Wordless Wednesday: Sneak Peek

St. Patrick's Day Banner

Okay, so I'll be honest here. I would've had this post up about 3 hours ago, but I got sucked into Pinterest. Every. Single. Time. It's a complete time suck. But I love it just the same.

In fact, this project wouldn't have happened without Pinterest. I made this project based on merging things I liked about three different banners made by: Rebecca at Simple as That, Tanya at twelve O eight, and Kim at The TomKat Studio for HGTV.

In my quest to increase our holiday decor, the goal for this year is to make a minimum of one new project per major holiday. (I'm not counting things like President's Day or Arbor Day here.) I've already met my one minimum for Valentine's Day, so St' Patrick's Day was next on the list.

Making a paper banner (or bunting, if you prefer) like the one I made for Halloween was the easiest of the options, so it was a natural choice for the first project to tackle...especially since I just got done being sick.

The supplies are simple and inexpensive. You'll need: scissors, book pages (I had some tea stained pages left over from the wedding flowers), green paper, chipboard letters or stickers, some form of adhesive, jute, and a stapler.

I'm all about making things easier on myself, so I used my Pazzle to cut out my shamrock shapes using a clipart file. If you have a Silhouette or Cricut, this is totally the way to go. If you don't have one of these handy machines, print yourself a template from a similar file on the internet and simply trace and cut as many cute little shamrocks as you need.

I trimmed the sides and tops of the book pages to keep the page mostly filled with words rather than blank space. I then trimmed out a triangle shape from the bottom of each page (use a template to keep your shapes similar).

Layer your shamrocks on top of the pages and adhere using your preferred method (I used a tape runner), then adhere your letters to the center of each shamrock. I spelled out "lucky", but you could easily pick whatever term you'd like. This stage took me the longest because I am terribly indecisive and went through four different lettering options before I settled on the black sparkle ChipChatter.

I made one extra shamrock page for each side of the banner as bookends, so to speak. I decorated these with two minibuttons each, again adhered with the tape runner.

Side note: Check your pages before you start gluing them together. I caught a lovely piece of profanity right in the middle of one of my pages (directly below the shamrock stem) just before I stuck everything together. That would've made it interesting.

Lastly, you'll need to string up your individual pieces. I folded the top 1/4" of each page to the back and adhered the jute in between the back of each page and the folded section. To make extra sure they didn't come undone, I placed a staple diagonally at each top corner to hold the jute in place. (I used a box of staples to help me keep the distance between each flag at a standardized length.)

Now just find a nice spot to hang it up and you're all done! Easy peasy. I love crafts like that!

Summary Sunday: I Hate Being Sick Edition

Well...it's been an interesting week. Guess who got sick...again? Ugh. This time it's some sort of sinus disaster. Not my idea of a good time. I've spent the last three days (yes...my ENTIRE three day weekend) in bed. I'm pretty irritated by the fact that none of the craft projects I had planned are getting done - not to mention the fact that I now have to try and figure out how I'm going to rearrange my blog planner. Ah, the downside of trying to be organized.

Now I'm having an OCD breakdown over the fact that the planner is written in pen - PEN, people! - and it won't be accurate. Seriously. You have no idea how much that bothers me. I'd say that I'd go back and redo it and put it in pencil this time, but pencil bothers me too. All the smudgyness? That's not okay. There's just no winning.

So this week's Summary Sunday is going to be pretty short and sweet. Because I accomplished next to nothing. Again. It's getting old. Thank goodness I'm on the mend because there will have to be some SERIOUS crafting this week. That day off I have coming up on Wednesday? Ya...other than the glorious massage I have planned, there will be some sewing and paper crafts happening. Beware the typhoon of crafting that will occur!

Now...let's get down to brass tacks...

Posts I Posted : In terms of quantity, this week sucked. I only posted once. That's a low for 2014 thus far. I'm mildly ashamed. I should have at least tried to dig a draft out to throw on for you guys. But...I will say that the one post I did was a good one.

We celebrated my niece's birthday this week. She turned 3.

How adorable is this little princess?

We went out as a family and she whooped us all at bowling. I'm not kidding. The kiddo scored 117 and beat the other six of us. Okay...so she had a little bit of help in the bowling ramp, but still.

Anyway, I made her birthday present and it ended up being the only post that made it on the blog this week. Thank goodness that project was a cute one. In fact, this may be one of my most favorite projects ever. I give you...Barnyard Hand Puppets.

Seriously, these were so much fun to make. I didn't even have to curse at the sewing machine once. That has to be a record. I'm currently drawing up plans for some additional hand puppet ideas. They'll probably debut sometime in the late fall (Miss M turns 4 in November). We shall see...I may not be able to restrain myself for that long.

Books I Read: This is the category where being sick actually paid off. I am ON TRACK with my Goodreads goal for 2014. Not only am I on track, but the books I finished this week will both be in the running for 2014 Book of the Year. Color me amazed! Let's see how long I can hold on to that one.

I finished two good books this week and I'm currently in the middle of what I think will be another winner. I completed Rapture by Lauren Kate, which was really good except for one flaw that almost made me quit the book altogether. I'm glad I stuck it out because this fourth book in the Fallen series actually ended up being better for me than either the second or third.

Speaking of series books, I also read Where She Went by Gayle Forman. It's the sequel to If I Stay, which I read back in 2012 (and apparently never finished reviewing on Goodreads. Oops.) Well, here's the thing. I really enjoyed If I Stay. But...I liked Where She Went better. That is super rare for me on a series book. I think I just enjoyed Adam's character a lot. Plus, I think being sick put me in more of an emo-type place, so his angst totally worked for me. Whatever the reason, I LOVED this book.

And now...well, now I'm reading Amy and Roger's Epic Detour by Morgan Matson. So far, I really like it. I'm expecting that it will be finished quickly. Last night I only gave it up because my Nook was running out of battery power and (thanks to the time change) it was 3 a.m. Ya...a little later than I planned on, but my schedule is all messed up with all of the sleeping I've been doing over the last few days. It's going to make going to work tomorrow at 8 a.m. just that much harder.

Recipes I Tried: It was a week of easy meals at our place. Monday night was burritos. No, not frozen ones...I actually made them. Tuesday night was Darian's favorite, Waikiki Meatballs. I should probably share that recipe at some point. They're delicious and super easy to make. Wednesday...hmm...what did we have Wednesday. Oh! I lied. Wednesday was Waikiki Meatballs. On Tuesday night, Collin made Alphabet Noodles and used up all of the cheese, so I couldn't make the nachos I had originally planned for Wednesday. (We're still obnoxiously out of cheese.) In case you're wondering, Alphabet Noodles are really just a homemade version of Spaghetti-O's. They're not that fancy. But it's nice when he cooks, because it means I don't have to. After that, it's just been leftovers and eating out. We had pizza at Miss A's party and then I've been sick. Collin picked me up some Costco chicken noodle soup yesterday and that was lovely.

Projects I Worked On/Finished: Well other than the aforementioned Barnyard Hand Puppets, nothing got finished. I'm really quite bummed about that. However, I did (with Collin's help) make some progress on the crop room. You can actually see both the table top and the carpet now. It's just this side of a miracle. Now the real work begins. I had Collin drag my paper racks into the garage so I can get them sold and have some money to put towards new cabinetry. I'm in the midst of trying to figure out exactly what I want in there. I think Collin is on to something though, he suggested a table top on the western wall that would eliminate the sewing machine cord from the floor (which would be awesome) and maybe a couch under the window to make it a little cozy. He also suggested a larger TV. I'm totally down for that one. We'll see what happens. I can tell you that the project will not be finished this month as I had originally hoped. The dead heater has seen to that. Stupid money pit of a house.

Favorite Pin of the Week: I'm a little sad to say that not a lot of pinning happened this week. For all the time I spent at home, not much of it was surfing the web. Shocking, I know. And so I have to go a little less classy than I had hoped for my favorite pin this week. Less classy, but hilarious. And I'll apologize beforehand because this pin is just a picture, it doesn't really go to the source. So you just get the link to my actual Pinterest pin for the most awesome coasters ever.

Ya...I laughed out loud at these. I particularly like the top left one.

So hopefully next week goes a little more impressively than this one. It's been a sad start to March. I need to get myself back on track and at least do a few things that apply to the theme.

I also need to get on the ball and start preparing for my April posts. That month is going to be interesting. I'll be starting the A-to-Z Challenge on April 1st, which will end up requiring a post every. single. day. of the month thanks to Summary Sundays.

I'm a little scared.  The good news is that there will be a crafting post on every day that month. The bad news is that I need to get photos organized and remake a couple of projects that are missing photos before April 1st hits. It's going to be a LOT of work. No more time for being sick! Let's get this crafting show on the road!

So much for being short and sweet. Apparently, if you coop me up for too long I can't stop myself from rambling. Maybe I can channel all this new found energy into something productive in the next few hours. Here's hoping!

A New Obsession...Hand Puppets

Today is a very special little girl's birthday. Miss A turns 3 today! We're heading out to party tonight, so I'm getting this post ready to go before then. But don't worry...I'm making sure it won't post until she's been able to open it. No chance of spoiling the surprise in case Mommy or Grandma happen to take a gander at the post beforehand.

As Auntie, it is always my responsibility to make sure that my nieces and nephew are spoiled with homemade gifts. This one might be my new favorite.

The pictures on this post are all mine, but the idea is not. I found the patterns for these guys via Pinterest. They were designed by Larissa over at Just Another Day in Paradise. She has a magnificent set of patterns over there to make all of these guys, plus a duck and a farmer. I didn't make the duck because I didn't have enough yellow felt. I'm not a big fan of the farmer (he looked a little creepy to me) and didn't want to take the time to make myself a new pattern just yet, so that one's on hold for now.

They were so much fun to make that they are now my new obsession. I've been thinking about new possible designs for the last couple of days and I can pretty much guarantee that there will be other animals making debuts on the blog in the future.

All you need to make these is your patterns, scissors, felt, and thread. So straightforward. You could probably sew them fairly simple by hand, but the sewing machine makes thing way faster. Each hand puppet takes about an hour to make. That includes all cutting and sewing. Not too bad.

I started off with the chicken. He's the easiest in the bunch so I wanted to make sure I knew what I was getting into before I got rolling on all seven different puppets. Sometimes a project looks like it will be simple, but blows up in my face. I didn't want felt everywhere if that happened. But...I needn't have worried; he was a breeze. The instructions are simple to follow and I was surprised at how easy the applique went.

After the chicken came the lamb. I think it might be my favorite. I didn't get as much scalloping on his head as I really wanted and I changed up the color of his belly (as well as a couple of other details on the other puppets), but I love his sweet little face.

Usually when I'm sewing a project like this I have my TV running up in the crop room. I run through series of shows on DVD (most often Gilmore Girls). This time though, I was all in the zone. No distraction. Except for my brain...which wouldn't shut off. The whole time I was sewing this lamb I kept hearing a few songs from my childhood run through my head.

The first was a church hymn called Little Lambs So White and Fair. I'm not a big churchgoer, but I very vividly remember being about 4 years old and having my Aunt Lizzy teach me the song on my grandma's piano. It's one of my earliest memories. I still love that song. It has a very pretty melody.

The second song was Mairzy Doats. Just a catchy little ditty.

Oh...and this lamb reminds me a little bit of Lamb Chop. Anyone out there remember that one? Lamb Chop's Play-Along was a short running series on PBS with Shari Lewis and her hand puppets. I only remember it in a blur, but I do remember that it featured The Song That Doesn't End.

We drove my parents crazy singing that on more than one road trip. I think it might have gotten one or more of us grounded. Thanks a lot, Lamb Chop.

I love the little bell accent on the cow. Brilliant idea on her part. I added the little nostril holes and I have mixed feelings about them. I like the added depth, but next time I need to make myself a circle guide. I get a little lost in the stitches when it's in the machine.

I also have mixed feelings on the horse. I think he's cute, but I think next time I'll do a different color. He's awfully dark. It makes him crazy hard to photograph and it takes away some of his cuteness. I also kind of cheated since I didn't do any of the backsides on any of my puppets, so he looks a little different than the original.

After the horse is where it got challenging. The cat and the dog both have those darned paws to deal with. That was some interesting sewing. I also managed to make the cat's whiskers a little longer than I planned. Oops.

Like the horse, I think I'll be changing up the color scheme on the dog. He is cute, but photographs dark. I folded his ears over and sewed them down to get the folded droopy ear look. I only tacked a small portion so that the thread wouldn't be obvious through the center of the ear.

I had everything finished up last night and had decided on no hooves. That was until this morning. I was getting ready to wrap these guys up when I glanced at the pig. The poor guy just looked so plain. He needed the contrast of the hooves. So I added them to the pig, lamb, horse and cow. I was actually pretty surprised that they only took me about 15 minutes to attach to all four puppets. Easy peasy.

I'm really glad that I decided to try these guys out. I seriously loved this project. Simple (and inexpensive) to make and so cute when they're finished.

I'm excited to see what I can come up with for other versions. They might be my new favorite thing.

Summary Sunday: 1st One on Monday in 2014 Edition

Yup. It's Monday...and I'm doing a Summary Sunday. Like Annie likes to say, "no judging". It's been an interesting few days. Let's just say that I should definitely start working towards getting posts done a few days in advance. Hahahaha...I'm laughing just reading myself write that. If you know me at all, then you know I'm totally a procrastinator. Me having stuff done super far in advance just never happens. Like, ever. But it would be nice. I'll keep dreaming.

I am obviously just not one of those "together" blog writers. If you thought that up to this point, you might want to look up the word gullible in the dictionary, because your picture might be there. I'm just about as much of a disorganized mess as they come. Which makes this even more entertaining...March is all about spring...including spring cleaning. This will be a challenge for me. We'll see how it goes.

This Summary Sunday post will be a little bit different. Not only is it a summary of last week, I also need to do a month end wrap up for February. To be completely honest, I have no idea how to do that without making this a total mess. So good luck to you as a reader. Because this might be brutal.

February's theme was love. That actually did go well. Thank goodness. I need something in this post to be positive in the accomplishment category.

There were lots of love themed posts during the month. I talked about how Collin and I met, got engaged, and finally got married...and we spent some of our wedding gift cards by having a delicious brunch at Brick 29.

©Broken H Photography

I congratulated my parents on an impressive 36 years of marriage...and they celebrated with some time together in Hawaii. (I'm jealous.)

I made the first of our new 2014 holiday decorations - which is actually our only Valentine's Day decoration. We then spent our Valentine's Day together as a family, eating sushi and watching the Olympics.

I reminded you to date your significant other all year round...and we went on a family date with my brother, his wife and my adorable niece to see The LEGO Movie. Which, by the way, if you haven't seen it...you need to. It's hilarious and cute and wonderful.

And then I piled on the DIY wedding crafts.

Our wedding canopy...

©Broken H Photography

Glitter Glue Mason Jars...

Wedding Invitations...

and my favorite post of 2014 so far...the origami wedding flowers that took me forever to complete.

Oh...and somewhere in the middle of all this awesomeness came some additional fun at our place...our heaters died. Space heaters and our gas fireplace are now our good friends as we save up for that joy.

And then I got sick. Yup. That was fun. I had to cancel a day of work and felt pukey and had a swimming head for about three days. Not my idea of a good time.

You started out good February...and I really did like you...but you ended on a very sour note. I think I'm okay with saying goodbye to you.

Now...how about last week...

Last week we got surprised by a band concert. We found out Sunday that Darian had a concert on Monday night. That was awesome. Well...the timing wasn't awesome, but the night was. We scrambled to make our schedules work and showed up at 5pm for the Potato Feed. Darian played great and we all had a good potato dinner together. They had a raffle going that night for some baskets full of prizes. Collin's office made a donation that got us a pile of entries and...well...we won. We won a lot. We never win anything. But somehow that night we won like six times. Total craziness. And I got an iPad out of the deal. Sweet.

As for the blog...

We already talked about the posts I posted, so I get to skip that one.

Books I Read: I finished Passion by Lauren Kate, the 3rd book in the Fallen series. I'm holding steady at one book behind schedule on my Goodreads goal and I have my Nook nice and loaded with a good selection of books for the next few months.

Recipes I Tried: We had potatoes on Monday night, does that count? Ya. Right. I was sick. No way I cooked people. (Yes, I should probably rephrase that to make it make some actual sense, but I'm enjoying the fact that it resembles one of those eCards about the need for appropriate punctuation and grammar far too much to fix it.) I made the men cook and we ate some leftovers on the other nights.

Projects I Worked On/Finished: Well...this post is getting even easier since I accomplished a big batch of zero last week. Boom! Laziness is paying off. I spent a lot of time bonding with my bed. We're good friends.

Favorite Pin of the Week: I love these cute little sock owls over at Craft Passion. Seriously...how cute are these? And the tutorial makes them look pretty straight forward to make too.

Wow. Longest review post ever. That only took me two hours. Ok. I'm going back to my evening now. And then I'll be starting on some crafting stuff later this week. Because the blog schedule says I have to. Fine. So be it. Crafting it is.

Shrimp and Pesto Pizza with Goat Cheese

Some days our best laid plans just don't work out. Today is one of those days. This was not the originally planned post, but it was a draft that I had started. Since I'm feeling a little under the weather today, building a full post is not in the cards. That just means that one of the February planned posts will get pushed to another date. Gotta roll with the punches some times.

So I actually made this recipe last summer. I honestly don't remember where I found it since I was pulling recipes from the internet, out of random cookbooks, and from a whole host of magazines at the time. It's not too shabby. In fact, the recipe is pretty simple to eat and the pizza was pretty tasty, but we all agreed that there will need to be changes for the next go round. 

You see, I braved it with the goat cheese. Turns out, none of us are really big fans. It's just a little too sour for our liking. So next time I think we'll switch to all mozzarella. I think I'll probably add some tomato and spinach in the mix as well just to deepen the flavor profile. You know I can't just leave a recipe alone. They're always being reinvented around here.

Up for trying it yourself?

The ingredients are pretty simple...

Pizza dough mix (I used a box of Jiffy Pizza Dough Mix)
1/2 lb. shrimp (thawed, peeled, and deveined; no tail)
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. Italian seasoning
1 tbsp. olive oil
1/4-1/2 c. pesto sauce
8-12 oz. shredded mozzarella
6 oz. goat cheese

And so are the directions...

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Prepare dough according to mix. Coat a 14-18" pizza pan with nonstick spray. Roll out the dough to the desired size and place on the pan. Cook crust for 2-3 minutes.

In a small bowl, mix together garlic powder and Italian seasoning. Coat shrimp in seasoning. Heat oil in skillet on medium. Saute seasoned shrimp for about 30 seconds on each side.

Spread pesto on dough. Add shrimp and mozzarella. Spoon on goat cheese. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 400 degrees until the cheese starts to brown at the edges.

Can't get much easier than that.

Fold ALL the Things! Origami Flowers & Kusudama Balls

So remember how I kind of disappeared for a little while in the summer and early fall of last year? Ya...that was because of this project.

One of the first things I decided on for my wedding was that I wanted to do all paper flowers. I think they're pretty, they fit in with the vintage theme (not to mention the DIY idea) and it saved me a TON of money by not having to purchase flowers. Added bonus? They can last forever.

And that decision led to months of me doing nothing but folding and gluing paper while Netflix played in the background. Whee!

The best part of this project is that you don't need a lot in the way of supplies. You just need a lot of time, some patience, and maybe some awesome friends and family who will help you out. Though I did most of the folding and assembling on my own, I got some hours of help from Patti, Krista, Annie & my mother. And lucky them, they all learned how to fold flowers in the process. That will totally turn into a worthwhile skill you guys.

Anyway, back to the task at hand (pun kind of sort of totally intended).

If you're looking for the basics, look no further. All you need is some paper and some glue. In my case, I bought a couple of books from the thrift store (I used four full paperback novels costing me a total of $3) and some glue. I also used some tea, some mini clothespins, and some binder clips. Total project cost: under $20.

If you want the tea stained/weathered look, brew up some tea (I used three tea bags per 8 cup batch to keep it dark) and pour it into a pie plate or casserole dish. I used my 9x13" glass pyrex casserole.

Submerge the individual pages for about 3-5 minutes depending on your tea and how dark you want the paper. You can put multiple pages in at the same time, but make sure each page is fully submerged and soaked before you put the next one in, otherwise you end up with white splotches.

The pages will need to be laid out individually to dry. I literally had hundreds of pages strewn across my kitchen counters, nook table and dining room table for days on end as I stained batch after batch.

Once you have your pages, it's time to start cracking.

The majority of the flowers I used are a basic flower known as a kusudama. The kusudama is a flower historically used in the Japanese culture for potpourri and incense. The flower is an origami flower, but not in the strict purist sense, since you will use glue in addition to folding to hold all of the pieces together.

First, cut your pages into squares depending on what size you want your final flowers to be. I used 2", 3", 4" and 6" sized squares. Why so many sizes? Well...I had a lot of projects. You'll see what I'm talking about later. The 4" size is the most manageable and still produces a decent size flower (It's the size that I used to make all of the example photos.) Each flower will require a minimum of five squares, with each square eventually becoming a single petal.

Once you have your square cut out, fold it in half diagonally to form a triangle.

Now fold the out side edges of the triangle up to meet the center.

This will form a small diamond.

Take your two folded edges and fold them halfway back on themselves towards the edge.

Now it should look like a tulip. That center point is your original top point and the two half spears are your original sides.

The next step is a little tricky. Undo the last fold you did, moving back into the diamond shown above. Now slide your finger inside each half one at a time and flatten them to the side. The crease that originally ran at the center of the diamond is now the center crease of each petal in the above tulip.

Fold down the tops of each side to create a small triangle.

Now fold each side back in half, tucking that small triangle into the center of the newly formed flap.

Line the flap of one side with glue and lightly pinch together. You want those small triangular sides to be on the inside to form the center of your flower. Use a binder clip, paper clip, or small clothespin to hold the seam shut while it dries.

This is what it should look like from the top of the petal when you're done. Take care not to fold the whole thing flat. You want the petal to stay full.

Once the glue has dried, assemble your flower using five petals.You'll assemble this by gluing the outsides together and holding them with the clips until dried.

My flowers became multiple items...most notably, my bouquets.

©Broken H Photography

At the center of each bouquet is a foam ball. I stuck a couple of wooden dowels into the center of the ball to form my handle and then wrapped it with floral tape followed by ribbon. The flowers were attached using some floral wire and glue. Each flower is glued to its neighbors to keep the whole thing stable.

The centers of the flowers are either left open or stuffed with a glued in pearl, adhered jewel or glued on button. The spaces between the flowers are intermittently filled with a silver glitter tulle ribbon. There was literally glitter everywhere.

I used a few other types of origami flowers to add some dimension in my own bouquet. My matron of honor's bouquet and my tossing bouquet contained only the origami flowers demonstrated above.

The flowers were also used to make corsages for the mothers and boutonnieres for the men. In the case of the corsages they were paired with paper roses. For the men, they were paired with paper lilies. Both the lilies and the roses can be seen in my bouquet above.

Remember how I said I used 2" squares? This headband is why. It is the headband that I made for my adorable little flower girl.

In this case, the flowers were all glued together to form a bridge. The flowers were then sewn (yes, with thread) to the headband to keep them in place. It held up pretty darned well because I trussed the crap out of it. Other than the purple flower, each little mini flower was decorated with an adhesive jewel.

©Broken H Photography

And there it is on the cutie patootie.

I also used the flowers for decoration. Lots of decoration.

©Broken H Photography

I did this primarily through the use of kusudama balls.

A kusudama ball is a ball made up of twelve of the origami flowers. You basically make them by gluing the sides of the original flowers together just like you did the individual petals. It requires a crap ton of paper clips or clothespins, but they're super cute when you're finished.

I used mine to hang from my canopy as well as the ceiling decoration. I tied them to multiple strings of white twinkle lights and hung them at different lengths.

For a good visual tutorial on how to make your own kusudama ball...check out this step by step one on Wikihow. I couldn't make a better one, it's pretty darned good.

It took a TON of time and patience and the helping hands of a few friends and family members, but I literally made all of my wedding flowers out of paper for only a few dollars. Plus I caught up on more than one Netflix series in the process. 

With today's average wedding floral costs running upwards of $1000, I'd say it was well worth my investment.