Friday, August 31, 2012

Antiquing Adventures. Is that a word?

Today my Mom wanted me to go with her Antique shopping.

Our power was out for about 6-7 hours today, so not being home sounded like a great plan!

Except I felt slightly bad for leaving my husband here, with 3 kids, with no power.

Not all the way bad...but slightly bad. I may owe him a present.

I LOVE antique shopping. Let me paw through old crap and I'll be the happiest girl ever.

There were a lot of issues I noticed.

1. How dare you charge me $25 for a bowl when I know damn well I saw it at Goodwill least week for $1. Seriously. I will kill you.

2. I know there are some weird people out there that collect random stuff. I get it. But old McDonald's Happy Meal toys, in a bucket, at an antique store? Has it really come to that?

3. Last time I checked, Twilight was published in 2008. There should laws. If the word "Antique" is painted in big, bold letters across your front window, I better not see anything newer than 1980 in there. I was so disappointed.

I didn't find a whole lot. I'm looking for stuff I can fix, re-do or play with. I don't want to pay $125 for a fixer-upper cabinet. Pass.

My Mom didn't have a lot of luck either. She's looking for Barbie shoes. Why? Quit asking me questions.

Best part of the whole trip- finding old post cards that were used and stamped from the post office with years like 1918 and 1912. I wanted those so much. I just had no idea what I would do with them. I don't want to frame them, because I actually liked reading them. I love little peeks into other peoples lives and seeing what it must have been like. Sounds a little stalker-ish doesn't it?

I wanted to find a few things that I could post on here and hopefully laugh about. But I didn't have a lot of luck.

I found these! Skeleton keys. Aren't they pretty?
Are you asking what I will do with them?
Didn't you learn that I hate questions?
Plus, I have no clue.
I just really liked them.
 
After shopping for a about an hour, my Mom needed a hit.
Of caffeine. In the form of diet coke.
So we found a bar.
It's called the Busted Nut.
Hehe.
I took a picture for proof.
People that live in Hastings are probably shaking their heads at my lack of maturity.
Don't care.

See? See? Do you see it?
Ha.
It's called the Busted Nut because it's apparently OK to be a complete and utter slob in here.
In fact, they encourage it by giving everyone a bucket of free peanuts.
And then you walk on the mess.
And it's ok to do this.
Weird.
And kind of icky.

Anyone else feel the need to sweep?
 
In one store I found something else worth laughing over.
Once again, I'm going to show my complete lack of maturity.

I'm assuming this is Paul Bunyan.
If you see nothing humorous in this photo, congratulations, you are an adult.
 
My brother and I thought it was hilarious.
My Mom rolled her eyes.
 
It's these simple treasures in life that make living worth it.
Hope you had a good day.
 
 

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

It's Tuesday! Yeah!

Not quite sure why I'm so excited for Tuesday. Probably my least favorite day of the week. It's a boring one, that's for sure.

I've had some serious housekeeping issues lately.

First of all- laundry.

I was washing a load of laundry yesterday and after I heard the *beep* I went down to move it to the dryer.

It was during this process that I noticed that, along with washing all our dirty clothes, I also washed a dirty disposable diaper. Not a poopy one, but still.

Ick.

Not sure how it got there. I'm assuming it was just bundled with the clothing and brought to the basement to be tossed in the washer. Or my kids are getting crafty and devious on me.

Either way, I had to redo that load. I guess I didn't HAVE to, the diaper was probably clean at that point. =)

Second housekeeping issue- I broke my toilet wand thing. Is that what it's called? A toilet wand? Sounds much more magical than it actually is. Toilet stick? Toilet scrubbie thing? Whatever. Toilet wand it is.

I must be scrubbing the toilets too hard because it's snapped in two different spots.

Never had this happen before. Either I'm the Hulk or this was a crappy wand.

After all that drama, I decided no more housework for me. At least for the rest of the day. I won't be able to go that long before buying a new toilet wand. There are two boys that use the toilet in this house. I'm lucky to go one day before it needs a total hose-down. If I wait a week, I'll have to buy new toilets.

I haven't posted about my projects for awhile, so I decided today would be a good day for it. Here are two I finished most recently:

This one was supposed to be something else entirely. I was so mad, but the wood is old and snapped in half, so I decided to use it for practice. I am practicing with stencils. Since I can't seem to find any good stencils at a store, I have to make my own with the computer and an exacto knife.
 
Sucks. It's not an easy or quick process and doesn't always turn out as well as I envision.
I did put it in my house. Mostly because I worked hard on it and didn't want to just throw it out.

This was another experiment. I stained a simple piece of wood, taped leaves on it, spray painted it and then stenciled the letters on it.
 
It's not terrible, but once again, much different than how I pictured it.
I have no idea what to do with it now.
 
I will probably quit this process soon.
When things stop turning out how I expect them too, I tend to throw in the towel.
Probably why I have tried so many different crafty projects and have nothing to show for it.
 
Plus, I found a giant spider in the garage and that's enough to keep me out of there for a little bit.
At least until I'm sure he's found a new home, far away from my work area.  
 

Sunday, August 26, 2012

Great Minnesota Eat All You Can and Waddle Home With A Cow

Close enough.

Jalon and I ventured to the Minnesota State Fair for our date night.

Best date night ever.

We ate so much food. Probably not as much as some, but it felt like a lot. Plus, we plan on going again with the kids, so this was more "try what you wouldn't normally try with kids around".

I took lots of pictures. Some pictures were just food items. I like sharing food. Hopefully it makes you hungry.

Here's what we ate:

I started with a Philly Cheese steak. I was hungry. It smelled fantastic. Tasted pretty darn great too.

Jalon. Eating Alligator on a stick.
Apparently eating alligator makes you cranky.
 Oh wait, that's just his face.

Yum...Hawaiian shaved ice.

Deep-fried Snickers Bar. He loves these. 
He was a little too giddy in this photo...no more candy for you, Jalon.   

Mini-donuts. My favorite. I probably ate more of these than anything else.

Salt water taffy. Jalon wanted an entire bucket. We totally needed the whole bucket.
 
I wish it was a whole bucket of mini donuts.
That would magically fill after I finished them all.
I would need bigger pants.
 
Then I HAD to get my picture next to this awesome vehicle.
I'm obsessed with tornado's and love this thing!
 
Just in case you don't know what it is, here's an informative link for you:
 
This one was the TIV 2. So cool.

I had to get a photo with it because I'm a nerd.
 
And since we didn't have the kids, we decided to venture to the Midway part of the fair.
This is where all the fun is contained.
Fun does not mean rides, not for me.
Fun means winning AWESOME prizes at games.

Lots of people had the same idea.

Jalon knocking down some cans. Took a few tries, but eventually he won!

Our prize cow!
Much bigger now than he looked hanging up.
I mean the stuffed one, not Jalon.
 
I just died reading that. I crack myself up.

Trying to make it up the ramp without killing anyone.
He knocked a few people in the head but I'm pretty sure they went away unharmed.
I'm still giggling at their shocked faces after getting whacked with the cow.

Waiting for our bus, holding the heifer.
We waited for this bus for about 20 minutes.
This heifer got heavy.
He's not stuffed with normal "fluff".
I'm pretty sure this is where Styrofoam goes to die.
Cow innards.

It was an interesting ride on the bus with our giant cow. He took up two seats.
But then the bus got full...like really FULL.
So we had to hold him. On our laps.
Awkward.
But funny for everyone else. 

Someone was kind enough to take our photo.
The cows face was right in my crotch area.
Jalon thought that was hilarious.
 
After getting off the bus, we had to drive home.
Normally, you would put something so big in the bed of the truck.
But it had rained earlier and I didn't want the cow to suck up all the dampness.
So he rode with me in the front.
He didn't fit anywhere else.
As you can tell, he didn't fit with me either.  

No, I'm perfectly comfortable, thank you.

Laugh it up Jalon, and take your pictures, but please get me out of the truck now!
 
I love date nights.
You just never know what's going to happen.
 
I cannot wait until morning and see what the kids think of it!
There's a small part of me that wants to leave it RIGHT in front of my older sons door, so when he opens it it's the FIRST thing he sees.
It's tall enough to be eye level with him.
That would freak him out.
Except he gets up at 6 a.m. and there's no way I want to wake up to a crying 5-year old that early.
 
Plus, that would be mean.
Right?

Friday, August 24, 2012

My name is Danielle and I'm a Paranoid Mommy.

I consider myself one of the best.

It's just so easy to become a paranoid mommy with all this information ready at our fingertips. There's so much out there and there's so much we're expected to pay attention to.

I think it's perfectly reasonable. I adore my kids, just as I'm sure all parents do and we want to keep them safe. I'm just unsure of the boundaries of TOO safe or just safe enough. I want them to live and have fun, but at the same time, I really just want to lock us all up in a bomb shelter and wait until their older, just like Blast From The Past. If you haven't seen that movie, it's a cute one. I like it. I hope that doesn't say anything negative about my personality.

There's so much bad out there. So much happening in our schools, shootings where you used to feel safe, child abductions and scary bacteria in our food, waiting to harm us. I know that I can't live in fear but once and awhile, it just gets to me.

I don't see anything wrong with being informed and conscious of what is out there. I think it's perfectly normal. However, there may be a few things that carry me from "conscious" mommy to "paranoid" mommy.

1. I can turn a simple back bruise into any disease that could harm my child, simply by googling images and hunting on WebMD.

2. The nurses know me by name because of the frequency I call them with inane questions regarding my child's health/wound of the day.

3. Every time something shows up on the news about children missing or getting abducted/harmed, I look up houses deep in Canada/Alaska, far away from civilization and wonder how hard it would be to become self-sufficient, while living in a cave in the middle of nowhere.

4. Or I start planning what kind of bubble would be the most safe without harming their ability to breathe.

5. I won't let my kids enter a lake. Any lake. Ever.
http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/story/19268985/cdc-confirms-amebic-infection-killed-lily-lake-swimmer
 and
http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/video?clipId=7014675&autostart=true

I know that these are limited to just a few lakes and I grew up just fine playing in lakes, but I can't seem to let go enough. Sorry kids.

6. My kids don't know what our front yard looks like. They are not allowed past the side door on our house. I don't care how good they are about staying close or not going into the street. Sometimes it's not just about them but about other people/cars around us.

7. I watch all the food documentaries that scare you about our diet/food source on Netflix and even plant a garden so my kids are super healthy eaters. Then my husband has to intervene because he's wondering where the real food is at since our garden failed produce anything edible. Turns out, self-sufficient isn't as easy as it sounded.

8. I don't like playdates with people that tell you just to "drop them off for a few hours". I don't care who the playdate is with (unless it's a family member). I'm not dropping my child off to play at your house because I don't trust you.

Most of these I feel are normal. I have had people tell me before that I can't let my kids live in a bubble forever and that I need to let go a little.

But since I'm the Mommy, I don't care what those people say.

I feel as if our world is changing and the rules that applied 20 years ago are not the same rules that we can employ today.

I can hardly stand to watch the news anymore, it gives me anxiety like you wouldn't believe. Whenever I hear of a child being harmed or killed, I get the shakes and stay up all night thinking of ways I can protect my children even more than I do now.

This feeling doesn't stop at just MY children. If I hear about a child that's been abused, I want to go into foster care and take in all kids that need a loving home.

My husband dreads this feeling of mine, but I can't seem to help it. He's scared I'm going to fill our house with 100 children. I would officially have my own circus.

This post came out a little different than I had planned. Sorry about some of my more serious points. I tried to be funny today, but I guess I just don't have it in me when it comes to this stuff.

It's hard to be a Mom sometimes. There's so much expected of us. I just hope I can do my job well, by keeping them safe and loved, while raising them to be good people.

Thursday, August 23, 2012

I'm in Project overload and having so much fun!

Last week, doing my Pinterest projects, I had so much fun that I can't seem to stop.

It's a little out of control. I'm sifting through garbage, digging through my husbands garage and looking for free crap on Craigslist just for more projects.

I may be obsessed. Help.

Although, it's such a wonderful feeling to finish a project and see it hanging in my home. Pretty soon I may have to sell stuff just because I can't keep everything I do, but for now, I'm still finding room on my walls.

But if you're a friend/family of mine that happens to live close by, be prepared. I may try to decorate your home with my crap.

Here's my latest project:

My in-laws bought this for me a year or two ago and I've been sitting on it for quite a bit, unsure where I wanted to go with it.
 
I believe it's an old medicine cabinet. It's not bad looking as it is.
 
But I finally found a home for it in my kitchen and in order for it to go there, it was going to need some small changes.
 
So I took it apart, completely ditched the glass door and decided a new coat of paint was required.
 
But I still wanted a worn/country feel to it.
 
So after painting it, I went at it with a metal file my husband had hiding in his tool box.
 
I think he may start hiding things from me on purpose, because I hardly use tools for what they were originally intended for. He's less than thrilled sharing his space with me. I have a very, very, tiny table that he has let me borrow for now in his garage. But I have to be careful where I tread and what I use, or I get the glare. I'm pretty sure you know what glare I'm talking about. And just in case you don't know which glare I'm talking about, I've included a photo for reference.
 
That face is the one I'm talking about. This is the glare I get when I do/say something stupid.
Or just being me.
 
This shelf is awesome. I love how it looks in my kitchen.
 
It works perfectly for holding some salt & pepper shakers I had around the kitchen. They never really had a good home and this holds them perfectly.

The paint was purchased at Menards and the background is fabric I found at JoAnne's. I like it. I like it a lot.


My kitchen has a shelf that is also black that you can kind of see in the left-hand corner and it works perfectly with it.
 
This was harder to get back together than I thought. Pay attention when you take something apart, because no matter how easy it may seem at first, it's probably not that easy.
 
A hammer helped a lot.
 
That's a mechanic thing. When it doesn't seem to want to go together, just grab a hammer.
 
Or maybe it's just a "me" thing.
 
Whatever. The shelf is hanging up and it's holding stuff fine. Who cares how I got it back together?
 
Now, off to find my next project. Should I reupholster some chairs in my basement or start building the signs I wanted?
 
Or maybe I should keep stalking Pinterest for more ideas.
 Anything to get out of doing the laundry.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

My Wednesday

Remember reading about my son, Declan, the one that doesn't talk much? Today, he sang a song for me and I understood exactly what he was saying.

Never mind that the song was "Imma Be" from Black Eyed Peas, he sang and I understood him!

Awesome sauce.

Want to know what I did today? I'm a SUPER busy Mom, as you will clearly see.

I washed the dishes. They were last night's dishes that I put off until today, but I still washed them. Then I spilled water all over the place after the sink filled up a cookie sheet that was hanging over the edge. When I started wiping all the water that spilled, I noticed that my floor was really gross, so I swished the water around a little. The kids thought this was a new game, so they ditched their cereal and came down to help me by stomping in it. I think I made my floor look worse than it did, but this was before I had my coffee, so I am excused from this lazy behavior.

I started the laundry. I didn't finish it or look at it since 9 a.m., but at least it smells better. Half the pile does anyway.

I painted my project in the garage a little, until it started to rain on me. Then I quit because rain makes me sleepy.

I read a whole book. It was a Julia Quinn novel called Ten Things I Love About You. If you like romance, but have never read her, I recommend you get off your ass now and hop to it.

She's amazing. Seriously amazing. I love romance novels.

I needed some romance after finishing the new Dean Koontz novel yesterday. It was wonderful, but a little scary/weird. If you haven't read his novels either, I suggest that you introduce yourself to 2012, get out there and read something of his. Anything of his, they are all awesome. I don't know what you're reading instead, but quit wasting your time already!

I'm not making dinner tonight. I worked my butt off on dinner the past few nights and it really hasn't worked out for me. Either the kids won't eat it, the buns are moldy (only to be discovered AFTER I've taken bites) or I burn/overcook the crap out of our meal until it resembles something my kids found in the backyard. I quit for a night. Pizza Hut, be ready.

Now, I'm going to stalk Pinterest until I come up with 50 more projects that I can fill my days with and destroy my husbands garage. I had such a fun time last week doing all those projects, I want to do another week. But this time I'll probably try to conquer just 1 project a day. Last week was rough trying to fit in all that crap.

Want to see what I made today? You should Pin this project! I may be the only person in the world that finds this funny, but I just don't care. This took me forever to come up with! I'm such a genius...I know you're going to want one as soon as you see it. You'll just have to wait until I run out of butter again.

I ran out of butter.

Found a pair of scissors. Playing with scissors is fun.


I needed a home for all those Box Tops I've been forgetting to collect for our school. So I created this awesome container to store them in!
 
What are the chances of me throwing this out accidentally?
 
HUGE.
But I did use permanent marker, so you never know.




Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Tasty Tuesday.

Why is today Tasty?

Not a clue. But it sounded good, so I used it.

I'm going just a little insane this last month of summer.

Trying to stock up on stuff for Evan to prepare him for the upcoming school year. I have enough lunch stuff to last us until December.

Today we went to buy him crayons that are required for school. The list that I have states VERY SPECIFICALLY, "Crayola, 8 pack, basic colors". That's it. So when I traveled to Target and went right to their "back to school" section, I thought it was very natural to assume that I would find these crayons easily. I thought that most teachers at other schools would think that basic colors would be the easiest to find/use, so we will ask for those. Think it was easy for me? You guessed correctly. I did not find the crayons I was looking for. However, there were tons of Crayola 8 pack of crayons there to choose from, just none in "basic colors".

Here were my options:
1. Pink Princess
2. Metallic Magic
3. Mermaid Shimmer
4. Cupcake My Day
5. Rocker Girl
6. Over The Rainbow
7. Dinosaur Roar
8. Born to Rock
9. Pirates Treasure
10. Sports Fan

YES, 10 random options for back to school, all reasonably priced, yet none required. Seriously Target? How many teachers do you know that are going to ask for Metallic Magic pack of crayons? Damn you.

So I had to ask an employee where I could find the "normal" crayons. She gave me a look of disgust for bothering her with my simple-minded question but had to walk me over to a completely different section of the store, where they were hidden amongst the other "normal" crayons that apparently are no longer part of the cool ranks for school. Maybe our teacher isn't part of the updated cool-list that came out requiring children to have Pirates Treasure instead of Basic Colors.

I know. Such a dumb thing to get irritated about. But shopping with 3 kids in a Target is no picnic in the first place and I was seriously annoyed by this.

There are tons of other things occupying my time this August as well. Probably not on the same level as people with actual jobs or things to do. But hey, in my mind, these things are taking up space. I don't have a lot of room for other thoughts...like remembering to brush my teeth or wash my hair.

1. Our remodel. Ugh...I'm not going into detail, but this is getting rocky. My husband and I have had many LOUD discussions over this topic. I'm trying hard to make the remodel cheaper, but that also has been making it harder to accomplish. Go figure.
2. Soccer. Games, practices, treats, jamborees, pictures...seriously. He's 5. He doesn't even touch the ball because he has other important things to do, like stare off into space or whine about how hot it is. Other 5 year olds are whipping around the field, scoring killer goals that would make a professional soccer player jealous. Those parents have to be in the backyard doing numerous drills with their children. Can we tone this down a notch?
3. My projects. My husband would be asking me, "If these stress you out so much, why do you do them?" Because I like to. When I get started on a project, it makes me all excited and let's me work with my hands on something cool, whether it's for the house or something I plan on getting rid of. It's fun to create stuff and be proud when it turns out how you wanted it to.
4. I keep trying to schedule playdates, but then I forget about them. So I quit. My poor kids. They have me as a Mom.
5. The State Fair is approaching. This is a yearly event that we MUST partake in, much to the dismay of my husband. He dreads taking the children out in public. Not that I blame him, much, but eventually they will have to learn what civilized humans look like, the earlier the better. So I have been planning out our adventure to make it as quick and easy as possible.
6. I want to make it to the Renaissance Festival. I love it there. But I'm hunting for cheaper tickets and a time that we can actually go, which is harder than I thought.
7. My husband is going through lots of stuff and because he is thinking too much, that makes me think too much. Stop thinking Jay.

Our son Declan is going through a small issue. He has been in speech therapy for about 8 months now and it's going OK. Morgan was in with him, but she's advanced enough to be removed. Declan will be starting speech therapy again, along with occupational therapy this fall. We are a little worried about his speech and wondering if it's not his ears causing issues or something else entirely. Declan and Morgan both had tubes put in this past winter and it seemed to help them both. But now, we aren't quite sure it helped Declan enough. Who knows?

Either way, I'm trying my hardest not to think too much about it and just enjoy him and who he is. He is so smart, so brave and daring. It's a Mom thing, I think, to constantly be concerned about your children and if you are doing enough for them. I would love for him to go to Kindergarten with his sister in a few years, but I'm not sure that will happen. Not that it would be a huge deal, but the sooner I figure this out, the sooner I can get him the help he needs.

Look at that face! I love this kid, despite the fact that he runs me to the ground each and every day.

I'm pretty sure I won the Mom of The Month award for August. I boiled lunch over, not once, but twice yesterday, ruining my clean stove and making the kids wait for pasta an extra half hour while I did clean up, twice. I also served expired cinnamon rolls this morning for breakfast, all because I forgot to take milk out of the freezer for breakfast.

They were only a month old and we survived. Those things are so preserved that I'm pretty sure the expiration date is just there for looks.

Please hold your applause until the actual ceremony at the end of the month. I still have a couple weeks to nail my win completely.











Saturday, August 18, 2012

Day 6? of I'm Feeling Pinterested? I'm so confused.

Yesterday (and part of today) was a few recipes from Pinterest.

I thought this would be easy.

Turns out I was wrong.

It wasn't exactly difficult, just exhausting! My back is killing me and my stomach isn't too happy either.

I picked 5 recipes. I know, 5 sounds like a TON, but a few were really simple, so I decided just to go for it.

1.
Chicken Ranch Tacos.
Sounds delish, right?
If you like ranch, that's a yes.



The original creator of this recipe made it over the stove using actual ranch dressing in the bottle. Someone in the comments section wrote a modification using the crock pot and powdered ranch instead of bottled. Since I had 4 more recipes to create that night, I decided to use my crock pot.

I followed their directions, here's what I used:
I even had a packet of Spicy Ranch hanging around.

I chopped the chicken up so it would be easier to feed the kids and then mixed the packets of seasoning up with the stock.

Dumped it in and cooked it all for about 3 hours on Low.
It smelled FANTASTIC.

And apparently this was a recipe for soup instead of tacos.

I strained some of the "juice" and put the meat on a tortilla with some cheese, lettuce mixed with ranch and a little taco sauce.

Tasted really good. 

Don't mind my messy table. We were already eating and I forgot to take a picture.

Suggestions if you decide to make this: Use the stove. Or cut down on the liquid. Maybe try cooking a whole roaster chicken in there and then shred and put back into the sauce for some really good tacos. The flavor is great, so I will be making these again.

2.

I decided this would be easy enough.
Plus, who doesn't like brownies.
All the ingredients, plus I added some butterscotch chips, because I love them.

The "mix" before adding the wet ingredients.


All ready to pop into the oven!

And instead of 20-25 it was more 35 because I doubled the recipe. I was hungry and I like chocolate.
These tasted good. They were supposed to be a box mix replacement. I think they would be close, if it wasn't for all the oil. Get rid of all that oil. Use anything else you find suitable. I've heard of cans of pop, applesauce and black beans (bleh). But the oil made them SOOO greasy! Flavor wise, these are good. Not spectacular, but easy to make.

3.
Oatmeal Creme Pies.
I love Whoopie pies, so this was a recipe I was craving!

I'm going to start right off by saying, these are not Whoopie Pies. Whoopie pies are a nice, light, fluffy cake like cookie, meant to have frosting in between.

While these are delicious, I would not recommend sandwiching them together. It's a thick, heavy, dense cookie and I felt that it would be a mouthful of oatmeal and the filling would just squeeze right out.



I did frost the tops of them. They are fantastic! The flavor is amazing and I would actually make these again, just by frosting the tops instead. Or find a light whoopie pie recipe and modify it to be similar to this one. Seriously, the filling is delicious! I didn't use it all, but saved it in a container for later. Not sure what I'll use it on, but it was too good to discard.

4.
Glazed Donut Muffins
These were exactly what I wanted for breakfast this morning!
I was so excited for these.

I baked them last night and glazed them first thing this morning.
I only did 1 coat of glaze because it was thick and I didn't want the kids getting a huge sugar rush first thing this morning.




They look good, don't they?
They are not good.
They are thick, heavy, dense muffins.
The topping is not fantastic.
The muffin is not impressive.

It's not terrible, but I wouldn't waste my time doing these again.
Although, the kids liked them.

4.

I had all the ingredients.
It was revolting.
Disgusting.
I can't even find enough words to tell you how icky this was.

It was foamy, seedy and gross.
Gross.
I even strained the raspberries before adding to the lemonade and ice.
Still disgusting.

DON'T. MAKE. THIS.
Even if you have all the ingredients.










Friday, August 17, 2012

Day 5 *YAWN* of I'm feeling...pinterested..

I'm beat.

This is not easy/fun anymore.

Yesterday was Crafting for myself. I chose something simple, supposedly easy and basic. Or so I thought.

1.


Doesn't that look amazing?
I saw it on Pinterest, had a tank top just laying around and HAD to try it!
Sounded REALLY easy too!
Warning: Whenever something sounds easy, means it's soooo very hard and time consuming, it's not meant for you. Run away from projects that "appear" easy.

But I'm stupid so I trekked on like an idiot and decided I was going to make this dress.
I bought my tank at Target and I found the fabric at JoAnn Fabrics 60% off. I am glad it matches a little, but I kind of find it ugly. These are not colors I would be naturally drawn to. These were colors on clearance and I had coupons. They win.

I cut my tank top in half...then cried a little. Cutting perfectly good clothing always makes me a little nervous.

I wrapped the fabric 1 1/2 times around me then pinned the long end together and sewed there. Doesn't make sense? Don't care. I give up.

Then you are supposed to sew along the waistband portion of your skirt and it's "supposed" to gather because you threaded your bobbin, by hand, with the stupid but special magical elastic thread that you had to hunt down at the store and it took you forever and ever to find.

And it doesn't gather.
So you cry.
Then hit your machine really hard.
After that, you suck down a Cherry Coke to help with the pain.
All is good.

The poster above put something in her blog about messing with your tension on your bobbin when using elastic thread, with a brother machine, and how to get it to do what I need it to do.

Except, I'm not good at sewing or messing with my machine.
I made a Nightfury once, from How to Train Your Dragon, and it looked like a turd with wings.
My son loved it, but it makes me giggle when I see it.

Then this is what happens.
You start messing with crap that you have no idea how to repair.
It's not pretty.
My poor machine.

I gave up and put it back together.

And used REGULAR elastic instead!
Which I happened to have the whole time and didn't have to hunt down.
Whew.
Day. Saved.

After putting my elastic in, I had to sew my tank on.

Ooooh, isn't that waistband beautiful? Of course not!
That's why there's directions on a sash. Or you can use a big belt if you have one.
I chose the sash because I had a TON of extra fabric.
It's 9:30 p.m.
I had been working on this dress since 10 a.m. on and off.
We had a Dr. appt. and a soccer game.
Darn distractions.

It's 10 p.m. and my husband was snoring. So I did the best I could with my photos.
The dress is....well. It looks like a dress, right?
I actually think it's just my body type. I'm not sure I'm cut out for this style of dress.

Here's my half-assed sash from the back.
I gave up after a certain point.
So very tired.

I decided to try it with a shrug/sweater thing I had.
Not too bad.

It looks alright.

Although, my fabric is see-through, so no romping outside in the sunlight.
My undies were giving a free peep-show.
I would need a bigger bow for them not to show.

And shut up about my messy closet.
It's where I hide stuff.
Apparently not very well, but when the doors closed, my room looks really tidy.

Ok.
That was it.
That's all I actually accomplished yesterday.

I have cooking/recipes today.
This should be easy.
Right?