I have discovered something...

I can sew! Well Sort of, I am learning! I haven't been here in quite awhile it seems. In lieu of woodworking, I have been following tutorials all over the web. I have been busy sewing for our first grand babies! Even though they live so far away, there is lots to do before they get here in April and June. I have been trying my hand at sewing some different things, and I will post pictures and the link to the instructions if I have them. Not everything is for the babies, sometimes you sew just because...


These aren't in any particular order but they were all made between December and now. 

Scrappy Owls, these are small as you can see my my cutting mat in the background. So fun to make! These ones hadn't been sewn and stuffed yet.
Tutorial here: http://theeternalthread.blogspot.com/2012/02/to-print-pattern-click-here.html

Scrappy Owl Pillow- tutorial here: http://theeternalthread.blogspot.com/2012/02/to-print-pattern-click-here.html

Back of Scrappy Owl. This was made when a friend told me her daughter would love the little owls I made, but this one is the size of a toss pillow. I love the re-size feature on my printer!

Boutique style burp cloths, pick from several Pinterest tutorials. These are pre-fold cloth diapers with pretty fabrics stitched to the center of one side. They are very cute!

Onesie dress and little matching headband. There were several tutorials on Pinterest, and I sort of used the ideas I liked from several different ones.  In the future, I will keep the skirts separate, it is a pain sewing them onto the onesie!

Overnight tote bag. Very roomy! I made this before my last trip to MA to see my kids, it held 3 days of clothes easily.
tutorial here: http://mypatchwork.wordpress.com/2011/05/02/tote-bag-tutorial/

I don't usually buy the pre-cut fabrics. There is a list of "equivalent measures" on the Moda Bake Shop site
http://www.modabakeshop.com/p/weights-and-measures.html

Loving these summer colors!

Crinkle taggy toy I made for a baby shower gift! 

Tutorial here: http://simplethingssweetlife.blogspot.com/2011/10/diy-baby-crinkletaggie-toy-tutorial.html

Again, there are lots of tutorials out there!

While I was visiting, I took my Daughter-in-Love to Joanne and she picked the fabrics for this great couch throw blanket. It is a simple strip blanket with minky backing, I used cheater binding (fold the backing over toward the front and stitch!) for the edges as the minky is very forgiving. No tutorial, strip blankets are too easy!

When I went back to MA at the beginning of this month, Daughter in Love #2 Picked fabrics and I made this quilt for their daughter due in April. All the squares are flannels that she picked and the white backing and binding are a surprise butterfly fabric I picked.
Tutorial here: http://www.modabakeshop.com/2013/01/marmalade-squares-quilt.html

That's not all, but a good selection of what I have been up to. More to come, I still have diaper bags to sew and two more baby quilts because in between two grand daughters, I will get a new Nephew as well!

Hurricane Sandy

I gotta say, Hurricane Sandy was not very kind to our area. 

We had to evacuate for a week. 

Our outbuildings filled up with four feet of water. Four feet! I haven't even had the heart to try some of the tools, they are just so crudded up from the salt water and starting to oxidize and rust. I did spray everything down with WD-40, but who knows? Waiting until the summer to drag everything out and inventory the damages.

I managed to snap a few pictures before I evacuated: 

Painted dresser...dressing it up a bit.

This dresser was painted some type of flat chalkboard black when I got her. 
Most of her knobs were missing, and the holes for them were too big from years of pulling and tugging to open the drawers. 
I found her online through a local swap and sell page I visit. I had to drive about 45 minutes to get her, but she was well worth the $20 I spent.

I have always wanted a painted dresser, and I kept going back to this pretty cherry blossom branch with birds on it. I found the picture I liked from a wall graphics catalog and uploaded it over at blockposters.com 
Its a free site where you can turn any picture into poster size. I printed out the sheets of paper and taped them all together to make my design template.

I taped the template over a large sheet of carbon paper, and onto the dresser front and got ready to trace the outline I would need to paint, because I am no artist to try to paint this freehand.

After tracing, I sat down with the only small paintbrush I had, (its like a child's water paint brush) and my sample pot of grey paint and painted on the branches and blossoms, following the lines and the actual picture because black on black is a bit hard to see.

I stopped many times to get up off the floor and stretch and take pictures, But overall, the entire thing, once I started painting only took two hours, including breaks.

I used an old pint of blue I already had to paint on the birds, just to give it a tiny punch of color!

Some new hardware and I am finished!

Pinterest Summer Challenge Projects

Pinterest. 

Yep. Love the concept, but I hear a lot of friends complain that there are so many ideas and not enough creating going on! So I challenged myself to create at least one thing each month from an idea or craft or DIY that I found through Pinterest. 

Here is what I have worked on the past few months:

Sewing table and ruffled skirt

I found these over at Raising up Rubies. 

I fell in love with Jaime's sewing table!

You can find her Pinterest boards here:  http://pinterest.com/raisinguprubies/ 

 My table is the legs from an old kitchen table attached to a solid wooden door. The skirt is attached by Velcro underneath the wood trim. My skirt is three smaller pieces so that I can access the storage space underneath. 

Denim bin

The original photo that I saw on Pinterest was a trio 

of different sizes of these bins. It was pretty fast and easy to make. 

Next time I would like to try square ones! This project traced back to Craft-zine here: http://blog.makezine.com/craft/denim_do-it-all_bins/

Faux Chenille lap quilt

Oh! I am in love with this quilt! The whole thing was fun to make! I would make these again! Pinterest traced back to this site with a great tutorial: http://www.aestheticnest.com/2010/08/sewing-heirloom-cut-chenille-baby.html

Shutter inspiration / pin board

I really don't have a specific link for this project. It is an idea developed in my mind and with a pile of shutters in my shed, the possibilities are endless! They don't match quite yet, but I wanted to share them anyway!

Drive By Shoot...photos

This afternoon I brought my camera out around the surrounding towns and took some pictures (while driving. shhhh)... 

Soybeans and Corn, farms and barns, abandoned homes, small town business, wild cats, and Bob

kitties

grain mill

old train depot

mini mart

wild kitties

This is Bob :o) He is our neighborhood
watch-mannequin. 

Painting the plywood floor

Okay, I am impatient. Very. I get tunnel vision when I want to do a project and completely forget to take "during" progress photos. 

Here is what we have done with the yucky brown plywood subfloor 

in the L shaped front room. 

Still have more to do, but I am excited how it is turning out!


I practiced on the hall floor first, since that is plywood as well.

Looks okay! Yep, I painted right over the vent. 

It was also yucky brown. 

This Valspar Porch and Floor Paint and the color is Sea Sparkle. not.quite.turquoise.

Here is the before photo:

Warning: this is the first time I have stenciled. Anything. Ever.

Close up of the detail of the stencil center.
I found some Valspar Sample paints on the "oops" shelf
at Lowes for ONE dollar!

I ordered this Hannah stencil from Sunny's goodtime paints HERE.

We liked it because it was two stencils in one, although I could have painted faster if the middle and edging were separate stencils. Originally I was thinking of only getting the 

outside edge stencil. Hindsight, I guess.

This photo is closest to the actual colors. I don't have a fancy-pants camera, so the pictures all come out slightly different.

Here is a view looking into the room, at the L,
the polyurethane is drying, looking shiny!
It did yellow a little, I am hoping that it clears up when it dries

I haven't stenciled all the way around yet, but you can see where the washer will go and the cabinets across from them will serve as pantry space until I can build shelving. Floor to ceiling. Oh yeah.
I know there is no wall there yet, just framing, 
and the dryer vent hole needs to be repaired. 
Like I said, progress. Slowly, but progress just the same.

                                      sharing at the following Linky Parties:


                                                      D.I.Y. Dreamer

Home Decor and Organizing link party

Natural Nesters linky party