Busted: First Attempts At Jewelry

I've decided I'd like to start making jewelry this summer.  One of my first attempts involved diving into a big bag of buttons I've had in my desk drawer all year.  The goal was to make a necklace.  Black and white seemed like a good place to start, since it goes with everything.  I found a Youtube tutorial that made it look so simple, and I started by laying out the buttons how I wanted them.

Things started off okay.  I used 24-gauge wire and pliers, just as the crafter in the video recommended.  But about 1/3 of the way through, it broke!

I wasn't in the mood to start over, so i turned into a pendant.  Now I just have to figure out what I want to string it on to.

Not a 100% successful first attempt, but a good start!

First Stitches

I learned how to apply fusible interfacing, using a video I found on Youtube.  It's a 7-minute video, but the good part starts around the 5:00 mark.  I thought the idea of using a wet pillowcase was pretty brilliant, so I decided to try it out.  (Works like a charm!)

Up Past My Bedtime...

Is there such thing as a sewer's high?  'Cause I think I might be on one.

This is not what I should be doing on the night before the last week of school...

...or maybe it is...

...This weekend has been a preview of the vacation that is to come!

Tada!  Cut up fabric.

Tonight, around 9:00 p.m., I:

1. Opened a dress pattern I purchased last month.
2. Tried to read over the instructions inside.
3. Decided the pattern was too complicated and folded it back up.
4. Spent an hour googling on the internet for an easier pattern.
5. Came to the conclusion that while there may be easier patterns, there wasn't one with the same fabric requirements as the one I purchased.
6. Decided to give it a whirl anyways, and started pinning and cutting out pattern pieces.
7. Cut out and labelled every part of the dress that I'm making in the main colour.
8. Folded it all neatly and put it in a Ziploc bag for tomorrow...or whatever day I decide I'm brave enough to sew.

The pattern I'm using is the Diane Kimono Dress.  So far, so good.  I figure I'm either going to end up with:
a) a great dress for traveling or;
b) super cute pyjamas.

Three hours later, I'm packing it in for the night.  If this really was summer vacation, I'd probably just stay up until I had at least most of the dress sewn together.  Ah, well.  I'll save the all-nighters for next week.

NotMartha Makes NutMuffins

We have a shelf and a half of gorgeous cook books and I love looking at them.  Rarely, however, do I use a cookbook when I'm looking for an actual recipe.  I tried tonight: I found our Company's Coming: Muffins and More book on the shelf and found a banana muffin recipe right away.  Alas, the recipe called for sour cream and margarine or butter and we were a little short on all of those things.  Cook books are for lookin'; the web is for cookin'.  A quick google search for "banana muffins oil" led me to a four-star recipe on the Food Network's site.

So....not only did the muffins turn out great, but I also noticed that a magnetic clip had attached itself to the side of the muffin tin before the muffins went in the oven.  The house smells like sweet, mellow banana-y goodness, not hot melting plastic.  (Oh yeah!)

Banana Walnut Muffins.  Yum!

The one drawback to finding recipes online is that you can't rely on batter splatters to help you find the page next time you get the urge to bake your favourite treats.  Here's hoping that the recipe's still online the next time I go hunting for it.

Why I got the urge to bake tonight, I dunno.  It was a sweltering one today.  We hit 35 degrees in our classroom.  Perhaps it was a little bit warmer outside, but at least outdoors there's a breeze!  I'm trying to enjoy the last few days with my students this year, but--if this picture is any indication--I'm looking a bit rough.  Ready for the holidays!

...and of course there's nothing like a heatwave to make me want to cozy up with a big ball of yarn.  I'm eyeing up this big red fella...

...and this bobbly blanket pattern.  Hopefully I'll get it started soon!

Sweet Little Dress

Hello, blogland!  I have made it through yet another round of report cards and I'm still smiling.  Of course, I'm completely exhausted and most of tonight's after-school activities have involved sitting on the couch and tinkering around on my laptop.  I've been pinning up a storm over on Pinterest, and while most of my pins revolve around Classroom Management and Organization ideas for next year, I've also found a lot of fun crafty ideas, including some goodies for my DIY Jewelry and For The Home boards. 

I've got a few crafts ready to blog, but I had finished photos of this one, so here it is!  My niece's first birthday was this weekend.  Here's part of her gift: a pink pinafore, crocheted in Bernat's Cottontots.  The pattern is called "Sunshine Baby Dress," from crochet genius Linda Permann and it's from the May-June 2010 issue of Crochet Today.  Since the pattern was written for a different kind of yarn, I swapped the recommended J hook for an H hook to make the pattern work.

I had a little fun playing around with Keynote and creating some funky photo displays (so simple).  Unfortunately, I took the photos on a very cloudy Saturday morning, so there's a few different shades of pink on display.

I like the lacy elements along the neckline...and also that this dress is worked in one continuous piece from the top down.  I'm also hoping that this can be a piece of clothing that goes from being a dress to a hippie top.  (The armholes are nice and big.)  I also think this thing feels super-comfy: it's 100% cotton and seamless!

Here's hoping it fits the birthday girl. ;)

I'm sharing this post on: Craft-o-maniac, 

Liebster

Thanks to Hanni from Hungary for giving me a Liebster award!  Hanni's blog is called "Hannicraft."  It is mostly crochet--gorgeous, gorgeous crochet (I love her bags!)--but she is branching out into some sewing projects as well.  

The Liebster award is a pay-it-forward deal.  Now that I have been given the award, I can pass it on to up to five blogs.  Here's my list (in no particular order!):

1. My sister-in-law, Ashley, has taken up blogging as a hobby in recent months.   A new mom and a newbie crafter, her "Sewrite" blog is a entertaining and informative combination of crafting scrapes and successes and commentary on parenting a child with Sensory Processing Disorder.
2. Beth @ Visions of Sugar Plums - Beth hosts a "Fibers on Friday" each week, where she invites you to post your current fiber arts projects, whether they're finished or not!  I like her "no pressure" approach. :) She also makes great socks that make me want to take up knitting.  Oh, and recently she has posted a lot of cute ideas for children's parties.
3. My sister-in-law's sister, also named Lindsay, has a food blog that I check out every so often.  I'm delighted to find that she's crossing over into craft blogging lately (cake decorating and knitting...nice combo!) and I look forward to reading even more of that. :)
4. My Ottawa buddy Kendra also has a food blog, called Kendra's Kitchen Musings.  She's the one who inspired me to get back on the blogwagon....and now I wish she was posting more frequently!  She writes just likes she talks--cheerful and folksy.  Take a read and I'm sure you'll be wishing you could take up a conversation with her.

I've stopped at four because most of the blogs I read have more than 200 followers...and I'm a stickler for the rules, apparently.  I guess I need to keep my eyes open for some fun new blogs out there. :)

About the Liebster scoop

The Liebster is an award presented to bloggers with fewer than 200 followers. It’s about spreading some love to the little guys in blogland. The name means 'the dearest' in German. The rules are quite simple:

1. Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog.

2. Link back to the blogger who presented the award to you.

3. Copy and paste the blog award on your blog.

4. Present the Liebster Blog Award to 5 blogs of 200 followers or fewer who you feel deserve to be noticed.

5. Let them know they have been chosen by leaving a comment at their blog.

Garden Tour

Okay, so I need a little help here.  I'm attempting to green up my thumb this summer.  I need some help identifying some plants that are growing in my garden and some tips on what to do with the rest of them.  Here's what we've got:

This one is in okay shape.  I just wish it had more purple blooms.  Don't you like the milk can it's sitting on?  I do. :)

Our little curbside tree is greening up nicely.  What are these things called?

Here are some of the hostas I transplanted from my sister's farm yesterday.

The hanging basket on the left is blooming and beautiful.  The other one is getting too much sun?  I just drenched it in water, picked off all the dead-heads and I moved it to a shadier spot.  Hopefully that helps?

  Now we venture into the scraggly backyard.  Until last weekend, this was duck territory, so I had to abandon all hope of getting anything done back there.  I like how even the weeds look pretty when a few forget-me-nots get thrown into the mix.

Taking the prize for both the ugliest and prettiest thing in the backyard, here is the clematis that was blooming and tangled in the debris from last year.  I scooped it all up and tied it to the trellis.  I guess it will have to do for this year.

Here's the other clematis.  It hasn't bloomed yet, but it's a lovely rich purple.  I scooped it up and tied it, too.  The hole is the duck den. :)  Dan cleared it all out yesterday.

More hostas that I plunked in amidst the ground cover and some purple "stuff" at the back that I transplanted.  Anybody know what this is called?

See what I mean about prettiest and ugliest plant?

The pretty part of the clematis again.

Weeds?  What is this stuff?  I think the lighter stuff is Bishop's Weed, which we have as ground cover in the front beds.  As for the rest....please help me identify it!

What's this green stuff?  It's growing in a pot in my backyard.  Should I plant it or kill it?

Please identify these purple thingies.

There are some pink thingies beside the purple thingies.  They look similar, but the pink ones are much shorter.

...and the white ones.  Are they the same stuff, too?

Is this thyme?  (Non-edible?  And anyways it's by the sidewalk so everybody's dog has "watered" it...I'd never eat it anyway!)

Is it just me, or is something digging in my front beds?

Is it just me, or does my dinner look delicious?  (While I watered and fixed up the flowers tonight, Dan made dinner.  YUM.)