I Have the Spring Itch...

OK I do but I don't. If it were Spring I wouldn't be posting til later in the day because I would be outside. But since it's not and heck it isn't even Christmas I like the cold and snow because it forces me to stay inside and create. So yesterday I came home from work and was working on about 4 hours sleep and started crafting. OK, I was crafting in between laundry loads. LOL. Anyway, I had a ton of ideas for Spring. Normally I can't ever think of anything to make. I know the normal bunnies, eggs, and stuff for Easter. But that is very seasonal to me. I like things that can be transitional from Spring to Fall. So I began thinking of colors and items I would like in my home. BUT here's the catch I am creating them for you. The things I will be making will be for sale after the New Year. You will be happy to know I am using things I already have on hand and not buying anything new. Technically if you think about it these are unfinished projects because I bought the stuff with a craft in mind. LOL. I just LOVE rationalizing things in my brain.

Anyway, I will show you what I was working on yesterday... These are just sneak peeks because they are not done. You can only imagine what these might become by the first of the year.







I was in a robin egg blue stage yesterday. LOL





Don't see anything you like? Just wait... I have a ton of ideas that I think I'll have to write down or else I will probably forget. LOL. Well, back to work and spend time with Steve. Today is his Birthday. I will try to be back on Christmas as I have to work tomorrow. But just in case Merry Christmas everyone!!!!

A Gift and Some Finishes

Good Morning everyone! I have been so busy these past few weeks that I just need to slow down and post for you. Believe it or not I think about all of you who read blog and feel guilty when I don't post. LOL. I am hoping to do better after the holidays. I don't know about you, but Christmas basically snuck up on me. My son said the same thing. I am basically ready just need to wrap today while the kids are in school. Steve already wrapped my presents and put them under the tree. I already know what they are because he took me to Pat Catan's last week and let me pick out stuff I wanted. Nothing like getting crafting items for Christmas. LOL. At least I know I will like everything. I also bought him his presents while he was with me. He needed clothes so that's what he got. We normally have good luck at JcPenney for him because they have big and tall. Steve and I also went to a thrift store and antique store last week too. I bought myself some Christmas presents. Steve hasn't been working so I wasn't going to ask him to buy them for me. I'm not going to show you what I got until Christmas though. I want to surprise you. LOL.

I did, however, get a gift from a very dear friend of mine. This was such a surprise when the mailman brought the package to my door. Sheila made this for me. She has beautiful arrangements that she does. She was worried it wasn't prim enough. I LOVE it!!!! I put it in my kitchen so that I can see it all the time. She even scented it!!!! She also made 2 grubby candles for me too. Thanks again Sheila!



If you'll remember in my last post I told you that I was going to finish up projects that weren't done at the beginning of the year. Well, after doing some cleaning I started that early. I had 4 projects on my plate. First, I wanted to frame my finished sampler. Well, not only did I do that but Steve hung it for me. I am working on another sampler that I had to improvise. I used the wrong count fabric, so the saying didn't fit that was on the pattern. I improvised with a new one and still have a little ways to go on it.



My 2nd and 3rd projects were to bind my fall mini quilts. I did just that. Nothing like procrastinating right. Though according to one of my friends I am just ahead for next year. LOL. These will be listed on my selling blog at the first of the year.



Last but not least was to make another gameboard on a cupboard door we found in the trash. This stupid door has been sitting in my dining room for months. Steve and I could not get the Chinese checkerboard right so there it sat. I finally got a stencil from Folk Art From the Harbor so we could finish it up. Well, I started it and Steve took over. It is not done yet, but I thought I'd show you his progress. The stencil used in the corner I already had. I LOVE Becca's stencils. She is able to personalize stencils for you if you have something in particular in mind and she doesn't already have it.

Anyway...



Well, ladies let's see what I can get into today. I'd like to work on my sampler, but I know I have plenty more things that I need to do before Christmas. I start my new shift tomorrow with Stacie. We work Christmas eve so we are going to bring some food into work that night. So we will be eating and hopefully crafting that day. LOL. Thanks for stopping by today.

My Living Room for Christmas

I know this is a late post, but Steve and I went Christmas shopping today. We still aren't done, but we will be finishing up Friday. My kids really didn't say they wanted much. But every idea they had they gave to their grandparents. So here I am trying to figure out what they would like since the good ideas were already taken. I have to say I really am out of the loop of today's teenage fads. I don't know what a lot of the electronic thingys are. Steve and I went to Best Buy thinking we were going to buy my daughter a Kindle. OK for those who aren't sure what that is it is basically an electronic device that you can read books, newspapers, or whatever on. By the time you buy that you can add a little extra money and have a computer. OR just go to the freaking library and get the book or magazine and read it and take it back. Seriously, that would make my kid even more lazy if she didn't have to walk or ride her bike to the library. Needless to say we talked ourselves out of it. We came up with an even better idea. As much as I didn't want to do it I got her a cell phone. Now that she is involved with all the after school programs she needs rides home and will be able to call. The good part is I had an old phone that I reactivated for her so it was really cheap. This way she can prove that she is responsible and won't lose or break the phone. If all goes well I'll upgrade her phone.

Anyway, as I promised I took a few shots of my living room... Enjoy!!!!

Oh yeah... no laughing at the tree. Steve wouldn't take me to the tree farm on his parents property. I had to choose from a bunch of Charlie Brown trees. This is the best one I could find. The kids decorated the tree. You can see how bare it is because the needles kept pricking them and they gave up. LOL.























I need to hide the cord better...





My stitchery wall is taking shape...





I hope you had fun visiting our home for Christmas.

I have some other pictures I'm going to load on my Picturetrail soon. I'll let you know when I have them up and running.

My New Bed

Finally, after almost 14 years of just having a metal frame with no headboard or foot board I have a bed. If you'll remember awhile back I bought a twin black canopy bed at the thrift store. I bought it thinking we'd be able to make it into a queen bed. Well, we used parts of it as well as adding new parts. Steve and his cousin figured out how to make it into my queen bed. Remember, I showed you the quilt I'm going to make for it in my last post. So when you see this picture it is with the quilt I already had. I haven't decided how I want to decorate or what I want on the walls yet. Right now it is only a blank canvas. Oh and Steve painted the room. I know it looks blue, but it is actually gray but on the blue side. My room is now very tranquil and I LOVE being in it. I'm thinking blues and browns with red too for the color scheme. Anyway, here it is...



The picture I got from my friend Pam's Christmas sale at her house. It looks like it's embroidered, but it's just a print. I had to have it when I saw it.



I also got this tree from my sister, who got it from a girl at work. I think it is just awesome. It might actually stay up all year and get decorated for the season.



I am off today and tomorrow so I will try to get some pics of my living room for Christmas. I know I am moving so slow this year getting pictures posted. I am procrastinating terribly this year. I finally baked three types of Christmas cookies last Friday and just getting around to frosting them today. LOL. I am running laundry, balancing my checkbook, changing the bed, and running kids to appointments today too. Plus school was cancelled here do to wind chill factors of 10 below zero. It is just a bitter cold outside.

I have started thinking about New Year's resolutions already due to my procrastination issues. LOL. I have a ton of unfinished projects to finish up. I think that is what I will be doing first before I start anything new. The list just keeps getting longer and longer. I have been walking around in my basement looking at all these projects piling up. It is almost overwhelming to me. So I need to buckle down and start cleaning and finishing. I have also decided no more new fabric until I use some of what I already have. Then I found a whole bunch of patterns I bought and never made. I need to make them or get rid of them. I am not sure what else I will come up with, but I'm sure I will before the end of the year. LOL.

Well, I need to get busy and get moving. I think I heard the dryer buzz. Have a great day and stay warm if you too are in this terribly cold weather.

Quick Update...

I know many of you wait for me to post on my days off. I've been trying to get some things caught up around here and trying to get muster up the energy that has been zapped from me recently. So basically I've not been doing much crafting because I've been lazy. Though I did start yet another stitchery... I was too bored at work with nothing to keep my hands busy. In the few days I didn't take it with me I managed to bite and pick at my cuticles and nails to the point that both of thumbs were cracked bleeding and sore. Bet you didn't know that about me did ya? lol. So if any of you have a sure fire way to make me quit biting my nails I'd LOVE to hear from you. I've tried it all.

In other news... I got a new position at work where I will be working with my prim friend Stacie. YYAAHHOOO!!!! We will both be working 24 hour shift twice a week. I will be working about 15 minutes from home and I will be able to craft with Stacie in our down time. I will also be gaining 12 hours of overtime every two weeks on my paycheck. Then every few weeks I will get 5 days off in a row. Think about it working 2 days a week and having 5 days off theoretically. Think about all the craft projects I could get done. LOL. This is the same job I had in August that was then taken away. I held out and I hit the jackpot being able to work with Stacie. We will be known as the broad squad. LOL. My first shift will be December 21.

Let's see... back to my laziness. I have decorated for Christmas though I didn't go all out like I have in years past. So let's just pretend that I've simplified my decorating and I'm not just lazy. LOL. I snapped a few pics of my dining room and will take pics of the living room next week and try to get them posted.























I work all weekend, but Steve will be painting my bedroom and setting up my pencil post canopy bed that he made. Girls I am so excited!!!! He thinks I need to make the actual canopy and drapes to go around my bed. Seriously, I'm thinking about it because the thought is for those drapes to be closed at night so that it stays warm in your bed. Let me tell you my bedroom is so stinking cold. The bed is going on my outside wall which has no insulation in it. I'll keep you posted on that. I have also been doing a little research on the computer and have found the perfect quilt I want to make to go on my bed. Click HERE and you can see it. It seems easy enough, but we will see. LOL. What I wanted to find out was the common types of quilts made in the Civil War era. Many of them were basic nine patch and I can handle that.

Today I did find some energy. I went grocery shopping today. Came home and Steve helped me make 3 kinds of cookies. Then we cleared out my bedroom and he patched holes in the walls. I can't wait to show you the progress next week. So stayed tuned!!!

Christmas Ornie Recipes

Last Tuesday my BFF's and I had another craft day. As usual we all had an awesome time. We had a new friend Michelle, who took the day off of work to come. We have been asked to change the day we meet so that those who work during the week can come. Hmmmm... we might have to have two craft days a month. I think that sounds awesome!!!

We decided that we were going to make Christmas ornies during this session. Pam had all the recipes ready for us when we got there. We all brought spices and Christmas cutters to use. And holy moley we used a lot of spices. LOL. So I will share the recipes we used. I will try to give you the names of where Pam got these, if I don't give you credit and they are yours please tell me so that I can give you credit.



Spice Balls

1/3 cup ground cloves
1/3 cup nutmeg
1/3 cup allspice
1 cup cinnamon
1 cup water
1/2 cup white glue

Mix everything together and slowly add water and glue until you get a stiff dough. Cover and refrigerate. We put ours in for an hour or so. Roll into balls and put whole cloves in your ball. You can add a metal wire in them to hang or leave as is for bowl fillers. Air dry. Rotate them often so they don't get flat spots.



Salt Dough Ornies (scented) Pam's recipe adapted from A Primitive Gathering Recipe

1 cup fine salt
1/2 cup filled 1/2 full of instant coffee fill the remainder with water
1 Tablespoon Maple Flavoring

Melt in Saucepan

Add 1 cup flour
1 tsp oil (vegetable or whatever you have on hand.)

Knead dough. Roll out dough 1/4 in thick. Use cinnamon on the table to prevent sticking. Use cookie cutters to cut out your desired shapes. Make a hole with a straw to hang your ornie or use as bowl fillers.

Put on cookie sheets and bake @ 250 for 2-2 1/2 hours. Let them cool then paint or dip in wax or both.

I had the girls cut out circles so that I could shape them like brown stone plates.



Cinnamon Ornies...
(this recipe came out of a magazine that I forget the name of.)

1 cup ground cinnamon
2 Tables spoons ground allspice
1 cup applesauce
1/4 cup white glue
whole cloves (if desired)

Combine cinnamon and allspice in a glass bowl. Add applesauce and glue. Mix well. Mixture should be stiff. Add water or cinnamon if needed to make a clay like consistency. Roll dough between two pieces of wax paper. Cut with cookie cutters. Make holes if you are going to hang them. Or use cloves to decorate them. It says to air dry but we put them in the oven @200-250 to dry. Check them often.

We had issues with this recipe. It was a very sticky dough. We ended up having to add tons on cinnamon to stiffen it.

I had to leave before this point. Michelle had bought some dirty snowballs last year and thought they could make them this year. So she brought some white fleece though felt or flannel could work too. They just wound it around like a rag ball to get these. They then tied it off with twine and coffee stained them. They are just awesome...



Well, we finally put the live tree up last night. It is HUGE in my tiny living room. Remember I told you Steve wanted a live one? Well, he said next year we aren't doing a live one. LOL. The lights are on it, I need to put the garland on and the kids want to put the ornaments on. I am still decorating my home. I will hopefully have pictures soon.

Samplers

I must apologize for this post because I said I would quit posting about my samplers. LOL. BUT I have not had time to do much of anything. Since last Saturday I have worked 82 hours. Though on Tuesday we had another craft day. I will post about that as soon as I get my end projects. I didn't bring them home with me because I lost track of time and had to run out the house to pick up my daughter from school. We had a great time making dough ornies and spice balls. I will post the recipes when I get them so you can see what the end product looks like.

My sale went fairly well. I got rid of a whole bunch of stuff! I still have a ton so that will go to the Goodwill. As I was clearing out the dining room from the sale I was also bringing up the Christmas decorations. The homestead is somewhat decorated, but I don't have my tree yet. :( Steve is bringing one today after he works on my new pencil post canopy bed! :) I'm so excited!!!! He and his cousin will be working on it together. Once I get it in my room I will be redoing my bedroom. I think I will be leaning more toward blues and browns. LOL you know me though I will change my mind a ton of times.

So this brings me to my sampler part. I have finished up some of my samplers as you'll remember. During this past week I took the frames Steve built to the glass place and had glass cut.

Sorry about the flash in the pic. It is no glare except when it comes to my camera flash. Anyway this frame was a bit bigger. Steve cut it down and remade it to fit.



The frame in this one was a part of a frame of something. For those who remember my side of the road free stuff this frame was part of that. It was actually a more copper color and I dry brushed black on it to tone it down.



Same frame as above brushed in brown. I know fall is past but it's ready for next year. These are permanently put in it yet. I need to straighten the samplers in their frames.



This is my newest one I finished over Thanksgiving. The is the first one done on linen. I don't have a frame yet. I have a frame to be cut down when Steve has time. I just LOVE this one. This was my $3.00 thrift store kit find. Now that this one is done I have been lost. I don't have another started yet and it's driving me crazy. So I need to check all of my patterns and see which one I want to start.



Then when I went to my sister's for Thanksgiving she told me I could have this one. This use to hang in MY bedroom as a kid. I totally forgot about it until I saw it. This was one where the pattern was stamped/printed on the fabric. The bad thing is the sampler was glued to the backing in the frame so I can't prim it. Oh well it still looks awesome. Not sure where I'm going to put this one.



I also bought some new stencils from my good friend Becca. I am so excited to use them. My Dad just stopped by so I better get going. I have a class for work I have to go to this afternoon. I will try to get something done to show you Monday. LOL.