What would Martha do?

Young Martha, bossin' it up.

Gosh, I am so sporadic at this! I just realized that while I have posted 4 times in October, and 3 (I think) times in July, I posted nothing in between!

However, I am thinking about re-thinking my strategy. You see, currently, my interests are willy-nilly. Whatever I am making at the moment, I post. But, if I took the Martha Approach, I would have much more structure.

Martha Stewart is kind-of my hero. (Heroine? Also, searching for the word heroine in google to make sure you are spelling it right automatically brings up tons of articles on the drug and rehab services.) She is business savvy and can make pretty much anything. She's the real-life MacGyver. She's my inspiration for wanting to share my projects with you, so I feel like this site should to more to be like her. Again, the Martha Approach.

I thought about renaming the whole thing "The Modern Martha," but Martha IS modern. That's part of her charm, she never goes out of style because she MAKES trends (and, conversely, she shows you how to make (craft) trends).

So, maybe I'll do a little house-cleaning and organizing. (Yes, I am aware this is the part where Martha would say "It's a good thing," but from anyone else, it doesn't sound the same.)

Halloweener! PT 2 (and other great costumes)

A gaggle of Sailors in 2007 (I'm third from the left, and my little sis is 4th)

Halloween's almost over, and while I DID go out (dressed as Audrey Hepburn aka Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany's), I didn't get ANY photos! TERRIBLE!

I believe I will have to dress in the whole outfit again, and take some photos to post. Ugh, but the hair! I had my Mom tease it into a beehive-like thing. It was a total mess! At the end of the night, when I took out my bobby-pins, my hair just sat there, not moving. And I was worried that it might fall down!

So, since I've totally failed this year at producing photos of the costume, here are a couple more year's past. Look, I know what you are thinking, "Today IS Halloween dummy, just dress up tonight!" But tonight is the Saints v. Steelers game, and I have been counting down the weeks until it is cool enough out to wear my Saints sweatshirt! Wait, I did wear that last week...

As Ursula, for the place I was working at the time, the Grove Park Inn's Employee Costume contest. A pirate won.

As Lady Liberty, with my sister (Hulk Hogan) and friend Sara (as a troll)

Halloweener!

HALLOWEEN! HALLOWEEN!

It's here!

And I'm in a tizzy! Today is October 28, and due to my lack of luck in the job department, I have spent very little on decorations. Did I say little? I meant NOTHING. Not even a freakin' pumpkin. BAHHH. So, to prevent Halloween sadness, I am going to relive various costume ideas over the next couple posts. Who knows, maybe even the creative stroke of genius will strike and I'll have a little Halloween Miracle! (I kind of have a cheapy idea already!)

So, lets start with 2004

.

This is the best picture I have of this costume, but that year, I was a plumber. I made a pretty cute little plumber, if I do say so myself. Then, I topped off it all off with a cute lil plunger and plumber's butt. It's harder than you would think to show a little bit of butt crack without being excessive.

In 2005...

My sis (the one in the middle picture with me) talked myself and our friend Janie into being carrots. I was skeptical, but joined in by making our little green carrot tops. The whole thing turned out fantastic, and we spent the night looking for a rabbit to complete the whole scene. We finally found one at the very end of the night, after the bars shut down and kicked everyone out. We pretty much bombarded him, and I think he might have actually been more than a little startled. Gosh, I wish I would find the picture we got of that moment.

A few rando's

A Sweet Little Box

and an Embroidered and Scented Neck Pillow

This little box is made to hold just about anything, and as an added bonus, soaks up some of those scraps you've been saving for... well who knows what we save those for? This, I guess. It was quite easy, and was modeled after a box

This should be pretty self-explanatory. First, measure out your fabric using the top of the box, and get an idea of what you want the finished box to look like. I grabbed some fabric glue from AC Moore (be sure you get clear!), and glued one end of the first strip to the box, starting on the end that I glued, and moving across. The glue holds pretty quickly, so you only need to press the fabric for about 5 seconds to get the placement you want. The whole box top was done simply ruffling the fabric and gluing. Self-explanatory, right? Don't over complicate it, and this project can be a quick and easy way to get a cute little box!

Above is my sweet little honey modeling the lavender and flax seed filled neck pillow I made. First, I made the pattern. Then, I cut out a top and bottom piece, as well as mulsin liners. This is the point you would embroider your monogram, if you so choose. I used water-soluble Stabilizer to keep my embroidering nice and neat. When finished, I went ahead and disolved the Stabilizer. You won't want to stick the finished pillow in the washer, pup.

Stitch all of the pieces together, just like a pillow, leaving a small opening for the filling. Your stack of fabric should be stacked like this:

muslin

wrong side up of outer fabric

right side up of outer fabric (So rights sides of the outer fabric facing)

muslin

Pull the ends through the whole to make the pillow right side out.

Then, I mixed lavender and flax seeds together, and filled the pillow until it was full, but still flexible in the middle. If you over stuff, it will be stiff. I sewed up the muslin liner first, and then carefully stitched the outer pieces together.

Enjoy! (Heating up this in the microwave, or sticking it in the fridge for a while makes it extra delightful. Remember to put it in a plastic bag either way, so that it doesn't soak up the smells of the fridge/micro.)

Stencils!

You may already know about my love for stencils, but here are a few simple projects I completed around March. The first are slip-covers for my donated (Thanks sis!) couch's hideous pillows. I still want to buy a slip cover for the whole couch, but just haven't gotten to it.

Before (on the right) and after (on the left)

The couch's new look.

I bought white denim from the fabric store, measured out the size of the pillow, and marked the width on the selvage. Then, I simply tore the fabric at the marks. I wanted the edges to be clean of stray paint, so I cut the front piece of fabric out, stenciled it, and spray painted it. The whole pattern was made with this one simple shape cut out of contact paper.

After they were dry, I sewed them to the back, which I made as a simple envelope opening to slip the pillow in and out.

The other project I mentioned was to make note cards for correspondence. So, I created a stencil that I thought would look nice and sponged paint over it (see picture at the bottom of this post) onto brown shopping bags cut into flat pieces. Using an exacto knife, I measured the size I wanted and sliced the whole thing up. Ta-da!

Below is the labor of love that went into making that stencil.

Atlanta, Here I Come!

I'm moving! After spending just about all of my 23 years (wait, is it 24? Ugh! Life is passing me by!) in WNC, I'll be rolling up and moving out! Honestly, I love this place. I am fairly positive I'll return. But Asheville is not friendly to the entry-level job seeker (that is, unless you are willing to work for free). I suppose the job market is difficult anywhere, but there aren't even any jobs here to apply for.

Like I said, Atlanta, here I come!

Now to just find a job and the world' most perfect apartment...

PS- Just got into Hero's. Had no clue... feeling like I am going to lose a lot of time to it...

Summer Gardenias Necklace

This little beauty was inspired by this gorgeous Anthropologie necklace. I made one for my sister's birthday back in December, just in time for her to take it to St. Thomas. (Ok, I didn't get it to her on time, it ended up being a late b-day gift!)

When I saw this one in Anthropologie for $228 originally, I got inspired to make my own. I ran across Maegan's version (of ...Love Maegan fame... my Fav site!) a couple of months ago, and the idea's been sitting on my brain since. So, here's how I did it...!

First, get your supplies together.

I used:

1. Flowers of your choice. I used two types of gardenias

2. Needle and thread

3. Fabric for the base of the necklace

4. Rope or ribbon for the necklace, and a rope or ribbon to tie the necklace together.

Next, cut all of the flowers from their stalks, and cut their stems as close to the base of the flower as possible.

Then, stitch the flowers together at their bases to make sure the petals don't fall off.

For good measure, take the next few seconds to arrange the flowers the way you want to wear them on the necklace. Move the arrangement to the side except the one you want to start with, and hold it in place on the fabric as you stitch it on. Repeat for each flower, placing it and stitching it, until you finish.

Next, cut excess fabric off, shaping the piece. Then, stitch around the edges of the fabric, creating a loop at both ends.

Loop the rope back on itself to hold it in place just above the necklace. Stitch in place, and wrap thread around stitches to hide them. Cut the rope at the top of the necklace, where it lays on the neck, and make the same same loops, stitch in place and wrap the thread around the stitches.

Run your ribbon through the loops at the back of the necklace, and tie.

Enjoy!

SAINTS!!! shirt

So other than being a total ass for the Superbowl, I also made this shirt with a matching bow. Here's how you can do it:

1. ƒirst, rustle yourself up a sweatshirt or t-shirt you want to paint on. I got lucky, and found this black one for $1 on sale at the Rugged Warehouse, but I assume a Goodwill will do you just as well. American Apparel shirts are great for this purpose.

2. Make a stencil. I found the Saints logo's I used by simply typing in "Saints logo" on Google.

For example:

I printed it out, and traced it onto a thicker paper. An old paper shopping bag would do the trick nicely if you haven't happened to have an internship where your only job is to pass our fliers, and you got bored after 75 or so and hid the last 25 at home. Here are my stencils:

In this picture, they've already been painted on.

3. Lay out your sweatshirt and pin your stencils down flat. This works best if you have a piece of cardboard and pushpins. Just pin the design right through the shirt onto the cardboard. I wanted the fuzzy effect, so I didn't really pin it down at all. Your image will be more crisp if you do though. Anyway! Go to work with spray paint. Make sure you have covered all of the edges of your stencil so as not to get any stray marks on your shirt. Again, I was not very careful about this. The spray paint won't stay forever, but it lasts through a year or so's worth of washes, and it works. You could always use t-shirt paint and a roller to accomplish this step. Whatever floats your boat. I'm an instant gratification kind of gal, so the spray paint gets my engine going.

4. Trim the shirt. cut out the neck, off the sleeves. Heck, make it a crop-top if you so desire. I probably woudn't have cut the sleeves, but they were kind of funny and tight at the wrists. I'm not knocking my shirt though, those fussy sleeves are probs the reason the shirt was on clearance for a $1 anyway. Put on your shirt. Love it.

Here's my finished product:

Also, notice the headband? I'm a freak for bows right now. Yes, the kind you wore when you were a kid. Somehow, they are a lot easier for me to keep on my head now then when I was a kid. I sprayed a ribbon of the appropriate size and length with the gold spray I used on the shirt. It was a little stiff, but it did the trick: accessorized my hair to match my shirt. Job well done, ribbon bow.

SAINTS!!!

So! The Saints won the Superbowl! I know, I know, this happened 2 days ago, and is technically old news. However, I was atrociously ashamed yesterday about my Superbowl behavior, and didn't really want to get out of bed, let alone blog about how happy/proud I was. I went to a party with a bunch of people who weren't fans of either team, and were there just to watch. I knew it was a mistake, but I should have guessed that bringing the Cruzan 151 that mysteriously popped up at our house would be a mistake as well.

At one point, my beau leaned over and happily said, "I think people are drinking the rum!" It sat on our shelf for so long that we weren't sure if it would ever see it's life's purpose of getting people drunk/buzzed acheived. Looking back on it, I think Dan was mistaken. I think that it was me who drank all that rum. Anyway, I'm glad that those people aren't my friends. They wouldn't want to ever have anything to do with me and football again.

Also, I had a terrible terrible nightmare that stemmed from me trying to train my dog not to get on the couch. I used a pillow to shoo her off because I heard somewhere that you should never use your hands to do anything but pet a dog. I felt so guilty about it because honestly, I didn't hit her with the pillow, but she seemed so out of sorts about being shooed by a big neon yellow pillow that she was more terrified than the time I beat the couch up to prove to my dog that she didn't need to associate with it. Anyway, the dog's still on the couch, and I have pretty much given up because of the dream. In the dream, my shooing guilt surfaced in me making a joke in really poor taste to my cousin about spanking my dog to teach her, and I got a blast of hate mail. When I woke up, I was so scared that it happened in my guilt/Superbowl 151 stupor that I searched everywhere to make sure it hadn't. Thankfully, it hasn't/didn't/will never happen. My pup is my baby, and is totally spoiled rotten. I mean, I make her food from scratch. I won't even cut up raw chicken and cook it to feed my boyfriend, sooo....

This is Gela as a puppy.

Amazingly broke after a ridiculous adventure to the Amazing Race

About two weeks ago, I was thinking about how The Bachelor is the craziest show out there because the contestants and bachelor talk about marriage so freely. I mean, surely some of them have seen any VH1 ...of love show out there. Most of the time the person looking for love isn't even with the person they pick by the time the entire season has aired. From that thought, I had a whole stream of consciousness that eventually lead me to looking up The Amazing Race casting calls. Surely enough, they were right in the middle of casting, but the closest call was in Yonkers NY, which is totally far away. Not knowing you could simply video yourself and send that in, I convinced Lauren to make the journey with me.

We thought we could do it on about $60 each. Plus, my Mom through in $50 to make it happen. We got to Raleigh (4 hours) and realized that we didn't have a video to submit (and thought that it was mandatory). We got to Richmond (8 hours?) and realized that our funds were going much more quickly than anticipated. We got to Reston VA where we were going to stay for the night (10 hours) and realized that we were much hungrier than the can of tomato soup we brought and thought we could live off of for dinner that night.

The next morning, I saw a crazy crash on the road. I hope those people are ok. We had a fight about an hour outside of NY, and tried to turn around but thought we were lost. By the time I felt that we should just pull off and try to get a free wireless signal, New York NY was outside of our window. It completely crept up on me. I figured that we had several hours to wait in line, and hopefully we could pull it together.

The day went totally up from there. Our linemates, Victoria and her hubby Stephen, were totally adorable, and indulged us in all of our silly jokes. They also offered us fries like, 100 times in the span of 2 minutes which was super nice. Then we met these two middle-aged twins who claimed that on their application, the famous person they both thought they were most like was Bill Cosby, so we called them the Cosby twins. Also, the casino that the auditions were in gave us $10 each! Turns out that that doesn't really translate into real money. They only paid us $2. Then, we stopped at a bagel shop, which gave us a free bagel and mini-cheesecake. Aweesssommme!

The ride home started at 4 pm and ended at 6 am. And, a snowstorm started and lasted the last 6 hours. It was hateful.

We're hoping that our Southern charm gets us on, cross your fingers!

Also, I had a job interview, and it went really fingers! Double cross your fingers!

xoxo!

I have a job interview! After much persistence (I applied, then stopped by, then called, then called again) I am going in tomorrow for an interview as a Merchandising Specialist! College Degree in action! I want to get into fashion, PR or events planning, so this job is on the course to my dream life!

I am feeling on top of the world! I'm going to try to finish working on the headboard I started making what seems like ages ago, and maybe even find some yarn to make a big chunky throw and matching pillows with. (I got the idea from this badass throw, and think I will try to accomplish the goal on the 10 hour drive to audition for the AMAZING RACE!!!) My bedroom will be transformed soon, hopefully! I've been on this kick lately where I have all of these ideas, but haven't brought any to fruition because Dan and I are going to move in the next six months. For example: I don't want to make a new kitchen table out of salvaged wood because we are moving, and it will be a pain to move. Or, I don't want to buy this book about stenciling walls called Stencil 101 Decor by Ed Roth which looks AWESOME because I don't want to paint the walls back white in 3 months. UGHH!

I also made these dog treats from my fav homegirl Martha last night! They were so adorable, and I think my pup loves them. So, I am going to try and bribe her into learning some manners with them today. I also have plans to got to Columbia, SC to visit my little sister Cynthia for the Superbowl, and will take some that I made in the shape of a chicken to her beau. Maybe I'll take the pig. I thought I had a heart shaped cookie cutter, but no such luck.

Snow Days and Dog Food

This is my blog! It is also my New Year's Resolution. No, I don't try to loose 5 pounds, or give up chocolate (or even liquor, like my sis) because I like to stick to things I can accomplish. One year, I vowed to learn to fly a plane and play the guitar. I didn't do either. But a blog, I can handle. Look at me go, I'm already accomplishing something!

My goal here is mostly to post the projects/crafts I work on. Rarely will I tell you about my personal life, and even more rarely will I tell you about my personal beliefs. But, as you will learn, I will probably talk about my personal life all of the time. For example, my sister Lauren and I are trying out for the Amazing Race! That will be happening this Thursday. Also, I learned to make dog food today. Unfortunately, I was out of the other food, and wasn't able to transition Gela to the new stuff. So far, I haven't noticed any indigestion....

Well well. It is late, and this is my first post, so I don't want to get over ambitious. Also, my Lovie is getting grumpy and sleepy and wants to spoon. However, tomorrow I have the Dog food recipe and pictures. Also, I plan on making some dog toys tomorrow because I'm kinda obsessed. However, this is by no means a blog about my dog. I like sewing and crafting in general, so there will be all kinds of projects. Maybe I'll make a snowman tomorrow. Sike.

The Saints are going to the Superbowl. Dream come true.

Oh! P.S.-Yes, I spell poorly and have semi-decent grammar. I'm willing to work on it if you're willing to give me a chance.