Y, because I love ya!

It's been a wacky 1.5 years since we moved from the golden state and while the upper valley is treating us so well, it's a total bummer to miss out on events happening 3000+ miles away. Jen's 2nd baby shower was one such event. Annoying to have to miss such a meaningful party for my old friend and bridesmaid, knowing that it'll probably be awhile until I get to meet little maddy.

Her little sister & mom threw what looked like an awesome party with a super cute theme: letters. The invite asked guests to bring or send in their assigned letter so Jen could compile them to make something like this for her (then unknown gender) baby:

(image from designsponge)

I was assigned with the letter Y and while I was excited about the idea, where could I go with the letter Y? It's such a seemingly uninspired letter.....

Dev got Z: 

zig zag. easy. 

done.

And now for an insight into my brainspace....

Brainstorming Y:

Yarn

Yodel

Yellow

Yak (but that's slang for "vomit")

Yama (mountain in Japanese)

Yoorknob

What's that? You haven't heard of a yoorknob???? 

Silly friends, it's when you find an awesome knob and key thing at a Vermont Salvage Place and you try to make it fit your friend's baby shower theme of letters when you were assigned the letter Y. 

Duh.

:)

And here's how I personalized it for a belated shower gift:

Wiped down the worn out door plate. 

Sketched the letter with a pencil.

Filled in the letter with embossing powder and applied a heat gun to get it all melty.

I did it in sections in case I messed up.

Once that first gold layer was down, I added....glittah!

I may or not have waited until we knew the gender just so I knew whether or not to glitter.

Wrote a little note on the back.

oh, hello there, toes.

Used my fave adhesive to get that knob onto the plate.

Did it make it through the mail, jen?

Bam. Done.

The REAL Royall Wedding

For the record, I did not attend this wedding. I have met the bride twice in my life (and the groom...none), but I LOVE her parents, her sister, and her sister's family in a way that could make my heart burst at the seams. So, naturally, I love her too.

Congratulations on getting hitched, Lane!!

Schatzel family on the left. 

Wedding couple in the middle.

Mama and Papa Phelps on the right.

Lauren (young mom on the left of the photo above*) shot me an email awhile back, asking for some tips on how to make a t-shirt for her upcoming little sister's bachelorette shindig. *not like "mtv's 16&pregnant"-young, just young looking. There's nothing I love more than making a good ole-fashioned t-shirt so I was more than happy to jump in with some iron-on tips (learn from my mistakes, friends).

But starting at square one.....what were we going to put on the iron-on?

Lauren mentioned the royal wedding of William and Kate that had just taken place and that her sister was about to marry someone with the last name "Royall". Could we do some sort of play on this wedding being the REAL royal wedding?

Well, sure! Why not!

Step one: 

Find official wedding photo of the royal couple.

Step two (part1):

find photo of the groom

Step two (part2):

find photo of the bride

Step three: 

applaud oneself for becoming facebook friends with a friend's little sister.

Step four:

photoshop and send for approval

Step five:

sit back and watch as wedding photos come in showcasing the fun!

on a shirt!

in a frame!

Congrats again to the beautiful couple. 

thanks for letting me play with your faces.

I think I can, I think I can.

How is it possible that I still don't have a good grip on time management and planning ahead? I mean, theoretically, humans are supposed to have been developing the ability to track time and days since birth, with the concepts of clocks and calendars to have sunk in by age 10 (according to this one site). And yet, I am constantly overloading my to-do list, constantly overbooking, constantly taking on more than I know I can handle. Are you all stuck in this same pattern or is am I alone in this?

I had grand intentions of gifting handmade items over the holidays; sending out loads of glorious packages across the nation to genuinely show how much I love you all. I had ideas flagged, materials purchased, and even mapped out a general schedule to enable a timely delivery. 

and.then.it.all.went.to.crap.

grrrrr.

At the very least, I was able to complete two items and although they arrived well after the holidays, I'm hoping they'll be well-enjoyed by a couple of lovely ladies in my life. As for the rest of you? Eh...maybe by 2045, I'll get my sh#t together.

for the 50s mom living in modern times.

loves cream, loves chickens, loves dots:

year-round kitchen chic.

chicken feet are so cute in pictures.

real life chicken feet creep me out.

one crisp pleat down the middle.

I used this FREE online tutorial that I had flagged last fall. 100s of people submitted their products to a contest, but I didn't get these done in time. See: opening paragraph of this post.

I actually had a delightful time with these two aprons! The tutorial is easy to follow, the cutie-patootie fabric showcases nicely, and although I was initially paralyzed by the choice of trim and bow, it became fun to play around with the combinations. Definitely add it to your loong list of things to do (bwaahahaha, I'm evil).

for the urban, loft-dwelling mom.

doesn't give two rats if you catch her wearing a Christmas apron in July:

and who appreciates an apron gift even if she has never been spotted in one.

elephant with earmuffs? adorbs.

gotta love the giraffe with scarf. 

it must be tough to have a long neck in the winter.

Material from the genius, Purl Soho.

Ribbon and rick-rack from another of my favorite spots in New York: MJ Trimmings.

Sewing - Project Super Quilt

A friend from high school was gathering handmade quilts and other blankets for kids at her son's hospital this winter. Spencer has been receiving treatment for a malignant tumor (rhabdomyosarcoma) since February 2010 and I've been keeping in touch with them through their blog: My Super Spence. I really wanted to send a twin-sized quilt over to them, but came across one.little.problem....I don't actually know how to quilt. Hmmmm.... 

I kinda hodge-podged a number quilt for baby Jack TWO years ago (what?!), but it was the first one I tackled and I never made a second attempt. Talk about going through a steep learning curve without retention of anything learned. But Project Super Quilt seemed like such a cool cause and I really wanted to participate. I stared at the grey quilt from West Elm on our bed a few nights in a row and gathered the wherewithal to finally tackle the project. Let the record show, I decided to go for a free-hand approach, thinking it'd be fun to have variety of bumps and squishiness to touch and comfort while in the hospital.

The numbers fabric is an Ikea purchase that I had been hanging onto for awhile....looks like I wasn't the only one who thought it screamed "make me into a blanket". It doesn't look like they're carrying the pattern online anymore, but there are always fun and modern fabrics in the kid section.

And check it out...the process was FUN. Jamie was catching up on season 4 of Friday Night Lights (a series that forces you to watch many episodes in a row) and I happily channel stitched with Tim Riggins and Matt Seracen chatting away in the background. The quilt was finished, packed up, and should have arrived on Holly's doorstep this week.

On another fun note, I happened to mention this craftiness to both Kerensa and Trish which resulted in Two.More.Quilts making their way to the hospital. Those two ladies graciously volunteered to hop onto my quilting bandwagon and hand made warm blankies for cancer kids. Love them!

And finally, if you're wondering how I got the quilt to suspend itself in the air like that:

thanks, jamie.

Fauxpholster...it's a thing.

We have this chair.  It has mini rose flowers on a cornflower blue background, came from my ex-boyfriend's grandmother, and I'm sure it was really pretty when she got it (hoping, at least). In 2010, however? Nope, not cute. Let's cover it up, shall we?

Wingback chair with such fun bones.

--never thought i'd be a person to appreciate "furniture bones"--

I decided to use a curtain from our old place. 

Please excuse the maniacal POM-POMS.

I entrusted someone to add a chocolate brown band to the existing off-white curtain and they took the liberty of adding strips of POM-POMS.

POM-POMS.

I mean, who POM-POMS without ASKING??

Tuck and staple. Tuck and staple.

I needed to get the cornflower out of there stat, but didn't want to spend so much time indoors yet. This is a temporary fix that will hopefully be more complete at some point down the line. Figure it could be a good project for the impending doom, right? I mean....winter.

Reject staples.

They didn't want to be a part of the chair.

Phew...no more mini flowers!

And because I'm not one to deceive y'all, here's a glance at the horribly unfinished back:

Bleagh!!

Fauxpholster!!

Wanna look at the front again?

Did I just add emphasis to the POM-POMS??

Is it normal to grow fond of the fuzzy things?

Sock giraffe seems comfy here.

Things are a-movin'.

We're in full-packing mode here, folks. 

All walls have come in a few feet as the apartment is now lined with boxes of all shapes and sizes. Jamie's sister has come and gone, a whirlwind in the kitchen; all cabinets empty and all plates packed.  With our official move day exactly one week away, I've been cleaning and packing and otherwise move-preparing from the second I get out of bed until I crawl back in at the end of the night. This process has made me question our moral character, priorities, and overall lack of cleanliness (have we really lived ALL this time with THAT MUCH DUST behind that huge bookcase? ugh). 

Why do I keep so many shoe boxes?

They don't even have corresponding lids!

Uh...go ahead and ignore the Jessica Simpson box lid...it's not mine.

While we're mentally preparing for a cross-country drive in a 22 foot truck, I have also been brainstorming strategy to make Hudson's journey as comfortable as possible. For our local long drives, he's typically strapped into a back-seat harness. The big moving truck will not have the luxury of a backseat so I've been looking to get something to ensure safety and comfort for the poor thing.

amazon.com

Problem is, while Hudson is only 20 pounds, he measures at a solid 24 inches long (excluding a crazy long tail). There's no way he'd fit in the Sprokett-sized carseat like the one above!

Enter the
Adidas Bag Hacked into a Dog Car Seat
project.

I found this sporty bag stowed away in the garage.

It had busted zippers; the teeth crumbling with age.

We made sure it would fit our intriguingly long dog.

He was NOT comfy like this.

I drafted an extensive and complicated plan.

and by extensive, I mean not at all.

The miscellaneous shoe boxes were broken down and taped together

to create a solid base and some walls for the bag.

There were some complicated alterations.

and by complicated, i mean ridiculously easy.

Perfect fit!

We'll keep his water and food in the external pockets and

I made an inner pocket to keep treats and small toys available.

Seems comfy enough, huh?

We should be able to thread the seatbelt through the two side handles to secure the bag to the bench seat. Then the car harness should have plenty of places to hook onto! Need to keep this scrappy guy as safe as possible.

And to knock off a super old & dated commercial:

One old sports bag..... $0

Some leftover shoe boxes..... $0

Packing tape..... $0 (incorporated into moving material cost)

Hopefully decreasing dog's anxiety level while traveling over 3000 miles in a truck.....PRICELESS.

Flag on.

There are some things that come across my inbox and they just make me happy, inspired, and wanting to just lock myself in a craftroom with ribbon and fabric and paint and awesome people. 

"gran's recipe flag"

available for purchase here.