C'mon, spill it

christmas gifts- belt and headband

2011-02-04T15:31:00.000-08:00

Okay, this one is going to need more pictures, but this is all I have for now. I had Kelsy's name and wanted to make something special, but this was a hard one. I had no idea. Anyway, I set out with the goal of a stretchy-elastic belt with big flowers and decorations... but ended up with a ruffley thing that clips together in front with these leather and metal clips. You can't really see it, but she's also wearing a headband- it's wrapped in leather with a little leather bow on the side. She's so cute, she makes anything she's wearing look designer, so that helps me out!

christmas gifts- aprons

2011-02-04T15:27:00.000-08:00

Jayme and Jill got aprons. This was a simple pattern, but my favorite part is the high waist wrap around tie. It looks so cute on my so cute sisters.

three old shirts = one cute dress

2011-02-04T15:17:00.000-08:00

This was a hang-out-at-home-one-Saturday-night kind of project. I took the front of a white shirt, the back and other parts of a grey shirt, then the sleeves and bottom of a polka dot shirt and put them together in this little thing that fits Teah. It turned out pretty cute, if I do say so myself.

christmas pajamas

2011-02-04T15:08:00.001-08:00

Our family has a thing for the grinch. We quote it all the time, and start watching it (the Jim Carrey version) starting in July. Anyway, for the annual Christmas Eve pajamas, I made the girls and their cousin matching "I heart Grinch" pajamas. Shirt Batter (Blake) did the embroidery for me, then I bought a pattern and made pants. The big girl's pants turned out pretty good, but I didn't do so well on the babies... too small.

ps- I'm so glad to have this blog to document all these projects without being so braggy on my family blog!!

christmas gifts- favorite things

2011-02-04T14:43:00.000-08:00

For Havi's friends, we gave them each a "favorite things" memory game.

Here's how I went about these beauties:

-First of all, I made these sheets on the computer- the front has simple pictures of 20 of Havi's favorite things and the back just a repeated pattern.

-Print them out on cardstock (2 copies per friend), ModPodge the front to the back, let dry.

-Mod podge the entire front of the sheet and the entire back of the sheet, let dry (for thickness).

-Cut into squares, don't loose track of your piles!

-Then we found some brown paper strips (to make them brown paper packages) and tied them with string.

-I made a label that said, "Favorite Things Memory Game- for you, my friend, who is one of my most favorite things in the world! Merry Christmas, Love Havi"

-We threw these in a cute little bag with a few of her simple favorite things- candy cane and lipstick, and tada! fun friend gifts for four year olds!

This could be a fun birthday party theme/favor.

christmas gifts- headbands

2011-02-04T14:37:00.001-08:00

We (I did the flowers, my sister Kelsy did the ribbon and attaching to the headbands) made about 6 of these flower headbands that Teah gave to her friends for Christmas. They turned out really cute, this one had three smaller flowers in the linen, others we did were: one large white flower, three medium printed flowers (pink, green, white), a couple with large linen flowers... that's about it! Simple to make- for the flower, just take a long thin piece of fabric and needle and thread, then sew and twist. Then hot glue some ribbon onto a headband (I bought some thin metal headbands on etsy), cut some felt in the general shape of the flower and use that for the back of the flower on the headband... does that make sense? Maybe someday I'll start doing tutorials :)

dinosaur purse

2011-02-04T14:30:00.000-08:00

My goal this year (it started with Christmas) is to try and MAKE instead of BUY as much as I can, and that includes gifts. It's actually pretty fun to make the stuff, but it's so fun to GIVE handmade! Havi was invited to her friend Amelia's dinosaur birthday party, and this year's birthday gifts will be purses to go with the theme, so we came up with this fun little purse. We filled it with some candy, wrapped it up and voila!

(last week we did a ladybug purse, but that got rushed off to the party before pictures could be taken).

Warning!!!

2010-05-06T11:10:00.000-07:00

I've been on a creative binge this last month. Here's what happened:

Birthday Outfit

2010-05-06T10:52:00.000-07:00

Teah turned 6! I made her this little skirt, headband, shirt thing. The white shirt is store bought, but to make it more a part of the outfit I traced a butterfly from the skirt and stitched it on the shirt. And the number 6. I like how it turned out, but I want to play around with this whole stitching thing a little more. There's some potential there!

Bracelet

2010-05-06T10:31:00.000-07:00

I made two of these and gave the cuter one away as a birthday gift. So here's the less cute one, but you get the idea. Pretty simple- layer a couple circles of different fabrics together and sew to a strip of fabric. I put a pearl bead in the center, but a button would look cute, too. Then make a button hole and attach a button. The cuter one had a two smaller flowers, this one is a little too big, in my opinion.

Crayon roll

2010-05-06T10:08:00.000-07:00

April hits us with a string of birthdays, so these little beauties, along with a pad of paper, made great gifts. I don't know what I have against following patterns, but I just winged it. Either way here's a tutorial for something similar.

Play dress

2010-05-06T09:54:00.000-07:00

I had that pink/white striped tank that was stretched out (I wore it when pregnant), and Teah had that blue tank that had a bleach spot on the bottom. So I cut them both in the middle and sewed them together to make this cute little play dress. I left the edge showing on the pink striped. It fits both Teah and Havi.

Eden's Dress

2010-05-06T09:47:00.000-07:00

Here's Eden't denim dress. I love how it turned out. I put pictures of Teah and Havi's dresses on my blog earlier, it just took me a little longer to Eden's done. Worth the wait, though. On all the dresses, I found a dress they already had in a cute, simple style. I traced out the pieces on a scrap piece of fabric (I have cheap white Ikea sheets that I use), then pin it together to see if it works. When tweaking is done, I use those as a pattern and pin it to my denim and make the real thing. I'm either too cheap or too impatient, but when the urge hits to make something, I don't want to go to the store to buy a pattern! It's been hit or miss, but I'm definitely learning.

2009-12-13T17:22:00.000-08:00

that girls blog reminds me of YOU.... her designs are what I see you creating
I wonder where she gets her graphics? I think I may just recreate one of her ideas for my christmas card this year...would that be horrible?

this would be fun

2009-07-05T19:45:00.000-07:00

so next year's going to be our 10 year anniversary, and i'm trying to talk leroy into training for one of these with me, then having our anniversary trip be to go to hawaii, do the race, and stay a while afterward. wouldn't that be fun!?!?!

http://www.xterraplanet.com/xduro/makena.html

http://www.active.com/page/Event_Details.htm?event_id=1714437&assetId=45D149F2-4587-4BFB-AED6-0CEDDB4A0919

http://www.mauioceanfrontmarathon.com/

2010

2009-07-01T19:50:00.000-07:00

HEY! Ok for my 2010 ideas...and input.....

...Ogden Half
...Ragner Relay
...Epic LOTOJA Race
...Marathon
...Wasatch Beaches
...Echo Tri
...BAM (battle at midway 15k)
...Provo River Half
...Volleyball...Volleyball...Volleyball!
...Trip to Lava Hot Springs
...Girls trip to st. george no kids!
...Girls trip to New York or some other FUN place no kids!
...Zions lets hike and camp!

Can't think what else I want to do right now. I am exhausted tonight!

2010 schedule

2009-06-26T17:19:00.000-07:00

okay. it's killing me that i'm just sitting around this summer missing out on all these fun events, so while i can't do, i CAN plan. and planning i am--- a whole year of having 'sore sundays' (i define a weekend as a success if you're sore on sunday). i'm giving baby until january 01, 10 to sleep through the night so i can have energy to train.

the list.
- Ogden half (not just run it, but RUN it. 1:45 or less)
- Ogden Valley Xterra tri
- Wasatch Back
- Heber Valley Tri (you have some there, right?)
- Ogden Valley Tri
- wasatch beach volleyball (we can try this out on off weeks, right?)

feel free to add. of course, this is right now a wish list, we do have to consider family events and money. but hopefully we'll be able to do a bunch of them. i'm going to come up with a work out program that will have swimming/biking/running/weights specific for beach vball.

excited? i am! have fun running and playing this summer, and i'll be there (well, probably a couple minutes behind you) next year!

just playing around a little

2009-06-11T20:24:00.000-07:00

i've always thought that if i ever had a company, i'd call it 'beach house designs'. hopefully i'd get rich enough from that company to buy a beach house :) i just did this label tonight... not sure i love the font, but the flourish things i really like. okay, i'll try it with 'sweet straps', one sec.

maybe. i'm really into this dark blue/purple color right now.

totally fell in love with this floral font.

more to come.

label

2009-06-09T19:38:00.000-07:00

What do you think of the middle one? I like the long S with the flower coming out of it.

MUST figure out

2009-05-04T11:27:00.000-07:00

these are the cutest things i've ever seen and we have to figure out how to make them!!

We seriously need to learn to knit.

2009-03-22T09:10:00.000-07:00

Imagine the possibilities!!!!

2009-01-27T19:25:00.001-08:00

I'm at my mom's, and of course I don't have my recipes here. So I'll just put the ones I know off the top of my head.

Bean dip
1 can ref. beans
1 can black beans, drained
1 cup cheese
1 cup salsa
1/2 cup sr. cream (I just changed that, 1 cup was a lot)

Boil everything but sr. cream, stir it in just before serving. Serve warm with chips.

Fajitas
This recipe changes every time I make it.
Cut beef or chicken into strips, put in bag with 1/2 cup oil, 3-4 slices fresh lime, garlic, salt, pepper. Marinade for a couple hours.
Cut up peppers (usually green are cheaper but colors are prettier and sweeter) and sweet white onion into long thin slices. Cook meat until done, then add peppers and onion. Stir fry together for a while until tender. Serve on a tortilla with pico de gallo, guacamole, ref. beans.

Pico de gallo
3 fresh tomatoes diced
1/4 - 1/2 sweet white onion diced
1/2 bunch cilantro cut into tiny pieces
2 garlic cloves cut into tiny pieces
1 lime
dash salt
Cut everything up except the lime, mix it together, squeeze the lime juice on it, let sit in fridge for 1/2 hour or so.

Guacamole
mash up 3ish avocados, mix with a couple spoonfuls pico. Salt and pepper to taste.

We had this last night when we had the new neighbors over for dinner, it was a hit.

Your turn!

Bags

2008-12-23T20:30:00.000-08:00

These are the bags I made for gifts. I think they're cute. They're big and have two pockets on the inside. My sewing machine needs to be tuned up or I would've made more. So simple and fun! Plus they're fully covered with interfacing so they're sturdy. You should make one if you like them.

St. George Half

2008-11-10T06:27:00.000-08:00

Where: St George UT
When: January 17, 2009
What: Half Marathon
Who: You & I
Time: 9:00 a.m.

What do you think??? Could be so fun! Its on running trails, and its only 35. And its in st george! We have 2 1/2 months. I think we should do it.

Projects can take on a whole new meaning with Christmas approaching

2008-11-02T20:49:00.000-08:00

All right. We can get some good ideas going here- projects for us and some to keep the kiddos busy.

Ideas to be on the look out for-

-snowflake/snowballs (martha style!)

-tree skirts

-stocking (you saw the post, right?)

-ornaments

-pillows

Please add to the list! Keep a look out for fun, different kinds of things, too. This'll be fun.

Hope the science fair project went ok!

I have a thing for fun stockings

2008-11-02T20:32:00.000-08:00

these are found here, here, and here.

Do you know how to knit? I want to learn. Some of these might be do-able for a project-- the polka dot one, maybe.

Hat and Mittens advent

2008-11-02T20:30:00.000-08:00

I want this, but it's so expensive! Any ideas on how to make one?

Treat Ideas

2008-10-24T07:40:00.001-07:00

What do you think?

2008-10-23T16:51:00.000-07:00

Ok, I need to run either the half or the full. I'm leaning toward the full because I really want to run one and I think this would be a good one to do. Are you going to run with me???

Girly

2008-10-19T22:06:00.000-07:00

I know this is girly, but how cute! She has a tutorial and template for making these... hair clips, headbands, etc.

Amy Atlas

2008-10-19T21:43:00.000-07:00

If we ever have a party, shower, ANYTHING we're totally going to check out this girl's site and figure out some of her techniques.

Chicken Tortilla Soup

2008-10-19T21:15:00.000-07:00

1/2 lb. (or so) diced, cooked chicken
1 can cream of chicken soup
1-2 cups chicken broth
1-2 cups salsa
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1-2 cups sweet white corn

Combine everything and bring to a boil. Serve with tortilla chips, sour cream, cheese, green onions, or whatever sounds good.

I haven't really measured how much of those ingredients I really use for a while, so I don't have an exact recipe, but this is close. Go with more if you want more soup. On the chicken broth, that's where you can make it creamier or not, so just watch that as you add it. I always go heavy on the salsa. Enjoy!

Pumpkin Shelf

2008-10-16T21:55:00.000-07:00

Throwing out fun ideas, not neccessarily something we could do on a craft night or anything, just adding to our collection of ideas:

If I had a shelf (let's start with the obvious- if I had a house), I'd do this in a heart beat. It's fall, it's natural, it's relatively easy, I like it.

Then there's this... maybe something the kids could do. Or we could take the idea and go somewhere with it. I got both these pictures from here.

FALL tile board

2008-10-15T09:45:00.000-07:00

Ok here's an idea for next week. I think this is darling and simple and cheap to make. What do you think? Any other ideas??? Is it your style? You can see the directions here

Perfect!

2008-10-15T09:43:00.000-07:00

I love it! Totally love it. The name is perfect! And you did a great job on the header! Wow! I am so impressed at what you can do! I am so luck to have a best friend like you!

Catch up time

2008-10-14T22:15:00.000-07:00

Okay, we have some serious catching up to do. So spill. What are those great ideas, fun projects, yummy recipes and all that good stuff you've been up to. I NEED TO KNOW and see... pictures are a good thing. I'll put up my conference hair clips. Oh, and that soup recipe. Let's just build a good blog that has all the stuff we love, links to good sites and stores, and a place to show off :). Good? Good.