Lessons from 2012

It's that time of year again.

Source: 25.media.tumblr.com via FrouFruGal on Pinterest

 

I love that I have my blog as record of some of the things I've done this year. Since I've only managed to produce 44 posts this year, there are obviously a lot of things that went on this year that I did not post about like this scripture bag I made for my sister but then never showed anyone.

Obviously, I was in a grey and yellow mood in January, mostly because I made a winter coat for my daughter out of the yellow wool (also something I did not blog about). Last winter was so mild she only got to wear it a few times, but she has it in the mission field with her this winter and she's getting more use out of it now.

Without further ado, here are some of the things I did in 2012.

In January, I used leftover fabric for the bag and the wreath. I made my Sweater Wreath, which I loved and still do. It's on my door again this month.

It has held up pretty well and I love all the fun felt flowers in it. Lesson learned from this project is that you don't always have to know the end result when you start a project. I made this up as I went along and got a real thrill out of the creative process. It was a very fun project and I realize that I need more projects to just let my creativity loose and see what happens.

In February, I introduced you to my plan for my Master Bedroom Makeover and I also created my Fridge Chalkboard Menu.

I really liked having a plan on my fridge where I could see it, even though I didn't always follow the plan which one son was very vocal about pointing out. He would complain that his tongue was calibrated for the scheduled item and once tongue calibration has occurred, nothing else will satisfy. I left this on the fridge at the old house for someone else to use and enjoy. I plan to cut a new one for my fridge just as soon as I find the box with my Silhouette machine in it.

March was busier with a Sister Palooza trip to Las Vegas as well as moving ahead in my Master Bedroom Makeover plans. I made some Pleated Pillow Shams for our bed.

Lesson learned: Pretty pillow shams are great, but pleated ones get wrinkled when you put them on the pillows that you sleep on. While I see no point in doing the pillow shuffle every night, I either have to resign myself to ironing the pillow shams if I want them to look pretty, or I need to make new ones for the pillows we sleep on.

In April, I worked on the bedroom in earnest. I knocked out the Custom-Designed Chair,

some Industrial Lighting for our bed wall

and the sewing project that nearly did me in, my Knock Off Pottery Barn Quilt.

Lesson learned from everyone of these projects is the same: beautiful things are worth the effort..

In May, I hand-stamped a drop cloth to make some fabric for a Bench Slipcover.

Lesson learned: Check color of drop cloth against other bed linens before diving in to project. I think I would have liked this better if I had bleached the drop cloth first. It is just slightly off in color against the cream of our matelassé quilt (shown above) and the white of the Pottery Barn Knock Off Quilt.

In June I made my Bicycle Planter, which has to be one of my favorite projects of the year.

Lesson learned: Don't put time, effort and energy into something that isn't yours. This bike was abandoned on the property at our old house. It was junky and hanging in the back of the barn behind a bunch of crap. I assumed since they didn't take it with them, they didn't want it. I was wrong. I'm on the hunt for another bike for our new house, but I still wish I could have kept this one.

In a close race for favorite project of the year is my Drop Cloth Subway Art ("This girl really likes her drop cloths," said in her best Jim Gaffigan voice).

This one was finished days before we got the memo that we had to find a new house. Thankfully, we found a new house in Lexington so I didn't have to add to the sign. I told Hubs that if we ever move to a different location than one listed here, I will have to start hanging hooks from the bottom with addendums to the sign.

Lesson learned: personal, meaningful items are a vital addition to one's bedroom. Hubs loves this sign as much as I do. Since I have failed to rehang it our new bedroom, he lovingly suggested a new home for it the other day. Is there any question as to why I love this man? He gets me. He really gets me.

August was spent packing, driving all over Ohio with my niece and nephew for their visit, getting Katie back on schedule after 4 months in Utah, getting the boys ready for school and moving. I only had one post in August and that was the Pallet Board Shelf I'd made for my bedroom in July.

Lesson learned from this project was that simple, easy projects are a good thing. I love the juxtaposition of the hard, worn wood with the soft, delicate baby gown. I'm contrary like that, I guess.

In September, since I was recovering from a stomach flu like no other as well as the trials of August, I showed my Master Bedroom Reveal which was actually finished a few days before we were told we needed to find a new house. *Sigh*

I'm glad for the experience of doing faux pallet wood wall project, but I won't be doing this project again in our new home. Our bed is in front of a wall that has plaster over brick and I'm excited to expose the brick. However, I might be persuaded to do a faux pallet wall in one of the boys' rooms.

Lesson learned: it's okay for projects to take time to complete. It was a big undertaking to redo our bedroom. I made or painted or created nearly all the items in this project. It would not have taken me so long if I just went out and bought stuff for our room, but it also wouldn't have meant as much to Hubs and I or had reflected our personalities and our life together so well.

This room had elements we both loved and it has things that remind us of our history together, making it a very special place for us to be together. I need to make time as soon as possible to recreate this atmosphere in our new home because it is important to live in a place that gives you joy.

October was a blur. I was sick. I was sewing. I was helping get the girl child ready for a mission. We did manage to take some family photos before the girl left and I was happy with the results.

I love my people!

By November I'd bounced back a bit and managed to take a break from all my driving to decorate my buffet. It remains one of the only places "decorated" in my house, unless you count the deer hide Hubs tacked up on the wall a few weeks ago. I do not count that.

The boys, however, have declared it "freaking awesome!" and have claimed this space as the man-cave. Since the room is clad in either brick or barn wood, it does lend itself well to the deer hide and shotgun school of décor.

Anyhoo, the buffet was fun to decorate and it reminded me that living in a house is not the same as living in a home.

We'd been living in the house since the end of August amidst boxes and stuff. It wasn't until early November when I decorated the buffet and shelf that it started to feel a little bit like our home. We have a long ways to go, but I realized how important it is to spend time on our home.

Another lesson learned: a wide-angle lens is a must for our new home!

Finally, in December, I showed you The Girl Tree, but more importantly, I made The Man Tree.

Lesson learned - It is absolutely vital to my sanity to exercise my creativity on a regular basis. Being creative is my joy and my happy. It's not just enough for me to clean or repair or refinish or reorganize. I have to create something. It is that simple.

So, there are the highlights of 2012. Even though we had some challenges and I have not been as creative the last half of the year as I would like, I feel so incredibly blessed for what I have been able to do this year.

I have a home and a family and the capacity to learn and grow. I have my faith in my Savior, Jesus Christ, which fills me with peace and joy through the highs and lows of my life. I have been so tremendously blessed with good friends, both in real life and online, who encourage and support me. I appreciate you all so much.

Thank you for sharing this year with me. I look forward to an amazing New Year and have some great things in store for my blog and my life.

Suesan

Silent Night

We just wrapped up reading our the Christmas story from Luke 2. I have all my boys home and after the story we let Katie pick the song we would sing. She chose Jingle Bells. She danced and mimicked driving the sleigh as we sang. It was adorable and one of the very precious moments.

We live out in the country. It snowed the other day and tonight, in the peace of my home, the song seems much more real to me.

This is my first Christmas with one of my children not at home. Last week was hard but I'm doing better this week. Despite missing my daughter, I am so grateful for this time to reflect on the birth of Christ, my Savior.

I am so grateful for his birth and his life and the gift of the atonement he gave to the world. I am grateful to know that my Savior lives.

No matter what your religious belief is, I wish you much joy and love and the opportunity to be surrounded by friends and family. Life is such a precious gift. Each moment we have with our families is a moment to treasure.

I am very grateful for all the wonderful family and the many dear friends I have in my life. I am so very blessed and I am trying to be better at recognizing the many gifts and blessings in my life.

I will celebrate my 48th birthday on Wednesday. It's not the best day of the year to have a birthday, and I can't say I'm all that excited about closing in on 50. Despite the AARP jumping the gun on inviting me to join their ranks, I'm happy to enjoy the last couple years of my 40s. Thanks, AARP, you sure do know how to make a girl feel good. My boys have not stopped teasing me for officially being "old," after all, I now have a card that proves it.

Even in my "old" age, I am looking forward to another year to improve my life, to reach some goals and maybe even fulfill a dream or two. I am excited so see what additional blessings await me this year.

May all the peace and joy of the season be yours. As you enjoy the celebrations of the holidays, please be safe. If you drink, please do NOT drive. Not ever.

Merry Christmas and a Happy, Joyous New Year.

Suesan

The Man Tree

Last week I told you the story of The Girl Tree and how that became a tradition in our home. This year, I started a new tradition. The MAN tree. See, every year when Ryley and I would decorate the Girl Tree, Hubs and the boys would often grumble and say, “Why don’t we have Boy tree? We’re going to make one and put fishing lures on it and Duck Tape stars and shotgun shells.”

Lots of talk, but no action. They certainly weren’t going to make one, but this year, I had the old Girl Tree that wasn’t being used for anything. I decided it was time to finally make a boy tree. Since my “boys” now all tower over me by at least 9 full inches, I figured it should really be called the MAN tree.

If you follow me on Facebook, you may have seen some of the ornaments for the tree as I made them. I shared several of the ornaments because I just was having so much fun. I started by using a vintage minnow bucket that I bought at a garage sale this summer for $3. I put a string of lights in the bucket to make it glow.

This one isn’t my actual bucket, but mine looks just like this. Being anxious to bring my tree to life, I started putting the tree together before I thought to take a picture of my bucket without the tree in it.

I just lifted the lid up and stuck the tree in. I don’t have anything weighing the bucket down because the tree stays upright without it. If I had the tree in a different location, though, I’d definitely weight the bucket.

I made a trip up to Glen’s Surplus, a local military surplus store to shop for decorations. I’d bought a bunch of washers that I was going to string together on fishing line for garland, but after finding some chain, I took the easy way out. You can see a bit of the chain in the picture above.

I wasn’t planning on making more garland for the trees other than the chains, but one idea I had for an ornament was to glue gun casings to a washer to make a wreath. That idea was a bust when I didn’t have the right kind of glue to make the casings stick and hot glue wasn’t working. I ended up making a garland out of the casings, like twig garland Donna at Funky Junk made.

When I got the idea to use the bullets, I called Hubs at work and asked him where there the nearest shooting range was. Apparently, he thought that was one of the sexiest questions I have ever asked him. Hubs gave me the number to a shooting range by our house and when I called the owner and told him about my tree, he invited me over to pick up what I wanted. Score!

Now, is this manly Christmas garland, or what?

From the supplies I was able to pick up at the surplus store, I managed to make a few ornaments, like this washer/nut snowflake.

I just hot glued the washers together in a pattern that I liked. In fact, if you look closely, you can see I wasn’t even all that neat about it. Oops. A little ribbon through the middle and you’ve got an industrial, manly snowflake.

I knew I wanted to make some Monkey Fist Bulbs for the tree. If you haven’t seen it, I used the Monkey Fist knot last year as drawer pulls for my Double-Wide Ombre Dresser that I made.

The surplus store sells a lot of paracord, and with leftover beads for the center of the knots, I whipped these up for the tree. You can watch this YouTube video to see how to make the Monkey Fist knot.

I also made a Good Luck Knot ornament from the paracord.

You can watch this YouTube video to learn how to make one. Since I was in a knot-tying mood, I decided to make some other knot ornaments. I used some twine for some other bulb ornaments. This knot is called the tiny globe knot.

I made a larger one with three strands instead of two and a larger wooden ball for the center. You can see it here next to the scout ornament. Every year we try to buy an ornament that represents things that happened throughout the year. Noah worked at a scout camp this summer, hence the scout ornament.

I used some leather lacing that I had in my craft supplies to tie a Celtic Tree of Life Knot that I think looks a bit like a wreath.

I decided to make Santa Suit ornaments out of the spent shotgun shells. I used a Magic Eraser to clean up the shells. The words on the casings came right off. I drew the belt on with a Sharpie and used silver Duck Tape for the buckle. I tied some twine around the top to hang it on the tree.

Some of the other ornaments were just swiped from the family tree. Like the bike for Hubs for the years he was in a bike race and won.

I got this lantern for Hubs last year when I discovered his not-so-secret-obsession with lanterns.

Or the chicken we got this year, since we now have a flock of chickens. Not that we have any black and white chickens yet, but next year, I hope to get a couple of them.

We also have an out house ornament to signify their love of camping. We got the beagle ornament last year and he looks a lot like our Fur Child, however, this picture is very fitting at the moment, as Brutus is very much in the dog house with me. Well, out house, is actually more like it.

The other day, I spent all day getting a Christmas stocking and box put together to send to our daughter, Ryley, who is serving a mission for our church. This is our first year that she won’t be home for Christmas and I worked really hard on that box. Unfortunately, it never occurred to me that I would need to put it out of reach when I left the house to run an errand.

Hubs came home to find presents strewn all over the floor, along with nuts and little scraps of chocolate-covered foil, but not a scrap of chocolate to be found anywhere. Brutus had torn apart the stocking and ate every last bit of chocolate. The presents were fine, but Baby Girl will be celebrating Christmas chocolate-free this year. Despite rumors to the contrary, dogs who eat chocolate do not die or even get sick. I am not that lucky. Do NOT let this innocent face fool you!

He’s definitely in the out house! #StupidDog #StupiderPetOwner

I loved making this little tree. It was the first time in months I have exercised my creativity in this way. Most of what I have been doing in the past few months has been more along the clean/organize/repair/unpack mode, so it was refreshing to take my creativity out for a spin and see that it is still working.

In fact, I may have annoyed my people when I would giddily show them my latest creation. The boys were very gracious in telling me how much they liked everything but I’m sure there was ample eye-rolling going on once my back was turned. It’s okay. I know that teenage boys don’t necessarily get into these things.

However, when we were at Walmart the other day, Hubs came up and threw some fishing lures into the basket. When I asked why he had them, he just nonchalantly replied, “For the Man Tree.” Huh. I think they really do like it. Sam actually got a great kick out of the Santa Suit Shotgun Shell ornaments.

My absolutely favorite part of the tree is the “star.” I’m not sure what this tool is. I believe it is some type of industrial stripping tool, but it was just too cool to pass up. The store had a lot of new ones, but I wanted the rusty one.

At first, I just stuck a branch of the tree through the hole and bent it against the “star” to hold it in place. I knew I wanted something in the center. I played around with some of the ribbon/twine/paracord to make a bow for the center but I didn’t like how that turned out. Finally, I glued some more of the washers I found at the surplus store together and came up with a design I liked.

I have no idea what those giant, wavy washers are used for, but they sure are fun. It’s the perfect star for the man tree. I love this shot with the bullet garland and the other chain garland. It’s such a fun little tree and my guys are happy that they now have their own tree.

I’m curious, though. Would any of your guys like this tree? Which ornament do you like best? Any suggestions for other “manly” ornaments I could add or make for next year? I was thinking of a way to come up with a star out of arrows, but we will see what happens next year.

Duck® Tape the Halls for Christmas

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Duck Brand® for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

If you have checked out my Project Page, you may have seen where I made Hub's a box of Man Candy and some Duck® Tape roses for Valentine's Day.

 

 

If you are a long-time follower, you may also remember when I covered my leg cast in both the cheetah print and the zebra print Duck® Tape. Not at the same time, of course. That'd have just been tacky! But every week or so I switched up my cast design since I wore one for seven long weeks.

Obviously, me and Duck® Tape go way back. We are practically Besties. Well, I may not have a leg cast on this Christmas, but that hasn't stopped me from finding ways to use Duck® Tape.

Have you seen the cute Christmas tape designs they have out? If you go to the Duck® Brand facebook page, you can see their awesome designs. I love the polka dot design and how cute are those snowmen? I didn't notice the title at first, but how funny is that? Duck the Halls. Very clever.

 

 

I think these fun Christmas prints would look very cute covering a paper mache box or picture frame. If you covered a foam frame with the tape and slapped some sticky-back magnetic strip on the back, you'd have a darling refrigerator frame, perfect for those holiday photo cards from friends and family.

I am currently decorating my buffet for Christmas. One project I decided to do was to cover a metal star with the silver Duck® Tape. I found this star at a surplus store for $2.69.

 

 

Since the Duck® Tape is not wide enough to cover each arm of the star, I tore off short pieces of tape to cover in the valleys first and then used a longer piece to cover the peaks, like so:

 

 

This next part  came about because I was too lazy to schlep out to the barn to try to find my X-Acto blade. So, just be cautious and do not try this at home if you have your klutz gene is flaring up. Basically, I just used the edge of my scissors to cut the overlapping edges of tape on top of the peaks or down in the valleys as needed. You really don't need to exert a lot of pressure for the tape to cut. It was pretty easy and thankfully my klutziness happened to be in remission when I did this. 

 

 

The fun thing about covering the star this way was that you created another star image with the edges of the tape. 

 

 

It's a great addition to my Christmas decor. I have it above my nativity set that I repaired a few years ago with toothpaste. You can read about that if you have a need to repair porcelain. Just click on the picture below and it will take you to the post.

 

 

So, that's how I Ducked my Halls this Christmas. What would you do with the Christmas Duck® Tape? I'm thinking my roses would look cute in silver, gold or even the polka dots. I may just give it a try. 

Be sure to check out Duck® Tape's Facebook page for project ideas.

Suesan