cake plate love....

Lately, I have been loitering on the Pinterest sight far longer than necessary.

I'm sure some might say it's unnatural and unhealthy for someone to sit and covet  admire all the pretty things on there, but I think I will take my chances with it all!

Well.......on Pinterest, I learned a valuable skill. And that skill is.....cake plate making! Yay me! :)

All you need to make your own cake plate is;

1. some sort of pedestal.

2. a plate

3. Spray paint, if desired.

4. some special glue

So, off to the thrift store I went, in search of a plate and a pedestal.

I found this candle holder for the pedestal......

And this plate........

I loved the green and black so I knew I wasn't going to paint the plate, but the candle holder definitely needed paint. Flat black to be exact.......

With a pencil, I traced around the candle holder on the bottom of the plate.

 I eyeballed the center, but a more perfectionist type might want to measure.

I  put a thin bead of silicone adhesive around my pencil mark.

Less is more when it comes to this kind of glue.....learn from my error here, folks. :)

I let it dry for a few hours and then flipped it right side up.

Easy, Peasy.

For now, this cake plate will hold Mr. Jack.

On account of I won't be baking any cakes in the near future.....on account of my unattractive mid-section girth.......on account of my emotional eating.

But a girl never knows when a cake may be needed....like for a decoration or something.

(or an emotional break down! haha!)

With the silicone adhesive, it is safe to hand wash these babies.

If you opt to spray paint the plate, put a paper doilie or other barrier between the cake and plate.

Have fun!

Multi-tasking.

There used to be a time when I could have several projects going and

be able to finish them all in a timely manner.

That ability has somehow, strangely and inexplicably, left me.

It must be my advanced age of 40-something...(yes, it's finally time to stop pretending I am 29),

 or the fact that I am in the throws of dealing with my fourth teenager,

 or I have developed some sort of "project ADHD".

Since deciding to stay in Arizona, we thought it might be "fun" to paint the inside of our house. We had previously painted the bedrooms but the monumental job of painting

the rest of the house has been procrastinated.

We have VERY high ceilings, and it just seemed like too big of a task

for our resident princess and yours truly.

Craig generously offered up his services and we dug in. We did get most of it done before he left for his latest track meet, but there is still so much to do. The trouble is, now I want to do other things instead of painting, but I HAVE to get this project finished now, or it just might stay in its present state forever.

And, that is a prospect that makes me feel just a liiittttlllle but crazy.

So yesterday, I was doing some touch up when I happened to walk past a mirror and saw this.....  

A big ol' smudge of paint in my hair.

Then I remembered a conversation that Ragan and I had

a few months ago while coming home from school.

Enjoy....

(Ragan) "Mom.....have you been painting today?"

(Me) "No, Why?"

(Ragan) "You have something white all in your hair."

(Me) "What? Where is it?! Can you get it out?"

(Ragan) "It's on the underside of your ponytail. OOoooo, I don't know if I can get it....It's a lot."

Ragan reaches over to touch my hair

(Ragan) "OH.MY.GOSH!!!"

(Me) "What?!? What is it?!?"

(Ragan) "Mom. You have a HUGE chunk of gray hair! Actually, it's WHITE. Here, let me pull one out so you can see."

She, (not so gently) plucked a hair and handed to me. Sure enough, it was white. Actually, "translucent" was probably a better word. Miss Clairol and I had an early morning meeting the very next day.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I just walked past the mirror again. This time, it looks like I have a little "crazy" in my teeth. As soon as I get that out, I start painting again. ;)

What do you do in the summertime?

There is a song that I learned as a child that began with the question,

"What do you do in the summertime, when all the world is green?"

Well, I don't believe the person who composed that song ever came to Arizona in the summer. Ha ha! There sure isn't anything green once summer hits here.

We have been enjoying cooler temps these last few weeks, though. It's technically spring all over the rest of the United States, but it seems Arizona skips right over spring and jumps right into summer.

We just finished up with preschool so my summer has officially started. I sure am going to miss all of these cute little people coming to my my house 3 times a week!

We always take a silly face picture when we have our class pictures. It seems to get all those funny faces "out of the way" before we take our serious one.

With the warmer weather approaching, the bugs start appearing.

A huge grasshopper came to visit recently.

Rusty had some fun with it before I set it free.

I also managed a finish last week.

I found a small shelf at a thrift store right about 3 years ago. It looked like it had been out in a garage or something because it was dirty and stained. But that was a bonus for me as it was only $5!

I painted it tan and stuck it in our master bathroom toilet room, affectionately referred to as "The Library".

Since there isn't a place to store TP in there and to avoid one having to fetch some from another place causing one to potentially be caught with their pants down (literally), this shelf served its purpose well.

But, it wasn't that attractive. Soooo, I had the mister cut a top for it and I gave it a little face lift.

Now that's much better to look at while one is......er....."brainstorming". ;)

Oh....I almost forgot.

I have a little secret.......

I found another chair!  

Isn't it awesome?!?! I can't wait to get started on the make over!

i can't find the off switch.

For my tired old brain that is.

Craig and I have been in quite a bit of turmoil about the recent job offer he's been given.

We haven't stopped talking about the possiblity of this job for about 9 months.

This job opportunity has been something that we have been hoping for and praying for.

We have been wanting to get back to Utah since we moved to Arizona 5 years ago.

Now that the choice was ours to make......

......we felt it was finanlly going to happen.

At least that's what we thought.

We wanted this.

We prayed for this.

Seriously, I felt like I might die if I couldn't get back to Utah.

I missed our kids.

And for reasons beyond our control, the new job  just.wouldn't.fit.

And, suddenly, Craig's present job seemed to fit perfectly.

Now, although I will continue to miss our families, especially our grown children,

I feel a peace that I know, comes from my Heavenly Father.

I feel he is letting me know that he is aware of our feelings.

He knows me.

He knows my family.

And more importantly,

He knows what we need.

All of us.....

What you need.

What I need.

 What everyone needs.

For that perfect knowledge, I am exceptionally thankful.

So, we begin our journey anew here is sunny (and decidedly hotter than I prefer)

Tucson, Arizona.

With all of this decision making, I haven't felt much like creating.

There isn't anything that sucks the creativity out of me more than a stressful situation.

It seems like I've had my hands in several different projects but haven't completed hardly any of them.

Sooooooo, I decided I would show some of the things I am almost done with! :)

Here are two quilt tops waiting for me to finished up.

I sure hope they don't have to wait too long!

 I joined a pinkeep swap over at Ravenwood Whimsies.
My swap partner is Patti from Raspberry Lane Primitives. This is a little sneak peek for her.
I am sending this off to you tomorrow Patti.
I hope you like it! :):):)

 And here is a finish that I just got done today.

This is my "sewing chair" It is also the "hair cut chair" and the "extra guest at dinner" chair.

A long time ago, I started painting it red, but I didn't like it so I cleaned it all off.

 But, it seemed that it was meant to be red, because this is how the old gal looks now.

I believe she's much too pretty to have her "after" picture taken in the garage,

 but, due to her smelly stain smell, that's where she'll stay for a little while longer. 

I have big plans for all of these chairs I have been making over.

Now that I know we are staying put, I have to get busy filling up these empty bedrooms.

I'm thinking a guest room........and a sewing room........and a master bedroom re-do..........and a whole house paint job........and a......................

A Love Affair.

You may remember me mentioning my fondness for chairs.

Some might call it a borderline obsession.

But for the sake of argument, let's just call it a love affair.

My dad gave me a box of chair pieces several years ago. There were the makings of four matching chairs. The backs were in tact, but the seat and legs were all in pieces.

We brought them back from England in the late 70's.

They are so old that they were previously put together with dowel.

Craig and I (mostly me) got a wild hair to put one of them together. It has just gotten to the point that we had to do something with them or toss the whole bunch. This was the third house I had personally moved the box of parts to and I know my parents had moved them that many times or more.  

So we cut some dowel pieces and started wood gluing and clamping one of them back together.

It was a bit of a puzzle but we did it.

There were bits of the old upholstery, nails and tacks on the pieces.

We pulled them all out and filled the holes in and sanded it really good.

I  love the detail of the top piece.

Isn't it pretty??

The open part in the back is supposed to be upholstered

but the chair back is curved we didn't have any
"bendy" wood. ;)

My very handy hubby cut me a seat bottom for it. I sprayed the whole thing with a gloss black. I bought

some foam at Jo Ann's using my 40% off coupon. It ended up costing about $3.50. The fabric I used for the seat was a remnant of upholstery fabric. It was around $4.

Not too bad for a make over under $10!

Now I'm excited to get the other 3 done! My plan is to paint them all black but cover the seats in similar, but different fabrics. We will use them with the table in our kitchen nook.

Fun stuff!

Speaking of feedsacks......

I have another feed sack project to share!

I've been dragging around some vintage 9-patch blocks forever. I found them on ebay for about $7!

They are all hand stitched.

I decided to use the disappearing 9-patch pattern and make them into a little lap quilt.

Mary @ Gettysburg Homestead just finished up a great tutorial with this pattern. http://gettysburghomestead.blogspot.com/

First, you cut your 9-patch in half down the middle squares, then turn your block and cut it in half again down the middle square. (Sorry-I should have taken a picture of this step)

 The thing I like about this pattern is there are several ways to arrange your blocks after they're cut....

You can sew them back together like this-

 Or like this-
(I chose this way)

 Or like this-

 Then you sew them all together!

I quilted in the ditch for this one. It went fast and easy. Two of my favorite things!

This is my favorite block in this quilt. :)

 I put a small checked gingham sashing on it and bound it with a small rosebud print. I like how the black anchored it but it has all f the bright colors found in the blocks.

 I think I am really warming up to all of these fun colors.

Have a great day!

a vintage finish.

About 5 years ago, I bought a vintage quilt top on eBay. It was an incomplete top so it was very inexpensive. When I got it, I didn't quite know what to do with it, but what I did know was that I loved the colors. I was made from old feed sacks, which delighted me all the more.

I could see where the seams of the sacks had been picked apart

and there were stamps like this on a few of the blocks.

I loved the "make do" quality of it.....

See here where two of the light blue hexies are the same color but not the same pattern?

 I like to think of the thrifty hands that pieced this together using the last bits of fabric they had. :)

Since I couldn't make any sort of a quilt out of the top I decided to take it apart and make a few things with it. First, I unpicked enough blocks to make a portion of the quilt into a table runner.

Then, I took two of the unpicked blocks and framed them. I found these frames at goodwill and spray painted them black. Then I used spray adhesive to attach them to the fabric backing.

I took the largest piece for the runner and machine quilted it.

I used a stippling stitch with a red variegated thread.

When that was finished, I couldn't decide how I would bind the edges.

I finally decided to measure and cut straight edges, because some of the border hexies were so uneven.

 Then I bound it with a black pin dot fabric.

It was a ginormous pain in the neck to sew all those corners,

and it took a whole lot longer than I want to talk about,

BUT, I'm so glad it's finished!

 I like how it is just the right size for our big table.

And I loooove the red!

 I hope that whoever pieced this all those years ago, likes how it ended up. 

 I am certainly grateful for all the work that went into it before it came into my life!

Chair make over #1....and some other stuff!

It's no secret that I have a "thing" for chairs. Every time I stop at a thrift store or yard sale, chairs are always one of things I'm on the lookout for. I like to have a lot of chairs and fill them with family and friends. I love the idea of sitting down at the table for a meal and having to scoot out to add a chair or two! 

Another thing  I love about chairs are their differences....There are just SO many kinds of chairs.

When I was younger, my family lived in England.

 I believe my obsession with  appreciation of all things old began there.

My parents acquired some antiques while we were there.

It seems that over the years, a lot of them have been passed on to me.

I have happily received them. (Craig-not so happy! ha ha!)

Here is the first make over in a series of several chair make overs.

This simple little chair is one that we brought back with us from England.

 There were two of them originally, but I used one outside in our garden many years ago

and it had to be thrown out because of weather related issues.

I am sad about that now, but anyway....

At first, I  weaved old ties together to form a "seat" and stapled them to the underneath side. It looked super cool, but after a few behinds sat on them, they began to sag.

So, I started over with a new approach.

The whole thing got a coat of black spray paint.

After that, I sanded the edges and rubbed it with a nice gel stain.

While that was drying, I attached a few layers of batting to the piece of wood that my most dear and helpful husband cut for me to use as a seat. (I used spray adhesive to do this)

The chair is kind of a smallish one so I didn't want the seat to be too padded.

Then, I used a $3 remnant of upholstery fabric to cover the batting.

I used the spray adhesive here too, but also used some staples to secure the fabric underneath.

And, here is the big reveal....

 

I will add a little throw pillow and some other things with color as soon as

I get enough gumption to drag all of my spring/Easter decorations out!

Another thing that I have been working on is re-framing this sampler.

I got it at a thrift store about 10 years ago. I didn't have that many choices as far as framing it back then. To have it professionally framed would have cost me a lot and the sampler is just an odd enough size that it was impossible to find anything already made.

 So, here is how it looked before.

 I enlisted my husbands expertise in making a frame for it that would be the right size,

but one that would still let me use the glass from the old frame.

He routered the wood a little deeper on the insides of the frame so the glass would fit....

 Sides of the frame

And top and bottom of the frame (I have no idea what that fuzzy bit of stuff is there...gross!)

 This frame also got a coat of black spray paint and gel stain.

I like it much better now.

I just love making over things that someone else has given away!

I am linking up with Kindra again this week. She is having another Thrifty under $10 Tuesday linky party.

Go on over and see what everyone has been up to.

A Make-over

About a year ago, Craig agreed to help an athlete on his track team by letting her store some things in our garage. She was moving back to her home state and couldn't take everything.

Months and months later, we still had it all.

We found out that she was no longer interested in driving all the way back to AZ to fetch her things.

We then got rid of a lot of it, but this old coffee table remained.

Since I needed a project, I decided to give it a make over.

So, I sanded, painted and stained it.

And here it is in our bedroom.

I'm not sure if I like it right there, but I thought we could use it for a bench or something? Or put a few gatherings on it?? I don't know....We'll see what happens.

But I do love the red.

 And it was free!-my favorite part!

Our bedroom is such a mis-match of things right now and I just might get rid of all of it one of these days and start over! LOL!

Kindra at At Home with K is having a linky party. It's all about make overs done for under $10!

 That's my kind of party! So go take a look!! 

 (Just click on the link above my picture.)

Calling all turkeys!

Let me be clear....I am not calling any of you a turkey.

It's just that I love the whole "turkey" theme of Thanksgiving.

I love putting my turkey's out to display after storing away all the remnants of Halloween.

This little guy is one of my favorites.

And, this big fabric turkey makes me happy when I bring him out of the storage bin and sit him on the shelf. He is holding a rather large sign, but I think he's doing a great job at it.

I would like to believe that he is personally reminding us to remember to be thankful! :)

I love the turkey theme so much that I dedicate a whole preschool day to turkeys.

I call it.....(wait for it....) TURKEY DAY!

We make our own little turkey puppet to sing with one of my favorite Thanksgiving songs.

Albuquerque the Turkey

sung to "My Darlin, Clementine"

It goes a little something like this.....

Albuquerque, he's my turkey,

And he's feathered and he's fine.

And he wobbles and he gobbles,

And I'm awfully glad he's mine.

He's the best pet that you'll ever get,

Better than a dog or cat,

Albuquerque, he's my turkey,

And I'm awfully glad of that.

Albuquerque, he's my turkey,

He's so cozy in his bed,

Because for our Thanksgiving dinner,

We had scrambled eggs instead.

I know you will be singing this little ditty all day long now.

But.....just go with it.

 :):):)

some finishes.

I have been spending a lot of time with my sewing machine lately.

I think I've run the old girl right into the ground actually.

 I am hoping that if I give her a little rest, she will start acting like she should again!

The tension is all wonky and I have unpicked my fair share of tangles threads.

Because, seriously, if she's a goner, I will be really sad....and bored.....

Anyway, tomorrow is the volleyball banquet for the high school. Makenzie coached the freshman team this year and had a total blast. The coaches do a little something for each one of their players. Makenzie wanted to something personal for them. So, she asked if I would help her make a little blanket for each one of them. We went and got a variety of those soft and cuddly fabrics and made blankets.

I did an overcast stitch around 15 of those babies!

Oh,  but they are cute. And soft. And cuddly. (I'm thinking I might need one for myself!)

She also put together a little bag full of candy and a lotion for them

 and she tied it on with the ribbon that you see in the picture.

 Also, thanks to Makenzie, I got another project done.

She is always wanting to do big projects....projects like painting a room.

She suggested we recover a chair that is Ragans room that has been waiting to be recovered for a long time.

Last year, for Christmas, one of Ragans gifts was some fabric to recover it. I got the chair at a thrift store (for $5!) when Ragan was in the 5th grade. At the time, her room was full of bright colors so we covered it with purple fun fur.

But, now that she is all grown up it needed an update to match her new room.

This is how it looked purple!

This is how it looked when I picked it up at the thrift store. (except that it wasn't disassembled!)

And now, here it is......

 all

shiny and new!

The legs were really a light colored wood so I spray painted them.

Ragan loves how it looks.

 And, that makes me happy. :)

Thanks, Kenz, for your gentle nudging. :):)