Strawberry!

My first ripe strawberry of the year! Yay! I wonder what it tasted like.

My husband, Seán, came in the house the other day with a surprise. He asked me if I knew that there was a ripe strawberry on my plant. Of course, I grabbed my camera and my daughter, Zara, and headed out to check!

Makeover Monday - Business Card Holder Transformation

A colorful redo for a drab business card holder.

Today's Makeover Monday is something that's a bit near and dear to my heart. I gave my very first business card holder a face lift. Way back when, I actually needed to carry business cards and I've been thinking about getting some for my blog and Etsy shop. I dug this out of a drawer, consigned the cards inside to the hot glue gun drip catcher pile, and got to work.

Fabulous Faux Hematite Ring

I'm head over heels for this ring. *cue rimshot* Thank you folks! I'll be here all week.

I believe I may have mentioned a time or two before that I'm a bit of a craft hoarder. Well...yeah. I've had a set of two resin faces for somewhere around twenty years. Yep. Twenty years. Think about that for a minute. I bought them, had no idea what I was going to do with them, and kept them. For. Twenty. Years! Even I realize that's insane. On the upside, I finally got around to using one of them to make my fabulous new faux hematite ring. Yay me!

GripZies - A Product I Love Right Now

This little product is a time-saver and it really works.

Let me say this first: I'm not being paid for this. I just really love this product and want to spread the word. GripZies is a little foam sticker thingy that makes hair clips non-slip. Before I discovered it, I had been using hot glue, smooshing it around with a craft stick to rough it up a bit, and holding it open until it completely dried. It worked, but it wasn't pretty. And it was a bit of a time suck. And if I'd let the clip close before it was completely dried....well, after a lot of very not-nice words, I'd have to bust out the craft knife to cut it apart. Not anymore!

Super Simple Bow Hair Pin

Plaid matches everything, right?

Iron Craft's Challenge #21 - Where We Come From asked us to do something indicative of our heritage.  I'm Cherokee, Scottish, and English. That's a pretty broad spectrum to pick from, but still I was blocked. I'm going to admit, I kinda copped out on this one. I made a Super Simple bow hair pin out of plaid fabric. I think it turned out totally adorable.

Kitty Ballistic's Beautiful Earrings

Trying to ignore the fact that I'm aiming a camera at my face.

I had a wonderful surprise the other day. I got the message that I had won Kitty Ballistic's earring giveaway! This is my second win recently. I'm feeling so lucky that maybe I should head to Las Vegas. Or at least buy a lottery ticket.

Kitty Ballistic's Creations is a blog that has a plethora of her amazing jewelry and funny felt creatures. The first time I had noticed her blog was because she had made a felt doll called Anton du Felt modeled after Strictly Come Dancing's Anton Du Beke, complete with a tiny tuxedo and cummerbund. So adorable!

Makeover Monday: Super Simple Berry Wreath

Berrylicious Wreath

For this week's Makeover Monday, I turned my attention to a wreath that had been given to me by my aunt. It had been in her basement for ages and needed a bit of a pick-me-up. During my last trip to a Dollar Tree, I found bunches of berries that I thought were sweet. I bought four bunches and used every bit of them for this wreath. And did I mention that this wreath is Super Simple? It took me all of, oh, I dunno, maybe four minutes to throw together.

Perfect Peonies

I really <3 peonies.

Depends on who you ask around here, these may be called pinies, ponies, or, as the rest of the world knows them, peonies. Peonies are one of my absolute favorite flowers. My grandmother, Mamaw Black, had a big, gorgeous peony bush in her front yard that thrilled me every time it bloomed. Sadly, both my grandmother and the bush have passed on, but my love of peonies remains. I visited my Aunt Lizetta and she loaded me up with an armful of the blossoms to bring home.

100th Post! - Earth Laughs in Flowers Printable

Woohoo!

This is my 100th post. Woooooohooooo!!! I started this blog on a whim and just assumed that, like with most things, I'd get bored quickly and give it up after a couple of months. But nope! I'm still here and still loving it. Yay me!

In honor of my 100th post and to say thanks to the readers who have stayed around, I'm offering this printable. Click here or on the caption to download it. The rules are the same as with all of my printables. It's free for you, but not free for you to make money off of (i.e. personal use only).

Earth laughs in flowers. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Enjoy and thanks a bunch for sticking around!

Two Easy T-Shirt Makeovers

An easy t-shirt re-do.

It's that time again. Iron Craft's challenge was called To A Tee. The assignment was to transform an ordinary t-shirt. I had two shirts that were in the same color family. I used the overly large, bleach and hair dye spotted one to make the petals. Lots of petals. I just really loved the color and thought I could use it for something sometime. Turns out I was right. Yay!

Super Simple Four Loop Hair Bow

This bow looks way more complicated than it actually is.

My daughter Zara loves hair bows like I love earrings. She's so my girl. She's very particular about what she likes in a hair bow. It needs to be smallish and cute but not too cutesy and absolutely nothing big and garish. It's always worn on the right side. Only one at a time. Any deviations are not tolerated. She's three and the girl knows what she likes. She needed a navy blue hair clip, so I whipped this little one up. It's Super Simple, like most of the hair clips I make for her.

Makeover Monday: Stripey Earrings

What's black and white and shiny all over? My made-over earrings!

So, turns out there's such a thing as being too clean. I had these silvery (and inexpensive) hoop earrings that I had cleaned a bit too much (hydrogen peroxide). The earrings' finish almost completely came off. So not cute! Most people would have tossed them, but seeing as I'm me, I kept them. And then painted them. Did you honestly expect me to do anything else?

Silk Rose Hair Pin

A sweet and understated hair pin.

You might just recognize the blue silk from the post I did on creating a silk flower headband. You might also recognize the rose from the post I did on adding flowers to a plain bag. I made a ton of those flowers. Well, this is a Super Simple way to use up one of those flowers.

Root Beer (Cupcakes) Float My Boat

How good does that look?

Root beer float cupcakes. Yup, you heard me. I really wish I had thought of this, but sadly no. They were the glorious brainchild of Jessica from How Sweet It Is. They're a chocolate/root beer cake with root beer frosting filling topped with vanilla frosting. Sounds amazing, right? Well, they are!

Floral Photo Frame

A Spring-tastic Shrink Plastic Frame

What does spring mean to me? That's the question of the week posed by Iron Crafter Spring Contest. Well, sort of. Technically, it's "Spring." Period. But I did have to ask myself that question. Turns out, spring means flowers, butterflies, and my daughter running barefoot through the grass. Who knew? It also means the return of flip-flops, but I couldn't figure out a way to tastefully throw them into the mix. Anyway, I made this magnetic floral photo frame from one of my favorite things - Shrinky Dinks shrink plastic.

How to Make Colored Sugar

I'm calling these Frost Blue, Blackberry Bramble, Key Lime Pie, and Orange Sherbet.

It was only after spending around three bucks on a jar of colored sugar for decorating baked goods that I realized I could probably make that at home for practically free. Definitely a #facepalm moment. Making colored sugar is so Super Simple it's almost embarrassing. I whipped up four colors in almost no time at all. Here's how I added to my starting-to-get-out-of-control sprinkles and sugar collection.

Makeover Monday: Adding Flowers to a Plain Bag

The flowers add a bit of personality to an otherwise boring bag.

My fabulous Aunt Lizetta gave me this bag because, well, she was over it. It wasn't exactly my style, but now it is. I spent some time on Mother's Day making rosettes while watching a couple of films (My Life in Ruins and It's Complicated, if you're interested) and enjoyed my awesome day. My husband Seán took our daughter Zara to Mass and went shopping for my super-special dinner. They made stir-fry and black rice with a Dairy Queen cake for dessert. Told you it was awesome.

Trudy's Scones

Tea and scones - so civilized. Photo by me.

If you are ever privileged enough to receive an invitation to dinner at Trudy Robinson's house, by all means go! She's an amazing cook. So amazing, in fact, that she has a weekly cooking column in The Lincoln Journal called Cooking: Plain & Fancy. In this week's column she has a recipe for English Scones, among other things. Of course, we had to try it. Turns out, this recipe is so easy and sooooooo yummy!

The Fruit (and Herbs) of My Labor

Painted pots courtesy of Zara.

 Last weekend was amazing. The weather was perfect for a trip to a greenhouse and the farmer's market. We picked up several herbs, strawberry plants, tomato plants, and some squash plants. I missed having fresh herbs over the winter, so I'm so excited.

We also bought some flowers to give my mother and grandmother for Mother's Day. I handed over two pots and some paint to Zara and told her to have fun. It looks like she did.

A Silk Flower Headband

This one's all for me!

April showers bring May flowers. That's the old nursery rhyme and this week's Iron Craft challenge. We were to do something to do with flowers. I made a flower headband using my husband's silk pajamas (with his permission, of course) and my daughter's headband. She wasn't using it anyway. Please don't tell on me.

Much Love for Mich L. in L.A.

Okay, so I never win anything. Really. Seriously. But for some reason Lady Luck was on my side and I won this fabulous necklace and equally fabulous earrings from Mich. L. in L.A. I guessed (wrongly) on her Mystery Thing challenge, and since no one got it right, it went to a random draw. Yay for randomness!

Makeover Monday: A Desk Chair Facelift

Much better, right?

My desk chair is an old cheap-o office chair left behind by my house's former owners.

1. Yay for free stuff!
2. Ooh! That poor chair needs help. Booooooring!!!
3. Lists should always have at least three things.

You might recognize the new fabric from the previous post Makeover Monday: Easy Memo Board Re-Do. Or not. Click the link to refresh your memory. Go on. I'll wait.

Whew! So glad you came back. I was worried for a minute. Anyway, here's how it all happened.