Category Archives: crafting

Feb 17 0 comments
crafting, food

How to turn store bought pizza crust into something delicious

  • Prepare yourself by constantly berating yourself about how much food waste you create.
  • Decide to build your child’s independence by allowing him to cook dinner.
  • Living with less-than-stellar planning ahead, decide that he’ll be using a pre-made crust for the pizza he wants to make.
  • Have a fun family experience.
  • Let time pass.
  • Feel judged by the pizza crust drying out in the fridge.
  • Feel judged by the cut red onion drying out in the fridge.
  • Throw the onion, some olive oil and about a handful of sliced almonds into a food processor.
  • Pastify it.
  • Spread the paste over the pizza crust.
  • Sprinkle with feta cheese.
  • Bake.
  • Enjoy.
Apr 05 0 comments
crafting, sewing

Wallet

I have been looking for the perfect wallet for years.

So today, to celebrate the beginning of Spring Break, I decided to make one. This is also a part of my decision to make sure that I don’t spend the entirety of the spring break just looking around on the internet. I am totally capable of doing that as I proved in December and then again in February. Many long weekends have been sucked in by the web as well.

Anyway, I found a wallet pattern (which I almost called a recipe) here. I made some teensy changes, one being a half-inch accident. The other change that I made was not to sew through all of the inside layers. I wanted to be able to put cash in the wallet for those rare cases when I actually do carry cash.

I wouldn’t call this a successful project, but I might try it again. I made some hasty mistakes in the beginning and by the end (knowing that I had already made mistakes) just rushed to get through it. I do like that my cards aren’t floating about in my purse and that in the rare occasion that I’m carrying cash, I won’t cram it in a pocket (to be forgotten and eventually laundered).

Nov 27 0 comments
crafting, decor, projects

Christmas craft!

I love the holiday season. And even though it is totally weird to go into the store and find both Halloween costumes and Christmas lights on display withing aisles of each other, I don’t mind seeing it. I love walking through aisles of peppermint candy, snowman shaped baking pans and nutcrackers. I love that there is glitter everywhere during this time of the season.

I am ready to put my Harry Conick Jr. Christmas CD on repeat.

Yes, I have in my possession this season’s wrapping paper. I also know what i’m doing about gift tags. There are bows in the closet waiting to be adhered to packages. I just think this stuff is so pretty!

But what, I asked myself, could I do today? Then it came to me: make a garland!! Text cannot properly convey the excitement that feels like delicate bubbles raising through my torso in a frenzy. Yes, I’m going to make a garland! I saw the idea years ago here and have meant to do it ever since. I did one thing differently. Instead of gluing this, I fastened it with eyelets.

Carpe diem, yo.

May 31 0 comments
clothes, crafting

T-shirts

Like everyone else you know, I have accumulated far too many t-shirts in the last few years.  In my recent attempts to get myself in order I was forced to acknowledge that I just have too many of them. Seriously, I don’t even store them with my other clothes. Well, not exactly. I keep them with my work out clothes, but I don’t work out in them because I feel like I am going to get tangled up in them. I tend to like my shirts snug. I like to know they’re there. I like shirts that give me a hug. I like hugs. Anyway, Here I am with a bunch of shirts which I never wear. Not even to sleep in. If I try to sleep in these, I really DO get tangled up.

BUT, I am somewhat sentimental about my t-shirts.  They’re hard to part with. Even when they still stink when they come out of the washing machine. So, I decided to re-purpose them. And with that, three scarves were born.

I made the first scarf and third scarfs according to a video on youtube, by Megan Nicolay, author of Generation T and its sequel. The second scarf required no sewing and was inspired by another video, which I can’t find right now.

No frogs were harmed in the making of these scarves.

May 30 0 comments
crafting, decor

Home

One of the things I have been working on in the last 7 months is really trying to turn my apartment into “home.” As soon as I type that out it seems contrived and hokey. It is one of those sentences that makes me think, what does that mean?, when I read it elsewhere.

I guess what I mean is that when I come home I want to think, “Aaah, I’m here.” I want to be immediately comfortable. I want to see something that gives me a tickle of thrill. Frankly, I am a bit of a homebody. Oh, sure, I enjoy having gone out and about once I’ve convinced myself to have done it, but I like to be at home too. I especially like it when I look around and see things that augment my mood.

While I have been working on it for a while, I have decided in the last few weeks to focus more directly on it.

I have focused most heavily on Alex’s room. I want him to love his room. I want him to feel special when he goes in there.  I think that I have had success in this area. He spends a lot of time in his room these days. There are a couple more things I want to do in there, but the basic room has taken shape.

The living area is getting better, but is not where I want it, yet. I have some ideas that I am unsure how to implement. And then there are the things that are just a matter of doing them. The kitchen is what it is. My bedroom has a way to go. But I am glad to say that the bookshelf is in much better condition. Speaking of condition, I have to do something about the closets.

I’m also trying to turn the hallway into sort of exhibit space for Alex’s art. While I am not the parent who is preciously preserving every bit of it, I want him to feel good about what he has up there. I have added some things I’ve done so that he can see his stuff right up there with mine. I smile every time I walk past an owl he drew.


I turned this lamp into something I could better live with with the assistance of a can of spray paint. I was made to show ID and promise not to huff it.

Step by step, day by day, I’m getting there.

Feb 22 0 comments
crafting

Hail to the Chief

I once lived in an apartment for two years without ever appropriately decorating. This is not right, as I like to look at things. Colorful things. Lots of them. It was another time, a rough time full of driving, driving and more driving. Some of it turned out to be worth it, other of it turned out not to be worth it. But such is life. We make choices.

I have been living in my current spot for about four and a half months. It is already more decorated than the place where I had lived for a couple of years. But, I am determined not to let this fall off the radar. I like to make stuff. I like to draw stuff. But, like before, time remains the issue. Time, I guess, is always the issue. Make some, or not.

So, I decided that today would be the day that I take up a bare spot on the wall with an image that would make me smile every time I looked at it. The official seal of the US Presidency. I uploaded the image to be rasterbated, then laminated the results. The trickiest part was figuring out how I was going to stick it together. I wanted this to be neat.  The answer turned out to be double sided tape. And then there was the trip to the office supply store for an additional ink cartridge. Ah, the life of a crafting writer…always in need of ink.

And a project was born.