NYC!

Thought I'd post some pics of our trip to NYC. It was a little hairy trying to keep 8 people together especially when two like to wander. Yes the 74 year old FIL and the 3 year old, and then there is the 77 year old MIL who was an amazing trooper given that she has a bum knee, replaced in October, and it made for an eventful three days!

Cool 12 year old in NYC

Radio City Music Hall Chandy....I think it'll look fabulous in my foyer!

Getting up at 4:30am will do this to ya. Poor baby

Cool 8 year old with her 3d glasses. Wish I had the pic of my FIL in them as well. Priceless.

Times Square 2012 Ball

Haven't changed the year yet!

Hershey Store, a must see if you are a woman in need of chocolate

Campbell Apartment in Grand Central. This is the ceiling!!!!

Window of the apartment. 

Grand Central Station ceiling. Another ceiling, I must always be looking up. It has constellations on it and lights at location of the stars. Jackie Kennedy was the one who orchestrated the restoration of the station. So glad she did. Gorgeous.

The ball that was between the North and South tower on 9.11 and the eternal flame in front. I am amazed and thankful that more of it was not destroyed.

Always looking for inspiration

North Tower Pool. You must make a journey here. You cannot help but be moved to tears from touching the names of the individuals who gave there lives that day. I can not describe it to you. It is something that must be experienced for yourselves.

Freedom Tower. Only 14 more floors to be completed!

With Love to you this Christmas. May God richly bless you this coming year. I love you guys.

Always being renewed,

Recycled sweater skirts

AHHHHHHHH! I have been without Internet for about 5 days now because my wireless thingy is intermittent. So I am going to try and post while I have access. We shall see how this goes. This was what I was going to post 5 days ago so if it sounds stale, it probably is after all it has been sitting around that long.

I get about 1.2 million catalog in the mail at Christmas time. It is something I look forward to every year. NOT. I have to hide the toy catalogs from the kids so they don’t go into toy overload and get that glassy eyed look adults usually get from too much , well, too much.

Every once and a while one raises my interest and I feel like I might find something that I have never seen before and so it is worth looking through while I have 2 minutes in the bathroom. ALONE.

Uncommon Goods was one of those catalogs and Tuesday, November 30^th  was one of those days when I had those two minutes. Alone. I found the most adorable A-line skirt made of recycled cotton skirts! Thought of several ways to cleverly suggest this to my husband and then I looked at the price. $54!!

No way Santa Fe. Not when I have a sewing machine and I am not afraid to use it. So off to the Goodwill to score some sweaters and make a skirt for myself.  Merry Christmas to me.  On the way with my two smallish lima beans, Izzy and Tessa, I thought “why not make matching skirts for all three of us?” Now why that thought hit me is up for CSI investigation because never in my life have I wanted to make matching anything for anybody. But that day it seemed like a good idea.


We managed to get 8 sweaters for $37 and I made 6 sweater skirts.  Why 6? I am glad  you asked!. We went to NYC to celebrate my IN-laws 50^th (woot, woot!) anniversary and and we were going to see the Rockettes Christmas Spectacular so I thought we might need some spectacular new Christmas sweater skirts for the occasion.  Not the ugly Christmas sweater party kind.

The first set is below. I love the jewel tones of the skirts and each of the girls got a pocket. Which we all know is tres chic with the 3-8 year old crowd.

 3 blondies, two honest to goodness, one not so much

 Mine

Izzy's

Teeny Tessa's

I am sure I will find all kinds of treasures in here after she is done wearing it!

The second set is for the Rockettes show cuz we kicked up our heels and rocked those skirts. We decided we would make the skirts look like peppermint sticks for the girls and just the girls as 42 year old women should know their limits.

At first these looked like cheer leading skirts  then like Santa skirts when I added the black band.  HMMM.  Needs something.  Rockettes inspire me will ya?  Sequins, of course, why didn’t I think of that. 

Miss Sassy herself

So sequins were added quick as a wink. It really was as easy as you might think!

Is anyone else feeling like I am writing a Christmas poem instead of a blog post here?

Two cute candy sticks

I kept mine simple but festive and I think it will be an all occasion skirt for me! I am in love with these skirts ands  apparently everyone else is as well because I was literally stopped no less than 6 times at work and asked where I got the skirt.  Since this is sew super easy ( I love puns in case anyone cares)  as soon as I get this WIFI thing fixed, I’ll post the tutorial and you all can make one for your bad selves and your own little elves.

What do you think?

Linking here:

Always being renewed,

Easy Vase Flower Arranging

Sorry for being so silent lately. With a birthday and a trip to NYC this past week, I've been crazier than usual, if that is possible. But I am so glad to be back and now I am full swing into decorating the house because I am hosting my annual cookie exchange this weekend. I am never this late but some years you have to say "whateva" and do what you can.  I'll post some pics of the abode when I get a minute. You do know that could be well into next year, right? Just didn't want you holding your breath and then I'd be responsible for all 25 of my readers fainting dead away. Not good for Christmas spirit.

So while I was decorating I wanted to use some branches from our concolor tree around the house. It is thick, so soft, (really concolors have the biggest softest needles I tell ya'), and BIG. With all of our mismatched ornaments on it, it looks like happiness threw up all over it. Beautiful chaos.

But as usual, I ran into the age old problem of how to make the branches look good in the vase.

Well, tonight I am going to share a little trick to use to make your flower (branch) arranging go much smoother. Have you ever tried to put plain branches in a clear vase?



These look so perfect! How did they do it at House Beautiful?  Mine used to look like a middle school dance with all the branches standing at the edge of the vase, no one lookin' at the other. Then I put on some great hip hop music and the branches decided to mingle. 


The secret is clear tape!



Add tape to the lip of the vase like above. If you have thinner branches add a few more lines of tape to the grid.

Then add your branches inside the grid openings. No I do not decorate for Christmas in golds and oranges. It is just I had these pictures from Thanksgiving and did you read the first part of this post about having no time?

 Ignore the Barbie's in the background. They are getting their hair done at the salon. Instead look at how nice and straight the middle branches are.

Keep your taller branches in the middle and the shorter ones to the outside and you will always have a great arrangment!

Enjoy decorating your humble home and don't forget to give generously to others this season.  Be it gifts of food, gifts of time and service to others, or just plain old presents given with a joyful heart.......Give and be invited into the bigger picture of life and love.

Always being renewed,

Croc tables at home

Savannah Auger, of Libertas Designs, sent me some photos of the crocodile tables I did for her in their new home!


First of all, let me say that Savannah was such a pleasure to work with. She was open to ideas on how to finish the fabric insets and she was very timely in getting me the fabric. Just what you want in a client.

Here they are in their new home, her bedroom. They are dreamy aren't they?

Love the head board and the lamps! Savannah said she has plans to wallpaper the wall behind the bed and there are some mirrors that will be installed above the tables. That is going to look fabulous. And speaking of looking fabulous.....

 This is Savannah! She had to be the model for her own photo shoot when some plans fell through and these show that sometimes plans were meant to fail!  These photos look great, edgy and glam all at the same time and plus I always like seeing the person behind the creations.

Secondly, I am glad I did not know who she was when I agreed to collaborate with her on the tables because I think I would have fainted dead away. I didn't know I was working for such a glamorous lady and one that makes such fabulous shoes!  So don't forget to jump motor on over to her website and take a look at creativity in another medium. Very Posh!




Always being renewed,

Baby footprint ornament

This is the last in the baby keepsake display series.  You can see the others in the series here, here, and here.

I saved the best for last because it is made for the season. It is a baby footprint ornament. Your baby's actual footprints on a glass Christmas ornament! How sweet is that?

Pretty sweet

This is what you need:

 white contact paper, large glass ornament, etching acid cream, paint brush, carbon paper, 1/4 inch vinyl letters, your baby's footprints. X-acto knife not shown because as usual I've forgotten something when I try to take my "tools you'll need" pic. I also realize I am dating myself with the carbon paper. I have had this for years so I don't even know if you can buy the stuff anymore!

I would say if you can not find carbon paper then take a pencil and color all over the back of the footprint very well. When you trace it it will transfer the graphite outline.

 Reduce the prints on a copier to about 70% for a large glass ball. If you can only find small glass balls, then I think you'd want to reduce them to 50%. It occurs to me that this would be the perfect diet if all we had to do was sit ourselves on the copier and press "reduce" by 50%!

Back to reality, take a square of contact paper about 3x5, lay a piece of carbon paper over it and top it with the reduced sized prints.
 Trace the print like above. Try to highlight the big crevices and notches, and not the little ones so much. Too hard to do with the X-acto knife

 Both little feet traced

Using the X-acto knife, cut out the footprints 

 Peel of the backing paper and lay on the glass. Once positioned well, press out the air bubbles. I used  my fingernail and just rubbed back and forth several times to adhere it well.

 Do each one of the toes the same way and this is what it will look like completed.

 Turn it over and use the vinyl letters to spell out your baby's name or initials. You can also add the birth date if you like. Yo pretty much have to eyeball the placement and start with the middle letters and work out on either side to make sure it all looks kosher. Sorry, I think that is the wrong word for this holiday post.

 Now turn it over and put it on a chopstick in a glass; you know my penchant for sophisticated tools

 Cover the glass ball entirely in the etching cream. Remember to put it on rather thickly and I also paint the footprints by starting ON the contact paper and moving out that way there is less chance that if I didn't seal the edge as well as I thought I did, I won't be brushing the cream under the lip of the contact paper. Not a worry with the letters.

 Covered like a snowball.  Let this stand for about 5 minutes. Then lift it off of the stick and cover the opening before running the whole thing under warm water! You do not want water getting inside the globe. You can't see the etching if you do until the insides dry out. Trust me.

Dry it off.

If you see some spots where it did not get covered well, just go back over those spots again with the cream, being very careful not to get the cream on the name or the footprints. Rinse again as above.

 I add a few pink beads and a bow to the top

 And now you have your baby's footprints to savor every Christmas

 See, I told you it was sweet

Always being renewed,

Linking with:  http://funkyjunkinteriors.blogspot.com/ Saturday Nite Special 112