Quilting

This week, I'm going to talk about my first ever quilting project. A while back, I got the idea in my head that I needed an exercise mat. I'm not really sure why, because I don't actually exercise indoors all that often (I like to walk), and when I do, a towel or blanket on the floor usually works great, but meh, when my mind gets an idea stuck in it, I have a hard time shaking it. However, I knew I didn't want to just go out and buy one, so I decided to go through my fabric bin and see what I could come up with. What I found was an old pair of curtains I made for our NY house that had a light olive green fabric up top and a cream/floral pattern on the bottom. So my mat is recycled. How do you like that? Even my off-white border pieces came from old curtains.

I lost interest in this project for a while, but I'm happy to report that I finally finished it, in time for New Years, even. New yoga routine, here I come!

Here's a pic of the top part all pieced together; I was honestly amazed at how fast it went together.  It took me all of two hours to go from pieces to pinned and ready for quilting. What did take forever, was cutting the pieces out. That was not fun, I'm not gonna lie. But hey, once that was over, it was smooth sailing. Even the quilting went fast, because (shh, don't tell my mother-in-law) I machine quilted it. Now, I had every intention to hand quilt this baby - I bought a quilt hoop and everything! But I had finished my first square and was starting my second when I said to myself, "Why are you doing this by hand? It's just straight lines. You'll get done so much faster if you machine it." And you know what? I was right; it was much faster. I did learn that I can't do quilting on my machine for anything much bigger than this mat, because keeping everything from bunching up would be nigh impossible. And of course, if I do anything other than straight lines, it would be best if I did them by hand, but for now, the quilting is done, and I'm pleased with how it turned out. It's not perfect, but it's good for a first try. 

The final step was binding it all together. I got my bias tape and started stitching, but about 1/3 of the way through, it became blatantly obvious that I didn't know what I was doing. The bias tape wouldn't stop bunching, and even with pins, I sometimes was missing the quilt all together. A quick call to the quilting expert, AKA mom-in-law revealed that I had to hand-stitch the binding, or at least one part of it. Now, all that being said, I still decided to finish the binding the way I started, just so the bad part wouldn't look even worse by comparison. Is that wrong? Even so, my exercise mat turned out pretty nice. Not bad at all for a first attempt. Take a look:

I even added ties so it rolls up!

Merry Christmas!

Hello, everyone! I've got nothing to post this week because of the holiday. After I have a chance to wind down, I'll post some new content. Until then, merry Christmas and happy New Year!

Not Now

Today I have an opinion I'd like to share. I don't know that it will be popular, or that me having my say-so will make any difference, but here it goes anyway.

By now, I'm sure there's not a single US citizen that hasn't heard about the recent school shooting in Connecticut. My heart hurts when I think about it. Friday, I avoided Facebook  because all the posts were bringing me to tears. I haven't read too much in the news either, because I just can't take it. I can't even imagine how the families of the victims must feel.

However, on Saturday, I braved Facebook and a few news sites, and my feeds were a deluge of people arguing about guns. From gun rights people, I saw every version of "guns don't kill people, people do" imaginable. From those who oppose guns, I saw everything from "we need stricter gun laws" to "ban all assault weapons now." This is not unexpected; it happens every time there's a gun-related tragedy in the news.

I don't know why, but I just couldn't help it. When I saw these, I got angry. Now is not the time for this crap, people! It's only been four days since the shooting, some families are likely still struggling with accepting that this is real, that this atrocity isn't some nightmare they're going to wake up from any second. The last thing they need is the TV and Internet inundated with politicians, activists, and armchair bureaucrats arguing about gun rights and dragging their murdered children into the fray. There's only a week left until Christmas, I'm sure things are hard enough for them without having to hear a bunch of idiots talking about it like it's just another statistic. What they need is time to mourn and time to bury their dead in peace. The way I see it, using the Newtown victims as fodder for your political agenda is little better than the Westboro Baptist folks protesting at soldiers' funerals.

I know some think that now is the perfect time, while the tragedy is still fresh in people's minds, to have this discussion and work on a solution, but I'm telling you that's not true. This argument has been going on for years, and we're no closer to a viable solution now than we were when the Columbine shootings occurred. And even if we were to miraculously all agree on what must be done, it would take weeks at the very least to get new laws passed through Congress. Trust me, this argument can wait a couple of weeks. Please, let's all take a break and give these families a little bit of respect.

The Christmas Season, Feeling Overwhelmed, and Netflix Woes

This post is a little early because I have a confession to make. As you may know, we don't have TV services at my house. I just don't see paying an exorbitant amount of money for a cable/dish package when I'm only going to watch like three of the channels. We rely on Netflix for most of our TV series viewing, and that works fine, although sometimes it takes Netflix a little while to upload new episodes. Normally, I'm not bothered by this, but you see, I have this crush. I finally talked my husband into sitting down and watching season 2 of AMC's The Walking Dead with me, and I've fallen hard for Rick. And you know how when you were young, and you got a new boyfriend how you wanted to spend every second of every day with them? Well, that's kind of how I feel about Rick now, and I don't know what do with myself. I just can't get enough of the long, lean, gunslingin' Atlas figure. Maybe I should get a six-shooter and a highway patrol hat for my husband... but I don't think you guys want to know that.

Source.

At any rate, my withdrawals haven't helped my feelings of being slightly overwhelmed. It seems no matter what I do, I can't get ahead on housework. I have so much stuff I need to do, so much I want to do, and somebody has stolen a few grains of sand from my hourglass! All this being what it is, I'm still very excited for Christmas this year. We're visiting family, yes, but ultimately because of my husband's work schedule, I've decided to spend Christmas Day at home. It will be the first time we've done that since the little one was a newborn. Now that she's a little older, I think it'll be an exciting day of seeing her open her presents and then playing with those presents. I also plan on making a nice dinner for us all. It should be good. Welp, that's all for now. Maybe I'll have something awesome to share with you all later this week. Until then, enjoy this picture of our beautiful tree we got from our local farmer's market:

Fishy Fun Party

So, my little one just turned four, and I have to say, I'm pretty proud of how her party turned out. One day she was sitting on my lap while I was browsing Pinterest, and together we saw this awesome fish cake from Cupcakes Take the Cake. My little one loved this cake so much that right then and there she decided she wanted a fish-themed party. With the help of Pinterest and Oriental Trading, I was able to come up with some pretty nice stuff.

The cake ended up being super adorable. The mama fish was chocolate cake, the babies were yellow cake, and all of them were frosted with a homemade cream cheese frosting. One of these days, I'll learn how to frost without making a complete mess of the cake board, but eh, I don't think too many people noticed. There was one alteration I made to the original cupcake design, and that was to add a fruit slice for the tail. I was going to include fins by cutting a fruit slice in half, but alas, there really wasn't room on the the cupcakes. A word to the wise, if you end up doing this, you won't need NEARLY as many M&M's as I bought. I got three bags, and in hindsight, I probably could have gotten away with one.


A lot of the food was just a matter of creative labeling. For example: carrot sticks were crab legs, bell pepper sticks were calamari, cheese cut into triangles became shark's teeth, and regular old cucumber slices became sea cucumbers. Potato chips and Goldfish crackers were arranged next to each other with a sign that read, "Fish & Chips." PB and J sandwiches became starfish with the use of a handy, star-shaped cookie cutter. Cheese puffs in Dixie cups (turned into buckets by the addition of a pipe-cleaner handle) became "live bait."

Other foods took a little more effort. There was my little squid, relaxing in a tub of ranch veggie dip. He helped make the bell pepper calamari appear a little more convincing. It was super simple, all I had to do was sink a baby bell into the dip upside down, use some gel frosting to make a face, and slip in eight pepper sticks for the legs.

Next were submarine cakes. My daughter has a video called "The Big Submarine" from Little Mammoth Media (they make wonderful educational videos for kids, please take a minute to check them out). I bought it for her so that she could see what life was like for Daddy when he was at sea in the Navy. Little did I know that she would love that video so much. When she saw these, she nearly deafened me as she pointed at the screen and shouted, "MOMMY, CAN WE HAVE THOSE AT MY FISH PARTY?!!" These were made with chocolate filled Twinkies. Yes, we ate collector's items, and they were delicious.  All I did was use frosting to "glue" on the M&M windows, and insert trimmed-down bendy straws at one end. If you absolutely love this idea, but fear paying $500 a box for Twinkies, DO NOT FRET. Little Debbie makes Cloud Cakes. I've noticed they're a little harder to find in stores, but you won't spend your child's entire college fund to get them.

I also made oyster cookies. The hardest part of this was finding something to use as pearls. Luckily, my local Hobby Lobby had shiny, white Sixlets in the wedding section. After that, it was a matter of coloring some frosting, frosting the bottom of a Nilla Wafer, adding the Sixlet, and then topping it all with another Nilla Wafer. I don't even like Nilla Wafers or Sixlets, but these cookies were tasty. Something about the flavor combo made them really, really good.

Last, but not least, is the Rice Crispy treat sushi. This was as simple as making Rice Crispy treats, making them into patties, wrapping them with Fruit by the Foot, and topping them with a fish-shaped candy. I did have to use frosting to make the fish candy stick, but I consider this a success, because a lot of my family told me this would be the only sushi they'd ever eat. (My family isn't terribly adventurous when it comes to cuisine.)

Now, you may have noticed the cute little labels I made for the food. That wouldn't have been possible without my mom's Cricut machine. Well, it would have, but it would have taken ten times as long and been a lot more work. Actually, I made quite a few decorations with Mom's machine. I made seashells and starfish to scatter on the tables, as well as fish and seaweed to hang from the ceiling. Speaking of decorations, I thought the room looked fabulous:



Thank heavens for my parents, my MIL and SIL. I would never have gotten all this set up in time without them.

We also played several games the kids thoroughly enjoyed. For the first game, the kids got to go fishing for fish-shaped goody bags filled with bubbles, stickers, and necklaces. In the next game, the kids became the fish and had to catch gummy worms hanging from strings with their mouths. As is expected with young children, chaos and hilarity ensued.

When the party was all over, we sent everyone home with favors that I got from Oriental Trading. These little water-filled games were so cute, and my little one loved hers almost as much as she liked her presents.

All in all, I felt it was a big success. It was a lot of work and a little bit stressful, but my philosophy is that eventually, there will come a time when my baby will no longer think my ideas are all that great, and so I might as well go all out while I can. The little one has already informed me that she wants a kitty party next year, and so I will be keeping my eyes open for more good ideas. If you'd like to check out my Pinterest party board, you can do so here: http://pinterest.com/am_crittenden/party-ideas/. Happy party planning!

Lazy Blogging Monday

Well, guys, I don't have a lot to report today. I've been pretty busy making preparations for my little one's upcoming birthday party, but I don't have any pictures ready or anything to tell you about that. I kinda wanted to do an political opinion piece now that the elections are over, but gosh, if you're like me, you need a little break from the onslaught, so I'll hold off on that. So today is lazy blogging day. Yep! I am going to use the work of others as material for my blog today. A friend of mine on Facebook shared this link, and now I'm going to share it with you:

Baked Fundamentalist Macaroni and Cheese

There's a couple of reasons I shared this. One, it's pretty funny, no lie. Be warned, he drops the F-bomb once, if you're sensitive to that kind of language. On the whole though, the article is pretty tame. Secondly, I shared this because it sounds like an OMG tasty recipe, even if you're constipated for a week because of all the cheese. Finally, I shared this because he and I have the exact same opinion on macaroni and cheese. I see all these recipes (Pinterest, I'm looking at you) that call for mustard, or bread crumbs, or ham, or some other such nonsense in your macaroni and cheese, and I hate it. That's not macaroni and cheese, dang it! Now I admit, I fix it differently than he does. I have two versions, depending on who I'm fixing it for. One is a baked variety for my Southern friends and family, the other is a creamy stovetop variety for my husband and little girl. The main ingredients in both of these varieties are macaroni and cheese; they comprise roughly 85% of the dish. There are no meats, no crazy spices, no vegetables. Simple. Pure. And that's how it should be.

Frosted Luminaries

There was one decoration that I did for my Pumpkin Party that I didn't talk about in my previous blog. They're frosted glass luminaries, and they can be used for any occasion where you need a little ambient lighting:

Like so.

 All I did was save up some glass jars, wash them, put on some foil star stickers (the kind you get in the office section of your local big box store), and spray on some glass frosting spray. I've seen ideas similar to this floating around on Pinterest, but most of them call for spray paint, and I personally didn't want to use anything so opaque. For my project, I used Krylon Frosted Glass Finish, mainly because it was the only kind my craft store had at the time. Just make sure your jars are good and clean, make sure all that sticky junk that holds the labels on is gone, and follow the instructions on the spray can. These would be great for Christmas, or even a wedding. You can customize your stickers to any shape, or just leave them off entirely. It's a great little upcycling project that takes only minutes to do.

Now, in case you're wondering, the sticky stuff on the jars I used was pretty stubborn. What I did to get it off was remove the label and rub some petroleum jelly on the adhesive. I let it sit for a day or two, then I scraped as much off as I could with a razor. After that, I washed the jar with HOT water and soap. If it didn't all come off after that, I spritzed it with some Pine-Sol and re-washed the jar with hot water and soap. I've also heard you can used peanut butter, rubbing alcohol, or nail-polish remover. Basically, these things are supposed to weaken the adhesive so that it isn't quite so sticky. I tried them all, and the petroleum jelly worked best for me; I only had to use the Pine-Sol a couple of times as a last resort.

I'm proud of how these turned out. I'm going to keep them handy for my next evening porch get-together. Anyway, that's it for now. Stay tuned for more crafty stuff!

Recipes as Promised

Here are the recipes that I promised from my Pumpkin Party post a couple of weeks ago! This week, I'm doing a couple of different blogs because I've been slack in the blogging department, but not in the life department! I have several things I'd like to share with you. So lets get to those recipes, shall we?

Caramel Cheesecake Fruit Dip

• Two 8-ounce packages of cream cheese, softened
• One 8-ounce tub of whipped topping
• One 16-ounce container of caramel dip

Beat cream cheese in a medium bowl until fluffy. Add whipped topping and caramel dip and beat until smooth. Chill until ready to use.

This can also be poured into a ready-made pie crust and served as a no-bake cheesecake. You can top it with chocolate sauce, nuts, toffee chips, whatever strikes your fancy!

Stuffed Jack-o-Lantern Peppers
This is a large recipe. Feel free to scale it down to fit your family!

• 18 bell peppers
• 1 large onion
• 1 Tbs. oil
• 3 chicken bouillon cubes
• 3 cups white rice
• 6 cups water
• seasoning salt to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large pot, add rice, water, and bouillon cubes. Bring rice to a boil on high heat, stir, and cover. Turn heat to low and forget about it for 20 minutes. (I mean it! Don't you lift the lid or stir it at all!) Meanwhile, wash peppers and cut tops off. Clean out the seeds and pith, then carefully cut out a simple jack-o-lantern face. Chop up the usable part of the pepper tops. Finely chop the onion. Add the onion, pepper bits, and oil to a skillet and simmer on medium heat until tender. After the rice is finished cooking, add the peppers and onion, then season with seasoning salt to taste. Loosely pack the rice evenly into each pepper. Place the stuffed peppers on a greased baking sheet so that they lean on one another. Bake in the preheated oven for about 1 hour.

Eggnog
This recipe comes from The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook. Keep in mind, this recipe uses raw eggs. Consume at your own risk.

• 12 eggs, separated
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cups bourbon
• 1/2 cup brandy (for a non-alcoholic version, we omitted the booze and substituted 2 tsp. rum extract)
• 6 cups milk
• ground nutmeg
• 1 cup heavy or whipping cream

1. In large bowl with mixer at low speed, beat egg yolks with sugar. At high speed, beat until thick and lemon-colored, about 15 minutes, frequently scraping the bowl.
2. Carefully beat in bourbon and brandy (or rum extract), once Tbs. at a time to prevent curdling the mixture. Cover and chill.
3. About 20 minutes before serving: In chilled 5-6 qt. punch bowl, stir yolk mixture, milk, and 1 1/4 tsp. nutmeg.
4. In large bowl with mixer at high speed, beat egg whites until soft peaks form.
5. In small bowl, using same beaters, with mixer at medium speed, beat cream until stiff peaks form.
6. With wire whisk, gently fold egg whites and cream into yolk mixture until just blended.
7. To serve, sprinkle some nutmeg over top of eggnog; ladle into 6-oz punch cups.

Apple Pie with Crumb Topping
This recipe came from the 12th edition Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. I actually found a link to the recipe on the BHG website here. The only difference is on the website, it calls for a premade pie crust bottom, whereas in the book, they tell you how to make a single pie crust. I will now give you the single pie crust recipe from the book, so you can choose whether you want to save some time or make a 100% from scratch dish.

Pastry for Single-Crust Pie

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1/3 cup shortening
• 4 to 5 Tbs cold water

1. In a medium bowl stir together flour and salt. Using a pastry blender, cut in shortening until pieces are pea-size.
2. Sprinkle 1 Tbs of the water over part of the flour mixture; gently toss with a fork. Push moistened dough to the side of the bowl. Repeat moistening flour mixture, using 1 Tbs of the water at a time, until all the flour mixture is moistened. Form dough into a ball.
3. On a lightly floured surface, use your hands to slightly flatten dough. Roll dough from center to edges into a circle about 12 inches in diameter.
4. To transfer pastry, wrap it around the rolling pin. Unroll pastry into a 9-inch pie plate. Ease pastry into pie plate without stretching it.
5. Trim pastry to 1/2 inch beyond edge of pie plate. Fold under extra pastry. Crimp as desired. Do not prick pastry. Bake as directed in individual recipes.

Well that's that, folks! That's how we made all the yummy stuff we served at our Pumpkin Bash. Because I'm a little obsessed with Halloween, I've already started making plans for next year's get-together. Our theme is going to be Lousiana Voodoo House, and the food is going to be Cajun/Creole faire. Our dessert is going to be beignets, and I've got some cute plans for snacks such as frog leg cookies and voodoo-doll breadsticks. See you next time!

Pumpkin Party!

*You'll notice that I've changed my layout from 3 columns to 2. I feel this squishes my content less, and it hopefully improves the overall appearance and function of my blog.

This past Saturday was our first annual pumpkin carving bonanza. I have to admit, as much as I love Halloween, inviting everyone over was actually my husband's idea. I'm glad he had it though, because we had a good, albeit tiring time. I spent the week before making decorations and lots of goodies for the party.

I decided to keep the decorations simple and fun. On the porch, I did streamers and spider webs, complete with pipe cleaner spiders that my little one helped me make.

Indoors, I did a small vignette with decorations that I collected over the years.

The food was to die for. (Ha! See what I did there?) Our menu included:

• Grilled BBQ chicken (the hubby's specialty)
• Mashed potatoes
• Corn on the cob
• Salad
• Stuffed jack-o-lantern peppers* (pic here)
• Witch finger pretzels
• Scarecrow treats
• Veggies and crackers with ranch dip
• Tortilla chips and homemade salsa
• Fruit with caramel cheesecake dip*
• Honey oat quick bread (which makes great French toast the next morning!)
• Autumn brittle
• Haystacks (sans the marshmallows)
• Graveyard gravel fudge
• Homemade eggnog*
• Apple pie with crumb topping*

*Recipes coming in a later blog.

Sounds good, huh? It looked good too!

And that's just the snack table!

All in all, I think our guests had a great time. They carved some snazzy pumpkins too!

 

After the party was over, since I didn't need the extra seating, I added some more decor to my porch.

Drinking wine from Solo cups? Stay classy, skeletons!

 I don't expect to get many trick-or-treaters out here in the country, but that won't stop me from getting into the spirit of the season. (Spirit, get it? I kill me! Oh, look I did it again! Okay, I'll stop now, I promise.)

So yeah, that's what I've been up to. Hope you enjoyed the blog, and stay tuned for those recipes. See you next time!

Why Zombies Scare Me

Halloween is just around the corner, so I thought I'd write something that's been on my mind for a while. For me, zombies are possibly the scariest Hollywood monster ever conceived. They plague my dreams and make me wake up in a cold sweat. Why, you ask?

The reanimated dead already play a roll in our collective psyche, which is why vampires are popular in the larger monster mythos. But there's something more disturbing about a zombie to me, because it represents primal savagery and enslavement to your base urges. The zombie story is a tale of the id versus the ego, a look into the nature of humanity. Losing the ability to reason and losing control over your desires is frightening, because it means losing that which makes a person human. A zombie is like a wild animal, but worse. An animal can often be deterred, but a zombie only has one desire, one driving thought, and that is to feed. It will fulfill this desire by any means necessary; the only way to stop a zombie is to kill it. Again.

Facing a relentless enemy that doesn't know reason, fear, pain, or remorse is scary enough, but then we have to consider how zombies are made. Infection occurs rapidly and spreads rampantly through a bite or a scratch, and in no time at all, hordes of the walking dead are swarming the streets. When this happens, at any moment a person could go from a reasoning being to a complete savage capable of infecting others. There's no hope of a cure. All that person once was ceases to be. Scarier still, the infection does not discriminate. Man, woman, child, black, white, yellow, red, or brown, it does not matter.

Then there's the emotional and moral dilemmas survivors must face while dealing with zombies. Survival situations can bring out the worst behavior in people. No one likes to think they'd be the person to trip their best friend while running from zombies, but if your life depended on it, would you? Would you kill someone for their food or their weapons if it meant that your family might survive another month? You may say no, but do you know that for sure? In the beginning, I mentioned that the zombie itself is a representation of the id, but in the fight for survival, humans also battle internally with the id. When faced with the choice between life or death, our true nature comes out, and we may not be as noble as we think.

One final point - I mentioned before that the infection does not discriminate. We see in zombie movies two types of people. The first is the stone-cold zombie killer, determined to survive and resolved to the fact that zombies are but shades of their former selves and cannot be helped. The second is the person who hesitates to fight because when they look at a zombie they can't help but see family, friends, and neighbors - people they once knew and loved. We always say to the second person, "Kill them! What are you waiting for?!" But what would you do? How would you act if you were staring down the barrel at someone you loved? What if that monster was your mother or your father? What if it was your own precious child, or your beloved spouse? Could you look them in their now soulless eyes and blow them straight to Hell? Could you really? If you did, could you live with that image stuck in your head for the rest of your life? What would stop you from, in your grief, turning the gun on yourself? I have turned these questions over in my mind a hundred times, and honestly, I have no answer for them. That, more than anything, is why zombies scare me to death.

Not Feeling it Today...

These last few days I've just been going through the motions. I haven't been able to sleep at night, but having a little one means I can't sleep during the day either. Caffeine doesn't help, so I've been shuffling around like a zombie. An irritable zombie. I try not to be crabby around my little one, but she's so bouncy and happy and chatty, and I'm so...well, not. Seeing happy people when I'm in this mood doesn't make it better. However, with any luck, I'll be in bed (and asleep, that's the key) at a reasonable hour tonight so I can be my usual self tomorrow.

At any rate, there were two highlights of this past week for me. One, my husband built us a lovely fire pit and outdoor shed, so our new rental is becoming more and more homey all the time. I love bonfires, and my love finished our fire pit just in time to enjoy some of the first cool nights of fall. We had a lovely visit from some friends and roasted marshmallows while the kiddos played with flashlights in the dark. The second highlight was the release of World of Warcraft's fourth expansion, Mists of Pandaria.

The above picture is my main, Leahsidhe, riding a kite across the isle of Pandaria. The graphics for this expansion are amazing, so I've been taking screenshots like nobody's business. (That is a link to my facebook WoW album, which is supposed to be public, so I hope you guys can see it.) But seriously though, Blizzard needs to give their art and graphics departments a big raise, because it's almost like playing in a painting. That's not all that's good about it, though. I'm having fun meeting the Pandaren and learning about their culture and history. There are several fun quest chains, particularly the quests with Riko and Kiryn on the Horde side, and the quest to smash hozen with the giant yeti in Kun'Lai Summit. There's also lots of extra funny stuff, like the interactive cauldrons on the Isle of Reckoning, or when you pass by Pandaren locals and they comment on how strange or skinny you look. As a hunter, I'm digging all the new tameable creatures out there. So yeah, I'm not quite 90 yet, but I'm enjoying the journey. Also, I'm going to confess about being wrong. In my last post, I said that MoP would be a lighthearted break from the drama of Azeroth, but it seems that tensions between Horde and Alliance are at an all time high, and the reappearance of the Sha is all our fault. Sha are big, bad, and feed on negativity. They stayed buried in Pandaria for centuries, then we show up with our faction war, and well GUESS WHAT:

Source.

Anyway, that's all for me today. Next week I should have a lovely blog about all the crafty stuff I've been doing. We'll see!

Here Come the Pandas

It's almost here! At 3 AM, Blizzard will be releasing its latest World of Warcraft expansion - Mists of Pandaria.

Source

I've heard a lot of naysayers complain that this expansion will be lame. They compare it to Kung-Fu Panda, and I admit, at first, I had my doubts. However, I find myself eagerly anticipating this expansion as a fun, lighthearted break from the usual drama in Azeroth. The first expansion brought us a demon invasion, the second had us battling undead hordes under the control of the Lich King, and Deathwing nearly ripped the world in two in Cataclysm. Mists of Pandaria promises rich lore, beautiful graphics, and the brew-loving Pandarens. Now, I'm sure there will be a fair amount of strife, since our pre-expansion event was Garrosh destroying Theramore Isle, a move that didn't sit well with the other Horde leaders or the Horde's long-time human sympathizer, Jaina Proudmoore, but it wouldn't be World of Warcraft without out some Horde-Alliance conflict. Anyway, enough out of me. I'm going to share the MoP cinematic trailer with you, which even if you aren't a WoW fan, I believe you can still appreciate (be sure to watch in full screen):

And with that, I'm out of here. See you when the Mists lift!

All moved in...

So I was doing pretty well there for a while, wasn't I? Blogging every week, keeping you up to date on the ins and outs of life. Well, then we moved. Our little family was living in chaos while living out of boxes for a couple of weeks there in mid-August, but now I can officially state that we're all moved in. Now it's time to get back on the blogging train. So here's a little peek at what I've been up to:

That is one of the fingerless gloves I made from a pair of Halloween knit tights. I bought the tights thinking it would be fun and quirky to have a pair of stripey stockings in my wardrobe, but the "one size fits all" label evidently meant all children, because I am a short adult, and I could not get them up to my waist. Anyway, I threw them in my fabric bin because I paid for them, and I wasn't about to throw them away. (In case you're wondering, returning them was out of the question because in my fervor to put them on I put a hole in them.) So I got them out the other day after deciding that I wanted to be a witch for Halloween -  just to make sure they really wouldn't fit. Sure enough, they were still too short. After staring at them for a few minutes, wracking my brain as to how I could use them, I said, "Screw it." I threw caution to the wind, and cut them off at the stripe where they reached my knees. I fray-checked the ends, and put them on. To my surprise, the ends didn't roll down and the socks stayed put, so I have a new pair of striped knee-socks. Well, I still had the tops. I thought about throwing them away, but a friend of mine posted a picture of some fingerless gloves for another friend of mine, and eureka! I made two tubes out of the tops, cut thumb holes in the sides, fray-checked the whole thing and now I have fingerless gloves. I've always kinda wanted some because my hands get cold when I'm on the computer or doing crafts, but I don't want to put on gloves because I lose all my manual dexterity that way. So there, problem solved. I didn't throw away money on ruined tights, and I got two articles of clothing out of the deal. Upcycling at its finest!

Now, I mentioned that I wanted to be a witch for Halloween. Obviously a witch needs a hat, but a witch hat is not one of the things I have in my arsenal of Halloween goods, believe it or not. I found one at Target for $2.50, and it was purple! (Purple is one of my favorite colors AND the color of the dress that was going to be the foundation for my costume.) For $2.50, I was expecting a basic hat with no frills whatsoever, but it had tulle, feathers, and a satin flower on it. That being said, it still looked a little cheap because the ends of the feathers were showing. Me being me, I cruised on to Hobby Lobby and picked up a pack of six small, sheer black roses with a rhinestone in the center of each one for $1.99. I hot-glued those bad boys on, and now for $4.49, I have a pretty snazzy witch hat:

 

And here's a close-up of the flowers:

 

I seriously like this hat enough to wear it without a reason.

Fall Anticipation and Other Randomness

Well, today's post is going to be short. I have a few craft projects on the table right now, but nothing is ready for me to do a blog about. So, I'm just going to talk about a few things going on with me.

Even though it's still HOT, HOT, HOT outside, I can feel fall coming. There's something about the sky now that says autumn is on its way*, and believe it or not, some of the leaves around here are starting to turn. I can't wait for cooler weather, fairs, bonfires, apple cider, beautiful foliage, mums, asters, and HALLOWEEN. It makes me so giddy I want to squeal!

What also makes me giddy is our new house. We signed the lease two weeks ago, and since we've been moving our stuff over one truckload at a time. I like our new place more and more each time I go over, so I think we're going to be really happy there. I sure am looking forward to enjoying a cup of coffee on our new porch!

I just found out recently that the Mists of Pandaria expansion for World of Warcraft is coming out at the end of September. I'm excited and a little surprised that it's coming out then; it's sooner than I expected. This means I have some work to do, like finish leveling some toons I wanted to have ready for the new content. Guess I'll be spending some time in Azeroth!

*For you science buffs, I did a little research because I wanted to know if I was just crazy or if there really is something to my feeling that the sky is indicating the coming autumn. I can't actually explain what I pick up on that makes me recognize the change of the season, but here's what I discovered: because of Earth's tilt, the sun appears higher in the sky during the summer than it does in the winter. This causes a change in the appearance of the sky's color, due to a phenomenon called Rayleigh scattering (what makes the sky blue). The change would be pretty subtle and would vary based on latitudes, but the lowest estimate I've seen about human color perception is that we can see approximately 2 million different colors, and I've also seen estimates as high as 10 million colors. Color variations are subjective, but it probably is possible for a person to pick up on a change in the sky's hue. Read about it all here:

http://www.morehead.unc.edu/Shows/EMS/seasons.htm
http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/1998-10/909280669.Ph.r.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh_scattering
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color

Sorry So Late

I bet you thought I'd forgotten about you this week. Never fear, I have not. No, instead I've been busy recovering from a weekend at my husband's family reunion by moving stuff to our new rental. So yeah, that craft blog I've been promising - I think I'm just going to break it up into several small blogs. Let's face it, my picture blogs are pretty long aren't they? This way, it'll be more convenient for all of us.

With that said, here's what I want to show you this week:

This is a wreath I made using jute twine, some wire, old jeans, and three vintage costume brooches that belonged to my granny. I started out with the intent to make something like a wreath I saw, where else, on Pinterest. The wreath is actually for sale on Etsy via TheCreativeGypsy's shop, but I thought, "I'm pretty crafty, let me try my hand at this." So I started wrapping the wreath with jute twine and was about to make the linen flowers when I saw this tutorial for denim flowers on Pinterest. The center beading looked so much like my granny's brooches that I changed my plans for the wreath right then and there. See, I love the old costume jewelry that my granny gave me, but it's not my style for wearing, so I've been looking for some way to incorporate it into something that I could see every day and get enjoyment from. Behold, my wreath! I just love it! It's rustic with a bit of glam. I'm sure the girls at Mary Jane's Farm would be proud. But I didn't stop there - oh no. See, in my granny's box of vintage jewelry was also a pair of clip-on earrings:



So I made myself some flowers that never die. They look just lovely in my milk glass bud vase. So just remember, if you've got something that means a lot to you, but all it's doing is cluttering up your space, turn it into something new. Happy crafting!

The Dream Net

So no picture blog again this week, but I do have something nifty to share. When I saw this on Pinterest:

I knew I just had to make one!

Originally, I wanted a doily center just like the picture, but I wanted to use one of my granny's old ones. Unfortunately, my mom has them all, and I just couldn't wait for my next visit, so I improvised. Mine has a more traditonal net center with lots of beads. Then I loaded it down with ribbons, strings, and LOTS of trinkets that all have special meaning to me. The end result is something unique and sort of bohemian:

My little one calls it my "dream net." She wants one too, so as soon as I get some ribbons that coordinate with her room colors, we'll make her one too :).

Now for a personal update. We'll be moving soon. Last night I took a second look at the rental property I mentioned last week. It's not perfect, but I think it'll do. I'll get some pictures up when we're all settled in!

Tonight?

Tonight could be the night. We are going to see a new place to rent, and I'm hopeful. It's a cute little house out in the country with lots more space than we currently have. It's the right price, and it allows pets. We could get really lucky!

However, our luck always balances out. This afternoon we are dropping off the truck for a laundry list of things that need to be tended to, including new tires and AC repair. Ick. There goes all the money the hubby made from his July 4th holiday overtime. You know what? I'm not complaining. We have always been fortunate with money. We've never been rolling in cash, but we've always had what we needed, and most of the time, a little extra. The powers that be seem to keep us on a short leash so that we never get too far down one path or the other, and I'm okay with that.

I'm making progress on the craft picture blog I promised you a few weeks ago. My main problem is that I'm having issues with uploading my pictures. I'll work on it over the week and hopefully have it to you by next Monday.

I'll give you a sneak preview of what's to come in the craft blog:

I have quite the budding artist in my house. She loves to color, draw, and paint, so my house is overflowing with paper swathed in colors. What I needed was a way to make them special. Now I know a few of you are saying, "but a child's art is already special," and I agree. But I've also heard it said, "When everything is special, then nothing is special," and that I also agree with. Believe me when I tell you, there were so many pictures piling up that I couldn't even see them all, because they were starting to blend together. I was already beginning to overlook the pretty pictures my girl had so put so much love and joy into making.

So when I saw this project on Pinterest, I knew just what to do with the little one's masterpieces. At first she was unsure of letting me cut them, but when she saw how they turned out, she was really excited about helping Mommy make pictures. Her favorite right now is the bird. I was thinking since I have so many paintings, that doing a few of these for every season would be a great idea. Now I look up and see a daily reminder of my little artist. I have plans on making Christmas gifts using this idea, and I'm sure the family will love them. I have also used her art to make cards for holidays. The one we made for her daddy on Father's Day turned out especially well, thanks to this idea I pinned: http://pinterest.com/pin/22658804345586346/.

Well, there you have it. Stay tuned for more Pinterest ideas made real, and more fun, crafty stuff by yours truly! See you next week!

Is it that time again?

It feels like it's been ages since I last blogged. Quite a bit has happened this week. We're still enduring a heat wave, and I swear that our little AC is losing the battle. We're supposed to get a reprieve from the high temps this week, and I so hope they're right. We had quite a storm not too long after I finished my last blog post, complete with golf ball-sized hail and hurricane-force winds. One of the pine trees out front decided to split open and fall over right in front of the house, and I am SO, SO grateful it decided to fall AWAY from the house.

Look at this tree. Just look at it. All falling over and crap.

 Had the wind been blowing the opposite direction, our master bedroom would have been crushed. That would have most certainly moved our rental search priority to DefCon 1. Speaking of which, last Thursday we took a look at a rental property that we liked very much. We may not get it because it's a tiny bit more expensive than we would like, but hey, at least we found something. That's a great improvement over the "no pets, no longer available" luck I've been having. We will prevail. With time and perseverance, we'll find a place that's both in our target price range and has the features we're looking for.

Now that I've given you a personal update, here is the real reason I'm posting today: HOMEMADE STRAWBERRY CHEESECAKE ICE CREAM.

Wipe your chin; you're drooling.

This stuff is delicious, and it wasn't difficult to make! I found the recipe in a Philadelphia Cream Cheese  advertisement in my latest issue of Better Homes and Gardens. It really does taste like cheesecake with strawberry topping. It even has graham crackers in it! I made this for dessert as part of our Independence Day celebration, and I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself. Anyway, without further adieu, here's the recipe:

Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream, courtesy of Philadelphia Cream Cheese

Ingredients:

• 1 pkg. (8 oz.) PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese, softened
• 1 can (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk
• 1/3 cup whipping cream
• 2 tsp. lemon zest
• 1-1/2 cups fresh strawberries
• 3 HONEY MAID Honey Grahams, coarsely chopped

Directions:

• Mix first 4 ingredients with mixer until well blended. Freeze 4 hours or until almost solid.
• Beat cream cheese mixture with mixer until creamy. Blend berries in blender until smooth. Add to cream cheese mixture with chopped grahams; mix well. Freeze 8 hours or until firm.
• Remove dessert from freezer 15 min. before serving; let stand at room temperature to soften slightly before scooping into dishes.

See, what'd I tell ya? EASY! Go make some. You won't be sorry!

PSSST! By the way, you don't have to use the name brand stuff. I didn't. But don't tell Kraft I told you that.

Too hot to do anything

I had a revelation a few days ago. I'm not very good at this whole blogging thing. My inspiration for blogs comes in fits and starts, so regularity doesn't really fit into the equation. Even when I say to myself, "I need to blog today, " oftentimes, life gets in the way, and I end up doing something else. I want to post more regularly, and I think the only way to do that is to actually schedule my blogging time. If I constantly gather my blogging inspiration and sit it aside, then I should have enough material to sit down and crank out a blog for you all once or twice a week. It's a nice plan.

That being said, it's too hot to do much of anything right now. I don't have to tell you about the heat wave because it's pretty much been all the news has talked about lately. Well, I might have to tell you, if you live underground, since temperatures remain fairly constant and comfortable there. But then again, if you live underground, you probably don't read my blog, so... Anyway, our poor little AC unit is having a hard time keeping up with this triple-digit heat. Our house is so poorly insulated that we can't keep it any cooler than the mid 80's. Which causes me to think. Why is it that I find a low humidity, mid 80-degree day outside to be beautiful, but when it's in the 80's in a climate controlled house, I feel like I'm going to melt away? I digress. Back on track. It's been pretty warm; so warm that I haven't even been playing WoW, which would be my usual indoor pastime, because my computer will kick out too much heat. All I've wanted to do is sleep, since the heat makes me sleepy.

I have managed to get a few things done in between sleepy times. Last night I sewed new curtains for my bedroom. The day before I got the shape ready for a paper mache project I'm working on. The day before that I painted a new sign for my living room. I want to get pictures up for you guys, but my laziness always stops me just short of doing so. Anyway, I can't fight it anymore; I'm taking a nap. Catch you guys later!

Life in Flux

All I want to do is settle down on my little hobby farm with some chickens, a cow, and maybe some ducks. I want to plant a garden and line-dry my clothes. I want to chase after my little one while she collects dandelion blooms for me to make dandelion jelly. Is that too much to ask?

Well, we still haven't sold our NY home, so we couldn't buy a place here in NC. We were fortunate enough to find a landlord who didn't mind our 108-pound monster dog or our cat. He also let us put up a clothesline and plant some vegetables, even though it makes mowing the lawn more difficult for him. However, our landlord informed us that on his birthday in January, he'll be officially retired, and he'd like to sell his rental homes. He said he won't kick us out if we want to stay, but I'm not sure if that means he expects us to buy this place or not. So, always prepared, we've been doing some searching for new places to rent. But good grief! Finding a place in our price range that will let us have our mutt is proving near impossible. It's a good thing we've got until January.

So if you don't hear from me, well, I'm too busy looking for a place to live.

Treasury Mania!

It's been quite a long time since I've put together any treasuries on Etsy, but lately I've been inspired to do a LOT of them. I started with one about dragons, but then I moved on to making treasuries that commemorate my favorite movies:

I have so much fun putting treasuries together. There are so many great items on Etsy that it's easy to come up with creative ways to express a theme; however, it's very difficult to limit yourself to just sixteen!

So go on, give my treasuries some love! etsy.com/people/AshleysCrescentMoon/treasury

P.S. To my friends and relations - any of these items in my treasuries would make a great gift. Hint, hint; wink, wink!

Gardening Picture Blog

It's picture blog time! It's May, and here in NC, that means gardening season is in full swing.

My corn is knee-high. Every time we go check on it, my little one asks if it has ears yet. She has a hard time believing that will be even taller than mommy in just a few weeks, so I can't wait to see the look on her face when it is.

I had some volunteer pumpkins this year. Apparently my compost didn't finish cooking enough to kill the seeds of our jack-o-lantern from the previous Halloween, so when I moved the compost, I got a few sprouts. I honestly didn't expect them to make it, so I didn't put much effort into helping them grow. In spite of my neglect, the sprouts survived, so I recently put a small fence around them so that my landlord wouldn't run over them with the lawn mower. I now I have an impromptu pumpkin patch, and I hope not to have to buy pumpkins for jack-o-lanterns this year.

I keep getting a handful of peas at a time. I will definitely have to plant more peas next time, because these are SO delicious, but there isn't enough of them to share.

I finally gave up on my bare root strawberries sprouting, and so I purchased potted strawberries instead. This is so much nicer than looking at an empty pot.

Here's a ladybug hanging out on our carrots. These are Danvers heirloom carrots, and the roots are just starting to turn orange. I can't wait to have fresh carrots with my salad!

My tomatoes are now taller than this, and they're starting to bloom. The 2-liter bottle is my totally advanced watering system. It has holes poked in the bottom so that it can gradually deliver water to the plant's roots. Soon, I'll need to make cages for them. Homemade salsa, here I come!

This is my first time growing potatoes, but they seem to be doing well. We'll see whether or not they actually produce, because all I did was plant some grocery store potatoes. A lot of books I've read say that store-bought plants won't produce because they're not seed potatoes and have been treated with something to prevent them from sprouting, but these potatoes grew eyes and leaves within a week of me bringing them home. I thought it was worth a shot, so we'll see how it goes.

I planted some more lantana in my little one's butterfly garden because I just can't get enough of the the stuff. I just love the blending of colors in the blooms.

Be sure to stay tuned for my craft picture blog - coming soon!