Apron Ooops....

So I made a mistake. I made an apron for my younger sisters daughter. Then my oldest sisters daughter found out and she wanted one. In my defense I didn't know that she baked. When we spoke last I asked about if she helped with Christmas dinner and she said no.
So I made to make another. I have changed the top of this apron but the bottom is the same. I also added the initials to the pocket. All of the fabric has sparkle in it except for the green but I like the combo. I hope that she likes it.
If not maybe the Red Velvet cupcake mix will help smooth over my faux pas.

Bum Cushions

I spotted these cushions in last years summer issue of Traditional Home Magazine. I thought it was a good idea and filed the image away in the back of my mind. They look custom and fit the square stools very well. They stood out to me because you always see individual cushions for chairs but not so much for different shape bar/counter stools.

Ytina mention that she liked the saddle seat stools that she has in her eat in kitchen but they hurt when you sat in them too long. I remembered the photo above and went hunting in my magazine pile to send her the photo. She liked the idea and let me know that she wanted black and white fabric. One day while in Fabric store I saw this print in another woman's arms and sent her a pick of it. The fabric was $8.00 per yard and the pad and filling should run you about $20 for four seats.(but you have to use your 40% off coupon)

Here is the completed seat. I added solid black trim to the edge. I find edges of things seem to get dirty first and I thought that black would hide that better. They don't look so great on my red stools. Ytinas are black so it will go much better. If you don't like the look of the tied stays on the seats you can always add rug sip material under the cushion. Also a cut up yoga mat will serve as a great substitute. learned that from Patty at Triangle Pilates ( no one wants to fall off the reformer or a stool.)

Here's to happy bottoms!

The Race season is on.....

Here we are again at the beginning of another race season. Kit started his this morning at the Krispy Kreme Challange along with Becky, Tim and Greg and a few other friends we met up with downtown. The temperature was 36 the entire time. I was freezing and don't get me started with the constant rain.
With all my complaining you would think that I was running. I think its worse as a spectator. Its hard to keep warm just standing there waiting to take photos.

I only saw 3 guys tossing there doughnuts back up. I get sick just thinking about it. Becky said that she was not eating them at all. Kit ate all of his but he says he still hates them and wont ever touch them again. He is now on his bike riding off the gut he swears he can feel coming on from the 2000 calories he just consumed.

I will do my first race for this year next month Tobacco Road 13.1. I'm not expecting it to be great because I haven't been well lately. But I will do it just the same. I really hope it doesn't rain.

The almost there Kitchen

When we moved into this house there were a few appliances missing. We bought a fridge and a microwave. The microwave on the counter was taking up to much real estate. We decided that we would get stainless with plans in the future to switch out the white ones. That has not happened yet.
I did manage to give the cabinets a face lift. There was really nothing wrong with them other than the normal wear and tear of 10 years also I just didn't like the color. So I sanded them down and used a gel stain to get them to the new color. The thing with builder grade cabinets is that they cover the cabinet ends and most of the island with particle board and you cant stain that. The solution was to replace it with wood wainscoting and stain it to match the cabinets.

Two days before Christmas we said goodbye to the blue Formica counter tops. The Granite was installed by Absolute Stone at a really great price. If you click on the top pic you can see that the Formica has chunks missing from it on the sides. It wont be missed!


A friend suggested Best Tile when I mentioned that I was looking for subway tile. The travertine I found was 3.99 sf. Other places I priced it was a lot more $$. I installed the backslash after the holidays it took about 3 days working 5 hours a day. They make it seem so easy on TV but I guess they skip the prep time and the clean up. I also installed lights under the cabinets. (They are hard to see in the picture because the overhead light is so bright) I'm please with the look so far. All there is left to do is the floor and get rid of the white.
Trim may be needed the bottom of the top cabinets so that the light fixtures are not so visible.

The island stools may be blending in a little to well so I may have to change them to black. What do you think?

THE DOG DID IT!

This is Friday's great great grandmothers chair. The chair is over 100 years old and has some great detail work on the back. Why is it sitting in my garage you ask? At some point in its history a very naughty dog got to it and I'm going to give it a little TLC for her.

One of the arms had a whole ripped in the fabric. The arm below was ripped off and it looks like it became a chew toy.

Here you can see some of the details of the chair and the old fabric that got pulled away. I had to rebuild and cover the arm that was chewed with an oak veneer. I hated to do it but it was missing to much structure and that was the only way to get it re attached to the back of the chair.

If you click on the first picture to enlarge it you can see that a fair amount of wood looks worn and discolored. I went over the chair and footstool with Danish oil. The oil had a walnut tint to it and that helped to bring the chair it a more even color. It will also protect help protect the wood as it is drying out in some spots.

Friday's year has not started off so great (understatement)and I am glad that I have finished it in time for it to give her a little smile....

Blanket's

I feel like I have been sprinting the past couple of weeks and now I'm wondering where the time has gone. Don't get me wrong I'm glad for the new year, for my sake and a few people that had a worse set of circumstances than my own.
I have managed to complete a chair for a friend recently. We also had the new counter tops installed 2 days before Christmas. I also got around to re-staining the kitchen cabinets and finished installing the new back splash yesterday. I also managed to squeeze out a couple of cakes in my misplaced kitchen. I'll post photos on all that soon.

The thing that I completed that I wished I had more time for was Felicia's baby Cayden's play blanket. It was hard to make time for it with all of my running around. My seams were not the best and a little crooked. On the way to the shower I realized that I paced the fabric tag on the corner but I didn't add the handmade stamp. (Felicia, just in case you are wondering what the little blue tag in the corner is.)
I had more time last year when I made this one for Jamie and her ladybugs. I had no crazy going on then. I miss that....

However I do like the clean lines of Cadyden's. I have to confess I'm not crazy over the traditional quilt patterns. Remember the one I made for myself was just 2 shades of blue in micro suede. It has come in handy with this real winter that North Carolina has decide that we needed.

I guess I can make it up to Felicia. All she has to do is have another baby and I can redeem myself.

The Grandparents

Kit's grandparents always send us great gifts for Christmas. The gifts usually come with handmade ornaments that his grandfather carved. When it comes to what we will get from them it's usually a struggle to decide. What do you get for a couple that seem to have the things what they want. We decided that handmade for handmade might work. I couldn't go with the apron and pot holder thing because I did that the year before. So we decided on my last tangible talent.

I'm a little rusty. I haven't picked up graphite in a while and my lack of practice shows. Kit seemed to think that it was turning out fine.( probably because he didn't have to do anything but provide prospective.)

The frame made it to Minnesota just fine and the grandparents liked it. Now we have about 11 months before we rack our brains on the next gift.