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Fancy Shmancy Desserts

Posted by on June 26, 2008 Leave a Comment

This is the story of a girl who is unemployed and growing increasingly more lazy by the minute. She spent some time today browsing some blogs about desserts. After seeing recipe after recipe for things like “tiramisushi” and “chai tea cupcakes” I’ve learned something important about myself. I’m just an ice cream kind of girl. No really, explain to me why I would want to eat sushi of any kind, much less tiramisu sushi?? Why not save myself the trouble of rolling it up and just make tiramisu?

I like my dessert yummy, hold the frill. I don’t need fancy names, dipping sauces or for pity’s sake 14 different kinds of meringue. I like cherry cordial ice cream or dark chocolate cupcakes. Rosewater frosting need not apply.

I like cake and I like green tea, but I won’t be making green tea cake with red bean filling anytime soon. Mostly because it sounds gross, but also the picture looked more like those Little Debbie Christmas Tree cakes than anything fancy.

Filed Under: General | Tagged:

A Blanket Making Frenzy!

Posted by on June 26, 2008 Leave a Comment

This is quite image hefty, I would apologize but let’s be honest, if I was really sorry I wouldn’t have included so many pictures. Quite frankly, I add the pictures in to show you how awesome I really am. That being said, I spent a few hours this morning making more blankets for this baby. Again, I make blankets because they are easy and I like the near instant gratification. Unless my fabric grain is off, and then I roll my eyes and remember that A) I’m not a perfectionist and B) it’s a blanket for a child who really doesn’t care about said blanket as long as the diaper is clean and the tummy is full.

Here’s blanket #1 – Made from the Michael Miller Disco Dot – Citrus, purchased on Ebay and some yellow minkee fabric purchased locally. Allow me to reiterate this fact, if you are going to fall in love with a fabric, do so before it is discontinued. Unlike other items, when fabric is discontinued the price goes up exponentially. I just happened to get lucky and be the only person who bid on said fabric and actually got it for less than it was retail. YAY! Specs on this blanket are approximately 42 x 42. The Pimpo (aka George from the “George & Martha” series) enjoys this blankets larger size.

Blanket #2 is essentially a baby shower gift. After receiving the greatest gift of a fabric store gift card, I headed to the store for something involving hippos. Indeed there was a flannel with baby jungle animals, including hippos. I fought the overwhelming urge to back this with green flannel and chose yellow instead. I believe you’ll approve. This is only about 36 x 45, still slightly larger than the average receiving blanket and wonderfully soft.

An up close and personal shot of the baby animals….awwwwww

Finally, blanket #3, made from Heather Ross Lightening Bugs blue and yellow polka dots (again, discontinued…see rant above), and blue minkee with a star pattern purchased with the aforementioned gift card. Now a new fabric rant, minkee fabric is wonderfully soft but is sometimes a nightmare to work with. More of a nightmare than my constant need to end a sentence with a preposition! (Like you even noticed). I’m not sure if it’s the nap of the fabric or what, but I had the hardest time getting these to line up..eventually giving up and embracing imperfection. That’s one of my more attractive qualities anyways. Specs: about 36 x 45 again, I hadn’t intended to use the Heather Ross as a blanket, but it is honestly the softest cotton I’ve ever felt and I couldn’t resist. Off grain or not, I love this blanket. I think the bear approves too.

An up close picture of the details.

Filed Under: Sewing For Babies and Children | Tagged:

Let There Be Curtains!

Posted by on June 24, 2008 Leave a Comment

After weeks of staring at a gigantic piece of fabric and thinking, “how on earth am I going to do this”..and then finally cutting, and thinking I really messed it up..and then calling my mom for back-up….(sigh)..my baby’s room finally has curtains! I believe them to be the greatest curtains ever, but I suppose you are free to judge for yourself. Made with Modern Basics Hippo fabric I bought about a month ago, it matches the room nicely and will at least keep the morning sun out of baby’s eyes. This is because I assume my child will be sleeping in the wee morning hours, presumably after being awake all night. We’ll see about that.

Maybe someday I’ll finish that weekender bag….

Filed Under: Sewing For Babies and Children, Sewing For Home | Tagged:

When Life Imitates Blog

Posted by on June 24, 2008 Leave a Comment

“It’s 2008, I can assume she didn’t flee on horseback”. Yeah, see blog posting below. Well guess what, Christopher Crosby, the 25 year old fugitive in Clermont County, IS fleeing on horseback. Apparently he’s believed to be on his third stolen horse at this point, yet our little rhinestone cowboy has yet to get out of Clermont County. He’s believed to be just living in the woods. Sounds like it’s time for residents to stock up on carrots and sugar cubes..then get their pitchforks ready.

In WHY NOT MEEEEE! news, one of the four Butler County inmates who tried to escape from jail last month tried to escape again today. Ok, so the first guy flicks off news cameras, the second guy spits and curses at the judge while his Hamil-tucky family goes crazy in the courtroom, then this guy takes off running through the courthouse and gets tased. He took off down the stairs which leads to the security post which is manned at all times by about 5 sheriff’s deputies, all standing around talking. This escape was not well planned, the closing arguments must have really gotten to him.  As a career juror, I have to tell you, this would have made my day. However, as a human being, I probably would have wet myself if the guy on trial got up and started running. Especially since the exits of the courtrooms require them to run passed the jury. This jury went on to convict this idiot (shocking, I know), and I’m sure this stunt…and the last stunt ..and the 8 counts he was convicted of will really make the judge sympathetic.

Filed Under: Life in Cincinnati, Nonsense | Tagged:

Who Hires These People?

Posted by on June 23, 2008 Leave a Comment

I want to know who is writing headlines in this town. No, really..it’s getting out of hand with stupidity. For instance, “Westwood Shooting Victim Taken To Hospital”. Well, where do you suppose we take them, BW3′s? While they might enjoy a tasty cardboard container of wings, that’s probably not on their mind after they got shot. Furthermore, why is a shooting in Westwood news anyways? Even better, in the story of a woman shot in Colerain you’ll find this line, “The woman fired off two shots and then fled in a car,”. It’s 2008, I can assume she didn’t flee on horseback. Unless you have some sort of description of “car” this isn’t helpful information. There’s a lot of people with cars, but not many people fleeing on speckled ponies. You get what I’m saying.

Oh, just by the way, Mt. Adams wants YOU! to help solve their parking dilemma. My solution is to avoid Mt. Adams. Perhaps these people should decrease their level of pretension and spend their $500,000 on a house that has a garage, or at least a driveway. By the way, $500,000 is the low end of the no parking housing in Mt. Adams. Again, the real solution is just to avoid Mt. Adams.

And finally, ridiculous news unrelated to Cincinnati. Pacman Jones no longer wants to be known as “Pacman”. Apparently there’s some “bad stuff” associated with his nickname. He won’t sign autographs as “Pacman” and would prefer to be called Adam or “Mr. Jones”. Seriously? This guy is 24, I won’t be referring to him as Mr. anything…well, maybe Mr. Pacman. Look NFL Diddy, you can change your name a hundred times and you’ll STILL be the same person, and we’ll STILL make fun of you.

Filed Under: Life in Cincinnati, Nonsense | Tagged:

When Pregnancy Causes Insomnia….

Posted by on June 12, 2008 Leave a Comment

Honestly, I just don’t sleep very well anymore. I’m not particularly uncomfortable or anything, I just wake up at random..or to go potty and then I can’t get back to sleep. So after 30 minutes of looking at the ceiling this morning I decided to get up and make a receiving blanket. I had pinned and prepared my fabric yesterday, in a way of procrastinating making baby room curtains. I’m terrified to cut the hippo fabric!

So anyways, I made a receiving blanket out of some Happy Hippo fabric I bought at Jo-ann’s probably about the same time I found out I was pregnant. It’s been waiting for the perfect match fabric to come along. I backed it with a polka dot print flannel I bought online at the Fabric Shack. Finished dimensions are 34 x 40, which is a little smaller than I would have preferred, but the blanket turned out really well anyways. I chose to use only a 1/4 inch seam allowance and finished with a 1/8 inch top stitch. I actually like the blanket more than I thought I would, and it’s nice to feel I did something productive with my time.

Filed Under: Sewing For Babies and Children | Tagged:

Maternity Skirts, Curtains and Baby Blankets

Posted by on June 8, 2008 Leave a Comment

Since I’m taking the weekend off from the Weekender Bag, I’ll show you what I have been up to with my sewing machine. After wearing the same black skirt to church for the last 8 weeks I decided that my maternity wardrobe needed something new. Also, I find maternity shorts to be a foolish purchase considering that while I might be pregnant again someday, it might not be in the summer. Therefore, I’m not spending money on shorts I’m only going to wear for a couple of months. A couple of cute summer skirts will do the trick, and cost much less in the long run. Yesterday I was able to pick up some of the new Amy Butler Midwest Modern fabric for 1/2 price due to an anniversary sale at the Stitching Post. Mom told me a skirt out of polka dots would look terrible, but then admitted to me this morning at church that it looked a lot better than she imagined.

I promise, this hangs much better on me than it does the hanger. I would like to get this same pattern in the moss/martini colors and make curtains, but that’ll have to wait until I have $50 laying around to spend on fabric…..which will have to wait until I have a job….which has to wait until I pass my state boards and have this baby….yeah, it’s going to be a while.

Here are some baby projects I am working on, and hope to have completed before the baby is actually born! Again, I’m kind of a disaster and I firmly believe I’ll be finishing up the baby’s room while having my first contractions.

First, curtains. Curtains are kind of a priority to me right now because of where the crib sits in the room, it gets a lot of sunlight in the morning and I don’t want my child being blinded or baked because mommy didn’t care enough to at least re-hang the blinds she took down when she painted the room. I bought this fabric from Modern Basics, it’s rather expensive..but it is 110 inches wide, so you get a lot of fabric. Really, that’s my lame excuse for justifying spending that much on fabric. But it is REALLY cute.

See how cute that is?! I couldn’t possibly deny my child’s hippo nursery something this adorable. What I did deny my child’s nursery was the $270 hippo bedding that matches this fabric. Honestly, expensive crib bedding is another purchase I can’t justify. What’s the point? $270 for sheets your child will pee on? Gross.

Finally, a baby blanket. Perhaps this one won’t turn out as wonky as the last one. It’s Michael Miller Disco Dot – Citrus (which I had to hunt down on Ebay…and Ebay terrifies me, so if I’m shopping there I’m desperate) and some yellow minkee fabric I picked up locally. Truthfully, the minkee is so soft I would like to make myself a blanket and forget about the baby. Other people are going to buy me blankets anyways….

I love this fabric and it’s probably both a blessing and a shame that I didn’t discover it until after it had been discontinued. A blessing to my wallet but a shame to my fabric stash.

Filed Under: Clothes, Fabric, Sewing For Me | Tagged:

Amy Butler Weekender Bag – The Progress

Posted by on June 8, 2008 Leave a Comment

After a month, I don’t know that I should even call this progress. It’s more like “Amy Butler Weekender Bag – I’m pacing myself…”. After spending two days doing the cutting I took a long hiatus from anything related to sewing in general, with the exception of looking at fabric online. I’ve also decided to start an Etsy store, but that’s equally as slow going as the Weekender Bag. Perhaps my life motto is, “I’m pacing myself”.

So here’s the update: I’ve managed to put together to the two front pockets. I’m dreading assembling the handles and decided to take the weekend off from this project and work on other things that I find more amusing.

That was all the cut out pieces of the exterior fabric only. There was also cutting of the inside lining, heavy weight stabilizer as well as Timtex. No, I did NOT try to line up my patterns as many people have suggested. I am not an anal crafter for one thing, and I also don’t believe everything in life has to be so matchy matchy. I’m sort of a disaster anyways. After cutting a million pieces from this pattern I had to start cutting a million strips of brown fake suede for the prepared cording and handles. Have I mentioned that I am completely incapable of cutting in a straight line, even with a ruler? It looked as if I let my 2 year old niece run wild with scissors (which I wouldn’t do because she’s precious and my scissors are sharp..I like her with all 10 fingers and both of her eyes).

Speaking of the prepared cording, that’s another reason that the bag was put on hiatus. I hated making the cording. I’ve read online that several people have just used regular bias tape to cover their cording. No, not me…why do something to make my life easier? In the end I just sewed the fabric in straight lines and so far it’s worked out for me. If it stops working out for me, I’ll let you know.

Here’s the front pockets..if you are interested.

Filed Under: Sewing Bags and Accessories | Tagged:

Lamest Trial Ever

Posted by on June 6, 2008 Leave a Comment

So, I’m a jury target. You think I’m kidding? I’ve been called for jury duty three times in four years in two counties. My husband has fallen victim to my curse, as he received his summons for Grand Jury this week. I cannot wait to call the Butler County sheriff’s department when I go into labor and beg them to get my husband out of court. So anyways, the jury loves me.

Four years ago, just before my wedding I was placed on a 10 day medical malpractice trial. Allow me to sum it up for you: 10 days of listening to arrogant doctors talk about how fantastic they are because they’ve been published, meanwhile no one could explain why the doctor involved actually did anything wrong! However, $12.5 million would’ve made the plaintiff ( A.K.A. family of the deceased) feel better. You know what would’ve made ME feel better? Not flushing two weeks of my life down the toilet because some walking time bomb had a heart attack. In his next life, I hope that guy takes better care of himself or at least doesn’t lie to his doctors. Lying to your doctors really doesn’t help your case in the jury room. As foreman of that jury I’m proud to say we actually spent more time eating pizza and making fun of the lawyers than we did deliberating. Frivolous law suits make me wish for better checks and balances in our justice system.

About a year and a half later I was called for jury duty in Hamilton County. Luckily my status as a student prevented me from having to serve. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the jury duty itself that bothers me (although, seriously..is minimum wage too much to ask?!) it’s the extreme stupidity you’re exposed to not only from other potential jurors but from the people involved in the case as well that annoys me. Further proving we have not evolved as people, if anything..we’re regressing.

A few weeks ago I was called for jury duty again. When I’m told to be there at 8:30, I’m on time. The court can’t tell time, as we weren’t moved to the court room and seated until  nearly 10:45. For over two hours I was subjected to the smartest people Hamilton had to offer. I was ready to stab myself before I ever even entered the courtroom. Of course they placed me on the jury, because who wouldn’t want a 7 1/2 month pregnant lady on their jury?! This case wasn’t civil, it was criminal. Oh, it was criminal alright, criminally dumb. It was the rape case with no evidence of rape. Brought to you in part by Hamilton, pitchforks and the letter L (for liar). I’ll spare you all the details and leave it at this: teenage girls should learn to get their stories straight, hillbillies will storm your house for any reason so watch your stuff, and Hamilton police are one step above Cincinnati police on the OneStrayPea competence scale.

As foreman of THIS jury (it’s going on my resume now) I’m pleased to announce we actually DID deliberate, for like an hour and a handful of minutes. Trust me when I say this, especially if you ever plan on becoming a prosecutor. If 99% of your evidence supports the defendants version of events, you can’t convict them. Apparently no one on that grand jury had any sense….again, can we get some real checks and balances in this justice system? Someday maybe I’ll get to watch my tax dollars work……

Filed Under: Nonsense, Squawk Box | Tagged:

Headline Reads: Ridiculous

Posted by on June 3, 2008 Leave a Comment

“Man Pays Wife’s $25,000 Bond In Cash”

This headline seemed so stupid I had to read the accompanying article. A woman being charged with running a national prostitution ring had her husband post her bail in $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100 dollar bills. This is almost as bad as posting your bail in change. Yong Williams of Cheviot was arrested in Covington (naturally) on charges of driving prostitutes across state lines and laundering her pimp earnings. You know, because just laundering money isn’t bad enough. Her husband listed sources of money as family and friends, I suppose all of those clients who support you could be considered friends? However, the icing on the cake to this story comes from John Doe No. 20, an out of state minister. He complains that the female who performed a paid for sex act on him talked on her cell phone the entire time. He says, “I don’t expect them to be interested, but they could pretend.” Better yet John Doe No. 20, you could be a minister who doesn’t pay for sex. I hope he at least took off the W.W.J.D. bracelet for this, because I’m pretty sure Jesus wouldn’t pay for sex.

“Dispute Over Planned Parenthood In Westwood”

Ok, this new Planned Parenthood is scheduled to open about 2 miles from another Planned Parenthood. Parents aren’t protesting the OLD Planned Parenthood, just the new one because it will be a negative influence on the kids in the neighborhood. Apparently just being in Westwood isn’t a bad enough influence on the kids? As a former resident of this upstanding community *insert laugh here* I get to say these things.

“Expect These NFL Teams To Miss The Playoffs Again”

The boys at Yahoo! Sports have come up with a mind-blowing list of teams that they think will miss the playoffs this coming season. This list includes: New York Jets, Cleveland Brown, Kansas City Chiefs, Detroit Lions, Arizona Cardinals. Who compiled this list, a 5 year old?! Was someone at the water cooler like, “Hey guys, I’ve got an idea…let’s predict that the 5 worst teams in the NFL won’t make the playoffs”. DUMB. Picking no brainer teams isn’t very edgy, this list is as ridiculous as picking the Falcons vs. Ravens for next years Super Bowl match up. Lame, Yahoo!, lame.

Filed Under: Life in Cincinnati, Sports | Tagged: