I MADE NEW CURTAINS

The curtains you see above were "make do's" because I couldn't find the ones I wanted at the time for a price I was willing to pay so.....for a year I used these in my den and continued to look for the others. I had ordered my kitchen curtains (black and beige checked prim look) and wanted some like them for my den (because you can see my breakfast area from the den). A few weeks ago I spotted the same fabric at Hobby Lobby and bought it. It was on sale for $2.99 a yard with 30% off......even if I messed them up with my lack of professional sewing ability, I wouldn't be out that much money! So........this is a picture of my new curtains that I made.............

I had to put a bottom curtain because you could see straight out on my sun porch and right behind this window is my computer. Who wants to look at the back of a computer? Also, this little chair will be painted black before long.

I'M A PROUD MAMA!

I have to tell you that I am one proud mama! My daughter, Amy, was voted Teacher of the Year for her school. Amy is a wonderful special education teacher (and mother), and I am so thankful her peers voted for her to receive this honor. She believes that her students can succeed and doesn't allow a "disability" to prevent them from achieving. Amy loves her students and is their strongest advocate. Being a former teacher, and knowing that many of you are teachers, I applaud each of you who have chosen this profession. You have the job priviledge of taking many children who have never been successful and changing them for life by believing in them. Teaching is a profession that doesn't receive much positive recognition. I want to thank each of you who teach. You are important in the life of a child!

EASY FALL CRAFT

One of my favorite places is Home Goods. I LOVE dishes (don't need anymore) but it's a weakness of mine. Home Goods happens to be next door to a fabric shop and since I had a need to buy fabric yesterday, I took a few minutes to go next door and "look". They really have good buys on some items and I think they have great seasonal decor. While looking I spotted this felt pumpkin. Everyone needs a little something new to add to their collection each year so I put him in my buggy. As I've told you before.....I will attempt to make anything that I see (if it doesn't look too difficult). It's just that I can't come up with originals. The more I looked at Mr. Pumpkin, I told myself that this is something I could definitely make. Since I was already going in the fabric store I headed for the felt. They had their felt squares on sale 8 for $1.00. I went ahead and bought several colors because I am going to copy be making Christmas crafts. It was pretty easy and didn't take much time to make my version of the pumpkin. Here is a picture of it below.

I only used one piece of felt to cut the front and back. I used pieces of the other colors of felt (that I already had) to cut his eyes, nose, mouth, and stem. Then I used fabric glue to glue them on. I took two black buttons for his eyes. The stitches are done with six strands of floss. After I stitched him (the front piece only), I sewed the front and back together and left enough of an opening to stuff. The one I bought wasn't stuffed real full so I did the same for mine. It made it easy to stitch together after stuffing. I then took some green floral wire that I had and wrapped it around a pencil and stuck it through Mr. Pumpkin....tied my ribbon...and TA DA!!! I made copied a cute little craft project that cost me less than $1.00 to make.

Here are the two friends together. I really like the color of the one I bought but you go with the color felt that you can get!

CROWS IN MY BATHROOM

After visiting so many of your blogs and seeing all the crows, I knew that I had to have some crows in my house! I visit Robin at the Robin's Nest every day. Her mother paints some beautiful things. They opened shop and I saw this crow plaque and knew it was supposed to hang in my guest bathroom. Linda at Behind My Red Door has these crow hand towels in her bath and she was kind enough to tell me where I could order them. I am so pleased with both my purchases. (It's very difficult to make a picture in this small bathroom).

I want to share a recipe for the BEST pumpkin bread. This makes 2 loaves, but I have a pan that makes mini loaves and I make it in this pan, wrap it in plastic wrap, and tie a ribbon around it for small gifts. Here's the recipe.

1 1/3 cups vegetable oil

5 eggs

1 16 oz. can pumpkin

2 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. baking soda

2 3 oz. packages vanilla pudding mix (regular or instant)

1 cup chopped nuts (optional - I usually leave this out)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix oil, eggs, and pumpkin in mixing bowl and beat well Sift together flour, sugar, salt, cinnamon, nutmegs, and baking soda. Add to pumpkin mixture and mix till blended. Stir in pudding mix and nuts. Pour into greased loaf pans. Bake for 1 hour. (Makes 2 loaves) This recipe makes 16 small loaves. Baking time is shorter for the smaller loaves. I judge the time by the yummy smell coming from the oven :)

Hope you enjoy this!

SPRAY PAINT MAKEOVER

Several years ago my husband and I were at the beach and found this wooden shelf thing (I call it that because I really don't know what else it is). It doesn't have any way to hang, and it's too heavy if it did. I have always used it sitting on another piece of furniture. We had it in our office area for a while and then for the past year or so it's been in the attic. After seeing some of my blogging friends' beautiful homes, I decided I would get the old piece down and go to my black spray paint...(sorry, Joy.....I'm still using black).You can see from this picture where I do all my painting. I painted it and sanded the edges to give it that old look (I'm not very good with pictures that will show details). I now have it in my den sitting on an old radio/record player in a cabinet.

This is my cabinet/shelf that I am using.....it's no longer in the attic! Notice the leaves that I won from My Brown Bag Studio. I started painting an old chair that we had in the basement today that I plan to put in the corner by this. Spray paint is a new love of mine!

TEACHING AN OLD DOG.......

I've always heard the saying, "IT'S HARD TO TEACH AN OLD DOG NEW TRICKS!" Well....I'm not saying I'm a dog......but I'm getting older, and I'm about ready to scream with trying to change my background. I look at all of your beautiful blogs with pictures of your homes, decorations, etc. and I'm having a difficult time even changing my background. One day I am going to learn how it's done and post a picture on my heading. I have found that people in blogland are so ready to help. Robin and Picket both have helped me when I first started blogging. There are still many things I want to add to my blog, and I will when I master ask enough people for help (THANKS Darlene). It worked!! I have been seeing the strike-over and couldn't figure out how it was done. I left her a comment and she emailed me instructions for doing this. I'll have to keep these instructions handy or I'll forget how it is done.

I made my muscadine jelly tonight and it is YUMMY! Also, I only peeled half of the pears last night because I was wanting to get to bed on time to check my blog. I had 5 jars of preserves out of those last night. I will finish them tomorrow since I am off.

Thanks to everyone who has helped me when I had a question about my blog. My husband says I'm addicted to blogging and he's right!

MY MONDAY SURPRISE!

Hanging on my mailbox when I got home today was a package addressed to me from Kimberly at My Brown Bag Studio. I won her give-away a week or so ago. I had already had a pretty good Monday--but seeing this made it a GREAT Monday!
When I opened the package it was even better than the picture had shown. The frame that she painted is absolutely beautiful. My camera doesn't even show all the details. I've tried to think of a picture to put in but having six beautiful grandchildren doesn't make it easy when it comes to one frame. They don't all live here so I can't get a picture of them together (right now) so.............I'm thinking I may have to get creative and put some word in the frame relating to fall. We'll see what I come up with. I just couldn't wait to show you what it looks like now.
I go out to the garden to cut some okra for dinner and pass my muscadine vine......it was loaded. I tried making a picture to show and had to actually crawl underneath and make the picture shooting up through the vine. I'm sure glad I live in the middle of cotton fields because if anyone would have seen me under a muscadine vine with a camera they might think I had lost my mind!!!! I went inside and got the biggest bowl I could find and it took only a few minutes to fill it.
I ate quite a few while I picked. These are delicious. I'm going to make muscadine jelly from these. My grandsons (especially Zack) loves peanut butter and jelly sandwiches so he'll really like this jelly. I'll have to tell him that it's grape. He is so much like his mother (you'd think she birthed this one) in the fact that he won't eat anything that "looks" different or has a different name. I used to tell Amy that a sweet potato pie was a pumpkin pie to get her to taste it.
I've never been too good at gradually doing things. I may have several projects started at the same time and trying to finish them all. Example at hand----I had this muscadine jelly project going and a friend said something about pears. PEARS!! Oh, my goodness---we love pear preserves! So, I say that I'd love to make some pear preserves this year. Look at this box of pears.
I am so glad to get them because a hot, buttered biscuit with pear preserves just can't be beat..........even better than muscadine jelly. So, right now I'm about to go peel pears.