fits into that tee the following spring :)

These bibs were higher than I normally go, but for $1.50 I bought them anyway. Joel loves anything monkey! The green turtleneck underneath was 45c.

I couldn't pass up these Ohio State bib overalls, even though they were $1.50.

I love, love, love this Carters jacket. It was only 45c.

Another shot of the ca-utest jacket! Oh, and the kid is cute too :)

This Future Rock Star is sporting a 50c shirt and a brand new haircut.

Not shown: throwing a temper tantrum because he hates getting his haircut.

Sometimes I buy girl things, not realizing it. Don't look too closely, but these $2 snowflake PJs are definitely for little girls. Lacy trim is a dead giveaway.

Thrifted plaid shirt and blue shorts. Probably 50c each, since I very rarely spend more than 50c on children's clothes, unless the piece is really something special!

Mmmmmm.... cheese stick!

This blue and brown plaid button up shirt was a score at only a quarter!

(Do I dress my son in too much plaid?)

The bib overall shorts were 50c.

The plaid shirt was a birthday gift, but the Monster Truck tee was 45c :)

Photos from Around the House: the Boys' Bathroom

2011-06-23T09:02:00.008-04:00

We've been in this house for about 10 months now, so I think it's high time that we get things up on the walls, don't you? During the school year while I'm teaching, there's not much time for doing anything crafty or decorative (or cleaning and unpacking apparently!). Now that it's summer vacation, I've been rolling up my sleeves and getting to work. I have a long ways to go but I think I can do it! I just might need ~~a swift kick in the @ss~~ some love and encouragement along the way!

I'm going to set a goal for myself that every three days, I'm going to photograph and blog about one finished room in the house. Um, we better make that every five days. Or maybe every seven. Many rooms are close to completion (and a few are actually done!), so this shouldn't be that hard, right?

Since I already blogged about my son's room the other day, today we'll start with one of the only other rooms in the house that is finished, my son's bathroom. Isn't it ca-ute?! It's my favorite room in the house, and it's almost completely thrifted. Woot, woot!

Here's a list of all the things that I thrifted for this room: the shower curtain, the little white thingies that attach the shower rod to the wall, still new in the package for something like 30c, the framed lion print, the giraffe picture frame, and the tissue box (which was hideous until I added a fresh coat of chocolate brown spray paint) . I already had the blue rug from the old house, so that didn't cost me anything this time around. I did splurge on the monkey rug and the monkey hanging over the toilet. The rug was from Target for $20, and the monkey wall art was about ten bucks at Babies-R-Us if memory serves me right. But my son loves monkeys, and so it was worth it :)

The paint was an "oops" paint so that only set me back a couple bucks. I also used it in the laundry room because it's so bright and cheery! I have almost the whole entire gallon left, so I can come over and paint your bathroom and/or laundry room bright blue too if you want :) I work for cookies. Or ice cream. ~~Or pickles.~~ Wait, that was the pregnancy talking there for a moment.

You can't tell from these pictures, but I also used paint to spruce up the light fixture. All of the bathroom lights in this house were brass. So were all the cabinet and drawer pulls. Yuck. I hate brass. I spray painted the bathroom lights with a brushed nickel spray paint and replaced all the cabinet hardware in the whole house. In this bathroom, the pulls were in my stash already.

Yes, I have a stash of drawer pulls.
No, I'm not a hoarder. (I bet all hoarders say that).
You just never know when you might need one, you know? Be prepared, that's my motto.

These cute blue stars were a garage sale find years ago. I'm so glad I finally got to use them! They look really cute in here :)

Just outside of the bathroom, I hung a monkey peg rack for my parents' towels when they come down for a visit. It was on clearance at TJ Maxx for $8, because the paper was curling off of the wood. Nothing a little modpodge couldn't fix!

Handmade Baby Shoes Minus the Interfacing

2011-06-22T17:27:00.005-04:00

Yes, that's right. In my ~~haste~~ excitement, I completely forgot to add in the interfacing. I've always shied away from projects involving interfacing because I didn't have any and was too cheap to buy some. I always figured I'd find some at a thrift store when it was meant to be. A few days ago I finally found some, new in the package, for... wait for it... thirty cents, and I knew right away what I wanted to do!

Equipped with an awesome tutorial at michaelmillerfabrics.com, some elastic, fabric and interfacing, all thrifted, I set out to make these baby shoes. It wasn't as tricky as I thought it would be. Here are baby Jonas's little safari shoes :)

This is the shot of the sole. I think it's pleather.
I should totally make Joel a pleather motorcyle-ridin' jacket :)

Dress and T-shirt Hacked into a Maternity Skirt

2011-06-21T10:46:00.014-04:00

{24 weeks and still going strong, baby!}

I'm on a red and teal kick right now. Maybe it's the fourth of July coming up. Maybe it's my son's bedroom redo. But when I saw this forgotten cut-up dress in my stash (that I thrifted eons ago for its fabric), I knew right away it would make a nice Independence Day maternity skirt.

I currently have a large pile of t-shirt scraps ~~scattered about~~ lying on my dining room floor, leftover from making baby gowns and t-shirt/shorts sets for my boys. I picked up all the reds that still had the bottom hem, pieced them together, and voila! A belly band!

This is the inside of the belly band. Not the prettiest. You would probably want to use thread that matches your fabric. Personally, I'm lucky if the thread in my bobbin matches the thread up top.

See the top portion of the belly band? That was originally the bottom hem on the t-shirt. That's why it looks so straight and pretty and professional. I'm all about reusing existing t-shirt hems to cut down on the amount of work I have to do. The bottom portion? Yeah, I did that part. That's why it's jagged and ugly. I really can cut straighter than a first grader. I'm going to blame it on the scissors. I think they need sharpened or something.

I cut the skirt portion off of the dress, machine basted around the top, and gathered it to match the length of the belly band. Pin right sides together, sew, and you're done! Talk about a quick project!

If you need more detailed instructions, you can find lots of tutes online on how to turn existing clothes into maternity clothes. Probably the most recent one is by Trudy. She goes into way more detail and gives you lots and lots of photos along the way. Instead of using t-shirt scraps, she cuts a tube of fabric from a cami. Either way, easy peasy!

A big boy bedroom and handmade bedskirt

2011-06-21T08:18:00.016-04:00

{Joel's ~~first~~ third piggy bank. They're all empty}

A little over a month ago, we made the big move from crib to twin bed! We figured that we better get Joel out of the crib plenty of time before Jonas needs it, so that perhaps he'll forget that the crib was "his." He is a very possessive little thing, and when Jonas arrives, we don't want him to feel like he's been kicked out of his bedroom.

We decided that it would be easier to keep the crib and nursery set up the way it is and just move Joel into one of the other bedrooms. (It was my sewing room, of course, that got the boot. Again. This happened to me at the old house too when Joel was born).

Of course we had to set up his big boy bedroom on the cheap! By the way, the photos don't do this room justice. It's actually very cute in real life! The lighting was bad, and I'm not a great photographer, so excuse the photos!

Anyway, here's the skinny:

Paint: I don't like to buy full price for paint, as I usually buy the Oops paint, but I splurged this time so that I could get just the right shade of blue.

Window treatments: These I bought new because I needed the black-out kind, and I needed them stat. The back of our house gets H.O.T. from the sun coming in. I'm talking greenhouse hot, people. I figured the black-out curtains would help. I think they were about $25 for the pair. (Ouch).

Dresser and TV stand: Free! The dresser was mine growing up, and Jason had the TV and stand in his apartment before we met.

Toy storage: My grandpa made this barn toy box for my dad some 50 years ago. It hadn't been painted in like 50 years, so that was the first thing that I did gto spruce it up. I added some wallpaper scraps of firetrucks, but then Joel ripped almost all of them off. I think I'll try again, this time with modpodge. I'm still going to make a little curtain for the bottom and some kind of fabric covering that rolls back and is held with velcro for the top. So please excuse the mess! The red bins I bought a couple years ago at Target. They were on clearance after Christmas for I think $2.50 apiece. I bought all they had :)

Thing keeping my son from falling out of bed: That was thrifted for two or three bucks. The funny thing is, Joel hasn't figured that he can get out of bed in the middle of the night. He stands there with his arms up, wailing, "Mommy! Mommy!" until I come get him. One night I found him trying to climb over it to get out of the bed! Geesh, child!

Bed frame: free from the in-laws, however they had left it outside lying in the grass for awhile (don't ask), where of course it got all nasty and rusty, so it needed some TLC. The wheels/feet were missing too. Did someone seriously go into their yard and steal the wheels off of the bed frame? Who does that? Probably the same person who stole the lids off our trashcans, and/or the person who stole the doghouse right out of our yard. Jerk. Sorry, I'm digressing. Anyway, luckily I already had some thrifted casters that we attached to the frame. It's really low to the floor, but I guess that's a good thing for a toddler! Ah, the silver lining.

Headboard: a thrift store find for a whopping $3.93. There is a chip out of one of the legs, however that gets hidden by the bedskirt. I was superstoked when I got it home and discovered that the wood tones do indeed match the dresser!

Mattress & boxspring: we bought these back in August when we put the old house on the market. (We used it for staging).

Bedding: we had all that bedding already, with the exception of the bedskirt, which I made with fabric I already had in my stash. The truck fabric was originally thrifted curtains. I cut them in half long-ways to utilize the upper and lower hems that were already there, ~~because I'm a total lazy sewer~~ to save time and energy. I sewed the unhemmed sides to a piece of large white felt since that part will be under the mattress and won't be seen. (The felt was a freebie too... we bought a new leather recliner, sofa, and loveseat when we moved into this house, and they came wrapped up in the felt. Of course I couldn't throw away yards and yards of free felt!) Finally, I made a pretend box pleat where the two pieces of truck fabric came together. In case you're wondering, a pretend box pleat is really not a pleat at all. I simply sewed a piece of red fabric from my stash to the white felt, under where the two pieces of truck fabric met. ~~Once again, because I'm a lazy sewer.~~ Super simple, and it does the trick!

Ceiling fan: (Not pictured because I couldn't get a good photo of it). I found two, almost brand new ceiling fans at a thrift store for $13 each! I was totally stoked! Luckily, my father-in-law is good with electricity, and he installed them for us :) Someone must have moved into a house that was a couple years old and ripped out the ceiling fans and donated them. Lucky me!

Picture Frames & Wall art: Several of the things hanging on the wall were thrifted or garage sale finds. I thrifted the Engine Number 9 metal sign years ago for $3 because I liked it, even though at the time I had no children and nowhere to hang it! The ambulance print was still new with tags, half off at Goodwill. $2.50! The race car print set me back $3. It originally had an ugly wooden frame, which I spraypainted black to match the rest of the frames. I bought the shelf for $5 at New Uses. It was originally purchased for staging the old house. The red and blue picture frames were 50c apiece at a garage sale. The wall decals were Meijer clearance- after the 75% off, all those decals were only $5. Score!

Thrifted little stair-step thingie: I painted Joel's name on it. It actually had some girl's name carved into it, so before I could paint Joel's name onto it, I had to fill in the girl's name with spackling and then prime and repaint it white. I like how it turned out :) He loves going "updairs" and "downdairs" on it!

Thrifted car rug: This was still new with tags for $5!

Eventually I'll get around to showing you photos of the nursery :)

Upcycled Toddler Tees and Matching Shorts

2011-06-20T08:08:00.027-04:00

There's no doubt about it.... I am certainly in the nesting phase of this pregnancy. I have been sewing and getting ready like there's no tomorrow these past few days. We even steam cleaned my mother-in-law's carpets the other day because 1)it was her birthday and she wanted them done, and 2) I want Jonas to be able to roll around on clean carpet when he gets here :)

A week or so ago my sewing machine focus was on finishing Joel's upcycled tee and short sets. I made them about a year ago, however after I made them I realized that they were way too big for him at the time. Of course, this time when I got them out of the closet, several of them were a little too short. I fixed this by letting out the hem and then adding coordinating t-shirt scraps around the sleeves and the bottom to create a faux layered look. I decided against sewing in the faux layers and instead opted to use some fusible hem tape. I love how it turned out. This one will be his Independence Day outfit :) Please excuse the slight wonkiness on the front. The hem tape came loose a little... I'll fix that later on today.

By the way, there are matching shorts for all of these tees, however most of the time, he wasn't wearing the matching shorts when I took the pictures. (We've been using the shorts as PJs bottoms since they're so comfy!)

The next two fit well just the way they are, so I didn't add anything around the hems. This one was the perfect shirt for Father's Day!

And this one is my personal fav :)

For this shirt, as well as all the others, I was able to use the necklines and the sleeve hems of the existing shirts to cut down on the amount of time it takes to make the shirt, as well as to make the finish product look more professional. (I'm not very good at sewing in straight lines!) All of the bottom hems are sewn by me though, which was a bit of a problem when it came to this shirt. The bottom obviously needed white too since all the other openings were white. Since I had no ribbed fabric on hand and I'm too cheap to buy some, I used white t-shirt scraps to make a bias tape and sewed it on. It doesn't match since it's not ribbed, but I guess it's not too noticeable.

{cute little boy sweeping with his newly thrifted vacuum cleaner}

For the tank top, I made double sided bias tape from t-shirt scraps and sewed it around the openings. For the coordinating shorts, I once again did the layered look by adding in some black t-shirt scraps. For all the faux layers, I was able to utilize the existing hems in the t-shirts. Score!

And because I had used up all the thrifted tees in my stash, you know I had to run right out and thrift some more!

The only problem is, I really don't like weekend thrifting. By the time the weekend rolls around, the 50%/75% colored tags are pretty much picked over, since the colors change on Mondays. Nonetheless, I had the itch to go thrifting on Friday, and so off I went. Not to mention, Father's Day was just around the corner, and I was hoping to find my hubby something special. That didn't happen, since I never find anything that I'm actually looking for... thrifting is all about stumbling upon things you didn't know you needed :) I did find a pair of vintage binoculars that I thought would make a cool gift, however they smelled pretty funky, so I passed. I've been wanting to get the hubs some binoculars ever since we moved into this new house. Our backyard looks out onto a bird sanctuary!

Anyway, all the adult tees I bought were 99c with the exception of the first one, which was $1.99.

I put Ketchup on my Ketchup ... I saw the kiddo version of this shirt while we were on vacation. We almost got it for Joel but didn't because of the high price tag. Joel really does eat ketchup on anything. He even dips tomatoes in ketchup. (And I'm not even kidding). Does that make me a bad parent?

I Rock. Need I say more since there's a baby on the way?

Peeps in the Hood ... perfect for an after-church Easter shirt!

A brown skull tee for Halloween. Check out the gold teeth :) I really bought this one mainly because I need to make Joel a pair of brown PJ shorts to match his monkey PJ tops.

Chillin with my Gnomies. When Joel saw this one, he exclaimed, "Santa!"

Lucky Shirt for St. Patty's Day

You can never go wrong with a shirt with a skunk on it!

A Handcrafted Father's Day Family Tree Mural

2011-06-18T15:25:00.012-04:00

Check. this. out. Is this not the coolest wall art that you've ever seen? It's a Bed, Bath, and Beyond hack. As soon as I saw it, I thought to myself, "I can make that too!" What a great father's day present!

Jig saw and sander? Check.
Lots of random frames? Check.
Scrap wood? Check. (I used luan plywood ... it's a really thin plywood used in flooring. We had some leftover from our laundry room remodel)
Black spray paint? Check! (I ran out of spray paint mid-project, another can set me back one dollar)

The only other things I had to purchase were double sided tape (the thick, heavy duty kind, sold near the Command Strips but way cheaper) so that I could attach the leaves and trunk to the wall, and the letters to spell the word "family." I found a nice silver font at Michaels, and with my 40% off coupon, it came to just over three bucks :)

I'm not sure I like how the upper right hand corner turned out. I might add another frame. We'll see. The more I look at it, the more I'm okay with it the way it is.

Unfortunately, we ran out of ink, and so my final photos didn't get printed out yet. I wanted to get this blog post up for Father's Day, so oh well!

Update: I opted to add the seventh frame after all.

Halloween in June

2011-06-14T08:15:00.004-04:00

My son loves Elmo. (shocker, right?) Since my parents got Joel an Elmo costume for Christmas, I decided that being Elmo for Halloween this year would be a good choice! The other day, at two different garage sales, I found him an Elmo treat bucket (50c) and some Elmo tickle-me gloves ($2) to go along with his costume. He's all set!

For baby Jonas, who will likely be less than a month old when Halloween rolls around, I decided that dressing him in a Cookie Monster costume would go cute with Elmo. Several years ago, I thrifted a McCalls pattern for baby clothes and hats. I never did use any of the patterns on Joel, so I figured I better get some use out of it, ~~because there's no way I'm going through pregnancy again~~ in case this is the last time I have a baby!

I made the sleep sack out of some fabric, vintage bias tape, and a vintage zipper from my stash. (I love me some vintage, thrifted notions!) Unfortunately, when I went to make a matching hat, I discovered that the hat pattern was missing. (Darn those used patterns). Never fear! Using Prudent Baby's awesome pattern, I was able to make a matching baby bonnet. Since I was not using fleece, I needed to finish the edges, so I added more bias tape. I also left off the ruffle on the front, since Jonas is a manly man-child. The only thing left to do is find some thrifted ping pong balls and add some googly eyes to the top of the bonnet.

I decided to add a felt cookie to the front of the sleep sack. I figured attaching it with velcro so that it could be removable would be the best bet. I'm pretty sure felt shouldn't go through the washing machine. The world doesn't need another felt cookie tutorial (plus I didn't take any photos of the process), so let's just suffice it to say that I used some thrifted fusible web to make the chocolate chips and some batting sandwiched between some tan felt from my stash. I probably should have used a blanket stitch around the outsides, but instead I used a straight stitch on my machine because that was a lot quicker. You can still tell it's a cookie, so I'm okay with that :)

A cute little boy in a thrifted tie

2011-06-12T08:21:00.011-04:00

Or as most people would call last Friday, my brother's wedding!

We had the wedding at my parents' house. My mom did most of the cooking (I helped make the Ambrosia salad!), and I was in charge of things like wrapping plastic silverware in napkins then tying them with pretty little bows, and putting the tablecloths on the rented tables. Very strenuous. I also had the very important job of photographer :)

I had some time to squeeze in a little thrifting because we arrived to my parents' house a day early, and so we hit up two thrift stores and a neighborhood garage sale. At the neighborhood garage sale, I scored this dresser for $10. The lady had $12 on it, but when I was pulling out the drawers, one of the knobs popped off. She said "I'll take $10 on it." Deal!

I thought my mom was going to kill me because I dragged another piece of furniture home to store in their basement, after she just spent the past several months cleaning out the basement, getting ready for the wedding. My dad thought it was hilarious... my mom, not so much. I'm sure some day she'll look back and realize that baby Jonas needs a dresser, and $10 was just too good a deal to pass up!

I found a few pieces of clothes at the thrift stores, including a still new-with-tags dress for one of the cousins at Christmas for $2.60 and a cute, like-new toddler camouflage raincoat for $2.11. (Goodwill was having a 35% off everything sale, hence the odd prices). At the second thrift store, I found two more kiddo ties and a pair of little Old Navy khakis for baby Jonas, all for a total of about $1.50. I don't know what it is with me and little boy ties, but every time I see one for about 50c, I feel compelled to buy it. Isn't he handsome in his new tie?!

A birthday party!

2011-06-06T18:36:00.010-04:00

Back in February, my little boy turned T.W.O. How time flies! My baby has turned into a full-fledged little boy with his own likes and dislikes, mood swings, and sense of humor :) He absolutely loves monkeys, so when it came time to pick a theme for the party, it was a no brainer.

If you google "monkey cake," a million and one cake images come up. I opted to go with the monkey cake from parenting.com. The only bad thing is that all the little things you have to buy in order to make the cake look like a monkey really rack up the price. You need mini chocolate donuts, licorice, brown M&Ms, peppermint patties...

I really like how it turned out!

One cake isn't enough for ~~my husband's ginormous family~~ our large guest list, and so I made some monkey cupcakes to go with it. I used these cupcakesas a jumping off point, however for the life of me, I could not get the vanilla wafers cut in half correctly to make the ears. I eventually gave up, raided the cereal cupboard, and decided that Cinnabon cereal made pretty good ears. They were a little Princess Leia-ish, but they did the trick.

And here's an action shot of my son enjoying said cupcakes:

This one's not the best photo of him, but it does show off the shirt I made for the special occasion. At a thrift store, I found a blue, furry, (still new-in-package!) "2" applique and a solid colored turtleneck to adhere it to. For under $2, Joel had a special birthday outfit :)

Upcycled Baby Gowns

2011-06-06T18:05:00.013-04:00

Baby sewing! That's all I've done since about 9 or 10 last night. (I do believe I'm in the nesting phase right now). Following thismamamakestuff's extremely awesome tutorial, I was able to create three baby gowns for baby Jonas for free, just using old t-shirts from around the house. Even the elastic used at the bottom of each of the gowns was thrifted :)

This first one was actually a 50c thrifted tee that I bought awhile ago. I had intended to make Joel a long sleeve shirt to wear in December, but since I never got around to it, I figured I'd turn it into a baby gown.

For two out of the three gowns, I was able to utilize the bottom hem of the shirt for the cuffs of the sleeves. For the Chris Kringle: Designer Chimneywear shirt, however, I had to hem the sleeves. I made it easier on myself by hemming the sleeve before I sewed under the arm. (Once the sleeve is sewn, the cuff is so small that it's difficult to sew. Just a little pointer from me to you!)

The second one was a shirt that's been in my closet since 1996 when my family took a trip out west. It's seen better days, but it did make a pretty cute baby gown.
I got this last t-shirt in junior high. It's by far the ~~rattiest~~ most well loved of the three. And guess what? Ratty t-shirts make ratty baby gowns. Who would have guessed it?!

In about four months, I'll have an actual baby that I can model these gowns on, but in the meantime, these photos will have to do :)

Pregnant! And other updates

2011-05-21T06:06:00.005-04:00

I am officially the worst blogger ever. So I haven't posted a single time this entire school year. In fact, it's been so long since I've posted, that I actually FORGOT how to log into blogger! I finally got that figured out and thought I'd give you an update because a lot has changed around here since last August! (Oh, and also let me apologize for the lack of photos in this post. One of these days, I'll get around to photographing the new house, my son's new summer haircut, etc.)

Update: a photo of my son's new summer haircut! Woohoo! (And he's in a thrifted outfit, of course)

We finally got the okay from the seller's bank to close the weekend before school started. We moved in from about 5 PM when we finished with closing until 3 or so in the morning when it wasn't so doggone hot. And then of course there was more moving on Saturday too, and then finally putting things away on Sunday, and then school started the very next day! As a teacher, I would not recommend moving the weekend before school starts. The beginning of a new school year is busy, crazy, hectic, and stressful the way it is... add moving into a new house on top of it, and I just about lost my mind!

With the housing market the way it is, we didn't ever think our old house was ever going to sell. It sat on the market for months with only one or two people ever even looking at it. Then all of the sudden in February, four families went through it in one day, one of them made an offer, and we closed in March, right before we left for vacation in Hilton Head! Woohoo! We were finally able to bring the rest of our furniture to our new house (we had left some of it there for staging), and our new house is finally becoming a home :) We put artwork up on the walls last week, so that makes me happy :)

We also got Joel's big boy bedroom painted last weekend. My baby boy is two years old and is just about ready for his big boy bed! We're going to move him into his new room as soon as school lets out so that we can start painting the "baby room" for his little brother! I probably won't post again for two more weeks until summer vacation, but hopefully then I'll have some time to show you the kids' rooms.

Wait a minute... "baby brother?" you say? I found out at the end of January that I'm pregnant again! About a month ago we found out it's another boy, which is a bit of a bummer because I always thought I'd have one of each, but on the flip side, we had good boy names picked out and never really could decide on a girl's name :)

This little peanut's name is going to be Jonas Alexander. Joel has my husband's initials (JMR), so this one will have my initials (JAR)! We decided to stick with names from our family tree, and of course they have to start with "J." That left us with either Jackson, Jonas, Josiah, or Jeremiah as our top picks. Jason really liked Jackson, and while I love that name too, it's too common right now. As a teacher, I'll probably have a dozen Jacksons in my class in about a decade. I wanted something that is a little less common, but still classic and timeless. One of my 10-great grandfathers on my mom's side was Jonas Potts. He was a Quaker who lived in Philadelphia in the 1600s. I figure a 400 year old name is pretty classic! What's also cool about this name is that if you take my husband's name, Jason, and rearrange the letters, you get Jonas :)

And there's one more reason I love the name Jonas. On my dad's side, in the late 1800s my great-great grandfather, Joseph Martin Bruhen, came from Switzerland all by himself at the age of 16 and settled in Ohio. He never saw his family again, and in fact had siblings born after he left that he never got to meet. (How sad is that?) But in the new world, Joseph prospered. He sent money home to Switzerland, and eventually he got married and had my great-grandmother, Josephine Marguerite Bruhen. Sadly, she was their only child, as their other two babies were either stillborn or died right after birth. Josephine, or "Nan" as we called her, had a daughter name Joan (pronounced JoAnn). My parents then decided to carry on the JO name even though it skipped a generation, and they named me Jodie. I wanted a name that started with the JO sound that hadn't been used in this line already. Jonas is perfect :)

I think there's a cup of coffee calling my name... it's only 6:30 in the morning. Pregnancy insomnia is at it again :)

Are you sick of Baby Thrifting? Me Neither!

2010-08-10T14:24:00.011-04:00

I'm trying to keep my mind off of the house. This house is a wreck with boxes stacked everywhere, and we can't get into our new one yet... so how about a post chock full of thrifted baby clothes?!

I love posts where I can combine my two favorite things: photographs of my son and thrifting! Woohoo! Here we go :)

Thrifted Soccer tank top, still new with tags, and 50c khaki shorts.
Notice the pretty bush in the background :)

Thrifted brown Gap Polo with adorable plaid shorts that were a gift.
Notice the cardboard box in the background... packing is good times!

I have become addicted to thrifted baby ties.
The dress pants and dress shirt were thrifted too.

59c pants with a 45c "Beep, Beep!" shirt

A rocket onesie, because my little man is as smart as a rocket scientist!

A very thrifted outfit, right down to the shoes!
I splurged a little on this sweater ($1), and he only got to wear it twice. Bummer!

Another one of my favorites! Same black dress pants, but different thrifted tie and dress shirt.

Thrifted plaid shirt, Gap jean shorts, and Champion shoes all for under $3.
Will someone please tell my husband that those jean shorts are cute and not straight out of the 80s?! He doesn't like the faded look AT ALL.

A little polo and blue shorts

We got a lot of mileage out of these 59c pants and little polka-dotted jacket :)

Well, after LeBron James left, this jersey isn't very fashionable anymore.
We can't wear it in public for fear of getting jumped by angry mobs of ex-fans.

"One MILLION dollars!" (Doesn't he look just like that guy from Austin Powers?!)

Thrifted soccer tee with handmade t-shirt pants.

50c tee with a pair of pants that were a birthday gift.

Isn't this thrifted Gap hat the absolute ca-utest?! Still new with tags!
The blue jacket was thrifted too for 50c.

My baby's first steps!
To do so in a thrifted outfit is just an added bonus!

Celebrating our independence in a thrifted tank top,
while holding thrifted flags!

Another small splurge on this tee. I saw it at the thrift store, and even though it was a whole dollar, I bought it. My husband grew up on the south side, and this tee just spoke to me :)

A cute 45c football sweatshirt, matched with Wrangler jeans for 75c.
What I loved about those jeans was their orange trim!

Packing and Moving, Blech!

2010-08-03T08:49:00.004-04:00

So I thought I'd be around more these past couple of months since I don't work over the summers, however at the beginning of June we found a new house that we liked in the next suburb over. We put in an offer, and it was accepted! We were all set to close on July 30, however it got pushed back and we are now anxiously awaiting a phone call with a new closing date (tomorrow perhaps?!) We've been fervently painting, staging, and fixing things around the old house, as well as packing and carrying things to the first floor to make the big moving day go easier and quicker. I'm a little worried about moving in 90 degree heat and a million percent humidity. That is seriously going to suck.

I've also been out thrifting buying things both for the new house and things to stage the old house. I watch all those HGTV shows like "Designed to Sell," "Unsellables," and "Get it Sold," not to mention "House Hunters," "My First Place," "Property Virgins," etc. I know wall color should be warm and neutral. My red dining room wall probably isn't cutting it. Neither was the country wallpaper borders all over the house. Hubby and I got to work removing all the borders and repainting. Of course, paint can get expensive, and so I had a plan. We went around to just about every Lowes, Home Depot, and Walmart in the city and gathered up various "Ooops" paints. In large five gallon buckets, we mixed various tans, browns, yellows, and creams and actually came up with a B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L. shade of butterscotch. We had ten gallons of it for about fifty or sixty bucks. We also bought some blues and some greens to mix. I found a wonderful shade of turquoise for the laundry room at the new house. I'll almost want to do laundry with a turquoise laundry room :)

I found some window treatments at the thrift store that I fell in love with. (Photos to come later once we get all these boxes out of here). We also took a trip to IKEA and found packs of two panels of sheers for five bucks! I bought three packs! They also had a duvet cover with matching pillow cases for five bucks! Don't you just L.O.V.E. IKEA?! While at IKEA we also bought some contemporary end tables for ten dollars apiece, and an awesome entertainment center for $220. That was a bit of a splurge, but we love it :)

The little one is waking up, so I better go tend to him. Hopefully the next time you hear from me, I'll be moved into a new house!

Catching up and toy shopping

2010-06-14T12:23:00.005-04:00

The end of the school year is rough when you're a band director. There's solo and ensemble contest, the concerts at the beginning of March, the concerts at the end of May, the trip to perform at Kings Island and then hang out in the park all day... There's barely enough time to spend with my husband and son, let alone blogging.

I'm pleased to announce, however, that Summer. Is. Here!

Already, I've gotten a few sewing projects finished with more ideas spinning in my head. I hemmed and elasticized the refashioned t-shirt shorts for my son. They turned out pretty big... 2T I'd say. He'll have to wear them next summer I guess. I also want to make little tool belts for each of the three boy cousins, as well as finish the one for Joel. I'm planning on appliqueing their names onto the fronts of the tool belts... won't that be cute?!

The reason I'm so driven all the sudden to sew these tool belts is because I found toys on clearance for half off at Dollar General!!! I went wild and bought about $30 worth of toys today (which would have cost me $60, of course). I bought four tool kits, one for each of the boys, for a whopping $2.50 apiece. I actually saw kiddie tool kits for 99c apiece at the Vanity Fair outlet the other day, but they were much smaller. The DG tool kits were pretty large. There's really no rush on this since the tool kits are for ages 3+, and these kiddos are currently aged 1 month - 18 months, but I like to shop ahead :) I also got Joel a large, yellow metal dumptruck for $6, a couple paint-your-own dinosaur kits for $2.50, and a shopping cart full of play food for $6. (Don't tell my husband but I think I'm going to go hit up some other DGs to see what clearance selection they have left!)

While I was out shopping, I also finally bought some countertop paint. After we painted our kitchen white, the beige countertops really stood out in a bad way. For $20, we got some rustoleum tan paint, and I began my transformation. It takes three days to dry; it's going to be difficult to not use the kitchen for the next three days, but it will be worth it!

So that's what I'm up to. What about you?

Cream of the Crap

2010-02-27T06:25:00.003-05:00

This has absolutely nothing to do with sewing, crafting, or thrifting, but I felt compelled to tell you this :) First you must know that I teach seventh and eighth grade band. Yes, this is quite an age group! Well the other day I was saying something about band students being the cream of the crop, and one of my students must not have ever heard that expression before because she exclaimed, "Cream of the crap?! What?" I thought that was pretty funny. You never know what's going to come out of their mouths!

In other news, all this talk about cream is making me hungry...

Thrifted Baby Fashion Show II

2010-02-22T21:32:00.006-05:00

I can't help it. It's been almost a month since my last thrifted baby fashion show. I had so much fun doing the first one, so you know I just had to have a sequel!

Winnie the Pooh Bowling shirt, which I love, love, love!

All tuckered out wearing his $1 garage sale PJs

Blue dress shirt and tie. I like how he chews on the gate, don't you?

You can barely see the pants, but they're thrifted too!

This is actually two different items. The long sleeves are part of a onesie that I thrifted on a separate occasion from the short sleeved basketball shirt.

And because this is my new favorite outfit, here's another shot!
This one includes some thrifted jeans too :)

Great Lakes! Yay for Lake Erie! (And my favorite pair of thrifted jeans)
My mother-in-law says he looks great in orange. Don't you agree?!

A fire truck shirt-- hubby was obsessed with fire trucks when he was little.

An Oshkosh airplane sweatshirt

One of my favorite sweatshirts. He looks like such a little man in this one :)

Thanks for drooling over ~~my thrifting finds~~ photos of my son with me!

A Cemetery and Pork Chop Side Burns

2010-02-20T10:15:00.006-05:00

May I just say that My Trendy Tykes, you're the best :) There's always cool things to do over at her blog. The other day she posted about Mama Kat's writing assignments. I can't get the link to open but maybe you'll have better luck.

Anyway, the assignment is to find a February photo from a previous year and tell a story about it. Wheee! Here we go!

So if you didn't already think I'm a freak...

Here's my random February photo. It was taken back in 2007. My husband and I had just met about two weeks before, and we were already taking our first over night trip. Well, us and two of his buddies. We were going on a cemetery hunting adventure down in southern Ohio, to find this tombstone. This is the grave of Elizabeth Linn McMillen, my great-great-great-great-great grandmother. She passed away in 1832 and is buried in the Old Burying Ground, Greenfield, Ohio. I love that her tombstone says "Hirs was a sudden call. No farewell given." I wonder what she passed away from. So sad. I hope she did not suffer. I know fire was one of the leading killers of women back in the day because their dresses would catch fire while cooking :( You can't see it in this photo, but her husband, who died in 1843, is buried next to her. His crypt is all busted up.

The super cool part is that my hubby's friend is an honest-to-goodness psychic and medium. He asked me if I wanted to know what William, Elizabeth's husband, looked like. Obviously I said yes! He said that he was not an attractive man with large "pork chop" styled sideburns. Hmm. I would love to find a photograph of him, but since they lived so long ago, I'm sure that will never happen!

Wallpaper Crafting

2010-02-19T23:27:00.002-05:00

I promised you that I would show you my wallpaper crafts that I've been working on. Here you go!

I thrifted these magazine holders (for 59c apiece I think) a long time ago and just had them laying around, unused, not sure what to do with them.

I finally decided the route I wanted to go with them: Decoupage them with boyish wallpaper samples (freebies) and put it in Joel's room. Here they are mid-completion. I still have some touching up to do and some more modpodging to do. (Is "modpodge" a verb?)

This one started out life as a blue magazine holder, however since I had three blue and one green, I decided to spray paint one of the blue ones a different color.

Some of the papers didn't lie flat and got wrinkly.
Any suggestions on how to prevent this?

A cute construction scene.

Here's a project that was also a wallpaper craft, made by me a few months ago. This was a wonderful thrifted wooden dollhouse (can you say score at $1.91) but it needed some TLC. It was red, and I wanted to go blue. I painted it, decoupaged on some wallpaper, and voila! At a garage sale, I found two construction guys action figures for a dollar, still new in the package, to go with it :)

I'm lovin' this brick wallpaper!

To make the doll house a little more boyish, I added a firetruck scene to the back. That, and I ran out of the brick wallpaper. Remember, I'm just using free samples from wallpaper books :)

And last but not least, *drumroll* ... here's the barn!

It has a fresh coat of red paint and some decoupaged wallpaper cut-outs.

I used my scrapbooking supplies to cut out pretty shapes.

As you can see, my husband has not yet fixed the sliding doors to hide the messy bottom.
I think he needs a swift kick in the butt, don't you?

And just for a comparison, here's the barn before the fresh coat of red paint. It probably hadn't been painted since my dad was a child, about fifty years ago. It was looking pretty tired, wasn't it? Speaking of tired, I think it's somebody's nap time :)

I won! I won! I won!

2010-02-17T11:15:00.003-05:00

I won my first three bloggy giveaways :) Yes, you read that right. I won three giveaways in the past couple weeks! I already blogged about winning the Valentines Day shirt from Robyn over at Our Homeschool Home.

My second giveaway win was a Wilton heart shaped cake pan by TidyMom and Lucky Leaf pie filling! Just in time for Valentine's Day! We washed it and used it right away. When I was making cupcakes for my son's birthday party, I used up some of the batter for a special Valentine's Cake for my husband and me. I frosted it with whipped cream and added a layer of pie filling on top. Mmmm! (Sorry I didn't take any photos. We dove into the thing too quickly).

For my third and final win, I actually came in second, but since numero uno didn't claim her prize, I won! A huge thank-you goes out to Jennifer at naughtysecretaryclub for hosting the giveaway.

It's a book about wallpaper crafts which is totally up my alley. So up-my-alley in fact, that I was already in the middle of several wallpaper crafts when she wrote me to tell me that I won! (More on that tomorrow. Or sometime this week. Or whenever I get around to it).

Here are some great ideas from the book that I hope to make someday: make some picture frame mats, cover up those old ugly tv trays, spruce up those cardboard letters you can get at Joanns (we actually have some of these from our wedding), make a belt buckle more purdy, and make a cool clock!

My mother-in-law would SO LOVE this clock. I think I'll have to get the ole jig saw out, use up some scrap plywood in the garage, and make one of these!

A huge thank you to all the giveaway-ers! Last week will forever go down in history as my luckiest week of all time :)

Post-it Note Tuesday

2010-02-16T14:07:00.003-05:00

Visit Supah Mommy to join the Post-it Note Par-tay!

Son. One. Fun. Done.

2010-02-15T07:24:00.007-05:00

I have a son.
My son is one.
I love my little son who's one.
We had a party and had some fun.
But now the fun is over and done!

Hand-me-down dress shirt, 30c thrifted tie, and 50c thrifted black dress pants. Love it!

The shirt and tie came off, and the clearance bib went on.

Making my fish face.

I saved money by making his cake (in a little thrifted cake pan I might add!) The candle has been sitting around for ages. I actually bought it for T-1's son when he was turning one, and I do believe he's five now. We never did use it, and so I figured we'd use it for Joel. Too bad I broke the foot off and was trying to melt him back together. It worked. Kind of.

Thrifted sippy cup for 19c!

Clearance napkins :) I paid full price for the cupcake liners though (75c I think). Boo!

Clearance party hat from either Joanns or Michaels. It's made of foam, so it's the kind you keep and reuse! I originally bought it thinking it would make a cute wizard hat for the dress up bin.

A thrifted number one (19c) on a quilt I made from scraps. I do love me some scraps!

Speaking of scraps, I made that banner too. My family oohed and ahhed over it. Well, not really. They're not the crafty types. They were like, "I would have just bought one at the store."

Cupcakes with junk mail security envelope flags on a thrifted blue tablecloth.

90c thrifted mobile, new in package :)

$1 thrifted Gap 12-24 months winter hat, still new with tags!! I gave it to him as one of his birthday gifts. I think it's a little big :)

Thrifted balloons. A brand spankin' new pack of 72 balloons for 90c. I don't know how much balloons cost, so I hope this was a good deal.

Thrifted loot bags, new in package. 59c I think. I sent people home with cupcakes :)

Five hard plastic signs, all thrifted, new in package, for 90c. These are very durable and can even be used outdoors with metal sign stakes.

Happy Birthday, little stinkpot! Here's to 99 more :)

Thrift, Thrift, Everything is Thrift!

2010-02-09T11:51:00.002-05:00

That was to the tune of "Signs, signs, everywhere are signs," just in case you were wondering.

I took this photo the other day, and then I realized just about everything in this photo was thrifted.

The bottle? Yep. (But not the nipples- those were Meijer clearance for 40c for a two-pack). The rug? Yep (Six or seven bucks). The shirt and jeans? Yep. (And the shirt was still new with tags!).

Woot, woot! I love thrifting. I just can't stay away. The other night I dropped off hubby and baby at his parent's house, and then I went to Walmart to get a new snow shovel. (Don't hate me because I went to Walmart. I know they're evil, but it's close. And cheap. And is all there is on the south side of Columbus near my in-laws' house. And near a thrift store). Hubby broke our other snow shovel- the one I got back in college when our Kmart was going out of business. We needed a snow shovel pronto, because did you see our weather forecast for Ohio? It ain't pretty.

Needless to say, I snuck over to the thrift store for a few minutes and picked up two pairs of toddler jeans. There was a pair of Old Navy jeans for 50c, and a pair of... drum roll please... Guess jeans for a whopping quarter! I'm not usually one to go drooling over a label, however how could I pass up Guess jeans for 25c. The back pocket is adorable :)

Stay warm!

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...

2010-02-06T15:19:00.004-05:00

Between these three tutorials, I think I can make my son some lap tees:

Made's 90 Minute Tee

Indietute's Lap Tee Pattern

Patchyapple's instructions for how to sew a lap tee neckline

P.S. My serger arrived today! I ended up getting a Brother rather than the Singer I was looking at. Now how in the heck do I use the thing?! Tips or pointers, anyone?

Update: Do you remember the book where the little train thought he could, but really he couldn't? Because that was the case with my lap tee. It was a Big. Fat. Fail. Oh well. You win some, and you lose some!

Celebrate the Boy, Y'all! T-shirt Recons

2010-02-05T18:09:00.009-05:00

Last summer I thrifted some adult male tees that I planned to recon. I made several pairs of t-shirt pants awhile ago that I blogged about here, but then saved the rest of the tees for when he was a little older.

Guess what? He's older. He turns one in just over a week! My baby is becoming... a toddler! *chews fingernails while eyes dart around nervously*

I decided to make him some shorts outfits for this coming summer. Nothing takes the winter blues away like sewing up some t-shirts and shorts! They're not done, mind you, but I figured I'd photograph and post them now since I don't plan on finishing them until this summer. They're not hemmed, and there's no elastic in the pants. I'll wait until summer when I know exactly how tall he is.

My favorite one! Is this not the greatest t-shirt, or what?

Even though the little king fu fighter on this shirt is awesome, this one was a pain in the @ss to sew. I screwed up the collar. Twice. I also had to piece together the shorts because I was running out of fabric, so there's a strange horizontal seam going across on the butt cheeks. *Sigh*

A shirt celebrating Mommy :)

And one for daddy. Can you imagine this shirt being worn by a full-grown adult? Me either. But it was an adult shirt, I swear!

This one needs fixed once I get my serger. The bottom of the shirt came out pretty wonky. Wonkiness aside, I think it will be a nice outfit for July 4th, don't you think?

Try to contain yourself. I'm going to give you the most ghetto of all tutorials. Here it is. Enjoy!

Boys and Dryer Sheets! A Beautiful Combination

2010-02-02T08:51:00.004-05:00

I must have jinxed myself. I was joking around yesterday about rushing out to get my serger off of craigslist rather than going to work, and then this morning I woke up with a K.I.L.L.E.R. sore throat. Since my job as a teacher entails me talking non-stop for about seven hours, I decided to not go in today. Hmpf. Maybe hubby will make the 45 minute drive to get my serger. I always feel bad about going places when I take a sick day because "if you're too sick to go to school, then you're too sick to go outside and play!" (Thanks, mom).

But in other news, how about boy's month, eh?! I'm so excited I can't quit talking about it to anyone who will listen! (Except right now I am saving my voice so I can't really talk but you know what I mean). Since I'm just laying around, sick in bed, eating ~~bon-bons~~ a salad, I figured I'd catch up on reading some blogs. And then I found this. It was love at first sight. It's a tute for making a boy's shirt out of a men's button up shirt!

Too bad it calls for interfacing for the collar, however I won't be buying that. I'm too much of a tight wad. I think I'll try it using used dryer sheets instead. That should work, don't you think? Has anyone ever tried it?

I was googling it when I found this handy dandy way to make applique. I have to try it asap! Basically, you sew whatever you're appliquing right sides together with a dryer sheet. Not that a dryer sheet has a right side. Then you trim the dryer sheet and make a slit in it, turn right side out, press, and voila!

Now excuse me while I go ~~dig through my laundry room trash looking for old dryer sheets~~ make myself another salad.

P.S. Dryer sheets as swiffer replacements?! Rock on!

The Best Day. EVER.

2010-02-01T22:58:00.002-05:00

Ok, so let me begin by saying how rad I think this 90 minute boy's shirt is! (What do you mean no one says "rad" anymore?) But once again, to finish out the raw edges, you need a serger. Boo hiss.

But alas! I checked craigslist, found a Singer serger, still new with the books and everything, originally 300 but being sold for 175! I am so on it! She said it's still available so hopefully I can make the 45 minute trek tomorrow to go get it. I don't suppose this counts as an "emergency day" at work, does it? I'm a teacher, so I'm not allowed to take days off unless I'm sick or have an emergency. Emergencies really are in the eye of the beholder, right?

So then I get another piece of great news! Robyn, over at Our Homeschool Home sent me an email letting me know that I won her giveaway! Woot, woot! I will be winning a very lovely Valentine's Day onesie, which is so fitting since my son will be turning one year old this Valentine's Day. Thank you Robyn; you've made my day!!

His and Hers Meatloaves

2010-01-31T10:58:00.005-05:00

I bought a couple jars of pineapple salsa on clearance for 75c. As it turns out, they were on clearance for a good reason. It is nasty. I even tried cooking with it to disguise the flavor, but it still came through. Ugh. Hubby didn't seem to mind it though, so I figured I'd make some Mexican meatloaves in muffin tins for him. I didn't use the Rachael Ray recipe that I linked to, however I'm sure it's a good one (it is Rachael Ray, after all!)

I took two pounds of ground turkey, one pound of ground sausage, 3 eggs, almost 2 cups of cracker crumbs and some oatmeal to make up the difference, some pepper, and a chopped onion. I mixed well and divided it into two bowls.

To his meatloaf, I added 1/2 cup of nasty salsa and all the shredded cheese that was left (probably somewhere between a half cup and a cup). To my meatloaf, I added 1/2 cup of ketchup, almost a cup of chopped dill pickles, 3/4 cup of pickle juice, and a dab of brown sugar.

I put the meatloaf mixture into muffin tins and popped them in the oven for about 30 or so minutes at 350 degrees. Three pounds of meat makes about two dozen meatloaves. If we weren't such pigs in this house, we could pop the extras into the freezer. (We can eat 24 meatloaves lickety split).

What's your favorite meatloaf recipe?

It's Boy Month at "Made"

2010-01-30T13:30:00.002-05:00

Woot, woot! I just wanted to share with everyone how sweet the month of February will be, now that it is boy month over at Made: A Creative Collection. There will boy tutes, clothes, giveaways, crafts, guest blogging... you name it, she'll have it! Yippee!

The Birthday Post

2010-01-27T18:11:00.005-05:00

Earlier this month I turned 31. T-3 made me the most awesome birthday gift E.V.E.R. Check out this hand embroidered needle book. It has a rabbit on it! A rabbit, people!

Here's a birthday photo of me blowing out my candles. I made that cake, by the way. I was pretty proud of myself because usually when I make a cake, I make it in a 9x13 pan, and it stays in the pan. I actually ventured from my comfort zone and baked two round 9 inch cakes, successfully removed them from the pans, and stacked them on top of each other. Go me!

Thrifted Baby Fashion Show

2010-01-25T19:30:00.002-05:00

I thought it would be fun to have a fashion show! These are all pics of my little one wearing thrifted outfits. I'll add prices where I can, though some of these outfits I bought awhile ago and have since deleted the prices from my file.

"File?" you ask. I keep a spreadsheet of all his clothes and the prices I paid so that when I'm out thrifting, I don't overbuy in any particular size. He's wearing 9-12 months right now, but I have his wardrobe nearly fully stocked up until 3T, and some things in sizes 4 and 5 as well. This is partly because I'm a freak, and partly because I'm banking on being unemployed and poor in the near future. I don't want to have to spend money on his clothes when I'm not working, so whenever I see things for 50c or less, if we'll need it eventually, I buy it!

This sweatshirt was a quarter; the pants were a splurge at 59c. Don't laugh. It really was a splurge since my usual limit is 50c! But I love them, so I bought them :)

This coat was a garage sale find for $2. My next door neighbor's high school aged son actually came over, knocked on my door and told me that they were selling some of his baby brother's clothes and that I should come on over and take a look. Good thing he did because my husband loves the Columbus Blue Jackets, and I was able to score this great heavy winter coat! Too bad the little one hates this coat though.

I don't remember how much the short sleeved polo was, but the jeans he's wearing here were 25c. I've layered a long sleeve onesie (which was a gift) underneath the polo for much added warmth.

Joel has five pairs of jeans in size 9-12 months. Two cost 25c, two cost 75c, and one cost 50c. I have no idea which pair this is. The hockey shirt is also 9-12 months according to the tag, but he outgrew this one pretty fast. It would have been better at 6-9 months. T-3 and I found this exact same Hockey Champ shirt while out thrifting last week, this time in size 2T. She made me get it. I'm talking full-fledged arm twisting here. At least this time I know that it runs small and that we should start putting him in it around 18 months.

Here's a slightly younger Joel. I have no idea how much this outfit cost, but my guess is 50c apiece! Oh yeah, and I thrifted that toy too.

We're moving backwards in time here. "My First Golf Game" was a family hit. My husband's family (especially his grandpa who passed away earlier this month) is really into golfing. It skipped my husband's generation, but perhaps Joel will be a golfer!

I don't know how much the shirt cost, but the exersaucer was $30 on craigslist. A week or two later I found the exact same one for half the cost at a garage sale. I hate that.

This was one of my favorite summer outfits of his.

I love this little sweatshirt. He can't fit into it anymore because it's 6-9 months :(

Accessorizing with thrifted goods :) This hat matches his Cleveland Browns onesie very well. Both were thrifted.

This tee was 50c. The onesie underneath was a gift.

Monkey PJs!

More hockey themed clothing! Did I mention that my hubby is a hockey enthusiast?

I lost track of the price of the polo, but those grey cargo pants were a score at 25c.

Wearing a "SuperWhy" mask that he received for Christmas with a thrifted long sleeve shirt and pants.

This short sleeved tee was 50c. I've once again layered it with a long sleeve onesie for warmth.

A hooded sweatshirt for those cold Ohio winters!

A "Batter Up if you like Baseball" tee with an elephant on it. Makes no sense to me either. But hey, it was 50c. You've seen the pants earlier. Remember? The 59c splurge?

Ohio State! I'm a sucker for all things Buckeye. This was a steal at 45c.

Blue and brown- one of my favorite color combos!

He has three pairs of 9-12 months khakis, two were 50c and one was 25c. The shirt was a hand-me down of my brother's from 25 years ago, and I believe the tie was 30c. The tie is my absolute fav. I almost forgot about the shoes! They were a little more than I usually spend on thrifted items ($4.50), but they do fit his fat little feet well so they were worth it.
One last pic. The tank top I'm wearing here was thrifted, and the baby carrier was a $5 garage sale find. I would not have survived our summer vacation without that baby carrier, so it was money well spent!

More Toy Storage

2010-01-24T07:06:00.005-05:00

We have too many toys. It's a sickness really. I'm pretty sure that they're breeding when we're not looking. And you know what's really scary: he turns one in a few weeks, and you know what that means. More toys!

Please don't tell my mom that you saw my house look like this. I think she might throw up a little.

I've been trying to come up with solutions for all my son's stuff. You already saw the barn toy box WIP last week. Did I finish it? Um, no. Not yet. But I am making some headway. Too bad it's coming out kind of pink though!

I bought some 75% off red plastic storage containers at Target during their after Christmas clearance sales. They were only $2.50 each! Woot, woot!

I also dismantled a large wooden three-panel screen that I used to have blocking the sump pump from view. I figured that was probably a death trap now that our son is mobile, so I took it down. Now two out of the three panels are hung on the wall for more toy storage.

This last one's not toy storage, but since I like it, I'm including it anyway. I'd had these old Coke bottle boxes sitting around the house for eons. When Joel was born, we had to attempt to clear out part of the closet in his room so that he could have a little space. We weren't very successful in removing all our junk from his closet, however we did remove the computer related stuff and moved it to the basement. (The computer itself moved to the basement when creating the nursery, so it made sense that the paper, ink, etc. would also come down to the basement).

I can't remember for sure, but I think the Coke boxes were flea market finds. The hardware to attach them to the wall was around twenty bucks at Lowes. Do you have any other creative solution ideas for me?

And don't forget, those messy living room shots are our dirty little secret! Mum's the word!

The Barn

2010-01-16T08:54:00.004-05:00

As promised, here are some photos of the barn before I started repainting it. In case you missed it, my grandpa built this toy box for my dad when he was a little one.

I've used this toy box as Christmas storage, as you can see. My Christmas tree fits nicely in the top part, which is hinged. The bottom part's doors never did work very well. When my brother and I were little, the doors fell off all the time, and so I don't think I'll put the doors back up. I'm thinking a ~~cute~~ boyish, little fabric skirt.

My grandpa painted some cute little windows on the side. I don't know if I'll put more windows up or not. (Um, probably not). I'm thinking about decoupaging some firetrucks onto it with a bunch of free sample wallpapers.

As you can see, the barn is in bad shape. Four out of the eight trim pieces were broken and a serious hazard to the baby, so I removed them and replaced them. This one looks like my rabbit chewed it!

So there you have it. I'm going to go downstairs and get painting right now. I want to get this project done this weekend!

P.S. Who's turning 31 tomorrow?! This gal!

Snow!

2010-01-08T19:41:00.003-05:00

Wordless ~~Wednesday~~ Friday

Ok, so I just can't do a wordless post. This actually isn't our latest snowfall- this was back a few days after Christmas. We got several inches (6 maybe?), so we can't take the kid out in it. We'd lose him in all the snow.

In other news, I've been busy transforming my dad's old "barn" toybox. My grandpa built it for my dad about 50 years ago. My brother used it to store all his cars and trucks, and now Joel will be using it! (For the better part of the past decade, the toy box has been used for my Christmas storage. So now the question is where in the world am I going to put all my Christmas decorations and the tree?!).

The barn unfortunately suffered water damage when the basement was having water problems, and over the years half of the trim pieces were broken off. I figured nails sticking out and sharp shards of wood probably aren't the safest thing in the world, and so I ripped them off and replaced them. The wood cost less than $4.50. (On a side note, while I was at Lowes, they were having an awesome clearance sale. I picked up four cuphooks for 88c and.... drumroll please... one of those chain thingies to put on the front door for 19c! The cuphooks are to hang up sippy cups in the kitchen).

I also was able to cover up some of the water damage with wood from the garage. Cost: Free! The paint I'm using is also free as it's coming from my stash. I promise pictures will come in a few days. I'm away visiting family for the weekend, but when I get back, I'll post some.

Stay warm!

Recapping 2009 in Photos

2010-01-01T13:08:00.004-05:00

January- when did I become old?!

February- what a great Valentine's Day gift!

March- Joel is a month old already!

April- His first Easter

May- Maid of Honor in T-2's wedding

June was a bad month for my son's scalp, but he eventually got better!

July- Joel's first trip to the beach. See his little t-shirt? That started out life as a long sleeve shirt but I made it short sleeved since it fit him in the middle of summer.

August- Joel's first vacation (Chattanooga & Lynchburg, TN)

September- Joel's getting to be a big boy!

October- Joel's first trip to the pumpkin patch.
He's wearing a completely thrifted outfit!

November- Hubby turned 30 this year too. I baked him a sweet cake! And I bought him a sweet thrifted birthday sign :)

December- Joel's first Christmas

Quit with the Free Mayo Already

2009-12-31T14:56:00.000-05:00

Dear Kroger,

While I am deeply grateful that you send me coupons in the mail, several of which are for completely free items, I do not think I can handle another free jar of mayonnaise. Your past two mailings have included coupons for free jars of Miracle Whip. The problem is, all of your jars of mayo expire in March. I waited. I kept returning to your store to check the expiration dates on your mayo. March 2010. March 2010. March 2010. How do you expect me to use up two large jars of mayo in the next two or three months?

In your next mailing, feel free to include a free coupon on something like cheese or bread. I go through these items quickly. Mayo- not so much. Today, in an effort to use up some of Mayo Jar #1, I whipped up some tuna salad and some tartar sauce. Said tartar sauce went beautifully with the $1.99 tilapia I purchased at your store during my last visit. I also have several jars of pickles from a recent grocery trip when I ~~went a little nutso~~ got excited at your pickles on clearance. Too bad hubby doesn't eat pickles. He also doesn't eat fish or seafood. Looks like I'll be eating lots of tuna salad and tartar sauce while my dear husband starves to death.

Please, for the sake of my marriage, do not send me another Miracle Whip coupon. You know I have a special weakness for all things free and would not be able to turn it down. You know I hate wastefulness and so I would be stuck trying to use up yet another jar of mayo. A girl can only eat so much mayo.

Sincerely,

Sewing-Chick

P.S. It would also be helpful if in your next mailer you were able to include some delicious recipes using said Miracle Whip. It would be even better if those recipes did not involve pickles or seafood so that my husband doesn't wither away to nothing. I have heard about cake recipes that utilize mayo- this I am willing to try (for my husband of course). Also, baconnaise is a new concept to me that I just might have to give a whirl. If you have any outstanding recipes like these, please send them my way. Thank you.

P.P.S. Happy New Year!

Don't Suck on the Toilet Seat

2009-12-30T09:30:00.001-05:00

Yeah, the wee tot actually did that. And unfortunately he did it before we cleaned the bathroom. *Sigh*

Remember these magnets?

Speaking of toilets and sighing... we had to have Mr. Rooter come out the other day because we noticed water had been leaking down into the basement closet. Sadly, among several other things, a Columbus Blue Jackets (my husband's beloved hockey team) autographed calendar got ruined from the water damage. As if this wasn't bad enough...

Mr. Rooter then knocks us out with a $1000 repair bill. They said the toilet was leaking (um, raw sewage dripping into the basement?) because the previous homeowner is an ~~ignoramus~~... ~~half-assed home improvement moron~~...

The home-improvementally-challenged-previous-homeowner stacked four flanges on top of each other instead of putting in a longer PVC pipe. This apparently was a no-no, and I got to pay to have it fixed the right way. I swear if I ever run into him, I'm giving him a swirlie.

Please Pray

2009-12-24T23:39:00.002-05:00

My husband's father's family has suffered two tremendous losses today. Bob, my father-in-law's step-dad and the man who raised him, lost both his grandson Bryan and his wife today, on Christmas Eve. Bryan was my husband's cousin and was our age- early 30s. He went into the hospital a couple weeks ago for what everyone thought would be routine back surgery and never left the hospital. One complication after another, including H1N1, led to his being taken off life support this morning and passing away within 15 minutes. Bryan leaves behind his parents, siblings, a long-time girlfriend and an elementary-school-aged daughter. In an unrelated event, Grandpa Bob's wife passed away about an hour later.

Please pray to ease the pain and suffering of this family. While my husband isn't super-close with his dad's family like he is with his mom's family and therefore I didn't know them very well, I still feel their pain. I cannot imagine losing not one, but two relatives on the day before Christmas. Sometimes it is difficult to understand why God chooses to do what he does, however hopefully they can find comfort in the fact that this was part of God's master plan. They are both at peace in the arms of the Lord.

Everything I Learned, I Learned From Little Women

2009-12-24T07:57:00.001-05:00

"Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents." (Too bad they didn't have the internet at their fingertips. They could have hopped online, downloaded some tutes, and made each other some wonderful handcrafted gifts!)
"Housekeeping ain't no joke." (Amen, sister)
"Something more than energy and good-will is necessary to make a cook." (Yes, I think it's called a Kitchenaid mixer).
"Lounging and larking doesn't pay." (Darn. That's what I was going to do when I grow up).
"Work is wholesome and there is plenty for everyone; it keeps us from ennui and mischief, is good for health and spirits and gives us a sense of power and independence better than money or fashion." (I'm not so sure about this one).
"Have regular hours for work and play; make each day both useful and pleasant, and prove that you understand the worth of time by employing it well. Then youth will be delightful, old age will bring few regrets, and life becomes a beautiful success, in spite of poverty." (Well said, mama!)
"Why mind the fashion? Wear a big hat, and be comfortable!" (Just do me a favor, and don't go out in public in your Snuggie. No, not even to a sporting event).
"He [Grandfather] wants me to be an India merchant, as he was, and I'd rather be shot." (I guess even back then children were rebelling against their caregivers!)
"Are you going to deliver lectures all the way home?" he asked presently... "Because if you are, I'll take a bus; if you are not, I'd like to walk with you." (And even back then, men hated being nagged by the women in their lives!)
"Mother likes to have us out of doors as much as possible." (Some things never change. 150 years later, parents are still shooing their children outside to get some peace and quiet).
"We go grubbing along day after day, without a bit of change, and very little fun. We might as well be in a treadmill." (Exercise sucked back then too.)

Upcycling Baby Food Jars into Christmas Decor

2009-12-23T10:54:00.006-05:00

*Hums Klondike Bar commercial jingle*
What can I do-oo-oo, with a baby food jar?

Over at Prudent Baby, Jaime came up with and posted several ingenious projects to use up those Glass Jars. My personal fav is to turn it into a pin cushion. Ca-UTE! (Ok, my real personal fav is the jello shot idea! Can you believe I'm almost 31, and I've never tried a jello shot? That should be my new year's resolution this year. Forget about losing weight, actually menu planning for more than two weeks, and blogging regularly... let's make my resolution one that I can actually keep!)

At first I was thinking that the baby food jars could be turned into a cute little tea set. I quickly scratched that idea when I realized that I wouldn't even trust some of my junior high students with glass, let alone toddlers.

My brain raced to think of something else. What about those clear glass ornaments that I've seen all over bloggyland, where the crafty mama swirls paint on the inside and makes a cool ornament for the tree? This would be cute made with baby food jars instead of round ornaments. I could put a little piece of fabric on the top and secure with a piece of wire wrapped around the edge. The wire could double as a hanger. Nice idea, but I'm too lazy to do it.

And then I remembered this. Yes, my friends, this is the most bomb-diggetiest idea. Place a photo in the glass jar! You can do what designsponge does and sit a grouping of glass jars of various sizes on your mantel, or you could make them into ornaments by adding fabric and wire.

You could cut out pictures from Christmas cards (like I did here) and put them inside the jars for a nice holiday display, or you could make a whole nativity scene with the jars! You could line up a bunch of baby food jars and put a letter in each one to spell out the word "Believe." The possibilities are endless! (Sorry my photo is so generic. I didn't have many glass jars lying around because we emptied the recycling bin the other day).

Things I Almost Did this Holiday Season

2009-12-22T21:24:00.007-05:00

Put up the Christmas tree? Check. Buy gifts for everyone on the list? Check. Take Joel to see Santa and pray he doesn't get H1N1? Check. Send out Christmas cards? Crap, I knew I forgot something. Hang outdoor Christmas lights? Crap. Bake delicious Christmas cookies like the good Betty Crocker wife that I am? Crap.

Christmas sweet treats I almost baked:

Aren't these Candy Corn Cookies the bees knees? Just make the cookies red, white, and green or perhaps red, white, and pink and voila you've got Christmas Candy Corn Cookies. It would look really cute with a bowl of actual Christmas candy corn nearby so people know what the cookies are supposed to be. Otherwise they might look like some demented Christmas trees or something.

Frugal Gift Idea: Cookies in a jar! Didn't quite get around to it though.

Anyone care for some Peppermint Kiss Cookies? Too bad. Just drool over the photo. That's what I'm doing too. Less calories that way.

Check out these knock-out-drop-dead-gorgeous cupcakes from Bakerella. Confession: teensy weensy lie here. I did not almost make them. I really wasn't planning on ever making them. They look way too involved for me. (Fondant? I. Don't. Think. So.) But if you've got the time (Time? It could happen- you do have 2 days), then these look A.D.O.R.A.B.L.E.

In the realm of sewing, I thought about appliquing a onesie today. The wee tot has a fairly nondescript white onesie that I figured I could spruce up with a Christmas tree applique (Get it? Spruce?). Then I changed my mind and decided to go the stocking route. I went so far as to gather up the fabric I'd use for the applique. I dug out a red print and even the white faux fur I would have used on the top part. Then I laughed at myself and decided no, I am not dragging out the sewing machine beast. I just put it away today. Sewing makes a mess. I'm having company in a couple days. Let it go. And with that, I put the fabric back away.

So is there anyone else who has been a slacker this holiday season?

Won't You Play Along?

2009-12-22T07:09:00.003-05:00

What? You don't have time for such shananigans when it's three, count them, three days before Christmas?! (Yikes!)

Anyway, here I go! Copy and paste into your own blog if you're up to it!

ALL ABOUT US (HUBBY AND I)

What are your middle names?
Mine is Ann; his is Michael

How long have you been together?
We started dating January 2007.

How long did you know each other before you started dating?
We didn't. We met on the internet, chatted for a week or so, and then met in real life.

Who asked who out?
See above.

Who made the first move?
He did. I think.

How old are each of you?
We're 30, but Jason just turned 30, and I'll be 31 in less than a month. Gulp.

Did you go to the same school?
Nope, we grew up a couple hours apart. Though the weird thing is, his grandpa lived right down the street from my high school!

Are you from the same home town?
See above

Who is the smartest?
I think we're both pretty smart! We both graduated in the top ten... I was 2nd of about 400, and he was 6th out of ??? Not sure- I'll have to find out :)

Who majored in what?
I have a bachelors and masters in music education. He was a geology major but didn't finish when he realized that he didn't want to have to move where the geologist jobs are!

Who is the most sensitive?
Oh that would probably be me!

Where do you eat out most as a couple?
We try not to eat out, but when his friend comes over, he always wants us to go to Asian Star. That's where Jason and I met in real life actually, so I don't mind. It's some freakin' good Asian food, too!

Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple?
The Virgin Islands, baby!

Who has the worst temper?
Definitely me. Jason's the most even keeled person I've ever met.

How many children do you want?
We said we wanted two. I can't imagine going through the late nights again though. I'm getting too old for this crap.

Who does the cooking?
That would be a big fat ME. I tried to teach Jason since I went back to work, and he's been staying home. That didn't work out.

Who is more social?
Me. Jason is pretty shy and stays quiet most of the time around others.

Who is the neat-freak?
Neither of us is a neat freak :)

Who is the most stubborn?
How come all of these are ME?

Who wakes up earlier?
Me, once again! I wake up to go to work, and even on the weekends, I get up at 6 because of my stupid internal clock. Either that or the baby!

Where was your first date?
Asian Star Buffet and some cemetery hopping!

Who has the bigger family?
Ooh, Jason finally wins one! His family get-togethers have like, 30 people. Ours usually have about 10.

Do you get flowers often?
No not really, but I think paying for flowers is a waste of money.

How do you spend the holidays?
This year it's Christmas Eve with his family, and Christmas at our house with my family.

Who is more jealous?
I don't think either of us is the jealous type, thankfully!

How long did it take to get serious?
We met in late January and were talking engagement in March. He was moved in by April 1 and engaged on Cinco de Mayo! Crazy, huh?!

Who eats more?
Hmmmm... can I go with a tie for this one?

What do you do for a living?
I'm a music teacher. He's a SAHD.

Who does the laundry?
Both of us do. Why am I still doing laundry when he's a SAHD?!

Who’s better with the computer?
That would definitely be Jason's domain.

Who drives when you are together?
He usually does, although we'll take my car once in a blue moon. I would prefer he drives though.

What is your song?
We danced to "Unforgettable" at our wedding, so I guess that's our song :)

Help!

2009-12-21T19:39:00.003-05:00

Maybe someone out there in bloggyland can help me with this. I took a long hiatus from blogging while my little one was an infant, and I'm slowly but surely getting back on the blogging train. While I was away, it seems that blogger and google hooked up, however the sites I follow are not working the way they should.

It used to be, if I clicked to add a site to the list of sites I follow, it would refer to me as sewing-chick and have my little photo there in the list of followers. You could click on me and then see a link to visit my blog. Well that's not the way it's working now. It now refers to me by my first name as if Jodie and sewing-chick are not one and the same. A mention of my own blog is nowhere to be found. Ideas, anyone? Did I miss something while I was away?

Thanks so much! *Hugs!*

Dieters, Beware Dollar General!

2009-12-13T21:44:00.003-05:00

Holy crap on a cracker. I just found out today while I was perusing Dollar General, that they sell... drum roll please...

Generic Girl Scout Cookies. I'm talking, honest to goodness, I-can-have-them-year-round Samoas (and Thin Mints and a couple other varieties)! They are d.e.l.i.c.i.o.u.s. Of course, I'll still buy some from the Girl Scouts when it's that time of year, but now I can have them whenever my little heart desires! (They cost $1.85 in case you're wondering).

Just thought you'd like to know!

Read to your Kidlet

2009-12-13T19:24:00.016-05:00

Today Joel learned how to pull books off of the bookshelf. Yay. There's no turning back now. Awhile ago I thrifted a new-in-the-package pair of straps to secure said bookshelf to the studs in the wall. Looks like we'll be needing to install that this week!

While we were ~~scattering the books all over the floor~~, I mean reading, I got the idea to share with you the Christmas/ Wintry books we own. I very rarely pay full price for books (though I did get Joel two books at Barnes & Noble last weekend because a percentage of the purchase price went back to the band program at my school). Most of these books were thrifted, though some were Jason's when he was little, and a few were gifts. Here we go.

Elf Help by Margie Palatini is one of my favs. It's about a cyber-geeky elf who royally screws up everyone's Christmas lists when his computer crashes. Luckily, the kids end up liking the gifts they mistakenly received, and the elf gets to keep his job as cyber-geek. My copy is personally signed by the author!

The Little Engine that Could and the Snowy, Blowy Christmas by Watty Piper. Santa's reindeer come down with an illness just as he's finishing up delivering all the toys. Uh-oh! There's one toy left to deliver but the reindeer are too sick to fly! Who will come to the rescue? I'll let you figure that one out.

Memories of the Present is by William N. Fullington. It's a tale of a grandfather telling his grandson about this metal wagon that he really wanted for Christmas. In the end, his parents couldn't afford the metal wagon and make him a wooden one instead. He overcomes his disappointment and realizes that the wooden wagon is super special because it was homemade. Can I get a hell yeah?

The Mitten is a Ukrainian folktale told by Jan Brett. In this tale, a little boy loses his white mitten in the snow. One by one, animals begin to snuggle themselves into the mitten to keep warm. Finally a bear squeezes into the mitten, sneezes, and all the animals go flying. The little boy sees his mitten, picks it up, and takes it home. It's a good thing too because his grandmother was going to rip him a new one if he lost his mittens.

Silent Night, A Mouse Tale by Betsy Hernandez and Donny Monk is a cute story about how the church mice ~~nearly ruined Christmas~~ were instrumental in the writing of Franz Gruber's beloved Christmas carol, Silent Night.

Rudolph's Second Christmas by Robert L. May is about two children whose dad works for a lousy circus. No one buys tickets for their circus, and they go from town to town, only staying in each town for one day. Because of this vagabond lifestyle, Santa missed them last year! The children were very upset. Rudolph saves the day by introducing a bunch of misfit animals to the circus. The circus suddenly is very popular, and so the family can stay in one town for months on end now. Santa doesn't miss them this year, and all is well.

The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg is a classic. I thrifted this one today for 50c! Woot, woot!

The Fattest, Tallest, Biggest Snowman Ever by Bettina Ling is a book that first and second graders should be able to read. It cleverly incorporates math into the story!

The Hat by Jan Brett is about a hedgehog who gets a hat stuck on his prickly things (what are those things called?). He feels ridiculous and when questioned by the other animals, he tells them that it's winter for pete's sake! Everyone should wear a hat! The other animals then go steal clothes from a nearby clothesline so that they can cover their heads too. And here the hedgehog thought the other animals were making fun of him!

We own three different copies of "The Nutcracker." You can't go wrong there. We also own three different versions of the Baby Jesus story. Baby Jesus by Lori Froeb is toddler friendly. The Christmas Story is a Little Golden Book, and I think it was my husband's so it's pretty old. Finally, we have The Nativity by Juliana Bragg, copyright 1982. It's as old as my brother!

There you have it folks! What's your favorite Christmas book to read to the kiddos?