Quick, before I get Sidetrack'd

I write a lot of funny things that the kids say and do, but don’t often tell funny stories on myself. I could claim that it is because I don’t do anything embarrassing, funny, or to make a fool of myself, but I would just be deluding myself if I believed it.

Several weeks ago I decided that I wanted to make something handmade for my new nephew. After contemplating a few different ideas I decided to make a plaque with his name and a sweet quote on it. I gathered all the supplies (and my best friend, Lindsey, the decoupage queen) to accomplish the job and we set to work.

One of the supplies I had on hand was a new bottle of all-purpose roll-on glue sold under the name of a certain lady who is famous for her homemaking, cooking, and crafting skills. When it came time to glue the paper onto the plaque I started to open the glue.

I took the lid and the roller parts off and was trying to figure out how to break the inner seal. I squeezed the bottle a bit and bam! the inner seal popped out of the bottle and hit me smack between the eyes!

All Lindsey and I could do was laugh. There was glue everywhere! All over my face, my arms, my shirt, my pants, the table, the chair, every surface within a few inch radius of the glue bottle.

And that was just the beginning of the disaster plaque making experience.

Over the past few years I’ve considered taking up several new hobbies. The most notable were quilting and sewing both of which resulted in my giving up and selling all of the related items (mainly due to my inability to stay focused on any one thing for a considerable length of time. There is a reason this blog is titled sidetrack’d). I’ve also dabbled in paper crafts (card making, etc) and, lately, a bit in decoupage. I enjoy both of these, but to do them on a regular basis just requires more creativity than I’m generally able to eke out.

That brings us to the latest in the long line…knitting. For quite some time now I’ve contemplated learning to knit, but I just haven’t made the effort to find a class or a book to help me get started. I enjoy needlework (counted cross-stitch, embroidery, etc – basically things that involved counting stitches and a pattern), so I think knitting would be a good fit. And, I would be able to knit cute little hats and sweaters and things for my girls which would be a definite plus (Little just isn’t all that into cross-stitched things :-)).

So, I’m off to seek out some instruction to get me started.

In honor of Boo’s birthday, my first attempt at cake decorating.

This post is quite laden with pictures.  I apologize if it takes a while to load. 

Wow, we got quite a bit done this week (especially over the weekend)! I think I actually accomplished everything I intended to plus a few extras.

The big tackles for this week were Boo’s room, getting baby things from the attic, and finishing the burp cloth sewing project I started.

Let’s start with Boo’s room…

This is what the room looked like when we moved in two years ago:

During the two years we’ve lived here it has been used primarily for storage. When we found out we were expecting there were boxes piled everywhere, the closet was filled with miscellaneous stuff, and it was generally a pretty scary place (especially if you were looking for something specific). Over the last couple of months we’ve been hard at work cleaning out, decluttering (although we still have some to do), painting, and making it a bedroom again.

This weekend, Matt hung new closet doors, we moved the rest of the nursery furniture out of Little’s room and into Boo’s, and we put his shelf with his name letters on the wall. Over the last week I also got his clothes, the bedding, and all of the covers for carseat, swing, etc washed and dried.

Today it looks like this:

The burp cloth project…

Please do not look too closely at the pictures. I am a beginner teaching myself to sew, and this is my first start-to-finish completed project. I’m proud of the fact that I actually finished a project for once even though it is certainly far from perfect, and I’m pleased with the way the fabric/ribbon combinations turned out. When I got frustrated Matt kept reminding me that this was something that Boo was going to throw up on; he certainly won’t care if all the seams are perfect and the stitching straight.

I also finished my Spring cleaning and the cleaning I needed to do before company, wrote all of my Thank You’s (for birthday and baby gifts), and got my birth plan into my chart at the doctor’s office.

Up next – packing the hospital bag and installing the carseat. Nothing too strenuous this week, but definitely things that are important.

Good luck with your tackles!

I’ve mentioned before that I am not a crafty type of person. I would love to be able to sew, make pretty cards, smock dresses, etc. Some of these things I could probably figure out and do acceptably well if I would just take the time. However, my crafting tends to go as follows…

Little is having her 9-month pictures made today. She is going to wear either a white dress, a blue outfit, or a green dress. A while back I managed to lose both of her white hair bows. Because she has fine, baby hair the “alligator” clip type of barrettes work best; they are also the easiest to get in her hair.

I’m having trouble finding the clips at a price I’m willing to pay, so I decided to make some myself. We have some Gymboree clips that I like because both sides of the metal clip are covered with ribbon. The ribbon is sewn together at the sides to make a little pockets into which each side of clip slips. I set out a couple of weeks ago to round up the supplies and, finally, this week got everything together. Yesterday, when I got ready to make the first clip (a white one to wear for pictures today), I realized that the ribbon I have is too narrow to cover the clip and have room to sew a seam. What to do?

My options were to find wider ribbon or resort to gluing the ribbon in place. I was unable to quickly and efficiently locate wider ribbon yesterday afternoon. I bought a hot glue gun.

This morning around 4:30 (don’t ask why I was up; I really don’t know) I glued white ribbon onto a clip. It doesn’t exactly look professionally crafted, but it will definitely work for pictures!