Gingercake

Goodbye May!

Last night I realized today would be the last day of my favorite month of the year.  May is fantastic in Western Pennsylvania.  Just beautiful!  I am feeling a little let down since I haven't been able to sew much lately but May is a hard month to stay inside and sew!  Here is has been happening this month...

Hopefully you can see that I made some changes to the website.  My awesome helper, Christian was in town and he helped me work some things out I have been wanting to do for a long time.  I do the designing and he makes it work!  Also, thank you to Vanessa for giving me some great tips to clean things up the looks of things here on the blog.  Good friends can give you a much needed fresh eye sometimes!

I joined a program in which I can choose my own sponsors for the blog.  Scroll down on the right to see them.  I love the program since I can choose who I want to have advertised and it can be part of my blog theme.  You have to be approved but it's a short process and I am looking forward to seeing how it's going to turn out!  There are tons of businesses to choose from.  Email me if you want more info on my experience so far!  

I wasted a bunch of energy on creating this silly turtle which I have now abandoned for other ideas temporarily.  Sometimes you just have to take a break when you can't get things quite right and you start to get too complicated your own good.  This turtle took up a week and I have only this oddly shaped thing to show for it!  If I pick it up again in a month or so I bet I'll figure out a way to make something better...

I have spending LOTS of time at my kids sports this month.  It's cute though and they like it.  I bring my chair and a blanket for the baby to play on and we watch all the fun of little kids playing soccer and baseball.  Not a bad way to spend your evenings and Saturdays!

I have other projects happening which I hope to share soon but this little gal is taking up A LOT of my time!  I refuse to complain though since she is one good baby and now that I am older and I know for sure this is my last one, I am really enjoying all her cuteness...

Sprucing up Your Wreath

I was decorating my outside wreath and realized I have not shared this on the blog before!  This is a super easy way to spruce up your old fake wreath to make it fresh and beautful.  I guess my camera is starting to have some issues so please forgive the little bit of blurriness :(

 

When we get our tree there is usually a pile of trimmed branches and I grab a few nice ones from different tree types- fraser firs, douglas firs, & white pines.  When I am ready to do my wreath, I get a few more textures from the yard- yews, boxwoods and if I still lived in the south I would be all over the magnolias!  In the past I have searched the woods for berries but this year it's all about simplifying and I think just the greens is still beautiful.

Then I have my garden gloves and clippers and I go to town snipping and layering!  I start the dark green background greens and shove them into the fake green- using the wired fakeys to hold them in if needed.  My little man helped me by chatting away and handing over branches.

Keep layering more greens until you have a full wreath.

I add the green "bling" at the end- boxwood and gold juniper.  Small pieces of those make a nice contrast. Stick a fluffy bow in there and you have an elegant wreath!  

See?  No sign at all of the fake underneath.  We had rain and snow last night too and it still looks great!  This work well for garland too.  I have done it on my bansiter many times.  What are your holiday decorating tricks?   Tell me some good tips!

Volunteer Sunflower and the Winner

We have a big volunteer sunflower growing in one of my garden beds.  All the seeds I planted were eaten by deer, but this one must have come from the bird feeder.  It is making all of us happy in our house with its sunny face.  Now it will make Stephanie Dott-Ginsmore happy!

Congratulations Stephanie!  You have won the Notebook Slipcover pattern!  Now for the rest of you friends- if you already bought this pattern and want the upgrade, go to my shop and use the coupon code NERDSRULE and you will get the pattern for 99% off!  This will only apply if you already purchased the old pattern (either on etsy or on bigcartel) since your email will be on file.  Only use it for the notebook slipcover since it will cancel out your other purchases.   This means you will only pay about $.04!  Awesome.  Email me with questions or problems.  

I loved hearing about all your school supply love- seems like we all love a new box of crayons, fun erasers and a fresh notebook!

 

Winners and Tomato Stakes

Thank you so much for all the comments on the new pattern makeovers!  I loved hearing what everyone is sewing too.  It was so fun to hear about all the handmade activity happening out there!  I used the True Random Number Generator and it gave me numbers 18, 8, & 28!  So the winners are these awesome readers...

The Love Your Lunch Box is next is a few weeks so you'll have a chance again soon!

Since I can't make a post ONLY about the winners, I decided to tell you all about my tomatoes!  Nothing too exciting but I have been trying a different method the last couple of years and wanted to share it with you all.  I used to always use cages with my tomato plants but now I have switched to stakes.

 This is the old timers method and I am liking it.  My favorite part is pinching off the suckers.  Do you know about the suckers?  You can train your tomato to grow up a stake only if you pinch off the shoot that grows between the main stalk and each leaf stem that comes off the main stalk.

Unfortunately I pinched all my suckers this morning so I couldn't show you one in action but above is what they look like AFTER you pinch them off.  It's so fun to stand up there in your garden early in the morning, look for suckers, pinch off and then have that wonderful tomato plant smell on your finger tips.  That sounds pretty wierd, but if you love growing tomatoes, you hear what I am saying, right?  When you grow with cages, you just have to wait until the fruits get red to start interacting with your tomatoes but with this method, you are doing something with them every week!  I love it.

I wasn't much of a student in science class but I do have 1 control tomato growing in a cage...

I know you all are on pins and needles waiting to see which plants will bear better fruit!  The cage one is a grape tomato though so maybe this experiment is already flawed???  We are growing lots of other things in the garden this year.  The deer have been brutal though!  Travis and the kids made a scarecrow for me.

Isn't it beautiful?  Especially his old hockey helmet in the crabbing net.  Awesome!  There is also a transistor radio playing in a plastic bag in the helmet.  The neighbor dogs are totally freaked out by this guy!  Another new addition last year was kholrabi which is super easy to grow and so yummy in salads right out of the garden.  It looks cool growing in your garden too.  

Does anyone else have new things growing in their garden?  

 

Spring Loverlies

SPRING!  We have had tons of rain but finally the sun is shining.  My sewing machine has been behaving badly the past couple of days and today I worked on my veg garden and got excited to grow some tomatoes and green beans.  I still have lots of manure to spread and seeds to plant though!  

The plants around the outside of the house are looking so pretty.  I decided to take some pictures and practice with my photoshop elements to sharpen them up.  Here are my spring loverlies for your viewing pleasure...

Don't you love that photoshop elements?!  Hope you are enjoying spring too.  The plants in the photos, in order, are daisy, chives, sweet woodruff, iris, ajuga, columbine, brunnera, peony, money plant, & kousa dogwood.  What do you have blooming?  

Climbing Fences

My husband has been putting up a split rail fence on our property.  A friend gave it to me a bunch when she replaced her fencing for her horses.  I told her we were having problems with deer in the garden and she thought maybe it would help.  What a wonderful gift!  It is so nicely aged and beautiful.

We may still use some for the garden, but this section just divides the mowed area from the higher grass.  The kids are really into the fence building- especially climbing it and hanging all over it.  It has been lots of fun evening activity.  Travis is not at all as amazed about this as me since he grew up in the country (unlike this suburban girl) and spent many hours climbing and sitting on fences as a kid.  When I mentioned this to him he said, "That's a big reason I am putting it up!  To see them play on it."  I see now that we are raising country kids, hmmm?

Above they are playing "horsey".  And below, the cat is joining in...

This last picture is for my mom, Linda, who loves peonies.  This is one is my newest addition...

We didn't have peonies down in Atlanta growing up- the summers are too hot and long.  My parents usually come up to visit in May and Mom gets to enjoy the blooms.  This year she can't come so this picture is for you Mom!  They are beautiful as usual and I'll pick a bouquet for you!

 

After School Spring Walk

I did do a bunny craft at Anne's preschool this week but the pictures are so dark that I couldn't bear to do a whole blog post devoted to them.  They are adorable but preschool lighting is not the best!  You can see them here.

The spring weather here in Western PA has been really rainy and it's been hard to get out and enjoy.  Yesterday we had rain in the morning but the sun came out by the time Elsie got home from school so the kids and I took a walk (Cal & I) / bike ride (girls) to the creek close by our house.

 We have lived at this house for about 15 months now and I didn't discover this walk until early last summer.   It is so beautiful by the creek and I thought I would share this with you all since you got all those city shots last time!

You can only see this waterfall in the early spring before all the leaves come in.  It is a pretty steep hill- how in the world did all those daffodils get there??

Anne has learned to ride without training wheels recently.  The girls had a great time riding over since it is slightly downhill.  They were not so positive on the way back since at one point I was carrying both bikes, my camera, and dragging Cal along behind me.

The wild flowers in the woods are just starting to bloom.  Bloodroot is all along the road on this walk.  Easy for pictures and I love how happy and bright it is among all the dark stick and leaves.

When we got off the road and went down the path to the creek I saw this flower which after a little research I realized it is just trout lily unopened.

and the trillium are just starting to bloom too!  These have always been my favorite.

We set the bikes aside and went down to the creek.  It was pretty cold but the kids wanted to put their feet in the water.  Isn't that part of being a kid?  Wanting to put your feet in the water no matter the temperature?

Can you see where all this water play is headed?  They all fell in, in chronological order of their age.  Just for you to know, each consented to having their picture taken...

and finally,  although it took awhile and she didn't cry about it until we got home and saw that she had a scrape on her knee, even the big girl fell in...

The falls in the freezing cold water didn't seem to bother anyone too much...

At the end I wanted to be in a picture too!  I set the camera on a timer on a rock and here is the picture that we got...

 HA!  I did take another that was centered but this one is so much better.  That's a whole lot of crazy curly hair and you can see how Cal chopped off his bangs.  Now, most mom's may rush over to the hair salon and get that look taken care of pronto, but I am just gonna let it roll for awhile cuz I think it's pretty funny still.  

I am hoping to make this walk many times this spring and summer.  It's only about 10 minutes away.  Sometimes we bring a picnic snack and have stick races in the "rapids".  In the summer, the kids and I wear our bathing suits.  I love not having to get in the car and not having to make a big plan.   

 

Forcing Spring

This time of year I try to find a forsythia bush and break off a bunch of branches (yes, I asked the owner of the bush!).  It used to be kinda tricky to find them but now I know what it looks like and I see it everywhere!  Once you bring it home, put it in a vase and in about 5 days you will have the picture on the right.  Pretty!

Growing up down south, we didn't give forsythia much credit since lots of plants looked beautiful in early spring, but up here in PA,  it is a welcome show of yellow before anything else is flowering.   It should be blooming in a couple weeks outside.  Next I think I will try a dogwood branch.

 

In other news, Amy just put up some kits to make crayon art folios in her fabric shop, PinkedFabrics.    Here is a peek of her beautiful combinations for the kit~

That girl always chooses the best fabric!!   Last week I bought a bunch of her fabrics and I am busy sewing away to get ready for my show.  I show you some pictures later this week so you can see all the prettiness for yourself.  Back to the machine...

217 Dresses! A Coupon Code and Other Ramblings...

Did you all see that 217 dresses were made for the Dress A Girl Around the world sew along?!!  That is awesome.  Although, there were a ton more dresses that I loved, here are a few of the beauties...

Dress #7 for Dress a Girl Around the World, 2. vintage flower pillowcase dress, 3. IMG_3721, 4. Pillowcase dress # 2, 5. Dress a Girl Around the World, 6. Dress-a-Girl #5, 7. Dress, 8. Last one!, 9. Reversible Pillowcase Dress" 

I just love the thought of 217 girls getting a dress.  Great job Vanessa!  The whole thing was so fun and I feel really fortunate to have been part of the planning and help.   As a big THANK YOU to all the friends who participated (or if you are still planning on making a dress!)  I made a coupon in my big cartel shop for 30% off all my patterns.  That means each pattern is only $4.20!   Enter the coupon code DRESSAGIRL to get the deal.  This will last for one week from today, March 17th to next Thursday, March 24th.

In other news, I am busy busy busy sewing up items for the Handmade arcade that I will be part of on April 16th.  

My sister is coming to help me!  I am not the best at "production" sewing so the seam ripper is seeing TONS of action which is pretty frustrating.  But, yesterday I made 20 of these and no seam ripping required!  

Outside my daffodils are coming up!  Remember this post?  This picture is my Happy Saint Patricks day contribution!

This is the time of year where I get pretty gung ho about gardening.  I am following my friend Kristi's posts about getting her seeds started.  If you are interested in starting seeds for your vegetable garden, this is an excellent series since it is down to earth and simple.  I have a bunch of perennials that I am going to divide and I was wondering if any of you would be interested in hearing about that kind of information?   I would think sewers are interested in flowers too, right??   Let me know! 

Lastly, my kids were wondering this morning where their St. Patricks day gifts were.  REALLY?  I guess you can't blame them for trying but seriously,  are people giving gifts to kids on St. Patricks day now?   Anne said, "you know, mom, just a bag of candy or something!"  Sometimes I feel like saying, "Every day you are a kid with me taking care of you is a gift!"  But I don't since they are actually pretty nice kids...

 

 

Orchids and Tape

Yesterday my sister in law Jenny and I went to the Phipps Conservatory together.  It was the annual orchid and bonsai show.  Usually when I meet up with her I don't bring my camera since I know she will have hers.  Her photos are magic!  Since she started a blog, I have realized that I SHOULD have been bringing my camera all this time and following along behind her.   She said orchids are a great subject since their shape of stacking behind each other make a nice composition.  Here are 2 of my pictures.

I used my 50mm lens which was a gift from my brother in law (my husband is one of SIX so i have lots of awesome in laws!) and in the AV setting.  It take the most beautiful photos!  I have a Cannon Rebel XT which is nice but the lowest and most affordable of the DSLR cameras.

In other news, I am working hard at the whole Photoshop Elements thing.  I downloaded these free tapes from PuglyPixel.  They may not have been the best thing to use with these orchid photos but since this post is about getting better at technical things, I thought it was fitting to use them.  Aren't they cute?  I also used the auto fix features in PSE to make my pictures more vivid.   Here are 2 more orchid shots from yesterday that are just from my usual IPhoto.  I made them brighter but not much else.  Still nice!

and lastly, these little people and Jenny's 3 kids were with us.   They wandered around happily with us.  We all enjoyed the green and warmth.   Hopefully I'll get some pictures of my own flowers in the next month or so!