2009 Lessons Learned

2009 was a little bit of a tough year. By deciding not to go back to work, I cut our annual income almost by half. The adjustment to that has been tremendous.

With that change has come a few lessons I have learned. I would like to share some resources I have found and even some people who's story I have found very moving.


Lesson 1 - Saving Money
Not using coupons is throwing away money. It takes a little bit of time, but the savings can really add up. When you combine a coupon with a store sale, you can get stuff for pennies or free. I like to buy the sunday paper every week and then I use the sites below as well.

Load coupons onto your store rewards cards:
http://www.shortcuts.com/
http://www.cellfire.com/
http://www.pgsaver.com/

Print coupons:
http://www.redplum.com/
http://www.smartsource.com/
http://www.coupons.com/

Product sites that give coupons:
http://www.bettycrocker.com/
http://www.gerber.com/
http://www.target.com/
http://www.kroger.com/
http://www.eatbetteramerica.com/


Lesson 2 - Staying Busy
I am not a fan of house work, so I like to find other things to do. I enjoy paper crafts and teaching myself to sew.

http://www.oneprettything.com/ has all kinds of craft ideas from kids to adults, from knitting to gift ideas
http://www.hp.com/hho/hp_create/ HP creative site for picture crafts and more
http://cp.c-ij.com/en/ Canon creative park has all kids of paper crafts
http://www.craftjr.com/ lots of ideas for kids
http://www.familyfun.go.com/ a great place disney crafts and recipe ideas



Lesson 3 - TV for free
Not live TV, but a great place to catch up on some shows.

http://www.hulu.com/


Lesson 4 - Pray for Others
We all have hard times, we all have our own difficulties, we all have our moments of doubt. I really believe that prayers are a powerful thing. I cannot tell you exactly how I came to find these blogs, but I did. These are a couple of the people I pray for that I have never met. Their stories have really touched me.

http://givehopetobensonandclaire.blogspot.com/
http://kendraandryanwebster.blogspot.com/



I hope 2010 has even more lessons to teach me.

Toy House

My little bunny is still in diapers. We buy the large pack of diapers and wipes since we will use them, and it saves some money. The empty boxes are extremely useful for packing up toys or other items to be put out in the garage until we have a garage sale or a donation drive comes by.


Today my 1 1/2 year old and I where playing tickle with a stuffed dog. We had an empty box of huggies wipes sitting on the floor and it dawned on me. "This would be a really cute dog house."

Of course, I did not take a single picture as I was making it. When I showed it to my husband he actually liked it. My son, 3 1/2 years old, really liked it. He wanted to put ALL his stuffed animals in it. This lead me to make a house out of the box of diapers. I did take some pictures of making this, but I got lazy and began using tape instead of rubber cement.

I will upload some pics tomorrow so that I can explain the process.

 

This is the small dog house made out of the wipes box. As you can see, I cut out some windows on the side. I used plain printer paper, so the details of the box bleed through. If you use a heavy stock, this would not be a problem.

TUTORIAL:

supplies-

empty box

printer paper or heavy stock

glue (rubber cement works great and dries fast) or tape

scissors or exacto knife

I did not want to be picture intensive, since the process is simple.

I cut off the small lid flaps first. Then I enlarged the opening on the side all the way to the bottom to make a door.

I folded the small lid flaps and attached them to the large flaps left to make the shape of the roof. As you can see, the top part of the sides are left open. From this point I just began adding paper onto the box. Rubber cement works great. I used tape on this box because I was being lazy.

You can leave the top portion of the sides open if you would like so that the kids can see in and play with the inside. (My son insisted I cover them.) There is also a space left on the roof that can be uncovered to allow you to see in.

To cover the front I simply folded the corners of a piece of paper under the sheet for the roof and tucked the rest back into the "house."

My son put about 9 stuffed animals and toys into the large box.

Enjoy,

Furniture Re-do

With the holidays, I had to clear off my dinning room table of my sewing stuff. Recently I purchased a desk on craigslist for $15. I have been been in the process of redoing the desk. I was almost finished sanding  when I realized that I need to sand the inside (where your legs go) of the desk as well.
I have only been able to work on it a couple of hours every few days. Having two little ones does not make this easy work. I would let my daughter play outside while I work, but the weather has gotten cold. I was hoping to have the desk finished by the new year...oh well, maybe I can finish before the end of January. The reality is that I want my garadge back. I hate having to park in the driveway.
I did find out a couple of interesting things about the desk since I got it. The brand was sold by Sears from 1940 to the early 1960s. The hardware of the desk is brass; solid and tarnished.



So here is a picture of my desk before:

Learning from a Pattern

I am teaching myself to sew, using a pattern now. I was working on making a little "smock" (for lack of a better term) for my little bit. I was working with a couple of patterns provided free online, but they where not sized like I needed them to be. In order to save the material I had, I was using fleece. Let me just say that crafting with fleece is AWSOME. You can cut it and not have to worry about finishing. Also, I got the fleece by buying a blanket from Walmart for $4.

My mother came over one day while little bit was running around with a fleece invention on. She told me to just go get a pattern. FINE. Never having used one before, I jumped right in. Well, I had to resew the seams a couple of times as I adjusted the size and length. In the end, I got what I wanted. I even sewed buttonholes. (Picture to come later.)

To top this off, I have been decorating for Christmas. We have the tree set up in the big living room, but our fire place is in the den. This makes decorating, easily, a whole house affair. Well, not this year. My 1 1/2 year old is Miss Distructo!! She keeps taking the decorations off the tree. Pulling on anything that hangs. Overall, making this year a "minimalist" decoration year. I love to put the cards we receive on the wall and made a couple of paper trees to decorate. (Picture to come...and if wanted, pattern as well.)

Here is the patten I made. I place the paper on the back side of my scrapbooking paper that is folded in half. The pattern should be 11 inches tall. I cut out three trees. I am not sure if you can tell from the picture, but two trees only have one side glued while the last tree is glued to the other two. I also shrunk the pattern so that it was only 5 inches tall, cut out four trees and glued all of them together so that it stands on a table top.

Finally, I purchased a desk from craigslist for $15. I cannot keep taking up our dining room table to sew. The desk is in a bad way. I need to sand and paint. I hope to get started this Saturday. I really would love to get it into our room before the end of the year.

Like always, I have some picture to upload of things I have done and a list of "to do" as long as ever. Updates on these to come as I find the time to upload the pics. Uploaded pictures on 12/22/09.

Too Cute Not to Try

I am steadily working on my sewing. I finished converting a 3-6 month dress into a cute skirt for my 18 month old. I made it up as I went, so it by no way looks "professional." Considering her shirts are long enough to cover the top, it looks really cute. I may have to post a picture.

Last year I made my son one of those fleece blankets that require no sewing, but a lot of knots. I have the fleece to make my daughter one as well. This will be the project for next weekend; especially since the fleece has been in my house for a year now.

I have found that fleece is wonderful. You can cut it and do not really have to finish the edges. It will not fray. With that in mind, I came accross this blog: Mad Quilter. She states that the pattern she is providing is for 6 month olds. Well, my 18 month old is pettite. She had a doctor's appointment last week and is now up to the shocking weight of 20 lbs 5 oz. With that said, I make the smock out of a red fleece blanket I purchased at Wal Mart on sale for $4.00. It looks so cute. I have to take a picture...like always... I am considering making a second one as a christmas present for a friend. Now to find out how to adjust a pattern to a larger size. Got to love the internet!! :)

TO DO LIST

I posted my TO DO LIST in October. Let me just update it:

1. Finish the flower mobile for my little girl's room.
2. Transform 4 onsies into t-shirts. (I hate the snaps on the bottom.)
3. Transform a couple of dresses into skirts.
4. Make pair of baby jeans from some of mine that ripped.
5. Finish 4 sets of baby leggings.
6. Do wall art for my baby girl's room.
7. Finish some hair bows. I have more I am making, but did get the ones I wanted done.
8. Edit and upload pictures to Walgreens to print. Also never ending, but got caught up.
9. Scan high school and jr high pictures.
10. Get the wireless router to work. (HATE working on this problem.)
 
YAY!!!! Not bad at all. I should post a list of "projects" I would like to try. That one might actually be really interesting. Maybe another day.
 
As for now, I will enjoy my almost completed list.

Serious Sewing

Yesterday I finished a sewing project I started a few weeks ago. I found a great pattern for a purse at this blog: Artsy-crafty babe.

What is true of all people who have been sewing for a while...and know what they are doing...they make everything seem easy. Such is the case with this bag. I thought, sure I can do that. Well, I can, but it does not look as good as hers.

I am very proud of myself for starting and finishing a project I found challenging. I did not give up or decide to do something else. (I did leave off doing the "darts" on the bag...but maybe next time.) When I look at my finished project, I can see all the flaws. But then again, I guess that's what makes it truly mine. One more thing, it actually has pockets on the inside; on both sides. I did foget to add those before I put the lining together, but then again, what fun would it have been if I had done it the easy way. (I thought of something after I posted this: Maybe if I had picked a different fabric, not stripes, this would have easier. I spent so much time making sure the stripes matched up and where centered.)