Meet Ganesh

The kids and I have been in our new place since April, and a few days after moving in I heard a cat in the wooded area behind our house meowing her head off. I try coaxing her closer to see if she was all right but she would have none of it. 3 months have passed since then and she occasionally comes back and meows her hellos and whatever she has to say to the world before skittering away.

About a week ago, I was outside on the phone, and after some, ok a lot of, 'Come on kitty, here kitty kitty,' she finally made it to the porch. She immediately turned into one of the sweetest cats I've ever seen. She couldn't get enough attention and head rubs. She was extremely malnourished so I fed her the closest thing I had to cat food, turkey lunch meat. That was all it took to hook her.

So I'd like to introduce you to the 3rd cat in my life that has adopted ME and my family. Everyone say hello to Ganesh Paisley.

(She has the most interesting fur I've seen on a cat, the hair on her belly is curly but hard to get a picture of, which one day I will)

First Aid Roll

Remember my Crayon Rolls? Well I had a thought a few weeks back....what about a First Aid Roll done up the same way as a Crayon Roll?

I picked out some coordinating fabric. Then after deciding what I wanted in my First Aid Roll I laid out all the items. I went with Wipes, a box of different size band aids, hand sanitizer, an anti-itch stick and a travel pack of tissues. I cut 2 rectangles to fit around the items with enough room for the seams. One rectangle for the back of the roll, the other for the inside of the roll.

Now to make the pockets. I cut two strips of coordinating fabric half the size of the original rectangle.

Don't forget the interfacing...I used a medium weight fusible that I ironed on to the back of the large rectangle.

I sewed the two smaller rectangles right sides together down one long side. Then pressed them open with the iron.

I then laid the smaller rectangle on the large one and placed my First Aid items back in to make sure the pockets fit just so. I pined the pockets in place, removed the items and ran a stitch from the top of the dotted fabric to the bottom to create the pockets.

Next I cut some Rick Rack half the length of the rectangle and pinned it to the top of the far left pocket. Then I took the rectangle I cut for the back and right sides together sewed up all 4 sides, leaving a 3 inch opening for turning right side out.

Here's a picture of the inside of the finished project. (I added in an extra pocket for my homemade bug spray that I found just for this picture)

It looks pretty cute rolled up too doesn't it? It is a little on the big side but I like it much better than carrying around a plastic First Aid box. This can stuff quite nicely into a big purse or travel sack too.

http://www.dipityroad.com/

Fabric Softner Sachet

I love fabric softener. I love the feel of clothes when they are fresh from the dryer and they are so soft you can smell the softness. I don't like buying fabric softener however, it's too expensive and I often wonder if you really have to use as much as they tell you to in order to get the same effect.

Fabric softener is important for your clothes though. It helps keep the fibers soft so clothing is less likely to tear or stretch improperly. You'll get a lot more wear out of your clothing and towels for that matter if you use softener too.

Anyone who reads this blog or knows me in real life, knows I'm a big fan of going green and getting the most bang for my buck. So when I can across a recipe for Fabric Softener Sachet's I had to make them.

I used some scrap material I had to cute a 3 by 4 inch rectangle. I sewed up the sides, leaving an opening to pour the 'fabric softener' into it.

 

The white fabric I used was very thin. I wanted something a little thicker to get the most out of this sachet. So I used some really thick fabric to make an outer cover for the sachet. I sewed 3 sides with right sides together. Turn the pouch right side out then slipped the 'fabric softener' filled white sachet inside.

The one seam you leave open just simple fold in the raw edge and then sew straight across to close the sachet. You can even use Velcro to close this pouch for when you need to refill the 'fabric softner'.

How cute and quick is that?  Say hi to my rock turtle in the background of the picture. He loves watching me sew even though you can't tell it by the disgruntled look on his face. :)

I made up several of these pouches in a short amount of time. Each of these pouches last a week in the dryer for my household of 4. If you do more laundry or have more kids then maybe you'll get 3-4 days out of each pound instead of 7 days like I do.

The most important part of these sachets are of course the ingredients. Cornstarch or rice flour (which I just found here locally, so my next batch will have rice flour in it), baking soda, and arrowroot powder and whatever essential oil smell you like best. I used orange for some of these sachets and lavender for others.

Fresh Salsa

This has to be the easiest Salsa recipe I've ever come across, and the taste is fantastic too.

3 tomatoes (1 lb.), chopped

1/4 cup finely chopped red onions

1/4 cup chopped cilantro

1 jalapeño pepper, chopped

1/4 cup KRAFT Italian Dressing

Simple combine all the ingredients.

This recipe is small enough for a few people or small gathering or simply double it for a bigger crowd. So yummy.

Wordless Wednesday.

Chocolate French Toast Sandwhches

Are your ready for this recipe? I was on the hunt for some new dessert recipes for a family get together when I came across this delicious recipe. It takes a little time but its time well spent.

Take a loaf of french bread and cut 16 slices about an inch thick.

Lay the bottom slices for the sandwiches in a 9x13 pan, bigger if you have one. Then take chocolate chunks, or if you can find a brick of chocolate chunk it up and lay a few pieces on each slice. Though I don't have a picture of this, go ahead and place the tops of the sandwiches on top of the chocolate spotted bread. :)

In a small bowl, whisk together 4 eggs, lightly beaten, 1 1/3 cups milk, 1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla, 3/4 teaspoon cinnamon and a pinch of salt.

Pour the mixture over the chocolate sandwiches and let this sit for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes carefully flip the sandwiches over, then cover with plastic wrap and let this sit overnight, or at least 2 hours before you cook it.

Before you cook this wonderful breakfast food, let it sit at room temp for 30 minutes, then melt 1/4 cup of butter and drizzle this over the tops of the sandwiches.

Bake at 425 degrees for 30 minutes or until the tops turn a golden brown. Serve with a sprinkle of confectioners sugar and try not to eat the entire pan in one sitting.

Flower Petal Shirt.

It's no secret that I love the color gray almost as much as I love ruffles. I was standing in my walk in closet the other day, trying to decide what to wear and I was overcome by how many gray things I owned. There are gray dresses, gray shirts, gray tank tops, gray dress shirts, even gray coats. I really need to start branching out into color. Two of my favorite gray shirts are the two below.

The one on the left no longer fits, due to my weight loss, but it's a comfortable fabric and not to dressy so I could wear it for any occasion. The tank on the right though I mainly purchased for the pretty fabric flower thing on the shoulder. :) The fabric was super thin, something I normally hate and it didn't last long. I think I maybe wore it 5 times before tiny holes started to appear.

So what to do with these two shirts that I loved but needed to make over before I wore them again. Have you seen this shirt from Anthropologie? Well I did and fell in love with it. I can make this right? Well I can try and make this. :)

I removed the sleeves from the dark gray shirt. This was the one without the holes so therefore it had the honor of being the base for this shirt.

See this paper looking heart on the shirt? That's the pattern I drew to cut out the flower petal type things. It's only about an inch and a half wide and tall.  Then I started cutting and cutting and cutting out these flower petals. I used all of the fabric from the light gray tank top. I cut flower petals out of the dark gray sleeves from the other shirt and I found some white cotton that I used to cut more flower petals.  The more the better.

Then I started pinning the petals to the shirt. Two petals per flower, laid out in a t shape. I'd pin on a bunch, sew a few stitches in the center and then I'd hang the shirt up to see just how everything would hang and then fill in the holes as needed before adding more.

Once I had all the flower petals how I liked them I used my seam ripper to rip a small slit into the bottom hem of the shirt. 

Then I measured around my waist with a strip of elastic and subtracted one inch so that it was snug. Then I slipped the elastic band into the open hem all the way around, sewed the ends of the elastic together, closed the hole and had a new fitted bottom to the shirt.

Though this shirt is somewhat out of my normal type of clothing. It was totally worth the time and effort put in. If you decide to take on this project, give yourself plenty of time. It took me 5 hours from start to finish.

http://www.creationsbykara.com/

http://romantichome.blogspot.com/