Life of a Shy Extrovert

 Note: This is not a post on crafting but I wanted to share.

Tonight I went to a Young Professionals networking type event in town. It was a chance for three local YPs to share their career and mentoring experience. Overall, it was a really cool experience getting to hear what career advice they had for everyone in the room. But it got me thinking, as all networking/social events do, about my extreme shyness. And my extroversion.

A shy extrovert? Isn't that kind of an oxymoron?

I'm classified as an ENFJ (if you've never heard of Myers-Brigg here's a link to learn more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator). Now if you scroll through you'll see the whole Extrovert vs Introvert piece. When it isn't in test format nearly everyone classifies me as an introvert. But, the thing is, I get a lot of energy by interacting with people.

During the work day I am most productive when students are around my office and popping in for quick questions. If it is the summertime I have to go downstairs to the rest of my co-workers at least every hour and a half to get a boost of energy. There's rarely people on my hallway in the summer, the quiet is awful to me and music doesn't fix it. If I go talk with a co-worker for a few minutes I can typically go back to my office and be super productive for the next hour and a half.

I love hanging out with friends on the weekends and weekdays. While it's nice to relax and do nothing on the weekends, I'm usually only OK with that if my boyfriend is home. (He's not often gone on trips without me so it's usually not an issue.) But I try really hard to plan something with friends on weekends he is away. If I can't make plans, there's pretty much a 100% chance that I will at least go window shopping so I can be around others for a bit. I enjoy it.

But...as much as I enjoy it I am extremely, extremely shy. I really struggle with initiating a social conversation. If I'm at work and a student, parent, or staff member approaches me I have no problem having a conversation about the school, the program we work with, etc. If the conversation is almost "predetermined" and is focused on something like work or something that I'm viewed as an "expert" on, I'm fine.

When it comes to this whole "small talk" let's chat and become friends thing though? I cannot explain how much I struggle. Again, this is where the whole everyone thinks I'm an introvert comes from. At the event  tonight, I wanted so much to contribute to more of the conversation but the anxiety that came with actually speaking up definitely beat out the ability to speak up. I love hearing people's stories, but I'm awful at asking the questions to get those stories.

I get very uncomfortable in social situations where I don't know anyone. Actually, if those situations happen, as long as there are no overly negative conflicts, I tend to leave them...immediately.

My boyfriend can probably recall when I first moved to our current location he hadn't moved here yet. So I didn't know anyone. I went to a United Way Young Professionals social gathering by myself. I spent nearly an hour on the phone with him trying to convince myself that I would be OK and calm down my anxieties. I stayed for an hour, to me it was awful. Because not only was I getting energy from being around people...I was getting anxious. It's not a fun feeling. I also spent the hour after the event crying because I felt like I made no positive connections and was so badly craving some sort of connection here.

Since being out of school (I went straight from high school to college to grad school) I have really realized how much of a shy extrovert I am. Actually, moving here made me realize that I was actually extroverted with just this almost painful sense of shyness. There are no longer those "situations" (aka class, clubs, etc) that allow friendships to form much more easily. There's not really an evident common interest any more (aka school). While I've found some awesome people in Greensboro, it's taken a lot of energy on my end. And I still struggle so much. I came home tonight and ended up falling asleep for a few hours, mainly because that shyness and extroversion conflict and really do cause exhaustion.

So chances are it will take me a long time to get really comfortable with you. Not because I'm introverted and interactions take energy, but because as much as I talk myself up, I have never been able to get past that shyness. I really do value my friendships and those people I get to be comfortable with because it takes so much for me to get there.

Twine and Frames

It's been awhile since I've done any blogging or crafting! Life got a bit hectic there! We've recently moved into a new, bigger apartment! With packing and moving and wrapping up the end of the year at work it just got busy. Today's post is just a very quick craft, but honestly it's one of my favorites.

With the new apartment, we each got our own closet. I was VERY excited by this because I'm kind of (read VERY MUCH SO) a neat freak. My boyfriend on the other hand is not at all. When I got to the new place I was trying to figure out how to organize everything in my own closet. Clothes were pretty basic, hanging or folded in assorted piles. My jewelry was what I was struggling with. In the last apartment I had a makeshift earring holder that I never really loved. It was cheap and plastic and broken. So I knew it wasn't coming to the new place.

I found an old frame that was empty and the glass broke in the move. I spent a few minutes disassembling the frame (removing the glass, taking off the tabs that held the back in, etc). If you do have a frame that you want to use that uses those little metal tabs to hold everything in, just bend them back and forth a few times and they'll pop right off.

Next I took twine and just tied string across the frame to form lines.

And tah-dah! It was done. It was really simple and for me free because I had the frame and the twine. If you have to pick those up though, you can get a cheap frame or an expensive one for however much you like and twine, which a big roll that has helped me with a bunch of projects cost $5.

I just hung up my earrings. I used the small command hooks for my necklaces. Again, this was a super simple, super effective project. I love how it looks.

The one above is close up picture so you can see the twine.

This one's a bit further away. The purses are hung with just a nail in the wall, I got the jewelry box forever ago from my mom, and the bucket with the nail polish was a dollar at the Dollar Store, I've had that forever too. I just threw my bracelets and sunglasses in a small basket that I got as part of some Secret Santa exchange forever ago too.

Most of the new place is put together with a few things here and there to work on. The rest of the bedroom will be put on hold while we wait for our new bed. It's organized now but we're not putting too much on the walls until we get the new bed.

Hope you enjoy! 

Easy & Cute Clutch!

It's been a bit since I've blogged here! Things have been busy on our end. We've done some trips/weekends away and then I came down with a bad cold...so crafting took a back seat to life for a bit. But I'm back!

My latest project is actually a second of something I made awhile back.  They're very simple clutch purses.

You need:

2 fat quarters ($1.00 a piece at Walmart)
Fusible interfacing (Ranges depending on what type you get)
A button or clasp
Thread
 Any additional decor you'd like to add

You first just measure the fat quarter to the size of clutch you want to make. A full fat quarter would make an over-sized clutch. I cut out two rectangles. I cut the interfacing to the same size and shape. Ironed a piece of interfacing onto each fat quarter. Then I sewed the fabric right sides facing each other. I left a small opening. Turned the piece out. Ironed it flat, sewed the opening close.

On one of the clutches I sewed ric-rac into the seam of the top of the clutch so that it just hardly sticks out.

One clutch I used a button and the button function on my sewing machine. On the other I used a small clutch. And sewed a bead on the outside.

And ta-dah!

Here's the first:

And the inside:

And the second:

And the inside (I will go back and clean up the threading that is visible.)

I love how easy and inexpensive this project is. You can go as simple or as elaborate as you want. And again, with this being so cheap, I can make as many as I want!

Princessfied.

So I know I mentioned earlier that I was running a half marathon. The Disney Princess Half Marathon to be precise. Well...I did it! Sunday, February 24th my two friends from grad school (and about 25,997 other runners) took to the road.

We woke up at about 2:30 AM (it still makes me tired thinking about that...) and threw on our costumes and headed to the bus.

We got to the run site and had music to listen to and lots of other princesses and princes to look at for a few hours. We then walked towards our corral. (We were all in corral C). After count downs and entertainment it was finally our chance to start (around 5:40 something).

The race started off really well. The first 9 miles one of my friends and I stayed together...after we hit mile 9 though she was able to maintain our speed...and I had to slow down a bit.

Throughout the entire race there were water/powerade stops (Thank you Disney!). There were characters that if you chose to you could stop and take pictures with, I was concentrating on the "I want to actually finish this" piece so I didn't stop (except once in front of the castle). There was some entertainment with bands, a choir, and all sorts of things. The best part was running through magic kingdom.

First, the crowd was really into it...everyone was screaming and cheering for every single runner. And let me tell you...I placed 9,097...so there were a LOT of other runners in front of me. We got to loop around the park and ran through Cinderella's castle. It was awesome...and definitely gave me a boost at the point where I was getting a little tired.

I definitely struggled the last 4 miles of the race. My feet and legs started to cramp, my ankle started to tighten up. I had to walk a few times throughout those 4. The volunteers (who were awesome throughout the entire race) definitely helped with cheering runners on, providing water, biofreeze, and Gu. But those last 4 they seemed extra loud and extra encouraging...which is definitely what I needed. Though...they kept saying, "You're almost there." and it felt like that was a lie. Haha. But, when I finally turned that last corner and saw the finish line...that was one of the most amazing feelings in the world. I was about to complete a half marathon. I was about to have just finished 13.1 miles. I definitely choked back some tears (which is extra difficult when you're running). 

I couldn't believe I finished...even when the volunteer handed me my medal, even after I had been sprinkled with fairy dust, even after I waited in line, not really knowing what it was for to get my picture taken. I just couldn't believe it. It goes to show you, if you think you can do something and you work for it...you can. I mean, I ran cross country in high school but normally couldn't finish/run all of those 3.2 mile races. And here I was, having just done a 1/2 marathon. I've been a diabetic since I was 16 months old, but here I was holding a medal saying I'd just completed a 1/2 marathon. Was it fast? No. It took me 2 hours 49 minutes and 19 seconds. The winner did it in about 1 hour 17 minutes. But I didn't even care. I'd just finished.

I really do want to thank my friends who were there with me. My friends and family who cheered me on from afar and all of those people cheering, whether it was friends/family of other runners, volunteers, Disney employees or the other runners. That's what I've loved about running, it doesn't matter how fast you are, it doesn't matter what your final time is...if you're trying, they're cheering you on. I love that. I absolutely love that about running. People appreciate your attempt, your effort. And it's everyone...crowds and fellow runners alike. That's amazing to me.

So, in this long detailed race story you're probably wondering...I thought this was a crafting blog? No fears! I did do a craft. Very, very simple. It's a shadow box for my race bib and medal. I figured since I got such a huge sense of accomplishment, I want to be able to display the medal for those days when I'm feeling a little down. And remember..."hey, you ran 13.1 miles...you've got this."

Michael's is typically having sales on their frames which is awesome. I got my shadow box for about $13. And here it is:

Again, nothing super fancy...but I love it. I may add some tulle or something from my tutu, change things up a bit (which is another reason why shadow boxes are awesome...very easy to make addition/changes), but for now it makes me so happy to catch this as I pass by it in my apartment.

Friends, Dragons and Sangria: Weekends Don't Get Much Better

I had another wonderful weekend of a friend visiting. One of my closest friends from undergrad came down for the weekend. We decided to do some crafty projects after searching around on Pinterest for awhile. We found an adorable Dragon...but the pattern and directions were in another language. So we decided we'd fake it until we made it.

We didn't use the pattern and free handed a lot of the cuts. I do love our dragons, but the person who created the pattern definitely did an adorable job.

Here are our projects.

 Meet Earl (blue) and Denver (red)!

Earl is mine and Denver is Sarah's. It was a lot of fun but it took a LONG time. We spent about 6 hours on these little guys.

But I think they were worth it...don't you?

 So cute!

It was so good to get to see Sarah again! It doesn't happen nearly enough. We also had lots of delicious food, skyped with another friend, went shopping (great sales at Michael's) and window shopping...oh and made a delicious Sangria.

The recipe is easy enough to make:

1 bottle Moscato
1 Orange
1 Lime
1 Lemon
1 bag frozen berries
Raspberry Blackberry Sparkling Water

Cut orange, lime, and lemon in slices. Put into pitcher. Pour moscato over sliced fruit. Add a small handful of berries. Let sit (refrigerated) for a few hours (we waited about 3 hours, you can definitely wait more if you'd like!). Add more frozen berries and about 1/2 a bottle (33 oz) of sparkling water. And enjoy. So simple...and SO delicious.

I'm ready for another weekend just like it!

Valentine's Gift for a Gamer

Every year for Valentine's Day, my boyfriend and I exchange gifts. Our second year together we actually decided to make gifts for each other, both of us were short on money so this seemed like a nice way to celebrate and not stress out about the cash. It's a tradition that we've kept up since that time.

Since I have a friend coming on the 15th we celebrated Valentine's Day early. This year he got me a little Valentine mailbox and put a little something in it each day. He was struggling to come up with something but I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed this. He "made" a little collection of gifts from some of my favorite things.

Day 1: A Paint Your Own Sun-Catcher in the shape of an elephant. Elephants are one of my favorite animals.
Day 2: A Luigi K'Nex Mariokart Bike.
Day 3: Cake Pop Sticks (I got a cake pop maker for Christmas, so this was an awesome gift!)
Day 4: A drawing of Sulley and I (when I'm dressed in my 1/2 marathon costume) as if it were done by Boo
Day 5:A Luigi's Mansion Valentine's Card and a Michael's gift card!
Day 6: Chocolates and multiple Valentine Cards, including a few more Luigi cards with some drawings by Terence in them. :-)

For him, I made him something practical but fun. He LOVES practical gifts, which makes my job of giving gifts pretty easy. He's a gamer. He LOVES video games. He's got tons of games and lots of controllers. We used to just put the controllers on the shelf on the bottom half of our coffee table, but they'd fall off pretty often. He'd been saying for awhile he should get a basket or something to keep all the controllers in. Luckily, he hadn't picked one up yet. So that's when I knew what the perfect gift would be.

I went shopping to grab the supplies as I didn't really know how I wanted to go about doing this gift. My first stop was Walmart. After digging around the store for almost an hour, I finally settled on picking up some foam sticker sheets ($5) and a small organizational bin ($5) which I wasn't crazy about. I wasn't exactly sure what I'd do with it. I knew I wanted to make some small controllers but wasn't really sure how I'd do it or how they'd be attached to the basket.

I then scooted on over to Michael's. After searching around I found a basket that I really liked. It was originally $14.95, but they were having a 40% off all baskets sale so it came out to $8.97. Woo! I also picked up some larger foam sheets that fit in the bottom perfectly ($0.89) and some star brads to hold the sheet in place ($2.99). And some foam sticker letters ($2.99).

I came home and started working away. I cut out the different controller shapes and used the foam stickers, pens and markers to build them. These foam sticker sheets were awesome. They made the project really easy. The only thing that I suggest is that you have SHARP scissors. Mine were a little dull so I didn't get as precise cuts as I wanted. If you're trying to do bigger shapes you shouldn't have a problem though. It was more the fact that I had a lot of TINY shapes to focus on.

Here's the front of the basket:

His name and a Game Cube controller.

One side of the basket:

 A Wii controller.

Another side:

A Wii Classic Controller.

And the back:

A NES Classic Controller and a Game Cube Wavebird.

I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out...and how few supplies that were actually needed. But mostly how excited he got when he opened it.

Mike Wazowski's doing 13.1 miles!

In my last post (Tutus and Training) I had mentioned I was getting a fanny pack for my upcoming 1/2 marathon. Being diabetic it'll be important to have some emergency supplies on me during the race. I didn't want just an average boring fanny pack. (Because they're ever so fashionable, right?). I decided to make my pack tie in with my costume in general. So since my costume is inspired by Sulley by Monster's Inc, the pack is inspired by Mike! Because they're such an awesome pair I didn't want them to be separated for 13.1 miles!

I bought green, white, and black felt. They were $0.20 each. I already had a blue felt sheet at home so I didn't need to worry about that. And then I bought a $7 fanny pack.

I put the green felt in my embroidery. Then cut out a white circle and sewed that on.

 I then did the same with the blue and the black. I just made each color progressively smaller.

Next I made half moons for both the eyelids and the mouth.

Then I of course had to add the teeth.

 Finally I attached it to the fanny pack. The pack is empty right now but will definitely round out when I put my camera and such in it. I'm excited about this one!

He looks in shock that he'll be going on this 13.1 mile journey...."Sulley...what were you thinking?!?"

Tutus and Training

So in a couple weeks (16 days to be exact) I'm going to be running a half-marathon. (Eeek!) First of all, I'm really excited. Second of all, "What the heck was I thinking?". This post is FAR more about the tutu and way less (as in really not at all about the training).

The excitement part comes from a couple of different things. One being that I get to run it with two friends from grad school. One I haven't seen since the beginning of football season, the other I haven't seen since the day we graduated from grad school (which was close to 3 years ago). Another reason to be excited? It's in Disney! It's the Disney Princess Half Marathon.

So where does the crafting come in? Well, it's a fairly common practice to dress up for the Disney Princess 1/2. Most of the ladies running in it dress as Belle, Mulan, Cinderella, Rapunzel, Tiana, Aurora, Snow White or any of the other Disney Princesses (sorry if I missed your favorite!).

While I've always loved Disney movies, I've never had a true favorite princess. I liked dolls and Barbies growing up but was kinda a tom-boy too. And my favorite dolls were American Girl Dolls...so I was kinda this geeky, sometimes girly, sometimes no where close to girly kid who liked Disney movies but didn't imagine myself as any of the Princesses. So I kept trying to decide which Princess do I want to be? Then I decided none. I was going to be my own princess. So I went to buy some tulle ($3 per spool) and elastic ($1). And realized which character my princess would be based off of from my color choice.

One of my favorite movies of all time is Disney Pixar's Monster's Inc. I ADORE Sulley and him and Mike make an awesome pair. So, my tutu is based off of Sulley.

I took the elastic band and wrapped it around my waist...if you do this I suggest measuring it so it's uncomfortably tight. All the tulle will stretch it out.

I then cut the tulle to (fairly) equal lengths. And then just looped it around the elastic. It is somewhat time consuming but really easy. I used 6 spools of tulle all together.

I also created a headband with a teal headband, purple fur and some grey card stock to make the horns. I'm going to using a fanny pack for emergency supplies, a camera and my phone. I plan to try to make the fanny pack look like Mike.

This is my friend Stefani (from my last post) and I together. We really wanted to have Stef join us on our running adventure (she's a grad school friend too) but she has a huge commitment with work every year during the same weekend as the race so she couldn't come...but to make up for that we made a tutu for her while she was here too!

Oh and the "What the heck was I thinking part?" comes every time I do a long run. :-p

Love in Frames

My friend Stefani came to visit this weekend! YAY!

 And we decided to do some crafting. We had browsed through Pinterest to get some ideas, but didn't have anything set in mind. So we took a trip to Michael's to start brainstorming. That's when Stef had a great idea about doing a combination of things we saw. We found some small wooden frames for about $1 a piece and bought 4 of them. We then bought acrylic paint for $0.68 a bottle. I bought purple, Stef bought blue and we bought a white. We each bought a thing of ribbon, we found some great ribbon for $1 a piece. And then a piece of scrapbook paper for about $0.69. We looked for small wooden letters, but this store was low on supply so we went to Walmart and found a big tub of small wooden letters for about $6.

We came home and started working!

First, we painted the frames. We did ours in varying shades of our respective colors. We just kept adding white for each new frame color.

We also painted the letters white...

Next we cut out card stock and the scrapbook paper  so that they'd fit just slightly larger then the inside of the frame.

We glued the paper to the card stock then glued the card stock onto the least pretty side of the frame.

 The scrapbook paper was facing out, so when you flipped it over, it looked like this...

Next we glued the letters to the center of the paper. We just used Elmer's glue for this..nothing to fancy.

After the glue finished drying, we got out my glue gun and started to attach the ribbon. All we did was cut a LONG piece of ribbon. (You need enough to attach the frames and leave some space in between each of them.) We just glued the frames to the back. Then cut a small piece of ribbon to make a loop at the top so we could hang our signs.

And ta-dah!

 

I "love" it. :-) 

 

We did another crafting project but I'll leave that for my next post! 

Crafty in the Kitchen

This is a little crafty in the kitchen post! As a precursor to another crafty afternoon. Tomorrow a couple friends and I are going to a painting and wine night. I've been to a few of them before and always have a fantastic time. So, I'm really excited. We're all bringing something for the painting event. One of my friends is bringing the bottle of wine and one is bringing cheese and crackers. I figured we needed something sweet...(go figure the diabetic would have this thought). It's been awhile since I've baked or made goodies. Granted I don't delve into these treats due to being diabetic but I really enjoy making them.

So on to the recipe! I made Chocolate Peanut Butter Balls.


This was super easy! (And no actual baking involved)

The ingredients:

18 ounce jar of creamy peanut butter
1 teaspoon butter, softened
1-3 cups powdered sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla
12 ounce bag of chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate chips)
1/2 teaspoon Crisco

The first step is to make the peanut butter mix that will make the actual balls. Scoop out the entire 18 ounce jar of peanut butter into a microwave safe bowl. Put in the butter and stir. Now, to be honest I didn't actually measure the butter, so that's a rough estimate. After you stir in the butter you want to microwave the mix for 30 seconds to a minute. Enough so that the butter is completely melted and when you stir it again it's a little creamier than it was before. Not TOO soupy, just a little creamier. Stir in vanilla. Next stir in the powdered sugar. I started with one cup and then stirred it in completely. I then started added about a 1/4 of a cup at a time and continued stirring it in until it got pretty thick. Once it got to the point where it was just balling up when I stirred I added about another 1/4 of a cup and mixed it with my hands. You'll want to add sugar until it becomes almost a play dough like consistency. Break a small piece off, and roll it into a small ball. Put it on a wax paper lined pan. If it doesn't lose it's shape after about a minute you're good to go.

Next you keep balling the peanut butter dough up into small balls. You can pick the size. Just make them consistent. After you've balled up all the dough put the balls in the fridge for at least an hour. Then stick them in the freezer for about 1/2 an hour right before you get ready to dip them in chocolate. You can probably put them straight into the freezer, but I had some other things I needed to finish before I coated them and I didn't want them to get too frozen.

To prepare the chocolate you can either microwave it or use a double broiler. If you have pots and a glass bowl you can make your own double broiler. Just fill your pan up with water. But use your bowl as a measuring guide. You want your glass bowl to be able to rest on top of the pan, without the water touching the bowl at all. Let the water boil, then turn the stove top off but leave the pan there. Put your glass bowl on top of your pan, and pour in your bag of chocolate chips and your lard. The lard helps keep the chocolate pretty! Don't stop stirring the chocolate until everything is melted. Once all the chocolate has melted remove the bowl.

Take the peanut butter balls out of the freezer and (this is the time consuming part) dip them one at a time into the chocolate. You can decide how covered you want them. Some of the balls I completely covered in chocolate, some of them I only have covered. I used toothpicks to dip the balls in and bring them out of the chocolate.




Then just put everything back in the fridge again! Allow the chocolate to harden and then enjoy!

"Put a Bird on It"

For Christmas I got some spending money from my grandparents. I decided to use that money to re-decorate the living room a bit. My big "redo" was the couch area. That's changed from season to season. It was first some coffee mug paintings I did (the big painting at the end!), then some Clemson decor for football season, then I wrapped up two canvases in Christmas paper for the holidays. So at the beginning of this month it was time for something new.

I went shopping at this big home decor store in town to find something that I liked. I didn't really have any ideas going into the store and figured I'd work from whatever I found. Well...this is what I found...

I loved the bird design. I found the middle one first and happened to stumble upon (actually literally, I tripped a bit on the display!) the two outside hangings. 

Walking around I also found this...which was PERFECT to go with my new wall hangings.

I thought it was adorable. Not to mention that total for the 3 wall hangings and the lamp shade I spent about $45. WIN! Everything was on sale for 50% off. DOUBLE WIN!

Next I knew I needed pillows to match. Something brown...and with a bird on it. But when I looked through the pillow section, while they had HUNDREDS of pillows, there wasn't anything there I was willing to spend the money on. 

So it was craft project time. 

I bought 2 yards of this pretty brown material that I found at Wal-mart for about $7.50 total. I already had a beige fabric so that was free (woo!). I also bought some iron-on adhesive (fusible webbing) for attaching the bird shapes to my pillows ($3 at Walmart). 

First I measured and cut the material to make the pillow cases...well actually they're more like shams...the kind that you have to sort of struggle to get the pillow in but the material folds over and meets in the middle of the pillow. I just used the pillow as my measuring guide, nothing fancy. I cut it so it'd be long enough to wrap around and wide enough to cover the pillow. I include extra so I can sew everything up. 

Next I sewed the top and bottom edges down. These are the edges that you'll see. Next I drew out my bird pattern. I just free-handed it, but you can use a pattern or stencil if you like! My first mistake was cutting out my first bird and the trying to iron the webbing on. Let's just say...today I'm going to pick up a new ironing board cover. If you use the fusible webbing, iron on a patch of material first then cut out your design. If you read the directions on the fusible webbing it's really easy to use. Just actually read them so you don't end up like me! 

After I ironed on the bird, I used my machine to stitch the outline. If you're really interested in doing things like this Google applique! There's TONS of tutorials and useful blogs out there. After the bird was applied and sewn, I just sewed up the rest of the sham. 

And ta-dah! 

Here's a close up of the bird (you can see the stitching around the bird):

And here's everything all put together:

I'm a fan. It feels all cozy. And it's definitely different from what I've had before but it still ties in with the rest of the apartment.

Hope you all enjoy!

Bandana Blanket!

So for Christmas I really wanted to make my parents their gifts this year. I had been talking with my mom about some of my crafting projects and had shown her a picture of the Clemson Wreath  I had made. She LOVED it and started asking questions on what I did to make it. So her gift was easy to decide on...I was going to make her a wreath.

It did take a lot of time because while it may not look like it...that's a fairly big wreath. Though I have to say the only un-enjoyable part was shipping it. Maaaaaaaan, that was a pretty penny.

My dad's gift took a little bit more time to think of what I could do. And a lot more discussion with mom. I had originally thought of trying to make him a wind chime. My parents have a few gardens at home and my dad enjoys putting knick-knacks to go along with the flowers. But after talking to my mom more I decided that a blanket was a better choice. We have a gorgeous quilt, that my aunt made, that my mom was actually getting a little concerned about. Both my parents use it while they're in watching TV or hanging out in the living room. It's just a small throw, but it was starting to get worn down from use and washing. My family lives in New England so blankets during the winter months are pretty handy.

Well then I had to decide...do I want to crochet or sew a blanket? I figured since my parents get the most use out of the quilt...I needed to sew it. The only problem is I'd only made a t-shirt quilt...and well...let's just say I only take that out every so often...it's not the most fantastic of my work. Granted, I did it about 4 years ago...so it's been a bit.

So now I knew I wanted to sew. Next step...picking out material. I knew I wanted to make it a Clemson "themed" blanket. My dad and I often text each other during the Clemson games. Having gone to a high school with no football team and an undergraduate school with no football team, I think my dad was just as excited to be able to have a non-pro team to cheer for. When I was shopping at Walmart I saw these great orange bandanas. PERFECT! When I was younger my dad always wore a bandana when he was working outside, so I knew he'd enjoy this.

It took a little bit of work and time to find enough orange and enough purple...the purple was the challenge...in fact I'm pretty sure I have about 12 extra orange ones in my fabric stash still.

Next, I sewed the bandanas together flipping between orange and purple. I made the quilt three bandanas by 4 bandanas. (I feel like that could be a line in a children's song...anyways...) Now these were big...each are 22 by 22 inches. The other challenge is that bandana edges aren't necessarily straight. So when pinning and sewing I went with the printed outer edge border instead of the edge of the material.

Next I sewed on the batting...this took the longest amount of time. Actually, a lot longer than I thought it would. I sewed on the batting (the stuff that makes it really warm) and stitched in each corner where the colors met. Then I actually hand quilted around every other paisley in the center. I wish I had hand quilted around the border, but again...that was a LOT of paisley. I did not attach the backing until after I was done. I liked the idea of a smooth back.

When I did sew the backing (which was just a full size orange sheet that I cut to the correct size for the quilt) on I actually put the backing face and the quilt face together, sewed around almost the entire edge and then flipped it inside out and closed it. Again, this was the first "real quilt" I made. So I didn't want to get overly elaborate and not have it ready for my dad.  I didn't use a binding (that outer edging around the quilt).

The cost wasn't too terrible either.

Bandanas-$1 a piece at Walmart
Batting-$12 at Wal-mart for a Full Sized Queen Quilt
Backing-$12 Full sized sheet.
Thread- $8 total (1 white for the quilting, 1 orange for attaching the backing)

(Sorry for it 1 not being the best quality picture and 2 for it being so wrinkled...shipping it home made it more than a little wrinkly.)

And a close up of the squares.

(Look at all that paisley!)

My dad LOVED it which made me beyond excited. I think it was a good way to start my quilting adventures and I definitely plan on continuing this trend! 

Coffee Nook Crafts

So for our anniversary my boyfriend bought me a Keurig (AMAZING!). I am a "drink coffee every single morning" type of girl.

SO I decided to convert a piece of furniture we had already in our tiny little living room into a coffee nook, since the cabinet was already near the kitchen I figured it was a good place to put everything. Especially since our kitchen is also tiny and pretty much filled to the max with kitchen supplies already.

Now, the actually conversion of the cabinet wasn't a big deal. It's an antique cabinet I found at a shop when I first moved down here. I had originally used it for a TV cabinet, it was perfect to store DVDs and supplies in. But, as I already mentioned, we've got a TINY kitchen...and I'm a girl who loves to cook & bake...so we were running out of storage space. We picked up a cheap black TV stand and moved the cabinet closer to the kitchen, it's currently filled with a crock pot, cast iron pan, waffle maker, ice cream maker, etc. When we first moved it I displayed all of my cookbooks on it. So the first step was finding space for them.

Next I just put the Keurig. Put a bowl full of K-Cups, a cute wooden & metal coffee sign that I had for awhile and a lamp. Ta-dah! We're done. Except something seemed off. There were photos hanging up on the wall that the cabinet was on...they were of a trip I took to New Orleans a few years ago. I just felt like they didn't flow well with the coffee set up. So I decided to get my crafting on and get started on the wall decor.

This was a pretty cheap project. I reused the frames that were holding my New Orleans pictures. They're just basic black (fake) marble frames. I picked them up at the dollar store forever ago. But here's what you'll need:

Black Frames (6 for $1 each at the Dollar Store)
Card Stock (cut to fit the frames: You can get a pack of card stock for about $6 at Walmart).
Yarn  (I already have a TON of yarn, but you can get a scan for about $3 at Walmart) I used 5 different colors for my project but you can scale it down to 3 for yours. You'll need a brown, coffee colored yarn, a gray yarn and whatever color(s) you'd like for the mugs.
Glue (I tried both Tacky Glue & Elmers Glue, I prefer the tacky glue-$3 at Walmart)

This project is really, really basic. And the only thing that takes some time is actually letting it dry. I sketched a basic outline of a coffee mug. Basically, a small circle, two straight lines coming down from the left most part and the right most part of the circle. A curved line to attach the two straight lines at the bottom. And a c to make a handle.

Next, I globbed a bunch of glue in the circle. I then started to place the yarn in a spiral to create the coffee inside the mug. Next I outlined the mug itself and then used both spiraling and some random patterns to fill in the mug. Think of it as painting with glue and yarn. :-)

After I filled in the sketch and I was satisfied with how the mugs look, I just waited for them to dry. A LONG time. About 2 nights worth. The yarn soaks up a lot of the glue, but also slowed down the drying process.

After they finally did dry, I put them in the frames and hung them on the wall.

Here are a few examples:

Now, this wall is really tall so I needed something else. When I first moved into my apartment I painted some large coffee mugs that used to hang above the couch. So I grabbed my favorite of the 2 coffee mug paintings and hung that as the centerpiece. Then hung three of my yarn art above and three below. I'm pretty happy with the outcome...and I really enjoy making my coffee in the morning. :-)

And the finished project:

 I love how cozy it makes our apartment feel and I love that I gave myself a bit more room in the kitchen not having the Keurig in there.

Hope you enjoy!