LANDFILL

So, lately I've been reading blogs of people who produce very little garbage. I love the idea but it's a really hard task. Everything you buy is packaged, double packaged or triple packaged. Even if it doesn't need to be. Every time I go to the grocery store and buy a head of lettuce, I think, "Do I need to put this lettuce in the plastic produce bag?" The answer is no, but I do it anyway. AND I can never remember my shopping bags. So I have a drawer filled to the gills with plastic bags. I'm a creature of habit and laziness.


And then there is the subject of diapers... It's really what started my whole pattern of thinking. How do I keep from contributing excessive amounts to our landfills. Some people, especially family, will think I'm a tree hugger, but... I like trees. Is this a bad thing?


This morning I was reminded of my seemingly impossible desire when I came across these extremely cool bags. They are almost entirely upcycled from old materials. I want one. They would make a great but expensive diaper bag.

You can buy them at peace4you.


They remind me of these dresses made from old canvas tents Mike and I saw at an art gallery in Nelson, BC. Angelika Werth is the artist behind them. They fascinated me. I couldn't stop looking at every detail. This is where Mike and I went our different ways in the museum. He went in search of the History of Beer and I stayed put.


They make me think of an old rocking chair I bought. I was going to go and buy some canvas fabric to recover it, but maybe I'll go in search of something a bit more interesting at Goodwill and upcycle it.

We'll see. Only two more weeks until this baby makes his debut. supposedly.

LIGHTING

These are AWESOME! I will be either buying them or making something similar to them for my own house. The idea of them over the dinner table makes me weak in the knees. Maybe the babies room...hmm I like that
idea too. Found here.

DONE!

And it only took me a year and a half to do it.


The inspiration came when I saw in a hip little fabric store some enchanting applique quilts and exclaimed to my friend Renae, "I'm going to start designing quilts!" And she basically let me believe that this was the best idea I've ever had! Because that is the type of person she is. I wonder if she would have told me if she thought it was a bad idea...?


I promptly recruited my friend Lara to help. She is amazing with a needle and thread. And to keep things manageable, I started by designing two baby quilts. One for her and one for me. When I posted the fabric in this post and the start of the quilt project in this post, my only thoughts were I'm going to get this done in a month or two. No sweat.


Little did I know that in a weeks time I would meet Mike and start a crazy awesome carnival ride that would lead me to actually finishing this quilt for our baby boy that is currently tossing and turning in my belly right now. A little miracle that I thought would never happen for me.


I wish I could say it is all Mike's fault this quilt took so long. But really, I'm just easily distracted. Creative ADD. That and the needle turned applique birds. If you want to make this quilt and you are in a hurry, machine applique. There is no shame in that. Those bird beaks require patience.


But now I am done. The baby can come and I think the small ruffle looks gorgeous. It isn't girly at all. Any baby can sport a small ruffle. Have I convinced you? I've certainly convinced myself.


I love the layered look of one quilt on top of the other. It adds a lot of depth. That scallop took a lot of brain power to pull off. You can barely see the contrasting polka dot fabric underneath, but trust me, It's dang cute.

I've never done a quilt with embroidery before, and I'm thinking it's possible that every quilt I make in the future will have it. It's just such a great detail. I showed a close-up last year of the stitch here.


All that is left is to wrap my new baby up in it when he arrives. Well, I have to write the instructions for the quilt too. I hope that doesn't take another year and a half. I hope I can remember what I did.

INSPIRED

It's been so long since I've wanted to be crafty. But tonight/this morning I feel the sudden urge. Maybe it's because tomorrow/today is my last day of work before I take maternity leave. (Thank you Canada for such a generous benefit.) I was feeling guilty about taking off a month early, but not anymore. My ankle bones disappear at the end of every day. It's pretty freaky and generally not an attractive look. But hopefully this will give me time to finish making blankets and burp clothes. Organize the babies bedroom. Finish the baby quilt I started two years ago. Etc, but now I want to add this to the list.


Wouldn't these be awesome hanging from your Christmas tree? I found these snowflakes on one of my favorite crafter's blog, maggie makes. I love the stuff she develops and shows. She is making hers out of fabric, but I think paper would be stunning too.

WEDDING TIDBITS...DECOR

Our reception was held in an old Mennonite church that had been abandoned due to a feud between church members. Never a good thing, but we fell in love with it as soon as we walked in. It had some great characteristics including a large hole that had been cut into the center of the chapel floor to accommodate the large machinery of the new owner. An interesting solution that probably had some Mennonites turning over in their graves. Hopefully they would approve of the wedding decorations more than the farm equipment. It's now the Gem of the West museum and filled with all sorts of fun nicknacks.

Apparently some people had more fun with the museum than even I had anticipated. I hope they don't mind that I showed their pictures. It makes me laugh so hard.

Being drawn to a spring garden theme for a wedding reception is definitely a good idea, unless you live in the cold north where spring is just barely starting to show. But that didn't stop me! I had lots of ideas that didn't pan out, like forcing paperwhites. Such a pretty bulb. But they wouldn't ship them unless night time temps were above freezing. But, I found out that you can also force flowering tree branches and lily of the valley. Woohoo!

So Mike and I cut some branches from his barely budding apple, lilac and cherry trees and I set to work forcing their blossoms. It was amazing to see their progress every day, but it was the cherry branches that became the most showy. And while there weren't any blooms on the trees outside, we had some beautiful spring flowers inside.

To give spring even more of a boost I decided to bite the bullet and make giant paper flowers from postal wrapping paper. I really went back and forth about doing these flowers. I knew they would be very time consuming and possibly flop and if weren't for family members ready to pitch in wouldn't have happened. I love how they turned out. Some people took them home at the end of the night and I have a few on the wall in my office. Some hard work you just can't get rid of.

To keep with the relaxed feel for the reception I found some beautiful paper by Amy Butler that were made into pennant garlands to drape everywhere. You say circus, I say festive garden.

Our guest book table looked so pretty and had such a great concept behind it. People were asked to write down memories or give advice that we would then hang on the stage wall. I think there was a lot of confusion. Most people didn't fill it out and those that did gave us the same advice, don't go to bed angry. We also got a few notes that people were writing to each other and passing around. "That guy at the table to your left is pretty cute." "Should we go over and talk to him?" "I think he's married..." We had fun afterwards trying to figure out who wrote these notes.

Every wedding has a favor and ours was no different. Mike's mom recently passed away and we wanted to include her in the wedding. Gladiolas were a love of hers and as a result the family farm had hundreds of bulbs that we packaged up and placed on each dinner plate. I love how it turned out.

And the desert table. Pies surrounded by spring flowers, moss and logs. Some of the logs were cut to be pie stands and others were cut to accommodate succulents. Have you ever tried to buy moss online. Not cheap. However, if you happen to have a friend who lives in Oregon that is willing to go pillage the nearest forest or sidewalk, that's the direction you should go in.

We bought pies, but the best ones were made by my mom and aunts. Mom made our wedding pie, however, it didn't make it out of my brothers car until after the pie eating started. I do believe it was eaten though. Just not by the bride and groom.

Which leads us to mood lighting. I really wanted candles in mason jars. I loved the relaxed look, but mostly loved the idea of washing them afterwards and reusing the jars instead of buying candle holders that I wouldn't know what to do with afterwards.

All I can say is, if you plan on decorating yourself, it can't be done without the help of your family, the grooms family and friends. I think that is what makes it even more memorable. Having everyone rally around to pull off a seemingly impossible task. The talking the laughing the idea swapping...I don't know that I would abuse everyone if I were to do it again. I would probably go more simple. But if I did that, I wouldn't have the memories of the love expressed through those helping hands. And what a loss that would be.

WEDDING TIDBITS...INVITES

The time has come (and probably past) to start sharing bits and pieces of our wedding. I know you're dying to see it all, because my life is incredibly fascinating. It is, I'm just waiting for Hollywood to call.

So, let's start with the invites. Makes sense.

I put in some late nights sketching, researching, and designing them, then I turned around and completely changed how I wanted the invites to look. I really like how they turned out, simple and fresh. Mike and I had a fun coming up with the timeline, I think it is our favorite part. Mike's most baffling part was WHY was I stressing so much over how the invite should look. Just write it down on some loose leaf paper and lets go make photocopies! Okay, he didn't say that, but I'm sure he would have been fine if that's what we had done.

Then it was all hands on deck to assemble. My sister and niece even came up from the states (with a couple wedding dresses in tow). What would I ever have done without family. Here are some of them, assembling and cutting etc etc.


Why are these times some of the most fun? Probably because I get to boss everyone around.

Their nimble fingers created this package...


Which opened up into these pieces...


That tells a little story...



Let me tell you. These pictures were a pain. The wind kept knocking them down and clouds kept rolling by and I should go back in and make them all the same size and color, but...who cares.

I will always love these invites. I may dislike the design as it becomes dated, but I will always remember the fun time we had getting the ideas out there, having family assemble them and for mostly what they represent. One of the best days in my life.

MURPHY MY HOUSE

I've always loved the concept of Murphy beds, but this company goes beyond expanding just a bedroom. If I had a tiny space I would seriously consider this furniture.

TIME TO PURGE

I've been reading my friend, The Lazy Organizer's blog lately. Well, I always read it, but lately she has been talking about getting rid of stuff. She introduced me to the 100 thing challenge. Maybe a little extreme for me, but I love the living on less philosophy. I have always thought I was an anti-collector and had mostly just the basics. But then I quite grad school and went to school for graphic design. Let the collecting begin...

As an artist, you inherently have to keep ALL of your drawings. Not to mention ALL of the art supplies. Then I started working for Stampin' Up! Where, as an employee, you get LOTS and LOTS of art supplies for bargain basement prices. And you simply cannot refuse these supplies, because, you may need them one day and when would you ever get them at such a price again? Plus, as a product designer, you must have all of the product you designed for your portfolio in your possession. This equates to more and more and more stuff.

THEN, there is the collecting of paperwork. Do I really need to keep 5 years of bank statements and credit card statements? Don't the banks have copies of these? Plus years of my payment stubs, and mortgage payment receipts.

I can't tell you how much collecting more stuff went against my belief system, but the belief of who knows, the IRS may come knocking and I will need to dig out the IRS forms I filled out in 2001 wins. And lets face it, that 2001 form could have been done wrong, but don't they have a copy of it? If they don't, why are they contacting me in the first place?

When I packed up my house last August, I considered it a time to purge. I got rid of clothes, furniture, electronics, mason jars, an extra microwave (why do I have an extra microwave? Actually, I had 2! extra microwaves), a set of 4 turned tabled legs that were sent to me by mistake ( I was always going to make something with them. I had them for 5 years), my bed, etc.

But, I kept the 8 large tubs of Stampin' Up! Supplies. I really don't stamp, but I thought someone in my family might enjoy using my stuff. I kept the 2 tubs of my art supplies. I kept ratty old towels (for my dog). I kept skirts, shirts, and shoes I haven't worn in 3 years. I kept t-shirts from the 90's because, I reasoned, they are good to paint the house in. And I kept 3 bar stools, which I really love, but were too tall for the bar I had in my house and will probably be to tall for a bar in any future house I may have, sigh...they are really cool.

So, after moving 5 times since September, and realizing most of my stuff is still in boxes and I don't miss it, I've decided to really purge. However, here is the problem. I want to keep my books. I have probably missed them the least, except, I love them the most. I have always wanted a library and find tremendous value in books. I don't want a kindle, I don't want all of my favorite magazines to only be available on the web. I love the smell of a book, the feel of a book. I value books. I know I can go to the library and I do, but I want my own.

I want this...
Admittedly, the books are half of my boxes right now. But I want them, and I'm going to get more. You can't stop me. But the rest can go.

MOTHER'S DAY

So, my wedding sucked all of my creativity from me. Hmm, that sounds like I hate being married. NOT TRUE!! I love being married, I just wouldn't decorate the hall next time. Or I would hire the SU girls to do it all for me, straight from concept to execution. Then I would just walk in and say, "It's soooo beautiful!"

It's taken a month, but I feel my design juices starting to come back to life. If I feel creative enough today, I'm going to make these for Mother's Day. Found at Simply...Gluten Free.