The Grotto

An early morning visit to the grotto at my sister's house:

Activities of the Heart

Since I missed a Valentine Day post, I'll catch up today before February is completely gone!

My scarf obsession turned into Valentines...  My daughter spotted a handmade flannel infinity scarf that she liked so I decided to make them both one.  The pattern is really simple and these can be made in under an hour.   The flannel can be bulky, which she likes.  And boy they are warm, I'm not sure it's been cold enough to wear them!

Scarves ready to go in the mail.

I loved this painted heart tutorial so our littlest sweetie got her Valentine on a shirt.  This shirt is cuter with her in it!  ha ha!!

Heart shirt for the sweet granddaughter

My hubby got his Valentine on his plate.  I have been following Ms enPlace and can always find something that sounds really good and cajun-y on her site.   I chose her Blackened Bacon Shrimp and Cheesy Grits to serve my cajun-lovin' hubby.  This dish was SO good!

And lastly, I played with the camera trying to get some photos of the beautiful velvety red roses that I received.

Strings Orchestra Christmas Concert

Uh, my tree is still not decorated.   I just gotta have some Christmas music first!!!

My nephew plays violin in the Florence City Schools Strings Orchestra.   This is such a good program and I enjoy going to their concerts.  (Just overlook the awful photos as I was playing with my camera, should have left it on Auto!)

They display their talents and what they've learned in guitar ensembles, beginner, middle school, and high school string orchestra.  They add in piano and even electric guitar for some presentations.  You can't play Trans-Siberian Orchestra Christmas Eve/Sarajevo without an electric guitar, now can you?

Christmas Strings

Middle school strings orchestra

High School strings orchestra

 I think I forgot to breathe and you could have heard a pin drop when they played Mannheim Steamroller's version of Silent Night.

Partridge in a Pear Tree

And I laughed out loud as they acted out the 12 Days of Christmas!

High Cotton Barn

Grandaddy's barn this fall

Alabama, USA Linking with:

Family Veterans

A big thank you to all veterans and their families for their service and sacrifice for peace and humanity not just here in the U.S. but in the world.

My brother entered basic training in the early 80's.  He saw the world and is now retired from the Air Force.

And other family members, mostly great uncles and distant cousins.

Mummy

I live in one of those neighborhoods where kids come from all over to trick or treat.  It is safe for the kids but there are way too many trick or treaters!  I get a big bag of candy, pass it out and when it's gone, it's gone.  First come, first serve. 

Some trick or treaters are just more special than others.   These don't just get the usual candy from the big bag.  They get something intended just for them.

My sweet grandaughter is one of those special trick or treaters (and ok, I admit sometimes my college kids get special treats too!).  I probably won't see her on Halloween in her indian outfit so I gave her a treat beforehand.

I ran across this cute mummy idea.  It's a perfect treat for kids who aren't old enough yet for candy.  And, no, I don't want to be the first grandparent to give her candy!

The original project used white electrical tape, but I used cloth sports tape.  Aren't mummies wrapped in cloth?   It was a little wide, so I just tore it down the middle to make 2 strips.

Remove the straw from the juice box and wrap pieces of the tape around the juice box.  Leave the area where the straw goes uncovered.

Attach the wiggly eyes with glue.   Attach the straw to the back of the box with tape.  Cover the area where the straw goes with a piece of tape that can be lifted up.

Cute, huh?  I thought so!

Do you have special trick or treaters?

 

 

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Someday Crafts

Wow Us Wednesday at Savvy Southern Style



Little Miss Tutu

Little Miss Tutu ....

turned ONE last weekend... 

...what a par-tay it was!

This is our sweet grandaughter.  Yes, time goes by fast and yes, we can't believe she's one and yes, they grow up too fast!

My 80's Afghan and Crochet

My grandmother made this afghan for me back in the early 80's.   I had it on my couch last fall.  It kept my tootsies so warm!   It's been put away during the summer so the cats wouldn't destroy it (they love it too!) but it's time to get it out again.  

I chose the colors back then and 30 years later, this chevron pattern and these colors are back in style.  

My Mom taught me a basic chain crochet stitch, but it didn't turn into anything, not even a potholder!   She said her third grade teacher pulled a few of the girls aside during PE class and taught them to crochet.  She taught them to make granny squares.

This afghan inspired me to want to try it myself.  I also began meeting with some wonderful ladies at a prayer shawl ministry.  These ladies had been stitching for a while and have made beautiful afghans.  The first couple of times I attended, I had yet to make one stitch!  Ugh, why was starting so hard!

I thought starting out small was best.  Maybe a scarf, since I love scarves.  I had already pinned several to my board that I might try. 

I googled EASY and BEGINNER crochet patterns only to find that those terms are often misleading!  Any pattern where each row is a different stitch is not my definition of EASY and BEGINNER!  Some of these patterns look like software source code!  Ha ha!  I really wanted to do one stitch over and over again to make something useful.  Was I asking too much?  

Finally, I found it!   And figured out the "source code" too.  Here's the first one I made, in my favorite color, of course.  It's a wrap that just goes around your shoulders or across your lap.

While shopping in Michaels one day, I ran across some "baby yarn" on sale.  It was so soft and a fun delicious sherbet color. 

Yet it was another misleading thing...it was one of those "fun" "boucle" yarns they call them.  Not so fun for a beginner to learn with!



I finally did manage the boucle and now it's ready to bless a sweet baby!

Kerry

Diners, Drive-ins and Chris' Hot Dogs

I doubt if Guy and Triple D ever stopped here but we make a point to whenever we're in the area.  And it IS a dive! 
 

It's Chris' Hot Dogs in Montgomery, AL.  My husbands father brought him here when he was young.  And his father came here with his grandfather (does that make sense!?)   It's been in business for 95 years.

Basically there are 4 generations in his family that have eaten at Chris'.  My husband remembers that he would eat about 12 hot dogs.  His Dad gave him and his brother a sip of his beer when he was about 13!

Back in the day, the buns were homemade and the hot dogs were very tasty.  They are nothing special today, but the sauce is their own original recipe.  It's a good hot dog sauce, it's all you need on your hot dog!  Oh, and onion rings, do order onion rings.

He said that each booth had it's own tabletop jukebox, but they're no longer there.

Being just down the street from the capital building, this place could probably tell a story or two if the walls could talk!

Kind of a neat place to stop for lunch just to say you did.

 

Anthro or industrial? magnet board

Seems like these days, a lot of our pictures never make it off the computer.  They remain on the disk drive, cell phone, blogs, Facebook, Instagram, wherever.   So make sure you're backing up your computer or at least the My Pictures folder (or wherever you're storing yours)!

My daughters needed some place to display the Zapps pictures from the events they attended.   A nice big bulletin board or something like that to also add some decoration or interest to the almost bare walls of the house would be great!

I thought those cabinet doors from the Habitat Restore would be perfect for a magnet board for pictures.   There's not a lot of pictures of my DIY here, but hopefully you get the "picture" :).

Just give them a coat of primer first thing. 

Then I painted on the color that I want the trim to be.  The color gray is so popular now and I thought the college crowd would like it.  This is called Elephant Gray. 

Sheet metal can be found at Lowe's in a 2'x3' piece for less than $10.  I took it to a local sheet metal shop and they cut it to the sizes I needed.  The cuts were crisp with no crinkles or bends, nice!

The one on the right has the primer/trim painted.  The one on the left has the metal inside the frame, attached with Gorilla glue.

I sanded the edges of the frame to give them a distressed look.  With the gray color from the trim and the gray/silver sheet metal, it kind of has an industrial look which I wasn't crazy about. 

Adding a few smiling faces using some pretty magnets should perk these right up!

.
Unfortunately, when I'm visiting Tuscaloosa, I can never remember to take a picture of them hanging on the wall!

This year my neices have moved to T-town and I had one more cabinet door with sheet metal to fit.  So I finished it as a little house warming gift for them.

After the primer, I spray painted it with "cherry red".  Whoa, was it bright!   Now, I wasn't going for a "crimson" color here.   I'm sure if I wanted crimson, all I have to do is look on the shelves for that color.  And if crimson is not one of the color choices, they're definitely missing out on some sales!  This color was just too bright.

So I started trying to tone it down a bit and washed on some of the elephant gray. 

I took a damp cloth and dipped it in the gray paint and rubbed it on.   I kept dipping and rubbing and letting it dry until I was satisfied that it wasn't too "cherry".

For the magnets, I used some gems from Michael's.  Not the irredescent ones, they need to be clear.  Using Modge Podge, I attached decorative paper or scrapbook paper to the flat side of the gem.

I got a tip from one of my crafty friends about using an old magazine as a work surface for glue projects.  This works great if the project is smaller than the magazine page size.   When you're done, you just tear off that page and have a clean page to work on.

This works great for glue stick projects such as cardmaking or scrapbooking.  When using a glue stick, the glue WILL get off the card and then the card ends up sticking to the work surface.  So you constantly need a "clean" surface.  With a magazine as a work surface, you just flip to the next page to continue with the card or scrapbook project.

Anyway, that was my crafty tip for the day!  

Glue magnet discs to the back of the gems once the paper has dried.

The magnets are ready to go!

Now ready to hang on the wall, here's the cherry-gray-distressed version. 

Hopefully, it has a little more "Anthropologie" look than industrial!

Now just add pictures! 

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Camera Critters #228

PW Easy Calzones

I love calzones.  One of the reasons I love them is that someone other than me makes them!  Some things are just better when someone else makes it.  Do you know what I mean?   And I usually cringe at the thought of rolling out dough.  I have to be in a "rolling out dough" mood which isn't very often.  That's too bad as much as I love pizza and calzones.  It could be that I made pizzas at home when I was growing up and I just grew tired of it.  But one day, I plan to make a pizza crust from my childhood recipe...when I'm in a "rolling out dough" mood!

The day I planned to make PW Easy Calzones, I had an unexpected guest.  One that was very eager to make calzones with me!  Yay!  My nephew was looking forward to seeing his cousins come home for the weekend and he wanted to surprise them, so he spent the day at my house.  And like any typical teenager, he stayed up until 2 a.m. playing video games just like the college crew. 

Now for the calzones, I ... uh... he used a frozen bread loaf cut into smaller portions and pepperoni instead of sausage.

I measured the ingredients and he stirred them up.  This filling is really good (not raw, in the calzone!).

We laughed at the elongated dough.  He explained they are ellipse shape.  He likes science, can you tell?  When the dough wasn't cooperating, we agreed that some things are best done using your hands!

Oh, and we managed NOT to eat all the pepperoni beforehand.

Brush on the egg wash.

I would like them to be a tad browner, but I decided to take them out of the oven before the filling escaped through that crack.

We loved 'em!


Linking with Sweet As Pie Cooking Club