The things I do part 1

I know I have been absent lately, but I have a good reason why. Actually, I have many reasons why. Would you believe me if I told you I made a list of all the gifts that I want to make people? A list that is itemized, with all of the needed things to make each project? Well, perhaps not everything. I didn’t write down little things like a pen for writing on the gift tags or scissors. Only the big important stuff, like “glue gun” and “band aids”. ‘Cause…we’ve really needed those band aids! And once each gift is made, I’m highlighting it so I know it is done. I’m tellin’ ya. This old girl is getting organized!

Would you like to see what I’ve been up to?

I asked for 2 things from Adam for my birthday: for him to put doors of some sort on my sewing cabinet and fix my rocking chair.

 

Here is my sewing cabinet before. As you can see, it is wide open for any little finger to play with stuff. And they did. Someone did something to the sewing machine and it’s not working right. Grrr. See our sturdy, hard-to-break pencil sharpener? I can’t tell you how happy I was that day when it came! Update: Adam took the rolling part of his desk (on some computer desks, a part of the desk where the keyboard can be put rolls underneath the main part of the desk top. This part of the desk and the hardware is what he took off another desk), cut the piece of wood a little bit shorter and attached the hardware to my cabinet on the inside, on top, of the stationary piece where you can see my sewing machine sit. So now I can roll my sewing machine in or out of the cubby hole. I found that sewing within it was too small and not enough light to see well. When I’m not using it, I simply roll it in and pull the curtain down. It works great! Oh, I also got a new machine!

  

And my sewing cabinet after. We put a heavy-ish type of material for the curtains for the doors in the front and covered the top, sides and partially the back with a printed material that matches the curtains. Adam screwed the material down, not glued. Do you like my hot orange chair? I know, it doesn’t really go with the decor, but it was on clearance for $10, so I’m living with the orange. Update: I found a wonderful tutorial on how to cover your “student chair”. When I have time, I’m going to do this!

  

For the top and the sides, Adam screwed some corner molding over the edges of the plywood. Then across the top, I hot glued some stretchy lace, a ribbon and some silver buttons. The buttons don’t match and I think it gives it a nice eclectic look. And I finally had something I could use those cute elephant buttons on. :0)

And he did fix my rocking chair.

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But making my sewing cabinet pretty (along with hiding my sewing stuff) isn’t the only project that I’ve bee working on. Far from it.

  

I made some stretchy headbands for 2 of my nieces and for Damaris. I also made some bows and fabrics roses to wear with the headbands (or just in the hair if wanted).

  

   

Adam thinks I went a little overboard.

Nah!

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Next, the children and I made some book marks for my sister and her husband.

  

 

  

 

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There are a few birthdays that we celebrate at Thanksgiving time in our family. Mine, my sister-in-laws, and her two children. So their birthdays threw some fun stuff into the mix!

For my sister-in-law:

  

This is a chocolate scented candle that I poured into a small (really small) cup and saucer. There are white shavings of candle wax on the top to be the “marsh mellows”. As my children are fond of saying, “You can’t have hot chocolate without marsh mellows!” (I completely cheated with this one, btw. I bought an already scented vanilla candle that was colored dark brown on the bottom, lighter brown in the middle and cream colored on the top. I then cut off the darker brown, along with half the lighter brown, and melted that down. I added some chocolate scent that I had. Once it was melted, I poured into the cup with the wick being weighed down by a paper clip and tied to a pencil. Before the wax cooled, Adam shaved off the cream colored wax and sprinkled it on top, allowing the dark brown wax to ooze up. Not too bad, huh?)

This little jar holds some wonderful body scrub that you can make at home and cost very little! It is a Brown Sugar Body Scrub and does it ever work! My feet love it!

       

Here is a nifty bag that I “made”. Okay, I didn’t really make this. I tied it. That’s right! It is a no-sew-bag. It’s called furoshiki. Furoshiki is to material what origami is to paper. Go check it out, it’s fun to do!

And lastly, who can have a birthday without their favorite cookie? Her favorite is chocolate chip and since most of the children and Adam ate them (the more-than-I-need-ones), they must be good. And yes, this is a large “pickle” type sized jar. The girl needs her cookies!

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It is now almost 10:30 pm. Waaaaayyyy past my bed time, so I will attempt (ahem!) to post part 2 of the things I do tomorrow. Mind the attempt part, please. *grin*