Life In Color

9

Tuesday and I did decide to get out this morning. She helped by getting me up way earlier than I wanted to, but it worked out as we were at the first sale before it started. Me, Tuesday and about thirty farmers. Oops, guess it wasn't the great sale I was hoping for. I only snagged a couple of things at it:

Jar lids and an old geography book (to cut apart). The linen is from another stop. I only had the one sale's address so I decided Tuesday and should go trolling - where you just drive through neighborhoods you like to shop and see if any signs are out. I set the GPS in our car to go home and took detours when ever I saw a sign. The rest of this stuff is from an estate sale that I found signs for, but had not been in the paper:

Full of a brand new (old) pack of clothespins. I love how it stays open. I think I'm going to use it in the craft or sewing area.

Another mini fork and spoon for Tuesday since she likes her other set so well.

Some embroidered pillowcases, I'm thinking a little dress for Tuesday from these. Not a lot of stuff, but enough to make the adventure seem worth it. And taking Tuesday wasn't bad at all. I put her in the Baby Hawk and had the basket for my stuff. Maybe when she gets a good reach on her it will be tricky. I did do a lot of drivebys because I wanted it to be worth it to get her out of the car seat and strapped onto me.

After thrifting we decided to stay out a little later because Bj had business calls and we had painters at our house, so we ate lunch with Sciarrino at her work. It was nice to stay out. And even nicer to come home to this:

Second times a charm on the painting.

We need gutters and some major clean up (the deck has lots of over spray, as do the windows) and we'll be done. There are a few things to be touched up, and we need our gas line that is going to the kitchen. But the light is at the end of the tunnel. I can just picture myself sitting on the porch. I want to track down an outdoor rug. We snagged some furniture from my dad's goodwill pile, a bench that was a Christmas present from my mom, and I have a plan to do a big pile of pillows. I'm trying to talk Bj into a baby gate for the front so we can sit out here (more afraid of neighborhood animals running up to us than anything). And I want to do some old windows hanging by chain in the space there where you can see the neighbor's house (that's two doors down, but since the guy in between went a tree hacking, we can see them really well). The yards a mess, in front and back. But we have plans for that. I think we just need to take a break from reno for a while. Of course I still have projects:

Flor carpet tiles. I mis calculated the first time I ordered, so the edges have been unfinished for a month.

Trying to make it baby friendly (on my side at least). You can also see in that picture light coming in. When we took off the back deck we got so much light flooded to the lower level (some might call it a basement), it's awesome. The other thing in that photo? The corner of the crib bumper - must finish this weekend!

It's hard when this little girl wants you to nap with her, who could say no to that face?

Weekend

Hands down I had an awesome weekend. We didn't go anywhere but we did have lots of fun. Starting on Saturday when I went thrifting. That's right, Sciarrino and I were back up to our old tricks. I thawed some of my milk, left Tutu with Bj and headed out early. I didn't have any huge scores, but I did get some fun things, like this Mulder action figure and these games:

Most of my weekend haul was from an immigrant's estate sale, and everything had Russian price tags. I even got an atlas in Russian:

I got a few knitting books, including this one, and some older pamphlets, this is my favorite sweater from those:

I did end up getting a "come home quick" text message, after Tuesday refused the bottle. We had given her one before to see how she would do, but she has never had to miss a feeding (that's right my max time away from her before had been about 1.5 hours). When I got home she smiled crazy at me like she was saying, "hey you came back!" And then she was too distracted to eat. I didn't want to waste the pumped milk so I heated it and had Bj try again. He fed her, and she stared at me the whole time and chugged it down no problem, funny little girl.

Saturday night Ethan and Sciarrino came over and we did a classic BBQ and game night. Sunday I spent the whole day with Sarah, scrapbooking. It so deserves it's own post, if for no other reason than I got pages done and this post is already going to be picture heavy. It was really fun though, and Bj got in most of our new windows while I was doing that - so a very productive day.

Sunday my mom and Bill were home from a southwestern vacation so grandma came over to hang out with Tuesday :) We went for a nice long walk, it was great, I love my neighborhood more and more the warmer it gets out. We went over to my mom's for a BBQ in the evening. I had my little brother hold Tuesday:

Which was pretty cute, though not as cute as this:

Tuesday's first swim!

(Let me take this opportunity to say that while yes, I am wearing my maternity swim suit - I am not expecting again! Yes, I did get a congratulations this weekend on expecting again - yikes. The sad thing is I thought I was doing really well eating better. I'm at 139.4, I was 134 when I got back from Hawaii in January last year (damn chocolate covered macadamia nuts), and 124 right before I got pregnant. So, I'm working on it! I also have this bad habit of sticking out my stomach when I hold Tuesday, and I'm sure the bad posture doesn't help)

She loved the pool. I knew she would. She kept pushing herself up out of her little seat and kicking her micro sized legs.

I think this is going to be a very fun summer.

She as totally cracking us up.

I should say I'm not really sure when babies are supposed to go in pools, but luckily this is my mom's pool and I know it is very clean and doesn't have too many chemicals.

Awe Tuesday loves grandma! I think I'll wait a while before taking her to a public pool. Tuesday would have stayed in here all night, but she started shivering, so we got her out. I got her back into some knitwear and she chilled in her vintage pram while we ate:

Last night was a whole other story. She did not want to sleep - at all. I think maybe it's because she took a nap yesterday while we walked, and another micro one when we got to my mom's. So maybe 1.5 hours of sleep during the day total? She ate so many times I lost count, and by 7:30 I just had Bj bring her to me in bed so I could nurse her lying down, I was so exhausted. Bj was so cute he said, "Tuesday you have to remember to thank you mom for all this milky some day." She's napping again now, hopefully it won't be a vicious cycle, but she looks too peaceful to wake up. She may just be going through a growth spurt, I don't know. But I hope I get some more sleep tonight!

I didn't finish it, but I did get it finished

Okay so I have been working on this project for almost a year... the shame!

This is from the lot of vintage patterns I scored from a family friend. It is so darling and I had the pieces knit up, and the thing seamed even for oh, a half a year or more. But the crochet, oh crochet, how you vex me! It had crochet edging all the way around.

I finally figured out that I wasn't going to be able to get good enough at crochet in time for me to finish this to my liking to fit little Tutu. So my friend did it for me and it turned out so awesome!

Vintage buttons from one of the only sales I went to last year (I am going to do better this year).

Sparkly Pants wore it today and spit up all over it. My mom and I managed to mop most of it up so I could take some photos. I should have taken the photos before, but you know, a finished knit you have to wear it!

Because they make everyone so happy!

Thanks Brent!

Yesterday morning my brother called to tell me they had just been to an estate sale I should check out, full of sewing and crafty goodness. So Bj and I decided to take our walk early and go to it. Boy am I glad he called us, the house was a weird sort of time warp. It was right across the street from the big park (about a mile from our house) and looked like it hadn't been touched since 1972. It was very strange, and we were not the only ones who noticed. Yes a lot of times people have most of their things from a certain period if they are elderly, but this went beyond. One woman was pointing out to her friend that the canned three bean salad was from 1969 in the cupboard. Even the boxes of tissue were old and of the mint green variety. And unfortunately for me her fabric stash was nearly completely 100% polyesters. And there were a lot of them. But she wasn't just a hoarder, she used everything. She must have been tiny (judging by the pattern sizes), and quite proficient. It think almost all the jumpsuits were handmade. It was so interesting. I did get some great weird orange fabric to make monsters, and this:

A vintage boys pattern, a homemade jumper (love the button details), and some flannel fabric I've been looking for to make wipes out of. My favorite find was this:

A little vase with buttons. I cleaned the vase after I took this picture and it's a very lovely shade of chartreuse.

The buttons are fantastic. I started looking for ones that would work well with the yarn Kay gave me, but couldn't stop there. I also got some jars with neat lids and a vinyl tablecloth with that flocked backing. You may tell me that the odds of my water breaking in bed are slim but the thought of anything happening to our Tempurpedic (a wedding present from Bj's parents) sets my head spinning so come December I'm taking counter measures, JUST IN CASE.

I stayed true to my original plan to knit up some handspun I made a while ago instead of diving right into my new stuff. It's my old thick and thin:

It's going to be a baby blanket (per Sciarrino's suggestion), but here's the thing I very much miscalculated (and I was actually calculating with a gauge swatch and everything) the amount of yarn I have left. Now it seems that I will only get halfway. Of course I'm still knitting on it, why stop now? I'll have to spin something up to go with it I think, but don't have any more of this fiber... well, I'll come up with something. I do love how the fabric is turning out:

Hmm what else is going on besides me getting in a fight with Bj about paper towels (I blame hormones for the over reacting, but really how can you scrub something clean with a paper towel? They are for spills, and besides it's wasteful). Well my friend Matt came over on Friday and I told him we were having trouble coming up with a good idea for the front pouch. Matt just happens to be an architect, and drew up this in a few minutes:

(not the line drawing, that's something I did in Photoshop, but the orange). I love this idea and so does Bj. We were so perplexed with what to do with the weird angle of the one side of the roof and I think this will be a perfect solution, AND give us a bigger porch than we thought possible. So excited. I emailed the Cadman to see if he could do some specific drawings. What do you think?

Love it

Feeling pretty good today since I finally got a haircut. My hair has been brushing the top of my shoulders for weeks now, nasty ends, the works. But of course I had to go and sleep through my first hair appointment last week, so today was the first day I could get in. I felt oh so guilty for missing an appointment when she was squeezing me in that I had to get up and make the famous chocolate chip cookies, I'm not beyond bribery, I mean my hair is going to keep growing after all. Also I tip big. :) She said they were the best cookies ever and I got the best haircut ever, so I guess we're even now. And I learned my lesson and already scheduled another appointment for September... with an alert on my phone to remind me a half hour before hand. Genius.

Also genius? My blog readers, you guys have been being so sweet to me! LeAnn recently sent me this adorable book:

Do you see that, popular Empire and A-line styles. Oh little baby please be a girl. There are about three pages for a boy:

Pants, a coat? Cute but it's no:

No that is cute. Thanks so much LeAnn! I can't wait to use these tips, or at least drool over the book a while.

As if that wasn't enough an astute local reader, Dianne emailed me a Craig's list link for a truck load of jars that she "didn't want me to miss out on." Nice catch!

Let's play a little game, who ever gets the closest number to the real amount of jars (I have not counted them yet) will get a little scrappy prize. As in some scrapbooking goodies. I'll pull together something cute. So guess away!

Oh and:

I know, enough about the powder! But seriously. I had to pee after picking up the jars (an hour and half away from me) so Sciarrino and I popped into an Albertson's. I was looking above the aisles and there were signs for brands of makeup/skin care like wet n' wild, and a couple other old ones. I joked to Sciarrino that if anyone was going to have a travel size of shower to shower it would be some place like this. We went through the aisles and sure enough travel size! Not only that but they even had my old Blossom Fresh, a scent I would like to remind you is not even made any more (when it wouldn't ring up at the check stand I whispered to Sciarrino, "it's because it doesn't exist any more!!!"). I thought maybe they would have the big containers too, so we went to look for those. It was some where totally random next to like hemorrhoid cream or something. I think Shower to Shower must have the worst marketing department in the world. Anyway, check this out: Shimmer Effects. It's so cool! You get a really nice shimmer from it on your arms, or where ever. It doesn't really have a scent, and it's not sparkly, just a light shimmer. I love it. I was all freaking out when we left the store. And rightly so, I mean totally out of the blue, and check out the size difference, you really do need a travel size of this stuff. And since I can't seem to figure out that it will ever go bad I intend to stock pile it until I'm one of those crazy ladies with their sugar packets. My grandchildren will be moving me into a home going, "What is up with all this shower to shower powder?!?!?"

It's not the same with out my thrifting buddy

Today I had to go to an estate sale. I say I had to because it was blocks from my house, and run by some good, honest, not over-charging people. But Sciarrino was at work so I had to fly solo. I just do not find it as fun at all. Half the fun is going with someone and then showing each other things. At least I can show all of you guys what I got:

To add to my dictionary collection. I think it's one of my more eccentric collections.

Are whales really that big? That seems ridiculous compared to the elephant. I love all the drawings:

I love the big old research dictionaries, but I think children's are my favorite. I'm trying to get Bj to go with me to a 6 family barn sale out in the country tomorrow, we'll see. I'm already kind of in his debt because he's working on my Ribbon Jar computer (hard drive issues, ahhhhhhh). The one thing we've decided? No major home repairs this weekend. We've earned a break I think.

Edited: I just realized putting away these books that I had the fifth one already (Po-St). So I get to cut that one apart, yeah!

Back in the thrifting groove

On Saturday Sciarrino and I got out our garage sale purses, baskets, and treats to keep us going through the morning and grabbed the local paper. We headed out into the big bad world of estate, garage, and yard sales. In case you haven't heard this is the coldest spring in the last thirty years, and I think as a result the sales have been HORRIBLE. I swear, there were weeks and weeks with no estate sales even listed in the paper. Crazyville, last year I couldn't keep up. So it didn't make me want to get up early and out there. But we decided there were a few neighborhood sales and it was worth it to get out. We didn't get a lot, I got jars and these goodies:

A never used watercolor tablet, a bingo game with awesome pieces, and a fun painting book. I have a collection of those learn to paint at home type books going and am planning to group them all together somewhere in the house. The shoes are the best though. This woman had hundreds of pairs, and they were 5 cents a pair. Sciarrino helped me track down the mate because there were just mounds of shoes. They are a little big, but check out how loved they were:

She had them repaired at some point, which is something I would do too.

In other news I'm cleaning out the craft room and I came across this:

It's a ring of Bazzill papers, with labels on the back that tell the color. I got it a few years ago off eBay, it's very handy if you're like me and have a ton of this stuff. Instead of bring your project to the cardstock stash, you just bring the ring to your project. I just go the official swatch box though, so I don't need it any more. I know it's not quite up to date, but if anyone wants to pay shipping ($5 priority), I'll happily package it up and send it to you, just comment below.

Gains and Losses

Today was my exact two week mark on my diet. I'm happy to report that I've lost a total of 8 pounds, or about a pound a week. I'm not happy to report that this would have been more but when ever Aunt Flo comes to visit she makes me eat like a friggin banshee. What is that about? This is what goes on in my head days before my monthly; "eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, ohhh have some more." I don't get it. The other day I wolfed down two chocolate bunnies. People I don't even like chocolate bunnies. Grrr.   And I'm beginning to think I might have to start supplementing the calorie counting with (gasp) working out. I know, I know. I don't want to do it, but something is happening with me. I don't believe those calorie calculators. The ones that tell you how much you can have to stay the same weight. When I fill in all my info (and of course mark my lifestyle as sedentary) it tells me I can have 1,600 a day to stay the same. They are such liars. I have a 1,500 day a couple times a week (1,200ish is what I shoot for) and I've gained back a pound. Well anyway enough about that, I did start taking fish oil tablets and the first few weeks I felt like they were a miracle pill, but I think my body's adjusted. Oh and also it's hard to eat right when your husband makes you a tuna melt... WITH A WHOLE CAN OF TUNA (who does that? I have never seen that done). I said, "damn hon, with the bread and everything this is going to have a ton of calories." He said, "oh and that's not counting all the butter I used." Oh but it was so good though. Mmmmm. So that's me checking in, 2 months down, 2 to go. Watch out for me in June, I'll be the one in the bikini (laying in my backyard where no one can see my incredible whiteness).

So now, let's talk about the gains. Oh, you know where I'm going with this, thrifty goodness baby! First of all I forgot to tell you that I went to an estate sale on Saturday before we started dying. It was across the street. There is no way I can not go to an estate sale across the street from anything (baby shower, lunch date, visiting a long lost relative, whatever). It was totally cleaned out because it was the second day. But the prices were good and everything under $35 was half off. So look what I got for five bucks:

Some of you might remember that I have one of these that looks very similar. But listen that was a crazy model. It had a slot for a 3.5" floppy disc, and way too many functions for me. I like simple. My friends I think I've finally found the perfect electronic typewriter: GX-6750. OH MY GOD looking up that link for you I see that they are not even an old model. They still make them, retail: $119.99 . Oh man getting deal like this makes me feel so awesome. Especially when they come with this:

Come on, two refill cartridges and a corrective tape? They were practically giving this away. Well this and the two callanetics videos (circia 1986 and 1992 - it's a gentle workout!) I got, too bad VHS players have gone the way of the dinosaur. I wonder if Bj would like me to hook one up to his high tech system. Oh man I'm cracking myself up over here. I have got to scan in the covers of these videos, classic high cut leotards. LOLOLOL.

So that was my first sale of the season. But I'm not going to call it official, since it was an accident, and I had to borrow three bucks because I was unprepared. Anyway I'm going to look at the paper Thursday and see if there is any reason to get up early Friday.

Did you know it's spring break here in Oregon, or at least the valley. It's true we like to have vacations during our worst possible weather. Floods of 1996 anyone? My brother took a little boat down and was floating on the golf course. It was like one giant lake. Good times. Well Michele has her nephew and I told them about the Tulip Festival (Bj and I went a couple years ago). So they decided to head down and I met them there at ten a.m. It was nice:

We can all handle the weather of course, but apparently the tulips can't and the only blooming were safe under tents. I bought some blooms, ate a sausage and headed to the goodwill nearby. Where I totally scored. I got lots of cool ledger paper. I think someone brought in stuff from a going out of business office supply store or something. Then I was picking around and saw this bag:

I never have good luck with getting used stamps (except off eBay) because they are usually just teddy bears. Nothing against teddy bears, but... I started pocking around the bag a little more. It was 9.99 (which is like a hundred bucks in Goodwill land) so I had to really look at it. And check out what I found, they are teacher's stamps!

27 differnt actions, including my favorite:

That's right, knitting. Also has random things like drumming, pushing, waving, pointing. I am in love with them. There were 10 modes of transport in there as well (including a hover-craft, LOL), and three random stamps: a teapot, kettle, and tap. Making me think that Goodwill split up a bigger set.

So this made me just about giddy, coupled with some other things which I'll explain below. Plus I'm still coming off the high of being on the juice (two diet cokes in one day yesterday, bad Amber, but I really get stuff done :). So I felt like today needed to be immortalized. I made a two page layout, "happy today" in like an hour, but I don't feel like the two pages have to be shown next to each other (read I can't seem to get a good picture of them like that). So page one:

The 11 things making me happy. KI Memories accents, new paper, fabric, random paper and flowers. I used my fountain pen so I'll type it out for you:

1.Someone left 1:13 worth of change in the meter at the library.
2. Pulling onto a busy street someone let me in.
3. Driving to the tulip fields, seeing Brett, Michele, and Violet. Eating sausage.
4.Awesome stamps: 27 actions, 10 modes of transport, 3 extras
5. this cool paper for 99 cents a pack
6.the $5 typewriter w/ extra ribbons & corrective tape!
7. 8 pounds lost in 2 months today.
8. Oregon weather - the rain, hail, and bursts of light.
9. new ribbon - getting lots done in Ribbon Jar land.
10. Finally found the song, "tears and Laughter" from Bones.
11. Being Alive.

Page two:

The today thing was an accident, I punched the letters out to close together with my quickutz, so I decided to use the negative image. The top right picture is a paper sample from Sciarrino, a perpetual calendar. All the pictures I took today, love my mini printer (old picturemate, 2005). Super quick flower with new silk. Expect to see a lot of these. I love making ribbon flowers like this! So there you have it. A good happy day. And I hope yours was even better.

p.s. yes, the layout is straight in real life. :)

Circle Time

On Saturday my mom, Sciarrino, her mom, and I took a class at our local quilt shop. Sciarrino and I saw the quilt in the window of the shop before Christmas and my mom was sweet enough to get me the class for one of my presents.

How do you sew curves? Turns out really slowly and with tweezers.

The cutting took FOREVER!! I think it will be totally worth it. I loved using the design wall they had in the class, things stick up there so well:

Sciarrino's progress (love the colors, I have that floral in mine as well, it's cool how different fabrics can look when paired with others). I decided I had to have a design wall as well. I saved the big poster boards that we used to hold pictures at the wedding and covered one with the plain flannel yesterday (just stapled it to the back)

Oh the letters, found those last night at goodwill:

Two bucks, had to get it. It reminds me of these toys I had when I was little, little boards with printed flannel, set up like a house, or a girl, and then shapes that could stick on shaped like furniture or clothes. It's a vague memory but I think it was something like that.

When I was looking at the games section at Goodwill I also picked up these Latin learning cards. I like to pretend I'll use the other side and teach myself Latin (I used to love to memorize Greek and Latin root words), but I'll probably just use the English side for scrapbooking.

Oh and did you know it's mustache March?

ew mustacheses (no idea how to spell the plural, obviously), yuck! Don't worry my brother shaved this porn star classic after one day.

Button fun happy times

Ah thanks for all the love yesterday. I did have a bowl of oatmeal this morning. I think using water instead of milk was the number one best idea. I tried it in the microwave this morning, watched it like a hawk, did not cover, and took it out to stir a few times. I would consider it a mild success. I did eat it at least, with a teaspoon of brown sugar (only 15 calories!) and some cinnamon. But I decided I need to try my hand at something I could accomplish with out fail, after yesterday's falterings. So I present to you buttons!

Of the home-made variety. So easy, just get one of these sets (and you can get refills as needed). Put all the layers together, done and done. These are actually for Brenda. We did that little swap, remember? And I am so terrible that I am just getting the package out. But it's filled with lots of love, hope you like it Brenda! My mom and I had a foot massage yesterday (thanks Bill!) and we had to stop by the antique mall downtown.

Mmmm more buttons. I love the old cards too (remember this? scroll down past me being crazy). No set project for these. I also finally started that top down hat I wanted try with the yarn I spun from Hello Yarn fiber.

Right now it looks like a baby beret. I hope if fits!