The Kind of Tears I Need

I just ordered this book:

One Thousand Gifts:  A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are

by Ann Voskamp

I've seen the cover here and there and... well... I could use a lesson in living fully, where I am, these days, instead of merely marking time or considering what will come tomorrow.  I figured nine bucks was a splurge I could afford in the interest of real life, real love, and this real faith that is having its day in the fire, in this season.  

I looked up the author and visited her page, here: www.aholyexperience.com

I read.  And cried.  And appreciated her words so much, because of the gentle conviction about my selfishness, all wrapped up in the reminder that grace and truth can make me better... that all the kinds of love I'm wrapped up in every day can be better, with the deliberateness and attention they deserve.

So, thank you, Ann, for the words I needed to touch my heart today.  I can't wait until the book arrives.

Edit:  Looks like I don't have to wait.  I have several Audible.com credits waiting for just such an occasion, and this wonderful book is on there.  I'm probably unreasonably excited about the amount of housework awaiting me tomorrow, since it means I can spend several hours zoning out to this on my iPod.  Still excited about getting a physical copy, but I am so in the mood to hear more of what all this lovely lady has to say.  Yay!

Camera Curiosities

I can breathe!  And it feels like a miracle!

I've been hanging out miserably in bed for days upon days now, but it seems as though I'm actually on the mend, and feeling like I may survive this horrid bronchitis/sinus infection/asthma flare up/king of all colds/black plague after all.  I'm still not quite 100% -- more like 60%, really, but with the way I've been feeling... 60% ain't bad, and I'm ready to put some real clothes on and attempt to get this place back in order today.   (Leaving 12 boys and a 7-year-old girl to their own devices for about a week hasn't resulted in a very tidy home, as you can imagine).

There's something on my mind though, that I hope you lovely readers and bloggers can help me with.

 

Image courtesy of http://news.cnet.com

 

Several years ago, I had a decent camera, a Canon something or other, that I purchased for around $500 at the time.  It was a point and shoot, but a very high quality one and I loved everything about it.  Unfortunately, there was some chip malfunction that caused the shutter to stop opening and that was the end of that.  Canon recalled the first version of this camera with the bad chip and replaced those, but mine was the second version and I was on my own.  It was a $200 fix, for a several-year-old camera, so I opted to put the money into a new camera instead.  Fast forward a few years and I've been through a few $200-range cameras, and I hate them all.  By necessity, most of my photos are taken indoors, and I really need something that can get a decent image, which I'm finding harder than it sounds.

In the coming months, I'll have the opportunity to finally invest a chunk-a-change into a real camera again, but I'm kinda clueless about my options.  Requirements are that 1) it costs less than $1000 (including any additional lenses I will need for basic indoor shooting), 2) it has some "auto" settings for basic, run of the mill photos before I learn to really use the thing, and 3) (obviously) the flash can be turned off easily.

I'd love to have an ever-coveted DSLR camera, but not entirely sure whether I need one or if having one with my limited skill will mess me up even more.  I consider myself to have a decent eye for photos, but I know *nothing* about cameras and lack the option to take a class on how to use my camera (a "how to" book or other DIY tutorial has to be the most education I can devote to it, for now).  I avoided buying Canon for awhile because I was so slighted by the way they handled the bad chip thing, but I'm over it enough to realize that it was the only camera whose performance met my expectations, and I've tried a few Kodaks, an HP (which was REALLY terrible), and a Sony something or other, so I'm probably partial to a Canon or Nikon, for those reasons.

I'm looking for recommendations on cameras that an average Joe can figure out how to take a normal photo with, and particularly something that can help me get better quality indoor shots.  I know the trick to indoor photography is lighting, lighting, lighting, but I kind of live in a dark shoe box with a few overly-saturated-with-light rooms, so this is much trickier than one might imagine. 

Anyway, recommendations are appreciated.  I'm not married to the DSLR idea -- a nice point and shoot might do the trick, but if I'm investing the money into a nice camera, I'd like it to be one that can serve as my standby and sidekick for several years to come.

Anyone?  Bueller?

Thanks!

Mr. & Mrs. & other cuteness

Today, I'm supposed to be hosting the 2nd Annual Super Bowl Party and Craft-O-Rama (us non-football fans get crafty while the others scream and holler at the TV all afternoon), but I'm still horribly under the weather.  Our neighbor has graciously decided to host the footballers later today, and my husband hauled 10 of the 11 kids with him to church this morning, leaving me to sniffle and cough in peace.  I've barely emerged from my bed the last few days, but I'm trying hard not to let that interfere with my creative blitz (a girl's gotta have her priorities, after all).  :)

Some of you know that I'm undertaking a slow-but-sure master bedroom redecorating project.  I'm working with a neutral palette and sort of a "burlap and ruffles" mentality, so I threw together these pillowcases for the bed last night.  I absolutely love them -- this may be one of my favorite projects ever.

 

They'll look much cuter on the bed, but the bed is not in show-able condition, quite yet.  Here's a shot of them together:

Do you love them?  This is a great motivator to get the room done, so I can throw these little finishing touches around.  The ampersand pillow is actually a throw pillow that came with our old couches, which we have since sold but still had a few of the extra pillows lying around.  It was the perfect size and gave the set some variety, even with that mute color scheme.

I wish I could say I just whipped these up in no time at all, but honestly, this setup took me most of the afternoon, mostly because of my severely lacking sewing skills.  Here's how I did it:

Step 1:  Used my trusty Cricut to cut cardstock stencils in the font I wanted on the pillowcases.

Step 2:  Used a permanent fabric marker to trace stencils and fill in the black letters. 

Step 3:  Heat set the lettering by ironing with a press cloth.

Step 4:  Cut linen fabric & burlap pieces.

Step 5:  Made ruffles and gathered them. 

Step 6:  Sewed the burlap, then the ruffles on to each pillowcase.  Voila!

I wish I could say that Mr. Smitten just adores them as much as I do, but he gave me a sideways look and asked, "How long until you think I throw that pillow out the window?  Once my ear finds that burlap, it's all over." 

Ok, so they're really more throw/decor pillows than ones we'll actually lay our heads on, but I still love the look and think it will be the perfect touch on our as-yet-to-be-completed neutral master project. 

In case you need some color after all that beige, here's a look at my just-finished Valentine's "mantle"(which is really a thrift store sideboard and a dining room window, but it'll have to do).  

Happy Super Bowl Sunday, for those of you sports fans... and I hope the rest of you get a nice, long nap, instead. 

Have Fun and Get Smitten!

Linking to:

Saturday Soiree at A Little Lovely   

You can't win 'em all

Anyone that's ever taken the time to make/create/upcycle/redo something knows that not every bright idea comes out quite as wonderful as the initial plan.  Because I think those "fail" projects are good for the soul to share... here's my latest version.

I love anything with letters and numbers -- I'm a word girl (in case the tattoo on my wrist that says "write" didn't give me away).  I've had this computer armoire sitting around forever.  The thing's had a variety of different lives -- computer desk, crafting station, sewing table, man cave bar, homeschool central, and currently big piece of furniture to stash all the clutter I can't find a place for.  TMI?

(See my hideous carpet?  I know I mention it in just about every post, but... it's just that bad). And the photos in this post will be horrible -- this room has no windows whatsoever and fluorescent lights that make photo-taking difficult at best.

Anyway, I took some chipboard I had laying around from a grab bag I purchased last year at CHA.

Picked out a variety of letters in different fonts/shapes/sizes, and painted half of them silver and half gold, with metallic craft paint.

 

And attached them to the inlaid doors of the computer armoire.  That sounds waaaay simpler than the task wound up being, since I could simply not find any type of glue that would keep the letters in place.  Hot glue dried too quickly, the letters were too heavy for liquid craft glue and the letters just slid downwards, tacky glue made the corners turn up when it dried, and on and on.  I finally got them pretty secure with glue-stick style craft glue, but this was no easy task, since the glue caught in all the corners and each letter needed to be cleaned with a Q-Tip.  Ugh. 

Here's the finished project:

Cute enough, but my husband and son both smirked at me when the saw it and after about 10 minutes, I decided it wasn't my thing.  I wound up removing all the letters and we're back at square one.

The funny thing is, those bare panel doors don't bother me nearly as much anymore.  Hah!  Since I'll be moving this into my neutral/peaceful master bedroom redo, I think it will do just fine as is.  Somehow, I still see myself hot gluing burlap to the doors or something, but I think for now, good enough is good enough.  

Now, go check out my not-so-fail-riffic dresser dress up project in my last post.  That one came out great! 

Linking to:  Typography challenge at:

Fun With Numbers

Hey friends.  I haven't been around much the last few days, thanks to what the doctors call "acute asthmatic bronchitis with moderate toxicity and severe dehydration".  Yuck.  I'm still coughing up a lung, but I ended up at the ER yesterday and got dosed up with fluids, antibiotics, and some breathing treatments that have me a lot more functional today.  I'm still hanging out mostly on the couch and trying to take it easy, but I didn't want my creative blitz to get too far behind, so I managed to pull myself together for a bit and hop on my Cricut for a few projects.  The first, which I'll show you today, was part of my long-in-the-works master bedroom makeover.  Because it's hard for me to find time to work in there, I'm giving myself until the end of the month to have that whole room completed, but I'm trying to work on things here and there.  I'm usually more of a whirlwind re-decorator -- throwing together a new room in a day or a weekend, but this is going to require more patience and methodical work.

For those of you that don't know, I live and work at a Christian children's home as a housemom.  This means that we live in a big house on campus with lots of kids (at the moment, we have 8 boys + our 3 kids, for a total of 13 people living in this house).  Since we live in provided housing with most of the furniture already existing here, my decorating freedom is limited by 1) not being able to do anything permanent like paint, upgrade furniture, take out the ugly carpet, etc., 2) working with a vocational ministry budget (funds are always tight, as is space around here), and 3) having to work in the few pieces of furniture we brought with us into this place and make it look alright with the outdated donated furniture that fills up most of the space.  Anyway, there is always a design challenge to work around here, which is both fun and frustrating, at times.  Vinyl is proving to be a great medium for me to dress things up, since it is both long-lasting and also easily removable.  Here, I used my Cricut to make Vinyl cutouts to dress up this ugly dresser.
 

Before:

After.  Well... kinda.  More like, in process.  

I still have to replace the knobs on this bad boy before it's truly finished. 

 

Isn't it fun?  Since the carpet is a not-so-wonderful greenish-turquoise color, I'm going for neutrals in the rest of the space.  I thought the black vinyl on the wooden dresser made a cute touch for the look I'm going for.  Can't wait to finish the room and show you when its done!

Whatchu working on out there?
Whatever it is, Have Fun and Get Smitten!

Linking to:

This week's typography challenge at:

By Request -- Coffee Can Upcycle

Hi Friends,

Someone mentioned wanting to see more of the coffee can storage that you got a peek at in my laundry room makeover, so here ya go.  Another free and fun trash-to-treasure makeover using only what I already had on hand (office tags, rubber stamps, empty coffee cans, and leftover wrapping paper):

Started with this:

And here's how the finished project came out:

And here they are in my sewing area, holding all my notions:

This would be a really cute way to organize scrapbook supplies also, and dress up a crafty space at the same time.  Use scrapbook paper, wrapping paper, newspaper, book pages, etc., and any size can -- juice cans, veggie cans, large coffee cans, etc.  I'm thinking I'll have to start saving every can we use from now on (especially if I hope to EVER reign in my abundance of scrapbook supplies)!

Have Fun and Get Smitten!

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Linking up to: 

 

Free Valentine's Printables

Hi friends.  I have to be honest, with all these boys in the house, a birthday next week and a big trip ahead of us in a few weeks (we're going back to Oregon for a visit, YAY!) I had kind of planned on skimming over V-day this year.  Much as I love love and all things that represent it, I just wasn't feeling in the groove.  BUT, hopping around Blogland and seeing all your adorable creations put me in the mood to at least do a cute table display and a "mantle" (which is actually the top of a sideboard in my dining room, since we don't have a fireplace or a mantle in this house).  I haven't done the mantle decor yet, but I did put together a little printable for anyone that needs some Valentine's cheer.  Just print it out and pop it any old frame you have lying around, and ... voila!  V-Day Decor.  Or cut it out and slap it on some red cardstock... instant Valentine to give your sweetheart.

 To use, click on the image above (to enlarge), then right click to save it to your computer.  You can then use your own software to adjust the size if needed.  You're welcome!  :)

Edited to add:  Here's another little printable.  I needed two, so I thought I'd share the other one I made too, in case anyone else can use them.  Thought it was worth remembering the ultimate gift of love when celebrating on this hearts and candy day.

Linking to the always wonderful Saturday Night Special at Funky Junk Interiors: