yellows and purples

:: yellow ::

Almost finished with my cardigan!

(above pic is clickable to get a better view of the fabric)

New camera strap slip cover!

(don’t mind my pissy look, damn sun was in my eyes)

New head scarf (from the book Weekend Sewing), and yes, in the same fabric as my camera strap. I figure their not to matchy matchy if I flip the fabrics around. (Fabrics used about are both from fat quarters from JoAnns)

(above pic is clickable to get a better view of the fabric)

:: purple ::

New purple skirt (similar to the one I made for K. for her b~day) for L.  Used fabric that the awesome Lisa sent me, as well as fabric from my stash.

As well as a little head scarf for L. (just altered the pattern a bit to fit her head).

Just keep knitting….just keep knitting

Lately it’s been kids crafts, squeezing in sewing when I can, and lots of outside play.  A little bit of knitting here and there to keep me busy, but nothing special to blog about.

Awhile ago I had posted about this sweater I wanted to make by CosmicPluto and had started on it (oh back in the beginning of April maybe).

Here it is now the end of May and I’m picking it up again.  The reason, my wrist was killing me for days back in April.  I’m a thrower and when I knit, I don’t let go of my right hand needle to “throw” the yarn around the needle.  Instead, I put my needle at a 90 degree angle to my left needle and wrap the yarn around – in a fast motion I might add.  I can’t explain it correctly but have been trying to learn how to knit continental style.  While my sweater is a little further along than pictured above, it is still no where near being half way complete.  Soon as I can get my gauge right with continental style (can’t purl worth shit that way), I’ll start knitting again.

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On a completely off topic subject, today James and I watched the show NCIS.  I’ve watched it a time or two before, but mostly stick with Law & Order (all of them) or CSI. 

This particular episode was about some Navy guy that was mummified and yada yada yada, anyways, the female character that had assisted in the murder was from Canton, Ohio (which is my hometown).  Apparently, in the show, she had won the lottery and that’s how she had all this money. 

What James and I thought was so funny was that she had said she had an article in the Canton Gazette for winning the lottery.  Um, there is no Canton Gazette, a Canton Repository, yes, but no Canton Gazette.  Why James and I thought this was funny, well, first of all, the only time Canton is ever mentioned on national TV is for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, that’s it.  The closest Canton ever came to being mentioned is Akron (on Gilmore Girls that I know of, Richard was on a business trip there) which is about 20-35 minute drive, depending on where you live in Canton.

Do TV shows just throw a dart at a map and say “Yep! That’s the town we’ll go with!”?

Eh! So I thought it was interesting, continue on with your day!

Hope everyone has a very blessed weekend!!

completely random

Complete randomness from my week…..

Spring flowers arranged on the kitchen table

A few library books…..not pictured is L.’s new favorite book “A Surprise For Rosie” (she truely thinks that the book is about her lil’ bunny Rosie)

New Spring/Summer purse for myself.  I had ordered some fabric from Fabritopia (more on that later, I couldn’t help myself when I saw this Heather Bailey’s Freshcut) a while back and they sent lil’ fabric swatches in the package.  I had been planning this bag for a little while and when these little swatches came in the mail, it was just what I needed.  Completely made up as I went along, with only one thing in mind……..the strap had to be long enough to cross over my chest.  Everything else is from my stash.

Then lastly L. and I made our own bubble soap the other day.  We go through so much of that stuff, and when you’re in the habit of spilling it or having it all used up in a matter of minutes, just go make some more.

(don’t mind her frizzy hair, she had used a different shampoo the night before in the bath. Her hair does some silly things sometimes)

Hope everyone has a very blessed week!!!

new addition

Yes, we have a new family member in our house now,  a super sweet, super gentle American Bulldog.  Between doggysitting my brother’s dog Nellie, and watching the movie Marley and Me, we’ve come to realize that all of us were ready to have a dog added to our family.

After much discussion, deciding, etc. we found the sweetest American Bulldog named Mary.  She’s 1 1/2 years old, sweet, very gentle with the girls, a little protective already, but most of all sweet.

While we are all still in that “getting to know you” phase, she will definitely be a great addition to our family.  Oh, and the girls think it’s hilarious that Daddy lives in a house with 4 women now.

weekend and outtakes

My weekend was not what I expected.  Let’s see, James spent the whole weekend getting parts and fixin’ the tank (it’s what we call my vehicle now considering that L. and I was in a 3 car accident a while back and my vehicle was the only one without ANY damage, my left front bumper hangs 1/2″ lower than the right front bumper, the other 2 cars, completely totalled, everyone was fine, just some lady pulled out in front of traffic and this guy hit her head on and slammed her car into my tank).  But I did have a very good Mother’s Day, and James took care of the girls, fixed the car, and made me dinner yesterday.  I, on the other hand, got a wee bit of sewing done, brought in some of my lilacs (couldn’t help myself, but my kitchen smells beautiful!), and made snowcones with the girls.

I had posted the other day about this skirt here that I wanted to make.  I talked James into giving me some of his shirts and went to work Saturday evening, and finished up yesterday.  I looooooove this skirt, probably because I’m a jeans and t-shirt kinda gal.  It’s super easy, super twirly, and super comfy!  I didn’t add my seam allowance when cutting for the pattern, but did have to add an elastic casing for security purposes (no thank you, I do not want my skirt falling down while chasing 2 kids around the yard).

After cutting off the excess from the hem, I ran it through my serger for a lazy hem (I dislike hemming and always try to find a lazy way out of it).

And the outtakes:

I thought the self-timer was on

She hopped in at the last second.

Happy Mother’s Day!

(Some of the flowers that the girls and I planted)

“A Mother’s love for her child is like nothing else in the world.  It knows no law, no pity, it dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.” ~Agatha Christie

The start of Summer sewing

Aw yes, Summer is not too far off around our neck of the woods.  Skirts, popsicles, ice cream, swimming, lightening bugs, crickets, and on and on and on. 

As I had said, the girls and I had decided to let our hair grow out.  Which means that all those flyaways and loose strands of hair will be bothersome in those humid months.  Via Threadbanger I came across Leethal’s blog (love her two-color a-line t skirt tutorial, need to talk James into giving me a few of his shirts) when she did the skirt round up, and also found a tutorial to make a headband from an old tshirt.  Right so, enough with the freakin’ links and get on with it already!

(sorry I can’t balance a camera and take pics of the back of my noggin at the same time, but you get the idea)

I also made one for K. but she wore hers to school today, and I’m going to make some more of these as they are super comfy, easy to wear, and both of the girls love them!

And there will be more Summer sewing as soon as I can get the nerve up to cut into this fabric.

Oh I can’t do it just yet, still in that petting stage.  The one in the photo directly above is going to be a skirt, it just screams skirt to me!

Hope everyone has a very blessed weekend!!!

rainy day play

When the rain is pouring down, I have this thing about not letting my children outside, they don’t get my reasoning, but maybe you do.  So to distract them from that urge to go and splash in puddles and avoid getting struck by lightening, I turn to my #1 thing and that is kids crafts.  We love to paint mostly and hey, who cares if you get paint on the floor, it can all be scrubbed up.  But I didn’t want to do our usual painting (as L. seemed to have used up all of hers from the last time we painted).  I remembered that I saw this puff paint recipe on One Crafty Mumma’s blog.

We didn’t have a nice thick sheet of cardboard, so I had to improvise and grab cereal boxes out of the recycling bin (after all, that’s what it’s there for right).

L.’s favorite part of the whole ordeal was watching the paint puff up in the microwave.

Seriously, how cool is that!?  She said that they did theirs in the microwave for 30 seconds and ours only took 20 seconds, so if you do this, I would recommend starting out at 15 or 20 seconds and see if it’s all the way dry.  It all depends on the power of your microwave though.  Anyways, it was a lot of fun and the girls really enjoyed doing it.  And as far as the recipe, it’ll still work if you add a smidge to much water (as we found out).

 

quick post

I’m not quite up to blogging lately, mainly because that gorgeous weather is calling all of us outside and I have this weird sinus-spring-flem-gunk going on right now.

So just a few quick snapshots of our days lately

My beautiful lilac bush (is it a bush or a tree, ours is freakin huge and shades the whole front yard) is almost in full bloom.  It smells so sweet when we sit out on our front porch.

Azaleas starting to peek out here and there.

Handmade hair fobs are my new love lately, and a definite must for 3 girls (myself being included) who have decided to let our hair grow out.  We’ll see just how long mine will last, I usually chop it off mid-summer (as seen in this picture here).

Summer clothing coming out of my sewing machine, more on that later, as well as my new love with F.O.E., and that my serger is fixed and I won’t go into detail exactly what was wrong with it, other than it was 100% user error.

Little sproutlets

The flowers that the girls and I planted back on Earth Day are starting to peek out of the soil.

K.’s flowers

L.’s flower (picture is clickable to get a better view of the itty bitty little flower)

And my flower (again, picture is clickable)

Hope every enjoys their week!!!