An Honest Scrap

I got "tagged" by Sweetly Southern with an Honest Scrap award. Cool, I love getting recognition from other bloggers. Thanks a million. Here are the instructions for what I am supposed to do now:

In accepting this award, I need to do the following:

1) Say thanks and give a link to the presenter of the award.

2) Share "ten honest things" about myself.

3) Present this award to 7 others whose blogs I find brilliant in content and/or design, or those who have encouraged me.

4) Tell those 7 people that they've been awarded HONEST SCRAP and inform them of these guidelines in receiving.

I will start with my 10 honest things

1. I am addicted to cheese, dill pickles and cookies

2. I hate loud noises

3. I would rather be plain like the pioneers than spend hours on myself everyday before feeling like I can leave the house

4. I wish my husband would dance in the kitchen with me more

5. I love getting snail mail (you know the stuff in your mailbox)

6. I hate making lunch ( I can handle breakfast and dinner just fine but I hate making lunch)

7. I am not good at making or flipping pancakes

8. I haven't been to a movie in years and I would really just love to go to one for the popcorn

9. I do not like clutter but seem to live fine in the "organized clutter" of my sewing room

10. I would love to be able to sew without having to use a pattern and cook brilliantly without a recipe, I just haven't gotten that adventurous.

Now I am tagging the following:

Char @ Crap I've Made

Naptime Crafts

Tracie @ My Crafty Side

Angie @ This and That

Tovah @ Dacebook

My Sister in Law Carrie

Kera @ Fox Plantation

I think these ladies totally deserve an award for inspiring blogs, for being creative and for making me smile. Keep up the good work ladies. Don't feel obligated to pass this along. I know these can be time consuming.

To Do's

I usually post my To Do list Sunday night but I forgot to put it on my last week's to do list and so here I am Monday morning posting. It is kind of nice because I can already check off a big chunk of Monday's projects. If you ever feel like you don't get things done then try writing up the To Do list after the fact of all you did in the day. Then cross it off. Chances are you are doing more than you think (isn't that right mom).

Monday: House cleaning, cucumbers in pickle crock, Melon Days projects

Tuesday: Chocolate zucchini bread, lemon poppy seed muffins, jar labeling project

Wednesday: New craft room organizing, old craft room cleaning

Thursday: Primary meeting, crafts (all day)

Friday: Baseball game out of town, take truck in for tune up

As a side note, I got a comment on an old post from a Jennifer about making "these" for her daughters party and wondering what kind of glue I used. I am sorry but I can't track down what project you are referring too so would you mind sending me a comment again and letting me know what you are referring to and I will be glad to answer.

A bit of This and That

Just checking in to the blogging world to report I have been busy with this and that and a bit of everything it feels like. Here are a couple of pictures of some things I have been up to as well as a few small fry pictures for fun.

Baby diaper card sets for Melon Days.
Some baby onesies for Melon Days. The designs on these were cut out using a Cricut machine (not my own, but my mother in laws). To make them I ironed a piece of Heat N Bond to the wrong side of my fabric and then cut that fabric piece to fit in the Cricut. I found however that you have to put the fabric in the Cricut with the paper backing of the Heat N Bond right side up and I also learned that it doesn't work too well on flannel. But there are a lot of cute designs that you can cut with a Cricut so I love this idea.

One of the latest burp cloth cupcake sets. I am going to try and box some up this afternoon so I will make sure to take a picture of that too. If you are interested in a tutorial on how to make this check the blog U Create on Sept 18th because I am going to be guest blogging and sharing the tutorial. I am so excited. What a great opportunity.

And now for a few small fry pictures:

I think we may have a girl who likes dress-ups.

A silly swimsuit moment.

Look at this gorgeous face. How did I get such a cute girl. Look at those eyes!!

A silly small fry face with wide eyes. She has been doing this wide eye thing for a while. So adorable.

Small fry and Daddy at the baseball game

First boo boo

If you will indulge me for a moment while I post about Small fry's first major boo boo so Grammy in Canada can see. I have to say that I am impressed we made it to 16 months before she had a major fall or bruise. I don't keep her in a padded house though I am a cautious parent. I know all the seasoned parents out there always say, "just let your kid run, let her eat dirt, she has to get hurt sometime, don't be too overprotective." But I must say, you all were first time parents once too and I am sure you were extra protective with your first child too so don't give me a hard time.
Anyway small fry was running after one of her favorite baseball players, Sarah, on daddy's baseball team and lost her footing on the pavement and did a face plant. This nice red mark is the result of that, plus a scraped knee. It is a nice bump and bruise today but luckily little one was not scarred for long. Nothing that a snuggle and a Popsicle couldn't fix.

New York City and something to laugh about

We did it. Small fry and I made it all the way to the "Big Apple" and back; both of us in one piece. It was quite the trip let me tell you. Nothing like traveling with a 16 month old while 6 months pregnant, alone, to help you realize just how inconvenient the world is to single parents with babies. Kudos to all you single parents. I am grateful that on most occasions I have my husband along with me to offer extra hands. But we did it and we had fun and we are home now safe and sound and ready to get cracking on the final preparations for the Melon Days booth and small fry's big move into a big girl room and a big girl bed. Here are a few highlights from the trip.
Small fry riding the subway. She loved the "big fast train" and all the people. Talk about a variety pack on the subway. I think she was the only blonde haired, blue eyed person almost every time we rode the subway. She sure generated a lot of attention.

Wouldn't you know that you can travel all the way across the country and your little nature girl will still find a big old stick and cling to it for dear life when you have to leave it in Central Park.

As part of the trip I wanted to get a "mini make-over" and come home with a new look. I was feeling rather drab before I left and so I was willing to spend a little money on myself while in NY. My brother hooked me up with a rather flamboyant man to cut my hair and this is the result. I really like it though it is shorter in the back than planned and I don't think I was nearly "fabulous" enough for the man cutting my hair. "Sorry to disappoint you Darren with my plain old Utah self".

Also as part of the make over I wanted to get some new makeup. We decided to head to Macy's and find a makeup counter to do a consultation. This is the before picture.

And this is the after. Notice the difference? Ya, me neither. Proof of the fact that when choosing a makeup artist to do a makeup consultation you should probably choose one that is wearing more than some 80's blue eye shadow and eye liner. I however had no choice. She was the one assigned to me. And actually I did end up getting a few make-up items that I really love and I do feel really good about them and using them so frizzy hair or not, the consultant was some what helpful.

This is how I felt after a day or two of New York life with a 16 month old and an outdoor temperature that had to be hovering somewhere around the 310 degree mark with the humidity.

Here we are on the peer at Coney Island in true New Yorker (must get in at least one more text message) style.

Here we are about to take our place on the over crowded beach at Coney island. Note the background people in the following pictures. I am very glad I managed to capture this rather large man in a rather small swim suit as part of the trip. This picture reminds me of another incident on the beach where another rather large man with a dude rag on his head and a very small swim suit stopped us to ask for the time and then lingered a little to closely for a very uncomfortable minute or two like a seagul looking for a free meal. I wanted to say, "excuse me sir, but we have told you the time now move along, there is nothing more to see here and we have eaten all of our lunch. Kindly continue on down the beach."

Small fry loved the sand even though it was rather warm. Speaking of warm, this lady in the background looked like she had been out in the heat far too long. She kind of reminded me of an over cooked steak.

Here we are at another beach on Long Island. Though it is quite brave of me to post pictures of myself in swimming attire, I wanted all to know that I am not ashamed of putting on a swim suit to play with my daughter at the beach. Clearly, however, this colorful wrap that my brother had and loaned me (don't ask why he had it) is doing absolutely nothing to disguise my "curves". Note to self, bold printed, tie dyed wraps are not figure flattering...use only on a private beach.

And so with that we conclude our trip to the Big Apple. Thanks to my brother for showing us a great time. I am really glad we went. I am really glad I didn't talk myself out of the experience because of fear of being able to do it alone. We made some memories to last a life time and I love spending time with my brother.

Inspiration in the form of an apple

Not just any apple, the one and only BIG APPLE. That is right folks, small fry and I are going to disappear off the blogging scene for a week while we head to New York City to visit my brother and get inspired in the Big Apple. Here's small fry showing off a cute new dress that was given to us. She looks totally ready to head to the fashionable New York.

And a quick To Do list for the few days we are going to be home:

Monday: Clean house, wash rugs, make a batch of bucket pickles, make a small batch of salsa, decorate Greg's school classroom, start packing (I know quiet the list, what am I thinking...I don't have much time that is what I am thinking)

Tuesday:Finish packing, primary meeting, leave for SLC for the night before flying out on Wed.

See you when we get back!!!!

Popsicle cookies

My mother in law was on a cleaning spree (insert chuckles from all those who know her because we all know exactly what that means) and was needing to find a new home for this pan.

A Popsicle cupcake pan. It was brand new and I was more than willing to give it a home. When I looked at it closely I wasn't sure how cupcakes would work in it as the individual spots are not that deep. But I had a better idea; cookies. So I whipped up a batch of sugar cookie dough from a package (shh don't tell anyone) and divided the dough into the pan, pressing down each one to make sure the mold was filled. Then I baked them for 12 minutes. I was not impressed with the design of the pan because there is no place to insert a Popsicle stick while it is baking. So when I took the pan out I had to dump the cookies onto a cooling rack and immediately insert sticks. I wasn't sure how they would turn out once cooled. And even though they were a bit cracked, they held the sticks pretty well and once frosted, they looked nothing but totally delicious and ohh so cute.

They taste great too I might add. (I think real Popsicles are definetely lower in calories and don't include the temptation to eat the dough) How fun are these???? Thanks Teri for thinking of me during one of your cleaning sprees.

You know you are in the trenches of pregnancy when....

these become a must have on your shopping list and then become a permenant resident on your nightstand. And you can actually eat them without gagging (a true sign there is no turning back).

Early morning harvest

We went out this morning to pick our cherry tomatoes and came in with all of this. What a wonderful feeling to know that we grew it all ourselves. I am especially grateful for the small pile of new potatoes. People around our town said potatoes wouldn't grow here and though this is our entire crop, I am happy to say to all the disbelievers "told you so."

Baby burp cloths and other baby creations

In case some of you have worried that I have lost my creative touch, I am finally here to post a few of my latest creations. I have been busy trying to make things for my Melon Days baby boutique and I have just been waiting to post a few of the projects all at once. My stack is getting bigger each day of items to sell and my craft room is beyond recognition and repair I am embarrassed to admit. It looks like an explosion happened in there and the amount of usable space is diminishing rapidly. I have decided to give up trying to "tidy" it up weekly as it is just no use. In just a few weeks the room will become small fry's and I will be relocated to the laundry room so I am just trying to grin and bear it until then. But that has not stopped my creativity. Here are a few of the latest creations.

First baby burp cloths. I found this idea on the blog Needle in a Haystack. I found this blog through the blog A little Tipsy. Both of these blogs are FABULOUS. I love it when I find great new blogs and tons of ideas. Thanks ladies to both of you. Anyway back to the burp cloths. On Needle in a Haystack she shows burp cloths that she made combining flannel and cloth diaper material. I didn't spend much time checking out what she did to make these. I saw the idea and immediately thought, "that is perfect!!!!!" and got to work. The flannel burp cloths are so cute but not very absorbent. This idea allows you to combine the cuteness of the flannel fabric with the practicality of the cloth diaper. GENIUS!!. Here is what I used.
I bought a package of these:

Then I just cut out my burp cloth with one piece of flannel and the other of the diaper material. I pinned them right sides together (p.s. is there a right side to a cloth diaper?) and sewed around the edge. Then I turned em right side out and sewed the opening closed and stitched all the way around. TADA, burp cloths, cute and absorbent. They are pretty light weight but I actually like them that way. I think they are easier to use.

Then I was thinking of a clever way I could package them up for my baby boutique booth and came up with this cupcake idea. I folded and rolled my burp cloth, along with a strip of extra material together to make the cupcake. Then I decorated with some ribbon and flowers and pins. It took me forever to get one just how I wanted it and after looking at it for so long I didn't even know if I liked it. But I persisted and made enough to take a few pictures. Then when I looked at them in the pictures I knew it was worth the effort. I think they turned out adorable. I am planning to package them as sets of 3 for my booth. I think I will look for some little boxes or something to put them in. Stay tuned for the final product.  For a tutorial on how to make these check out my interview over at U-Create

Here is another recent project; a little girls bow holder. I didn't want to make something that was too huge because I am trying to focus on baby stuff. I used an 8x10 " picture frame that I got at the DI. I repainted it and sanded the edges. I used my trusty Mod Podge to glue a piece of scrapbook paper over the backing of the frame. Then I added three ribbons to hold the hair clips.

Side view.

Another one with a different background.

Lastly, M is for Miracle.

I made one of these for the nursery in our home before small fry was born. Since we didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl I made one that says, "Precious" and have it hanging over her crib. I wanted to make a few of these to sell as well. Here are just 2 of the ones I have made. I know that every baby is a miracle but for those who have been trying to have children for a while or thought they never could have children, the birth of their baby is extra miraculous. I made these with those people in mind.

I am extremely embarrassed to post these pictures with the carpet of my sewing room as the background. I do vacuum it once a week but small fry loves to take the strings out of the trash and sprinkle them everywhere and I am not too careful to make sure I throw any of mine directly into the trash after vacuuming day. Hence the terrible background. Sorry, it was late when I took the picture. No time for a cleaning. Boy and girl Miracle banners.

To Do's

Making a To Do list last week was really helpful. I remembered it all week and when I checked my blog I was reminded of it too. I was able to get done everything on the list so that was wonderful. Here it goes for this week:

Monday: House cleaning, freeze salsa and making applesauce and canning it

Tuesday: Baseball game with hubby

Wednesday: Go to Grand Junction to do some shopping (could be an all day thing)

Thrusday: Make new baby burp cloth cupcakes, make hair bows

Friday: Baseball game at home with hubby

Question

Why is it that when daddy is watching the baby a hunting show on TV about elk or a baseball game keep her super happy and entertained and she just sits on his knee and is perfectly content but when mommy is watching the baby we have to:

do bubbles

play with the shopping cart

watch her pictures DVD

read the elmo book

read a story

feed the stuffed animals

take out the pots and pans

have a drink

do more bubbles

look at the pictures on the computer

have a snack

color with a pen

etc

etc

etc

?

I spy

I am waiting to get some material to complete one more baby project so that I can post it plus the other 2 I have recently completed but I won't be getting out of town until Wed. and then it will be a day or 2 before I am finished so in the mean time you will have to endure a few random posts.

Here is a look at one of small fry's toy bins. Let's play eye spy. Can you find:

a bag of random cords belonging to something electronic in our home

a perscription bottle that has a coin in it

an empty eye drops bottle

a deer hunting DVD

What more does a girl need for toys? Not the remainder of the items in this bin let me assure you.

Sewing with pins

Why is it that I seem to sew better when I have 4 or 5 pins in my mouth? I have the pin cushion right beside me and yet they always end up in my mouth. I am sure I am not the only sewer who finds her lips double nicely as a pin holder. I know my mom did it. Anyone else out there? When I was in college in one of my Home Ec teaching classes they stressed that as a teacher you should never let your students see you with pins in your mouth. You might teach them a bad habit. Well when I taught sewing classes my pins, my students pins, pencils, you name it; my mouth made a great holding device. As for bad habits, with drinking, smoking, cussing, gossiping and lying well established as bad habits, I am pretty sure their parents weren't saying, "How dare that Miss. K teach you to sew with a pin in your mouth." (Gotta love those ranch kids from Eastern Montana.)

To Do List

Okay so I am going to try something new here. I think I am going to start a weekly to do list on my blog to help me keep focused on what I am doing. I have a lot I feel needs to be accomplished before baby #2 arrives and I am feeling really overwhelmed. I thought today that maybe posting a little list will be helpful to me. Don't know if it will or not. I am not posting to brag about all that I need to do or complete. It's just that you know how it is. You write down your "TO DO'S" on a paper, that gets used by your husband to write an important phone number on, then that baby has to have the paper, she enjoys tearing it to shreds and half way through the week you are off track and frazzled. Sound familiar to anyone? So I am going to give this a try.
NOTE: please do not judge me should I never make mention of this again and it all falls totally by the wayside. Just know I am off track and frazzled somewhere in time.

This week TO DO

Monday: Going to a funeral so vacuum when I get home.

Tuesday: Chop and freeze onions from garden, make brown sugar zucchini bread, chop tomatoes to add to salsa and freeze second batch of salsa

Wed: Remove something from the laundry room

Thursday and Friday: gone to baseball tournament with hubby.

Okay that looks like a reasonable start for now.

New Blogs to Check out

I just took a minute to update my sidebar and add a few links to some new blogs I have found. I know when I first started blogging I always checked out sites other people had on their sidebars. It is hard to keep that updated but I think it is really helpful to people. Here are a few new blogs that I have found and really enjoy (You will have to click on the side bar to link sorry- just easier that way)

It's a Girl Thing- She links to other blogs with creative ideas and has some of her own. You can never find enough of these kind of blogs if you are searching for new ideas.

Nap Time Crafts- A woman after my own heart. A busy mom who tries to squeeze a craft or two in during nap time. She has cute ideas.

My Crafty Side- Another woman after my own heart trying to squeeze a craft or two into her day. Check out her stroller diaper bag. Love it!!

That went Well- Just found this today via Sugardoodle. She has money saving tips and coupons. I linked because she had a post about $10.00 in free Schwans food. I went to the site and entered and got 24 root beer float bars for free. How great is that. Going to keep tabs on this site. Sorry probably it isn't going to be helpful for anyone out of the U.S.

Happy blog searching.

Diaper Bag questions

Since posting about this diaper bag set that I made for a friend a few months ago I have had a many questions about posting a tutorial for how to make the diaper bag. I wanted to address those now. I didn't come up with the pattern myself. It is called the Everything Bag and the pattern is by Amy Butler. I got it from her book Little Stitches. So I can't post a tutorial for it because it is not mine. Her pattern is, well I wouldn't call it easy, but it is not hard. If you are an experienced sewer and interested at all in sewing baby stuff then I highly recommend the book. It comes with all the patterns included.
As for the baby sling, if you are interested in making one of those check out this website. This is where I got the instructions for the one I made. The little box pouch which is to hold binkies and other small items I made from this tutorial.  I just made mine smaller.
For the change pad clutch (the long skinny one) you can read my tutorial here.  This folded change pad I got from a book called Heart to Art, but I have since created my own folding change pad and you can see that tutorial here.
Sorry this wasn't more help but I don't want to claim something that isn't mine. I have made a couple of bags as requests for people. If you are interested in that send me an e-mail.

Flower hair clips tutorial

I know that everyone and their dog is making flower hair clips for children. I am a little slow at jumping on the band wagon. For one thing I have had a hard time finding flowers that I really liked to make the clips. So this is a tutorial for how to make hair clips from one stem of fake flowers. I found this beautiful flower at Michael's craft store. I figured it had enough pieces to make at least 4 or 5 hair clips. The price of silk flowers is kind of high and you need to have more than one flower for each clip so this type of silk flower worked really well because it had 3 different sizes of petals all on one. Here is what I did.

1st Buy your hair clips. I had a hard time finding the old fashioned "alligator clips" that everyone uses for these (the ones the little grannies use to hold their pin curls in). I couldn't find them in any stores on our way to Canada but I figured if there is ever a place that carries anything that is outdated or not in high demand now in would be our Wal-Mart in Saskatchewan Canada. Everything seems to be about 3 year behind there. Of course they would have oodles of alligator clips for all the senior women who need them for pin curls. NOT!!!! Couldn't believe it. So this is the package that I got. I don't really like the design of them but they worked in the end.

2nd Cover your clip with ribbon. Start by putting the hot glue on the bottom and placing your ribbon like so (see picture and stay with me here)

Add a bit more hot glue and fold the ribbon back over itself (this make it less likely to fray) and continue gluing over the spring end. Make sure you don't get hot glue on the springs.

Continue over the top and down around to the underneath side but only to where the clip ends and the spring begins.

Like this.

3rd Get some of this grippy stuff. What in the world is this called? I tried explaining what I was talking about to my mom until I was totally frustrated and then when I found it she said "oh ya grippy stuff. I found it at the dollar store.

Cut a piece of grippy stuff as wide as your clip and as long as the underneath of the top side. Apply a small amount of hot glue to the ribbon and attach the grippy stuff. NOTE: after I made these and did the pictures for the tutorial and put it in Small fry's hair I realized that due to the design of these clips it would help to put some grippy stuff on the bottom underneath the spring part for extra hold.

Now because I loaded my pictures in the wrong order and don't want to take the time to fix them I am going to show you how to attach the finished flower and then I will show how to make the flower.

So 4th Apply hot glue to the ribbon on the top of the clip then press the flower down and hold. You want to place the flower so that the spring end of the clip is kind of tucked underneath.

Bottom view.

The finished product.

Now onto making the flowers.

1st You want to separate the flower petals and cut off any plastic attaching pieces. I used 4 petals for each clips. 2 large, one medium and one small.

2nd Starting with the largest first put a dab of hot glue in the center and attach the next pedal on top (slightly rotate your petals so they don't all lay directly over the other). I pinch the underneath side once I have them layered while the glue is still pliable. This gives the flower a bit more dimension I think.

Here is a picture of the pinched underside.

3rd Continue to add the other 2 petals in the same way.

4th I added a jewel to the center that I attached with hot glue. That is it.

The finished flower

And my beautiful model showing off her mom's creation.