The Fruits [And Leaves] of Our Labors

At the beginning of the season we planted a vegetable garden in our back yard. We've done this in the past, but two years ago pretty much nothing produced anything, so we didn't do it last year. This year, things are different. Here's what the garden looked like when we first planted.
We planted 4 different heirloom tomato varieties, 2 cucumber plants, 1 crook-neck squash, 1 butternut squash, 3 different bell pepper varieties, 4 hot pepper varieties, sugar snap peas, cilantro, and basil. Notice all the empty space covered with bark? Here's what it's looking like lately.

It's filled in beautifully! Most of what you're seeing is the butternut squash vine that has taken over the back yard, but I don't care because I already have a few big squashes on the vine. I'm pretty excited about it. See what's coming along.

We've eaten some sugar snap peas, and I've already had two BLT's with my fresh tomatoes. Fa-Nominal! But I was too busy enjoying them to take a picture.
One of the things I'm most excited about is the basil. It's thriving, so I finally made some pesto. Oh man, it's beyond good! I picked about three cups worth of leaves off the bush, and you can't even tell I took anything off the plant (I'll have to make some more!). Here I am (in my new Anthro shirt, told you you'd see me in it soon!) cutting off some leaves.

I brought them in the house and put them in a big bowl of cold water to wash off any dirt and/or bugs. I put them through the salad spinner to get them dry, then I put those in the food processor with about 2/3 cup walnuts, 2.5 oz Parmesan cheese, 1 clove garlic, 1 cup canola oil, and salt and pepper to taste, and voila!

Put it on pasta, bread, a cracker, a fork, whatever! I've eaten three meals of whole-wheat pasta and pesto in as many days. And I might just have it again for dinner tonight. It's that good. Or you can come over and have some with me. The Rockstar doesn't like it (He's crazy, but we love him anyway) and I need someone to enjoy this with me!

Cup 'O Tea

Saw these nifty bracelettes and thought of my mom.

I think she'd be into them.

And now, I'm off to the beach...

Tipping

Wow, I didn't know the star feature in Reader was going to be a novel thing for you all! I'm so glad I could help out, although, I apologize if I've only further fed your addiction. To make up for it if I did, here are a few more awesome tips:

• Baby Shampoo is a cheap, yet effective eye make-up remover. Just rub a little with warm water on your eyes and voila, clean eyes, and no tears!


• A grapefruit spoon is not a grapefruit spoon when it's a peeler for fresh ginger, or a strawberry huller, or a great tool for getting kiwi out of it's fuzzy skin.


• Newly shaved legs + Baby Lotion = Silky Skin Perfection


• This makes for a great summer foot exfoliater. The next best thing to getting a pedicure, but way less expensive.

And coming soon, another shirt to cardigan tutorial, but with more pictures this time...

Gold Star!

Do you use Google Reader? It's kind of, totally addicting. WAY worse than email. With email, I constantly check back and am disappointed, because no one ever emails me. With Reader, there's always something new, because it loves me more than email. I love it too, because it allows me to "Star" posts that I like, and keeps them all in one place for me. That Reader, so thoughtful. Here are some posts I've recently starred in Reader:

• Recipe for Homemade S'more candy bars. Yum...
  
• Ingenious new use for broken clock.


• Cute [free] softie pattern with tutorial.


• Delicious Melt Aways recipe.


• How-To for cabinet knob wall hanger.


• Gorgeous and inspiring table before and after.

Have a lovely weekend!

The Lamest Tutorial Ever

I tried my hand at an upcycled garment! I had a plain white long-sleeved t-shirt sitting in my closet, just asking me to do something with it.

I decided to make a cardigan. I know, "It's the middle of summer!" you're saying. But my office is always a little bit chilly (as are these Utah evenings, if you ask me) so a light cardigan to warm my upper arms was just the ticket. Plus, is it just me, or does anyone else feel like their arms are a little bare in a cap sleeve? So I can just throw this on over and voila! No more bare cap-sleeved arms.

I thought I'd make a little tutorial for it, but, as it turns out, I'm not very good at making tutorials. I'm just not patient enough to stop at every step and take a picture, but I'll try to give good instructions in lieu of some of the pictures.

*As a little caveat, before you go doing this yourself, understand that if the shirt you start with is fitted, you're not going to be able to button it closed once you're done with the project. I knew this from the start, and was okay with it, since I never button my cardigans anyway, but if you wanted to be able to button your cardigan up, you'd want to have some extra (contrasting would be cute!) fabric on hand to add to the middle of your shirt once you cut it up the middle, and you'd put your buttons and button holes on that.

So, here's a picture of the shirt I started with (and still had picture-taking patience).

I wanted three-quarter length sleeves so I tried it on and figured out about how much I wanted to take off, then added about an inch to that so I could hem the edge and still have the sleeves the length I wanted. (How's that for a run-on sentence!) I measured that amount on both sleeves and chopped them off. Now my shirt looked like this:

Next I used that yard stick you can see on the right edge of the picture and measured the middle of the front of the shirt all the way up, then cut along that center mark. Here's a picture:

You can see where I marked up the center of the shirt with my washable marker. Next I folded under 1" on each side of the center cut and pinned it down.

Here's a close up shot:

And that's pretty much where I stopped taking pictures of my steps, but hopefully I can give good written instruction.
Next, using a ball point needle (because my shirt was knit) I sewed up the folds on either side of the center using a straight stitch. I did my stitch closer to the outer edge of the fold so that the buttons would be between the stitching and the edge of the fold. (Oh, geeze, does this make any sense? Why didn't I take more pictures?!)
Next, I laid out my buttons down one side to figure out basic spacing, and decided I wanted six buttons, about 2.5" apart. I marked on the shirt where each button would go using my washable marker. I made corresponding marks on the other side of the shirt where the button holes should go.
I know, these buttons are purely decorative, so I didn't really need to put button holes, but I thought it would look weird with out button holes. Plus, my machine has a button hole setting and I get strangely excited any time I get to use it (just in case you didn't already know I was a nerd!).
Still using my ball point needle, I stitched the button holes down one side of the center. I didn't even bother cutting the "hole" part of my button holes, just stitched them on for looks.
Now, my machine also has a stitch that will automatically sew on buttons, and I was all excited to use that, but...I broke my first button. Cracked right between the holes. Better than breaking a needle, I guess. Feeling a little defeated, I sewed them on by hand. Don't worry, I have since learned how to sew buttons on using the machine, and it worked beautifully. Hopefully I get around to posting about that project as well.
I don't know why I left this step until the last, but finally I hemmed both of the sleeves, so they didn't have raw edges. I just folded them under (like I did for the center seam) and did a straight stitch using the ball point needle. Sorry, no pictures of that!

But I did take a picture of the finished cardigan!

What do you think? I have an identical black shirt that I plan on doing the same thing with, but maybe this time I'll do a little more embellishing. If you wanted to, you could make some of those cute fabric flowers that have been floating around the blog world using the extra fabric cut off the end of the sleeves. Maybe I'll do that on the next one...and take pictures, too. :)

Weekend Loveliness

I had a most enjoyable weekend. We were able to spend Saturday with family at my nephew's baptism, which was followed by a signature Fancy Nancy party. Love those! Then Nancy, hostess extraordinaire that she is, watched the kids while I went shopping at Anthro with my mom, Emily, and the Rock Star. Oh boy, did the sale rack yield up her treasures! Fortunately I had some birthday money to spend, which I did with reckless abandon.

I got this top, only I got it in a cerulean blue (which I can't find a picture of online)

I also got these pants (which I'll have to hem like 6 inches off of, but such is the life of a short woman).

And I got another top, but there are no pictures of it to be found online. I'm sure you'll see me in it one of these days. Thank you Anthropologie, for having a sale rack. I'll love you forever for it!

Been a While

'Member how I used to blog? Yeah, then I just stopped for months! Lame, I know. I've been doing a lot of thinking about making, but just not getting around to the actual making part. Some things I've been thinking about making...

Bakerella's Pillow Cookies (brownie and chocolate chip cookie all in one? Yes, Please!)

Home made basil pesto, with my home grown basil, which hasn't died! I'm not the best at keeping plants alive, but the Rock Star pretty much tends the garden, so this stuff is thriving.

I am in LOVE with these overalls. The print, the bow, the ruffles on the bottom? C'mon! I want to try and copy them. Mom, you may be getting some sewing related phone calls soon.

I'm also feeling so inspired by all the upcycling people are doing in the blog world, turning old and boring clothes into new and fabulous clothes. I have a few pieces set aside that will hopefully get a make-over soon. In the mean time, here are links to some of my favorites

1. Katies Scandalous to Fabulous Skirt

2. Ashley's Stained Shirt turned Shrug

3. Katie's Liberty Shirt Turned Skirt

4. Jess's Floral Refashion

5. Nancy's T-shirt Skirt

Look What I Found!

Remember those vintage Valentines I framed for my Valentine's Day decorations?

Well apparently somebody else has the same one, and made it into a free printable download.

How Fun is the Internet?

Check out this great source for CUTE oil cloth!

Found Via this post on Prudent Baby.

Thank You Martha

So I was reading this months Martha Stewart Sunday night and saw an ad for this:

I don't think I've ever seen lemon ice cream before. Lemon sorbet or sherbet, yes. Ice cream, no. I'm a bit of a lemon fiend, and really, who doesn't love anything Haagen-Dazs? So Monday night at the grocery store, I decided to pick some up and try it.

Oh, it's good.

Even my husband (who is not a lemon fiend, and thinks I have a some-what unnatural affinity for lemons) really liked it. I'm excited to have a little more after dinner tonight. You should probably try it. That's all. :)

Yup, She's My Sister!

Witness the moment my sister's company becomes a household name! Katie Richardson and her husband own Puj Baby, and her baby bath tub was on Ellen today. I couldn't be more excited for her! Click here for a link to the video. (I was having a hard time trying to embed it). Now go buy an awesome baby tub, or booties, or sling for every pregnant lady you know!

I Could Make That...

Oh man, I say that a lot when I'm shopping, or see something I like on a blog. The question is not whether I could, but whether I'd ever actually get around to it! But that was the first thing I thought when I saw these lovely, yet prohibitivly expensive letter blocks from the MOMA Store.


Cute, right? But they're $120.00! Don't get me wrong, I totally respect paying for a quality designed beautiful product. I just can't always afford it. So I might have to go the thrifty route and make some similar ones out of cute craft paper and modge podge. Nancy, you're my resident modge podge expert, what do you say?