can you believe...

...we've lived here for months and never been to Cheeburger Cheeburger?


thanks for helping us remedy that asap, dad


'cause brownie batter birthday cake milkshakes are amazing.

organizing fun

so i'm a serious sucker for some organization
especially cheap organization

so when i saw this idea to organize my falling down piles of fabric that drive me crazy, i immediately headed to the dollar tree.

i got 7 pieces of foam board, measured my little shelves, and drew off 8 rectangles to make some mini-bolts


cut out all the bolts


folded my fabric and wrapped it around


and used straight pins to secure it


all wrapped up


oh how i love how neat and organized they are! i can actually see all the fabric i have. it's so pretty... and all for $7

as for the rest of our over-stuffed closet...

28

happy birthday, babe. i'm loving our adventures and

can't wait to see what this year holds. love you.

pattern sewing!!

ooh i'm so excited -
it's been one of my goals to saw using an actual pattern for, ummm, like a year and i finally did it!
yea, this is no big deal to most people but i pretty much feel like a rockstar for actually figuring it out :)



day 1 - watched lots of videos on youtube on how to read a pattern, seems easy enough

day 2 - umm, it wasn't as easy as it looked on youtube. there's lots of paper and i'm scared.


day 3 - finally get everything lined up ( i think ) and it's not fitting on my fabric - ugh. quit.


day 4 - new day, new fabric (iphone pic)
i finally figure out why i'm cutting out 2 of one piece and only 1 of everything else ('cause they're all on the fold!) big step for me. actually get stuff cut out before getting too nervous & quit. still can't quite figure out where all these pieces are going.


day 5 - bored out. of. my. mind. our plans cancelled on us. 8:30. nothing to do. so i finally started sewing and - you know what - it wasn't that hard! side note - i might have picked the easiest pattern ever - no zippers, no exact arm holes, just elastic

oh how i love my new serger (thanks mom!!) im sure you all gaze at the seams in your clothes with pride too, right?

after i got the whole dress put together, i got a little cocky and figured out how to use the rolled hem on my serger

i do love it!

james recommended adding some ruffles to the collar to make it look a little less homemade. he even picked out the yellow. im pretty impressed with his consulting. i'll probably continue using his expertise.



if i use this pattern again, i'll probably use a smaller size and and make it a little longer but overall, i like it! and i've finally accomplished my goal of using a pattern. woohoo!

more snowed in projects

i looove hoodies but just try to find one in a cute girlie color - no luck
soooo, enter one of my favorite things -



now i've used rit in my washing machine before, followed the directions on the back, and never had any problems what-so-ever
buuut, we're renting from one of james professors and sharing a machine with 5 other people, so we decided to play it safe



the directions say to stir continually for 30-60 minutes - ugh - but when it's snowing, all we've got is time
so i got a plastic trash can, and yard stick to stir, and some hot water from the stove

plus

a diet coke, some turkey pepperoni's, the heater, and a computer to catch up on castle :)



stirring, stirring, (blurry but the camera died soon after)


after stirring, i rinsed it out in the sink (no problems with it staining our white sink) and washed and dried. now i think it turns out better dying in the washing machine - the color is more saturated and there aren't any blotchy places, but it'll work to run errands for sure.
and while we're fancying up a hoodie, why not add a couple rolled flowers






this little project has been in my sewing stuff since last year and now that i got a serger - woohoo!!! - there's no reason to avoid sewing knits

i got some weird little stains on the bottom of this shirt last winter but couldn't stand to throw it out so i cut the bottom off



sewed a tube out of some jersey



and serged them together



(oooh how i hate to take pictures of myself but this looked terrible hanging up, i tried every angle i could, oh well)
i added a little sash to cover up the seems and waaala!

jewelry board

snow days insist on projects, right? because you can only watch so much 24...

so i finally escaped to the thrift store down the street and grabbed this beauty.
i know, try not to be jealous.


gave it a couple coats of white paint


hot glued that gorgeous painting in a couple layers of batting (although i'd do a couple more layers if i did it again)


and then i resisted the urge to go buy cute fabric and used some out of my stash to hot glue over the batting


put some pins in to hold my necklaces


and ta-da! ready to hang


maybe now i'll actually remember to grab a necklace when i'm getting dressed

lately...

8 inches of snow + temps below 30 for a week =
icy roads, no school for a week and really long icicles outside our window!


so you know you've got good friends when they plan their anniversary trip to where you live and then let you totally crash their whole weekend! we had so much fun with Logan and Cody last week - lots of eating, driving around, and hanging out late. I felt like i was in college again!

mr. troy even surprised us with a trip out and took us all out to eat - told you we crashed their whole trip!

if you plan your anniversary trip to chattanooga, i promise we won't bug you the whole time, but we had an absolute blast with logan and cody. thanks, guys!


on saturday before the snow hit, we headed up to atlanta to see my dad who was working a big show downtown. we had a little too much fun walking around and taking our picture with the ginormous tractors





there were satellite t.v.'s in the tractors! james second guessed his calling for a minute or two...


and this is a pic of my dad's hotel, standing in the lobby looking up. cool, huh? i pretended i was a six flags while riding the elevator. i'm a total sucker for heights :)


have we mentioned how much we love it when people come visit us?!

handmade gifts

this year, emily, grace, & i decided to do some handmade gifts for each other.
i like to try to be crafty and all, but these girls have real talent, like with paint...
can i just say wow.

*sorry for uggg pics, snowy days stuck in the apt = not much light...grrr



em ordered this calendar from etsy and then watercolored it herself. how cute is it?! i mean, learning to watercolor is some serious dedication to a handmade christmas. just look at that little purple flower. and when the year is over, i can cut the top off and frame just the little owls. oooh how i love fun art. awesome job, em!


she also sewed these awesome infinity scarves that i can't get enough of. snow day? yes, thank you. i'm totally copying these.


grace hand-sewed this pin cushion. um, adorable. looks just like it came from anthropologie, don't 'cha think? the jk, the beaded flowers, the buttons, absolutely love it. it's like art on my desk. i never put it up because it's just that fun. awesome!


and wow. grace has some serious talent. seriously. no words. im. in. love.



handmade gifts are so fun because i get to think about the special person who made them every time i see them. thanks so much girls, i absolutely love them. now ya'll need to teach me how to watercolor. love ya'll!

snow days

warning: picture overload...

we're definitely loving all our snow days here!
chattanooga is great because it snow lots more here, but everything still shuts down which means...
no school!

james woke me up late last night to look at the snow pouring down



of course we needed to drive around this morning...
this was how deep it was on our windshield

we got 8 inches by this morning and it's still coming down!













isn't everything so pretty covered in snow!




we've definitely learned a couple things about snow days -

1 - they're perfect for breakfast at waffle house



2 - our heater does not enjoy snow piled up on it. thank goodness for space heaters.


3 - use the four wheel drive vehicle.

i might have insisted that we take my car to our pastor's house because it was already warmed up and we might have had to drive up several seriously steep hills and the road might have then frozen over and we might have had to leave our car on the side of the road after sliding down a hill towards someone's living room.

lesson learned.