MERRY Blocks

MERRY Christmas!  Or MERRY whatever you might like to MERRY.

I had a really cute set of FALL blocks from a Super Saturday event a few years ago.  I wanted something fun for Christmas.  These were made out of a spare piece of fencing I had in the garage (yes, there's a large random pile of wood that I have collected from the cull wood bin at Home Depot.)  I cut the piece into random sizes and cut out some random letters using my Cricut.  No, I'm not a super cool vinyl expert like all the chicks in Utah.  I'm old school - paper and mod podge.  There was a little sanding and painting involved - but I think this one is easy enough to replicate without a tutorial.  

Happy Crafting!

Dresser into Dress-up Closet

I apologize in advance for these TERRIBLE pictures I am about to post.  My cell phone camera is horrible, and my real camera isn't operational at the moment.  Therefore, you and I must endure blurry photos - often with a glaring flash that detracts from the end result.  

With that disclaimer, I present to you the underused dresser in the kids area of my basement:

It is. . . large.  The drawers hardly open anymore and it has become a catch-all despite my efforts to label and organize in kid friendly ways.

After some Pinterest motivation and inspiration, I headed to the basement armed with a rubber mallet and a screw gun.  I removed the drawers, then removed the runners for the drawers (power tool moment!)  Then, I had the pleasure of using the rubber mallet to knock the shelf out.  When the entire right side of the dresser was barren, it was time to head to the garage.

Who do you know who just happens to have some random PVC pipe hanging out in the garage, along with some hardware for hanging up closet rods?  Me - that's who!  The items had been intended for a different project that had become obsolete - this remake was meant to be!  With my handy tape measure and chop saw (another power tool moment!) I hacked a hunk of PVC pipe the right size to create a kids size closet rod.

I headed back to the basement, screwed in the hardware, slid in the PVC pipe, then stood back to admire my suddenly more useful piece of furniture in the basement.  Good-bye catch-all - hello dress-up!

The cupboard side (on the left) has bins for holding hats, gloves, boots and all of the other accessories one needs to become the superhero within!

It's not beautiful, but it's super useful!

We're Here!

Well, I'm here!  Did anyone else imagine Horton Hear's a Who when they read the title?  That's what I was thinking of when I wrote it.

It's not as though crafting has died in my house - it's just continuing on undocumented - which, I know - is a monumental loss to humanity as a whole.  However does the world continue without my random, occasional posts?

So, here's the deal.  Between our work schedules, Penny and I don't have a ton of time to get our craft on.  The crafting continues - lonely, bleak at my dining table, or in my cold basement.  Although I often have the company of my sweet little Ryan to hang with - and believe me, he wants to help - it's just not the same!

As I was crafting for Christmas it started to feel like I was working in a sweat shop - well, without the sweat (it's really cold in my basement - where the belt sander is located - and even colder in the garage - where the chop saw lives - seriously, my breath was visible.)  There's something comforting about that extra touch of companionship.

I spent hours, and hours, and hours - if you've ever been in my basement, you'd understand - organizing and cleaning a crafting area.  Take hours of work, my aching back and several shelves/cupboards that Penny gave me and presto - I now have a totally awesome crafting area to work at.  No more hauling stuff up and down the stairs to work - although the saws are all still in the garage, travel will still be required, just not as much!  My husband is excited that family meals are returning to the dining table!

You can now rejoice (I heard that) and celebrate the awesome creations that will flow forth from my new craft area!  (Cheers, roaring and accolades abound!)  

With that being said, I will go forward and post some badly photographed projects I've recently finished!

This one time, when I used to blog . . .

So, I plopped down at the computer, determined to do some writing, and discovered that I'd been completely neglecting my blogs.  And I mean neglecting!  It's not like I've missed a few weeks, or maybe even a couple of months - it's been over a year for some of my blogs.  Ry-Ry - my littlest - is still a baby in his blog pics and his most recent post was in 2009!

So, it's time to get a grip and get back to it!

I haven't been particularly crafty, more clean-y than crafty, lately.  And I'm not sure that our frosting/fondant making marathon on Thursday qualifies as crafty either.

Clever it is!  Random money saving tips from Sara!  You know you've been wanting to hear it!

1.  Switch from using the measuring cup that comes with your detergent to a measuring cup that is the exact size you actually need to do a load of laundry.  At our house, we always wash full (large) loads of laundry.  So, I filled the scoop/cup for the Tide detergent to the "proper fill line" - there are various lines on the cup that comes with the detergent - needed for my load of laundry, then dumped it into a liquid measuring cup in the kitchen.  I discovered that I needed to use 2/3 cup of detergent for a normal load of laundry.  I chucked the cup that came with the Tide into the trash and use a 2/3 scoop (which stays in the detergent bucket) to measure.  I was using an extra 1/3 cup of detergent all the time, and who knows how much my spouse was using!?  Small change, long term savings!

2.  Sign up for Groupon alerts - either email or the phone app.  (I love the phone app myself!)  Look at the deals every day.  It only takes a minute to look through the deals, and we have bought some great ones for the summer.  Recently they had $4.00 movie tickets through Fandango, and a $30.00 one year family pass to the Butterfly Pavilion!  It's a great way to stretch the entertainment budget a little further!

3.  Are you planning your menu for the week yet?  I know, it can be a bit boring or tedious - but it saves so much time and money in the long run!  If you don't do a dinner menu yet, start!  (Now, I will repent my laziness and go write up this weeks menu myself!)

I know it's not much - but that's what I've got at the moment!  Talk to you soon (well, sooner than last time!)

glittery pinecones and glittery fingers!!

For one of my Michaels craft submissions I made a BEA-utiful and sparkly pine cone candle holder. The three mystery items for that week were as follows 1-Pine-cones 2-Candles 3-Glitter!!!! I mulled over ideas for a while I knew everyone would probably try and make some sort of centerpiece so I tried to shake it up a bit. I perused some online pine-cone crafts, and found one that looked like a topiary, whala I found my jumping off point. I decided to make the color scheme monochromatic using only white and red, of course as you can see I failed my 2 toned color scheme and snuck some green in there, oh well anything to be pretty.
Here is a list of supplies I used Pine cones,white acrylic paint, crystal and peridot glitter By Martha Stewart, Hot Glue, Glue gun. Tacky spray. 3 2 1/2"Foam Balls, 1 8" foam disk, 1 12x12 piece green paper, 1 12x12 green and white stripe paper. 2 3/8" dowels, 3 taper candles, 2 sprays of red berries, 3 sprays tiny green berries, green sparkly ribbon 1" wide, 2 large green leaves, 1 pine spray.
I started out the day before painting the pine-cones white, using a solution of 3 parts water to 1 part acrylic paint. mix well and dunk the pine cones into the solution shake off the excess paint and leave to dry on newspaper. the next day or after they were completely dried I took the foam balls and hollowed out a hole for the candles, I then glued the pine cones to the foam balls with hot glue. This process takes a while I had 2 glue guns going to speed things up.I covered the ball leaving the bottom open as you can see to accomodate the dowel, and because you can't tell that the very bottom is covered. After I was done I glittered everything. Using Tacky spray I liberally covered the pinecone balls. I brought them indoors and sprinkled as much of the crystal glitter as would stick, over a newspaper of course to catch the excess. Using the same method I glittered the tiny green berries, the large leaves and the pine spray with the peridot glitter. I made 3 tiny bows and 1 large bow with the green ribbon and set aside.
Next I cut the wood dowels into 7" 4" 2" lengths and inserted the dowels into the bottom of the foam balls. I took the dowels out of the balls and filled the holes with lots of hot glue then reinserted the dowels. Next I traced a circle around the foam disk onto the green paper I cut out the circle and glued it to the top of the disk using the tacky spray. I then cut 2, 1 1/4" strips of striped paper and glued them to the circumference of the foam disk using hot glue. I eyeballed the placement of the dowels and made a mark where I wanted them to go on the disk. I inserted the dowels then removed them again to fill the hole with hot glue to reinforce the dowel. Once the glue was set I continued decorating the topiaries by filling in the spaces between pinecones with clusters of red and green berries. I took the green pine sprig and glued it to the base then I glued the 2 large leaves on either side on top of the pine sprig. next I layered 2 berry sprays over the leaves. last I finished off the center of the spray with the large bow. I inserted the candles and glued on the tiny bows at the base of the candles. Whew done!!! just make sure if your burning the candles not to let them get too low, the centerpiece is NOT flameproof!!

Michaels crafting bonanza week 3

As my sweet Sarah a fore mentioned, I am attempting to win us a fabulous cruise From Michaels. Here's the catch I have to craft a new item every week. each week they reveal 3 mystery items. OOOh MYSTERIOUS!!!!! you construct a clever,unique, and hopefully cute idea, post it on their web site and a winner is chosen from that weeks entries. The weekly winner gets a 100$ gift card to TA DA! of course Michaels. After the seven weeks of crazy up all night hopped up on Coke Zero so I can hurry up and submit this thing before the deadline crafting is over. They finally announce a Grand Prize winner out of the 7 weekly winners, and hopefully one of them will be me!!!! I plan to submit something every week. Alas I can not submit more than one entry a week so I have to make it count. Unfortunately I missed the first week but I did manage to get in my entry for week 2 just under the wire. the mystery items for that week was scrapbooking paper, any glue, and Chargers (The ones that go behind plates not phone chargers, witch is what I would have thought if they had not shown a picture) My Idea was to stack the 2 chargers support them with paper columns and make a stage for the Nutcracker ballet. Cute Right? Well I got a little busy and didn't get around to my project because of all the stuff going on that weekend. I decided to go online and see when the weeks deadline was. I still had 2 hours!!! I grabbed my stuff and in a frenzy made my project as fast as I could I have to admit it was not up to my standards. I just didn't have the time to add any more. I submitted my project and that made me feel good even though I wasn't 100% satisfied. Accomplishing any task these days fills me with a great sense of accomplishment (don't ask). Well I didn't win but I am hopeful, the winners submission wasn't that much cuter than mine would have been if I had more time. So I still have a chance. I think I am going to keep my little Ballerina and give her stage a little more pizazz just for me . I'll post a picture when I have made the changes. Now for this weeks entry!! Mystery Items: pine cones, candles, and glitter. Super cute but limited, I will have my work cut out for me, trying to make it new and original. wish me luck cyber friends!!!!

Would You Care For a Cookie?

Easy Cake-Mix Cookies

When it comes to baking, MissPenny takes the cake!  She bakes the most delectable delights!  I'm gaining pounds just thinking about the cake she made for her hubby's birthday!  Anyway, back to the present.  Since I don't have anything particularly crafty to share (even though I'm wrapping up the repaint of the living room/hall area of the house. . . which just gave me a cool idea) I did want to at least share something!  So, here's a simple recipe my mom has been playing with and found to be quite handy!

Ingredients: 

• 1 box of cake mix (I like the ones with pudding in the mix - but it doesn't matter)
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup of oil
• (maybe a tbsp of water if necessary)
• 1 tsp. vanilla or almond extract (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350*.  Mix the box of cake mix, eggs, and oil together with an electric mixer.  It should be moist enough by itself, but if necessary you can add a tablespoon or so of water to help soften the dough. (Cake mix with pudding already in it tends to be very wet and sticky - it was messy to work with but came out great!) You can roll the dough into small balls and bake for 12 minutes at this point (cooking times may vary depending on your oven - at Mom's house it takes 20 minutes vs. only 12-14 minutes at my house) or get a little crazy with it by adding other ingredients!

Here are my favorite variations:

Cranberry-pecan Cookies - yellow cake mix version with almond extract, 1/2 cup dried cranberries and 1/2 cup chopped pecans!  So yum!

Peanut butter cookies - yellow cake mix version, 1 tsp. vanilla extract, and as much peanut butter as you'd like - stir until it smells and looks like peanut butter cookie dough!

Super chocolate cookies - double chocolate cake mix (with pudding in the mix) version, 1 tsp. vanilla, 1/2 cup of chocolate chunks!  SO GOOD!

Sugardoodles - the yellow cake mix version, rolled in cinnamon sugar before baking!

I've taken to jotting down the exact cook times for my oven since it varies so much from the recipe book.  I always tend towards undercooking my cookies - they stay moist longer if they aren't bricks to begin with!  Keep in mind that different cake mixes (brand wise) may be a little more wet/dry.

MissPenny will surely call this kind of baking the cheaters route - but I'll readily admit that I'm a cheater when it comes to cooking!