Sewing on the brain.....

All I have been wanting to do lately is sew.

Eat, sleep and sew. In that order. These are the times when having a full time job really stinks.

Being a sewing newbie it takes awhile to get up and running with all of the necessary knowledge and tools.....and fabric stash. After about 8 tries I got the whole "putting in a zipper" thing down pat. All I have to say is thank god for the Internet and online sewing tutorials. Without them the zipper hurdle would have done me in and I would have had to avoid them like the plague for ever and ever.

A few ladies at work had me do custom bag orders which are so fun (one for her daughter for taking her stuff to dance class, one for her mom for Mother's day with a matching zippered pouch, and I am working on one for her daughter's bridal shower.)

I'm also planning on doing a few really cute teacher gifts for the end of the school year at some point this week, and I bought the CUTEST apple print fabric to do the job! How nice will that be to give them a handmade gift instead of some cheesy store bought item!

Anyways, here are a few of the things that I have sewn recently (and I plan on doing a whole bunch more)! Leave me a comment and let me know what you think.....

Reversible headbands for Steph and Jen:




A bag and matching zippered pouch as part of my niece Karyssa'a communion gift:




Matching skirts for the girls:



And then I took this t-shirt and pile of fabric:



And I made THIS dress for Jennifer!!!!



The last one was a COMPLETE learning process and one that I will try again soon. It turned out OK, but there are a few things that I need to do differently next time.

Off to sew.......

:)

I have LOTS to post about....

I promise.

I just need to find the time to do it.

This time of year always gets busy, but that is no excuse for my lazy blogging.

My mom (otherwise known as Granny)and Uncle Bubba (otherwise known as my brother) read this blog and I'm sure they would appreciate some pics of two cute little girls.

I'll get on it soon.

I promise.





Just as soon as I can stop sewing every waking minute I am home!!!

(Why didn't someone warn me just how addicting this would become!!!??????)

Easter 2009

Not much to say about Easter.

We did all the normal things:

* dyed eggs
* hunted for eggs
* the Easter bunny brought baskets of yummy and some new Spring clothes
* ate lots of chocolate

Here is pictorial proof of all of the above:

Backyard projects

For anyone who owns a home you know what I mean when I say that the work is never done. There is always something to do. Always.

Ron and I have already been working hard in the backyard this year on a few projects that have really needed to be done.

First and foremost, Ron built a beautiful new enclosed garden for me (complete with working gate to keep little munchkins out. Ahem. Steph and Jen.) Oh....and hopefully it will keep the bunnies out, too. I'll keep you posted. A few weeks ago I planted the lettuce, onions, and I transplanted the strawberries from my previous patch of dirt. This weekend (after the last fear of frost) I will have all the veggies planted. Fresh veggies = YUM.



Secondly, in order to build a bit more privacy into the backyard experience we have started to add privacy bushes along the perimeter. We started with a small area on the side yard where we added 5 more forsythia bushes to the 3 that we had planted a few years ago. These will spread out and provide a nice hedge in a few years, as well as a gorgeous yellow color in the spring.

Here is the before:



Here is the after:



Then comes the big project. We ordered 28 Thuja Green Giants (which were delivered a week ago and are now sitting on the back deck). We are planning to plant them 5 feet apart along the entire length of our back and side fence. These plants grow 3-5 feet a year and in a few years we will have almost complete privacy (which is a far cry from what we have now).

Gotta love yard work.

New countertops are like heaven on Earth

Let me start this conversation by explaining to you that Ron and I built our house nearly 11 years ago. We were just babies at the time and had never owned a home in our lives, much less built one from the ground up. We were slightly overwhelmed to say the least, and had no prior knowledge of anything to pull from when faced with certain decisions like flooring, shutters and yes, even counter tops.

All that sounds like one big excuse and that is exactly what it was meant to be. An excuse for the horrible decision that we ultimately made.

See.......the problem is that 11 years ago we picked blue counter tops for the kitchen.

Yep, you heard me right. Blue.

Go ahead and let the little chuckle out that you are trying real hard to hold back. Just let it out. I do.

So if you think back 11 years ago you will remember that the "in" thing at the time was a very cheesy country look. My friend Jeanne recalls that time in history as being dotted with the blue colored ducks that everyone seemed to have on display. I tend to remember the horrid stenciling that everyone did all through the house (hearts and tons of leaves ring a bell????)

Well.....I was a bit of a victim of that cheesy country look. I allowed it to insert itself into my first home. I have been successful at removing most of the evidence of this tragedy over the years, but unfortunately it is quite difficult to hide the ugly kitchen floor that matches the terrible blue counters.

Since Ron and I have decided that moving is just not in our cards for at least the next 5-10 years, we decided to do a little upgrading in the house.

The decision to replace the counter tops was the day that I have been waiting for each and every second for the past 10.5 years. And that day is this Monday. I will go to work with blue counter tops and I will come home with gorgeous neutral colored granite.

Hallelujah!!!!!!!!

Lake in Wood

I realized that I completely forgot to post pictures of our recent camping trip to Lake in Wood! oops.

We went in early April and it was the maiden voyage for us in our new camper. The weather held out (it only rained the day we left) and lucky for us we went with our friends the Chamberlain's (who needed to teach us a thing or two about camper life)! We were also lucky enough to meet up with 2 other families that are friends of Chris and Rachael.......and who are now friends of ours!!!

It was a great weekend and the kids (7 in total) had a BLAST! We loved the campground and will be back in the future. Since it was Easter weekend they had an egg hunt for the kids, we took bike rides to the playgrounds, Ron, Steph and I took a nice long hike around the grounds (actually, we hiked so far that we wound up at a quarry OUTSIDE of the campground and had to climb through some barbed wire to get back in. Steph was a trooper and only complained about walking a mere 748 times.)

Here are just a few pics from the trip: