jane's apron

buttons

Analise at sugar*sugar sent out a button challenge last week.  The challenge?  Show your buttons.  I can do that. 

I never "got" the vintage button thing. I just didn't know what I would use them for.  The first vintage buttons I ever had came from a giveaway from Analise...and now I "get" it.  I have a very, very small stash of buttons but they are so fun to use and look at.  Sorting through the buttons and arranging them for a picture is something that I could do all day long.  I limited myself to a cup of buttons and three button flowers.  And...when my family started asking "what's for dinner?" I answered with an "I've been busy"... 

soft chocolate chip cookies

Trying once again to take a picture of food.  But it's probably impossible to make chocolate chip cookie dough look bad. These are my new favorite cookie...soft chocolate chip cookies.  They are made with a touch of sour cream and they are like little chocolate chip cakes (loaded with both semisweet and milk chocolate).  The recipe is from Martha Stewart Living and you can find it here.  Try them this weekend...you probably have all of the ingredients. 

I hosted book club and a Pampered Chef party this week so I made lots of these cookies.  The Pampered Chef party was to partly benefit our upcoming school auction. I've never hosted a show before and am now "kind of" thinking about buying the Stainless Cookware Set.  Is this crazy?  Does anybody have any experience with the cookware?  Pros/Cons?

vintage va-va-voom

The interview I was telling everyone about with DIY Style is up and ready to see.  It is really hard for me to see and hear myself but I think they did a great job of showing my stuff and who I am (bad haircut and all...ack!).   

I have been lucky to find some great new vintage train cases and the next one I want to work on is shown briefly in the vodcast.  It's the coolest sparkly robin's egg blue color...perfect for a nice "spring-y" project.  I'm thinking of adding touches of red and orange...should be fun. 

The vodcast is here at DIY Style.

spinning

We are safely back...but my head is still spinning from that 18 hour thrill ride home from Orlando...

my new kitchen corner

I recently updated a little corner of my kitchen.  I have had the flower hooks since I was in high school...truly amazing for a girl that tires so easily of stuff.  They followed me to college, to my first apartment, to my daughter's room, and now my kitchen.   My Mom is always telling me that I need to display my aprons so I guess this counts. 

The teeny tiny book on the shelf is from EllynAnne Geisel and is called Apronisms - Pocket Wisdom for Every Day.  I have a couple of these cute books and picked up a few aprons with pockets at my thrift store...I feel a blog giveaway in the making.

a different kind of pattern

Part of my spring cleaning has been the crazy idea to use some of the stuff I have stashed in my craft cabinet.  I had cut the covers off a vintage sewing book and, while we were all home for a recent snow day, I made two wall hangings from them.

My usual sewing patterns just weren't working for me...I guess the real-ness of the book cover had something to do with it.  I decided instead to use a couple of photographs from one of my pattern books and then cut them to "fit" into the book cover.  I snapped the big eyelets in the book cover as usual but I think next time I'm going to try using buttons.

   

disney world

We are all off to the happiest place on earth.  Traveling the old school way...all of us in the 1997 minivan getting on each others last nerve.  But isn't that sometimes the fun part? 

I never look at the record section at my thrift store but this one caught my eye on half-off-day last month.  The old record covers are a fun size, sometimes have fun graphics...I'll think of something to do with it.   

I'll be using the automated posting feature and have scheduled a couple of posts to keep things interesting around here while I'm away. 

art

I have always wanted to have artwork at my house.  But, in reality, I just never had much access to really great artwork.  This has all changed with the discovery of so many creative blog friends and etsy. 

When Catherine at Red Shoes offered her amazing house paintings as prints I ran so fast to get my Visa card that I nearly fell on my face.  This print is perfect for "our house" too...there are 5 of us. 

On the etsy side, I know that everyone is probably familiar with Emily at The Black Apple.  I was so happy to get this print from her...

Finally, I found this print from Cathy Nichols.  I'm pretty sure I found her shop from someone that "hearted" my shop...just love how that whole thing works!  The title of the print is "where you go I follow".  It just plain makes me happy.

I will post a follow-up to this post to show my new artwork displayed in my house.  Soon...really (i.e. my husband is still "working" on cutting that dining room table mentioned here...sigh).

misc goodies

I've got a few misc. things to post about today...

I received this fun bunch of thrifty goodness from Barbara at oodles and oodles.  Barbara had a trivia question about Grant Wood's American Gothic...which I answered incorrectly.  I should be wrong more often.  Oodles and Oodles is my new favorite blog because Barbara is thrifty and funny...a perfect combination.  I'm currently following her daily posts of items bought for $1 or less.

If you look to the lower left of this page, you can see that I added a new section called "Things to try...".  It's a place for me to keep track of tutorials and other stuff that I might want to try (someday) but be sure to check it out for anything you'd like to try too.

About blog comments... I almost always reply to new readers but, for some reason, I was not getting all of the emails for comments and I know I have missed a few of you in the last few weeks...so sorry!   

Finally, I was tagged by Gabreial at Vintage Indie.  Vintage Indie is the best source for vintage goods at etsy and other places...I love it.  Things have been crazy busy around here (too many field trips, stressful brownie scout meetings, 6:30 am soccer games, computer problems, etc.) that I can sum up lots of random stuff about me in one example.  During our snow day last week, my cell phone was missing for about 24 hours...and was recovered the next day in a pile of snow across the street...I won't even begin to explain how that happened but will let it serve as an example of my daily, goofy, messy life.      

diy style

Today I'm going to send you to a fun place...but I'll be there too.  Last year, the creative group behind a locally produced sewing site saw my work at the Rock & Roll Craft Show and contacted me.  Was my train case still available?  Could they buy it to use as a sewing box for the studio set?  Could I make a clock for the set? 

DIY Style is a sewing site for young, hip, creative chicks (no matter what your age) and they offer sewing projects, tips, and vodcasts with all kinds of good stuff.  Their new season started this week and you will see my train case and clock featured in the vodcast.  And, while I'm not sure of the date, an upcoming vodcast will feature a little interview with me in my studio (i.e. my kitchen)...I'll let you know.  I know they also taped an episode at Mary Engelbreit's new studio right after they were at my house.  This is enough to make me hyperventilate...seriously.

DIY Style

new vodcast (the cute little dog bed!)

sewing kit

As I watch the vodcast, I probably should be looking at the sewing box but really I'm looking at the sewing machine.  How in the world does Allyce sew so fast?  Why doesn't her machine make the funny noise that mine makes?   Why doesn't her bobbin thread stop working and have to be fixed...every five minutes?  Why doesn't she look physically exhausted after sewing something?  I'm thinking I need a new sewing machine.  While you're at the site, join me and sign up for the sewing machine giveaway...a Babylock Creative Pro.