Straight Stitches

Saturday, June 23, 2012

It's Been a While...

Dana June 23, 2012 0 Comments

Sorry it's been so long, folks. I'm back in action now, so let's jump right in. Today's recipe is an original that I'm pretty proud of.

Mike has a tendency to say silly things like, "I don't like [enter name of vegetable here]". It's all good; I see statements like this as a challenge. Last fall I got him eating squash when I put it in soup with sausage. The next challenge: Sweet potatoes. I actually already completed this challenge a long time ago, but I reenacted it last night.

Step one: Preheat your oven to 425 degrees and cut the sweet potatoes into fry shapes. I slice them into planks and then cut the planks down. I like shoestring shapes, but you can do steak fry shapes or whatever you like.

Okay, here's where I stupidly forgot one of my own steps. Put a cooling rack on your baking sheet and then lay your fries on it. The space underneath the fries will allow air to circulate all the way around them and cook them more evenly. Then, sprinkle your fries with salt and garlic powder. Why garlic powder? Because real garlic will burn.

Then into the oven for 30 minutes or until the surface is crispy.

Whabam! Sweet potatoes fry deliciousness! And Mike ate his all up. "I don't like sweet potatoes" my eye. :-)

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Dictionary Picture Mat

Heather June 13, 2012 0 Comments

I'm working on Harrison's 1st year scrapbook. I know he'll be turning 3 in October. I'm only a little behind. :)

So while I was going through pictures and getting ideas and trying to organize photos, I came across the photos from our vacation last summer to OBX.

I found this picture of the boys.

How adorable is that pose? We were on a dolphin cruise and Harrison just came up behind Devlin and they stayed in this pose for several minutes. Steve was quick with the camera and snapped several of these photos.

So I picked my favorite shot, and printed it out on some 4x6 photo paper I had lying around. Then I had to find a frame for it. Nothing like planning this out!

After locating an 8x10 frame that I had hidden (between fabric totes), I cleaned it up and then tried to figure how the best way to showcase this photo. Enter poster board and my 1974 dictionary.

I cut out a mat from my poster board, and arranged the photo in a museum gallery kind of way. Then pulled out the dictionary and went straight for the b's. I found the entry for brothers and ripped the page out. Then I laid the page out the way I wanted, I had to rip out another page (found the beach page) to finish covering my mat. With Mod Podge in hand I glued the dictionary pages down and folded the edges over the edge of the poster board. After I got the picture taped to the poster board. I took a sharpie and added some arrows and things to the definitions I wanted people to notice.

Then I centered my picture in the opening and put my picture together. I hung this picture up in our gallery wall on the stairs.

So there's my favorite photo from our vacation last year and the boys have a nice spot together on our gallery wall. Not bad for a 5 minute project.

Heather

Monday, June 11, 2012

Sewing for Dana {again}

Heather June 11, 2012 2 Comments

Have you guys ever had a lot of projects and not enough time to document them all? Yea, me too.

So this dress has been done for little over a week, and I'm just now getting around to sharing it with you guys. I'm bad, I know. I'm sure I'll console myself with this cup of coffee I found. :)

So anyways, our grandmother's 50th wedding anniversary is coming up, and while I'm sure Dana had grand plans for what she was going to wear; I had different plans. I called her up and told her that I was making her something for said fun event, and then realized how that sounded and asked if she had a dress, to which she replied yes, but I still informed her I was making this dress. :)

Enter Simplicity 1913.

Cute dress, right?

Well I had this lovely tangerine fabric just lying around. Its a sportswear type (gabardine or twill or something) and completely washable, and I knew that it'd look awesome on my baby sister. Her coloring and mine are very similar and oranges just look lovely on us. Not to mention orange is happy! So I got busy on making this dress for Dae.

The construction of the dress is nice, and I like most of it. I love the details though!

There are 8 buttons on this dress and not a single one does anything but look pretty. :) The belt material is just some sheer fabric I had lying around. You'll be seeing it again soon. :)

This is the only part of this pattern that I dislike. There should not be exposed seam selvage on the dress. I tried doing this up like a proper collar and enclosing it inside the collar, but the curve on the color is just to great to accommodate it. My grandmother said to hide the seams with a bias tape made out of the material, and I may still do that, but there are other things to sew up. One thing I did really like about this pattern is the fully lined bodice. It creates a nice edge on the neckline and arm holes. The bodice lining also encases the seam between the skirt and bodice. Looks so nice!