Hearts, hearts, hearts.

Valentine's Day was never my favorite. I had fun making valentines until about fourth grade, and then it was just a drag. It was never very exciting later, either. Now, I like the crafty aspects of it, but could still really care less about the holiday. Yesterday, I looked at a list of restaurants with prix fixe menus for Valentine's, and NOTHING. Nada. Zilch. Absolutely none of it looked good. Seriously - why stuff a perfectly good fillet with OYSTERS? Yucky.

The worst of the worst? Places that advertised a "rose for the lady" at every table. BLECCCCCHHH.
With all of that said, I had a blast making my cards for Sarah's swap, and stupidly forgot to take a picture of them. Things are going swimmingly for Lisa's swap package, as well, and that one should be on its way to her shortly. Here's the mantel, currently, waiting on this year's valentines to arrive and cover it even further in crafty goodness. I decided that the Christmas card holder could continue in service for an extra couple of months. Besides, the cute dress card that Sarah made last year covers up the Christmas star at the top. Aren't I tricky...
Props to Sarah for the bottle brush tree & button tree idea/direction - those used to be Christmas decorations, but I've decided to make them work year round.

Look who's come to live with me....

Yep, it's a new yo-yo maker. Only this time, it makes hearts. Tonight, I read the directions (only in English, not in the other three languages, I'm not crazy), and tomorrow I'll attempt one. I know you'll be waiting with bated breath.

It is POURING here, which we desperately need, but it's too warm for January, and now it's humid! We'll have enough of this in July, thank you very much, I don't know that we need it today. Hmpf.

Happy Monday...

January Mantel

January Mantel
Originally uploaded by sarahblascovich

For the mantel-loving folks out there, here is what it looks like today. Mid-month, it will probably go ahead & transition to Valentine's Day, just because I love red that much. It also means that I can put out last year's swap goodies, and add this year's to it as they arrive.

Fun things include: our photo by MonkeyBean; an altered bottle made by Dawn, coveted by me, and Christmas presented to me by the Motherina; bottle brush trees Monkey & I dyed last year; and the l-o-v-e-l-y soldered piece from Lennye.

The other side of the mantel is kind of dull, so I didn't even bother to take its picture. For excitement, I signed up for the Decorated Fireplace Mantels group at flickr. Since I'm the only one in the group who's posted a picture so far, we'll see how this goes. I just want to make sure I'm up on the hottest mantel trends (*snicker*). Speaking of flickr - I'm thinking of upgrading to the Pro account. Any thoughts on this? I mostly just want the ability to EASILY organize & label all of my pictures, somewhere other than our skittish hard drive.

Happy Sunday!

Resolution.

Resolution.
Originally uploaded by sarahblascovich

I will use more of this yarn this year. I mean it!! I decided to use the felted sweater bowl the Motherina bought me for Easter in the way in which it was intended, too.

In the bowl, you can see an unfinished dishtowel (navy), an unfinished scarf (speckled), unfinished knitting practice (green), & really pretty yarn that I know will be something fun - just nothing very large, since I only have that skein.

To help me make this resolution a reality, I've been trolling YouTube for knitting & crochet videos. The best I've found (so far) are from www.knitwitch.com; she's even a Georgia girl, so it's like supporting the local economy or something. It's interesting how many people attempt to hold the camera between their chin & shoulder while attempting to explain what they're doing - let me just tell you, this doesn't work. At all.

Happy weekend!

Vintage Heart Swap, #2!

vntg heart swap 2
Originally uploaded by from my cherry heart

The lovely Dolly, who writes at From My Cherry Heart, is hosting her second annual Vintage Heart Swap. Sign-ups are open until January 9th, I believe. This is a fun one. To see my treats from last year, just look here.

In other news, I had an email today that the Handmade Toy Saving initiative is currently #1 in its division at change.org, but we don't want anyone else pulling ahead here at the last minute. Voting continues through the 31st, so click on that link on the sidebar. NOW! GO!! Thanks. :)

Observe --------------------------------------------->

I added this festive little widget to remind all of us to DO SOMETHING about a new law scheduled to take effect early next year. It's getting a lot of press in some places, though none here in Atlanta, as far as I can tell, but then again folks here do love them some plastic. I'm no libertarian, but this really is our sweet government going too far. The intent is WONDERFUL - protect children from toxic toys. The only problem is that it affects everyone, even your grandma who crochets little bears for the church craft fair. To learn more, visit here or here.

And even if you think I'm full of hooey, stop by the site and vote for SOMETHING.

For once, ANYTHING is better than nothing. :)

Holiday Traditions Swap Treats

From the lovely Sarah M.:
Absolutely gorgeous washcloths. As in, so pretty that you're afraid to use them. They are perfectly knitted, and make my crocheted ones look like a preschool craft project! Sarah also included a bar of this soap, which we love. We love it so much that we just finished our bar, so she saved us from having to buy more! That is serendipity in action, friends.
This bag was FULL of killer shortbread. As in, the best I've ever eaten. It was amazing. I took some to work today, and it was a hit there. In the spirit of Christmas, I was even honest, and didn't claim to have made it or anything!
And the grand finale - knitted elves. Their little hats & scarves are knitted around corks, which is just about the cutest thing ever. I have a thing for elves, and these fit in perfectly.

Sarah also sent a tutorial about their family's advent tradition, which was really interesting. Our advent calendar growing up (handmade by the Motherina) was different from this, and much less interactive, so it was cool to read about doing it in a different way.

Thank you SO MUCH, Sarah, for such a great swap!

Because Monkey L*O*V*E*S these dark pictures.

I don't know if she's complained about it in the comments, but Monkey simply adores the way I never take blog pictures until late at night. Therefore, the pictures are always dark, since I am allergic to the flash. When you live in Northern Europe, like it's starting to feel like I do, it gets dark at about 4:00 in the winter. That makes it impossible to work all day and get decent photos. With that in mind, I present Christmas decor 2008 - in all its shadowy glory. It should also be noted that this is only one room. I'll show you more later, if you're good.

The aluminum tree, now with color wheel! We moved it in front of the fireplace this year. We also found that precious tree skirt at an antique store for a steal.
The angelic portion of the mantel.
The not-so angelic portion, with non-flammable icicles!

Crafty update.

First off - the infamous diaper cake. These are de rigeur at school showers, but apparently something of an oddity at St. Paul UMC. Who knew?
Who knew, too, that the parents-to-be (our pastor and her husband) would register for non-bleached environmentally friendly diapers that are, um, beige? Beige = not good for diaper cake making. I did not know this, of course, until I opened them. Thus, the cake is a little dingy-looking, but I think you can still get the effect.

I also decorated some onesies for them, which were then strung on this clothesline. I had thought we would use some vintage tablecloths of mine for these tables, so the onesies were WAY too heavy for the plastic. Fortunately, thanks to the magic of Mr. Stapler, we got them to stay up for the duration of the shower.
Moving on to fall - for KK, here's the mantle:
I took my leaves and used glue dots to stick them to my IKEA tree. I waited overnight to do this, which wasn't bright, as they would have been much easier to glue fresh. You will notice the lack of acorns this year - no little wormy friends, either...
There are a couple of additional pre-Christmas projects coming down the pike, I think, but there is definitely Christmas crafting to be done. Whoo-hoo!!

While you're surfing around blogland, be sure to check out Julie's fun blog (I've linked to it before) and etsy shop. She's having a fun little contest right now, too. Her shop is chock full of the results of her gifted thrifting - she's got some books that are making me very envious!

Happy Tuesday, everyone.

Something we should ALL do.

Even those non-sewing boys who lurk here but never leave comments...

First, visit SouleMama's post from today. Then, link over to her new craftivism effort, Mama to Mama, and read about a simple way to help new mothers in Haiti.

Convinced? I thought so.

But for those of you who aren't nudged to action, you should read Meg's amazing post about the effort, and Haiti in general.

Now I know you're going to help, aren't you?

When you're done with your project, read anything ever written by Edwidge Danticat, and you'll see why this is so important.

Those, friends, are your cryptic instructions for the evening.

Happy Monday.

Right now....

1. Baby shower decorations being made, including my very first diaper cake! Photos to come.
2. Laundry being done BEFORE it threatens to turn into an avalanche!
3. Pictures being admired. Monkey & Bean rock!
4. Cat being laughed at for refusing to move from the floor register in our bedroom. It's not that cold, is it?
5. Plans being made for a busy Halloween/Day of the Dead/Fall kind of weekend.

Happy Thursday!

Finally.

It's fall. It feels wonderful outside, though if the temperature were to lose another 10 degrees, I'd probably love it even more. We invested in a few more window screens this year, so my adoration of open windows can continue. I used up a fair number of soup coupons at the grocery store yesterday, so now my customary grilled-cheese-and-soup-for-dinner-three-nights-a-week tradition can continue. We also managed to just about finish putting up the Halloween decorations. I haven't made much (yet) this year, but I did add a few things to the mantle. I'm sure you'll be able to spot them (haha), but if not, I added a detail picture so that you can admire the kitty cat with a candy corn nose.She came from a fabulous little primitives store north of the city - Mother Dearest's favorite. (As did the Owl sign at the top of the page - man, we love that place.)
The pumpkin outside the door actually came from Waycross! I was driving back to the hotel and spotted it, so I had to go back the next day for it. I'm pretty sure it's from some sort of heirloom seed, because it's a much paler orange than anything you'd find in the stores. Mr. Pumpkin is decorative for now, but he will be cooked and eaten later. There is pumpkin soup in my future! In addition, somewhere we found a pumpkin-pepper-cheese souffle recipe that needs to be tested.
Although I missed out on/didn't sign up for any Halloween swaps this year, I did succumb to the pull of ApronThriftGirl's Red & Aqua swap. My newest swappy partner is Shawna, who writes at Farm Girl Living. In related swap news, my partner from last year's Halloween swap, the fabulous Heidi, has a new blog address, so be sure to stop by her new home! Lovely Heather at the Speckled Egg has added some images of the tag book we put together for her store's birthday - oh my goodness, it's amazing.

One last thing - my sweet cousin Bethie has new pictures up of Baby Brooklyn. She is darling, and though I maintain that she still looks like my uncle (Beth's dad), she is definitely starting to resemble her older brother Aiden. If you just need more cute baby in your life, you should stop by.

Happy Monday!

Off into the world...

This is from my finally-finished summer swap - whoopsie! Some things just take quite a bit longer than anticipated. Anyway, it's yellow & pink yo-yos & Scrabble tiles on a Quizmo! card with a pearlized paint wash. Believe me, it sounds fancier than it is, but it was fun to make. It, along with some other vintage goodies, is on its way to Susan!

The poll results are in, and shockingly, no one picked the most direct route from Paris to Copenhagen, which I must admit was actually my secret preference. I'll leave it up for another day or so for your amusement.

Back to real work at work today, which was unfun for all of the reasons that working in state government can be unfun: a "seminar" on Internet/computer security; gigantic technical meltdown requiring us to pack up our computers and go to the other side of the building for an online meeting; having to make hotel reservations three months in advance...

Tomorrow will be better! Good luck to everyone headed back to real school this week!

Happy Monday.

Today, I will...

. . . do a bunch of laundry,

so that I can actually pack a suitcase,

and be ready to leave at the CRACK of dawn tomorrow to go to Indiana.

. . . update my Ipod,

including burning the Brendan James cd,

so that I do not nut up on the plane,

because my last several flights have been awful,

and I have four ahead of me in the next five days (thanks, Priceline!).

. . . finish my swap for Susan,

so that it will be ready for mailing in the morning,

and she will not think I am a flake.

. . . send some work emails,

which I have been avoiding,

simply because I don't want to look at the stupid documents ANY MORE.

. . . talk to Bear,

because we are the food committee for the upcoming NOLA trip,

and we cannot let anyone (much less ourselves) down. :)

Happy Friday!

New friends.

This is my new penguin friend. She has a man in her life, and he lives with me, too. Well, actually, they've been living here for about a month, but they just decided that they liked me enough to visit me tonight. They made a pretty cool appearance in some items for the Parasols, Pink Lemonade, & Polka Dots swap.

My partner for this swap is the lovely Susan, who blogs at Days Too Short. {I think we can all relate to her title, even thought the days are mighty long right now!} You should stop by and say hi. Be sure to observe her fabulous garage sale finds! She's a very dedicated swapper, and must be excellent at time management, because I think she's got at least three swaps going at any one time. I'm late half the time when I only do ONE at a time! :)

In other news, our demographic at church has decided to organize! (Go ahead - sing the Internationale, I can take it.) The first meeting of the Backyard Bible Club (long VBS-related joke, not a statement on our geekiness, though that is also evident) will be Thursday night. I am allowing a single boy to make pancakes in my kitchen. Obviously, our first activity will be a time of prayer that nothing burns. Just kidding. Sort of. :)

Happy Monday, tomorrow. And remember, the revolution will not be televised. At least, not in this house, since we don't have TV.

Hibiscus.

I know you were beginning to think that it didn't exist, but it does! It does! And here's photographic evidence of that. I'd like to point out that even though it's taken me far too long to acknowledge it, the thing is STILL blooming! WOWIE!

It's hard to say why I haven't been writing anything - it's not like I've been nearly as busy as I was last week, but it just hasn't been happening. Weird, huh?

I promise to do better this upcoming week. I have a new swap partner for you to meet, and some peeks at things I'm making for her - woohoo! There is also some patriotic fun on the mantel (I know you won't sleep until you see that), and probably some other stuff I can't even think of right at the moment.

Happy weekend.

Promised hibiscus photo notwithstanding,

I give you the Sweet Goodness Swap 20 questions game:

1. What is your favorite Summer Drink(s)?
Cream soda - at least this week

2. What is your favorite Summer Activity?
Going to the beach - I love the beach, but I came from very non-beachy people, and I married a fairly non-beachy person, so until Caro moves close to a beach, I'm out of luck.

3. If you could spend a lazy afternoon reading, what would be in your hands?
Heavens to Betsy - do you people seriously think it's possible to answer this question? ANYTHING might be there - shallow fiction, long fiction written by foreign authors, crafty magazines... There is just no predicting this.

4. What is your favorite type of craft/art medium?
Paper - no, wait - fabric, unless you count ribbon...

5. What is one art/craft supply you absolutely have been dying to have or try?
I have been wanting to get into the vintage millinery stuff that is on everyone's blog, but we do not have flea markets/yard sales in Atlanta that sell that sort of thing, and old hats at antique stores are always way too expensive to buy, much less disassemble, so I haven't. Yet. ;)

6. What are your favorite colors in our 'rainbow sherbet' theme? Pink, lime green, yellow, orange, aqua (or blue)?
Together? That would be pink & aqua, but I'm partial to yellow by itself.

7. What is your favorite sweet treat?
Chocolate? Ask Jean Knee if you need additional clarification on this one.

8. Are there any craft or art supplies you would NOT be interested in receiving?
Hmmm. I don't make candles, or soap, or anything that involves a heat source, because I would probably cause a house fire. Other than that, I think it's open season.

9. What is your favorite song today?
Funny you should ask: darling little brother decided to "help" me with my ipod, and downloaded about two entire Billy Joel albums - leaving me re-loving this.

10. How do you 'pamper' yourself during the hot summer days?
Um, staying inside and deeply, deeply appreciating the man who invented central heat & air?

11. Do you have any kidlets or pets?
We have a cat. She is a mess.

12. What is your best potluck dish for summer get togethers?
Why, that would have to be the Pampered Chef sandwich ring, the very favorite thing of some folks who read this blog. (haha)

13. If you could take a summer vacation anywhere, where would it be?
Funny. Mongolia (yes, the country) apparently has this amazing summer festival called Nadam. Obviously, getting to Mongolia is difficult. And I can't sleep on trains, so who knows if I'll ever get there. But I'd like to.

14. Describe your decorating style. Does that say anything about your personality?
Eclectic? Country Victorian? I-want-my-grandmother's-kitchen? Trying-to-be-Meg-Ryan in You've Got Mail? {And yes, the question marks probably do say something about my personality.}

15. What are your initials?
SBB

16. Why do you like to join swaps?
It's fun to see what other folks are making. It's also fun to get mail, so I'm not going to lie about that. I have a hard time giving away things that I like, so this makes me do that, which is probably good for my personal growth, and definitely good for the amount of clutter in this house.

17. You have 25 dollars to spend just on you for a little treat. What do you buy? (you can list more than one thing)
Books, old dishes, ice cream. I love thrift stores, so that $25 would go a long way & still let me buy ice cream when I've finished.

18. What's one craft supply or art supply you absolutely cannot live without?
Solid-colored card stock.

19. Who's the last person you hugged?
Lindsey. I haven't actually seen any other humans yet today.

20. What's your favorite number and why?
Four, currently, for a very particular reason. ;)

A delightful change of pace.

You may remember way back in the day when I made a dishtowel bag for Barb's Purse Project.

Well, I haven't exactly kept up with the challenges, um, at all. Mostly because of work, but also just because I haven't. So, I've decided to take Barb up on her current challenge: the tshirt bag. I've seen these on Etsy, and on trendsters here in Atlanta. We certainly have PLENTY of tshirts in this house. In fact, I got a free one just this week that I will never ever wear. It is a putrid shade of yellow. Might as well give it away or make something else out of it!

Anyway, you should all go check out the contest - Monkey will love the prize - and then start sewing. In fact, I think you could do this without sewing, if you were willing to tie a whole bunch of knots or something. Tshirts don't unravel...

Happy weekend!

Ode to way-too-dark pictures.

One day, I will once again become smart, and take pictures in the afternoon to avoid these issues. I wanted y'all to see the cool journal that Geri made for me as part of our swap. It has a neat vintage French graphic on the cover. Also, you should know that those stripes on the side? Yeah, that's not the pattern on the paper. SHE CUT THOSE OUT AND GLUED THEM ON. As someone whose "scissoring" never got up to snuff, I'm seriously impressed.
This is what I'm using it for - cutting out all those magazine pictures that I want to keep. It's already eliminated about a foot worth of old magazines! And I haven't really even gotten rolling!

Other updates? Work stinks. Visited the EAV farmer's market, where we bought really yummy bread, arugula, a whole bunch of green stuff for Lindsey, and ordered some strawberries for next week. House moderately clean, but laundry disastrous. Can't win them all, it turns out. Also turns out that the end of the school year is crazy even if you're not in the classroom.

Happy Thursday.

Crafts to see and crafts to receive...

Since my lovely Celebrate swap partner Mary has no blog (though I think she should start one - hint, hint!), she asked me to post a picture for y'all. Quite frankly, I was pretty thrilled with how it turned out, since it was semi-monumental in embroidery size for me, and the first thing I'd really machine pieced & semi-quilted. Most such endeavors have to go to my mother, who is required to love them & praise them.

Anyway, for those of you who might care, I embroidered the words, added the buttons, pieced the front, added the embroidery with a decorative stitch (thank you, Singer!), added the backing, lined it, and added a few rows of quilting. Not too difficult, except that anytime you use that much fabric, things can get a little tricky.

My second knitting class was this morning, and it definitely was a step backward. At the first lesson, it appeared I was a continental knitter (this has to do with where you hold the yarn while you knit), and that was working for me, but then today, we had to purl, and things fell apart. I couldn't even BEGIN to purl, and it also became evident that I couldn't maintain any kind of tension. SO. Now I am becoming an English knitter, and hopefully I'll be able to knit AND to purl, which should be a good thing. I'm afraid I might have to sign up for Knitting 101 AGAIN, which is bad because: a) I have to pay to take the same class twice; b) I'm not sure I can find 3 Saturdays in a row again; and c) I am way too grade-obsessed to even contemplate viewing this as me failing, which it pretty much is. However, if this English-knitting thing works for me, I can erase what I just said.

Dinner tonight was here, where the food was yummy, the decor was beyond mid-century atomic cute, and they apparently serve sliced of cake that cover an entire dinner plate. We didn't have dessert, but I do think one slice would feed 10 people, no joke. We'll have to explore that as an option the next time folks are in town. ;)

And, in some serious excitement, it's the one year anniversary of the fabulous blog written by my dear friend Monkey. Head on over for her nifty giveaway. Crafting is awesome at the Monkeybean Mansion, so you don't want to miss this one.

Happy weekend!