Back From The Beach

Hello fellow crafters! I'm home from being at the beach for nearly a week with my family and I have a case of the crafties! The trip was great but I'll be getting the craft ON very soon! I think I'm having withdrawals! Haha! The vacay was excellent, heck ANY time at the BEACH is AWESOME. Now that I'm settled in, I'm ready to get the projects started up and completed! 

Don't you just love the BEACH? Palm trees, sand, fresh salty air, the sound of the ocean... NATURE! I love it! The atmosphere is so much more peaceful at the beach. I'll give you a little peep at what I saw on my stroll to the beach each day! I was trying to envision what type of house I would want if I ever had the opportunity to move to the water! Hmmm!

Here are two cottages with more modern features.   

 

Here are two older ones. They all blend so well though!

I don't think I saw two cottages that looked the same. I love that about the beach. The houses all look different and all paint colors are acceptable! 

The house below was my favorite house to walk by! I really liked the fresh style of it. It was a very simple bungalow but it had a cool flare to it! 

I zoomed in just for you! It's got these cool zebra painted striped shutters, which I thought added a nice creative flare. It was not overdone. The shutters were such a simple touch that I thought it looked classy!

The shutters were more like panels in between the doorways but I think they were quite stylish!

Another pink house! See? It works at the beach.

Another fun thing I like to do at the beach is to check out the signs or names on the houses. I've been trying to come up with one too for the future! Wishful thinking but you never know! Some are really clever and I just think it adds great humor and creativity to these vacation homes. Some names tell a story about the owners. I couldn't capture all the clever signs I saw(I didn't want to look like a stalker!) but here are a few that I thought were cute for different reasons. 

If you had a beach house, what would your sign say?

Did Somebody Say Dessert??? Quick and Easy Dessert!

I Scream! You Scream! We All Scream For ICE CREAM SANDWICHES, and just in time for Labor Day cookouts! How's everybody hanging on this holiday weekend? I've been working on some home projects that I'll share soon but thought this dessert recipe might be appropriate for a weekend dessert! Sometimes you just have to take time away from decorating to eat dessert! 

This dessert is a quickie and I made it last night for a cookout. If you like whip cream and ice cream sandwiches, your sweet tooth will enjoy this!

Ingredients

24-ice cream sandwiches

1-large container of whipped topping

chocolate syrup

caramel syrup

nuts - optional

Using a large rectangular pan put down one layer of ice cream sandwiches. 

You may have to break one or two to fit them all.

Spread half the whipped cream over the layer. You'll cover more than I did. I accidentally used a small container of whipped cream and had to go back to the store for another one. 

After you spread the whipped topping, you can put a little chocolate and caramel.

Layer the rest of the ice cream sandwiches.

Cover with whipped cream and put some chocolate syrup and caramel.

You could do cute designs with it too but I wanted to make this quick and easy! Yum! If you make it, let me know how it turns out! I'd love to hear or hear how you might modify yours!

Can You Have Your Cake and Eat It Too?

Not if you get one of these!

It's a diaper cake! How is everybody doing? It has been another busy week but it's winding down! So going back to some old crafty projects, this is one I made a few years ago for a close friend who was having a baby boy. It's very easy! Just follow the simple steps below for the baby celebrating fun!

Supplies

• card board cake bottom
• paper lace doily
• a few skinny long wooden dowel rods
• rubberbands
• a regular pack of diapers - I buy them size 2 or 3 so they are bigger and take up more room and the new parents can enjoy the centerpiece for a little while.
• Ribbon - I used 2 rolls of wide ribbon from Wal-Mart and polka dotted from a craft store.
• Some sort of useful topper or items to hang off the ribbon

Roll the diapers and rubberband them, making three layers. Carefully put it together placing the dowel rods thru each layer to hold the layers together and finish with ribbon. You can do so many things with this. Be creative!

It makes for a great conversation piece, whether a centerpiece or gift for any new mommy!


Have a great weekend!

A Do It Yourself Bench Pad

I made this easy peasy bench seat cover tonight. Little by little I'm trying to dress things up around the house. Guess how much it cost me? Hmm. It was under $20.00! I wanted something shaped similar to the bench pad I found below. The striped one below is a Home Depot bench pad and this mammer jammer goes for $44.98. Woah! It's cute and all but that's highway robbery! 

If you're like me and don't know how to use a sewing machine you can fudge it and not sew at all! I have hand sewn a few things before but still haven't tackled the machine. That is on my long term list of things I want to learn!

So to make your own bench pad you'll need:

Foam Padding

T-Square

Electric Meat Knife

Fabric

Liquid Stitch Glue

Large Safety Pins

Measure out your padding and draw the lines to cut using a marker and the T-square for accuracy.

Time to pull out the electric knife!

Be sure to use the meat blade because you'll need the two separate serrated blades working together to cut through the foam. I tried the bread knife and it didn't work.

I made a mess of my edge! Boo hoo!

Hold the foam tightly, from the end you start cutting from so that you have a nice, clean cut. For me, it was trial and error with a lot of error and a lot of going back and shaving off more foam so there was a smooth edge to work with.  

Here was the FAIL part of my project. My iron is officially a craft iron now and ruined from the last project I did. There is glue on the iron and I accidentally got it on the microfiber fabric when trying to smooth out the wrinkles. Lov-e-ly! It was smack dab in the middle of the fabric too. Fortunately I had enough fabric on either side of the mishap that I was still able to use it for my bench cover. RELIEF because it took a while to find this fabric! Oh yeah, this fabric came from the scrap pile in Old Time Pottery. They have pretty good prices on fabric. You have to weed through the piles though to find the good patterns but it's worth it! 

Liquid Stitch - I feel like I'm cheating with this stuff but until I learn the sewing machine this is what I've got!

Once the foam was cut to size, I more or less wrapped it like a present, gluing it down with Liquid Stitch.

I used safety pins to add extra support. I used six total, four for the length of the bench and one on each end for the flaps on the sides.

That's all it took. It was easy as pie and adds a some warmth to the bench in the foyer. 

Getting Set Up To Sew

How have you been? What have you been up to? Hopefully you've been having some fun while the summer winds down. I just got back from a much needed break from work. I hadn't taken a vacation all year so I just spent a week with my parents and children at my parents' house and it was super nice to get away. 

It feels good to be home but it's always kinda sad to say goodbye to my mom and dad after a visit. They live 8 hours away so we don't get to see each other that much. Anyhow this time I inherited the piece of furniture below. It's bittersweet. It is a sewing machine that belonged to my grandmother who passed away nearly five years ago.  

I'm glad my parents offered me the sewing machine because I have been dying to learn to sew and it belonged to my Nana. I'm not sure how old it is but my Nana used it to make my mom and aunt's clothing when they were little! The machine is solid; I don't think they make em like this anymore! I would much rather have my Nana here to teach me to sew but it's something that is very special to me for sentimental reasons.   

The top of the table unfolds.

The sewing machine is attached and pops up.

Here it is popped up!

Here is a chair that I was given that was also my grandmother's. It's not exactly my taste but I am going to transform it to make it more my taste. I want to make it look more modern. I'll share once I have it complete.

 

I can't wait to start learning to sew. If anyone has any suggestions as far as lessons I'd love to hear. Has anyone been successful using YouTube or lessons online? OR did you take a class in a classroom setting? I'd love to hear any suggestions! Hope everyone is enjoying the end of summer!

Ta-da! Look What I Found!

It's already Wednesday! I'm always stating the OBVIOUS! What have you been up to? Working on any home renovations or crafty delights? Excuse my nerdiness. I am psyched because I have been to the gym three times since Saturday and  feel sore but so GOOD. I'm doing a free 7 day trial but I'm ready to join. I used to go to the gym 4-6 times a week and just haven't found a way to fit it in since having kids. I can't seem to find the motivation on my own to work out so this has got to be a lifestyle change. Anyhow enough personal stuff but I'm excited! 

Does anybody else enjoy making TO DO lists? I get so much satisfaction of making a list and marking items off the list! My dad got me hooked on a Franklin Covey day planner when I was high school and I swear by it!

As much as I'm on a computer between work and home, I found a very simple website that is a quick and easy TO DO list generator. http://123.tadalist.com/  is a great tool and you can log in from any computer. After signing up you create a user name and password and can start making to your own TO DO lists right away! Once you complete a task you simply click the bullet and it gets marked out. You can make several TO DO lists too so you're not limited to one or two.

I made a general TO DO list BELOW for your viewing pleasure! ha ha! I don't know if anyone else enjoys making lists but I couldn't live without them. 

Now, I don't have one of those new-fangled computer phones but I believe this is also an application you can download to an iPhone. I love it!

Make A One Of A Kind T-Shirt

How is everyone doing? I hope good! Okey-dokey after a long and busy weekend I'm finally able to sit down to post. I'm working on some new home decor and organizational things but after two FAIL projects this week, I took some time out today to put a smile on a little guy's face. 

To catch you up on the electronic part of the blog, I've been busy even though you haven't seen a post in over a week. ;) I've been doing some behind the scenes things like DECLUTTERING! Similar to so many things in my life, I junked up my site and HAD to spend some time cleaning up the mess. It's a learning curve and I'm trying NOT to do too many things at the same time! It's hard though!

For one thing, I have been trying to add a signature to my posts and haven't figured it out yet. GRR! I tried about 5 times via www.mylivesignature.com and it keeps coming out pixilated. I give up for the time being. I'll figure it out eventually.

So are you ready to see exactly how I put a smile on my kiddo's face??? Well I took him to see the movie smurfs for one thing but I surprised him this morning with the shirt he is wearing! It's a one and only Tow Mater t-shirt. No one else has one exactly like it so he thought it was pretty special. You wanna know how I made that happen??? Tee Hee! The secret is... drum roll please... IRON-ONS!

Iron-Ons are AWESOME! They are such a fun way to make a one of a kind t-shirt! Super cheap and very easy! 

What you need:

• a high res picture that you print to a printer - it's okay to do this as long as you aren't selling them for profit. as long as you do this for personal use, you're okay.
• cotton t-shirt (light colored works best! and you can get them for cheap at craft stores... A.C. Moore currently has them on sale four for $10.00.
• iron emptied of any water
• cardboard
• iron-on transfer paper to run through your printer

So here was the process and, by the way, I have taught myself some new things electronically to include more detail. I hope it helps!

This is the picture I saw first, which made me want to do a t-shirt for my son. I couldn't decide how to crop it so I continued looking for a MATER picture, and the instructions follow!

I simply googled tow mater. In doing so I clicked Images and Large both circled in red below. 

Several images of Mater came up, as you can see, and I chose the one below. I clicked on the image and saved it to my desktop. I named the file something I would recognize and I flipped the image. VERY IMPORTANT! Note: if there is ANY text in your image, you need to flip the image before printing so that it reads correctly when it prints.

Next I set up the image to print. See below for the settings I chose. I chose Full page so it was a good size on the t-shirt. I didn't want a small block of an image and I thought I might cut Mater out somewhat but had not decided yet.

Below is the package of transfer paper I used. Notice the bottom reads "Oops proof" with some of the letters backwards, as to remind us that we need to reverse the text as I noted above. They do have a return policy with Hanes t-shirts if you purchase them from a craft store and make a mistake, which is good to know! 

My photo is printed BELOW. 

I put the paper image on the t-shirt and played around with the placement.

I cropped the image with scissors, cutting out the top portion of the picture so that Mater's head was at the very top of the image.

Once I decided where I wanted to put Mr. Tow Mater, I ironed the t-shirt.

Be sure to empty ALL water from iron and set it on DRY to do the Iron-on.

Follow the directions on the transfer paper packaging. I put a good sized piece of cardboard inside the t-shirt so the image doesn't adhere to the back side of the shirt too.

I laid the image on the t-shirt, image side down, where I wanted it, and went to town ironing. 

I ironed with good pressure back and forth, up and down, all over the image for 180 seconds. 

After I was finished ironing, I let it cool before peeling the paper away.

The peeling part was fun! Just be sure to do it carefully.

I cautiously used both hands but had to use one hand to take the pictures! :) 

I see a Mater! WOOHOOO!

Yep, GIT-R-DONE!

We now have a Mater and one excited boy! 

I washed the shirt before he wore it anywhere and it looks superb!

Magnetic Chalkboard Pantry Door

I'm sorry I have been MIA for the past little bit. I have been under the weather for the past week and come to find out it's allergies. I've had two doctor appointments to hear the same thing. Who would have thunk it?!?!? I never would have suspected! I thought maybe laryngitis, strep or bronchitis. Just goes to show, you can never really self-diagnose!  Anyhow hopefully in the time I've been away from the computer, you have had some fun even with the higher than average temperatures we've been having. 

I'm excited to share my latest lil project! I took advantage of the inside of the pantry door to make use out of it by converting it into a magnetic chalk board! It works! 

You'll need:

Painters tape

Magnetic wall paint - I used Rust-oleum Magnetic Primer in a can from Lowe's.

Chalkboard paint - I used a small plastic jar of it bought at AC Moore. 

Paint brush or sponge and stir stick

Tape up the door panels.

Use caution when painting the magnetic primer. It has more of a paint thinner consistency so it's liable to drip.  Keep a damp paper towel nearby and put something like newspaper on the floor to catch drips. You could also be smarter than me and cover up the whole door except for the panels you intend to paint. Oh and use a face mask and make sure the kiddies are away because it's a little stinky during application.

The chalkboard paint comes in black or green and I chose black because I did my pantry labels in black. The magnetic paint only holds light weight sheets of magnets. It won't hold heavy duty ceramic types of magnets so keep that in mind. Both the magnetic and chalkboard paints are non-toxic too so they're safe for kids.

The primer went on gray. I did two coats of the magnetic primer and let it cure for 24 hours.

Then I painted on two coats of the chalkboard paint.

I let it dry for 24 hours.

Now the whole family can use the door for "to do" lists, recipes, ingredients you need to buy, magnets as long as they're light weight...

It's a fun, simple idea for any closet, cabinet or pantry door! The whole family will enjoy it!


I’m linking up to the Something to Talk About Link Party today. Go on over and see all the fabulous diy, crafts, furniture makeovers and more.

Hmmmmm! Indecisiveness and Randomness

Hello! How are you? Hope everyone had a great weekend! We had family in town so I was busy entertaining. It was a good time though.

Okay so first off I'm a little paranoid about writing now. At work last week we had a lesson on sharpening writing skills as a practice run for someone who is giving a presentation to a sales team to help with their writing skills. It took me back to about the 5th grade but it was very helpful. It was a great refresher and reminded me of all the things I do wrong writing. Now I want to put the lesson to use and write better and be more to the point. I find myself being too wordy when I get excited so just ignore me if I do that!

I am super excited to share a next project with you that I'm working on tonight while cleaning the downstairs. It's an easy project that the whole family will enjoy! I'll share it in my next post because I am still not quite finished. Can't wait!

In the meantime I am trying to decide what to do with some of this fabric. 

I have some ideas of new projects and I am playing with the fabric, moving it around the house trying to decide what to do with it. Part of my problem with any project is making decisions. Are you good at making decisions and following through? I will postpone something just so that I have no regrets. I want to make sure I am ready to proceed with a project therefore I question myself over patterns and designs for a while until I am ready to move on with it. I have several ideas for some of these fabrics I've just got to make up my mind but we'll see. Please stay tuned. I'll be posting as soon as I make some decisions and get to work! Can't wait! Until then...

Lightning Lighting

It's Tuesday night but for me it's like Wednesday night this week b/c I've got a 3 day weekend coming up. Yippee! I wanted to say thank you to all new followers and anyone who reads along! It is sincerely appreciated. I have many different simple projects I am working on and I post as often as I can! Here's a sneak peek at my last little project.

It has been a good week although I must be getting "blonder" with age. It's either that or "baby brain" that has gotten the best of me lately, I'm just not sure! Sunday I embarrassed myself terribly. I pulled out of the garage to run errands after being home for a little while from grocery shopping and drove up the street waving to several of my neighbors. When I got to the end of the street I stopped at the stop sign and then looked in my rear view mirror and realized I had a 12 pack of double rolls of tp sitting on top of my trunk. Now all our neighbors know what brand of toilet paper we're using. Leave it to me to be a lame brain! I guess it could have been worse but how embarrassing, and now I'm sharing it with you guys! Oh well, I'm sure I gave all my neighbors a laugh, I know I was laughing!

Oh I forgot to tell you that I saw Disney CARS II. Our son loved it. I kinda prefer CARS in Radiator Springs myself because of the charm but it was fun. One cool thing was that we saw someone driving a DeLorean (a replica of the Back to the Future car) in the parking lot before we saw the movie. That added to the excitement of seeing another CARS movie! 

On the CARS note, I did another small thing for the boys in the CARS theme. I felt like they needed a night light in their bathroom so I covered a night light with leftover fabric from the CARS pennant project http://keepitsimpleyay.blogspot.com/2011/06/so-super-psyched-about-cars-ii.html. Their bathroom decor is very simple so this was a small touch that added a little color that even jives with the wall color. I picked up a night light at AC Moore. You can follow the directions in my post http://keepitsimpleyay.blogspot.com/2011/01/easy-modern-fabric-night-light.html about covering a night light with fabrics and making it your own. 

I used Krylon Easy-Tack spray-on adhesive to glue the fabric down.You want to get the night light shade a little damp with the adhesive and then position the fabric over the shade, pushing out any bubbles or lumps to stick it down to the shade.

 My little paper night light is ready to be covered.

I didn't cut a particular shape out of the fabric, I just cut enough to cover the shade and then positioned it, pressing and smoothing out bumps and lumps.

After the fabric was stuck to the shade I used my sewing scissors and cut around the edges, leaving about a half an inch of fabric on all the sides. Lastly I rolled the fabric over the edges to hide them.

I look like I need a V-8 here but I think it turned out to be a nice little addition!

Go Lightning!