One for me, and one for you.

My Swap partner for Hot-Drinks-for-Hot-Mamas has received her apron, so here are some photos of it... :)

I'm pretty proud of it since it's my first apron, and my first completed embroidery project... oh, and my first pleated ruffles. :) {which took forever!}

Sherrie's favorite color is purple, but I couldn't find any fabric I liked. After visiting her blog here, I found out she liked Primitive dolls. So I decided to go with that theme.

I made it double sided cause I found this Christmas fabric that worked perfectly with the Primitive/Country style.

Close up of the embroidered pocket


With the apron, I included a couple of treats:


A few of my favorite recipes


Some hand made cards

Peanuts hot chocolate :: Peppermint Patty Candy Cane and Charlie Brown Vanilla Cocoa
A square of hazelnut filled chocolate and some fun beanie magnets.


I'm glad she liked it. :)

Apron!

Yayyy!! I got my Hot-Drinks-For-Hot-Mamas swap package! I gotta admit, I've been keeping an eye on the mailbox all week! I love packages!!!
{with excitement comes many exclamation marks!!}

I was partnered with Emily at The Dabbler and she did an awesome job! I love my bright orange apron and everything else she included in there.

Everything was packaged so pretty. The apron was wrapped in the tissue with the pretty brown ribbon.
{disclaimer: because the orange of the fabric was so bright, it's kinda hard to capture in photos without it coming out kinda wonky}

And here I am modeling it. :) I really like it.
(not sure what's going on with my hair though)

Closeup of the awesome pocket and top detail. Very cool.

Closeup of the design on the fabric. The little dots are kinda metallic.

Other awesome items in the package:

Cute little card made with matching fabric scraps.

Bellagio Gourmet Mocha... YUMMM! ;)

A Caramel Apple making kit... fully stocked with little sticks and chocolate sprinkles!! How cool is that! I was wanting to make some caramel apples too! :)

An Organic Autumn Spice orange candle. Smells yummy.
It's my first organic item. We've been trying to reuse, reduce and recycle more and more.

I love everything in my package, thank you so much to Emily!! You did an awesome job, I'm so glad you enjoyed putting it together, cause I enjoyed receiving it!! :)

And a big thank you to Val at Yarni Gras! for all her hard work. :)

My partner's apron will be blogged about soon... ;)

Don't you love packages? What's the funnest package you've received lately?

B.

Blogging By Mail Swap

My Blogging by Mail Swap buddy Marisa at July Bug received her package, so I can finally blog about it. : )


I'm so excited that she liked everything!

Here's what I got her:

The bigger package top left has a package of colorful happy birthday candles and some of my favorite recipes from my stash.
A liquid measuring conversions guide magnet for easy recipe reference.

The flower is a fabric pin I made, there's hazelnut cream filled chocolate in dice-like wrappers, other hazelnut chocolate assortment, all wrapped up in a fun spiderweb baggie with a hand stamped tag.

A Good Earth sweet and spicy tea blend... I'm not a big tea drinker, but this stuff is AWESOME! it's tough to see, but there's Jolly Rancher Cherry flavored chapstick. I can't live without chapstick.

Some of my newly discovered favorite artists.

A collection of hand made/stamped cards (see previous post here for closeups). She got the Friends card, the Yellow Birthday card, the Brown and Blue Birthday card, and the Happy Holidays card.

Last but not least, a small notebook that I personalized by stamping her name on some coordinating pretty/shiny metallic paper and antique-ing the cover to look more weathered. and some cool monster pencils.

Since hubby and I are both unemployed right now the budget was really tight but I had fun making small things fun and creative. Most items were only a couple of bucks but stuff that most people enjoy.

:)

I'm so glad she liked everything.

This was so much fun, thank you so much Stephanie for putting this together. Can't wait for next time.

Lots and lots of photos...

I love rainy days... I love the gray overcast sky, the cool chilly air, and how crisp and clean the rain makes the weather... everything seems a little sharper and brighter...

This was from a few days ago...

(click on photos to see a larger size, then click on your back button to return here)

I got some static cling window decorations from the $1 bin at Target... there's some orange and yellow fall leaves and at the top some black bats...

Our driveway...

Our neighbor's and our yard... I love the sharp colors.

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Well, rainy days make for crafty times (and hot chocolate)... I made a bunch of cards to give away to my swap partners...


Happy Birthday Card 1
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Happy Birthday Card 2
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Happy Birthday Card 3
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Friends Card
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Happy Holidays Card
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Love Card
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Tri-Fold Card 1
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Tri-Fold Card 2
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Please excuse the not-so-sharp-or-great pictures... between the 'baby' camera and the low lighting, the conditions weren't so great. :/ But it was fun to get back into making cards.

More to come...
B.

Ruffled Skirt!

I was inspired by Grand Revival Designs' Ruffled Skirts to finally make one of my own. I know... they're for girls... but they were just so cute!! and so fun! And I bought some super cute fabric that worked perfectly!! I love it. :D

I have only completed one item of clothing since I first started sewing in my Home Economics class in high school... and that was a dress for my prom! ... quite a long time ago! (and I had a lot of help from the teacher)

So, I was very excited to actually finish an item of clothing by myself. I followed Tonya's tutorial here, with a few adjustments to make it fit of course... and here it is:

Some new pretty fabrics combined with some I already had -






This is the first top layer... I forgot to take photos before I started



Second layer...






And modeled by yours truly... :D (please ignore the mess in the background)



Twirling is so instinctive in this skirt!! lol.



Close up of all the layers... can you see the details with the piping. I thought it added a little something extra



also another first: zipper! that was a little tough cause of all the layers... I didn't want the layers to lay flat and make the zipper show too much... so I had to get creative... which meant that the zipper wasn't the prettiest. but it works.





Hope you enjoyed... If you want to give it a try, head over to the tutorial - it's VERY easy... just a bunch of rectangles sewn together. She even uses elastic, so there's no zippers to sew, couldn't be easier! I have many more garments that I've started and have yet to finish... but am hoping to get back to them soon. Especially once we finish painting and putting together the Craft Room. :D yayy.

B.