bathroom redo

We have been thoroughly enjoying our "new" bathroom and Steve was kind enough to take a bunch of pictures of it over the weekend.  It's amazing how just changing a few things can make a big difference. 

When we first moved into our house, I was dismayed by the super manly master bath.  The black counter top and black and white floors seemed really difficult to work with.  Also, there was a black shower curtain when we moved in.  I know- I thought it was strange too. 

I felt like we were stuck with a certain look right from the beginning, but vowed to make it look less like a bachelor pad (which it used to be, actually, so that's probably why it looked like one).  I added some hot pink accents, as well as some aqua and lots of white. 

I like a bathroom with lots of white because it looks super clean.  I LOVE white towels.  I'm not sure why I'm ever tempted to buy anything else, but inevitably I am and I do and then I regret it two months later when they look faded and weird.  Meanwhile, the white towels that we bought a year ago still look brand new.  Lesson learned. 

Several years ago, we bought this little stool and recovered the seat with a black and white toile.  Our bathroom is pretty big and I love being able to have an extra (soft) place to sit or set things down. 

With all the white that we have, painting the walls gray was a great move, because now the white has something to contrast with.  Other than painting everything, we also installed a new, curved shower rod, and a new curtain rod.  I've been enjoying the curved shower rod and actually do think it gives a little more elbow room in the shower, although I was skeptical at first. 

The curtain rod has these gorgeous antique glass ends and I'm still on the hunt for some drawer pulls to match.  We moved the dining room curtains up into the bathroom because the colors were perfect.  And it's a good excuse for me to make new dining room curtains, something I've been wanting to do anyway. 

So that's the full reveal!  I still maintain that painting is one of my least favorite activities, but I really enjoy it when it's done. 







stuffed zucchini

Is anyone else totally excited for the opening ceremonies tonight?  I can't wait!  I love the spirit of camaraderie and national pride that a goes along with the Olympics.  We may need to find a more prominent place to display our new flag. 

I'm taking a mini-break from fabric design today to do other necessary things like laundry and lawn mowing and making dinner.  We finally ran out of barbeque chicken.  Bummer. 

Tonight we'll be enjoying stuffed zucchini, a recipe shared by my bff that has become a favorite.  The recipe gets modified (quite often), but here are the basics:

Cut three large zucchini in half lengthwise.  Scoop out the middles (I like to use a melon baller). 

Chop up the middle zucchini parts, 1-2 tomatoes, and 1/2 red onion.  Saute veggies in olive oil, salt, and pepper. 

Bake zucchini shells, cut side down, at 375 for 15 minutes.  Flip shells over and sprinkle shredded mozzarella cheese in the bottoms.

Add something to your veggie mixture- 1 cup breadcrumbs, 1 cup chopped pecans, 1/2 lb. cooked sausage.  Pick one, pick two, pick them all! 

Fill the shells with the veggie mixture.  Top with more shredded Marcella.  Bake at 375 for 20 minutes.  Yum!

Yesterday's mail brought a big package of new fabric and today's should be bringing another one- exciting!  Actually, the mail haul yesterday was pretty fabulous all around- I got fabric, a new magazine, and a thank you note from my favorite four year old.  Written with her own hand.  I loved looking at each painstaking letter and backwards "S" and scribble and knowing how hard she worked on it.  What a treat to receive. 

I'm looking forward to playing with new fabric, finalizing fabric designs, and relaxing with Steve this weekend.  Hope your weekend is delightful!

incomplete sentences and colored pencils

I just had the urge to start blogging in list form again:

- Lots of drawing.  Graph paper everywhere.

- Hours of design work on the computer

- Only one more week of sewing class

- You know it's serious when I pull out the French curve

- Ordered scarf fabric for fall.  Lots of it.  Super excited. 

- Barbecue chicken every night this week.  No time to stop and cook something else.

Apparently, my speech functioning has been reduced to partial sentences.  Sorry about that- I used to have quite a vocabulary.  I blame the fact that I have been working so hard every day that my brain hurts and then Steve gets home and we work for a few more hours, for good measure. 

What are we working on?  We're designing our own fabric, and if that sounds awesome, it is, and if it sounds super hard, it's that too. 

Why so frantic?  We're designing it for an event that is a mere five weeks away.  Meaning I need to have the fabric here at my home in three weeks, so that I can actually make something with it.  Meaning I need to order the fabric in one week, so that it can be printed up and get to me in time.  So you see what that means. 

 Keeping me company while I work is this picture that I found when I was digging out my old colored pencils.  I love this picture.  Not sure why it was in with the art supplies.  I believe that it is circa 2000, the only year that my siblings and I were all the same size.  Just look at us- practially quadruplets!  Our ages at the time- 11, 20, 14, 15.  I miss those rascals now that we're all grown and living in four different houses, three different states, two different time zones. 

It's back to work for me now- I'll stop in on Friday with an update and hopefully some better sentence structure. 

weekend highlights:

- Eating cake (sometimes both before and after dinner)

- Finishing the bathroom! (no pictures yet)

- Coffee in the yard on a cloudy morning

- Date night that included filet, wrapped in bacon, stuffed with gorgonzola.  Heaven, I tell you. 

-Group Skype with my mom and brother

- Peach fizz (not to be confused with "peach fuzz"): peel a ripe peach and throw it in the blender with some ginger ale and sparkling water.  Guaranteed to make any day a party.

- Watching Steve watch hummingbirds.  Precious. 

- Pool day

- Finishing everything on our "to-do" list in approximately 30 minutes

- Did I mention the cake?  It's almost gone. 

After a weekend like that, I feel ready to tackle anything today! 

finally Friday

In the past seven days, we have made four trips to Lowe's and two to Home Depot.  I think that our bathroom is finally almost done.  The thing about painting is, once you take a room apart and paint it up all nice, you really want to fix all the things that never worked quite right and get rid of that plastic shower curtain rod you used in college. 

So that's what we've been doing- the fixing and spiffing up.  We just have to hang the curtain rod and pick out some new cabinet hardware (I've got my eye on this knob at Anthropologie) and that's it!  The never ending project will come to an end and I'm baking a cake today to celebrate. 

Seriously, I am baking a cake today.  Late this afternoon, after I finish the laundry and mowing the lawn and shipping out packages.  And, it is my fondest hope that we will have another rain storm while I bake.  I love baking while it rains.  I'm crazy about late afternoon summer rain storms, provided I do not have to go out in them. 

It feels like it's been a busy week, shop-wise, but I am starting to realize that busy is the new normal.  That's so exciting for me- that it's the norm to be shipping out multiple orders and have tables piled with sewing projects and be making things faster than I can photograph them.  I'm living the dream over here. 

We're laying low this weekend- I'm planning to eat cake and spend time in the yard and go on a date with my handsome suitor.  Sounds like the perfect end to the week!

Hope your weekend is lovely!

blooms and barbeque sauce

This morning, I decided to stroll around our yard and our street to take a few pictures before it got hot.  I think I missed my window though, because it was already hot as blazes out there at 9:30am.  Very few plants are brave enough to bloom in this weather, but I managed to find a couple. 

I also checked out our new, secondary hummingbird feeder.  Because one feeder is never enough. 

Yesterday, I spent several hours taking hundreds of pictures and managed to get eight new items posted in the shop!  I still have nine more to go, but I should have them all up by the end of the week.  I am the most excited about the new zipper pouches that match the market totes- those fabrics are just so lovely that I want to make a little of everything with them!

Today is a car day, so I'll be running errands and planning food for the week ahead.  I decided that making more barbecue sauce is a priority, so we'll be doing that over the weekend.  I also remembered that I wanted to share the recipe, so here it is:

2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

1/2 cup cider vinegar

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

2 tablespoons honey

2 cups tomato ketchup

2 tablespoons spices*

Combine all ingredients in a sauce pan and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for about 1 hour, stirring occasionally. 

* Here are the suggested spices- I just sprinkled in a bit of each and aimed to have a total of 2 tablespoons when I was done- seasoned salt, smoked paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, chili powder, black pepper, allspice, ground cumin, cayenne pepper, ground cloves.  Just use what you have!

Be sure to save back some sauce to dip your chicken (or whatever else) in after you've grilled it too.  I mean, baste while you grill, of course, but also dip afterwards.  It's that tasty. 

I'm off to the store and feeling thankful that our car has air conditioning!

P is for...

Our weekend can be summed up with one word: painting.  We painted our bathroom and, while I know you may be fooled into thinking that such a small room would be quick to paint, it took the majority of the weekend.  We still have to hang curtains and shower rods and such, but I thought I'd offer a glimpse of the color today.  It's a warm gray, called "Fading Light", and, thankfully, we love it.  So I'll save the full bathroom reveal for later, when I have nice pictures to go with it.  For now, I'll just say that after I cut my thumb twice and we got stuck in the bathroom because we removed the door knob, Steve had to buy me frozen yogurt for dinner to convince me to keep going. 

We did actually get some time to relax yesterday and then we cooked dinner together in the evening.  Steve is a great cooking partner.

I don't usually like to cook on the weekends, but if we do it together it feels more like an event and less like a chore.  Or sometimes I just need to say to myself, "This is not a chore."  Funny how that actually works. 

The good news about cooking on the weekend is that we have lots of leftovers today.  That gives me more time for important things like sewing and photography.  Do you know that I have at least a dozen new zipper pouches upstairs, just waiting to be posted in the shop?  Hopefully this will be the week! 

someone agreeable to talk with

Last night, we brewed decaf coffee and heated up some milk. 

We added a couple chocolates to our saucers and headed out to the back yard. 



Truthfully, I'd been looking forward to it all day. 

As daylight slipped away, we sat in our lounge chairs and watched the hummingbirds on the feeder.  We talked about our days and about what we'd do tomorrow.  We made a few plans and talked through a solution to something that had bothered me all afternoon.  I was reminded of something I'd read awhile back-

"This was the cream of marriage, this nightly turning out of the day's pocketful of memories, this deft, habitual sharing of two pairs of eyes, two pairs of ears."

This was the cream of marriage- I couldn't have said it better. 

The weekend's almost here and we're wavering between having some down time or tackling a big project- I'll let you know which one wins out! 

a public service announcement about herbs

Today I'd like to encourage you to start an herb garden.  Well, don't start it today because it's way too hot, but definitely think it over.  I'll remind you again in the fall when it's time to plant. 

Herb gardens are great for people who usually kill plants, people who forget to water, people who don't believe in weeding.  Those kind of people.  Also, people who like to eat. 

Many of the herbs in my garden (oregano, rosemary, thyme, mint, chives, lemon balm) are perennials, so they just keep coming back year after year.  In the spring, I buy a few annual herbs for the season (basil, cilantro, parsley, dill). 



I almost always have more than I can handle, so I like to preserve some to eat throughout the winter.  They also make a great gift for neighbors or people you may be visiting over the summer.  Sometimes I include them in bouquets of flowers that I've cut from the yard. 

 There is no substitute for fresh herbs and they are so expensive at the grocery store!  (Not to mention, not all that fresh.)  You can grow them in pots, you can grow them in the ground.  You can plant them in spring, you can plant them in fall.  You can eat them with meat, you can eat them with veggies.  You can eat them in a box, you can eat them with a fox.  You get the idea. 

Today, I am roasting a chicken that will be lunch for the coming week.  The skies are cloudy and overcast and the whole house smells delicious, the combination of which is making me want to curl up with something to stitch. 

It's my day with the car though, so there's no time for stitching, but I will probably dream about a new quilt as I drive around town. 

mini vacation

We had so much fun, but oh is coming home again sweet.  I almost cried with joy when I climbed into my bed last night. 

Sadly, the weather was not as cool as I'd hoped, but we did get to go swimming.  And walk downtown to the post office.  And see lots of people. 

And dogs.  Lots of dogs. 

We also ate amazing food, like grilled chicken with homemade barbecue sauce (recipe forthcoming), plenty of salad, many ounces of frozen yogurt, steak, sweet potatoes, and loads of fruit.  I love sharing meals with people. 

Our one meal out was at Gillie's, an old favorite.  I used to eat here in high school and everything is still exactly the same.  I love that.  There was an older man playing guitar and singing in the corner behind us while we ate.  Talk about atmosphere. 

Want to know how many adults it takes to entertain three toddlers?  Only one, if it's Uncle Steve.  I know how they feel- I find him pretty enthralling too. 

I got to rub two bellies simultaneously and talk about names and nursery fabric, all while feeling pretty darn petite.  As the oldest, I used to be the biggest out of this group.  Not anymore, hehe...

My mom is a great hostess and we totally took over her house and she didn't even mind.  It was fun to see my sisters and our friends and I felt a bit of disbelief this morning when I realized it would just be me at home all day. 

But- I have several orders to finish up, as well as a mountain of laundry, so there's that to keep me company.  PLUS sewing class to look forward to tomorrow night- I can't believe we're on week three already!