another finished corner... for now

Another finished corner? But wait... those curtains DO NOT match the ones she made. Bless her heart! No, I am not pattern-challenged--well, at least not too bad anyway. I ditched 'em. Well, I mean, they are in my fabric stash again, but they won't be hangin in my living room. When you find $50-a-panel-curtains (that match your living room pretty closely) for $4, it's kinda hard to convince yourself to continue working with vintage polyester. :)

Hanging on the wall is the guitar picture that I was having trouble finding. I was quite distressed, because it's one of my favorites. I drew it shortly after David asked if he could begin courting me, but we couldn't yet because I still had this final project to do and needed to focus on that. Funny how my subject was guitars (because of him) and that this picture happens to be my guitar and his guitar side by side. Kinda shows where my focus was heading. ;) I found it after much searching, and was so happy! (The little picture on the lamp table is one of us when we were dating--he's playing the guitar while I watch happily.)

For 10 years, I've searched on and off for a frame for the "our guitars" picture. The problem is, it happens to be 17 by 24 inches--way bigger than your average frame at Goodwill. I wanted so much to have a nice frame, but for very little cost. And though I never officially priced it, I'm pretty sure having a custom frame made for such a large picture is out of my budget. So how did I find one? My brother got this frame with the faded out picture of an airplane and a car from one of his civil engineer jobs and Mom had been saving it for just such an occasion (not really knowing about my endless quest for just the right frame). I had to do a tiny bit of refashioning to it, but if I don't tell you what I did, you might not notice. So, I'll keep it at that.

After looking at this picture, I realize how bland the fluffy off white pillow (and its mate that I've kept shammed for 6 years until now) and the off white throw look sitting on the couch. I'm going to have to remedy that. But at least things are starting to come together. And, having things still to fix means more posts later on, right?

instead of cards

Last year, I bought two or three boxes of Valentines that I just knew the kids would love handing out this year--Transformers, Hello Kitty, something I can't remember. Two months ago, I set them aside because I knew I'd need them soon. And although my life has been one long organizational ordeal since after Christmas, I have yet to find that special place that I stored the Valentines. My house is pretty dang small, so I'm a little confused. Anyway, since kids in Aubie's class are always giving out goody bags, and as of the night before the party I had still not found the cards--I refused to buy more!--I made these to go with the Valentine gummies I bought. Sure, what's a kid need a key chain for, but I thought they turned out cute.
The names were done on Shrinky Dink paper (I love to make small things, but Shrinky Dinks make things even smaller!). The little flowers were some small ornaments that I got on clearance after Christmas . (Had I realized at the time how many uses I'd find for these, I'd have bought them all!!! Pics of other uses to come later.) And I had the all the key rings already on hand. Pretty nifty little Valentine for about $.30.

snow!

This past weekend, we were so happy to get our first (and most likely last) snowfall of the season (possibly of the year). The kids had so much fun playing in it. Here's a few pictures.


The snow was much thicker across the street at the park, so we went over there for a while. I believe this big snowball that Matthan was playing with was Aubie's attempt to start a snowman. Matthan just wouldn't let us make one--he kept stomping it or whatever else.

In this first picture of Aubie, you can see one of the huge snow clumps right in front of her jacket. If it hadn't been coming down so hard, the snow wouldn't have gotten so thick on the ground since it barely got to 32 degrees all day.

Since we had to wait until the day after to make our snowman, we had to work with top-of-the-car snow. Poor little thing looks more like a bird in the first shot. We had to move him to a new home so he wouldn't melt so quickly. With this old white tarp in the background, it looks kinda like an ice cave--a great new home for a little snowbird.

As you can see, the kids had a lot of fun! Jennifer from Wisconsin and Becki from SD are working with me to figure out an economical way to ship us some snow, but so far none of us have come up with a solution. Oh well. I think this'll do me till next winter. :)