Two Parts Crazy, One Part Fun

Win a Rosetta Stone software pack?! Yes Please!

2010-01-26T09:46:00.000-08:00

I couldn't resist this giveaway opportunity - especially having looked into Rosetta Stone myself and knowing how expensive they are!

Have a blog? Want a chance to win too?

Go HERE. The contest ends February 1st, at 7pm for us west coasters.

And here's what I had to post in order to qualify for the contest:

Surround your family with language. By taking them there!
Travel to Paris, Madrid and Barcelona with Homeschoolers from all over the United States. Join Rosetta Stone Homeschool, Heart of the Matter and Fusefly on the inaugural Homeschool Language Learning and Networking Trip August 2-11, 2010. Become immersed in new lands, explore history, culture, art and community. And truly speak to the world. For more details visit www.RosettaStone.com/Homeschool/LanguageLearningTrip.
Hurry, registration for the trip ends February 15, 2010.
For your chance to win a Rosetta Stone language product, please visit Heart of the Matter. Entries are being accepted until February 1st.

Happy Tuesday all! :)

DINE OUT (ALMOST) FREE!

2010-01-20T12:37:00.000-08:00

Hey Guys!

I follow a blog called Discount Queens! They post primarily about random special offers and coupons! (How can you not love that?!) They just informed me of this awesome deal :

Right now, Restaurant.com is offering a 70% discount on their gift certificates! NORMALLY, You can get a $10 gift certificate for $4, or a $25 gift certificate for $10 - but right now, through 1/26/10 if you enter promo code FEAST, you get 70% off! That means you can get $25 gift certificate for $3!!!

NOTE: The "almost" free part is the catch - in order to use these certificates, you need to spend $35 (some restaurants also have other restrictions, so make sure to read them before you purchase). Meaning when you use it, you'll get $60 worth of food for $35. Personally, I love to treat my friends to meals, or go out and have an appetizer and dessert every now and then - this is your opportunity to do so without breaking your budget. Even if you were to simply split the tab with another couple, a $60 bill goes from $30 per couple to $17.50! I love it!

I just ordered a couple - one for Hiro's in Petaluma, and one for 3rd Street Aleworks in Santa Rosa! (And don't worry if you aren't nearby me - Restaurant.com is national, you can search by your zip code for restaurants near you!)

Hope you guys love it too! Just wanted to share! :)

How to organize your ENTER-MAJOR-EVENT-HERE photos

2010-01-19T21:26:00.000-08:00

As some of you know, I got married about 5 and a half months ago. Thanks to having MANY photographer friends in the wedding party, in addition to the one we hired, I have OVER 2,000 photos!

WHERE THE HECK...

DO...

I....

START?!?!?!

And how do I even begin to go through them!?

I came up with a few simple steps to fire myself up for this daunting task:

Step One: JUST DO IT.

Seriously. Just do it. Just set an hour (or two? or...) aside, and go through those photos! Seriously? You don't need all of them. Inevitably you will end up weeding even more out after you've printed them, but you don't want to waste money on throw-aways because you were too emotional in the moment to actually decide.

I WISH I had taken a screen shot of the 247 minute upload time to Costco's website, just so I could prove it to you. But that's the next step

Step Two: Get them printed.

I started the upload process, turned off my monitor, and went to bed. I woke up the next morning and viola! All of the pictures were ready for me to choose to print.

(Just a tip: I can't verify this from personal experience, but I wouldn't wait too long in between uploading and putting in a print order, because I have heard that after a certain amount of time, your upload batches can get deleted from non-use, and I can only imagine that unknown timeframe being even tighter when you're talking a LARGE batch like I had).

So, I woke up, and went through each picture deciding how many I needed of each (here is another opportunity to downsize the number of photos you print - I must of gotten rid of at least a couple dozen at the stage in the process - it's a lot easier to discard a once-seen-as-absolutely-necessary photo when you are staring at your order total as you go. Because I am making a few extra scrapbooks for family, I ended up with - seriously - 748 total photos.

Plus side? (I know, can you believe it? But seriously, there's a plus side) Instead of getting my photos at $.13 cents a piece, I got them for $.10 cents each! Which, at 748 photos, adds up to a $22.44 savings! (Note: this can be used to soften the blow to the hubby - who is a guy, and of course doesn't understand - that you are spending $74.80 on photos). ;)

Another note, wave buh bye to the "One Hour" deal - apparently 748 photos + MLK Jr. day = 2 days processing time. So....

Step Three: Pick up your photos.

I made this extra large, just so you can see what 748 photos looks like! And yes, that's 6 envelopes.

Step Four: Organize those photos!

Like I said, I am making more than one book, and not every book is getting every photo (I don't even want to imagine my Costco bill had this been the case). So I took ALL of the photos out of the envelopes and started them sorting them into 4 piles for each of the scrapbooks I intend to make. Even if you are not making multiple books, this process could also be used for dividing photos from one event into different time frames, if you have a lot.

Example: my pile, as the bride, is by far the largest, I may end up needing to make multiple books for myself. In this case, I would take my pile and put prewedding events in one pile, wedding events in another, and honeymoon pictures in another.

Once I sorted out the pictures to the piles where they belonged, I went through each individually pile and put the photos in a rough chronological order. I figured I'd need to do this before putting a book together, so I might as well do it now. Once I did this, I put them back into one of the Costco envelopes and labeled it :

Now, you are as ready to scrap as you will ever be!

Stay tuned for the scrapping process itself!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope this motivated you to get your own photo projects together that you have been putting off! (We all know how daunting they are!) ;)

A fabric hunting extravaganza!

2010-01-17T21:23:00.000-08:00

What did you do this weekend?

I recently broke out my sewing machine, that my wonderful husband purchased me for my birthday (back in July). It has been ages since I have sewn anything, and being the crazy person that I am decided to start with a santa suit for my husband's family's annual christmas eve party.

WARNING : IF YOU HAVE CHILDREN WHO BELIEVE IN SANTA, DO NOT SCROLL DOWN WHILE THEY ARE IN THE VICINITY.

Here's the process and finished product:

This was the "thumbs up - you can do this!" picture after I had sewn something that resembled clothing.

Here he is trying it on before I make the final touches - snaps to close the jacket, and sewing down the collar so it doesn't stick out like it is here.

Here's santa!

One last shot, before he changed out of his suit.

After constructing this suit on the kitchen table (where I used to sew with my mother when I was a kid) I decided - after living amidst the fuzz from the fur lining for two weeks - that it was time to get-a-move-on on getting my craft room together. My husband and I bought a house a few months before we were married, and we were lucky enough to score one with TWO extra bedrooms, which means I can have a craft room (naturally, the other was the designated "guest room").

And so I began this arduous journey - okay, it hasn't been too arduous. I'm pretty handy ;) But it's definitely been a journey. Walk with me...

First, there was the evolution of the desk:

$10 craigslist desk I picked up, conveniently, around the corner. I stripped it - or tried to - note to self, when trying to strip MANY layers of old paint, use the toxic stuff, not the natural stuff, and don't take the Home Depot guy's recommendation of a plastic scraper, and use a metal one.

Then I primed it, painted it, and put it in the room, on the large area rug I purchased on clearance at Pier 1 Imports, for $40, so that I could spill stuff and not worry about ruining our carpets.

As you can see, this desk does not scream tons of working surface area, so I headed to Home Depot, again, and purchased an 8'x4' sheet of melamine for about $30. I brought my measurements with me, and had them cut it for me there (SO thankful for that! I don't know what I would've done!)

I put some 2'x4's on the wall to hold it up, and made myself a beautiful work surface:

SO much better. Wouldn't you agree? Now it definitely screams WORK ON ME!

For some inspiration, I decided to make what I like to call "inspiration boards." These are simply painted rectangles on the wall, bordered by door casing (about $8 worth).

Then I took some small nails, and bought a pack of fun colored mini binder clips, to hang print outs of projects that I want to do.

I haven't done much else since then, because I have been so excited to actually get crafting! I saw a tutorial online, and made this shirt:

I LOVE this shirt, and that it fits, and that I made it and it fits, so I wanted to make a few more. Unfortunately, there's really one large chain store that sells fabric in my town - Joann's and they charge around $7/yd. for jersey knit. I did a little research, and found some discount fabric stores in San Francisco (about 40 minutes south of where I live). So, I got a few girlfriends together, and we headed out on an adventure to find fabric. Our first stop was a huge fabric store near Union Square, called Britex. It has 4 stories! I could tell by the website that it was pretty ritzy, so I figured we'd spend most of our time on the 3rd and 4th floors looking at buttons and notions (3rd) and remnants (4th)

These are a few shots from the inside of the store (shh! don't tell! We saw way too many "no photography" signs while inside. Thanks to cell phone cameras, I was able to snap a few undetected):

See the library ladder over in the right corner? So fun!

I was literally standing in the same spot and turned to one end and then the other - it's a long NARROW store - now I get why they have 4 floors. Needless to say, even their REMNANTS were way out of our budgets, but it was still fun to check it out, and we all got a few of this-and-that from the scraps box. Here's what I scored:

Some linen scraps that will probably end up as a fabric flower, and a few other fun scraps I just couldn't let go. I really like how they grouped similar fabrics and sold them as one unit.

Our next stop was called "Discount Fabrics." Their location was like a big garage/warehouse with huge metal industrial shelves packed with rolls and rolls of fabric:

Here's my friend Eve browsing the clearance section:

Although we had planned on 5 stops, it had already taken us about 4 1/2 hours to get to San Francisco, and through the first 2 stops, so we decided to make just one more, where I hit the jackpot on jersey! I bought 4 times as much as I could get for the same price locally! This amazing find was purchased at Fabric Outlet, in the Mission District. I will definitely be returning to this place!

Here's the jersey I bought:

I'm so excited to get to sewing shirts out of these fabrics! Finished product pictures to come, when I'm done ;)

Thanks for stopping by! Hope you all had a great weekend!

Testing the button!

2010-01-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

Here it is guys! In order to make the button work, I have to stick it in a post! So, here goes nothin'!

~HAITI~

2010-01-14T16:32:00.000-08:00

I thought it only fitting to write about Haiti today. My twitter account has been blown up by current news stories of everything that is going on there, and I think the more attention we can draw to the subject the better, because it really puts our lives into perspective.

In 2006 I had the privilege of traveling to Biloxi, MS to help a team from Samaritan's Purse try and rebuild the surrounding community from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. What I saw there was the most amazing display of destruction I have ever seen, and can only imagine the sites that people are looking at in Haiti today.

Katrina :

Haiti :

This is the president's palace, by the way. (Can you imagine how the American people would react if this were the White House?)

As a former history major, I am sad to say that my knowledge of Haiti is not very extensive. I think for the most of us, the mention of the country of Haiti merely flashes images of poverty and tropical resorts through our brains - and that's it. That's all most of us know, myself included. Because of this, I wanted to dig around a little and enlighten us all to who the Haitian's are.

Haiti was the location of the "New World" that Christopher Columbus landed upon in 1492 but the original settlers left behind by Columbus died off, and new Spanish colonies were formed on the eastern side of the island (now the Dominican Republic). France colonized the western part of the island (now Haiti). Haiti was home a well known stop to most pirates carrying slaves and other goods from Africa to the Northern Americas. The typical stories of tyrannical colony leaders and fierce slavery, small pox, and the like continued until the French revolution. The social and political upheaval in France carried over to its colonies. From this (1803) point forward Haiti experienced 32 coups, leading to almost constant governmental change. In 1987 Haiti reached it's first (technical) democratic point, but many elections have been interrupted or shut down by military groups terrorizing people trying to vote. Since 2004, the United Nations Stabilization Mission has been in Haiti, providing basic, and steepened during election time, security to the civilians. Haiti is home to about 9.8 million people - about the population of Los Angeles. It is said that 80% of Haitians are Catholic (which makes sense. Most countries that were once colonies of Europe have a high percentage of Catholics), and about 16% are Protestant Christians. Haiti is also known throughout the world for it's vibrant art :

I hope that this has given you a little bit of background to the people who were recently devastated by the earthquake in Haiti.

Finally, and most importantly, here are some things you can do to help:

1) You can pray for the people of Haiti, and for the relief workers, that there be hope amidst the destruction, and that safety and success surround the relief teams.

2) You can donate $10 to the Red Cross by texting "HAITI" to 90999. The $10 will show up on your next month's phone bill, but will be sent to the Red Cross (for more information, go here). You can also text "YELE" to 501501 to donate $5 through Yele Haiti.

3)Other organizations that are taking donations (to name a few) : (Christian) World Vision, Food For the Hungry, Samaritan's Purse (Non-Christian) Mercy Corps, Unicef, AmeriCares, YeleHaiti, Doctors Without Borders, and International Medical Corps.

4) If you are a nurse, you can sign-up to volunteer in Haiti here through the California Nurses Association.

5) My fellow blogger, The Pioneer Woman, is doing a blog giveaway - where she will be donating $500 to Haitian relief efforts, to the charity of choice, of the two winners. She is also donating 10 cents for every entry to the giveaway. You can enter here.

God Bless you all!

Jewelry giveaway!

2010-01-13T22:20:00.000-08:00

Mostly all giveaways I have seen lately ask you to blog about them, and I don't. But I had to make an exception for this jewelry maker, because of this ring :

I ADORE this ring, and wish that I had seen it years ago when I was looking for a purity ring. Hopefully I will remember to look up Cap Creations one day when I am in the market for one for my daughters.

Another piece I saw that I am considering purchasing for myself (or maybe hinting to hubby for V-day?) ;)

If you are interested in entering the giveaway for yourself, you can find it here.

Thanks for stopping by! Good luck!

Today's findings! (And it's only 11:15!)

2010-01-13T11:30:00.000-08:00

This introduction is short because I simply cannot contain my excitement about this find :

PEGBOARD IN A PICTURE FRAME!!!!!!!!! GENIOUS!

I have always had this odd fascination with pegboard and all of it's versatile organizational functions, but it is SO old school, and I've never seen any really compelling ideas on how to dress it up - until now!

Here it is in the whole room (which is also totally drool-worthy! Teal walls!? Zebra rug?! To die! I LOVE the price breakdown too!)

We can thank A Brooklyn Limestone In Progress for this tasty treat! I am definitely planning on implimenting this in my craft room!

One more fabulous DIY project:

Learn how to make this awesome fabric necklaces HERE at Pretty Ditty!

Thanks for stopping by! Happy Crafting!

Love Love LOVE This!

2010-01-12T13:30:00.000-08:00

Digging around in blogland is always bound to turn up little nuggets of goodness, and today was just one of those days. I had some time on my hands, so I doned my explorers cap and started digging around a few of the blogs that I follow.

Our trip took us through forums and shops and other tasty tidbits fellow blog followers had picked up, and then I stumbled up this gem, by Hokey Croquis

It's a sketchpad specifically designed for sketching clothing! The book include this pages with scale model bodies lightly outlined on each one, perfect for sketching ideas!

In case you were wondering, the definition of Croquis: sketch: a rough sketch or draft of something ( technical ). [Early 19th century. < French< croquer "to sketch"]

Here's a picture from their site of a sample page-in-use:

I LOVE the side section for fabric samples, buttons, etc.

I was just telling my husband on Sunday not to delete the last episode of Desperate Housewives because I wanted to sketch the top that Gabby's wearing in the first scene to attempt to try and recreate it myself! (obviously the completion of this shirt has me thinking I can actually do it). This little book would be quite handy for such a sketching project! ;)

A couple of other projects I found on my trip, that I will definitely be adding to my to-do list?

This AWESOME looking magnetic board to store little crafting tidbits -- I may even make a manly-looking one for the garage. After my organizing frenzy last night, I realized we have a lot of LITTLE this and that, that have no homes other than haphazard baggies and catch-all cups. Here's the tutorial

And how about one more? Okay, okay! ;) Drum roll please.......

This is possibly the prettiest display of wrapping paper my eyes have ever feasted upon. I have always wanted to make a dowel system for my wrapping papers, but never thought of attaching them to a fun frame, instead of having them floating in the abyss of the wall. Here's how to make this looker.

That's all for now folks! I hope you enjoyed my trip through blogland as much as I did!

Happy crafting!

Welcome!

2010-01-11T22:29:00.000-08:00

Howdy y'all! Welcome to my new blog! I have recently become an avid follower of some craft blogs (which you can check out for yourself to your left) and it has inspired me to craft so much so that I decided to create a blog to document all of my creations!

I have spent the better part of this evening setting up this blog, and will therefore forego posting any real content, except to say that prior to setting up the blog, I spent the better part of the late afternoon tidying up my garage. The garage is an extension of my (wonderful, AMAZING) craft room upstairs, as my husband would not be very happy with me sanding or sawing in my upstairs-bedroom-converted-craft-room.

We got these shelves from Target - not actually these shelves - ours are black and aren't on casters - they're from the REorganize line that for some reason doesn't show up on-line. BUT, if you are looking for something like this, the ones that we got, that I am sure you can find in your local store, were considerably cheaper than the ones I linked. Anyways... we got them - 2 of them - and I finally got around to putting up the second one today. I love being able to adjust the shelf heights to accommodate the different size bins and boxes and such. Organization can be beautiful.

Ta ta for now. Happy crafting -- or shall I say organizing, for today!