Rachael Ray gadgets and Sandra Lee Meal

A cooking spoon that rests on the edge of a pot? Genius! They are part of Rachael Ray's cooking line. I found these at Ross, oh yeah, plural.
The second one was great for ladling the Mexican hot chocolate I made for desert. The spoons are a heavy duty silicone so they won't burn or melt as they nestle on the edge of the hot pot. That Rachael is so clever.
The Mac 'n' Cheeseburger Pie is from Sandra Lee's, Money Saving Meals recipe book. This meal scored high with all five family members. Needless to say, I will be making this again. I've made many of the meals in the cookbook and continue to have each family member rate the dish from 0-10, 10 being the highest score. This has helped me look back and determine if I will make the dish again...or...not.

Diary of a Reading Kid & Father/Son carpentry project

I had to take a picture of this rare event in my home.  My munchkin reading on a Saturday afternoon instead of playing outside or propped in front of the tube.  No way! The amazing thing is that he finished this book by Sunday afternoon.  What book could be this captivating... to a boy..... well, it's Diary of a Wimpy Kid.   These pictures were taken last weekend.  
Oh, yeah baby!  He got the whole set as a birthday gift from Papa Pablo (grandpa).  That means I can rest assured he will meet his reading goal before his first report card.  Thank you Papa Pablo for making life easier for us.  I'm sure that's why Munchkin got the book set, right? ;)  No, actually, Munchkin got mula$$$ from Papa and he made a wise investment on these fabulous books.  All I know is that I'm happy there are some good books out there for boys to read.  Do you know how many times my son refuses to read a book because, "It's a girl book".  The only problem now, is that he already read three of the four books.  What will I do next?   I know.... I'll see if he's willing to read The Series of Unfortunate Events books.  My older kids loved those.
While my munchkin was reading last weekend, Father and eldest son were busy using their carpentry skills.  I am not a fan of Halloween, but I am a fan of dad and son bonding.  Their mutual goal to make our front yard a cemetery showed how well they work together.  Dad made all the cuts on the miter saw, and son was the architect.  "Pretty good", I said.  Well not good enough it turned out.  The wood was stained this weekend to look old and murky ("Oops" stain from The Home Depot). 
This is what our yard looks like now.  Yup, they also constructed crosses.  Well, at least we have a Christian cemetery in our front yard.  That makes me feel a tad better.

Easy Closet Make Over

Before

After

My son's small closet just wasn't cutting it any more.  He has been growing and we needed to raise the top half of his closet so his shirts would fit properly.  My hubby carefully removed the closet structures (so he could reuse dem).  We patched up the holes left behind with chalking he had in the garage.  I purchased a quart of "Oops Paint" at The Home Depot  years ago for a dollar (yup, one dolla).  It was just enough paint to give the closet two coats.  We had the bottom closet rod with the brackets already installed at the proper height, so we didn't have to touch that at all.

We already had what we needed, and this resulted in no out of pocket expense when we got to work.  

Should any of you not know what "Oops Paint" is, well let me share.  The Home Depot has a section (usually the end caps) where they discount paint that was not color matched to the customers liking.  Some colors could be quite offensive, but if you keep checking back, you could actually find a color you like.  These "oops" color failures are drastically marked down; making painting projects budget friendly.  For example, we painted our daughter's room with "Oops Paint" for only $10 (that was two gallons of Behr Paint).

Hubby's Birthday Weekend

I don't have pictures to share, but our weekend was full of activity and my hubby's birthday. Yipee, he made it another year! He enjoys watching his boys play their respective sports and he got plenty of that..... and some side line coaching. If ya know what I mean? The coaches might not of appreciated that too much. He also went mountain bike riding, and came back proud that he had conquered the terrain. He also heard some somber news about one of his favorite "rides" being destroyed by those horrible fires we had just a month ago. Last, but not least, we ate at V's favorite restaurant, Outback Steak House. I was flattered when he looked at me, and said that my steaks are tastier and next year he wants me to make his steak dinner. Aah, the food network has helped me develop some skills in the kitchen.

Bohemian Burlap Purse Tutorial

You will Need:

Empty rice bag

water proofer shoe spray

3 coordinating fat quarter fabrics

coordinating thread

Fabric to line the inside 

embroidery floss in coordinating color

1.  Spray the burlap rice bag with the water proofer spray.  Follow directions on the bottle.  I put on three coats.  This step is important.  If your bag gets wet, the print won't bleed.

2.  Press your quarter fabrics flat.  Cut 4 inch wide strips from the selvage edge from each quarter fabric.  Stack the 4 inch strips of the three fabrics neatly together.  Measure 4 inches from one end of the strips in and cut.  You will end up with three (3) 4 x4 inch piece (patch) since the strips are stacked together.  Using the same process cut remaining patches to measure 2.75 x4 inches, 1.50x4 inches, and 5x4 inches. Now, arrange the patches in a way that makes you happy.  On the reverse side, number each patch so that you know the order to sew them.

3.  Prepare your sewing machine with the thread.  Sew patch #1 and #2 together with a 1/4 inch seam, and right sides facing each other.  Sew patch #3 onto #2 with right side facing each other and continue until all of your patches are sewn on.  You end up with a long colorful strip in the arrangement that made your happy.

4.  Sew the outer ends of each seam on the right side of the fabric, as shown below.  This will add a decorative stitch and strengthen the strap.  Do this on every seam.  Fold the fabric length wise with right sides facing each other, matching up seams as much as possible.  Sew lengthwise with a 1/4 inch seam and finish off one end. If the patches don't match up perfectly, no worries, it won't show.  Turn it inside out through the opened end.  
5.  Press the strap with the length wise seam sitting in the center of the strap, as shown below.  Also, press the finished end into a point.  Fold the unfinished end into a point as well and hand sew it down without going through to the other side of the fabric.  This will be the underside of your strap.
6.  Sew your straps onto the burlap rice bag.  Sew along the perimeter of the point too (not shown, but the picture below shows the placement of a strap).  Visualize sewing a triangle since the strap ends in a point.  You might also want to zoom in to see the stitches, or you might want to see the original blog (here's the link).

7.  Now cut the fabric that will be the liner twice as wide as your rice bag.  Finish the top the the fabric with a 5/8 inch hem so that it sits just below the zipper, as shown below.  Sew the side and bottom of the liner.  Do not turn the liner inside out, leave it like that and put it in the rice bag.  I put a generous amount of rice in a ziploc bag and placed it inside the liner to keep it down and in place.

8.  With your embroidery floss hand stitch the top of your liner onto the rice bag.  Sew just underneath the zipper.  The embroidery floss will show on the outside of the bag so use evenly spaced and straight stitches.
To see how the final Bohemian Burlap Purse, click here.  I will make another tutorial for the fabric rose.  I want to include pictures along with the directions and I've reached my pix maximum for this blog.

I hope you have fun making this purse.  One of my favorite concepts about this sewing project is that I'm recycling.  I enjoy bringing new life to things that would otherwise be thrown away.  I've recycled curtains, old furniture, jewelry, beads and rice bags into something new and functional, how about you?  I'd love to hear what you've recycled into something new.