Covered Composition Books

I love buying those black & white bound composition books during those back-to-school shopping sales. But I really LOVE decorating them. Here are some I made for my niece & nephew.

What does it say about me that I still make lists in paper notebooks?

Probably that I need to make one for myself. My little notebook is nearly full of half-checked-off lists!

Supplies: Mead comp books
Left book: Lil' Davis Designs
Right book: Basic Grey

Fabric & Ribbon Poultry

I subscribe to lots of newsletters and read lots of blogs, and somewhere I saw these most adorable chickens!

Here's my version of "The Chickummyjig", which I think I found via WhipUp. It's a free pattern from Tania Ennor at http://www.myrtleandeunice.com/.

I am using all of my scraps to make as many of these chickens as possible. My son picked out the white fuzzy fabric for his chicken, and I have several brown fat quarters to make some more! The ribbon on the brown chicken legs is from American Crafts. The yellow fabric is about 12 years old, I can't remember who made it.

I'm thinking this is the birthday present all the little kids are going to get this year from me. They are so fun to make, and I laugh with joy when I am sewing them together.

Recent Pages

i've been scrapbooking for my family a lot lately, gearing up for a big project. i really enjoy doing these pages for us, too.

i went skiing this year, but how i got to do just that was pure serendipity. My word for the year is "do", and i made a list of all the things i wanted to do. i added "skiing" to the list because i really did want to go but i don't have skis or much experience. The next day i got an email from some workout buddies that they were arranging a ski day at Breckenridge and buddy passes were available. i could actually go that day and the buddy pass was so affordable! Then i had to figure out ski rental. The next day our paper highlighted The Ski Shop, which rents skis for the whole weekend. Yeah! So it really did all work out. It was so much fun and i met my goal of not requiring surgery at the end of the day. Boy, was i tired! A good tired.Here is a page depicting potty training. We seriously thought this would never happen, but it did and Curious George made it fun & successful. Phew!

My guys love spelunking, but since the little one can't say that, they really like caving. Everywhere. In bedrooms & under the dining room table. The big guy doesn't quite fit under the chair, though.

Inspiration Board

i'm taking a Big Picture Scrapbooking class called Re-Purpose, Re-think, Re-invent, taught by the one and only Jenni Bowlin. i'm a little behind, but catching up quickly. Our first project was to make an "inspiration board" for cool old stuff we find at flea markets, in our house, at goodwill, yard sales, wherever!

So i found an old 8"x10" frame and sanded it. i'm not really into blue so much anymore, but this blue feels nice and "old" to me. My grandma loved blue and had the clearest blue eyes. i have some of her old things, so i thought this frame would be a perfect fit for the class inspiration board. i sanded off some of the paint to make it feel more "antique".

Then i got out a very old pack of cork tiles i had meant to use for something else and cut it to a little smaller than the cardboard backing of the frame. i attached the cork to the cardboard with foam tape.


i found some old material that has little tiny grey-blue flowers on a tan background. i cut a piece with a 2 inch overlap, placed the cork on the wrong side, pulled the fabric tight and taped it to the cardboard with duck tape. Then i just laid the newly covered cork in the frame, pushed down the little staples that used to hold the glass & picture, and whallah, an inspiration board for my found treasures.

So far i have my Great-Grandma's buttons and rhinestone bird pin on the board. It may sit on my desk, or it may go on the wall.

Thanks for looking!

A New Pillow

This is my pillow. i got it for my 9th or 10th birthday (i'm now 36) from my mom's best friend, Patty. Patty made this out of scraps and it was my most treasured pillow for years. i loved stuff with my name on it. Now i mostly like stuff with the letter "A".


Years ago, i found this pillow again in my big box o' stuff from my childhood. i now have a beautiful niece named Macy. Only one letter difference! And she loves the color blue. Hmmm.


i finally did it! i took it apart, washed it, made a "C" out of a scrap piece of fabric in keeping with the original pillow, closed it up, and whallah, a new pillow.

Macy loved it! Yeah!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Regift 25 years later.

What i love to do

Hi! Welcome to my first post! In this blog i want to share what is "creative" to me. It's stuff i do-like make jam and can veggies and my household & life routines. It's stuff i make-like scrapbook pages & pillows & quilts & raised beds. It's stuff i think-like random ideas (good and well, it seemed good at the time). It's stuff i find-websites & scrapbookers & quilt ideas & home management & parenting.

i hope you enjoy. It's a big leap for me to put myself out there, but i think it's going to be worth it. Thanks for checking in on the ride.

-amy

The Start of Simply Striving

Why am i doing this? Putting myself out there?

Because i've been striving to be & do so many things that i thought i'd document the journey, the successes, the failures, the milestones, the projects, the ideas, the inspiration.