Not a lot of space to write...

So everyone is getting into menu planning right now, and, for once, I am ahead of the curve. I have been planning our menus for years. As I'm sure all of you know, it makes it so much simpler to do your grocery shopping and to keep track of your inventory. I am taking, and joining the rest of you, it one step further to actually plan out what meals are on what days. Before I would list all of our planned meals on a notepad that was attached to our fridge, and then we could just pick and choose what we felt like making and mark it off after it was made. Very high tech.

I have been sewing up a storm this week, and today was no different. I am attempting to get ahead of my workload for the bedroom makeover, which probably would have been a better plan had I started earlier. Oh well, but at least this gives me a good segway. Enter two new pillows. This time they are braided and gathered. :)  I had some 14" pillow forms lying around. Now they are sitting pretty on my bed.

The instructions are the same as the original braided pillow, but the measurements are different as the pillow is 2" smaller than the original pattern. This is also going to make 2 pillows instead of 1. So on to the show!

So I have an announcement! I'm very excited! Ok, so that's not unusual for me, but what I am excited about is the fact that Saturday, the hubby and I are starting our bedroom revamp! So Ex.Ci.Ted! Can you tell? I don't think that I've used nearly enough exclamation points. :-P

So I'm not going to divulge much about the revamp....I'll wait to do that. I've been trying to post something every day, but this weekend I'm not going to be able to do that, because we have A LOT to do. I'm dropping the kids off at my grandmother's Friday morning and then picking them up Monday. We have 2 full days to get the room painted, and then mostly put together. I have furniture to paint, but I highly doubt I'll be able to get it painted this weekend.

So this week, I've been trying to get some old projects finished up and moved out of my work space. :) I was trying to do that this morning, when a piece of glass maliciously attacked me. Then my ever-so-helpful-but-squeamish husband was very little help when I asked him to clean up said glass after it decided that I did not need the small chunk of thumb it wanted. Not to get too graphic, but it was making a statement about my thumb. I dropped the glass (how it didn't break I'll never know), then quickly got to the sink to get cold water running over my thumb. Of course, during my dash to the sink, Harrison decided right then he wanted a nap. Now. So I'm bleeding all over and the baby wants to be put to bed. Steve puts him to bed, then comes back down to help me get my thumb wrapped. 45 minutes later I'm back working on the project, where I accidentally break the glass. It really was an accident!

I've actually had this project done for about a week now, but its only now that I've had a day where I didn't sew or cook something up! I'm so glad to be able to share it though!

Dev loves to call people, but I do not like repeating myself umpteen times during the day.....especially when its a 10-digit phone number. So I figured that I could simplify my life and his social need by creating something that we'll both love. Enter the photo phone list.

I must admit that I started this pillow without a fully formed plan. I knew that I wanted to make a yo-yo pillow, because yo-yo's are easy and I wanted a pillow that I could knock out quickly. Ha! Life got in the way today.

Harrison is teething. They (whoever 'they' is) should rename teething to - your baby will be miserable for most of the next year, because he's in pain and he would like to share his pain with you - loudly. Ok, so that's a little long, and I know my little guy is hurting and I feel for him, but I really can't wait till his teeth are all in! If I had been able to just sit and work the pillow probably would have taken about an hour, but instead, I worked on it piece meal throughout the day.

You're going to have to forgive me, because I've tried starting this post three times now and haven't gotten very far. I woke up with an awful sinus headache and thinking is almost beyond my capabilities this morning, but I want to share with you what I made for dinner last night, because it is definitely a keeper and would be lovely for Sunday dinner. We are having leftovers tonight, but that's ok because we'll still be eating as a family. :) So on to the show! 

Eagerly awaiting the meal!

I'm taking a small break from pillow making, not because of lack of inspiration or motivation, but because I don't have all my supplies. I thought I had a round 14" pillow form floating around, but I can't find it. So when I went to Jo-Ann's last night, I figured that I would just get one. Guess what!?!? Jo-Ann's did not have ANY round pillow-forms. Crap. For the project I also can't use loose stuffing. So I will have to go to Hancock today and get the pillow form. Darn, another trip to a fabric store. ;-)

The aforementioned trip to Jo-Ann's was not a total loss however; because I got fabric to make a small quilt. I've been following Obsessively Stitching's First Quilt Ever series, and I've made the plunge! So you will be seeing some posts about my first quilt!

Ok, so I'm lying. I don't have any clue as to how to achieve a pillow with pig tails, and make it look good, but I do have a little something to share with you about how to create a 'braided' pillow. :) First off, I made the pillow in 2 hours - start to finish, during Harrison's nap, so this is definitely a project for all you ADD crafters. :)

I already have an alternate to this pattern in the works....imagine ruffled/pleated sections! I am getting ahead of myself (again) so let me start at the beginning.

**The collage pictures are not working for me, and a couple of readers. So I've replaced the pictures with the individual pictures.**

Sometimes I make things more complicated than they have to be, and then genius strikes and saves me a lot of effort! I love when that happens. Well, I love when it happens early in the process. ;-)

So I love that all these letters and typography stuff is popular now, what's even cooler is that Devlin wants to move out the Red Sox stuff in his room {his father is heartbroken}, but Dev has told me he wants an ABC room! Yay....because I love the possibilities that this brings, so today in about 3 hours I whipped up a really cute pillow!

Also please let me know if you like the collage effect. I'm trying it out and don't know if I like it or not. I look forward to hearing from you!

Every good southerner has heard of Hummingbird Cake, and it's wonderful! I love a good cake. I'm not much into frosting, but give me a gooey, moist, scrumptious cake and I'm all yours.

However, when I started mixing up the recipe for Hummingbird Cake it reminded me more of a batter bread than a cake recipe. The only difference? You usually don't frost a loaf of bread, but whatever category it falls under I will definitely be making this again as it has quickly become my fav.or.ite! Icing included.  So on to the goods!

I promised you the recipes for last night's dinner and here they are....except for the cake...that will be tomorrow. I got the Ribs and Potato recipe out of the Food Network Magazine, April 2010 and its de-lish! The Peas & Pearl Onions are my creation. Hope you enjoy!

Today did not start off well.

At 7 am, I realized that I locked my keys in my car last night. After frantically searching the house for an hour, I broke down and called a locksmith. While I was searching and feeding the baby, my dear sweet hubby was trying to break into our car. No go. $70 later the locksmith found my car keys in the baby's car seat.

After that I check on my lamp project only too find that the porcelain glaze I put on it did not work with the spray paint. Valspar must've really meant business when they said latex only, so I have primed and added the first coat of pain to the lamp base, again.

The dishes are not done. I didn't do them last night, because when I finally got home with the boys I was too tired to do them, so they are still, very kindly, waiting for me in my sink.

So I was surfing around How Does She? a while back and come across her tutorial for make four dollar store frames look good, and I was in love. I knew this would make a wonderful gift for someone.

Jess stop reading - unless you want don't want to wait to find out what I made you, then by all means read on. :)

So I found the frames that were mentioned in the tutorial, and then had a hard time deciding on the finish for the frames. I originally wanted to just paint them white and then glaze them and add appliques. Then I thought about just decoupaging paper to them like the tutorial did, but I didn't want anything to color specific. I know that Jess is redoing her kitchen in a pretty taupe color (very similar to what I've picked for our master bedroom!) and she's keeping the green  that was there along with white, but then I thought that while I envision these frames for her kitchen, she may not put them there. Oh the dilema!

Then I remembered that The Graphics Fairy has this lovely letter image! Bingo....we're golden.

First I must apologize for the {bad} quality of these pictures. They're from my cell phone and the lighting in the McDonald's play area was bad awful, but Pink Baby (aka P.J.) looked gorgeous. The outfit is too big for her, but cute nonetheless. She is the same size as H, but 3 lbs lighter. She's a skinny-minnie. Hopefully by the time that summer weather returns the dress will fit, but at least it will fit for a while! So enjoy! Hopefully I can get some good quality pictures soon.

So I got tired of the look of the old template so I decided 3 days ago I would 'design' my own. It looked fabulous in Photoshop! Making it look that good in real life........HARD, but I finally got the basic look down.  I have some more tweaking to do because the font sizes are screwed up....but it's up! Yay, me! To all of you that do design templates...KUDOS. You are far more talented than I, and probably less stressed about it. I completely feel like these last 3 days were some of the most frustrating. The basic design probably took about an hour....the rest of the crap on the other hand.....oh my. I wanted to give a shout out to a blog that helped saved me. I looked at every tutorial and then followed the ones I wanted meticulously (the three column, button, menu, and background). Thank you April Showers Blog Design!

This is the frame after a whooping 10 minutes. The bottom seems blank....

I have long wanted to display Dev's (and eventually H's) artwork and feature it in one room or another. The other dilemma......my husband. I love him dearly and he has very good design sense....we just have different design senses. :) I like a modern take on vintage shabby. I love black. I love girly touches, but not to girly....just a hint of femininity,which is the problem I'm having now because this needs something else to finish it. Its masculine....I need the right flourish to make it mine. :)

Besides what I've already mentioned this craft was so quick to make, before I decided to add the moulding. I got the project 'completed' in like 10 minutes, then I decided I needed to add more. Gotta love stuff you can do so quick though! So on to what was done...

Daddy was goofing around with Dev's viking helmet from McD's

First I must celebrate! Harrison is celebrating his half-birthday today! Yay! I can't believe my little guy is 6 months old already....wow...time has flown, now on to the rest of the post...but be warned....H is going to be joining us in this post in honor of his half-birthday!

So I was blog surfing today, like I do every multiple times a day, and I have noticed that almost everyone makes their own patterns for clothing. I am feeling left out. 1 - I cannot draw...if you want stick figures, well stick figures that have legs that aren't attached, then call me. 2 - I guess I am not brave enough to try......or maybe I lack the imagination and/or creativeness to actually design a piece of clothing from scratch.