Birthstone Nest Pendant

You may well remember back when I tried to duplicate the ~Ruffles and Stuff~ Family Tree Brooch/Pendant. The gift was well received, but I thought that the tree was a little too big especially for the petite women in my family that I wanted to give it to for Christmas.

So, I put my thinking cap on. And maybe it is because of the name of my blog, but I thought of bird nests and using the beads as eggs! I'm sure it's been done before, but even so I thought I'd share with you how I did it.

Supplies


Ignore the glue gun! That was a proto-type. Hot glue and wire don't work together, it seems. However, you will want to gather:

-Wire cutter and needle-nose pliers
-Beading wire in your choice of metal
-Chain necklace
-Beads in the children's birthstones (Pictured here are Peridot/August for myself and Aquamarine/March for my brother)

I bought the beads at AC Moore. They have a large selection of beads in plastic tubes that are decently priced.

First, I strung on the the two beads onto the end of a piece of wire, and started coiling the wire around. If you look closely at the bottom of this picture, I think you'll get what I mean:



I continued that until I felt the nest was big enough. Then, I brought the wire up to the top of the nest and wrapped it around the nest a few times and then looped it through a chain on the necklace before snipping it and tucking it in.

Voila! Easy peasy.

Adelaide

I promised some sewing posts, and here I am to deliver. This dress has been a long time in the making.



Guess how much she cost me?

$4.00 for fabric on the last day of the 4-H fabric sale
$1.00 pattern (Jo-Ann's sale)
$2.00 for interfacing
$3.00 for thread

Comes down to a total of $10 for a tailored dress. Not bad. :-)

I've wanted a red dress for the longest time, and now I have one.

Before I go, I just wanted to share a close up of the pleated sleeve. I love these kinds of sleeves. McCall's did a nice job with this pattern.



Next up, my pleated purse with a customized liner.

Harvest Tortellini Soup

October is a wonderful month. The leaves look gorgeous, and the weather is nice and crisp. And my allergies attack my poor little sinuses until they give in to a full fledged sinus infection. I try every year to fight it off, but the infection comes with out fail. Its a good time to enjoy soup. And boy have been enjoying soup in this house! We have about four different kinds in the freezer at the moment.



This recipe is one that I just whipped up at the beginning of the month to use up what was left of my tomatoes. In late September, I pulled all the green tomatoes and put them in a big, brown paper bag in a cool dark spot. I wasn't sure it would work, but they actually ripened. And not so quickly that they rotted, either!

Then, when they were ready. I peeled and sliced them. If you haven't done this before, it is surprisingly simple! It was my first time trying this, and I was pleased. Bring a large pot of water to boil, with a dash of salt. Then, dunk the tomatoes in for 30 seconds and place them in a large bowl. Do not put them in cold water or on ice. Just let them cool. The skin peels off so easily!

Ok, now, to the recipe. As usual, I made this "dutch" so you could alternate it as you like.

I used:

About 10-12 medium sized tomatoes, peeled and cut into medium pieces
Large handful green beans (frozen or fresh)
Large handful sliced carrots (frozen or fresh)
1 whole zucchini, sliced
2 cans Veggie broth
Half cup of chopped onion
About 6 oz. of cheese tortellini*
Olive Oil
Shake or two of preferred Italian spices, to taste**

*I actually used a little more than half of a 12 oz. package. If I don't stuff the soup with tortellini, Ben will put all the tortellini in his bowl, and I will get about three. :-)

**My spice rack actually came with a jar of Italian spices that contains basil, thyme, oregano and marjoram.

First, I cooked the veggies in the bottom of a large pot with olive oil and spices. I added the tomato last...about right when the rest of the veggies were ready.

Then, I added the broth and brought it to a boil. Once it was boiling, I simmered it for about 20-30 minutes until heated throughout. You can add a teaspoon or two of tomato paste here, to thicken it if you like.

That's all folks! Goes great with tuna sandwiches. :-)

Summer projects

Most of the summer I spent holed up in my bedroom (the only room with sufficient A/C). Even there, it was too hot to work on my biggest project most of the time. I was working on this wonderful knot-pattern scarf for my father-in-law's birthday in August. Sure, August seems like a strange time to give someone a thick, wool scarf. But it was my husband's idea (and he was so very excited about it), and well, he won't be receiving the scarf at Christmas after the ridiculous Lake Effect snow has already begun. My FIL was very pleased with the gift and said he looks forward to using it the next time his snow blower breaks in the middle of a blizzard. Hehe.

I called it the Mariner's knot scarf because he really likes to take his boat out on the lake with the entire family.




Here's a close up of the knot-pattern:



The knot was a little difficult to work with at first. If you use this pattern make sure to make all of your knit rows loose! Otherwise you won't be able to get the needle through three stitches three times in the next row. Once I figured that out it was a breeze to knit.

Also, for the cast-on method I found this video very helpful:


She goes nice and slow so you can actually see what she's doing. :)I like this method for casting on bigger projects. Once I learned it, it went by so very fast! Though I did not do the correlating bind-off, and you really couldn't tell.

My other project, when it was way too hot to knit with wool was this neat little tea wreath:

(Please excuse the glare... the lighting in our home is a bear to work with).
I had been trying to come up with a better way to offer the variety of tea I have to guests. Flinging open the cabinet always kind of intimidated them, and all the tea was high above the stove. Kojodesigns solution works out perfectly. I put the rest of the tea bags in little baggies in a drawer. No more boxes filling up my cabinet! Which is nice, since our kitchen is very organizationally space challenged.

Ok, I've rambled on enough. I am working on some Christmas projects that I'll have to wait to share. But I also just got a dress-form, so look forward to some sewing projects coming up!

"New" Shoes

I was packing for a wedding last week when I realized the outfit I was going to wear (pink knit top with white and pink floral skirt) had only one pair of shoes that would go with it, and those shoes were kind of nasty looking.



So, I decided on a whim to see if I had any fabric paint that would work. Lo and behold I just happened to have a pearly white and pink. I also had on hand a jar of buttons, which included some cute little green ones. I really wasn't sure about painting faux leather with fabric paint, but I figured I couldn't end up with worse than I had.

Here is the end result:



I was pretty pleased with them, and I got several inquiries as to "Where did you get your shoes?"

New design

I redesigned the blog. Wonderful background image courtesy of Ollibird.

Family Tree Pendant

I fell in love as soon as a I saw ~Ruffles And Stuff~ family tree brooch/pendant. So much so that I dove head first into wire jewelry making.

I made this for Ben's sister Suzie and I'm so glad that she loves it.



It was a fun, meaningful gift to make, and I don't feel so shy about jewelry making any more.