the bridal shower cross stitch collection

much like my quilting & sewing phases, my desires to cross stitch comes in waves.  though in this case, the waves are few and far between.  i don't know what gets me in the mood to do such things, but once i have an idea, i go for it.  in this case, i started off with one idea.  then two.  then i think it turned in to five or six before i finished my last one.  i wanted to add some nerdy themed/quote decor to the bridal shower in a way that could be used for home decor in the future without being to blah.  i had made aileen 2 cross stitch pieces in the past for various things, and so i decided for some reason she needed more.  i started with lord of the rings, then rolled in to star wars.  followed it up with a little binary & parks and recreation.  lastly, i topped everything off with a classic princess bride quote.  these all sat on a glass case, each in their own frame (as seen in the previous bridal shower post) with all the photos of ben & aileen surrounding them.  the positive responses were great, and absolutely made the time it took to make them all worth it.  half the patterns i found on etsy, while others just appeared on pinterest and i had to graph them out on my own.  without delay, here's the cross stitch parade!

things that fuel the crafty fire

with being crafty comes the need for some crafty comfort. here's a little list of things that help me keep the crafty motivation going when i get in the zone for a long stretch of time.  really, it does sound ridiculous to some extent, but these things really seal the deal in to keeping doing what i love.
a cold beverage
9 times out of 10, late night crafting is supplied with a large cup of water, ice and all.  most often, with a lid and straw, since the general crafting area is prone to cats walking through or elbows being bumped (the less spillage the better).  i'm not a fan of hot drinks at all, or even coffee, so a cup of icy cold h20 (or dr. pepper for mid day crafting) really hits the spot
snacks
right now, my guilty pleasure is these dark chocolate covered pretzel crips.  usually you'll find a bowl of cheddar blasted goldfish or cheese its by my sewing machine.  so deliciously unhealthy, right?  but oh so good.
a noise distraction
much like blogging in silence, sewing and crafting in silence is no good.  if i'm in the living room, i primarily set the tv to something i've seen at least once.  reruns are great, especially if they're episodes of friends, big bang theory or how i met your mother.  another top contender is anything on hgtv.  they're basically all the same on each show, am i right?  occasionally on sunday afternoons i'll throw on a classic disney movie or two or three.  if i'm out of tv range, i plug my ipod in to my old computer speakers and either jam to my fall out boy music, or let it create its own shuffle playlist.  with 3,500+ songs on it right now, the variety could be quite interesting.
comfy pants
last but certainly not least, comfy pants are a must have.
so many times i have tried to comfortably sit on the floor pinning a quilt sandwich together to be quilted, and i just couldn't do it because of not being appropriately dressed.  in the summer, it's usually a pair of high school p.e. shorts, but right now its been my starry yoga sweats.  they're quite cozy and allow me to crawl around the floor without any grumbling.  the only thing they lack though... pockets :)

sneak peek of what's to come soon

while the whole 30 day challenge was going on, i've been keeping things busy at the sewing machine!  i spent the first sunday in april chopping fabric up in to at least 5 different stash bust quilt tops, with fabric laid out for some more to be cut up soon.  of course with that, i had to save a few things so my blogging streak would semi continue in to may.  at least until the fun weekends got here :)  so in the meantime, here is a little sneak peek of some posts that are going to be happening soon!

movie ticket shadow box

i stumbled across this idea awhile ago on pinterest, and thought it was AMAZING... so i had to make one all for myself. a quick trip to joann's, and i got the frame and paper all in one trip. now, it totally doesn't match the color my room is painted right now, but that's quite alright with me. it's sparkly, teal and pretty :) the paper was originally 12x12, as all pretty paper tends to be, so i cut it down to 10x10 to fit my frame. the original shadow box appeared to be larger. or maybe just more rectangular. either way, i preferred the square frame format, since most movie ticket stubs end up being that shape these days anyways. (that picture totally makes my teal strip look crooked, but it's not... i used a ruler!) the teal stripe was also cut from a 12x12 piece (i think it's 3x10) and stuck down to the background piece. i used my cricut to cut the ticket shapes as well as the lettering. ran those letters through my sticker maker, and they were good to go!
i got my brother to dremel a slot in the top for me so that for any future movie going experiences, i can easily just drop the ticket stubs in through the top to add to my collection. sure is useful to have brothers around that are handy with dremels too. dropped my tickets in, ranging from 2008ish up to a few weeks ago. my wallet was relieved to have the stack cleared out. but that just means more movies need to be seen! and there you have it! it was super simple on my part (since i didn't have to do the dremel-ing) and turned out fantastic! now i have a super cool piece of wall art to show off my growing movie ticket stub collection :)
original pinterest post: kirsten johnson
cricut cartridges used: mickey mouse font (for ticket shapes) alphalicious (for lettering)

homemade fabric curlers

growing up, i always always always wanted a my size barbie. well, thanks to being exceptionally taller than anyone else when i was little, my size barbie wasn't even my size. well, it's taken nearly 16 years to get to this point, but i finally have my own personal "my size barbie"... and i'm sure my sister is going to love seeing me call her that. anyways, thanks to another pinterest find for me to try out, and a saturday full of nothingness, i decided to give these curlers and shot, and see how well they would turn out... and what i might potentially need to change for round 2.
i pulled the fabric from my scrapbox, and these were all on top since i had searched through there for baby shower inspiration that was changed abruptly. in a whole afternoon, i cut, sewed, turned, stuffed, and sewed 15 curlers together. the buttons had to be hand sewn on the ends, which went super easily. i've had my sewing machine for 2 1/2 years now, and my mom has had her janome longer than that, but we both STILL can't figure out the button holer. so i had to pull out ye ol' kenmore and sew the button holes in the end that way. until it started to fight me. seriously. i was planning to leisurely sew button holes while watching footloose, not start a world war with a machine. mom was able to get them to go though. thank goodness. wrapped her hair up in semi large chunks (as it appeared from the original blog post i saw these curlers from) and sprayed it down with hairspray. they all went in fairly well, and i think the tight squeeze of the buttons in to the button holes helped held them tight. then, she was off to bed to sleep the night away... i never found out how comfortable they were to sleep on though...took the curlers out...and it was beautiful. i should have left it like this. haha. just kidding. i'm sure she would have washed it out in two seconds if i did. i combed it out a bit, twisted the front back, and it led to...this. not too shabby. there are a few things i would do differently for next time though. i would do a little bit smaller chunks of hair, which would hopefully allow for better "curls". the other thing i would change would be the type of hair spray used. this stuff was some mega hold spray or something, so the curls were pretty crunchy coming out of the curlers. hopefully that would help them lay nicer or something. i'm no curler expert, since the only way my hair really keeps curl is doing rag curls, so having someone else's hair to try it on is always a bonus. plus it's much easier than trying it on my own hair.
the original curler tutorial is listed here: life with monkey

weekend wips [& front page news]

i feel semi productive this week, now that i laid everything out that i did in to words. to top it off, i used invisible thread this week - something i haven't done in ages, and do not plan to do again anytime soon once these wedding bits & pieces are over - and didn't want to rip someone's face off. yeah, using invisible thread is THAT intense.
the bridal shower/wedding: as far as the shower goes, i got a thing or two done here and there. i painted some pink stripes on 2 foam core boards that will be used for one of the bridal shower games. for that same game, i purchased a blank card set, as well as pulled out my orange glitter scrapbook paper to cricut some numbers on. i'm thinking this week i will crank out the rest of the game and finish it up, as well as hopefully get a start on the invites. for the wedding portion, the ring bearer pillow has been stuffed and sewn shut. texted off a photo, and it was well received with a "cute!" from the bride to be, which makes me happy. the set of buttons also came this weekend, and though smaller than expected, they will still be perfection for the pillow, garter, and potential hair accessories. so crazy how it's creeping up closer and closer every day!
baby shower: the main fabric is still sitting around, and i still have to go cruise joann's for the accent fabric. i ordered the template to use for the creation of the quilt (dang "online only" purchase... found it cheaper on amazon though) and now awaiting it's arrival. once it's here, i guess i will really have to start working on it!
t-shirt quilt: everything has been chopped. it was pretty intense, that's for sure. i mean, did i ever imagine myself hacking these shirts up when i actually was wearing them? no, probably not. but still, it has been fun "remembering" when i got these shirts, when i wore them, and all that jazz. a few of them i had to turn in to half block sets because the writing/graphic on them was smaller than the others. once i get everything all pieced together, then i will be able to determine how many more blank filler blocks i will have to make in order to get the quilt to an even amount of blocks and then get cracking!i made the front page! i finally updated all of my christmas gift projects on to the craft forum craftster and for the first time, one of mine made the "hot new projects" section on the front page! seriously, i kept checking it every time i went back to my computer just to see if it was still there or not :) it was gone by sunday night, but the excitement of seeing something i made on the front page sure made for some "uplifting" excitement over my weekend. and in case you missed the original blog post for the apron, you can find that here!

jacob's t-shirt quilt

well now that things are redone here, christmas has come and gone, and the new year is here... i can now begin the parade of christmas gift posts. i'll kick it off with the first one that was on the "to do" list for the longest time. jacob's t-shirt quilt.
the last few shirt quilts i have done were just solid blocks, so i decided to shake things up a bit. the width of all the blocks were the same size, but the height was changed depending on the size of the shirt graphic. of course, that made for some tricky math, and needed some filler space here and there.
my mom cleared out some of her old boxes, and found some scraps of fabric from clothes and such that she had made for jacob years ago, so i incorporated some of thse in to the quilt to make it a little different than the others. it ended up being much wider than it was tall... so i guess he can either use it sideways, or wrap it around himself a time or two.

weekend wips

are you ready to see this massive list start getting crossed off? are you SURE you are ready? because things are happening, and it's happening FAST! before i know it, it's going to be christmas eve. yikes. but i must not worry. i'm on top of this, right? yes. must keep telling myself that.
t-shirt quilt j: DONE AND DELIVERED. the thing that has been on these weekend wips since i started blogging again in august is FINALLY off the list and out of my possession.
christmas gift b: DONE. just need to photograph and wrap.
christmas gift c: it's moving closer. it has been cut up and ready to start sewing. since the quilt is done, i guess i have no choice now but to take the plunge.
christmas gifts e&f: moving closer. all my supplies came, but it's another partial fear project. i do need to get one or two more things before i can actually begin, so hopefully, this week i can get it going. depends what my brain looks like during "cram for the christmas show" time.
christmas gift g: DONE! one of those super quick, but super excellent projects. i'm really hoping the recipient will enjoy the humor of it though :)

my teenage self

if there is anything i have a whole lot of, it would be t-shirts. you know, the fun graphic ones with cartoon characters, movie heros and silly saying. yep, I've pretty much got a truck load of them. for awhile now, i have been collecting shirts that have shrunken over the years of washing and keeping them in a box beneath my bed. waiting for the day to revisit them and give them a "second chance" at life. haha, that does sound incredibly cheesy. but included in this box were shirts with memories packed behind them that I couldn't see myself letting go. including shirts that were worn...

to meet & greet concerts

back to school shopping

spending time with friends

and a whole lot more every day occasions.

the last time i made a t-shirt quilt for myself, i was still in high school, and still wearing at LEAST 95% of these shirts. but now the time has come, in my transition from college student to real world "adult" to clear space and give these shirts a final resting place AND a new look! i'm a little hesitant to hack in to some of these shirts because of the memories they hold, but know in the long run it will be so much easier to relive the good times if they are out in the open to see instead of in a box. Once the first cut is made, I will feel a little bit better, and be able to continue on ward!