Pergola

It's been a long time!

A couple of posts ago I mentioned the project in process was the pergola.  We finally got everything done and love sitting out there.  It's so cozy and feels like an actual room.  Well I ended up not having to make the shades or curtains as I found them already made in outdoor fabric at reasonable prices!  Excellent news for me because other projects have come up. 

One of those projects is our wedding!  In June we were engaged and have set a date of 5/19/2012 for the wedding.  Most posts until then will probably be about projects related to the wedding :)

For now though, here are pictures of the pergola...

The furniture is from American Sale.  They price match so shop around.   After we found what we wanted I looked online to find it cheaper and did so we went back in told them we found it for less and they beat the price! 

The curtains and curtain rods came from Improvements Catalog.  I came across them, got on their mailing list and got a coupon! 

The shades I actually got through Ace Hardware so working for them has perks :)  They are by Cooloroo and Ace is  retailer that sells them so I got those at a good price too!

I'm not going to say where the ceiling fans came from because they may have been from an 'orange' competitor!  Sometimes your options are limited and finding ceiling fans with a wet rating isn't something you find everywhere.

If you didn't guess by those 3 things I'm all about finding bargains and shopping around.  Sometimes it may take a little bit of time to search but Google is great and you'll find what you want and save a little money.

Monthly Baby Stickers

I don't know what was going on about 9 months ago but I'm glad I wasn't drinking that water!  In the last month there are sooo many people having babies.  I made these as a gift, they are stickers that you put on their shirt and take the monthly photo.  This is just a couple of them, but there are 12 to get through the first year.  The concept was not an original of mine, I saw it over at my cousin Beth's blog.  To create mine I used my Sizzix Eclips for all of the pieces and ran them through the Xyron to make them a sticker. 

Joe's birthday

To say Joe loves golf is an understatement.  Until recently the living room was a golf range.  We spent many nights early in our relationship at the driving range!  On nice days I'd hit balls too, but a lot of times I'd park myself at the bar and have a couple of drinks as he popped in and out.  I'm definately a fair weather golfer!!  If the heaters are on at the range it's to cold for me :)

If you haven't figured it out by now, this blog is mostly about my projects so here's another one!  I made a golf cake for Joe's birthday.  The cake was really good, it's a Betty Crocker recipe, layers of banana and chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting!  One of these days (see prior post on no time) I'll brush up on my photography skills!

So many ideas so little time

So many ideas, so little time is my theme lately.  I find more and more that I want to be doing something that I truly enjoy, scrapbooking, making cards, sewing (I think), baking etc.  It's not that I completely hate my job, I am very fortunate but at the same time my passion for it is gone. 

Sometime in the next few week's I'll post about the work on the patio we are doing.  We got new furniture, the shades are on order, I will be making pillows and curtains for the pergola and it will be stained.  All before the end of May!

In the mean time I came across this contest and thought that having new projects to buff up my sewing skills would be perfect!  I've sewed 1 thing so I need all the practice I can get...again, so many ideas, so little time!

Sherrod Studio: Sponsored Giveaway

Easter Cards

Here are a couple of my latest projects...

Spring mantle

Well here it is, spring already! I can't wait for the midwest 'spring' to remain on the warmer side. We are in the phases were it's in the 30's and snowing to 60 the next day. Here is the mantle for the spring. The fish is still there. Time has gone so fast that it hasn't even really phased me! I do have a project idea that when I get the time to actually do it then I'll broach the topic of moving the fish :) It's not completely what I had in mind but with time and my Sizzix having some issues this is what it will be.

Valentine's Day Mantle

Now that I have a mantle to decorate I thought it would be fun to have it decorated as we go through holidays and seasons.  Here is my Valentines Day decor.  It was actually kind of hard with already having a red wall so I kept it pretty simple and didn't want to go overboard.  Also, don't you love the fish as the nice focal point!?  Well not me :)  One of these days soon the fish will have a new home on a wall somewhere else in the house.  I didn't want to move in and just take over so I'm taking it slowly with suggesting we move the fish.

I found the idea for the heart wreath at The Idea Room.  My wreath was about 12" from top to bottom and I purchased 3/4 of a year of felt and had more than enough I didn't count the circles either but think it was somewhere around 80.  I also took a long strip of the felt and wrapped the white foam wreath.  I put it together and if you weren't looking at it straight on you could see the white.  I took it apart and wrapped it and put it back together again.  It probably only took a couple of hours total, not too bad.

The pictures really aren't very good, I had been having problems with my camera and never knew how they were going to turn out!  That's not a good thing so I've since then purchased a new one.

 The Idea Room