Haute To Sew

{Sewing Tip Tuesday} #13

2012-05-22T06:00:00.000-05:00

Guess what?? My birthday week has finally arrived. Friday I will be the big 30! Only 3 more days in my 20's. I have sense of doom upon me. But, I'm super excited for all the FUN we will be having to celebrate this weekend!! OK, on to the show....

This week's tip comes from Sew It Love It. Ilse made a list of the 12 most common mistakes when cutting fabric. I'm going to give you the list, but you'll have to visit her blog to get specifics on each point. I'm not trying to steal her post, mmmkay.

12 Mistakes to Avoid when Cutting Fabric:

1.   Forgetting to preshrink
2.   Leaving wrinkles
3.   Letting fabric hang off the table's edge
4.   Ignoring pattern layout instructions
5.   Fabric nap in the wrong direction
6. Upside down prints
7. Unmatched plaids and stripes
8. Cutting on the right side of fabric
9. Twisted grain lines
10. Grain going crosswise, not lengthwise
11. Using old or dirty shears
12. Moving patterns

I found her article extremely useful. Hope you will too! Visit Sew It Love It and educate yourself on cutting fabric!

Wordpress

2012-05-17T14:28:00.000-05:00

After attending Bloggy Boot Camp I realized the importance for me to switch to Wordpress. When I first started this blog I didn't know any difference between using Blogger vs Wordpress, so I just went with what looked easiest.....Blogger. I also wasn't sure where this blog was going to go, whether I would enjoy it, or what it was going to evolve into. Sometimes I'm still not sure about those things.

I'm scared about moving my blog. I'm scared of losing content. I'm scared of losing followers. I'm not sure if the people that follow me with GFC will still follow me. Back in March when Wordpress announced they were no longer going to support the GFC widget, people went into a panic. I follow a ton of blogs through GFC and I seem to still get updates on everything. Does anyone know about that? I mean, I know I won't be able to put the widget on my new page, but will my existing people still see my content?? I hope so.

I was told at the conference to hire someone to move everything for you. Yeah well I would if I got the winning lottery numbers handed to me, I would. Hiring anyone for anything is expensive. I'm savvy. I can figure it out. I'm actually taking an online class for $30 to show you how to move it yourself. Pray everything goes smoothly.

So if things look weird around here, or something tragic happens {hopefully not}, fear not, it will all get worked out. In the meantime, I might not have as many posts for you. But in the name of saving money, I will get this figured out. Thanks to everyone for sticking with me!! Without you, there would be no point in any of this!

{How Pinteresting} #11

2012-05-17T14:14:00.002-05:00

Sorry this is a little late in the day. I didn't really feel all that great yesterday afternoon and didn't get around to posting this. But hey, better late than never, right?

We had some friends that had a baby last week {I'm jealous}. I saw this super cute embroidery hoop on Gwenny Penny

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Isn't that darling? I think her words are stamped. I don't know how to do that, so I embroidered mine.....not that I'm a pro at that either, but it worked :) My friends' nursery is green, pink and brown. Here's my version

Oh how I wish I had a baby.....someday

Freezer Paper Stenciling Tutorial

2012-05-16T06:00:00.000-05:00

You all know I just had my 2nd wedding anniversary. And you saw my gorgeous anniversary band Mr. Perfect bought. Well I don't believe I told you what I did for him. His main gift was this baseball gift basket I put together with tickets to the Royals vs. Yankees game. We had a blast! But there was something else....

Something a little funny and kinda an inside joke, but I'm gonna tell you about it anyway.

A couple weeks before the big anniversary, Mr. Perfect and I were looking online to see what the 2nd anniversary gift was. The traditional was cotton.

Me: (listing off various cotton gifts described online) Babe, it says clothes, linens, napkins, a bunch of stuff that doesn't sound like anniversary gifts.

Mr Perfect: Like a t-shirt that says "all I got for my 2nd anniversary was this lousy t-shirt".

And then we both laughed until we had tears coming out our eyes and couldn't breathe. See, so it's kind of an inside joke, but you might chuckle a little at it anyway. But seriously, after a joke like that, I couldn't not make a shirt that said that!!

I decided to make this my first try at using freezer paper to stencil something. I printed off on the computer what I wanted it to say and gathered my supplies.

I had decided to do 2 t-shirts that were matching so it could be a "his and hers" type thing. Plus, if I screwed one up, there would always be another one.

I cut 2 pieces of freezer paper the size of my printed paper and layered them on top. I figured I could cut 2 stencils at a time to save me from spending an entire week cutting out words for my stencil.

Then I got to work cutting out my stencil with an exacto knife. If you cut out words like this, you should probably rent a movie.....just sayin. Here's my stencils all cut out.

And here is the pile of dots and such for the inside of the "O", "A", "R" and "D". Can't forget about those!

Next all you do is iron your stencil to your t-shirt. Then paint! I used a sponge type brush and dabbed the paint on there. To make the shirt washable, make sure you mix fabric medium into your paint before you start applying it.

After it is all dry, tear the stencil off your shirt and you are done!

They both turned out great! So he got the navy colored shirt and I got the teal one.

Now here's how he reacted when he opened it.....

We were sitting there, each of us with a shirt sized box in front of us. We had both said this box we were giving each other wasn't the real gift (mine was the baseball gift basket and his was the ring). I think we were both thinking the same thing......that the other one had a gotten a t-shirt with that saying on it. He opened my gift first. And he didn't laugh very much or anything. I thought it was weird. He thought it was hysterical when we joked about it. So I opened his gift. He had made a t-shirt for me that said the same thing! He had printed on an iron-on transfer and just ironed it on a shirt. Not nearly as crafty as me, but hey, gotta hand it to the guy for making me a shirt!

I'm sure you are tired of my babbling and reading about my inside joke with my hubs. Hope I didn't bore you to death! On a crafty related note....I kinda like the freezer paper stenciling. Might be doing more with that here soon!

Shame on me

2012-05-15T18:39:00.000-05:00

I am SOOOO behind in my blogging! I've busy doing projects, and watching tv, and just....life. This last weekend we had 3 birthday parties in one day! Then Sunday I had to photograph a graduation.....on Mother's Day.....what is up with that??

I have about a million projects I want to post about. I just need to find the time to do it. I need to focus in the morning when I'm most productive instead of watching reruns of Project Runway. I need a little personal assistant is what I need HA! I wish.

So to my readers: I am sorry I didn't have a week in Instagrams post. Honestly I didn't even take any pictures last week (which is usually what happens the first week I'm done with my day job every summer). I am so sick of being glued to my camera that I just quit taking pictures of everything for a while. But not to worry, I'm back on it this week! I'm sorry I didn't have a sewing tip this week. Fail! Next week, I promise.

Please don't leave me!

What beauty products do you use?

2012-05-11T04:46:00.001-05:00

This post brought to you by Bloom.com. All opinions are 100% mine.

If you didn't know, I'm turning 30 this month. EEK! I've been having a little bit of a crises about it too. Seriously, who wants to be old? Anyway, a couple weeks ago I was having an especially difficult time because my skin has been breaking out a lot lately. I know it's hormonal {I've had some changes lately} and there's not a lot I can do about it, but I don't like it. I also have saggy bags and dark circles under my eyes that have haunted me for years.

Between the teenage acne and the geriatric bags I decided it was time I changed my skin care routine. Oh and let's not forget I have blackheads, an oily T-zone, and my eye shadows always crease. I buy new makeup and skin care products alllll the time to try and fix all my problems. Here's the massive pile of makeup I've got in my bathroom right now

I wish I had had a personal consultant before I bought all that! Most of it I don't even wear. It either doesn't look good on me, or I break out, or I'm even more oily.

If you are anything like me, you are going to want to check out Bloom.com.

Bloom.com is a social beauty network that is revolutionizing the way that women find and buy the right products. Within Bloom.com you can read unbiased feedback on your Beauty Matches and what is trending in the social world. Bloom has 10,000 items from 150+ top brands. And guess what? Bloom.com is free to join!

It's pretty much like your personal beauty shopper. You set up your skin, and hair profile and tell them what you are interested in beauty wise. And they give you tons of recommendations on basically every type of beauty product! How sweet is that?? What I'm totally in love with, is that it will give you high end suggestions and "budget" suggestions. You all know how I like cheap!

They have some pretty awesome kickbacks too! Purchases come with free gifts AND 10% back in Bloom Dollars. If it's your first time purchasing you get 30% back on your first order!

Now for the really great part........ Bloom.com is giving you the opportunity to win a FOUR Girlfriend Luxury Spa Weekend in Vegas, all expenses paid at the luxury 5 star Aria hotel!! You can enter yourself to win by joining Bloom.com for free. And you get additional entries to the sweepstake for every friend who joins from your invite!!

I don't know about you, but I sure could use a spa weekend!!! Seriously people, go check out the site, you'll love it. And enter to win a free trip!

Win a spa vacation for 4 girlfriends!

{How Pinteresting} #10

2012-05-10T06:00:00.000-05:00

It has been awhile since I've done one of these posts hasn't it? So sorry! It has returned!

Here's my "pin"spiration photo for the week. It comes from Mommy in the Mountains

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I think that rug is just stinkin cute! Our front porch needs some MAJOR lovin. It's so bare and not welcoming. We might as well hang a sign on the door that says "buzz off". I have tried to spruce it up with a cute wreath, but, ya know, they only do so much. We currently have one of those small, stiff, mats you can buy at Walmart or wherever that has 3 faded palm trees and the word Welcome. But, I live in Kansas, not California. That rug is on its last leg for sure! So into the trash it goes...

You remember me going to Ikea? I bought a plain rug to put on the front porch, with the intention of painting it. I can make it cute, without some cheesy palm trees. And it's actually a decent size without having to break the bank to buy it. Score!

Before I show you mine, let me just say.....I KNOW chevron is overdone. I KNOW ombre is overdone. But whatever, I still like it all anyway. And on another side note...all my pictures have a slight red ring around them. Uh, that happened in photoshop because I forgot to reset a setting. My bad. Ignore it because I'm not going back to redo all these pictures lol. Anyway here's my rug

I just planted the flowers a couple days ago so those really dress up the place too! And ignore the glare on the glass and harsh shadows....my house faces south....allllll day long.

Wanna make your own?? It's simple.

Start with your rug. Make sure you do this project on the carpet in your living room like I did, just don't tell your husband {hehe} .......this is one of those moments where I'm sorta happy he doesn't read my blog......

Tape off your design, or use a stencil, whatever you want to do. Let me just warn you, these scratchy, high pile rugs are SO hard to tape. Like, the tape doesn't stick at all. It's barely just sitting on top of the rug.

Then paint! I used a nice stiff brush and tried to really work the paint down in the fibers.

Peel the tape off and voila!

What do you think? I love it. Mr. Perfect loves it. The kid has already wiped her feet on it. Guess that's what it's for!

I heart Pinterest

{Sewing Tip Tuesday} #12

2012-05-08T06:00:00.000-05:00

I've got a new sewing tip for you today! Hooray!

This one is a good one for anyone that does quilting or uses bias tape. I haven't quite mastered bias tape. I've only attempted it a couple times and I have to admit I'm not that great at sewing it. This is one of the reasons I haven't decided to make a quilt yet lol.

Anyway, I got this tip from MeiJo's JOY. She uses the casing from a crafting blade to make her own bias tape. Check out this picture:

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She has 2 blades at different widths. Remove the blades and the end piece. Fold your fabric into the shape you want and feed it through the casing. Iron when it comes out the other side. Go check out her blog to see how she does it!!

My Week in Instagrams

2012-05-07T10:53:00.001-05:00

Can I just say how happy I am that last week is over?? Seriously, it was non-stop busy and I need a break! Last week was my last week of work until end of June and I couldn't be more thrilled about that!!!

Here's a little glimpse of my week. You can follow me on Instagram {meredith_hautetosew}

1. Mr. Perfect brought home so flowers for our anniversary. So pretty!

2. So I have my engagement ring, and my wedding band that runs along the bottom. The intention has been to buy another contoured band one day as an anniversary band to complete the look. Well guess what friends, Mr. Perfect bought it our anniversary. I already got it sized and soldered to the rest of the set. It's so beautiful, I just love it!

3. Can you believe these twin's names???? I mean really. Nothing like setting up your children for a miserable life right out the womb.

4. And once you stop laughing at the twins, start laughing at their older brother's name! What is wrong with these parents?!?! This is just blew my mind.

5. We spent Sunday at Kauffman Stadium watching the Royals vs. Yankees. Part of my gift to Mr. Perfect for our anniversary.

6. Our stadium got a major facelift a couple years ago and it is amazing! It is so much fun to go to ball games there.

7. Gotta have peanuts!

8. We met up with a friend who was part of a group in a dugout suite. It was pretty amazing to get that kind of view.

9. Had a post-game cocktail on a rooftop downtown. I always enjoy discovering new places in the city.

10. Last night we had some wicked storms blow through. Huge hail. Tornado sirens going off. Torrential rain. Us, the kiddo, the dog and my mom spent some quality time in the basement bathroom with a pizza. Good times.

There was so much more this week I could have gotten pictures of, but was just too busy! Celebrated a niece's birthday and a nephew's birthday. Work, work, work. Now that I'm done with work for awhile, I'm so excited to have time to get some projects done!! I have a super long to-do list! Can't wait to share it all with you. YAY!

Now it's time to take a breath, and quite possibly a nap!

Anniversaries!!!!!!!!!!

2012-05-01T06:00:00.000-05:00

us at my cousin's wedding last weekend

Today is a special day.......it is my 2nd wedding anniversary!!!!!!!!! Since it is a Tuesday and we have his daughter, we can't really do much to celebrate, but that's ok. We have a sitter for a couple hours tonight so we can go to dinner.

I can't wait to share with you what I got/made him for the occasion!! I would tell you about it now, but as I'm writing this, he is laying in bed next to me. His cell phone has him in a trance so I doubt he would look over at my computer screen, but I don't want to take any chances. Hopefully I can find some time this week to show you though :)

Sorry I don't have a sewing tip for you today. I promise it will return next week!

OH, and I totally forgot.........last Friday was my BLOGOVERSARY!!!!!!!!!!!!! My little blog turned 1 year old!!!!! I had intentions on making an entire post about it, but it completely slipped my mind while I was out of town. Not every good planning on my part huh? Anyway, THANK YOU TO ALL MY READERS!!!!!!!!!!! I wouldn't be doing this if you weren't here to support me :) Love you all!!

Here's another picture of my face for your viewing pleasure

us with my sis and her bf

Hope everyone has a marvelous day!!!!!

My Week in Instagrams

2012-04-30T21:44:00.000-05:00

If you haven't noticed I've been a little MIA lately. I've been out of town constantly. My cousin got married this last weekend. Life is just moving too fast. I don't have any time to get anything done, which in turn means I have no time to blog. On the brighter side, this is my last week at work until July-ish so I will have plenty of time for new projects starting next week! YAY!!

Ok, sorry for the rant......moving on....

1. My sis's bf talks about this "Tasty Tacos" place in Des Moines, IA ALLLL the time. So my coworker and I stopped there for lunch on the way to Minneapolis.

2. Don't those tacos look like heaven?? The picture is not lying, they were to die for!

3. Lifetouch corporate offices when my training was.

4. If you follow me on facebook or twitter you know we made a trip to Ikea in Minneapolis. It was SOO much fun! And by the looks of it, you can see we made off with some loot :)

5. Fancy chicken dinner at Napa Valley Cafe at the Mall of America. Yum-O

6. Grooms cake at my cousins wedding. He's a huge Royals fan.....even made their wedding color Royals blue haha.

I can't promise you I'm going to have stellar posts this week, if I can get around to posting at all. Between work, my anniversary (tomorrow yay), my nephew's birthday, my brother-in-law's birthday, my niece's birthday and baptism, dental work, and more work work work, I'm kinda busy. And I'm hoping to get my flower bed planted on Saturday. We'll see if I have any energy by then.

{Sewing Tip Tuesday} #11

2012-04-24T06:00:00.000-05:00

Hi all! Today isn't so much a "tip" as it is a TUTORIAL!! YAY! Everyone loves a good tutorial right?

For some reason I did a REALLY bad job at photographing myself in the mirror. It must have been the cold I had last week...clouding my head. Forgive my bad pictures.

Alright, here we go....

Take a pair of jeans you want to cut up and turn them wrong side out. Lay them out on the floor. Take a pair of skinny's you like and lay them on top, wrong side out as well

Next pin along the edge of the top pair of jeans as a guideline for where you will sew.

Then sew about 3/8" in from that line of pins. Don't make your pants too skinny that they will cut your calves in half when you turn them into capris! Make sure you backstitch at the top. Don't worry about the bottom because you will be cutting it off anyway. I used a denim needle and jeans thread, but you don't have to. I did it to match the inside of my seams with what was already there. If your pants have dark thread, I would use dark thread.

Ok, so try on your pants to make sure your legs aren't too tight. If they fit well, cut off that extra flap. I used pinking shears to prevent too much fraying on the inside.

Now you need to decide how long (or short) you want them to be. I put my pants on, decided where I wanted them and then just stuck a pin in the front of my jeans about 2 inches lower than that.....on just one leg. Take them off. Line up your legs and cut them at the pin.

This next part is key to making them look professional, like you bought them from the store. See how the inside seam has the yellow stitching, then that light blue serged edge?

Well I don't have a serger, so I can't serge my edges. You have have one, but all means serge your edges. If you don't, follow these steps....

I set my machine on the #8 stitch. I don't know what it's called, but it did the job I wanted it to. Find one similar on your machine.

Then sew along the outside seam at the bottom 3 or so inches. I used a cornflower colored thread to match the other leg.

It doesn't look exactly like the other side, but it gives your jeans a little something extra to make it look nicer.

Now all you need to do is cuff them, iron them like CRAZY, and tack those edges down. If you need help with this, check out this tutorial on cuffing shorts.

And that's it!! Way to refashion those jeans you weren't going to wear anyway!!

Don't forget to like me on Facebook and follow me on Twitter! I promise I won't hound you about this every day ;)

My Week in Instagrams

2012-04-23T15:22:00.004-05:00

I'm back! Bloggy Boot Camp was uh-mazing! It is such an informative conference for a blogger. I left there feeling like my head was going to explode. I was saturated with info. I met some really great people too! I'm not necessarily "shy", but I am timid for sure. I don't just walk up to people and start chatting. That's not my thing. So I was kinda forced to break out of my shell and be friendly. It was a good experience for me.

Anyway, I drove back saturday night when it was over. Then yesterday, the hubs and I did nothing but lay around in our pj's all day and watch tv. It was a much needed, relaxing day. So I'm a day late on this post, but I'm still posting it!

Here's what my week looked like.

1. I took these drugs like an addict all week and I'm still fighting this cold. I sounded like a 60 year old smoker at my conference. I'm sure it was super attractive. At least I didn't end up coughing while people were speaking!

2. I mentioned before there's a new temple here in KC. Me, Mr. Perfect, his brother and sis-in-law all went to a tour. My bro and sis-in-law are both LDS and had been up there giving tours, but not on one for themselves. It was really interesting and gorgeous to see.

3. LOL! We like to tease Carmen by putting her "bonnet" on. She looks like she's going to murder me in my sleep.

4. My hair needed a color refresh. I just love the way it looks when I get done and it's all wet

5. St. Louis Cardinals Stadium from my hotel room window. I had quite the view!

6. I've seen the arch a million times in my life, but when I came up to this stop light, it just looked so majestic.

There you have it. My week in a nutshell. Tomorrow I'm driving up to Minneapolis with a friend from work for a training session. I was pretty excited about it when I said I would go with her, but now I'm not really wanting to go. I really just want to stay home and relax, not sit in a car for 6.5 hours one way. Oh well. We are going to go to Ikea on Wednesday after our training so that will make it worth it :) Expect some Instagrams from Ikea, and frequent posts on my facebook page.

Oh, and I joined the world of Twitter. After going to this conference, I learned I'm apparently missing out by not being on there. I haven't tweeted yet, but I'll get into it. So won't you follow me please? You can click on the link to get to my profile. I'm @hautetosew. I think I did that right. I'm not really sure how to use Twitter yet. I tried to search for myself, but couldn't get "me" to come up. If you have problems finding me, please let me know!

Business Card Altoid Tin

2012-04-20T14:45:00.001-05:00

I think I mentioned earlier in the week I'm going to Bloggy Boot Camp this weekend. It's in St. Louis, which is about a 4 hour drive from me. Soon as Mr. Perfect gets home from work, we will switch cars and I will hit the road! I'm pretty excited to learn some new things. And equally nervous. I'm not exactly the most outgoing, social person around new people, so this could be challenging for me. Mr. Perfect suggested I take a flask to help loosen me up lol. I don't think that's really necessary. I just hope I don't end up being the weird, socially awkward girl that no one talks to!

Anyway, I made business cards this week to take with me. They aren't fancy or anything, but I think they work well with my blog design. What do you think?

I feel so savvy having that QR code on there! Fancy right? But does it look like something is missing?? Yeah, that's my email address. I made these and had that "something's not right" feeling, but couldn't figure it out...then when I was like 2/3 done with cutting them, I realized I forgot to put my email on there! DOH! But I suppose it's going to be ok. My email is on my blog, so if someone wants it, they can surely find it right?? At least that's what I told myself to feel better about my mistake.

So I can't just throw these in my purse with a rubber band around it! Bust out the mod podge, scrapbook paper and an altoids tin.

SO CUTE! Now when I hand out a card, it actually looks like I'm crafty, not ghetto.

I suppose I should probably go pack, and figure out what I'm going to wear, and hope I don't have a breakdown trying to figure it out! Wish me luck! Hope everyone has a great weekend!

{How Pinteresting} #9 PART 2

2012-04-20T14:07:00.000-05:00

Sad news friends...spraying tea on your legs for a tan did NOT work for me :( Maybe I did something wrong. I don't know. I showered, dried completely and started to spray it on. It just beaded up and ran off. I tried rubbing it in and it still just sat on top of my skin. I thought maybe it was because there is shea butter in my body wash and that was creating a barrier. So I went in the kids bathroom and washed the other leg with plain ol' Ivory soap. Still did the same thing.

I'm pretty disappointed. So I don't know what to try. I read all the comments and advice on Born to be Blonde and did exactly what she said to do. Anyone have any suggestions? I will keep trying to make this work if anyone has some advice. Wish I could have told all my fellow pasty people that this was the best tan ever, but no. Please leave me your suggestions!

{How Pinteresting} #9 PART 1

2012-04-19T06:00:00.000-05:00

There are going to be 2 parts to this week's post. I screwed up what I was going to do and I have to wait to finish it up. So so sorry my friends. Let's start with what I am wanting to try out...

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I saw this on Born to be Blonde. She shows you how to tan your legs using tea. Yeppers, tea. Sounds intriguing huh? I'm going to put myself out there and show you how SUPER white my legs are. This picture seems a touch blurry and I feel like my legs look like rubber, like the way Barbies used to look before they started using plastic.

YIKES!! As you can see, I am in desperate need of a tan. I don't want wrinkles and don't like to go to the tanning bed. I mean, how do you really know if they are even clean?? Gross. I also don't like tanning lotions. I always feel like I smell weird and my skin is greasy and it streaks. Where does that leave me? Tea.

So on this site, she says to steep black tea bags for 10-15 minutes in boiling water. I bought 50 tea bags for like $1.50 at my grocery store. Shower, exfoliate, dry off, then spray the tea on and rub in. Here's where my problem is and why this is a 2 part post...

....I made a sugar scrub to exfoliate with. But when I went to spray on the tea, it just beaded up and ran off my leg. My mistake is washing before I exfoliated in the shower. I ended up with a baby oil barrier on my skin. Oops! So the tea won't rub in. No worries though. I will do the tea treatment after my next shower and follow up with how it works. In the meantime, I will show you how I made my sugar scrub!

I bought all these things at my favorite bargain store...you guessed it...Dollar Tree!! $3! I used the entire bottle of baby oil and all but about 1/2 cup of the sugar. The ratio is about 1c oil to 2c sugar. Mix together and store in the jar. Easy peasy!

Here's my tea and supplies all ready to tan, but it was a no-go. boo.

The scrub smells good. It leaves your skin SUPER soft. It's cheap {what's better than that}. And it's easy to make.

Stay tuned peeps....I will post part 2 when I have a verdict on the tea tan.

{Sewing Tip Tuesday} #10

2012-04-17T06:00:00.001-05:00

I seem to getting another cold. I'm not happy about this. I have lots of things to do this week and NO time to deal with crud. I'm also attending Bloggy Boot Camp in St. Louis this weekend and I don't want to be sick for that either! Ugh! Hopefully I can pump myself full of enough drugs to kick this cold quick!

On with the show...

This week I'm sharing a tip with you that I saw on Sew4Home. If you have trouble turning little tubes right side out, then this might make your life a little easier :) I always push them out with knitting needles or a pencil, but this seems like a lot less frustrating.

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Use a hemostat! She says she bought hers on Amazon for cheap, like $7. I would spend $7 to make my life easier. Pretty clever huh?

My Week in Instagrams

2012-04-15T12:39:00.000-05:00

I can't get over how much I love Instagram! If I wasn't obsessed with my phone camera enough...

Here's the highlights from my week

**I only missed 3 pins on Wii bowling!! That was a personal best for me. Quite proud, I might add :)
**Miss Carmen loves taking car rides. She sits like a person. It cracks me up
**Saturday was an emotional day for me. I was hormonal. A good beer soothes me.
**Mr. Perfect cooked the BEST whole wheat chicken alfredo. YUMMO!
**I gave myself some french tips
**There was a ball pit at a school I was at. I just wanted to lay in there and nap LOL

Hope everyone has a great week!

THE END!

A Spring Wreath

2012-04-13T06:00:00.002-05:00

I FINALLY won over Mr. Perfect with a wreath!!!!

Woo Hoo!!

If you've been reading for any length of time you know Mr. Perfect hates wreaths. Well, I may have changed his mind with this one :)

I believe his exact words were "Looks great hunnie". That's a whole lot better than the response to my last wreath, which was "are you trying to pay homage to a powdered donut?"

Did I forget to mention how much this beauty cost me?

Let's break it down...

*wreath form = $1 (dollar tree)

*felt = $1.30

*Ribbon = free (already had it)

TOTAL = $2.30!!

You know how I love a cheapo craft!

Since Mr. Perfect likes it so much I just might leave it up all year round. Pretty sure I'll never sell him on another wreath again. This was a once-in-a-lifetime, isolated event lol

And this is what the kiddo had to say about it..."woah, that is so cool how you got those twigs to curl together like that". ME: "I bought that". KIDDO: "oh, well I like the pink flowers"

ME (silently in my head): "Big shocker! A 10 year who loves pink (eye roll)"

hehe

{How Pinteresting} #8

2012-04-12T06:00:00.000-05:00

Can you believe I've been doing this series for 2 months already?!?

Wow!

I've seen several projects around the web world using nail polish to paint jewelry, bobby pins, and keys!

Yes, I said KEYS!

So genius, why didn't I think of painting things with nail polish??

Saw this as my "pin-spiration"

source

Woah

And mine...

Sweet! Hope my boss never wants the key to the office back {tehe} cuz it's teal now!

Notice anything different about these pictures???

That's right, they're Instagrams!

I'm so stoked that Android has Instagram now. I have several other apps on my phone that are VERY similar to Instagram, but they don't have the nifty borders and online community sharing. Squeal!

I've been thinking that maybe one day every weekend I will do a post with Instagrams from my week. After all, I am a photographer by profession {wink}.

What do you think?? Wanna see pics from my week?? Lemme know

Also, if you are reading this in a reader, click on over to my blog for a sec, would ya...

See over there in the side bar where I have a FACEBOOK button????

I decided it was time I created a fb page for the blog.

I haven't really done much of anything with it yet, just a few posts. But I'm working on figuring it out. I'll pretty it up and post more often...like all the time...I'm a fb junkie :)

So do me a favor, click on over there and "like" me. Please Please Please. I love you forever!

Now get out all your polish and bling out your keys!

{Sewing Tip Tuesday} #9

2012-04-10T06:00:00.000-05:00

Yesterday my kiddo came home from school and said her school nurse passed away from cancer over the weekend. She wants me to take her to the funeral. I think she's old enough to handle it, she even has plans to make a card. But should I? I hate funerals. Ugh.

Just need someone's opinion on that...

Now moving on

The tip today is useful to anyone who sews any kind of pouch or bag with a zipper that you sew all the way around at once. Did that make any sense?? Let's look at the picture first then I'll talk about it.

So in this picture I was making a cute little coin purse. I have my outside fabrics sewed together at the bottom and my lining fabric is sewn together at the top.

See on the right side where the zipper is parted? That's the side the zipper pulls towards to close. You can see that in your head right?

Here's the genius tip...

When you start to sew something like this all the way around, sew TOWARDS the teeth on this side.

Believe me when I tell you that it is 100 times easier to keep those ends of the zipper lined up if you are sewing towards those teeth instead of sewing through the tape edge first. Not that I know this from experience or anything ;)

Hope that helps someone!

Have a great Tuesday friends!!

Liebster Award...TWICE!!

2012-04-09T06:00:00.002-05:00

So what is a Liebster award?? I didn't know either until I got one...

Liebster is a German word meaning 'dearest' or 'beloved' but it can also mean 'favorite'. It is a special award given to bring recognition to blogs with less than 200 followers.

My blog has been growing a little bit lately and I'm so excited about that! I seriously let out a squeal when I found out I had received this award not once, but twice! One of my very loyal readers, Amy at My Infernal Journal, gave me this award several weeks ago. I'm embarrassed that I haven't posted this until now {Amy forgive me}. Anyway, then I was awarded this again by Natural Nesters!

If you receive this award there are a few simple rules:

1. Choose 5 blogs with less than 200 followers to pass the award on to

2. Show thanks to the blogger you received the award from by linking back to them {gotta show some love!}

3. Post the award on your blog and list the bloggers you are awarding with links to them

4. Jump up and down and enjoy the supportive community of bloggers!!

Here's the blogs I chose to pass this fab award on to (in no particular order of course!)

Emmaline Bags & Patterns
Here's to Handy Andy
la vie en rose
freaking craft
Free Time Frolics

All of these blogs have some great projects and great people behind them as well! Go check them out!

Upholstery Spray Paint?!?!?!?

2012-04-06T06:00:00.000-05:00

MY MIND = BLOWN!!!!!!!

I saw this couch on the Sasse life

SHE SPRAY PAINTED IT!!!

Are you just as baffled as I was???

It's some paint called Simply Spray that just soaks in without changing the texture or feeling of your upholstery.

Crazy right?!?!

I think Kim got paid to write about this paint and I am not, but I still wanted to share it with you all.

I am still flipping out about how bad a** this is!

The paint is pricey, but definitely cheaper than replacing a stained couch!

Google it, you won't be sorry!

How many more !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! can I put in this post ;)

{How Pinteresting} #7

2012-04-05T06:00:00.000-05:00

I have had the very worst headaches of my entire life the past 2 days.

I'm talking stabbing, sharp, throbbing pain on my entire head, down my neck and into the top of my shoulders.

Ugh

I've never had a migraine....maybe this is a first.

And the thing that's the most frustrating is that I don't know why I'm having them. There are usually a handful of reasons for my headaches...it's time for the chiropractor, I'm stuffy, I'm absolutely starving, or I drank too much the night before. But this is something completely different and I just don't know how many more days I can deal with it.

Ok, enough with my whining. But I will tell you that because of these headaches, my project this week took me literally like 4.7689324857 seconds! Woo Hoo!

If you have been on Pinterest this week then you have probably seen this ring by A Rosie Sweet Home

source

So simple and so chic! I love it.

Here's my version

PLEASE ignore my horrible nails. I painted them sunday night and for some reason all the polish bubbled up. I think maybe because it was 90 degrees that day and we refused to turn on the AC. Haha

Back to the ring...

So adorable!

You can find the tutorial at A Rosie Sweet Home

And you can check out my Pinterest here!

Send good thoughts my way and make this headache go away!

How to Braid with 4 Strands

2012-04-04T06:00:00.000-05:00

I had someone a while back that left a comment on this bracelet I made

Her mind was baffled on how to braid with 4 strands.

No worries, I will show you how!

I going to use 4 different colors of embroidery floss so you can see what I'm doing.

I'm also going to braid it rather loosely so you can follow.

Ok, here we go!

Step 1: Move left string (blue) over one spot to the right.

Step 2: Move right string (yellow) under one spot to the left and over the next spot to the left. Make sense? We moved the yellow under the purple and over the blue.

Repeat!!

Red goes over yellow

Purple goes under blue and over red

Yellow goes over purple

Blue goes under red and over yellow

And here's how it should look repeated over and over

SUPER DUPER EASY PEOPLE!!!

Now you are in the know on braiding with 4 strands :)