I love instagram!

Hello there!  I had high hopes for this week.  I wanted to post here, print out some pictures for scrapbooking, tidy the house and spend lots of time with my kids.  But, for various reasons, none of that is happening.  But I shant complain!

I have a ton to share.  We've gone on some road trips and such.  Hmm...maybe not a ton, but lots.  :D  But given my exhaustion from doing a bunch of nothing, that will have to wait 'til later.

I just thought I'd quickly tell you that I've joined instagram.  I didn't get the hubbub at first (I'm always late to the party), but I just love it!  You can see my feed HERE.  Nothing special, just me sharing stuff.  I would love to share beautiful photos like the people I follow, but I just don't see a whole lot of beauty around me.  I'm slowly (a.k.a. lazily) trying to change that. :)

I'll also share a funky project I completed.  I think I mentioned that I got a new car.   Sadly, as comfy and gadget-laden as my minivan was, I'm just not (100% not) a minivan kind of person.  It was an impulse buy, highly (completely) driven by jj.  I have a thing about cars.  I want mine to reflect my personality. Well my new car (truck?) does that.  It's a relatively rugged ORV, and he needed that extra erica touch.  So I made him a bunting! 

I made it out of a tarp.  I hadn't realized it was jj's only tarp, but how perfect is it?  Anyway, he's so me, and I absolutely love him.  He's going to take us to fun places, like...

...sand dunes.  Or not.  I swear we almost got stuck.  Maybe with different tires... 

Anyhoo, I'd better get back to my nothing.  Hopefully I'll get to those pics soon...

One happy momma...

"use me erica, use me!" said the pile of loveliness.

Hello there!  It's a lovely day today.  The morning was dreary but now it's sunny and cool.  I prefer this sort of day.  The dreary morning makes me appreciate the sun.  And it keeps it a bit cooler...not to say that it's been particularly warm yet.  Unfortunately we have some butterflies we need to release, but this week has been in the 50's (yet last week it was in the 70-80's) and it's too chilly for them.

isn't he funky looking?  It was hard to get a good pic through the mesh.

Mother's day is well past, but I must show you the lovely surprise jj brought home for me!  An iPad!

I was so happy!  And a pink case even! Needless to say I bought Mollie Makes straight away.  I love the real thing, but at less than half the price...well, you can't beat that!  I may buy the real thing once in a while if I really want the little gift.

I also got the Home issue.  I'd passed it up at the store because of the price, but digitally I could justify it.

wow, this pic is really out of focus...

One thing I just had to buy the real thing for was Flow's second paper issue.  It has a bunting!  I adore buntings.  Love, love, love....LOVE!

*sigh*

It looks rather lovely on my relatively-unadorned wall, don't you think?

I wanted to show you these sequins I bought.  Aren't they pretty?  I have no idea what I'll use them for though.  I bought them from Studio Calico, so they were intended for card making or scrapbooking, but I feel like I should make something that showcases them.  Hmm...

Well, I hope we all have a lovely weekend.  Monday is a holiday for the US, so that's something to look forward to.  Suddenly I have a craving for grilled food...  :D

Some new goodies

A little bunting I made for our bedroom door with vintage sheets and alpha stickers

Yes, I did talk about saving money in my last post, but I posted that after I bought this stuff... 0:D  Let's talk about this saving money business.  My intention is to save my spending money...the money set aside each month for my pure enjoyment, i.e. crafting goodies.  But there are ways I should be saving for the whole family.  Namely, my friend Starbucks...

I love me a good, naughty beverage.  I was never one of those people who couldn't function without their coffee in the morning.  I totally didn't understand that.  But you know what I've noticed?  I have a significantly more productive afternoon if I have my delicious hazelnut macchiato, or vanilla latte.  Mmm...  And I eat less too.  But here's the kicker, I have a perfectly good, functioning espresso machine!  I own the syrups!  I own the beans!  Why am I not making my own?  That's way cheaper than getting Starbucks.

jj suggested that maybe I'm a little addicted to the actual procurement of the drink, the drive, the saying hello to an actual person (being a stay at home affords me little interaction, you know).  But is that worth $4?  No.

So anyway, on to the goodies.  I got Denyse Schmidt's Chicopee line.  It's funny, I'm not even 100% in love with her lines.  I like her lighter, brighter collections, but none truly sing to me.  And yet I seem to have quite the extensive collection all the same.  Not sure what's up with that...

These are my favorites from the line.  Unfortunately the orange on the first two is only present in these two fabrics, and the rest of the oranges are darker.  That lime print is interesting.  And the blue almost has a pixelated (is that a word?) feel to it.

I suppose one could argue that I have too much fabric...where am I going to put this?

I also got Color Me Retro.  I *love* this red.  It's bright and happy.  The blue is pretty nice too.

I'm rather excited to look through my new books!  I'm anxious to see what Selina Lake's new book is like.  I don't want to get my hopes up, because I don't think anything can live up to her Homespun Style.

 I hope you have a lovely week!   :)

I have a goal!

 Hello there!  I haven't blogged in forever, I know.  But today I felt the need.  I'm on a mission.  I *must* stop spending money!  must, must, must!  I don't need more things.  And we're talking about craft things, of course.  Do I want more?  Oh yes, I certainly do.  Am I in love with 3/4 of the new things that come out?  Indeed.  And why, I ask, must they release new things so often?  And why must I have such a broad range of likes?  Ugh...this is going to be quite the task, indeed.  I give it a week before I start going crazy!  :D

I haven't been keeping up on my blogs lately.  Maybe I've been too busy browsing the online shops.  Blog reading is difficult too.  Don't you find that you can see something in an online shop and feel blah about it, but then you see what someone's actually done with it suddenly you *need* it?  I do...all the time.

I would love it if you would share, in the comments, tips and tricks you've used to try not to spend money.  Maybe you have a fun story, or are trying to do the same thing.

I haven't been up to a ton.  I've mostly been scrapbooking because my paper-fun table is in my craft room, but my sewing table is not.  At least that's my excuse.  I started doing this thing called Project Life this year.  It's quite nice.

Here's a page I just recently finished...

Nothing special, but I just loved that trip and so the photos make me super-happy.

The pic at the top of the post is something I made with my silhouette machine.  I saw something similar, a print, on etsy and just loved it.  I just stuck strips of some of my vintage sheets behind the cutouts.  The one on etsy had a cute girl on, and was therefore much cuter than mine, but I'm thinking I might cut out a flower from a vintage sheet and put it in the white space.  

We had a special visitor to the bird feeder recently.  He's a pileated woodpecker.  He's huge...and loud.  Love him.

Hopefully I'll be writing more often now that I won't be shopping.  But I've said that before, haven't I?  :D

lazy days...

a little hexagon project in progress

Hello there!  Can you guess what I'm going to say?  I can't believe summer vacation is almost over!  It went by so quickly!  It's like I don't pay attention to the day or month until suddenly there's only a week left.  As in years before, I had so many plans and so few were carried out.  And if you ask me what I've been up to, well I can't really think of much!  ugh...

Well, we did go to an airshow.  It was great fun.  I think it's the happiest I've seen jj in a while.  He's just too stressed at work, and home, and everywhere...

this is my favorite plane.  I like the big, fat ones.  :D

I am however looking forward to autumn...not to winter...not to saying goodbye to the sun...not to rain.  I miss a nice autumn back east (I live on the west coast of the US now), but any autumn will do.  I love Halloween (the decorating mostly) and pumpkins, hayrides and corn mazes.  But let's not wish away the tiny bit of summer we have left...

I know I said I'd show you my craft room, but I haven't gotten around to taking any serious pictures yet.  I've been trying to organize and whatnot.  My paper craft supplies are quite a mess.  And of course I've decided and re-decided how to sort my fabric.  :)

When I was first putting together the room I was surprised by how small my fabric stash was...I had thought it was much bigger.  I thought maybe I didn't need another cabinet, I could put both paper and fabric in one...

Oh how wrong I was...yikes!

this is the fabric (yum!)

There's even fabric behind the fabric!  I really need to start making stuff...

Here's my paper cabinet...in progress.  I'm trying to organize it.  There's much more space now.  (It looks like a lot more than it really is.)  0:D

look at the mess already!  I put a curtain over my door because my curtains weren't up on the window yet.  that's fixed...

 You want to know my favorites?  The vintage fabrics and sheets!

Some of my favorite-favorites are from Junette @ patternlike

I've been trying to spiffy up the house a little bit.  It's really been lacking for...years.  I've been in a rut for...years.  :D  I finally got around to putting up my vintage, crocheted pot holder collection.  I think it looks nice.  It would look even better with some new paint...and some new curtains.  On the right, you can just barely see the fork and spoon hangings I painted bright orange.  I'm very happy with my two new IKEA lamps as well.  (psst...I LOVE IKEA!!!) :D

you've got to love the hawaiian bread package in the corner...nice.

I also made a wreath for the front door some time ago.  I can't say I love it...it leaves quite a bit to be desired, but it's welcoming all the same.  (And I'm too lazy to fix it up.  I originally planned to put a bunting that said welcome on it...)   :D

this poor door needs some paint too

Well that's enough show and tell for now.  I thought about breaking this up into multiple posts, hmm...I could make them and then not publish until later...  If I don't do it now I just plain won't get around to it, you know?

Hopefully we can chat again soon!  Until then...

A peek

Hello there!  I'm back!  :)  And with news...well, sort of news.  My room is (practically) finished!  Just the window moulding is left.  Ahh, it's the best room in the house, by far.  And I shall have a reveal of sorts very soon.  I haven't actually used it yet though.  For one thing, we've been vacationing and visiting, and another, it's going to be hard to leave my dining room-crafting ways.  It's rather cozy in here.  I'm right where the action is and all.  But I do hope to bring some action into my room.  Give the kids fun things to work on and whatnot.  Here's a peak!

I love my door!

I love my knob!

So for now I'll show you some pictures of what we've been up to.  :)

We went camping about a month ago.  It was COLD.  In the mid 40's (that's 5C for my int'l friends.  Is that right?  My calculator says so, but that sounds so cold...)

the river was loud.  my girl asked if they turned it off at night.  :D

 The campfire was my friend, to say the least.  And I believe* I broke my little toe 2 weeks before, so it was a little unhappy, but luckily it didn't hurt once we started walking for extended bits of time.  I guess it warmed up my foot.  Yay. (*I never went to the doctor, but when I smacked it against the concrete I heard a snap, and it's still swollen looking after almost 2 months.  Yes, I know, I should go to the doctor.)

brr

love this place.  so beautiful.

such beautiful weeds

And then my parents came for a visit, and we took a drive east...

there's little I like better than mountains.  they call to me, "erica, come visit us..."

Well, I hope to post again soon with some craft room eye candy.  I hope you'll love it as much as I do.  :)

A creative mess...

Well hello there!  :)  I'm very happy to say it's Thursday!  Thursday is my second favorite day of the week.  It's filled with the anticipation of Friday, the first best day.  I imagine some people prefer Saturday, but I enjoy looking forward to it instead.  :)

Today my girl's class had a mother's day tea party.  It was fun.  I, unfortunately, had to join the class in a 'chicken dance.'  I'm not big on doing such things...  I made lemon-poppyseed cupcakes and lemon bars for the occasion.  Unfortunately, I have some extras...fewer now than this morning.  0;D

I don't have any finished projects to share with you today.  I hate to use such terms, but I imagine I might be considered as having ADD.  I can't stand to focus on (aka finish) one thing at a time.  So right now I still have that bunting to finish, I've started on another pillow project, I bought a crochet pattern (one of SO many I desire to do) and I'm putting fabrics in hoops.  Oh, and I started on my Single Girl a while back (it's going to take me forever).

Here is the beginnings of my new pillow project. 

note the classic foot-in-photo shot.  lovely socks... :D

I ran out of buttons to cover!  Don't you absolutely hate it when you want to do something and you don't have what you need?  Agh!!!  On the left you can see some of my yummy beads (I made a few pairs of earrings the other day) and my hoops in progress,

I love the threads too...

I hesitate to show you my ugly blue carpet, but you know, it is what it is, and there are too many other things to do before we replace it (she says with disappointment). :)

I can't wait to show you the super-cute crochet pattern I bought, but for whatever reason I can't seem to bring myself to sit and work on it...strange.

These are some leftover bits of fabric from my button making.  I like the shape...

And lastly, a funny little story.  My girl takes a card making class after school.  The other day she said she made our cat a card.  Well she actually 'gave' it to her.  The cat was on jj's truck. It was so cute...

Hope you have a great weekend!  :)