Scrapbooking again

When I packed up all my scrapbook supplies to make room for Vivian I never thought it would be almost 4 years before I would do any scrapbooking.  Since I am a very organized person and like to have everything in a specific place having everything in a box prevented me from doing anything.  I hated searching through the boxes starting a project, realizing I needed something or wanting a specific item then not knowing where it was made me decide I didn't like scrapping that way.  I then set up a place in the office that was once a garage.  I didn't like it there either.  Although all the boxes were within reach, I didn't like that I couldn't see everything.  I still had to search for stuff.  When I finally found new homes for all the baby and toddler toys that were taking up the family room. I decided I was going to turn Vivian's play area into my area.  No where in the house was just for me.  There is no room in my bedroom for my desk so this was my only option.  Another plus to having it in the family room I must keep it organized and clean since I would be looking at it everyday and so would anyone that walked into our house.  Now I have an area and I posted the picture a few weeks ago.  It has evolved a little since the picture but not much.  I have added 2 lights, small desktop organizer and my Cricut is now sitting on the desk.

After many years of not scrapbooking, I have spent the last two weeks completing a book.  It took me a little bit to get started and to figure out what I wanted the book to look like.  I am very happy with it. I will post pictures.  Just not now.  I have to show someone the book first and I want to get her reaction.

To help get me back into scrapbooking I found a great online community to help get my creativity going.  It is www.twopeasinabucket.com  Of course I just lurk mostly, but seeing how much the trade has changed in the last 4 years makes me nervous to post anything or share my work.  I see a lot of great inspiration, but I also see a lot of layouts that make me wish I had an ounce of their creativity.  There are so many great looking pages.  I posted a few pages I did, but after seeing their work I wanted to remove mine.  My work looks so plan compared to their work.  I also see things that I think are over the top and would never do.  I do love seeing how people put things together whether it is my style or not.  There is also so many more products now.  Some things I have  are "out of date", but I will still use them until they are all gone.

I decided 2012 would be the year of mini projects.  My goal was 75.  So far I have completed 10 projects.  I think that is pretty good considering I didn't start any projects until mid-January.  Eight weeks into the year and 10 projects.  I think I will reach my goal of 75 projects.  I made a list but I only had 27 projects.  I knew through out the year I would new ideas and projects to do.  I will add them to my list as I see, think about or find them.  Now onto another project......What I am not sure yet.

Yes I used my KitchenAid for that

I saw a blog a few months ago about other uses for a KitchenAid mixer.  One thing I would have never thought of doing was using it to shred chicken.  I had the opportunity to test it out when I made chicken enchiladas.  The one thing that I dislike about making them is shredding the chicken.  I always use boneless chicken.  I boiled my chicken breasts like normal when they were done I tossed them into the mixing bowl attached the paddle and turned on the mixer.  Less than a minute later I had restaurant style shredded chicken.  I will never shred chicken by hand again.

A Week Later....

My goal at least 1 project a week....Well I really haven't been working on a project since the dress unless you think organizing, buying, more organizing of my scrapbook stuff a project then I have been very busy. I am getting supplies ready for 2 books I am going to start working on.  I have also dusted off my cricut and have figured out how to connected it to my Mac.  This alone took a couple of days since the software is only available on PC.  I had to buy a program to allow me to use PC based programs.  After getting that all setup I realized why I wasn't too upset when I got laid off.  I no longer enjoy computer support.  If I can't stand doing it for my self how can I enjoy doing it for someone else.  That made me decide I need to do some soul searching and decide what I would not like but love and enjoy to do.  I really wish I could find a job doing craft stuff but their are very few jobs that would allow me to do that.  Until then I will continue to do what ever I want to do and enjoy my kids.

My plans for this week include prepping the garden.  I have taken down the greenhouse I built over the 2 raised beds.  Now it is just time to get them cleaned up, refilled since the dirt has settled and start planting.  The dogs have decided they like laying in the garden so I need to find a new higher fence to go around the garden.  Looks like I will be making a trip to home depot to see what they have either pre-built garden fencing, but I have a feeling I will be making something since I am cheap.

Now what project is next on my list except for the Garden....I did return to Joann's and buy the fabric I used for Vivian's dress to make a quilt.  They had all but one of the coordinating patterns.  Of course my luck it is only available online.  Now I am trying to see what else I need from there so I may be able to get free shipping.  I found this really cute idea on Pinterest and I think this may be the next project since it will take an afternoon to do 3 of them.  It is a birth announcement type picture.

Framed Birth Announcement

Time to Make a Dress

A few weeks ago I saw a picture of a cute peasant dress and decided Vivian needed one.  After searching for a pattern, finding several and getting one from a friend, I decided on one.  The next step finding the perfect fabric.  Of course this is alway the hard part for me.  I can never find the "right" fabric.  Now fabrics have either very bright colors or geometric designs I can't stand.  I always go to the store with a color in mind but never a pattern.  This time I wanted a soft color with a more vintage look.  I love vintage patterns.  I found the perfect pattern with a coordinating pattern.  It is a quilting fabric.  I fell in love with it but still looked through out the store, but could not find anything else I liked.  Fabric normally has the designer and pattern line on the selvage but this one just says design exclusively for Joann Fabrics.  I was thinking of making a quilt out of this fabric line.  That is how much I love it.  After searching Joann's website I finally found the name of the pattern line and I am pretty sure I will make a quilt with it .  I just need to figure out what size quilt I want to make and how much of each pattern I need.  The fabric is Legacy Studio Fabric Bobbish - http://www.joann.com/search/_legacy_studio_fabric_bobbish

The dress was pretty easy to make and it took about an hour to cut and sew.  I did this while Vivian was at school.  I had to wait until she was him to complete it since I wanted to make sure the neck and length were correct.  I made the dress about 1-2" longer than the pattern.  I wanted her to be able to wear it longer and she is A LOT taller than most 3 year olds.  Most people don't believe me when I say she is 3 because of her height.  I am so happy with the dress and it fits Vivian great.  I need to get a picture of her in the dress.  Until then here is the dress.  Isn't it adorable.

Wanted to try an appliqué

I was going to make a dress for Vivian and I still plan on doing it this week, but I wanted to try an appliqué.  The Slice I recently purchased will also cut fabric.  Vivian has been asking for a butterfly shirt.  The appliqué design card has a few butterfly patterns.  I decided I would try an appliqué.  How hard could it be?  We picked a shirt and then I picked some coordinating fabric from my ever growing fabric stash.  I really need to stop buying fabric and fat quarters until I use what I have.

Cutting the fabric was a lot easier than I thought it would be.  First I had to put fusible web on the fabric.  Then I cut a shadow of a butterfly and then the butterfly.  Once that was done I ironed it onto the fabric and then did a blanket stitch around both pieces.  Much easier than I thought it would be.  Very happy with my first appliqué.

What Do You Do with Banana Peppers

My banana pepper plant has been the most successful plant in my garden.  It has been producing lots of peppers since April.  Yes April and it is January.  I picked a bunch more this week and there are about 15 baby peppers growing now.  They will be ready in a couple of weeks.  I have pickled them once before and was very pleased with the outcome.  I decided I would go ahead and try it again but this time I had so many more peppers.  The last time I found a recipe for one jar.  This time I decided I wanted a sweeter pickled pepper.  I used a combination of the first recipe and the new recipe I found.

First attempt I used the recipe posted here - http://jessicasfoodspot.blogspot.com/2009/07/so-you-grew-gardennow-what-5.html

This time I used the first one and this one - http://www.food.com/recipe/sweet-pickled-banana-peppers-17254

Here are my ingredients

1/2 lb Banana Peppers
4 cups white vinegar
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tsp mustard seed
1 tsp celery seed
1 tsp pepper corns

Directions

First sterilize your jars.  Since I was cutting some peppers and leaving some peppers whole, I used 2 different sized jars.  I ran the jars and rings through the hot water cycle in my dishwasher.  Once the cycle is done, remove the jars and dry them

In a saucepan bring the vinegar, sugar, mustard seed, celery seed and pepper corns to a rolling boil.  Remove from heat.  In a large pan bring plain water to a boil.

While the brine is coming to a boil, prepare the peppers for canning.  I cut 3/4 of them into rings and removed the seeds.  The remaining 1/4 of peppers I cut off the stem and removed the seeds.  Fill the jars with the peppers.

Pour the brine over the pepper, leaving 1/2 inch space at the top.  (Note: I filled the jars completely to use all the brine.  Once the canning was done there is a space of about 1/2 inch at the bottom of the jar as you can see in the picture of my completed jars.  I did the same thing the first time and forgot.)  Place the lid and screw on a ring.  Place the jars in the boiling water and boil for 10 minutes.  Remove the jars from the water and allow to cool.  After a few minutes check the jars to make sure they sealed.  This is simple to do.  If the jar is not sealed the lidd with pop up and down.  If it did not seal then it must be stored in the refrigerator.  If it did seal they can be kept in the pantry until the seal is broken.

Some recipes say let the peppers sit for a few days and some say a couple of weeks.  I say you decide.  I have done both and the peppers are great after just a few days if you can't wait to eat them.

Making Menu Planning Easier

I have become obsessed with Pinterest.  I spend so much time on the site.  I have found so many great things on there.  I have done a few and added a ton to my list of things I want to do one day.  Recently I came across a menu board that I absolutely love made by Clair at http://clairsfairytale.blogspot.com/.  I am guessing I am not the only one that loved the board that she did two follow-up posts on her blog.  I loved the board so much that I made one.  First I had to figure out what we eat regularly and also things we eat occasionally.  My goal was to come up with 30 days of meals.  I then had to write down what was needed for each meal.  Once that was done I printed the meals and lamented each one.  I have several crockpot meals I love to cook and sometimes I just find a crockpot meal I think we will like.  I decided to just have one card for the crockpot.  Periodically I like to try new recipes.  I made one card that says New Recipe.  I am very happy with my completed board.  I have decided I will make it a family event to plan the weekly menu.  The older kids will each get to select 2 meals for the week and then I will select the other 3.  Hopefully this will make things easier since they say I never ask what they want to eat.

Now here is my completed board and a sample of the menu cards.  My cards are very simple and only list the main items.  On the front is the menu and the back is the ingredients needed.  Some nights we also have rolls and salad with the meal but I felt there was no reason to have this on the cards.

Pretty easy to see that is the card for baked chicken and the back of the card for Hamburgers with Fries or Chips.  Of course with hamburgers I do add other ingredients tot he meat but they are main staples I always have on hand.  I didn't list any ingredients that I always have in the pantry. 

I have several scrapbook kits since I am a member of a monthly kit club.  That made this project so much easier since everything is already coordinated.  I used my Slice Elite and Bon Appetit Design Card for the designs on the pockets and the word menu.  Now that I am looking at the picture I may pop open the frame and move the word Menu over an inch or so to the right to make it look centered between the cards and the frame edge.

Here is the direct link to the board - http://clairsfairytale.blogspot.com/2012/01/ultimate-menu-board.html

Now onto my next project - a peasant dress for Vivian.