Little Baby Hat and a New Afghan

I guess I skipped the month of September, and almost the entire month of October. I haven't really been working on much besides Christmas presents though. Those always get posted after Christmas anyways.

But there is nothing like good news to make me want to post! Mr. Sir and I are expecting a baby! It is due around April 1st. I also joined a small community sewing group. Most people in there don't know how to sew at all so it is just basic sewing projects but still a lot of fun. So I sew with them along with my County Quilt Guild.

For the last community sewing meeting the theme was baby hats. So of course I jumped right on board to make my little baby a hat. No we don't know the sex of the baby. I just chose blue because it was on hand. If we happen to have a little girl, I will either hold on to it or give it as a gift to some adorable little baby boys I know.

 Then Mr. Sir and I went to the thrift store in search of a new nice hoodie for him to wear and ran across a couple of baby afghans. This green one below is really soft, made with high quality yarn and is a decent size. We got it for 2.50. I think about how much work went into making it and love it all over again. This was our official first purchase for baby. I was gonna try staying away from green because we are finding out the sex when it is born but I couldn't pass up the softness.

Happy Halloween!
Live and Love

Dilly Beans

I realized a couple of days ago that I haven't posted in almost a month! It has been quite crazy around here. I was trying to think of things that I have accomplished to post about, but it has been so busy that I haven't gotten much done around here.

So yesterday I took some green beans from our garden and made dilly beans. I love dilly beans with a passion, especially my mom and dad's dilly beans. I used a different recipe, I used the one from the Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving.

We aren't quite sure how they will turn out though, first of all the type of green beans we planted this year aren't very tasty. We are hoping that the taste improves with the pickling. Second, we didn't have any garlic cloves so we used minced garlic. Third, we also didn't have any dill seed heads so we used dried dill seed. Finally, our jars were just a little too empty so we filled the space with some onion.

So, hopefully they turn out okay. If they aren't any good then we aren't out too many ingredients.
Live and Love

A Home for my Shiny's.

I have this bad habit of taking my jewelry off and just tossing it on top of my dresser, or dropping it in a drawer.
Not only that, but I have a decent amount of jewelry. It helps having a mother who is a jewelry artist (www.quiltedinclay.com). I can't always wear jewelry due to some excema that flares pretty badly at times but I love having it available for when I CAN wear it.



Anyways I decided that I needed a good DIY project to organize my jewelry and I came up with this.

It is just a long rectangular box that my laptop cord came in, I painted it. Added some roses on top (left over from our wedding cake that I haven't found a use for yet, no they are not edible). I then screwed in a bunch of screws and glued a couple of pearl buttons on to cover a couple of blemishes. Tada! Easy peasy. I  made two holes in the back and hung it on the wall with a couple of nails. I put my hairpiece from our wedding onto the top of it, the long skinny red box on top has a pearl necklace that my oldest sister got me. If you can see the paper that I pinned behind it. It is a love letter that Mr.Sir wrote to me once when we were apart. I have it there to remind me of how good he is to me.






A lot of my necklaces consist of a chain and then a pendant, I had this storage container on hand and decided to put my pendants all in it underneath the chain hooks. That way I can pick out my chain and pendant without digging through the drawer.

Then I needed a place for my earrings. What I really wanted to do was take a embroidery hoop and put lace inside, but alas I had neither hoop or lace. So what did I come up with? Yogurt lids. We go through a lot of yogurt. So I took two lids, cut out the inside, painted them black and glued in some tulle. I finished two of them, but I think I am going to do two more to
spread out my earrings a little better. I also need a system for my bracelets.



Hope you enjoyed.
Live and Love

Urine.

Urine.

I know, attractive title right? Mr.Sir and I just adopted a new puppy. His name is Sherlock. He is only 5 months old and needs some training, which is to be expected. Of course, we are still learning what his 'gotta go, gotta go' cue is, resulting in 3 accidents. Two of those three accidents were on our bedroom carpet. Yikes.

We have had a urine problem with Luna too. She is a feisty Siamese and can be temperamental and decide that the couch, my old roommates bed (I am still sooo sorry about that!), or any soft spot on the floor makes for a good substitute for her litter box. So I had done plenty of research for pet urine removers, before the puppy. The best I found was Natures Miracle from the pet store. But at 8 dollars a bottle, it gets pricey and I am frugal, frugal, frugal. So one day, I was talking to my pastor's wife and she mentioned a mix that she used on her puppy piddle spots. I tested it on the kitty urine couch cushion and it worked!

Pet Stain Remover
- 3 tbsp Laundry Detergent, I use a homeade mix which is 1 box Borax, 1 box washing soda, 2 bars fels naptha soap. (I think I keep messing up and telling people 1 bar, but I am pretty sure I used two, just so all you family type people know) I got the recipe from Being Creative:To Keep My Sanity then I drop essential oils in it and shake it real good.
- 2 cups boiling water
- 2 cups white vinegar

I mix the laundry detergent into the boiling water until it is all dissolved, let it cool a bit and add the vinegar. I use an old olive oil bottle because it has a decent spout. The original recipe didn't have as much vinegar but I feel it is needed for the odor. *test the carpet/furniture first like with everything other foreign cleaning mix* then soak down the spot, let it sit just for a couple of minutes. I like to do some rubbing to get into all the crevices of the carpet then I step down on it to soak up as much as I can and let the rest air dry. It is so cheap that you can use a ton, like I did for my couch cushion, I made a HUGE bowl of it and just drenched the cushion, then I used the hose to rinse it all out.
Hope it helps!
Live and Love