• Blog - Creativity

    T Tuesday: full ♡ edition

    This past weekend was one that filled my heart. J came home on Wednesday night for the first time in 2.5 months. It was really great to have him at home again. He left again Sunday afternoon but Thanksgiving really isn’t that far away. 

    Then Mini-me and I shared a little treat together before heading off to the mall. We were both in search of shoes. While we were there I asked her if she wanted to go to Barnes & Noble to see if her magazine was on the shelf.

    It sure was! Her look of glee was priceless! She had already gotten her complementary copy but seeing it on the shelf makes it even more real. Here she is taking a photo to send to her friends. It’s so funny that the girl pictured along with Mini-me’s words happens to look A LOT like her from behind. Crazy coincidence since the publishers didn’t know what she looked like. 

    The magazine was featured as one of the Trending magazines on the newsstand. How cool is that!?! I’m so proud of her.

    I’m still plugging away at my new journal. I decided to gut the rest of these books since they really aren’t good for anything but fodder for other projects. 

    After removing the text block I go through and remove any images for future use. It seems the older the copy, the more images I like. 

    This book was just too pretty for me to gut yet. The cover makes me think of mid-century bark cloth. So pretty.

    I’m thinking about putting together a December Daily journal. Over the last few years I’ve noticed some posts and social media chatter about them but figured it wasn’t my thing. Now I’m thinking about giving it a whirl. Now that I’ve figured out the multi-picture prints on one print..(I’ll have to do a tutorial)…I think that I might be able to keep up with both words and photos throughout the season.

    Have you ever played along with December Daily?

  • Blog - Crafts - Creativity

    T Tuesday: this and that edition

    Once again I’m sitting at my keyboard wondering where the time went last week and what do I have to show for it.

    I have continued to use my personal handmade journal. It’s fun adding interesting bits to pages. I’m thinking I want to start another for old photos and memories of the kids. I have lots of random photos printed that would work perfect in that sort of journal.

    I’ve been browsing Pinterest looking for sewing projects. There is something about Fall weather that makes me want to sew. I came across some easy fabric coaster/mug rug projects that I decided to give a whirl since I had some squares pre-cut from a long forgotten project.

    This was the tutorial I used. Of course, I didn’t have the exact sizes but I figured it didn’t really matter. I turned out slightly larger than I would have wanted. Then I noticed some half square triangles in my stash. I had started making pinwheels and abandoned that project decades ago.

    They do make cute coasters though!! I’ll likely make more of these…at least as many as I can with the quilt pieces that are ready to go. Another prime example of not throwing anything away….it pays off.

    Volleyball still rules our evenings (and some weekends)…at least for another week or so. Like last week…two evening games, two practices, a parade and an early morning tournament… I cannot wait until Mini-me has her drivers license. 

    I’m not holding out much hope for a peaceful week. Tuesday morning Mini-me has a 7AM ortho appointment…ugh. I have picture day at school. I’m not banking on that being a great photo since I’ll have little to no time to get ready. Oh well.

    What are you doing today?
  • Blog - Creativity

    T Tuesday: journal edition

    I cannot even begin to tell you how many times I have thought about and even started a personal diary or journal only to abandon it within a week after basically forgetting about it after day 2.  I would either think I had nothing to say, be paranoid about someone stumbling across my inner thoughts or perhaps just was intimidated by the hundreds of stark white pages ahead of me.

    So l started actually using my newly created personal journal. I’ve discovered that it is much more inviting to write in than a blank page for me. I actually want to sit down to write. I even think during the day about remembering to write something down later. I’m rather excited about this new phase in my creative journey.

    Watching the growing community of Hobonichi users was very inspiring as well as generous journal folk who share their videos on YouTube. So many ideas to put to use. I feel as if I pulled together the things that will work for me from the plethora of information I’ve absorbed. That being said, its important to me that I am authentic in what I do…not just copy ideas verbatim. What fun is that!? Besides this is my personal journal…if I can’t be real on those pages, there is really little hope.

    I think I might do another video after a while to share some progress and interesting tidbits or techniques I’ve used in the journal.

    I did a little before school refashion for Mini-me last week as well. We’d picked up this sweater at Goodwill but she didn’t like the length it was on her…she’s very petite aka short. So she asked me if I could do something about it…15 mins before we left for school. What do you think?!

    Last week simply flew by. Volleyball games during the week, a tournament that both Mini-me and I worked at then a short trip to a small apple orchard with friends. I finally tried a couple of varieties of apples that were developed by the University of Minnesota; honey crisp and sweet tango. Both were so good! The orchard also had a few pear trees. I’ve never been a fan of pears but I took a slice when offered since it was the polite thing to do. I was actually surprised at the difference in taste than typical grocery store pears.

    Thank goodness we got some nice apples because I really need those. You know the old saying “an apple a day keeps the doctor away”… well, I am fighting a cold. I was hoping it was just allergies but I fear it is a cold. Those darn germ covered kids and surfaces at school. Just can’t seem to avoid it. So my beverage today is an immune boosting drink. Fingers crossed that it does the trick.

    Work and volleyball still dominate our schedule.

    What are you doing today?