365 Photo Project - Photo 2

Now I know you might be thinking, "What the heck? Why does it say photo 2 when there were 2 photos posted for photo 1 and now 3 photos posted for photo 2?" Don't worry, let me clarify. Although I love the idea of posting one photo for each day of this 365 Photo Project, my goal is more to post 365 photo projects rather than just 365 individual photos. I'll just label them as photo 123... for ease of reference. Meet Audi. He is Khuno's new cousin. Yes, my SIL and I refer to our dogs as our babies; therefore, they are cousins. He is a corgi husky mix that my brother and SIL rescued from the SPCA. He is just over 4 months and he doesn't bark, loves his crate and can hold his pee. What. The. F$@#.

What's My Hubby Up To?

While I sleep, make cards, sew, take photos, blog, eat, work, sleep, one might ask what my hubby does while I'm doing all these things. Here's the massive list... My amazing hubby cleans, cooks, walks the dog, bakes, works, sleeps and indulges me every single day. Today I woke up at 11:00 AM to this. 

That's right folks, homemade pot stickers for breakfast. He knows I love them and they are quick to make when I'm in a tight bind. He not only cleaned the house this weekend, but he cleaned 2 bathrooms, made a roast for supper and made enough pot stickers to last me a month (maybe). 

He freezes them on the baking sheet before putting them all into a nice ziplock bag. He didn't stop there though guys. No. He. Didn't. He whipped up a triple batch of gingerbread cookies to freeze because we had extra butter laying around. It's no wonder he crawled into bed today at 9:00 PM. 

365 Photo Project - Photo 1

My friend Jinnee is starting to get into photography. She bought herself a DSLR and I'm so excited to have another photo buddy to learn with. She asked me if I was interested in joining her on a 365 Photo Project and I thought it'd be a great idea! The basis for the project is to take one photo a day. If you ask any photographer how does one get better at photography, the simple answer is practice. Jinnee will be focusing on a new theme every week so I will try and follow suite. Just let the record show though, I won't be posting a new photo everyday because lets face it, I'm lazy. Period. I'll just be happy that by the end of the year, I'll have posted 365 photos. Some will be bad, some fair and hopefully by the end of the year I'll fit in a couple goods and maybe even greats! This past week's theme was taking photos in the dark. I have always wanted to try taking photos with a bokeh effect so what better time than at Christmas with all those colorful lights? So I put on my coat and boots at 10:30 Friday night and headed out with Jamie and Khuno to capture a couple of photos at night. The bokeh effect is those circles of lights you see in photos that look oh so cool. I couldn't get my camera to focus very well because my shutter speed was long and my breathing kept moving the camera. Here's my very first attempt at some bokeh! 

My neighbor turned on his lights to check out who the heck was standing on his front lawn. Good thing Khuno is very recognizable. My neighbor very quickly realized I was no hoodlum and went back to watching TV in the dark. In case you're wondering why I took a picture of my watch, it's because I had nothing else to put in front of my camera. 

Stocking Stuffers

As you may remember from Friday's post, this past Christmas with my girlfriends involved making stockings and getting each other stocking stuffers. It was really neat seeing everyone's different stockings and having them all hung together to celebrate Christmas, but more importantly, friendship! There's a really large stocking over to the far right and then a really small stocking in comparison to the far left. The large stocking is so large you can only see the cuff in the picture! I had Jamie help me trace out the lining to my stocking and when I went to use his lining as a template to cut out my stocking, I reversed it so there are only two stockings that face the left... Thank goodness D's stocking kept my stocking company otherwise I would have felt really silly. Why is it that all stockings face the right anyways? 

Saturday Morning

You read that blog title correct! I was in fact, awake this morning at 7:30 AM. Last night Jamie reminded me that we had a dentist appointment this morning at 9:00 AM. "Why?! Why would I do that to myself?" I asked Jamie. It's not that I can't get up early, but sleep is just oh so nice. Every year I always get a lecture from my dentist on proper brushing because the backs of my teeth are stained like mad. Today as he was doing his initial exam, he came across those same stains and let out an unprofessional, "Ewwuugh". It's a good thing I wasn't embarrassed. My response, "I know they're stained, there's no need for the lecture. Just clean them so I can restain them." I love my dentist. We have a special relationship. After bickering with him about my flossing technique and him pushing me to go on a cruise for our honeymoon, we finished at the dentist at 10. On the way home I decided to make Jamie do a detour to Planet Organic. I had purchased some soap the last time I was there and actually quite liked it so I grabbed another couple of bars along with a bar of goat milk soap. It's supposed to be really moisturizing for eczema. I almost got the bright red bar with anti-bacterial acne fighting properties until I smelt it and almost threw up. 

I actually almost threw up a lot today now that I think about it. I gagged a few times at the dentist, then smelling that God awful soap and then several times when I was smelling different essential oils. A lady actually laughed at me when I told Jamie that many of the oils made me gag. I finally settled on some grapefruit essential oil. Why do I need some of that expensive crap oil you might ask? I was poking around on Pinterest and found a pin on homemade carpet powder. Khuno's food is very fishy so the basement (my crafting lair) always has a weird odor. Hopefully the baking soda/grapefruit oil will help eliminate some of that. We also purchased some new toilet bowl cleaner and dish soap. The dish soap smells awesome but still comes in second place behind Amway's Legacy of Clean Dish Drops. That stuff is still my all time fav.

After the bit of shopping we decided to stroll (...drive) over to Credo for a beverage. Their rooibos london fogs are another one of my favorite things. Lattes are quite tasty as well. Turns out our neighbor knows the owner! We had taken our engagement photos at Credo and even though we have had many conversations with the owner, I still wonder if he recognizes us. I got my answer today when he commented on how well the engagement photos turned out! I emailed him the link after Katch posted it on their blog. 


Now I'm not sure if any of you have been to Queen of Tarts before, but if not, please go. Yes some may think it's expensive compared to the local favorite, The Duchess, but supporting local businesses is important to me. The Duchess boasts about their use of quality ingredients but what sets Queen of Tarts apart is their use of local ingredients. Support local always costs more but I don't mind paying the extra cost. I had my heart set on this amazing bread with cherry tomatoes, but sadly it wasn't being made due to the lack of fresh local cherry tomatoes. The owner said she'll be bringing that back in February. If getting downtown doesn't fit with your schedule, you can find Queen of Tart goodies at the Alberta Avenue Farmer's Market that runs
year round. Their bread is so worth the calories. We got their seeded baguette today. Wow, I wrote a lot today. Thanks for reading! (You know who I'm talking about)

Sew Your Own Clutches!

This Christmas my girlfriends decided to try something different. Instead of doing a secret santa gift exchange, we all opted to do a stocking stuffer exchange instead. Each girl would make her own stocking and instead of getting one gift, we all got 13 gifts! I really liked the idea of getting something small for every girl instead of just one. I had found a tutorial way back on Martha Stewart's website on how to make your own fabric clutch. After watching the video, it seemed easy enough. I didn't take pictures through the process of sewing these clutches because I just simply didn't have time! I ordered the clutch frames from Upstyle, who is the lady that does the video tutorial. Instead of poking around looking for cheaper frames and such, I just opted to buy hers because it was the same ones she used in her tutorial. I ordered 20 frames, 10 in silver and 10 in gold. I purchased most of my fabric from Earthly Goods and just a few from Fabricland and Stampin' Up! The fusible fleece and fabric stabilizer I got from Fabricland and I made personalized labels using the recommended Jacquard Inkjet Sheets. I had a hard time finding the Gutermann Glue so I purchased the E-6000 glue from Michael's to glue the clutch frames on. My poor hubby was sucked in to helping me glue because he was way better at it and was able to stand the stink of the glue. "I used to build model airplanes." 

 There's a couple clutches missing from the picture including the one I made with my beloved Joel Dewberry fabric, my SIL's clutch and my tester one. Sewing 15 clutches took a fair chunk of my time. As Jamie put it, "Sooooo many purses."

Then of course I make the poor guy help me wrap them because I needed his fingers to help me hold and tie. I reused some old packing paper to try and stay green and made some gift tags with my card making supplies (which I've neglected lately). 

Boutineires

One couldn't have a fabric bouquet and not have fabric boutineires right? I applied the same concept of melting polyester fabrics to create the flower. Family wore the red flowers which I made with melting organza fabric I found at Dollarama. My brother and SIL helped me cut a gajillion circles of various sizes to create over 50 boutineires (we have a lot of family). I also made my brother and SIL cut fabric leaves out for me but when you try and assembly-line mass produce something, quality starts to go downhill. I went back and did some trimming of the leaves to create the shape I wanted. I used hot glue to glue all the layers of the flower together. The leaves had a thin metal wire attached to the back so it would stay straight. I left the wires from the leaves long so I could wrap floral tape around the bottom. The wires were unfortunately really skimpy looking so I had to glue extra triangular pieces of leftover fabric to create that typical look. To wear them, I hot glue gunned clasps on the back so we wouldn't have to use those pokey scary pins that always seem to poke the wearer. 

 Jamie and his two groomsmen had special white organza boutineires with the pop of a red leaf to tie all the colors together. Jamie originally wanted to wear a red bow tie but I vetoed it. I think a bow tie seemed too formal for a fall wedding. Especially since it was outdoors. I will still make him his bow tie to wear for another occasion (that post will come when I actually get to sewing it). 

A good number of boutineires were leftover from my family not wanting to keep them so instead of throwing them out, my friend suggested I post them on kijiji. I'll give that a go in the spring and see what happens. Happy belated new year everyone! Back to the grind as usual tomorrow.