Paris Street Market

One of my FAVORITE summer activities is going to the Paris Street Market.  It is at a local shopping center the first Saturday of the month May through October.  My sister and I hopefully get out together with our bags and sunscreen and a bottle of water and a hair tie (we learned that one the hard way:) and hit the parking lot.  Usually the trick is to get there early so that you can find a place to park and in the depths of summer so it isn't too hot.

We walk and look, talk and gab, and hopefully come home with something fun, different, special.  We have brought the kids with us, but it is always a little funner when you aren't chasing a wee one, and aren't having heart palpitations as your child runs into someones booth and touches everything at once.

Some time around 11 we head over to Panera and have Barbeque Chopped Chicken Salads and perhaps a frozen lemonade.  Amazing. 

September and October are always my favorite ones because everyone has out fall decorations.  Both my sis and I were very inspired to get home and set up some autumn decos of our own.  I did make some fun pumpkins, but that is a post for another day.

They put a 7-eleven right by the shopping center, so our new tradition is to stop and get slurpees as big as our bodies when we leave.  At the beginning of the summer they had a lime slurpee that when mixed with the cherry is AWESOME!  They haven't had the lime recently, but the old standby of cherry and coke is not sad either.

I will do a post soon on some of my favorite market finds.  I have some really, really good ones.  I just LOVE that you can buy something vintage and original. 

Happy Fall everyone.  There air here has had a very fall feel and some of our leaves are beginning to change.  Always one of my favorite times of the year.

Bingo

My sister and I were shopping at a cute, local vintage store one day and I came across an old Bingo game.  My Gramma loved to go play bingo and when I saw the game I instantly thought of her.  When our whole family gets together we often will have a bingo game night in honor of her.  The bingo game gave me a fun idea for a collage that encompassed Gramma and would be a nice visual for so many of things that embody her.

 We had a mini-family reunion recently with some of our family and I made each of us a Bingo Collage.  In addition to the bingo cards and the numbers, I included cards because Gramma was always playing at her kitchen table and trying to wrangle others into a game with her.  Everynone has a chicken as she collected them in her kitchen.  All of them are different, but they all contain elements of what I think of when I remember my grandmother.

Apple Sloppy Joe's

Last night I made a twist on Sloppy Joe's or Messy Fred's as we call them.  I had a friend in college who always said that and it has stuck. 
I have been in a terrible dinner making rut.  I just feel so uninspired to cook.  I was looking through some recipes and was going to make a chicken with apples, but we only had one chicken breast.  I hear Costco calling our names.  I did have one thing of ground turkey and my mom had some Sloppy Joe's in the crock pot the other day and it had smelled amazing, so I went with it.  The apple idea from the chicken was already in my head so I combined them.

1 lb of ground turkey or beef
1 apple - chopped or minced - depending how chunky of a texture you want
1 cup of ketchup
3 T of spicy mustard
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 T cumin
1 T red chili powder
garlic salt to taste
1/4 cup apple juice

Brown meat in a saute pan.  Add apple and let saute on med heat to let the apple become soft for about five minutes.
Combine the rest of the ingredients in a bowl and mix together.  Pour over the top of the meat and let simmer for a couple of minutes.

The Sloppy Joe's turned out so sweet and good.  I really liked the added twist with the apple.  I added the apple juice as a last thought because everything seemed a little dry and it made a huge difference.  I also added some fresh dill from our garden and it was very yummy as well.

Picture Wall

I did this picture project at the same time as I did the valance below.  I thought, oh, I'll wait a day or two and then post it.  Two weeks later, here I am.  We finished a painting project I have been working on for almost a year.  Trust me, not that complicated, just hard to find a block of time to paint when your three year old wants to "help."  Once the painting was done I hung some family photos, many of them that I have had set aside to hang up for a few years.  I guess the title of this post should really be procrastinators anonymous or something.

 

It did take a lot of measuring, but worth it to have everything even.  I bought most of the frames at Walmart for only about two or three dollars a piece.  I made sure to get a couple different varieties of frames so I could add over the years and it wouldn't be too obvious.   I am really happy with the ribbon and overall how the wall turned out.

Cherry Valance

I bought the cherry fabric that is in the middle of the valance for another purpose.  I really loved the fabric and should have bought more, but you know, hate to buy more than you really need.  Just for fun I had thrown it over the curtain rod in the kitchen to see what it would look like.  It ended up staying up there for about five months.  Yesterday I finally got my act together and sewed it into a real valance, instead of a jagged piece of fabric.

I had a half yard of the cherry fabric and sewed a five inch boarder of red gingham to each side and the bottom.  I was originally going to just leave the valance hanging straight, but it seemed like it needed a little more to it and I just saw a cute tutorial on a valance with the tie ups.  I grabbed a little ribbon, pulled it all the way around and tied the bows.  I definitely like it better with the tie ups.

The valance looks a lot better than a little piece of fabric thrown over a rod.

Ribbon Organization

Really should have rolled up all the ribbon before taking the picture.  Oh well, I think I was getting a little too much help!

My husband made me this stand a long time ago to display scarves I had made for a few craft shows.  Since then it has sadly been hanging in our storage room going unused and mean while my ribbon has been in a jumbled mess.  I have been in major craft organization mode while setting up my cabinet and getting all my stuff moved from one location to the next.  It is taking a long time.  Hopefully when it is all done I will be happy, organized and ready to go.  I do know one thing for sure, I am not allowed in the fabric store for a long time.

Anyway, while organizing, it seemed like a good idea to marry these two together and create something useable!

Little Fawn

This little guy was hanging out in our back today.  So cute.  He was happy to let us watch him for quite awhile and then his mama came and they moved along.  When I am driving a half hour to and from work everyday I need to remember this moment and why we choose to live in the boonies. 

New Work Station!

I don't have a technical sewing room or office.  We do have a guest room which houses all my mess most of the time, but I am hoping that space has a different purpose some day and want to get all my stuff out of there.  I am trying to get all the mess reorganized and moved into the storage room now that my amazing husband has build some awesome shelves.

I saw in a magazine awhile back ago about sewing spaces how a woman had a Hoosier Cabinet as her sewing space.  I have been scouring antique shops and Craig's List ever since.  I really liked the cabinet idea because is that it has doors in which you can shut away your mess. I also liked that a true Hoosier should have a work space that slides out when you need it and back when you don't, which is great for a workspace in the middle of the family room.  Finding a cabinet with the slide out work space was a lot harder than I thought it would be.  Most of them didn't have that function which is what I wanted most.

Counter pushed in

Counter pulled out

Finally, I found success on Craig's List and we packed up the fam and went to take a look.  The woman who owned the cabinet was super nice and had a cute house.  They were retiring and down sizing and she was wanting to de-clutter her life.  I understand the need for de-clutter completely.

I have been working slowly to get it organized exactly how I want it and moving all the other stuff into the storage room.  I will show that another time.

I love the door rack and that it has shelves inside the cabinets

Apparently this little secret drawer inside belongs to the kiddo.  I didn't know when I bought it, but it does!

Hoosier's were first created to give kitchens a good work space before we had all the counter room that we do now.  So part of most traditional Hoosier's were flour bins and sifters.  This one still has the bin and sifter intact.  They are really cool, although I don't really know what to do with the flour bin, so it kind of is a waste of space, but I like the tradition of it.

I will include a future post with it all decked out and ready to go.  Here's to non-traditional work spaces!  To be honest, I'm not sure I would even really want a sewing room as I kind of like to work in the middle of the fray.  I feel like I am part of the action and can easily meet the need of the kiddo.

I am at my wits end!

Do you see this beautiful picture here?  Do you notice the activity that this wonderful child is doing right here?  Well, lately we are having very little of this activity during the night and really not so much during the day.  I can't say what the activity is because if I say the words out loud the universe will smite me and make it worse, but I just have to vent for a moment!

I just don't know what to do anymore!  I spent the first two and a half years of this kids life going from my room to his, trying to soothe and relax a screaming child with a hurting belly.  Then I just GAVE UP and slept with him for the last 6 months because I was so bone tired.

Now I am trying to work my way into my own bed again because I miss my husband, and I miss the complete, wonderful darkness, and I miss not having feet jabbed into my pancreas all night.  I have had a few nights of success and a few of misery.  Sometimes the crying seems as though he really is in pain, but he won't tell me for sure if his belly does hurt.   In addition, we really try to manage his diet to make sure he isn't eating the stuff that hurts him. His skin has been bad with eczema lately and he spends a lot of time in the night trying to claw most of it off no matter how much product I apply. So, is it pain or is it behavioral?  I am leaning toward behavioral and I am trying real, real hard to ignore through the crying episodes, to let him know that sobbing all night is not the solution to our problems, but I JUST DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO ANYMORE!

He won't go to sleep until 9 or 10 at night, he is barely taking a nap, he wakes up at 6 in the morning and is awake half the night.  He refuses to let my husband help him in the night, so the job is only for me.  I ordered some books for expert advice, but I have read books before, I have done the techniques, I have sat in the dark in the other room and cried myself while my child sobs alone in the dark, trust me, I have tried almost everything.  The biggest problem is that most of the advice seems to be for behavior, not so much for pain.  I am hoping there is some solution out there that can help me, please dear God, help me!

The Help

I just finished The Help by Kathryn Strockett.  It was such an amazing read.  From the beginning to the end I was completely riveted.  She tells the book from three different point of views and does a great job with giving each woman her own voice.  It has been a long time since I have been so captivated by a book.  I highly recommend that you read this book!

A Thank You Gift

My Mother-in-law helped us out a lot this last school year.  She loves vintage finds.  I found this cute little red chair and made the fun, chair size pillow.  I used four 5 x 5 squares for each side.  I used American Jane Punctuation Fabric.  I am working with the charm pack for an upcoming project and really didn't want to, couldn't use the floral fabric, so these were a few extras that worked out great.   

 Now... what to do for my mother????

To a GREAT Man!

So, I am not really a celebrator of the Father's Day.  However, my husband is an awesome daddy to our great kid and I am very lucky to have him.  On Friday we just celebrated our 6th Anniversary and I really couldn't be any happier to have found such an amazing husband and father to our kiddo.  Love you!

Should my amazing husband read this post, sorry Babe, I know you don't want attention on you, just love you!