Photography Adventure

Kierra and I went on a collaborative photography adventure not to long ago and I was thinking it was about time to share them. (Are you happy now Shae?!)

Mad Men Chic

When I first heard that Banana Republic was teaming up with the costume designer for the tv series Mad Men Janie Bryant I was very excited. This cool collection is a modern take on 60s silhouettes. So far the collection is only available at Gilt.com, but I love it and I know that once it's available in stores I might have to go exercise my employee discount or at least try on a few dresses.

Happy Weekend

This site is ridiculous and 100% amusing, you too can get on the waiting list for a petite lap giraffe from Sokoblovsky Farms

Please note that their diet consists of distilled water and bonsai tree leaves and they require weekly bubble baths.

Once Apron a Dream

The other day I was sewing the curtain Sharayah bought me fabric to make and found myself distracted. Leftover was the perfect size rectangle to make her a surprise. I had an adorable "pattern" for a half apron (I use the term "pattern" loosely because I never even got the pattern my friend made out and just went from memory). I knew Penelope, the resident wire dress form in Shae's kitchen would look fabulous in it.
This apron is incredibly easy to make and takes barely any time at all. It is easily adjusted to fit any style and size. Here is my handy work on paint, an unproportional pattern to get you an idea.
1. The skirt: Hem right, left, and bottom of A. Run a gathering stitch on the top.
Get creative: add Rick-Rack, pockets, lace, bias tape, ribbon, buttons, and personalize the apron.
2. The ties: Hem bottom, left, and top of B and add a gathering stitch on the right.
Get creative: I add Rick-Rack and ribbon to the ends of the ties to add personality.
3. The waistband: Iron in the raw edges and iron in half, so you have a long rectangle that you can't see and raw edges and see the right side of the the fabric only.
4. Gather the skirt so that it is just skinnier than the waistband is. Gather the Sides of the ties so they are skinnier than the sides of the waistband.
5. Pin the left tie on the waistband, then the skirt, then the right waistband sandwiched in the waistband so you hide the unfinished edges. Sew along those three sides and you have yourself a brand new apron.

Play with the fabric combinations, make the ties different, piece together the skirt from a bunch of different patterns, add lace tiers. This pattern is so not picky which makes it a fun, practical project.

For the Love of Lamps

For living in such a small apartment I have collected an impressive amount of lamps. They are all over the place, even one in the bathroom. For my latest project I took it upon myself to create a new lampshade for my living room. I found a sturdy lampshade at a garage sale (I fell in love with the scalloped edges on this one) and stripped it of it's very out dated fabric. To give this old lamp a fun new look all it took was some pretty fabric, a hot glue gun and voila!

And here is how it turned out

Crazy and Colorful Wedding

Please check out this crazy, beautiful, quirky, adorable, colorful wedding featured on Style Me Pretty (follow the link and watch the video at the bottom of the page, it's heartwarming).

Legalize Frostitution

Oh how I love cupcakes. These chocolate cupcakes, with a chocolate ganache and cream cheese frosting went over wonderfully at a little party I went to.

Chocolate Cupcakes

3/4 C butter
3 eggs
2 C flour
3/4 C unsweetened cocoa powder
1 t baking soda
3/4 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
2 C sugar
2 t vanilla
1 1/2 C milk
Allow butter and eggs to stand at room temp for 30 minutes.

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

Stir together: flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and powder, and salt.

In a mixing bowl beat butter for 30 seconds on high. Add sugar gradually, beating in between additions. Beat until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time beating well. Beat in vanilla.

Alternately add flour mix and milk to butter mix. Mix well.

Fill baking cups and bake for about 18 minutes.

*Tip: I have an ice cream scoop that is only used by me for cupcakes, it makes an almost perfect measure not to mention minimizes mess.*

Ganache

1 C whipping cream
12 ounces milk, semi-sweet or bitter sweet chocolate, chopped (I used chips)

Bring whipping cream to just boiling remove from heat and add chocolate. Let stand for 5 minutes. Stir until smooth. Cool 15 minutes. (Makes about 2 cups).

Cream Cheese Frosting

1 8-oz package of cream cheese
1/2 C butter
2 t vanilla
5 1/2 to 6 C powdered sugar

Allow cream cheese and butter to stand at room temp for 30 minutes.

Beat butter, cream cheese, and vanilla on medium speed until light and fluffy.

Gradually beat in powdered sugar until desired consistency.

What I did with $25

A little cash doesn't seem to stretch as far as it used to, but a few days ago I was on a thrifting mission. I know thrift stores smell bad and there are a lot of rocks you have to discard before finding your gold, but when you find your items it all becomes worth it. I was going to buy beautiful things for just about $25 dollars. I got some surprisingly good items. At this little boutique known commonly as Value Village I got myself a copy of The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, a sweet t-shirt I will be reconstructing in a later blog post and a lovely pair of boots that are Sofft and basically brand new (with the wonderful scent of real leather) which is a steal seeing that similar shoes go for around $120. And then at Goodwill I struck gold again and got a Levi denim jacket to go with all my summer dresses, a pack of variety yarn for my knitting needs, and and two Nicholas Sparks novels: Nights in Rodanthe and The Guardian (which I am probably going to finish very soon, and definitely recommend it).

And here are my wonderful finds:



P.S. Kierra found some gold too:


2 zippers, some yarn, a book and a lace curtain for her sewing creations:

Party

On June 10th Kendra and I graduated from High School. After 13 years at our small christian school we were finally ready to be done. There is no better way to celebrate such an accomplishment than with a party, right?

Our school colors were, you guessed it, blue and white. But the real color wasn't all that pretty, so we started our plans with mismatched blue floral and patterned fabrics. We cut them in squares as large as the fabric would let us and put them on top of white tablecloths as overlays.

We got some more mismatched fabric and I made a fabric pennant banner. By making a paper pattern triangle the size I want the pennants I used it to cut the fabric to size I folded over the edge and buzzed over it with my sewing machine making a pocket which I slid some cotton yarn through. I made two strands, one was double sided because it could easily be seen from both sides and this one I cut on the fold and stitched along the edges while still leaving a pocket at the top.

For a photo display we arranged spray painted willow branches in a hurricane with some blue beads in it. From the branches we hung photos that we had printed up at Costco with a white border. We sandwiched fishing line in between two photos with some tape. Around the neck of the hurricane we tied a strip of one of our blue fabrics. This sat nicely in the middle of my cupcake display.

The cupcake display was arranged with a bunch of cake plates stacked on top each other, some cupcake trees, some upside down wine glasses in various shapes, some blue beads, a square of fabric and some glass domes. I used aunt Martha's cupcake liners that were in 2 silver patterns.

The food was a pasta bar. The table was two layers as it had a closet door that was bought at a salvage yard and covered in chalkboard paint for easy food labeling. There were two types of noodles, a white sauce and a red sauce as well as baked ziti. We had salad and bread, both bread-sticks and a french bread.

The entire party was a huge success. It was weird having so many people I knew from so many different places all together in one place. We loved every minute of it.

Legalize Frostitution

I love cupcakes and I believe despite the the trendiness of them they are here to stay. I made these cupcakes to bring to a bonfire at a friends house. I just bought the Reynolds Baking Cups and now I am in love. They hold their shape and color so incredibly well. I am making my way through the Better Homes and Gardens special issue "Cupcakes", or at least trying to and finding good products to pair with amazing recipes is a big plus in my book.

This recipe only made twelve cupcakes but I thought it was delicious.

Vanilla Cupcakes
1/2 C butter
1 egg
2 egg yolks
1 vanilla bean or 1 t vanilla extract
1 1/2 C flour
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/4 t salt
3/4 C sugar
1/2 t vanilla extract
1/2 C whipping cream

-Let the butter and eggs stand at room temperature for 1/2 an hour.
-Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean with a sharp knife; set seeds aside.
-Stir together flour, baking powder and salt.
-Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
-In a large mixing bowl beat butter on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Then add sugar and beat for an additional minute.
-Add egg, egg yolk and vanilla bean and the additional extract then beat until combined.
-Alternately add flour mix and whipping cream to batter until combined, beating on low speed.
-Bake 20 minutes.

Butter Frosting
This makes way to much for the vanilla recipe so cut this recipe at least in half.

3/4 C butter
8 C powdered sugar
1/3 C milk
2 t vanilla
Milk

-Allow butter to stand at room temp for 30 minutes.
-Beat butter with mixer on medium to high speed until smooth.
-Add 2 cups of powdered sugar beating in well.
-Beat in the 1/3 C milk and the vanilla.
-Gradually beat in the rest of the sugar.
-Add milk until desired consistency.

This makes about 4 1/2 cups.

Visit Better Homes and Gardens website for more of the recipes from this magazine.

Firework Show

The 4th of July has always been one of my favorite holidays. Fireworks are one of the most amazing things that man has made. Last year the cops threatened us with a citation quickly ending our firework show. So this year we decided to go out of the city limits. We went to our friends grandparents and lit fireworks there, and what a show it was.

I heart Bargains!

If there is one thing that I love, it is finding a good deal. A little while back my sisters and I went to a resale shop that is closing its doors and loaded up on some fabulous finds. We left with armfuls of stuff.

This dictionary and atlas will make for some great craft paper, I love doing projects with dictionary paper. And how great is the coloring in this Atlas?

After a little polishing this is the perfect little holder for my new rings (I won't be wearing them all at once, promise)...

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with these guys yet, but I just couldn't resist buying them.

And finally a humorous art piece for my mantle.

We were able to buy all this, a big bag of knitting supplies and more for less than $20! Good deal? I would say so.

Circle Scarf

This is basically the easiest and prettiest knitting project ever. I used super bulky, Houston cream, Lion Brand Yarn (from the hometown USA collection) and some size 13 knitting needles and went to town just doing rows of knit. Made the length and width to my liking then sewed the two ends together. I am really excited for the fall when it is actually appropriate to wear it. All in all I think it turned out to be pretty shnazzy.

Party

Yesterday was the 3rd of July, it was sunny and lovely out so we had our friends the Mailliards over. The food was great & the company was fun.

The Menu:
Pink Lemonade (In Mason Jars)
Sodas
Build your own BBQ Pizza (on Naan or Focaccia)
Garden Salad
Watermelon
Drip Raspberry Lemon Cake
Fruit in Raspberry Liqueur with a Vanilla Cream


The Mason jars worked wonderfully to have adorable pre-poured beverages that we easily were able to pack in ice, keeping them cool and refreshing.





The Pizzas turned out very well. We made a spread of toppings and gave a quick how-to (this is where putting olive oil on the bottom of the bread so it didn't stick to the grill or burn went over my dad's head as he put it underneath his toppings originally). The Naan bread was recommended by my friend Cooper and it made a wonderful crust. Not too thick and it did not dry out.


Berries always make for a great summery dessert. The berries are in season (well the strawberries are and the raspberries are almost there) and easy to find.

The Vanilla Cream was from aunt Martha (if only it was true that she was actually my aunt)

Kendra found the recipe for the Lemon Rasberry Cake


They paired so nicely most of us had both.


The night was beautiful and I hope you all have a wonderful 4th of July!

Infinity

Around the time my sister Sharayah moved out of our home I decided I loved to sew. When she needed curtains hemmed, I dug out May-Ruth, my Grandma's sewing machine we borrowed over 5 years before to make pajama pants with my mom (I might add we never made) and I shortened her curtains, made her several other sets and pillows and cushions and more to decorate her little apartment. Soon enough I made a couple shirts, a dress, aprons, more pillows and the story continues.

Recently a friend bought what is called an infinity dress, I had seen them before, in fact Sharayah owns one. Its essentially a skirt with a waistband and two really long pieces of fabric that can be wrapped and re-wrapped into and infinite number of dresses.

I had some stretch jersey that I bought a while before and knew I could do it fairly easy. The other morning I drew out a pattern of 3 pieces (in the picture on the top right; left to right: skirt cutout 7 times, waistband on fold double layer, and strap 2 yards) and sewed it together with unfinished edges to allow the straps to stretch the way they want to.

The dressed turned out so well my sister Kendra begged and bribed me (a whole $2!) to make her one. It took just under 3 hours with the pattern already drawn up and I'm sure if I make one again it will be even faster. (Pictures of dress 2 up soon)

The First

Blogging is a funny thing. Honestly for a long time the word blog for me was synonymous with the word nerd. However now I am somewhat of a blog addict and if that means I am in turn nerdy then that is just fine with me. Because some of my daily reads like A Cup of Jo and Design*Sponge (along with countless others) can truly bring inspiration to an otherwise hum-drum, inspiration-less day. So here I am along with my creative and clever sisters blogging about art, crafts, fashion, music, adventures and anything else that catches our eyes or our ears.

And here we are...

And here is the song that inspired our blog name by an artist that is often a soundtrack to our lives, Ben Folds...