Things to Try Thursday-Travel Purse

I went out of town last weekend and needed a little purse to take with me.  A purse to hold the bare essentials.  I knew I would be at a place that I didn't want to haul around and keep up with a lot of stuff.  I turned to a great tutorial over at Susie's Country Garden. 

She came up with a great, and easy, tutorial. 

Here is the purse that I made! 

It turned out to be perfect!!  The long strap was perfect to drape around my body and keep the purse on my hip so I could keep track of my stuff.  The pocket in the back was great for holding my camera. 

I want to make a couple more of these purses for my Mom and her friend when we go to the flea market this fall.

Happy Sewing!

What I Wore

This week has been a fun and exciting week for me.  I spent half of the week up in Wisconsin visiting friends.

On Thursday I took Mr. E to school and then proceeded to drive 9 hours to Milwaulkee, WI.  After having a wonderful dinner my friends and I headed to the Milwaulkee Irish Festival.  We listened to some good Irish music, and a little bit of some Celctic Rock...the Red Hot Chilli Pippers.  They are GREAT!!

Top: I made
Jeans: Levis from Goodwill

On Friday I went to a cute little town called Cedarburg, WI and did some shopping.  The town is filled with tons of cute shops ranging from arts and crafts to vintage jewlery.  My friend and I stopped in this great candy store and snacked on some chocolate covered raspberries before heading home.  That night we went back to Irish Fest to listen to some Irish/Celtic bands.  Our plans were waylayed once we became completely soaked!!  While we were listening to the Young Dubliners when a monsune hit the lake front and we all got completely soaked.  I don't think I could have been any wetter if I had taken a real shower with my clothes on...this was a crazy rain storm!!  After driving 45 minutes back to my friends house and picking up some supper on the way we discovered they had no power.  We had a fun evening playing Phase 10 and giving my friend a hard time for beating her husband and me.

Top: I made
Capris: I made from a pair of Old Navy pants I bought at Goodwill

Saturday we went back for a full day of Irish Fest. I was a pleasant day and we had a lot of fun walking around and watching the sites.  We were able to watch some of the tug of war tournament...I never knew it was such a serious sport.  These teams had special boots, coaches, and all...the Irish really get into their sports!

Top:  I made
Capris: from Kohl's

Sunday I woke up and drove home.  It was a little quicker trip home since I didn't have much traffic to go through in Chicago.  I was excited to see my kiddos when I picked them up at my parents house,  they weren't so excited to see me. 

Top:  Banana Republic
Jeans: Levis from Goodwill

Monday I spent the day doing laundry and catching up on stuff around the house.

Top: given to me by a friend
Shorts: Old Navy

Tuesday I took Mr. E to school came home and got the hubby and we joined a gym!!  I am so excited...they have all kinds of fun excercise classes...well as fun as excercise can really be.

Top: from Target
Shorts: Adidas from TJMaxx

What's Cookin' Wednesday-Crunch Bars

My Grandmother made these little bits of deliciousness a while back and was generous enough to share not only the bars, but the recipe too. 

If you are looking for a quick, easy, and delectable dessert....THIS IS IT!!! 

These bars consist of stuff you probably already have on hand...isn't that great!!
1 sleeve of saltine crackers minus 2 crackers.
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
8 oz. chopped chocolate
1/2 - 1 cup nuts
coconut (optional)

Start off by lining a cookie sheet, one with sides, with aluminum foil.  Trust me this is an imperative step unless you want to be scrapping goo off for years to come.

Line the cookie sheet with 35 saltine crackers.  Just a tid bit: a sleeve comes with 37 crackers...how strange a prime number.  Most things are packaged in even or divisible numbers....but not a sleeve of crackers.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.  While the oven is preheating melt the butter and sugar over medium high heat in a small sauce pan. 

Once the mixture is melted boil for 3 minutes, don't stir it during this time.

Now pour this wonderful goo over the saltine crackers.  Try to pour it evenly over the crackers...if they don't get covered with the goo, then they don't taste quit as good.

Now pop these babies into the over for 5 to 7 minutes.  Take them out once the tops are nice and golden brown...mine is 5 minutes or a shade less.

While those bars are baking chop up your chocolate.

When the bars come out of the oven, immediately cover with chocolate and spread evenly over the bars.

Now comes the fun part...cover your bars with you toppings, i.e. nuts and coconuts.  I used slivered almonds, that just happens to be what I had on hand. 

These bars are good with all different kinds of nuts and with or without the coconut.  Customize to your taste!!

Now let them cool, if you can!

Break the bars into pieces and enjoy!!

Makin' It Monday-Appliqued Backpack

Mr. E, as you know from previous posts, has started to preschool.  He was required to have a backpack to take to school that had his name on it.  We already had a backpack that I bought at a yard sale a year ago.  This used to be our church bag. 

Mr. E, Miss C, and I took a trip Hobby Lobby so Mr. E could pick out the color felt he wanted for his name.  He went with yellow.  He wanted to do gray, but thankfully I was able to talk him out of that.  Next, I picked out the orange crochet thread to attach/accent Mr. E's name.

I decided to bust out the ol' Cricut and get busy!!  I cut test letters with my George cartridge to make sure I had the correct size.   Next, I put some wonder under on my felt.  Then I tried cutting the letters in the felt.  I say tried because something wasn't right with the depth of my blade and the felt didn't get cut all the way through.  No worries, the blade did trace the letters nicely onto the felt so I just cut the letters out with my scissors.  The letters aren't perfect, but hey it is for a 3 year old...and one that doesn't really care how neat his name is cut out. 

After ironing the letters in place I just stitched them on with the thread.

When I bought the bag it was obvious that it had been used as a preschool bag before....there was old tape residue on the from flap where someone else's name was on the bag.  I used an extra piece of felt, one of the original buttons...I forgot to mention that I had to replace the strap buttons because one was missing when I bought the bag...and made a little moving dump truck on the front as well.  This gives Mr. E something to play with on the ride to school! 

Here is the finished product!

Mr. E loves it and that is all that matter.

Happy Crafting!!

Giveaway Winner

The winner is...
7


Random numbers generated Aug 23 2010 at 10:33:11 by www.psychicscience.org

Free educational resources for parapsychology, psychical research & mind magic.

Number is bunnee36!!  Congrats!! 

Thanks to all of you for entering and following along!!! 

Frugal Friday-Children's Books

I have many addictions.  Thrift Stores is one of them.  One of my addictions while at Thrift Stores are Children's books.  This is one of Mr. E's addictions.  I guess I learned it by watching him...(on a side note, does anyone remember those commercials from the 90's..."I learned it by watching you", sorry for the attempt a humor). 

Whenever we go to one Thrift Store in our town Mr. E always rushes to the back of the store to the bookshelves.  He would spend all day there if I would let him.  I have to limit him to one book.  The books are only $1.00, so it is hard for me to say "no". 

Lately while at Goodwill Mr. E has discovered their bookshelves and has been picking out $0.50 books.  Once again, hard to say "no". 

We have to stop on the book buying spree, he is proof of this...

This is the bookshelf in Mr. E's room. 
Each shelf is crammed with books.

Even on the side of the bookshelf.  These are the books that are too tall for the book shelf.

Pretty bad huh?  I don't think we can fit even one more tiny paperback on these shelves!!!

Here are the books we have gotten at garage sales, thrift stores, and Goodwill in the past couple of months.

Yep, there are 40 books here...and then this beauty.

My Grandmother found this book for Mr. E at a yard sale...it is really old...has that old book smell.  But this is such a great book...Mr. E loves it all ready.

Mr. E is almost four and he LOVES books!!  I know it is hard to tell by looking at all these books, but he can spend hours looking through them and studying the pictures.  I can't wait for him to learn how to read.  It will change him forever!  In a good way of course. 

So do you or your kids like to read?  I didn't start to enjoy reading until a couple of years ago when I discovered I could read things besides text books. 

Happy READING!!

My 100th Post and My 1st Giveaway!!

I am so excited to have made it to my 100th POST!!!!  I know it isn't that big of a milestone, but it sure is for me.  I can't believe I have been diligent enough about making things and sharing them on here.  I have had so much fun since I received my sewing machine for Christmas!  Don't get me wrong, for a while there we weren't on the best of terms.  Fortunately the Hubby's aunt came to my rescue and gave me some pointers on avoiding Gremlins. 

I'm also excited about having 50 plus followers.  Another thing that might not be a big milestone for some other bloggers, but it absolutely thrills me!!  I can't believe that there are that many people who choose to read and follow along with all the stuff I make! 

There are so many things I don't understand about blogging, but I have had fun learning some of the ropes!  I hope to get to know more bloggers as I continue to share things on this site! 

In order to help me celebrate I thought I would giveaway....

A covered journal and a rosette hair band. 

To enter just leave me a comment!  If you don't have your e-mail address attached to your account, please leave that in your comment too!!  The giveaway will be open until Monday morning at 9:00 a.m. CST.  Then I will choose and winner!!

If you have any suggestions on how I could do things different, I would love to hear those things too!!

Thanks for following!!

Things to Try Thursday-Stamped Shirts

Miss C has a cute little romper that I love!  I have a sweater that is a similar pattern.  The guys in the family don't really have anything to match...so I decided to remedy that! 

I found this tutorial over at I am Momma-Hear Me Roar.  I love the idea of creating unique clothing!!  Obviously since I have been in a refashion kick. 

I just used a $0.99 stamp from Hobby Lobby and I went to town with my red fabric paint.  Here is how the guys shirts turned out.

I hope you try this out!!  It was very quick and easy.  Don't forget to go here and check out the tutorial!!

Happy stamping!!