The bug I love to hate

::Oh, stink(y) bug how I loathe you!

::You come to visit my home every fall. You're an unwelcome guest that never seems to leave!

::When you are disturbed a little too much-you exude a terrible smell. You know-like really, really under-ripe, cut-into fruit, or freshly cut weeds.

::I use to flush you, but after you surprised me by not goin' down and crawling up my leg-I just gently pick you up with a tissue or my bare hands and flick you outside. ☻

::You make my tough-acting 17 year old scream like a little girl!

::I had never known about you the first half of my life. I was introduced to you after I moved to Christmas tree country. Apparently you live near Christmas trees and therefore you live near me!

::As with everything, God put you on this earth for a reason. I just wish I knew what it was.

::Oh, stink(y) bug-I love to hate you. And by the way-YOU STINK!☺

Towel rug-finished!

I finished the 6th project in the Handmade Home Project. It's the towel rug and I really like the looks of it. I found a brand new towel in my cedar (hope) chest that I decided I would use. And I went with a 'vintage sheet' yet again for the fabric-I love this cute print!

What I did was-I took this towel and cut it down to the size I wanted. Then I cut the sheet to the same size. Then I cut 5 two inch strips of the leftover piece of towel. Then pin and sew the strips on the material. After that, sew right sides together leaving a 4 to 6 inch opening to turn right side out. Then topstitch the whole thing closing the opening as you go.

As you can see I didn't change my thread to the proper color-but I'm okay with that. And note-my linoleum and wall paper are over 20 years old-and I'm okay with that too. You know-it's vintage.☺

Also-if your floor is slippery-Amanda advises to use puffy fabric paint on the back to help with the slippage. Not a problem here-the hairspray on the linoleum will take care of that!☺

Funky Finds

I thought I'd show you a few of my Goodwill finds from yesterday.

I just took a quick stroll through yesterday, in between church and lunch out. Here's what I found for the low price of only $2.41!

::A couple yards of this-'it's so ugly it's pretty' polyester. I had my eye on it before-but I had a feeling it would be left for the 29 cent rack and it was!

And some lovely notions bundled in two 99 cent bags:

::5 packs of sewing machine needles

::2 spools of cool looking string-one's white and gold and one's white and red

::Singer sewing machine belts-I just bought a Singer, but I didn't know they had belts

::Finally, two packages of Color Magic Yarn-For Smart Gift Tying (And bonus-it doesn't stink, as sometimes these old things do!)

And now I feel like crawling back in bed on this chilly, stormy, windy, wet day. But I must go clean my lovely cousin's house. Have a great day!

Vintage sheet potholders and say hello to my little friend

I think my friend Dawnie is set now with BIG potholders. Here are three more-made with the vintage sheets we love so much. Note the little pockets you can put your hand in. I was watching a sewing show on PBS and they were making them like this. I really like them and I hope she does too.

And say hello to my new, little friend. The other night I had had it with my Brother sewing machine-so I ordered this Singer Simple from Walmart. It was 90 dollars ($103.00 with tax and shipping) and had good reviews. Hope I like it. Of course-Brother has been behaving himself ever since I ordered Singer Simple. But isn't that always the way?☺

I've just entered the Netflix zone

I just received my first movie from Netflix. I signed up for a free 2 week trial. If I would decide to keep my membership, it's about 9 dollars a month. I probably won't keep it. I'm not a movie renter (I know I haven't rented a movie in 10-15 years) and not much of a movie watcher since we got our computer-going on 4 years now.

But buddy-if I was a movie renter and watcher, this would be right up my alley. I dislike stopping at stores (except Goodwill). Most of the time I don't even like to leave my house. (I know-I'm a little-ahem-weird.)

In case you don't know-you sign up for Netflix online. You choose how many movies you want to receive at one time. (I chose one. Your monthly fee is more-the more movies you get at the same time.) Choose your movies in the order you want to receive them. Your movie arrives very quickly in your mailbox. When you are done with the movie, stick 'er in the return envelope, put 'er in the mail and wait for your next movie to arrive. I know most people know this-but just in case you didn't-I thought I'd tell you.

I just think this is cool, man-very cool. Whoever thought this up was genius, I tell you-genius.☺

PS-Do you see I chose Twilight for my first movie?...Hope it's good.

PSS-Definitely not as good as the book!

Baby's fringed play mat-done!

Side one.
Side two.

The 5th project in the Handmade Home Project is finished. It's the baby's fringed play mat.

I used fabric from my stash. The white background polka dot one is a sheet.

I did things a little differently than Amanda does in the book. But that's okay-she says everyone would have their own take on each of the projects.

Amanda made her's with a light colored sheet, cotton batting and a piece of a bedspread. Then you are supposed to get your kids involved and have them make drawings on the top with fabric markers. Cute idea.

I used fabrics from my stash (including a sheet) and a piece of polyester fabric for the center. Also I made it reversible. Even though there's a little pink in the print-I think this would be appropriate for a boy as well as a girl.

See those little "fringes" on the edges of the play mat? If I remember correctly, babies do like to play with little things like this.

So, bring on the baby showers. I'm ready!☺

More lovely senior photos

Yes-she's sitting on an old washing machine. Love it!

All taken by one of my lovely sisters-Jodie.☺

"Vintage" floral sheet baby girl quilt

Yesterday-I started this little quilt/hap, and this morning-I finished it.

I just love the look of "vintage" floral sheets and I think they make a lovely baby girl quilt/hap. I don't think I'll ever use anything else ever again. I used 6 rows of 5 (6 inch) squares.

I cut two pieces of soft flannel and used one for the center and one for the backing. So this is fairly thin, but I really like the feel of it. Then I knotted it in the corners of each square with embroidery floss. The binding is "vintage" floral sheet too. I used the french fold method for binding-Ooh, la, la!

If I was more ambitious, I'd make one of these for my bed.☺

And please note: I strung a clothesline between two poles on my deck. I love the look of "clothes hanging on the line". Just look at that beauty blowin' in the wind. (Yes, the answer my friend is blowin' in the wind, the answer is blowin' in the wind.)

And now I think a storm's blowing in. I better go get that beauty off the line!

Pretty in pink, polka dotted polyester

What do you think of my new handmade church dress? I bought it from Goodwill. It was on the 29 cent rack.

What? You don't like it? The nerve!

Oh-I'm just kidding. I bought it for the material. It may be polyester, but it's pink and polka dotted-so I like it. Perhaps another clothespin holder?

When I was checking out, I made sure I told the clerk I was buying it for the material. She said, "Oh, I thought you were buying it for Halloween."

Yeah, it's pretty bad.☺

Mom's house

I went to my mom's house today-to do a tiny bit of cleaning, because a tiny bit of cleaning is all she needs.

Mom and Dad got a new deck with a roof over it about 2 weeks ago. Mom is very excited-she's wanted a roof over the deck for a long time.
Mom's hens and chicks in piece of driftwood.
Mr. Bee on Mom's zinnia. He was on a yucky zinnia, so I moved him to a prettier one to make a prettier picture.
Here's Baby Elephant Cookie Jar. She was given to my mom by my grandma a long, long time ago. Today's the first time Mom or I noticed she was a baby. Note the bonnet and bib.
Mom's bistro set and Mom's mums. (Both gifts from Jodie-Well aren't you the good daughter today, Jodie?)
Finally, I drug this hap out to Mom's new swing. I made it for her. (Wait, maybe I'm the good daughter!)

Can you spy my baby in the center? Mom gave me her old grandma t-shirt (now-I don't mean old Grandma, I mean old t-shirt) to use in this hap.

So there you have it-some scenes from Mom and Dad's house. Hope you enjoyed the tour!☺

I love...

that hand and these feet,

this smirky smile,
that name,

this face,
my girl,
Hope☺!

Thank you, Jodie, for taking the time out of your busy day to take these. They turned out beautifully!

Oh, Henry!

I went over to my middle sister's (Jodie) house today to do a little cleaning. I do that every couple weeks during the crazy school year.

When I got there I found this pan of what used to be O'Henry Bars (see below). What gets me was that the last time I visited, I saw on the counter top, the exact same thing-an empty pan. Grrrrr! I was a day late and a dollar short, apparently. Oh me, oh my, O'Henry Bars are some good eats.

I took a pic of the recipe cause I was too lazy to copy it and I don't know if I can find mine. (This is our mommy's handwriting.)

Also, I'm too lazy to type it-so if you'd like it-there you go! (Click on pics for deets.)
All that picture taking was making me tired. Break time, already! Left over coffee and a swing and satellite is all I need.☺ Now-I didn't work as hard as I could have-but there was a Mission Organization marathon on Fine Living and we don't have satellite at home. But I did do some work (see above).

And just because they're so darn cute I had to take a pic of a pic of my niece and nephew.
I just knew if I took my camera with me I'd find something to blog about.☺

Corners of her room

I was sitting on my daughter's bedside, as I do every morning that I need to get her up. I was looking around her dim room and this (I don't know what it's called) contraption (below) caught my eye. I thought-I should put that on the blog-and that's what I'm doing.

My girl was into funky things a couple years ago-so I made her a funky room. (FYI-She said she wanted to change it after about a year-and I said-no, you're keepin' it.) There are four different colors on 5 different walls.

My sister had gotten her the below contraption as a gift. After I had painted her walls I remembered 'the contraption' had a little kit with it so it could be hung. Wonder of wonders I located the kit and put it on and hung 'the contraption' from the ceiling. (We have vaulted ceilings upstairs.)

Whenever any kids come in her room they love to play with it.
Pull on the string...

keep pulling...
and it shrinks into a small ball. Neat, huh?

And while I was up in her room I snapped a pic of her towels-just cause I like 'em.

Good night!

Mouse pad-done!

The fourth project is finished from the Handmade Home project. The project in which I will try to make one each of the 33 projects in the book Handmade Home within a year. So far, so good.

This morning I made the mouse pad which was pretty easy. It's basically a 9 x 9 inch piece of material for the back and two pieces equaling 9 x 9 for the front. I used a piece of a thrifted shower curtain and a piece of a sheet. You are supposed iron on fusible interfacing to each of the wrong sides and then zigzag stitch wrong sides together.

Well-I used what I call Wonder Under and I don't think it's fusible interfacing-but I think it still has the same effect-which would be to make your fabric sturdier. But-I ran into problems sewing this up because my needle kept getting sticky and that caused my machine to freeze up. I was almost done-but the sticky needle kept giving me problems. So I did what anyone would do with their mouse pad-I stuck it in the freezer. I thought this would help with the stickiness. While it was in the freezer, I cleaned off my needle. After I was done cleaning the needle I hurried up and took the mouse pad out of the freezer and finished it.

So besides the problem with my sticky needle (I think it was from using the Wonder Under), this was a very easy project.

I tried it out and my mouse works very nicely on my new pad!

*****Four down 29 to go*****

Volunteering

Mr. Sunflower volunteered to grow.☺ (Did you know plants that pop up, that you didn't plant, are called volunteers? Well-they are!)
Mr. Maple Tree volunteered to drop his leaves (yes-fall is here). So autumnal of him!

And I volunteered to take their pic-cause I'm nice like that.

Now, I must go volunteer my cleaning services at my lovely cousin Michelle's house.

Wait a minute-I guess I can't call it volunteering if I get paid. Oops-my bad. (Always wanted to write that.)

If loving you is wrong, I don't want to be right

Dear Mountain Dew,

How can something that tastes so right, be so wrong?

Love, Me

P.S.-I have better things to do than writing my beverage a love note, I just don't want to do them.

Bandana blanket (or hankie blankie)

After seeing this bandana blanket tutorial here, I decided to make a version for my "other" little girl (my niece) for her birthday which is coming up soon!

Wow, this was a fairly easy project. It took about two hours from start to finish. I sewed the six bandanas together then I backed it with this huge, cute, thrifted, flannel, cherry sheet ($1.50 on 1/2 price day). I doubled-over the sheet, so there are two layers of flannel plus the bandanas. So it should be pretty warm. I made the binding from fabric I had on hand and tied it together in two places where the bandanas meet. It's even been washed and dried. That's why the binding is curled up in spots. It's perfectly imperfect. (That's the way I like to think of it.)

Also, I ordered Jess a custom pencil case from Artscow.com. Then at Wallyworld I saw these pink pencils (already sharpened!) and this rubber band ball (I think these are cool!). And let's not forget the Discover gift card with her name on. Bought that with my part of my cash back bonus-they customize it and ship it for free. Yeehaw!!!

I think my "other" little girl's making out pretty good this year. I always give her her gift early. This year will be no different. I'll probably deliver this tomorrow.☺

Potholder redo

Have any potholders that are still functional but have seen better days? I do. I thought I try recovering this one.

My friend Dawnie had asked me to make her a potholder. The ones she always uses are really big (she must have bought these at a craft show), and she couldn't just go buy one that big at the store.

So, she gave me one to take home and instead of making a whole new one-I tried recovering it and it turned out pretty good. Then I thought I'd try to recover one of my own.

I traced the potholder (with washable marker-leftover from having a young child days) on the wrong side of one of two pieces of fabric. I cut the two pieces out about an inch bigger than the line.

Then I sewed right sides together about a quarter of an inch outside the line, leaving about two inches or so open. (Nice sewing, huh?)
Then I trimmed off the excess fabric and turned it right side out. I then stuffed my good ol' potholder in the opening. Tried sewing the hole shut about five times with the machine. It looked terrible, "sew" I gave up. Then I took my ruler and washable marker and drew some squares (cause I can't sew a straight line to save my life)and sewed over them. I brought it up from the darkness of my basement and into the light of my dining room to sew the hole shut by hand and thought-this looks kind of like a pumpkin. So I got out the green seam binding and sewed a stem on as I was sewing the hole shut by hand.
Here's my potholder redo and Dawnie's. (See how big?)

I think they turned out pretty cute if I say so myself.

Now I must go clean something...cleaning is so overrated!☻

Cleaning the closet

I don't get excited about clothes. (Could that be a result of weight gain?)

But I love my pillowcases, sheets, and wrapping paper!