almost march?!?!? whoops!

I think that I should just go straight to a pictorial blog format, but then again, I probably wouldn't keep up with posting that way either. Just for the record, I did use Pinterest as my inspiration for a couple of things prior to the holidays. Like doing a child's shirt with an offset applique letter. I love how this shirt came out:

I made a couple of other things while I was making this shirt as a Christmas present.

It makes me so happy to make personalized gifts! I also branched out, prior to Christmas, and made my first two pairs of little boy pants. Thanks to the MADE blog, I had a great tutorial to follow. 

The jersey knit felt so comfy, that I think I may have to make me some pants!

recent projects

Clearly, I am not cut out for this blogging thing. But, as long as I am crafting, I will still try to post what I have done. Here is a recap of the past couple of months:

pinterest

If you prefer to make dishes with your own pulled chicken, then here is a great time saver that worked like a charm for me: http://pinterest.com/pin/28006828902279936/. I make a lot of dishes that require pulled chicken (pot pie, jambalaya, chicken and dumplings). Now, I know that I could save myself some time using canned chicken, but I prefer the taste of my own pulled chicken, and I also think the canned chicken could be more costly, and the good news is that now, I can make my own pulled chicken in half the time and everything will be home-made...right down to the dumplings!

Want another incredible time saver, meet the sock bun curls tutorial, here. Thank you, Pinterest! I love this way of doing my hair! It saves me time and it also means that I will not be putting damaging heat to my hair. After I hope out of my shower, my hair is curled in less than two minutes. And the curls last-it's a little bit of big-Texas-pageant hair when you first take it down, but it will fall to soft wavy curls. Love it!

pinterested?

I have a confession, I am super-addicted to pinterest. I am in serious need of a pinervention. Serious, very serious. But I was thinking, is this just another place for me to file away ideas and never actually use them, like my collection of torn out magazine pages with ideas. Am I going to be idea rich with no creations? Where is the fun of that, just sitting on the couch searching for ideas and never implementing? So, I am going to do something from my pinterest boards every week up until the holiday season gets too overwhelming and I can't do anymore.
 

Here is my first pinterest. Yes, I started with food, seems simple enough. I made fried pickles. See the recipe here. I made it for a football gathering and everyone liked them. The pickles (I bought thicker sliced hamburger chips) are in a beer batter. I bet the batter on some chicken tenderloin would be close to the Chili's chicken tenders. The funny part was me looking for a single can of beer at the grocery. The beer man asked if I needed help-ha! This recipe has officially graduated to my Confirmed: Yum Recipes board. Here is how they looked:

keychain

About a year ago I made some key fobs out of ribbon. The key fobs were cute, but they were easily worn out or dirtied.

Then, I started seeing key fobs made with durable webbing. I googled the materials and found this great site which came with instructions and all supplies needed. If you do not want to buy in bulk, then check out their sister site, The Sewphisticated Stitcher.

Just monogram your 7/8" ribbon, cut to 10" in length.

Place iron-on adhesive on the back of the ribbon. Then, attach the ribbon to the webbing. Sew together.

Sew the top together and clamp the hardware on the top of the key fob.

These make great gifts and are very quick to make. So many colors!

rebirth-part 2

The whole time we were tearing out everyone's homes, I wasn't worried anymore, and there certainly wasn't time to cry over the whole ordeal. I remember thinking, "Brannon can fix it." That's really all I thought-tear it down and we'll put it back-no biggie. It's been a long time coming, but with the exception of some exterior painting and some drywall work in our garage, we have just finished all of the rebuilding. This event has consumed our lives. Ask anyone who knows us, and they will tell you that it has been all that we have done with our free time for the past year and a half. In fact, I am sure many friends wish it would just be over to not have to hear about it anymore or so they can make plans with us again! :) While it doesn't replace all that was lost and the trauma of being stuck in a flooded home, we did try to make this condo top the pre-flood home...that we had just done. See:

Dining Room and Foyer

 

Living Room

 

Den

 

Kitchen

 

Master Bath-obviously, we have some cabinet doors to put up

 

Master Bedroom

 

Guest Bath

Guest Bedroom-with those doors and shelves we still have to put up.

I would have never believed what happened in Nashville in May 2010, if I hadn't seen it myself. However, I am so happy to see the beautiful homes that our families have now. Thanks to all of our friends and family for help and support while we put things back the way that they belong. 

Flood? What flood?

rebirth-part 1

Saturday, May 1, 2010, Brannon and I sat in a hotel room in St. Louis after watching the Reds play at the Cards' stadium. My father called me to tell me that our house was going to flood. Now, what you need to understand about my father is that he is a bit of a worrier. I just appeased him to the best of my ability to end the phone call and I told myself that I was not going to get worried because there wasn't much I could do from St. Louis. I should have remembered that sometimes all of my dad's worrying is legitimate (like the time he told all of the neighborhood kids to quit standing on the retaining wall because it was going to fall-we all thought he was crazy...that was until one morning after a heavy rainstorm, the wall was in our driveway). 

I am fortunate to have one of my best friends as a neighbor, so I called her up and asked her to check out the level of the river. She said that for one, my dad had already had my brother call to check the river situation with them, and that secondly, the river was way up, but shouldn't reach our house. That night everyone in Bellevue went to bed thinking, "Wow, that is a lot of rain" and "Wow, the river/creek/drainage ditch is really up", but I don't know that anyone, except my dad, knew what Sunday morning would bring.

Brannon and I had no problem falling to sleep Saturday night and we were set to depart St. Louis on Sunday. However, we were awakened not by our alarm clock but by a call from my father-in-law, Don. His home was flooded. I could barely process what Brannon was telling me. I immediately called my aunt, who lives in my subdivision to go check out our house. My aunt crawled out of bed (sorry, Weech) and reported that the river was at the fence in our neighbors backyard...in other words, the river had made it to our property line. My aunt reassured me that the river still had a ways to go...I did feel reassured. This is pretty much what she saw:

Brannon and I began pacing our hotel room knowing that we still had a long time before we had to board that plane. It was during this pacing that another call came in alerting us that my in-laws were on their way to try to get to the g'parent-in-laws' place to save as much as they can. The great news is that the g-parent-in-laws had just gone to the beach for the week-so they were safe. The bad news is that this also meant that my grandparents and Brannon's other grandparents were flooding and they were all home. At this point, my house was irrelevant, the grandparent-in-laws' house was no longer a priority, all attention and worry and stress was on my grandparents who were standing in water in their home...awaiting rescue. My in-laws made every attempt, risking their own lives, to make it to my grandparents and to save them. Fortunately, Brannon's other grandparents were already safe at this point. I was so relieved to finally learn, after what felt like an eternity, that my uncle had made it to my grandparents by boat. They were safe. It was surprising how in no time, water in our homes was no longer a big deal, and my grandparents had become everyone's concern.

In the end, Bellevue Nashville flooded. Places where you didn't even realize that there was a river nearby were covered in 5-feet of flood water. May 2, 2010 was the most stressful and shocking day. While Brannon and I could not make it home and ended up stranded in Chicago, we had great friends who stepped in and moved as many belongings in our home upstairs. They also moved as much out of our garage as possible as it became evident that our garage was going to flood. That day, Brannon would have lost his truck and lawnmower and various other tools if it weren't for our wonderful friends.

The flood brought so much destruction that is still being sorted out even to this day. Brannon and I had water in our crawl space and garage. The water stopped just inches below the sub floor. Here are some pics from our home:

My neighbors were so awesome for doing everything 

to save our belongings:

 

 This is what Brannon and I returned to:

This is what happens when water fills your crawl space:

We were very fortunate, but 3 out of 4 of our grandparents, my husband's father and my husband's aunt and uncle were not so lucky as water entered their homes. Here are some pictures of my grandparents' home (courtesy of my cousin Janet, from whom's Facebook page I jacked these :))

Here is the really sad part: my grandparents had just bought this house in late summer 2009. Brannon and I, with some help from family, renovated it (including building all of those kitchen cabinets) and had the condo move-in ready in time for Christmas 2009, and it was all torn out in early May 2010. We took it down to studs and slab. That was all that was left, but at least our grandparents were still with us.