sweet nothings

Stocking Hangers

Once we finally got our mantle hung, I immediately started holiday decorating! I wanted new hangers and new stockings. I had already purchased fabric to make our stockings (which i actually didn't get enough to make Wina's which is why her stocking ended up being houndstooth :D ) 

THe one problem I found was that because I had waited so late to start looking for stocking hangers...there wasn't really much of a selection left in the stores. So what's a girl to do? Make her own!

Hobby lobby had knobs on sale. So I picked up 5 glass and metal knobs. 

I also purchased 5 wood plaques that are about 4 in square. At lowe's I picked up brackets and 1x2 piece of wood. I also picked up commando velco removable hanging tabs.

I cut the wood into 3 inch pieces. I screwed the wood piece to the plaque using 1x3/4" brackets. 

yes...I should've taken the price stickers off, but they were not coming off easily and leaving a sticky residue so I left them on...nobody will see them anyway. Then I spray painted the entire thing black.

I drilled a hole in the center of the square and inserted the the knob. After I put the knobs I put velrco sticky on the bottom on the brace.

Put it on the mantle where you want it to rest. With the removable velcro I can take it off the shelf after Christmas and it won't leave a mess...well at least that's why the product promises!

I think they turned out so cute! The stockings were sewn up last night...procrastinate much? But I really love how it all turned out. 

until next time...

S

 

Our New Mantle

We have a super massice fireplace. Literally it's floor to ceiling with a 2 foot hearth and the entire thing is about 15 ft wide. Two problems i've had with the fireplace - no mantle and brass cover on the front. The brass cover is currently being hidden by old shutters. For now that is working. I have priced a 48" fireplace door set and it's not cheap. We are trying to decide what we are going to do about that. The mantle seemed to be the easiest solution. I bought this at lowes...

I painted it the same color as the trim in the house. TIm hung it a couple of weeks ago..instant love! It really made a huge difference to the fireplace. I immediately started decorating it!

(a quick side note...I used red glitter clothespins to hang our christmas cards (ok some of them since i ran out of clothespins) on the shutters for display! I like!)

I love the way it all turned out...the black and silver and red and white. yummy! (ok so it's not really yummy but it works well with the living room decor!)

Stay tuned and I'll post how I made the stocking hangers!

until next time...
S 

 

December Daily 1 - 5

I started doing this in 2008. I blanked out last year and didn't finish but I'm back on this year! 

New curtains

I finally finished these silly things! Let me just say...I hate making curtains! But now I've learned I hate making striped curtains even more!

When we started doing the living room project (new floors, furniture, paint etc) I found these curtains on a blog called the Yellow Cape Cod.  (this is her picture and her blog is linked below)

http://www.theyellowcapecod.com/2011/01/bold-striped-diy-drapes.html

I loved the curtains the moment I saw them! She posted instructions on how she did hers...I did mine a bit differently. First of all I went to IKEA and bought inexpensive white panels. Another difference is that my stripes are 13.5 inches wide versus her 14 (not that big of a deal i'm just saying what mine are!)

Another thing I did...I pinned my stripes down( i was real technical with my measurements...ha! ) and then I did a basting stitch with the sewing machine. I think she chose to use the heat and bond so that she could remove the stripes later...but since I used inexpensive curtains that I wouldn't hang without the stripes, I wasn't concerned about removing the stripes later. The basting stitch just made it easy for me to iron on the ribbon to cover the unfinished stripe edge.

She uses her tabs to hang her curtains and I chose not to. I already had rings with clips and I wanted to hang my curtains that way. So i cut the tabs off. Then I took black quilt binding and covered the unfinished edge. I hemmed the bottom stripe with heat and bond.

These weren't hard to do. They were just time consuming and I'm not good at keeping things straight so that was a challenge! :D

Anyway, here is a pick of them at night since I finished them late last night. I need to get a pick of them in the daylight. I really love how the turned out! 

Plus I like this picture since it includes my pretty Christmas tree!

until next time...S

 

 

Peace Bunting/Banner

I got a crafty itch this weekend...I had purchased on a whim a jar of tinsel glitter. I wanted a banner for the dining room hutch but I didn't want it to have any color but instead to match the rest of the dining rooms major accent color - black but still look Christmas-y.

This is what I came up with...

i think it turned out so cute! I used chipboard triangles. I covered them with some old Christmas sheet music. I also covered the chipboard stars in the same.

I stamped the letters on with foam stamps. I glued around the edges and dipped in the tinsel glitter. Tinsel glitter is not for the faint of heart. It's very clingy even more so than glitter. It was every where! I think everything in my craft room will have tinsel glitter for a while...

I attached the stars with those double sided sticky foam thingies...you know what i'm talking about right? the sticky things for scrapbooking! :D

Anyway. I'm quite pleased with the way it turned out!

until next time...

S

Headboard Bench

Two years ago I found this headboard at a yard sale for $5.

Much to my husband's unhappiness it's been just one more thing cluttering his side of the garage for way too long. Sunday after Thanksgiving was a perfect day to do something about that sad little headboard...

I dug through our scrap wood and other than going to lowe's for two front legs and the decorative wood piece on the front ($15 total at lowe's)...I bought nothing new! With a little paint and some light sanding...I have a lovely bench for our front porch! Grand total $20 (sorry in advance for the yucky pics. it's rainy and cold here in Texas)

The pillows I made this weekend...Burlap and red/white ticking. (just a side note...i don't like burlap. i know it's a hot craft staple but it's dusty and not straight and just bleh! this is probably the last burlap project i'll ever do! :D ) I stenciled the "merry" and "christmas" on the fronts of both pillows. The "christmas" was actually white but after the rain it's looking a little pink...oh well. As for the pot. I spray painted a clay pot red. With a 1 3/4" inch punch and some white contact paper it's now a polka dotted pot! And i won't even lie...that's a $4 fake poinsettia. I kill the real ones so I figured if I put a fake one out there it'd last a bit longer! :D

I think the bench and the pillows (pot too) turned out pretty festive! The bench will be fun to change up for different holidays and seasons!

until next time...

S

 

 

 

Merry Christmas to all!

 
 

December Daily Days 9-21

really...I'm 13 days behind.

wow.

this month is flying by.

i can't keep up.

shopping is done.

decorating is done even if it's not as good as it usually is.

all gifts are wrapped.

a few gifts left to make or finish...then wrap.

time for baking. nora is biting at the bit to start baking.

kind of funny since all she'll really do is spread a few sprinkes and be done.

maddie has surprisingly left the gifts under the tree alone. ornaments are a different story.

the weather is killing me. hot cold hot cold. got to make up it's mind as it's making me sick...literally.

santa is not maddie's friend. 2 for 2 on making her cry. lifesize dinosaurs are a totally different matter.

so here are the pics for days 9-20 although not every day has a picture!

Day 9

 

As I've mentioned before, the sunsets have been really beautiful lately. I came into the living room the other evening and there was a glow to the living room. I just couldn't seem to capture it but it was warm and glowing and beautiful. I won't forget it! I walked outside to snap it outside too.

 

Day 10

 

For the past few years I've been doing the advent calendar with a gift each day. Nora loves it. Last year I included Madelynn but she didn't really get it. This year I bought a bunch of simple gifts bags for each girl and loaded them with all sorts of goodies. Each night the girls open a bag and find a treat. Madelynn has really enjoyed it this year. Nora has also, but it's been somewhat of a competition to see who gets what each night. Sometimes Nora wnats Maddie's gift and sometimes it's the other way around. I tried to do most gifts similar but it is a bit hard with the age difference. (reminder to self...include pic of the bags)

Day 11 

 
 
 
Our cousin Josiah had his 6th birthday at the Dallas Science and Nature Museum. They are currently having a dinosaur exhibit. great party and a lot of fun until we went into the exhibit. In her defense, it was a bit dark, loud and could definitely be frightening. Tim had to carry Nora out because she was so scared. Madelynn on the other hand thought the dinosaurs were so very awesome! She wanted to touch them all. In the main building they had a t-rex and triceratops that were "lifesize". Nora was fine with those. Madelynn wanted to get into the display SO BAD!! She's a funny girl! We took the kids down to the children's play area and they had a great time playing. We ended the evening with a family dinner at Chuy's. It's always fun to visit with my aunt and uncle when they come to visit. Happy Birthday Josiah!

Day 12

 
Madelynn is all about climbing and getting into things she knows she isn't supposed to get into. The hearth on the fireplace is about two feet from the floor. I have their little PBK chairs in front of it right now so they can sit and read their Christmas books. Madelynn keeps climbing over and standing on the hearth. It wouldn't really be such a bad thing except that she was told not to climb up there (afraid she's fall) and yet she is always so proud when she gets there. I tried to snap a shot while she was getting in trouble from daddy but instead she saw me and posed! little stinker!

Day 13

She loves to find a way to sneak up on you and bug you...like kicking the pillow you are resting your head on while she enjoys a cookie

Day 14

will be a layout without a picture

Day 15

This morning Nora got ready for her fieldtrip and went to play with Maddie while I got dressed. They dug out a bunch of the dressups and started playing! Such silly girls. We should've just stayed home and played dress ups and skipped school!

Day 16

 

 

 

 

I made the girls those little tops with santa and their name on the front.  Nora loved it! I dug the black/white striped leggings from their dressers and put a white shirt underneath and they were set! I picked Nora up from school early and we drove out to Allen to see the real Santa. Madelynn looked at him and watched him with the other kids while we waited in line. She was fine until it was her turn to sit in his lap...all I can say is at least we have a picture. Crying or not...I'm glad I have a picture for my Santa album! Nora chose Uncle Julios for lunch afterwards! It was as always yummy. I love being able to do special things with my girls! Such a fun day!

Day 17

  
I went to the bathroom...was literally gone maybe a minute or 2. Came back to find this. The table is an antique that I had painted white. It was already in need of refinishing but really wasn't planning for that right before Christmas. Needless to say, I ordered a new table.

After the marker incident we went to Nora's Christmas party at school. Madelynn was included in the snacks and thought she was such a big kid!

 
 
 
 
 
 

Day 18

no picture

Day 19

yep, it's been literally 7 years since we bought a new dishwasher. it seems our dishwashers like to go out in December. so we spent the evening picking out a new dishwasher! super!

day 20 

 

I have a chest cold. I wanted to stay up for the lunar eclipse, but I felt pretty crappy. I took some meds, set up my tripod (took this pre eclipse photo), set my alarm and went to bed. Looks like a pretty clear sky, right? Well, my alarm went off and outside I went. It was so cloudy out the first time I went out that I couldn't even see the moon. The next time I went outside I could see the moon slightly through the clouds but at that point I'd missed the big event! Stupid clouds.

Day 21

 

 
My friend Emily and I took our kids to see Yogi Bear. Cute movie. Afterwards, John wanted to play a game. So he and Maddie had target practice. He kept telling Madelynn "don't shoot you face"

 

Ok...woo. I'm caught up! I've purchased a really cute digi kit and templates from Shabby Miss Jenn Designs and I'll start putting my layouts together once I get my sewing and other remaining gifts finished. For now though at least I'm keep ing up this way! Enjoy!

4 days left!!

until next time...

 

 

 

Fabric Memory Game Tutorial

 
This year I wanted to spend some time making a few little things for the girls. I make them clothes and costumes and such all year, but I rarely just make fun stuff. This week I made memory game from fabric and our family pictures! I've seen tons of variations of these and just went with what I felt was the simplest way!

Supplies -

printer fabric paper ( i prefer cotton poplin but you can use whatever you find just make sure it is NOT fusible)

felted wool (i'm not talking about felt by the yard. i tried that and it has too much fuzziness to it. you need the heavier felted wool)

sewing machine and thread

fabric

computer and inkjet printer

pinking shears (or a pinking shear rotary cutter blade)

I chose 18 pictures. I picked only pictures of our family - girls and us plus wina. I made a new document in Photoshop (8.5x11) and put 6 pictures per sheet. I cropped each picture to 2.5". I spaced the pictures so that they were spread out with at least an inch around each picture. I printed each page 2 times giving me a total of 36 pictures. I figure that we can divide them up and each girl can play with 9 pictures each or all 18. just seemed like a good number :D

After I printed the pictures I cut each picture out to be 3 inch squares. The 2.5" pictures plus a white border. I removed the paper backing and pressed each square with the iron.

Out of the fabric I cut 36 4" squares. If you are using cotton fabric which is usually 42-44" from salvage to salvage...it takes about half a yard of fabric

Out of the felted wool I cut 72 4" squares. I believe I used a yard and an 1/8 of fabric. The wool is only 36" wide.

 

all wrong sides together fabric, 2 wool squares and photo to make the "sandwich"

I used a little spray adhesive to keep them stuck together so that I didn't have to pin them together. The photo fabric square is smaller than the wool and backing fabric. It's the quilter in me...but I always make the backing and batting larger...

 

Sew around the photo making a nice square...

This entire project goes really quickly. The longest and hardest part was choosing pictures!

Once you have all of the squares sewn together...you need to use either pinking shears or pinking rotary cutter to trim the excess off. I places my ruler about 1/8" from the picture edge and used my rotary cutter to trim. I have rotary pinking shears and for this project it was perfect!! Mine is olfa brand and you can usually find them at joann's.

  

With an additional piece of fabric and ribbon, I made a little drawstring bag to keep the cards in...I used my 8.5" square to cut two pieces of fabric...sew them together right sides together along 3 sides. Made a casing at the openinging. ran the ribbon through and there you have it!

 

Until next time...

 

Hello December!

i've been a little behind on the blogging as somebody *coughbevcough* pointed out tonight! so i think i'll do a catch up post.

First off...We had a very low key and relaxed Thanksgiving at my inlaw's home. The Monday after Thanksgiving I had to have a bone graft around one of my dental implants! Such fun! My mamaw came to stay for a few days to help out with the girls! It was so awesome having her here! It a time/situation when my mom would've been here for me so it was so great that mamaw came to be with us!

I've shut the Maddie and Rose shop down for the holidays. I'll open back up after the first of the year! I needed to time for our family and not worry about filling orders and making sure everything was shipped in time etc. I'm working on some new items and hopefully I'll have them up shortly after the new year!

For the past two years I've done a December Daily...which means I did a scrapbook page(s) each day of December. I started in 2008 (you can see that album HERE) because that was our last Christmas as a family of three. And of course I did it last year (see the album HERE) since that was our first Christmas with Maddie. Here we are and it's day 7 of December I haven't done a single layout! Yikes!! I'm behind! But I've decided to blog each week and then after the holidays I'll catch up and do the layouts. I've got so many things going on with parties and events as well as making gifts that I just want to enjoy my month doing the things we want to do and not having to make sure I don't miss a day of scrapbooking. Granted I do it digitally, but sometimes I just run out of time! So this year I'll do it differently!

Here are the first few days of December.

Day 1 of December!

 
Madelynn and I took Mamaw out to Canton to meet my dad and papaw for lunch. Madelynn thoroughly enjoyed Dad and Papaw's attention all to herself!

She and Papaw played peek-a-boo before we left!

 
Day 2

 
Madelynn is having a very difficult time staying away from the Christmas tree. She likes to yank...literally yank ornaments off the tree.

Day 3

 

This was our snack week for Nora's class. They were doing Sailor Sam in their High Hat program. So I chose all 'S' snacks to take to school s'mores, strawberry shortcake, strawberry smoothies, string cheese, pretzel Sticks, star sugar cookies...it was so fun! I took cupcakes to lunch on Friday. We had pizza and cupcakes...yummy! Nora's teacher is setting up times with each parent to show/share/talk to the kids about a holiday tradition. After lunch, I told the kids about one of our holiday traditions. I keep a very large basket on the fireplace full of Christmas books. Nora chose Cajun Night Before Christmas and I chose Humphrey's First Christmas to read. The kids loved the stories! It was so fun to be able to spend time with Nora and her class this week!

 

Day 4

It has been pretty chilly lately. Anything under 65 is cold, but we've had some days with only highs in the 50s. I was in my craft studio working on a birthday gift when I looked out the window and noticed this beauty. So very pretty and I love that it's such a strong red. It's been there for days but I just noticed and I'm glad I did!

Day 5

 

Tim hung the Christmas lights. Nora was supposed to help, but she did more damage than good. He asked her to untangled a strand of lights and she got tangled in the strand and tripped. She got back on her feet and stepped on 3-4 bulbs and broke them. We all three laughed once we were sure she wasn't hurt!

Day 6

 
I've usually have all of my Christmas decorations out before Thanksgiving. This year we had so much going on that I didn't get it finished before we left for Thanksgiving. And when we got back I was out of commission for a couple of days plus Mamaw was here! I'm steadily getting the decorations up...I might finish by Christmas Eve!

Day 7

 
 

I picked Nora up early from school today and we went to Color Me Mine. The past few years we've been painting a "cookies for santa" plate. I turned their feet into snowmen. I can't wait to see how the plate looks after it's been fired. Nora loves to paint at CMM. She painted an ornament while I put the details on the plate. Madelynn stayed pretty contained. She colored with markers on the white table paper. Madelynn took a late nap so we missed lunch. After CMM we stopped at McCalisters for a late lunch. Spooncake is back for a limited time so we shared a slice!

 

Day 8

The sunsets have been so beautiful lately. I snapped a pic of one the other night with my phone and I really wish I'd had my camera with me. Tonight I managed to get this one. Not nearly as pretty as the one from my phone the other day (see below) but I think the moon sliver was a neat part of the pic!

 

There you have it...caught up for the first 8days of December. I might update each day or I might wait a few days...we'll see!

Madelynn's vocabulary is expanding very little by very little. She won't take the pacifier out long enough to talk. She tries to talk around it and it's very annoying! The other day I asked if she has been "naughty or nice" and she replied "naughty" Today I asked again and she said "nice". She's right...she was a super sweet girl today.

Nora on the other hand has been a total heathen. I think she's having some hearing loss we might need to check into. It appears that anything I say to her or tell her to do, she doesn't hear me therefore not doing what I said or ignoring me or doing the opposite of what I've asked. She wanted a skateboard for Christmas to try and motivate her (she's currently grounded from her DSi and the TV) to follow instructions, I bought the skateboard she wants while she was with me at Target. Weren't in the car 5 minutes and she slapped across the car at Madelynn. Seriously?? Needless to say I told her that I was returning the skateboard first thing in the morning. She started crying and I told her that from now until Christmas I'm going to start returning her Christmas gifts everytime she misbehaves, defies me etc. The only way she'll get them back is for good behavior. It seems to be working because she cleaned the living room and her bedroom AND vacuumed today. Scary! But...progress!

I'm off to craft. I'm working on several projects for the girls. Homemade gifts are not taking the place of store bought gifts, but I thought it'd be special to give them something I made specifically for each of them...we'll see. Probably like all the other gifts...play with them 5 min and toss them in a pile *sigh*

until next time...