Needle felted Santa…

I can’t remember where I got the inspiration for this Santa but he sure has been a hit! And I’m tired of making them…I made 10 last weekend and they are all gone. Phew! I also made 10 snowmen and got them shipped on Friday. It has been a busy Christmas Season!!! I’m now working on paper projects. People…I’m making my own SVG’s! (That is the file that my eCraft cuts from). Hopefully I’ll have something to show you next week. I have glue and ink all over my fingers…and floor…and table! I have to break out the shop-vac today and get rid of some paper and dust bunnies! I can’t have random dog hair and dust getting stuck in my glue lol!

If you have time on your hands go read this post about making a simpler Christmas. I agree with her!

And I have to say my heart is broken over the tragedy in Newton. It’s so hard to watch the news coverage…I pray that each and every family finds even a moment of peace and comfort.

Cutting ornaments and cards with eCraft…

There’s a lot of wonderful free cutting files out there and I’ve been having a ball finding them and seeing what my eCraft can do! One of the free files I’ve tried is the “Baubles by Bird” file.

I’ve also purchased a few files from Lettering Delights. One of my favorites is “Season’s Tweetings”. So far I’ve been very happy with my purchases too! Here are a couple birds using the Season’s Tweetings set-

And here are some ornaments using “Baubles by Bird” files-

  

I have just been having waaaaayyyyy too much fun! There is paper EVERYWHERE…little tiny pieces wedged into every crack and crevice of this house lol! Good thing it vacuums up so well…

Happy Crafting!!!

eCraft

Did I ever mention that I got an eCraft digital cutting machine for my 40th birthday…a year and a half ago? I did! I was so excited I went to JoAnn’s and bought 75 sheets of scrapbooking paper to practice with!!! I expected there to be a learning curve with the machine…but I didn’t expect to fail so horribly. I had done a lot of research before I decided which machine to buy. I picked the eCraft because you didn’t need to use a cutting mat and you were only limited by your imagination as to what you could have the machine cut. Well after getting discouraged time and time again by bad cuts and ripped paper I finally realized I received a lemon. Last summer I packed it up and shipped it back for a replacement. I got my replacement and am just now starting to play with it. I approached it like it could bite me – I was scared. The good news is that this machine works much much better than the old one. As you can see in the picture I’ve had it cut some pretty intricate cuts and so far so good. If I really get excited about everything being “just right” I’ll cut off the little tabs with my craft knife. I’ve started to play again. Now I can’t wait to rush through my housework and get back to the eCraft. I want to design my own SVG’s (that’s the file the machine cuts) and that will take more time. Maybe even more time than I can give it…lol. My brain doesn’t accept learning as quickly as it once did. The program has almost gotten the best of me a few times. When I explained to my dad what I was buying he said “Isn’t that cheating?” my dad uses an excavator to dig basements…is it cheating to use the excavator rather than a shovel?

Happy Crafting!!!

How I make washing dishes more pleasant…

Aside from not using a dryer my dishwasher is also on the fritz. I’m pretty sure I can fix it but I just haven’t taken the time to try. I really don’t mind doing dishes. Of all my mom-cleaning jobs washing dishes may be the least offensive. I like to see the cluttered counters all tidy again. It’s instant gratification. It’s also a good time to ponder. I ponder very important things like…how can I make this job easier? (While I don’t mind washing dishes I don’t want it to take all day!) And after a big meal like yesterday, Thanksgiving, the dishes were everywhere!!! Here are my tips and another installment of my jury rigged life:

• Above you’ll see what I use to drain my silverware. It’s a plastic container some french fried onions came in…I drilled holes in the bottom for drainage and clipped it to the outside of my dish drainer. This way I have the entire dish drainer for plates and bigger stuff. The one that came with the dish drainer is under the sink holding sponges…it took up way to much room in the dish drainer.
• My dish drainer rests on the top sides of my sink…I like this because if something needs to be dumped out, like milk left in a glass, it won’t get on my clean dishes and it won’t get my dishwater icky.
• I fill up my copper bottomed tea kettle with the cold water that comes out of the faucet before the hot water gets to my sink. My hot water heater is in the basement on the other side of the house. Darnit. It’s cheaper and hotter to heat the water on my gas range than to keep pulling it across the basement from my electric water heater. 
• Let the hot soapy water do the work! I fill the dish tub with plates and silverware first and let them sit in the hot soapy water. While they are soaking for a bit I add super hot water from the tea kettle. Then I’ll do something else in the kitchen for a couple minutes…like put away the pot holders…or get recycling ready. When I get back to the plates they are clean and only need a wipe…not a scrub. Refill the sink with glasses or whatever and repeat. I always wash the silverware last. I don’t know why…habit.
• Have two dishcloths in the dishpan! While waiting for the hot water to do it’s magic on the dishes use one dishcloth to wipe the counters…if there is a really sticky or stained area don’t stand there wasting precious crafting minutes scrubbing! Take the other hot soapy rag from the dishpan and lay it on the problem area…while that is soaking go back to the dishes. When a new load of dishes is soaking go back to the problem area. Chances are the hot soapy dishcloth dissolved the problem and you can just wipe it away.
• Let the dishes air dry and have the kids put them away later. Air drying is more sanitary…having the kids handle them…well it’s a chance I take.
• I periodically refill my tea kettle, heat it on the range and add more hot water to the dishwater as needed.
• When I’m really on a roll I make sure my sink area is clean and tidy. Sometimes it’s the cleanest and tidiest place in the house. Sometimes it’s also the most peaceful place to be in the house…nobody bothers me because they don’t want to get roped into helping lol!
• Other tips: Use a good dish soap. I stick with Dawn. It’s nice to have a plant or pretty piece of pottery to stare at while pondering at the sink. Have something pretty in that area. If you use a sponge get it really wet and microwave it for a half a minute or so to sanitize it, don’t wash your dishes with bacteria from a dirty sponge!!

Well, while this seems like some pretty basic stuff to we “pro’s” I’ve noticed a lot of teenagers going through my house who don’t have a clue how to handle a huge mess like the aftermath of Thanksgiving…this post is for them…

Happy Crafting!!

More needle felting…

I’m starting on a new needle felting path. When I demonstrated needle felting at our church bazaar many people commented on the “cute pin cushion” I use to keep my needles in. So next year I will be offering some up for sale. This is the first one. I think I need to needle the little bird a little smaller. It’s funny how something looks different in a photo.

I’m also going to start showing you guys my “Jury Rigged” life piece by piece. Did I ever tell you that I challenged myself to live without a clothes dryer for a year? Well, it’s been about 6 months now without a dryer and I really don’t miss it. That might change come winter. Anyways, as long as I do a load of laundry every day we’ve been getting along just fine. But sometimes I don’t get that done. Like this weekend. I then end up with more laundry than clothes line. One thing I’ve jury rigged is this-

This can be a real lifesaver when a million socks need to get dry. I just match them up right out of the basket and clip them on the clothespins. To make it I drilled holes in a wooden hanger and drilled holes in the clothespins and wallah! I will probably modify it later – I think some jump rings and chain would be better than this cause the pins are “stiff” but if you have a similar problem this works great! (I then hang the hanger on the drying rack, I’ll show that another time.)

Happy Crafting!!!

Needle felted snowman picture -

 

Sorry for the fuzzy picture…I couldn’t seem to hold still. Well, the Bazaar is all done now and it went great!!! When we have the final numbers I’ll give you a recap but everything I made (except the pouches that took me TWO DAYS to figure out) sold!!! Last I’ve heard the Bazaar raised well over $10,000!!! I spent my time at the Bazaar needle felting. It is relatively new to this area and people are fascinated by the process so I demonstrated. It was so much fun meeting so many different people. I even made a contact for future wool…

I needle felted this little snowman this morning. I’m not 100% sure he’s done but I had to get him on the wall. I picked up the frame at a thrift store and made my own “rub-n-buff” by mixing carnuba was and pigment powders together and applying it with my finger. The frame was originally a bright brassy gold color…now it’s kind of a copper color. Mary if you see any of these frames at our favorite thrift store pick them up for me please!!! Doesn’t matter if they have glass in them or not…I picture a bunch of them on the wall with seasonal themed needle felted designs… I hope I come across lots!

Happy Crafting!!!

Needle felted Santa’s

This is the next batch of needle felted projects going to the Spirit of Christmas Bazaar. The Bazaar is on Saturday!!!! We are going to have a BUSY week getting everything ready!!! Again, I wish I had focused on needle felting right from the beginning rather than waste my time on other projects that didn’t really turn out well. I’m going to work on some of them next and cross my fingers that something can be made of them. You’ll see them next week if all goes well. These guys were inspired by some others that I saw somewhere online – mine are different…I needle felted everything but the beaded eyes…the other ones were mass-produced and used felt for the nose and mustache and hat rim. I hope people like them!!!!

Happy Crafting!!!

A bowl of snowmen…

It’s that time of year again…the Spirit of Christmas craft bazaar is in just a few weeks!!! I’ve been working on these little guys off and on…

I hope to get several more ready for the bazaar. I’m also working on a wood/painting craft that isn’t going very well. Darnit! I wish I had spent my time needle felting some things instead of painting. That is more of a can’t-fail craft. This week is going to be a very busy one – I have two sets of parent/teacher conferences, three different meetings, an all-day driving test for the middle kid, Halloween festivities and more. Ick. I don’t like feeling like I’m “behind the eight ball” before the week has even started…Friday is going to be a GOOD DAY lol! Have a good week yourselves!!!

Happy Crafting!

What am I working on??

Well, right now I am working on my Asus Transformer Tablet – a lot! I’m organizing my photos. This isn’t a job for the faint-hearted. I’ve already organized around 3,000 photos and there’s a lot more where they came from! I recently retrieved 4 years of photos from my external hard drive and I have to organize those. And now I’m scanning all the photos I had from the pre-digital era onto my computer. Oh my gosh! This is a labor of love! I’m doing it for my children and I’m doing it before it gets any more out of control. I used to scrapbook…and I loved it…but it got away from me and there is NO WAY I could scrapbook everything. NO. WAY. I’d have to have a house just for the scrapbooks! And with my luck it would burn down and all would be lost. This way I can store all this information on a dvd or external hard drive and it takes up very little space. And when my kids are ready I can give them a copy…and if they lose it I can burn them another one. No hard feelings. If they accidently spilled water on a scrapbook I’d be furious and sad. This just makes sense for us.

So, I thought I’d share some great apps I like to use -

Sony Million Moments app – I like this app because I can tag photos, which puts them into an “album” based on the tag. Each photo can have more than one tag. Downside-there are only 8 tags…So if you had 9 kids you’d be out of luck lol.

Album App HD – I like this app because you can create some pretty cool “albums” and add text. It’s still in the beta stage so it’s only going to get better and better. Downside-you can’t resize pictures in the app and you can only make 25 albums.

Jumble File Manager app – I like this app because I can easily organize my files that I have stored on my sd card. Copy, paste and delete. Downside – I’m lazy, I wish I could tap and drag the files instead of tap/copy, tap/paste, tap/delete. Oh well.

Touch ReTouch Free – You can remove unwanted things from pictures! Even a whole person!! Downside – you have to pay to upgrade to the version where you can then add things to the picture with a cloning tool. I will probably do this at some point.

Little Photo – Has lots of great effects…black and white…sepia…lomo…fun stuff!

Well, does your brain hurt yet? Mine does. There are so many wonderful tools out there to make a digital scrapbook that I’m going to invest the time into this project. While writing this post I’ve scanned about 25 pictures into my computer…only about 2,000 to go! Once they are in the computer I’ll save them to a sd card and organize and make scrapbooks on my tablet. Then I will save them again to the sd card and bring them back to my computer to burn a copy. One of those apps saves to a pdf format. I figure this will be the perfect ice-fishing craft. Extremely portable and no little pieces. If only I could keep it all straight in my brain!!!!

Happy Crafting!!!

Pretty little zipper pouches…

I’m not going to lie…it took me TWO DAYS to figure out how I wanted to make these…and in those two days my house blew up with fabric and string. These tiny little bags created a huge mess.

I wanted to sew a little pouch with a straight zipper on the top. I didn’t want to have rounded corners. How can something so silly occupy so much of my brain?

(I left this one blank so the ladies at church can pick out what they want stamped inside that little “frame” – I made these for the bazaar) Also, I still have to bead some little “zipper pulls”.

I became obsessed. But finally…FINALLY…I understood all the different tutorials I read online and when the light bulb turned on in my brain I wondered how it could have taken me so long! You don’t even want to know how long I pondered fabric choices…and then I decided to stamp on the fabric…and I have a lot of stamps (a lot of options)…

I always start with fabric that is inexpensive. This was VERY inexpensive…it was a table cloth I got at a garage sale for a quarter. The zippers were free from a friend…cost of supplies was almost zero. Cost in my time? Well, a lot. But I learned a lot – and I freed up a lot of space in my brain so I can move on to other projects!!!

Happy Crafting!!!

Almost finished wet felted slippers -

Here they are! I absolutely love them. I used about eight thin layers of wool to make these and they fit my feet beautifully! If you remember from the last post I used this method to make duct tape shoe lasts. They “fuzzed” up a bit and then settled down to a nice firm slipper. I still need to decorate them with some needle felting. I just can’t decide what design to try…I’m a person who always sits with my feet tucked up under me so I don’t want anything lumpy. I kinda figure I’ll just wait for the first stain on my slippers and go from there – lol! There is no hurry…I can wait years if I want to. I don’t know what kind of wool roving I used, wish I did, but I used about half a ball I got at the Wool Festival this year. I REALLY hope the same seller will be at the Wool Festival next year! I also tried to make some fingerless gloves with some of the wool I’ve cleaned myself…epic FAIL! I’ll take pictures and share them some other time.

In other news we purchased an Ice Castle fish house – the Lake Of The Woods edition. Like this one. Without going outside to check I think ours might be a little longer with more floor space. I can’t wait for ice-fishing this year!!!! We will be camping on the ice every chance we get! I’ll be bringing a bag of crafts to do each and every time, I see lots of embroidery in my future!!!! (Easy to pack and not too messy) I’m excited to get the fish house ready for us – I’ve started making quilts. Polyester quilts again – they are very warm and stain resistant. I’m using polyester that has to be at least 50 years old…and it looks brand new…kinda weird lol! Here is a picture of my living room right now -

There are piles of polyester EVERYWHERE!!!! I have to get busy and get a handle on this before it takes over the house…who am I kidding…it’s already taken over the house. I’m also busy getting some ornaments painted for the church bazaar and I tried some wire wrapping lately…with no success…and I’ve made some lotion with the beeswax I processed – oh yeah – I sewed and painted a pumpkin – I’ll show you next time. Phew! I also want to tan some deer hide this fall if my hubbie or sons get one. Anyone tried that before? I know it’s going to be gross but I’m going to try anyways. Can’t believe I didn’t think of it before!

I have to share a great idea I saw on Pinterest! Do you like hashbrowns? Do you LOVE hashbrowns like I do? Have you been disappointed when making hashbrowns at home? For me the answers are yes, yes and YES! (I always end up with “mashbrowns”). Well stop trying to make them on the range and make them in your waffle iron instead! Just mix the spuds with a tablespoon of melted or soft butter and let them go. Works like a charm and the hashbrowns are crispy and wonderful!!! I used my big George Foreman grill to make a bigger family-of-five portion and that worked too!

OK, gotta go sew some squares together…Happy Crafting!!!!

Wet felting slippers – step one

Don’t these look CRAZY! You should have seen me while making them – even crazier! I followed this tutorial by Sally Pointer and then made some slippers. However…I can only find ONE slipper right now so the pictures of them will have to wait. My house is that messy – it was quite a weekend. Saturday was slow and easy and Sunday was church, lunch, and then a marathon shopping expedition with my husband. We spend a couple hours at Home Depot trying to find different things we needed. And, I have to say the help we got there was EXCELLENT! We went to another, similar store and nobody helped us…we wandered around for three times longer than we should have…maybe that’s their point? Well, it doesn’t work for me – I’ll just keep going to Home Depot. smile.

Happy Crafting!

Steampunk Polymer Clay

Buckle your seatbelt and get a cup of coffee, this is going to be a long post! Let’s start with the crafty stuff.

I’ve been playing with polymer clay and having a blast!!! This entire pendant is polymer clay…except for the wire part that is used to hang it from a necklace.

 

I attach them to a necklace like this…this way I can have one necklace and many pendants…saves a snarly mess in my drawer lol!

Some I like more than others…I’m not terribly thrilled with this one. I can’t wait to see if they sell at the Spirit of Christmas Bazaar at our church. Might not be what the people around here are looking for…we will have to see!

Also my husband just got home from an elk-hunting-trip in Colorado. Lucky boy!!! (I was going to craft the whole time he was gone but ended up sick and didn’t do much at all – what a let down!) While he didn’t get an elk another hunter in their party did so we will be able to try it out. They divided the meat evenly … that’s a nice way to do it! We will be cooking some up tomorrow. Here is a view he had while sitting on the mountain waiting for the elusive elk…

Because of his job he doesn’t get to have a beard…but this is what he looked like when he got home! Full beard!!! Doesn’t he look like his brothers Mary!!!!

Here is the horse he rode from time to time out there. Another in the party brought two. They use them to get the elk back to camp once they process them a bit in the field. Otherwise it would have taken them all day…we (me and the kids) wish there was a picture of hubbie on the horse because we just can’t picture it. He is not a “horsey guy”.

Here is a picture of camp. That’s one of two wall tents they had out there along with our Rhino. Still love that Rhino. They used one tent for cooking and hanging out and the other for sleeping.

Here is another view from camp. So peaceful! He had no cell reception up there so we didn’t talk to each other for around NINE DAYS! That’s the first time that’s happened since I’ve been 17! It was strange, didn’t like it. I told him the “no girls allowed” rule is dumb. I’m coming with next time! lol. I think the next trip will be in five years or so…one of our boys will be 21 by then and the other 16. (weird to think about!!!) Next fall I have my sites on Montana. I want to take the kids there and camp through Yellowstone…I just can’t get that place out of my mind. We had such a good time when we went a couple years ago. It just made me awestruck…

I’ve also been busy with some household crap stuff. I finally put the end to a quest that began about two years ago with this stuff -

I’ve been asking around for something to remove caulk in hardware stores for a couple years. I’m not kidding you when I say the salespeople would look at me like I was crazy. I even had one laugh at me. Well, while in Home Depot I asked again and the THIRD person to help me in this store plucked this stuff right off the shelf and said “This is what you’re looking for” like it was no big deal. Over the years I’ve asked dozens of people…just had to find the right one.  My bathroom caulk had gone black, probably mold. And it wouldn’t come off. I scrubbed and scraped and it was stuck on for eternity…until I got this. I still had to use plenty of elbow grease as it isn’t magic, but IT CAME OFF!!! Oh happy day! My bathtub doesn’t look all cruddy anymore. It drove me nuts that I’d clean it and it would still look dirty. NO MORE – it looks CLEAN!!!

I also cleaned the carpets with my carpet cleaner. I use Melaluca laundry detergent he to clean them and nothing works better. You can’t buy it in the store, only from an at home person…like Avon. I get it from my mother-in-law. (thank you!!!) Full disclosure: I had a tiny Chihuahua who came to live with us untrained. She never did get the whole “pee outside thing” completely down pat.  grrrr. Well, this stuff gets the stain and stink out. And it doesn’t smell while drying. (Other cleaners would get the stain out but then the house would smell like pee while the carpet was wet and anytime it was humid) I just use around a tablespoon in my carpet cleaner. It even works on old stains.

I’ve also been baking again. I’ve made dinner rolls a couple times and cinnamon rolls a couple times and I’ll be processing a couple laundry baskets of apples today. That kinda takes care of any crafting time. By the end of the day I’m so tired I want to send the kids to bed by 7 so I can go myself.

Take care and Happy Crafting!!!!

Beeswax and honey soap

Here is one thing I did with the processed beeswax. I made some beeswax and honey glycerin soap. I poured the soap into a little honey hive candle mold I had – perfect! (Why I don’t get rid of things!) I packaged this little soap and a few others to give to the people who gave me the wax and the most beautiful honey you’ve ever seen. I used a recipe similar to one of these.

(Cell phone picture – my camera batteries are currently powering a wii controler!) Isn’t this little bag cute! I got a pack of 10 at Michael’s for a dollar! This is the easiest way to wrap something…I love using little bags.

I’ve also been mending. Darning. Here is one example. These are my husband’s boiled wool hunting pants. He’s HARD on them! I’ve spent about 2 hours darning various holes all over the darn things. And the holes aren’t in convenient places…not getting in there with the sewing machine! This hole is right under the pocket and along the (super bulky) seam and then goes a little further down. Argh! Well, I’ve done the best I can.

At least I have the proper tools. I keep all my darning supplies in an old treadle sewing machine drawer. I purchased the darning egg at a local antique store for about 10 dollars. It has a metal cuff that holds the socks in place. All the darning yarn I’ve picked up at thrift stores for pennies, and my Grandma has been giving me hers. It’s becoming quite a collection! I’ve also been darning socks. We all got new socks and then my dryer ate them! Brand new socks!!! The dryer tore holes in several pairs so I’ve been darning them up. It’s actually kind of fun.

Well, that’s it for now. I have a whole crafting palooza planned soon – I’m going to really make a mess around here and hopefully finish up some old projects and start some new ones. I plan to take a week and really tear into them.

Happy Crafting!!!

Life is fascinating!

Can a person ever learn enough? The fascinating part is that there is always something new to learn and explore. I was doing a good job cleaning my house and just “researching” on the computer in the evenings…darn pinterest! Well a pin about water marbling your nails caught my eye and next thing you know I had all my nail stuff out and was playing.

Not bad if I do say so myself!

Then I noticed my beeswax was starting to mold so I thought I better process it right away. (A friend has bees and the best tasting honey ever! They give me the wax.) I started with this -

And some really grungy combs -

And am now in processing mode. I found a couple helpful articles that I’ll share if this turns out – lol! Basically you boil the comb in water with low heat and let it cool. The bee legs and other debris settles to the bottom and the wax rises to the top. It shrinks when it cools so it’s easy to lift out of the pan and then throw the water out the window. Do this a few times until your wax is clean. I’ve also been experimenting with boiling the wax in a nylon to strain it the first time but I didn’t like how much was stayed caked to the nylon…this stuff is precious! I have some projects planned to do after I have clean wax. See…always something to learn! Again I get “I don’t have time to do any of that…” well, I’ve decided I don’t have the time either…but I do have tremendous DRIVE to do this. And DRIVE trumps time. Something else has to give…like my messy basement. (Upstairs is done) I just won’t invite anyone to the basement any time soon. lol. And, while the wax is cooking I’m going to be cleaning my kitchen…gotta keep an eye on the wax anyways. So I’m crafting AND cleaning!

Happy Crafting!!

Polymer Clay

Whoa summer is going too fast!! And that makes me feel like I have to go faster to get everything in and done…and I’m feeling overwhelmed. The mess in my house has also exploded – like it does this time every summer and that makes me feel even more overwhelmed. I haven’t crafted but a little bit last week. That makes me sad – but what I made makes me happy -

I saw a pin on Pinterest and fell in love with the leather looking technique using polymer clay! Well, amongst all the chaos around here I had a birthday. Another one – it’s a good problem to have lol! My mother-in-law sent me some mad money for a present and I purchased a pasta machine thing Like this one to be used for polymer clay. Love it! And it’s an easy technique – I want so badly to play with it again! I keep telling myself later, when you have time…darnit!

Here’s another one I made for a peace-loving-friend who has a birthday next week.

Well, to address the chaos in my home/life I’ve made a decision to limit my time volunteering for the next couple weeks and to limit my time crafting and to clean up the house! I decided to tackle the problem (house) from top to bottom front to back. Yesterday I spent 6 hours cleaning my daughter’s room and the hallway upstairs. And. I’m. NOT. Done! Still have hallway to finish and two boys rooms upstairs. We are wiping down baseboards and walls and purging toys and clothes. My poor little guy had to try on a lot of clothes yesterday to see if they fit and we have two garbage bags of clothes to donate now…and room to put his school clothes once we buy them. I figure if I do a GOOD JOB it should last awhile. I hope that’s not wishful thinking. Fall will bring school and heavy volunteering at the church – time will be limited. And every time I think I have a full day to do something someone tries to schedule me for something or I have an appointment. Argh!!!! After cleaning and cooking all day yesterday I finally sat down at around 9 PM and thought “OK what should I do…clay? felt?”…and decided to read a book instead. There was nothing left in me energy-wise.

Oh – yeah, I also walked/ran a little bit in a 5K race last weekend. You can read Julie’s story of the day here. The ONLY reason I did it was because Julie asked me to. It sucked. I gave all of myself to that race and almost died. (and then felt strangely proud of myself for a few days! I like that feeling!) Julie has done this before and likes doing it. I think she’s nuts. But…when I got home my husband was saying how he could be faster…long story short – we are doing it again in October, and my husband is going to race me. And I’m gonna whoop his butt!!!!!! So I have to train. What is this world coming to? I’m going to try to jog a race? Oh boy. I don’t know how…but I can’t let him beat me can I? lol!

Happy Crafting!!!

Getting white pillowcases white again!

Remember when I made these pillowcases? It was in early June. We’ve used them everyday since then. Of course I wash them, but then put them right back on the pillow. Well, they were starting to look dingy. Really dingy. Not only does our head transfer oils to the case all night but I use moisturizer and sometimes don’t take my makeup off like I should. (Cause I don’t use makeup very often and forget! lol) We also live in an area that has a lot of iron and all our whites end up looking dingy really fast anyways. This bugged me. A LOT! These pillowcases are sooooo soft and smell so nice when washed I want to use them for a long time…just don’t want them looking dirty even when they are clean. Well, somewhere in my brain I remembered they used to boil clothes a long time ago and decided to investigate. I got on the internet and spent waaaay too long learning about boiling clothes. I’ll make it short and sweet for you – I filled a large pot with water got it on the stove and added a healthy squirt of blue Dawn dish soap, put in my pillowcases and made sure they floated freely, put the cover on and got it up to a boil. Then I just poked at them for a bit with a long wooden spoon and turned off the burner and let them sit for a bit. I rinsed them like crazy in the sink and hung them to dry. They are once again SNOWY WHITE!!! No bleach needed!!!! (I don’t care for bleach, I think it smells and breaks down the fabric, also can cause yellowing…probably because of all the iron in our water)

After I washed these cases I used the same water and boiled all my micro-fiber cloths too – they smelled so much sweeter. Then I used the boiling water to clean out my slow sink drain. It was a good morning!!!! I think the blue Dawn dish soap is the key. I’m gonna start buying it by the gallon lol! FYI - I’ll probably boil them a few times a year to keep them nice and white…

Happy Crafting!!!

Collage for the library…

I made this collage for the library – it was supposed to be a “quick craft” and ended up taking me several days! It went through many UGLY stages before I was finally satisfied. My hope is that they frame it and sell it with the understanding that I will add a quote if the buyer wants one. I’m so bad with quotes! And, they are personal…so this way they can pick what they want.

I think it’s the final details that bring a collage together – I liked it a lot more once I did some pen work -

It’s hard to catch it on camera but this collage glimmers with different pigment powders and paints. I was inspired by this pin on Pinterest. I started with a piece of cardboard and mod podged torn up magazine pages over the entire thing – then traced the bird and branch and painted around them…it gives it all a nice texture.

It was also Abby’s birthday this week – I made her a couple new pillow cases and put some new pillows in them.

I got the fabric at a garage sale for one dollar!!! The fabric on the cuffs was from my stash – a gift from a friend of a friend.

She likes them! (And Grandma Mary we did get your phone call and card – thank you!!)

Well, that’s it – got a new project on the craft table right now – here’s a peek -

It was a wooden tray that I’ve started painting and papering… Happy Crafting!!!

On today’s craft table…

This REALLY IS what my craft table looks like LOL! I worked really hard one day and cleaned up my office (where my craft table is located) and then proceeded to make an even BIGGER mess. I’ve been having a lot of fun with collage. I’ve been pinning different things I see on the web and am now trying out some new techniques. I anticipate a lot of “fails” but that’s OK, collage is forgiving…you can just paint over it again!

This is one collage almost finished…

I have this hanging over our bed. It’s a reminded that LIFE IS GOOD! What you can’t see is that I’ve doodled lots of important dates all over the picture…just little reminders that LIFE IS GOOD! Do you like how I framed it? heh heh. It’s a happy accident!

I LOVE that I can change it out whenever I make something I like better!! So EASY!

In other news we took Abby to camp again yesterday. She was soooo excited! And last night we had a QUIET HOUSE! Abby was at camp and the boys were each at a friend’s home for the night. It was weird and even weirder to wake up to a quiet house too. Not bad weird…good-but-I-wouldn’t-want-it-to-be-like-this-every-day-weird. It’s so quiet I just want to lay on the couch and watch TV or take a nap…but I can’t lol!

Happy Crafting!!!