New beginnings

Hi Friends!
Its mid October 2013 and I haven't blogged in who knows how long! I haven't had any wedding crafts going on and most of my time is spent working. Our weekends are filled with seeing this friend or that friend. Literally.

Anyway, over the summer I took obedience class with my puppy, he was too old for puppy kindergarten but I decided we needed some extra training time and the guidance of a class. After that was over I decided to take a beginner agility class and tomorrow is my last class of that one. We started the class when he was only 10 months old and the trainer thought he wouldn't be ready but boy is he amazing! Slightly biased but I think he's one of the best in the class. I plan on continuing on in the spring when we'll hopefully have more $$$. I really think someday we could compete in agility. I have done agility before with my older sheltie, Scout but I never felt like we were good enough to compete. The class I am taking now provides a "real" foundation for agility, it isn't like the class Scout and I took which was just about introducing the dogs to the obstacles. There is a lot more training that goes into agility than the obstacles its really about the flatwork and body language, which is what we are learning now.

The other exciting thing going on, which will give me something to write about, is that hubby and I are moving!! We are renting a house on the other side of the town we currently live in and are so very happy about it! I'll have a few projects to share as I begin to form each room together. Since we'll probably be in this place for a long time (we are renting with an intention to buy) and its a "real" house I wanted it decorated in an adult like way (hehe.... as opposed to young hippy college apartment kinda way).

 For now I'll share two things...
This house has window seats which I've alwaaaaaaaaaaaays wanted!!! So I'm making a cushion to fit on the bench. I already picked out the fabric....

hard to tell in the pic but its orange/red/ yellow and brown. Its not pinky like the picture appears. This will before for our office room (which is our 3rd bedroom and might be a nursery if we have kids someday). The room will be painted a light yellow and the floor is a medium tan rustic looking "wood" ceramic tile. Hubby loves 70's style things so the orange and brown in the fabric gave it that kind of vibe. Unfortunately I only purchased 7.5 feet of fabric and I just measured the seat at 7 feet! yeep. I don't know if I'll have enough fabric!

More pictures to come as the project moves forward!

Then I got this beautiful baby.....

This is the Deco sunflower slipper chair from Wayfair. Its supposed to be lavender but in reality its kind of a grey-ish color. Two of these will be seating for our formal-ish living room. 

 I've been searching for little accent chairs for a while now and it looked like I would have to spend at least 85 minimum for one of these chairs (with the nicer ones being $130+). Then, one day in my inbox I saw that Wayfair was doing a "Pairs" sale. You could get two of these slipper chairs for $140 total!!! That's only 70 each!!! Free shipping and the tax was only like 8 bucks. I'm a huuuuge sucker for a good deal. It's a sickness. But hey, If you were to buy this chair right now it would 110 for only one of them!

I like that its a pretty neutral color so I'll just put some bright colored pillows on them to dress them up. I also love that they are short, if you read the reviews that is the biggest downfall but I on the other hand love that because the house has only 7.5 foot ceilings so a lower chair makes the room feel bigger. 

More on how the living room turns out when it happens! We will be moving in a few weeks!

How-To:

How-To: Make your own butter! (and Buttermilk!)

Trying to get back into the blogging today and I'll start off with this super easy how-to! Making your own butter is way easier than you might think if you've never tried it before. Its one of things you should do at least one in your life!

For me, the hubby and I have been looking for ways to improve our diets. We started buying organic milk and are venturing into whole wheat pastas and using different ingredients like grapeseed oil, flax and even buckwheat flower. We have been buying large quantities of margarine for years now and have recently thought that it is not as healthy as you would think. Margarine and (fake)"butter" are both just highly processed oils and crap. Real butter might be high in fat and what not, but at least your putting something real into your body. Just remember its best to use real butter in moderation.

So how to make it yourself?

We used heavy cream (Hood), but we will not be buying Hood again, we're going to look for a more natural organic cream to use next time.

Regardless of what you use here are the steps....

Time: 20 minutes
Makes: 2 cups of butter
Supplies:
Large Mixing Bowl
Hand held beater
1 Quart cream
spoon
strainer
small bowl


-Pour 1 quart of cream into a large mixing bowl.

-Use a hand held mixer to beat the cream until it thickens
*we tried to put it in a regular blender the first time but it creates air pockets when it gets too thick and doesn't mix well.

-Keep blending for 10 minutes as it continues to thicken

-At the point when it is clearly very very thick, let it sit for a few minutes

-Beat once again for another few minutes and it should all of a sudden start to get a bit thinner but you'll see it start to separate, and beat for another minute or two

-Strain off the liquid (which is Buttermilk!) into a separate bowl, the bits left in the strainer can be places back into the large mixing bowl. Then use a spoon to squeeze out the remaining liquid.
*If you used exactly 1 quart you should have exactly 2 cups of buttermilk strained into the bowl

-As you squeeze out the remaining liquid it'll form a large glob of nice yellow butter

-ta da!

-You can also add a cup of cold water to the butter and strain again to "clean" the butter. This gets rid of any excess buttermilk. The buttermilk and water will not mix back in with the butter so you don't have to worry about accidentally dissolving it or anything like that.

-Package butter into an airtight container and use in moderation. You can add a pinch of salt to the butter if you feel necessary. And you can use the buttermilk to make pancakes!

Sangria Wedding at Longfellow's Wayside Inn

April 13, 2013 was my good friend Aimee's wedding to my husband's college friend, John. For literally months (I work slow!) I worked on this card box for their wedding...

Aimee chose a beautiful Sangria color for the wedding with White and Gold accents. 

Brief Review of Previous Boxes and What I Learned:

This is my third card box and luckily I feel like each time I've been able to improve upon it. The first one was for my own wedding which was just a small shoebox covered in a shiny purple paper with a small cream bow (like 1/4 inch think) and a cream heart applique. I liked it because obviously I made it but it was small and didn't fit all the cards. My second card box, the beach cardbox for my friend Cassie's wedding was made from  two square boxes. This one was gorgeous but delicate and not well thought out. I didn't make the hole big enough in the bottom of he top box for the cards to be able to fall to the bottom. That resulted in some old ladies tearing the box apart to get cards in. Also, I glued small seashells down with super glue but some fell off because they were too small and the glue wasn't strong enough (Maybe use hot glue next time?). Also, I had a large ribbon glued down around it from top to bottom and that made it so you could even open the box!

So, this box I wanted to be perfect!! I chose three round boxes at AC Moore and cut a rectangular hole in the top cover of the smallest box. I also cut the whole entire bottom out of the top and middle boxes so that it would be completely open to the bottom. Then I traced the smaller boxes bottoms onto the larger boxes covers so I could cut out those holes (using an exacto knife is all you need for this).

 I then searched high and low for a purple sangria colored paper to cover the boxes. I looked in a lot of craft stores like AC Moore, Michael's and a few local craft stores and I looked online at Etsy and the like. I could not for the life of me find a sangria colored paper. So I decided to look into paints knowing that if I didn't like it I could just redo the whole darn thing. Luckily I chose two purple paints that were close to the color I wanted (I used my bridesmaid dress as a reference for color) I found that mixing the two together created the color I was looking for. I also found that it needed at least two-three coats of paint! I hard large tubes and almost ran out!

To top it off I used sticky pearls that I had bought for the beach card box. I decided on a simple pattern on the top and bottom. I think it looks pretty elegant if I do say so myself! I then used two ribbons (both off white even though I was going for gold-ish) wrapped tightly around the top box and tied into a bow. I cut the edges to make them fancy. I highly recommend using two ribbons with different material/texture! It really adds a level to the bow. I was then also going to use a heart applique with the couples names on it but it didn't print correctly. In the end I also bought a purple flower clip that went on one side. I saw it in Nordstrom Rack and had to have it! Sorry I don't have a picture with it on the box.

So in the end I think this box was one of the best. Sturdy, Elegant and does its purpose well!!! The wedding itself was just beautiful. I am so incredibly happy for you (if you're reading this Aimee!) Aimee and John on their marriage!


Here is a picture of the wedding party in front of the Old Grist Mill. I have very fond memories of this mill from when I was a child (like really small child...  2-7 years old) having picnics with my family and great-grandmother right next to the water. It was so nice to be back there as an adult and share that with my husband.

I am the bridesmaid third from the left (the one with the dress too short because my stupid seamstress screwed it up!). Hubby is the best man (closest man to the groom) he was the most handsome man there!!!! (Sorry Aimee, I'm biased!)

Welcome Back!

HI! I'm back after a long unexpected hiatus. Mostly because I didn't have much to blog about. I left off in September 2012 after completing an aisle runner and card box for a college friend of mine's beach wedding in Newport, RI where I was a bridesmaid.

Luckily 2013 has been pretty awesome and I think its going to end even better than it started. Around the time of my last post I got a new job and I have to admit it is a pretty perfect fit for me as far as jobs go! I've been there for about 7 months and its the longest I've gone at a job with out hating it and dealing with constant drama and crazy bosses and/or management. That fact alone is pretty amazing in itself. The only person above me is my boss, the owner of the business and he's awesome. my 6 co-workers are sorta under me but they are the best group of people I've ever worked with. Honestly I think the fact that they are mostly guys and older and well educated has something to do with the less-drama int he workplace thing.

Anyway, so I have a great husband a great job, a great dog and we recently added a puppy to our family. His name is Odo (after a character on Star Trek: DS9) and he's a 5 month blue merle Sheltie.

This is him at my work not too long ago. Cute huh?

This is Odo on the left and Scout (my 7year old sable Sheltie) is on the right

Odo is almost full grown and a whole head taller than Scout! The sheltie standard sates that shelties should be between 13 and 16 inches at the shoulder. Scout is all of 12 inches and Odo will probably end up at the top at 16 inches. I never thought when I got a second sheltie it would be another small sable one. Little did I know that fate would bring me this large blue boy! 

On another note, it looks like I have a lot of craft projects to share for this coming year. Starting with my most recent project a card box for my good friend Aimee's wedding where I was also a bridesmaid and hubby was even best man!