(very small) home improvements

I wish I had remembered to take a "before" pic for this post but I am a bit too scattered for that these days! Nonetheless, in our hall we have a strange and useful cubby of sorts built into the wall just above the air intake for the HVAC. The man who first built this house and who lived here for about 40 years (!) was kind of a nutcase and also really cool. He was a handyman with OCD and we find little lists and odd things hiding in drawers and cabinets - reminders of Mr. Nelson. Anyway, the space is pretty cool because the inside of the door holds a ton of useful things on hooks: screw drivers, tape, a shoe horn, an extra air filter, lint rollers (a *must* with three dogs), nails, screws, a hammer........ this keeps us from having to run down to the basement where all of the "real" tools are kept every time we want to do something small like hang a picture.

Anyway, the front of this thing was super ugly - basically just a big piece of wood panelling inside a frame... so I painted it with chalkboard paint and left a love letter to my hubby! (Now, I know that chalkboard paint has had it's run on design websites and everyone is completely over it and all, but I love black and white more than just about anything and therefore with my white walls I will heart the matte black of chalkboard paint - AND it's functionality- forever!)

(much improved!)

Next, I embraced another love of mine - succulents! Every year at the beginning of summer I head out to buy a few more of these guys - because it's likely I killed quite a few from the last year by leaving them outside past first frost! I think my dollar store dinosaurs add that little touch of "quirk" that make these extra fun:



I love any small project that brightens up the space with a sense of humor and bring some life to your home - don't you?

finished baby blankie

I finished the blankie last night and I am quite proud of it! I added a round of double crochet to the outer border to make it more substantial. I think Isci likes it too!

blankie update

I got distracted with other sewing projects for a while this week so the blankie went on hold. I've finally got it pieced together and now all I have to do is the border and threading in the ends! Hopefully by early next week I'll have it all finished :)

HAVE A HAPPY WEEKEND!

travel bibs

I came across this pattern over at B Is For Boy and I just had to make some... and now I'm addicted! They are made with a pocket on the back to hold both utensils and wet wipes to clean up messy baby faces and fingers! They were super easy to make - by the time I got to the third one I had it down to 40mins start to finish... but I think I could do it in 30mins now. I can't wait to give the girly one to my friend that just had a wee girl last week and I think I'll take one of the more boyish ones to my cousin and her 6 month old this weekend.

fronts of bibs:

backs of bibs (with wet wipes and utensils):

all folded up and ready to travel:

baby blanket in progress

Here is an amazing baby blanket I found on Ravelry.com that I am currently in the process of making:

I am using Stitch Nation yarns by Debbie Stoller (available at JoAnn's) in the following colors:

(left to right: Clementine, Little Lamb, Espresso Bean, Honeycomb, Aquamarine, Meadow & Mediterranean)

I love these yarns! The colors are so vibrant and they are a nice quality but aren't too expensive. I hope to finish the "Meadow" (green) stripe this evening and begin joining and finishing the edges soon. Hopefully in a few days I'll have it finished and ready to show off!

recovered cot

Last week I came across a project someone had done where they recovered a cot with cute fabric (now I can't find the blog to save my life - grrr) and I wished that I had an old cot I could do the same with. Well, lo and behold if I didn't go to the thrift store and there sat 3 vintage nursery cots just dying for a makeover :) yippie! I am not as impressed with mine as I was with the one I saw online but here it is.

The cot before:

It was a steal... and in the end I bought all three... why?! I don't know.

I decided that I wouldn't waste "good" fabric seeing if this endeavor would work so instead I used an old IKEA beadspread that our dog Scout had nervously chewed holes in when she was a puppy (that's Scouty and the fabric there).

First I ripped the seams of the existing (n-a-s-t-y) fabric and laid it out flat on some butcher paper to trace my template. Then I traced my template onto the new fabric and cut it out and sewed it up.

The hardest part of the whole thing was taking apart the cot to put the new fabric on. The screws were old and tough and it wasn't an easy job to do by myself (there may have been cursing involved. I may have scared Scouty.) but in the end I got it done.

Voila!

BIG NEWS and tiny shoes

I am going to try to get back to blogging now that I have a new reason for crafting and being thrifty.... I'M PREGNANT and we are due to meet our little boy in early October! YAY!

(yes, all of these say positive... and no, this isn't even the tip of the iceberg of how many tests I actually took!)

I'll be honest and say that crafting/sewing for a wee boy seems harder to me than doing the same for a little girl... maybe it's all those vintage flowered sheets that I dreamed of making into crib sheets and dresses for so long. But now I get to search for and buy *new* boyish fabrics and that is fun on a whole new level. :)

Today I've spent the entire day sewing little shoes and a bib to match:

The pattern for the shoes can be found here and I just traced around a bib I already had and free-styled this one by adding a pocket. There will be many more crafts and money savers for this mama-to-be... let's just see if I can keep up the blogging until the wee one comes!

not quite as easy as pie...

the incomparable "miss james" over at bleubird vintage (my new fav blog) made a post about these adorable pies in a jar and i just had to give them a shot. i needed something special for my clients that would be personal and yet easy on the wallet.

for the record, i am terrible in the kitchen. terrible. but i gave it my best shot:

i decided to make mine a mixture of pear and cherries. they didn't turn out as pretty as miss james' so i decided my packaging needed to make up for it. i've been on a pompom kick (as has every other crafty gal on the internet it would appear!) and used some of them to add a special something to my jars:

i also have been using my pompoms to spruce up my gifts! pompoms are the BEST!

i can't figure out why my pics are all going in sideways - ??? any clue? they are normal in the folder i upload them from....

getting back on the horse

i haven't sewn anything in quite some time and decided i better get back to it... only to discover i'd lost my touch. sad. i know i'll get it back after i sew a bit more but this incredibly easy jumper was way more trouble to sew than it should've been!

here's the 80's looking pattern (which is actually from the late 70's):

i thought that if i shortened it and wore it with a tie-neck blouse, white tights and little black mary jane heels it would look less 80's and more 60's.... we'll see!