In His Grip

Three Word Thrusday

Leaves of Fall!!!!

Sewing Pattern Lamp Shade

This is a lamp shade that I have had around for a couple of years.  I have two of these lamps with this pink shade and they have been very happy in Ryan's room.  Okay, I know that it is not Ryan's room because he does not live with us anymore but I just cannot bring myself to call it a guest room.  So I think I will always call bed rooms by the name of the child that occupied it, perhaps Ryan's Retreat, Lindsey's Lounge, and Anna's Escape.  I don't know just a thought.  Anyway, I decided that the shade need a redo.

I took the fabric off of the frame and this is what I started with.  The first time I went into Urban Arts and Crafts, I fell in love with the lamp shades they have hanging above their cash register.  They had made them using sewing pattern pieces.  I knew that someday I would make one of my own and decided this was a great lamp shade frame to try it on.  I began with sewing pattern pieces and Mod Podge.

 I started delicately painting the Mod Podge over the pattern pieces and overlapping the pattern pieces as I went.  I folded the tissue over the top and bottom wires and carefully Mod Podge the back side.  Once the tissue is covered in the Mod Podge it tears very easily as it is wet.  So I tried to get a coat on and then not go over again. 

Once the first coat had dried completely I put a coat of Mod Podge on the inside and then when that dried, I coated the outside with a second coat.  The result makes the shade feel like plastic.  It was not nearly as fragile as I had imagined.

I added trim along the top and bottom edges just to snaz it up a bit.  Besides the edges were a bit rough and I needed to cover them up, and you can never go wrong with a great beaded trim.  Trim scrapes in my studio are a perk of my job and you can bet I save every little bit.  You never know when you will need a dab of trim.

Here is where the lamp now lives, in the Stitches by Sturman studio.  I love the golden light that it gives off.  I have not deceided what to do with the pink bubbles, you can see the one at the top and there is also one on the bottom.  But that is for another day.  I think I will put it on a timer so that I can leave it on all the time and will not have to worry about turning it off and on.

Summer to Cozy Winter Bed

This is our master bed the way it looks from March-ish through October-ish.  We have a wide variety of pillows and if it were up to me we would add some Euro shams behind the shams you see here but Jeff has put his foot down and says there are too many pillows as it is.  (Like he makes the bed and arranges those pillows on a daily basis.) But being the compliant wife that I am (ha, ha), I have let the Euro shams go for now.  (I do have some fabric set aside in my"fabric closet" that will do very nicely as Euros someday, shhh, don't tell Jeff.) 

When the weather starts to turn chilly I want a more cozy look to our bed.  So I just make a couple of changes.  I add another down comforter with a velvet duvet cover and the shams are change out to match as well.  The matelasse cotton throw is folded up on the end for an extra blanket if we need it.  And wal lah, a cozy bed for winter cold nights.  When the temperatures get even colder I have some fun brown and blue snowflake flannel sheets that will help take the chill off of those cold sheets. 

Holiday Mart Fun!

Last night the girls and I along with our friend Sheri went to the Junior League Holiday Mart.  If you take all of the small boutiques for women, children and home decor and put them all in one place this is the Holiday Mart.  I had not been in several years and this event has moved from a "craft" show to a shopping extravaganza.  We had so much fun and as we were shopping, we kept seeing this one mannequin in all of the different booths to display jewelry, scarves, hats, etc.  Every time we saw it Lindsey and Anna would turn around an make the same face as the mannequin.  I think they got it down pretty good by the end of the night..

Three Word Thursday

Trunk or Treat!!!!!

My Sister is Creative Inspiration!

This is picture from my sister Lori's shop.  She has space in a store in Chehalis, Washington where she resells junk that she had taken from trash to treasure.  She is a good part of my inspiration when it comes to my trash to treasure projects.  In fact, I have a project in process right now that was idea that she gave me last week when we were talking on the phone.  I will post this project here soon.  You can go over to her blog CinnabarBlue and see some of the other fun things that she comes up with.  See, right there is a sweater pumpkin, black and white, who would have thought it would be so cute.

This Old Ironing Board

This is the old ironing board that I found a couple of weeks ago and paid $5 for.  The legs were broken and it did not really stand up very well.  But with some wood glue and a couple of screws, ta da, it stands up just great and I decided it would make a perfect table in my studio.  And look, the legs were already red so no spray painting needed.  After looking at it for some time, I felt it needed a little spiffying up.  I took an old dictionary and decided to decoupage some of the pages on the top of the ironing board. 

If you look closely, the edge of the pages of the dictionary were red and the Mod Podge made the red bleed slightly.  I ended up putting several coats of Mod Podge on the top so that it would be smooth.  I need all the help I can get on cutting down on the dust bunny collection.  I love how it turn out!

 

Its a Halloween Party!

 
Thank you for coming to my  Halloween party!  As you can see by the pictures above we are decked out for the season.  I have to say that Fall is one of my favorite times of year and I so love all of the colors, the candy and treats that go along with this holiday are not so bad either.  If you want to check out other Halloween parties, go on over to A Fanciful Twist where there is a huge party going on.

Chocolate Chex® Caramel Crunch Recipe

This is a recipe that has come highly recommended by a couple of my friends.  Last week during the Pumpkin Run Sheri was telling me about this Chocolate Chex carmel stuff that she had made the day before and could not stop eating it.  She had tried it when our friend Cathie had brought it to a party that they had attended a couple weeks before.  She said it was easy and yes, she was right, easy peasy, and super good.  ~WARNING~I am not responsible for how much you eat of this recipe.  If you tend to be like me,  you won't stop eating until you are sick. 

 

8	cups Chocolate Chex® cereal
3/4	cup packed brown sugar
6	tablespoons butter or margarine
3	tablespoons light corn syrup
1/4	teaspoon baking soda
1/4	cup white vanilla baking chips

Into large microwavable bowl, measure cereal; set aside. Line cookie sheet with waxed paper.

In 2-cup microwavable measuring cup, microwave brown sugar, butter and corn syrup uncovered on High 1 to 2 minutes, stirring after 1 minute, until melted and smooth. Stir in baking soda until dissolved. Pour over cereal, stirring until evenly coated. Microwave on High 3 minutes, stirring every minute. Spread on cookie sheet. Cool 10 minutes. Break into bite-size pieces.

 
In small microwavable bowl, microwave vanilla baking chips uncovered on High about 1 minute 30 seconds or until chips can be stirred smooth (bowl will be hot). Drizzle over snack. Refrigerate until set. Store in tightly covered container.

Three Word Thursday

Repay with kindness!!!!!! 

Element 8 is my Hero!

The last week or so I have had some computer technical difficulties.  I hate it when my laptopstops working, it makes me realize just how dependent I have become to this cute little pink box.  I also now know just how much time I spend reading and sending emails, blogging, and just plain waisting time on this piece of technology.  But it is a necessary tool for me, after all, I am running a business here.  A couple of weeks ago I took my computer to Jason at Element 8, my computer was running slow and I knew that there was a virus involved.  A day later he delivered my computer running great.  But then this week my computer kept turning off.  I could not keep it on long enough to check email or do any of my "business".  Because Element 8 did a great job for a reasonable price last time I gave them a call again.  The next day Ed from Element 8 called and said that my laptop was ready for pick up and that they had to do surgery and removed two large dust bunnies from the inside of my laptop.  He then proceeded to tell me that I really should not set my laptop on any fabric.  Really, fabric is my life, that is what Stitches By Sturman is all about.  I have dust bunnies cohabitating in my studio with me all the time.  They multiply like rabbits, ha,ha!   So the fact that they found their way into my laptop is no surprise.  My computer is running great once again!  Thanks Element 8 for rescuing me once again.

Creepy!

Last week while I was in Minnesota, my Mom and I gathered some moss.  I use this in my baskets in the spring that I plant flowers in.  I also have a couple of ideas in my head to use it for some things I want to make for Christmas decorations.  We gathered quite a bit and laid it on my Mom's living room floor to dry.  We sprayed it with bug spray just in case there were some unwanted bugs that may have come along for the ride.  After laying in Mom's house for two days we wrapped it in newspaper and then put it in two large trash bags and I then loaded it in my car.  We brought it home and I put the bags of moss in my studio to unload latter.  Well this weekend I started to unload the moss, because it was still a little moist and I wanted it to dry out before storing it for use in the future.  As I was laying the moss out in my basement, I had unloaded one bag and went to get the other bag and what did I find on the floor by the other bag . . .

 
this creepy half dead salamander.  Okay, so now I am a little creeped out that I have a basement floor full of moss that is drying out and wondering if there were any other stowaways with my moss.  Creepy, creepy, creepy!!!!!!!!!

Pumkin Run with Friends

So it was freezing cold this morning but we had all made a commitment to our friend Haley to run in the 11th Annual Pumpkin Run.   We were at the very first pumpkin run eleven years ago and I cannot believe how big it has gotten.  What is really fun about it, is that a good number of the elementary schools in town have running clubs just to train for this event.  There were over 3,000 runners out on this cold morning. 

 
Today was not about what time we got but just to have fun with Hayley and make her first 5K an experience to remember.

We were all about taking time to take pictures along the way.

Hayley set our pace and decided to how fast we would run, when we would walk, and if we would run again.  

Had to stop and get a picture of this fan because Hayley was sure he was rooting her on.

 
Hayley heading for the finish line.

 
The joy of being able to say, "I ran 3.1 miles today, what did you do?"

So Sheri is a sucker for a cute cow any day.

Three Word Thrusday

Beauty of Autumn

Even Work @ the Lake Can Be Fun!

One of the tasks that we needed to accomplish this week at the lake was getting the docks ready for winter, and up north that means lifting them out of the water.  First we have to take all of the dock boards up.  These are in sections which isn't too bad. But then you need to realize there are three docks needing the boards taken off and stacked in order so they can be easily replaced next Spring when the operation is reversed.  Once the boards have been taken off the "A" frames need to be raised and then the wench attached.  For the two small docks we use a hand wench.  Which does not seem that big a deal but believe me, it is a lot of work when you are raising the dock one small chain link at a time.  

Okay, so I totally posed for the camera here.  But I did click it a couple of times for maybe two minutes, it is really hard!!!!

This is how high the docks have to come out of the water.  The frozen lake is really not the problem for the docks, it is when it comes time to thaw in the spring when the damage happens. As the ice beings to thaw it moves back and forth across the bay with the wind and can wreck havoc on anything in its way.  Although Jeff did most of the work, Dad was there to supervise, and Mom and I for all of that moral support.

 
We also took time for a photo on top of those dock boards we just removed.  I am not sure how it is that work just doesn't seem as much work when you are at the lake, or Jeff is around to do most of it for you. 

 

Sweater Pumpkins

This is my newest project.  I was inspired by sister Lori who told me she was making some pumpkins from old sweaters.  So I kept my eyes open for some pumpkin looking sweaters at our local Salvation Army and Goodwill stores.  I do frequent these two stores often as I regularly find unexpected treasures or something that can be made into a treasure.  I picked up two sweaters, the orange one was a ladies small that I was able to make one large and two small pumpkins out of and the amber colored one was a mens large that I was able to get two large and  three small pumpkins.  Here is a quick how to:  I went out to sewing.about.com and found this pattern and instructions.  

Cutting out the pattern pieces.

Sewing the eight sections together to form a circle.

 

Sewing the ends together after all eight pieces had been sewn together.

After filling the form with stuffing, I used a piece of a stick that I had found out in the backyard and cut to about 5".  Sticking it through the opening and closed the top around it by gathering with thread and secured with hot glue.

Using very strong thread, I used an orange cotton yarn, to go up through the top and through the bottom along the seam lines all the way around to create the ribs.  

I then added some brown wire and leaves and there you have it, sweater pumpkins.   

Fall~Up in the North Woods

Fall up in the north woods is so pretty. I never realized until this trip that I have never been up north in the Fall. You cannot help but recognize what a creative God we have.  The colors are so vibrate and the contrast from the deep greens of the pine trees, golden leaves of burch, and the brilliant reds of the maples are more than I expected and the people are saying that this year's colors have not yet hit their peak.   This is the back porch and what welcomes you when you arrive at the lake house.  

This is the scene across the lake from my folks' house.

 

Giving His Heart Away!

We are up in the north woods this weekend visiting my folks.  Amongst all of my Mom's other fall decorations sat two bud vases one with a yellow rose addressed to my Mom and an orange one for my Dad.  The note card on my Mom's explained how it would be a little strange for another women to be sending my Dad a love letter but she had to do it anyway.  The letter to my Dad was from a gal in town that my parents have become friends with she and her husband and two girls.  She told him how much he meant to her and how much impact he had on her life since they had moved to Cook, MN.  She went on to say that it has been because of my Dad and his guidance that she and her husband had made decisions regarding their business, as well as getting their life where it needed to be spiritually as well.  She said she had a very short list of people that she could say have truly made a difference in her life and she wanted my Dad to know that he was one of them.  She is sure that my Dad's heart condition is because he has given so much of his heart away that he forgot to keep enough of it to run his body.  Wow! It is such a blessing to have my Dad and Mom for parents and to know that others love and care for them too.  But to actually have someone take the time to let my Dad just how much he has meant to her and her family, was something a lot of people don't often get to hear.  Makes me know I need to let those influencers in my life know how much I appreciate the part of their heart they have given to away me.

My Kind Of Coffee Table Book

Here is my kind of coffee table book.  I was in Calico Corner the other day and saw this book, but for $40, I just walked away, but not before I wrote down the title and author, to do an internet search later.  Even with the paper jacket cover off this book looks good.  I have always been one of those folks that buys my books according to the cover and this one certainly fits that standard.  Not only does it look great on the outside but the inside pictures are to die for.  I do have a special love for design and textiles and this book is filled that.  My own particular style does tend to include a lot of different patterns and textures and there are lots of examples of that.  This books has already inspired, in my head, several different projects.  Here is just a small sampling of the what you can find inside this book.