A Birthday Gift, A Thimble, A Cake Plate.

I have a theory or two... I don't blog often because my life is boring. I don't blog often because I have become so busy that I don't have time to craft. I don't blog often because I am Miss Lazy Bones. It's a problem. One that I aim to fix, and soon. Last weekend I had the loveliest birthday celebration. That weekend even trumps my Lawrence, Kansas birthday weekend four years ago when I turned 16 and I thought that would never happen.  My birthday isn't until the 19th of April, but the present that my sister bought for me (plus my mother and herself) was a ticket to see the Avett Brothers in concert. They're only my favorite band in the whole world. We were a good distance away from the stage, so the pictures aren't good, but I'll take what I can get. We also saw their tour bus when we left, which made an already fabulous night truly magnificent. We each bought a bandana with their name on it as a souvenir!

Earlier that day, we went antiquing; there are quite a few flea markets in Springfield, Mo. We went to a huge one that was absolutely crawling with people, but I still managed to snag up some cool stuff: a thimble, a set of old Betty Crocker cook books, and a vintage cake plate. A cake plate. I have needed a cake plate for so long. Too long. Putting a finished cake on a dinner plate ruins the whole experience for me. I gotta have a cake plate. And now I do. It's time to bake, I think.

After the flea market (I believe it's called Urban Market, but don't take my word for it.), we went to a wonderful little shop called Red Velvet. This is a place that I love so much I want to live there. But let us move on.

My all-time favorite vintage clothing store is Red Velvet. The two sisters who own and operate the shop, Elsie and Emma, each have a blog, so definitely check them out! My sister and I, we consider them celebrities, and we actually saw them that day but I couldn't bring myself to say that I read their blogs and that I absolutelylovewhattheydoandtheyareamazingandcouldwepleasebefriends? because I didn't want to come across as a stalker and a weirdo. I found a cute little carpet bag purse there, along with a cute hair bow that I'm going to put on a purse.  Pictures of my spoils in my next post!

It's Official.

I'm a horrible blogger. Deplorable. I mean, my last update was last year. I would like to say that getting a Tumblr account is the cause, but really, it's not. It's all me. And if you've been reading my blog, I humbly beg your pardon. I'm back, though, and with new projects to boot!

Above are the ingredients for a pair of cork earrings!

I used a box cutter to slice off two disks, stuck a head pin through both, added an ear hook, then hot-glued on buttons!

 Below is a new item for my shop called a T-Bag, an Eco-friendly bag made out of t-shirts; I've used them as purses and shopping bags, while my mom uses them as lunch bags. You can do anything you desire, really. Simple, cute, and unique! 

My last picture is a beaded ring in-progress. You see, I have a problem: I'm petite. Never mind that this causes a slew of problems when it comes to clothes, but jewelry? Hmph. I can't wear the two types of jewelry I adore: rings and bracelets. Standard rings and bracelets that can be found in the stores slide right off. Even those stretchy rings are too big. How does that even happen?! It's annoying, to say the least. The ring I'm making will be made of seed beads strung through wire with a shank button on top!

The photo doesn't really show it, but the button is green. It's positively Slytherin, isn't it?

A Last Minute Vacation

My last minute vacation came about literally at the last minute, although I had to wait about two weeks getting where I am right now: my sister's apartment, specifically her couch. I am about 4 hours from my house, in a city, quite a difference from the country and the 20 minute, 30 minute, or hour long drives I have to make to get anywhere. I adore the city. Fabric stores, health food stores, yoga classes, art and history museums, book stores, malls and my sister, with whom I haven't spent more than a weeks worth of time with since she scuttled off to college 4 years ago.  Primarily we've done craft projects, some painting, vegan cooking and eating, quick drives to Walmart ( I always forget chocolate when we grocery shop) and episode upon episode of Charmed and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. You might say we're having too much fun and we'd have to agree with you.

I've some new store items of the sewn variety that I'm trying to put together, but alas, now I forget thread every time I step foot in Walmart. In my last topic I posted about a reversible skirt in the making and I'm proud to say it's finished. My vacation was the impetus I needed to get it done because I simply couldn't leave home without a newly sewn garment. I've only worn it once, however, in the car ride down here. Go figure. Photos of my skirt and store items will be coming soon, so stay tuned.

Have a terrific weekday!

Paper Bag Reversible Skirt

I'm always on the look out for easy (so far) sewing tutorials, and I love when I go to a site (most times a  sewing blog), fall in absolute love with a garment, which leads me to another blog where I find too many turtorials than I know what to do with. In this case, I stumbled upon the blog Grosgrain which, in turn, led me to Chie Duncan's blog for her clothing line Vivat Veritas  (I suppose I first went to her etsy shop of the same name, found here ) and then somehow I found this materinity website . I'll never know why I clicked the link, as I'm not expecting nor am I expecting to expect anything of that sort in the near future, but I'm glad I did because I found a skirt tutorial from Chie Duncan detailing the how-to for one of her skirts that she has (had?) in her shop. Unfortunately, I have not begun to sew it yet, because I'm scared I'll ruin the fabric. The fabrics I found I love, probably because both 9.99 a yard fabrics where on sale, one from 9.99 to 5.99 and the other to 3.99 (hot diggity dang, I say!).

I love this material so much, I'll probably just leave the skirt butterfly side out.

I didn't like this one as much, but there was very little by way of options at the fabric store.  

 

And, as promised, a picture of the headband I made.

Have a wonderful week!

A Stitch of Sewing

My sewing adventures have finally expanded! It's about time too; I long to make intricately gathered skirts and back-baring dresses and tops and while I'm not there yet, I do believe I am well on my way. I started with a dress made from an over-sized men's button down shirt, tutorial found on transientexpression.wordpress.com. I flew through that with only a few mishaps (mostly because my bobbin thread kept breaking.) although by the time I was finished with the piece I was too angry at the thing to put the last touches on it (the straps). I then went through my closet and was inspired to try my hand at transforming my grandma's muu muu into...something. I was onto something, I tell you, but I messed up a bit there, and made it too tight here, and then I didn't want to even look at the thing so it found a new home in the trash. Clearly, I need to work on my patience. That happened (or, rather, didn't happen) twice, but through it all I learned my way around my machine. Now I'm onto headbands and a simple highwaisted and elastic waist reversible skirt. Photos to come!

Aunt Bee Bakes Banana Bread

I like to make things. These 'things' could be anything from, as I've stated in past posts, jewelry and flowers, to herbal shampoo (specifically designed for blondes) and face scrubs (cloves and tumeric? What?) DIY halter tops and bags, and, oh, do you know how wonderful embroidery is for a quick project? You don't? Please, if you're so inclined, head over here http://www.sublimestitching.com/howto.html (if you're a newbie, like I am) and immerse yourself in the slowly dying art that is embroidery. You can make darling little things for the darling people in your life... customized embroidered handkerchiefs? I'm all over that. I believe that those handy washable tissues should come back into vogue. I digress. The point is, I make things. And when I was little, like, 9 years ago, I started cooking beyond the occasional scrambled egg which is what I am trying to get at: I bake, bake and bake. In fact, culinary school is a bright point in my future (I'm that girl who has her own space for HER cookbooks in her mother's kitchen). The other night I came across this banana bread recipe which has only a slight difference in ingredients from other b-breads, but differs extremely in taste. Now, some banana breads can be insanely sweet. Which is a rather tasty thing when you spread salty butter on top. But have you ever taken note of how much sugar actually goes into these breads to bring out that insanely sweet flavor? Holy moly, an amount I have never thought much of until I made a different sort of banana bread. Instead of pouring, pouring, and pouring more sugar into the dry ingredients, I added a combination of honey and agave nectar.  It tasted less sugary and more salty, so hey, you could even forgo the butter (I did) and I think the banana-y taste was louder without all the sugar. However, I'm still on the fence about it. It's something to get used to as all my tastes buds know is sugary goodness. But I get enough of my sugar fill elsewhere (i.e chocolate and...other things), so I thought, "Why not?".  Also, if you have kiddies at home with you, I'm thinking they might be open to trying some. My niece? Pretty much ate the entire loaf.

 1/4 cup butter
1/3 agave nectar

1/3 honey
3 eggs, beaten
3 very ripe bananas, mashed
1/3 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups flour

1 cup of nuts (walnuts! almonds! Perhaps half of each?)
Preheat oven to 325 degrees
Add the dry ingredients together in one bowl, the wet ingredients in another. Add the dry to wet and stir. Pour into a greased pan.  This recipe made two small pans. Bake for about an hour or whenever a toothpick poked in the middle comes out clean. You know the drill.

Wedding flowers

My newly married sister (May 29th was the big day!) made a great deal of her reception decorations. For a long time we were crafting tissue paper flowers and before that she had made hundreds of origami flowers. She ended up going over board on the origami and had a lot left over. Having no clue how to use them now that the wedding was over she gave them to me to sell to you! The first picture shows the individual flowers that will be sold and the one below shows what she did for her centerpieces.  A last minute change had us hot gluing buttons on the four in the flower pot.