Sew sweet :: Thursday

Eventually, I will go into detail about why my sabbath consists of sewing. For now, here's a little something I whipped up last week.

It's an iPad case! After I hash-tagged my little heart out on instagram, I realized that I covered my apple ipad in an apple print. Totally not intended...but so cute!

DIY Baby blankets

I officially suck at blogging. I can keep trying, though.

I made a couple of blankets around Christmas for some friends and family. I hope they are getting well used :)

The first was a "Taggy." The woman who cut my fabric at Hobby Lobby told me that if I called it a "taggy" I would get sued because the lady who first coined "taggy" is on a rampage.

Noted.

For Tate man's blanket, I used fleece fabric and bought some cute ribbons that matched. I also stitched a "T" onto it so everyone would know it was his :) If you are wondering which tutorial I used...I didn't. I pretty much just guesstimated everything.

After the first try, I realized I had added the ribbons on backwards. Re-do!

I hope you enjoy, little Tate!

I also made a blanket for our friends who just had a little girl. I absolutely fell in love with this print and want to use it on any and everything I can re-do in my house. So if you come over sometime soon...you might see it. A lot.

I used a tutorial I found on pinterest. This only took me about an hour (including the time it took to cut that silly soft yellow fabric)

Need a blanket? I'd be happy to make one. Just let me know what kind of fabrics you would like and I'll get to work on it. You could even pick them out all by yourself :)

Oh, the bummers of night shift.....

I stayed later at work this morning for a committee I am on, so I got home at 9 and stepped out of my car only to hear the sound of a jackhammer. Yes, friends, the jackhammer is back. I thought for sure they had finished that portion of the project next door. So, I kindly asked Mr. Jackhammer man about how long he expected to be doing said project. To my delight, he said about an hour more. So, to kill some time I thought I would catch up on some blog posting. I know...it's been a while.

Anywhooo, things around the Chappell house are going quite well. To make a long story short, my husband made the decision to quit his part time job to focus on seminary studies. I also benefit from this, you see, as we had zip, zilch free time to spend together. And it's been amazing. For instance, this past saturday we had plans to get quite a bit done around the house, but due to some unforeseen circumstances (i.e., an emergency trip to the eye dr.) we ended up doing pretty much nothing all day. But we were able to just be with each other, and that was pretty great.

So.....want to see what we've been doing? How about I just show you.

Here's the last 30 days in pictures!

I had a birthday...

 I found my best friend's initials on a sweet old building in Chicago...

We visited Chicago and tried to soak up it's awesomeness....

More awesomeness....

My husband ran a marathon!

His marathon buddies....

I made a wreath for our front door....

I also made these nifty decorations thanks to a tutorial found here (i absolutely LOVE this blog!)

I made a cover for my kindle!

My mom and I traveled to Indiana for the Covered Bridge Festival...

We ate Dairy King. Frozen Ski. 'Nuff Said.

We had a blast at a wedding with our great friends...

We took a lot of pictures at said wedding...

My mother in law hooked me up with a killer deal on stamp sets from Stampin' Up.

 I'm pretty sure I saved 99%....

The Cardinals won the World Series!

The Cardinals had a parade for Winning the World Series!!!

We saw TLR (otherwise known as Tony LaRussa) ...not knowing he would announce his retirement the next day. 

We saw Albert Freakin' Pujols...

This is pretty much how awesome St. Louis Baseball fans are...

We made a table....

This is a project in the works...

We finally found a table for under our TV. FINALLY.

So, that about sums it up....i think.

30 days of crafting

So...I haven't posted in a long time. Yes, a very long time. We have been insanely busy and things are hectic around the Chappell house. I have been neglecting a ton of projects that have been sitting around, so my plan is to finish them in the next 30 days.

Each day I will either make a new project, or if I am working that day I will probably post a project that has already been made/started and I am finishing up or hanging up/setting out the finished project.

I am really, really excited.

yay!

boldness.

I am being refined.

I am learning to be patient with this process.

I know this will take time.

But I will still proclaim my God. 

Because He pursues me relentlessly.

Because I am loved. 

Because I am a child of God. 

And I believe.

(Beautiful Things- Gungor)

Memories!

Tonight I rode with some of our closest friends, Steven and Nicole up to our other friend's (Jeff and Whitney) wedding reception. Jeff and Whitney are the couple who's wedding we went to in Mexico. I truly miss hanging out with Steven and Nicole, as they are sooo much fun to be around. We enjoyed some desserts...

 (missing from this place is the fruit pizza, and two halves of cheesecake)

(Steven and Nicole enjoying some chocolate dipped strawberries!)

Needless to say, the food was delicious. And the company was even better. It was so great to see Jeff and Whitney! I knew Jeff before Whitney (kind of) and I am so glad that Whitney is a part of my life now. She has been such a great friend, and I hope soon we will be closer than 10 hours!!

(Whitney, looking gorgeous, as always!...and me sporting a hunchback!)

While we were at the reception, the table behind us had a few young and old souls playing skip-bo. I was instantly reminded of the time I spent at my g-ma and g-pa Kirkpatrick's house growing up. They watched me quite a bit in the evenings, and on the weekends. I loved playing games with my Aunt Florence, and watching my grandma meticulously wash/dry and hang up clothes on the clothesline. My grandma used to scour the carpet and pick up anything visible. (I once saw my mom do this and we laughed pretty hard about it) Anyway, long story short, my grandparents have all passed away. Oddly enough, my maternal grandma and paternal grandpa both passed away on the same day. I remember sitting in ole' Cougar Village working on some nursing stuff when my mom called me about grandma.....I'm pretty sure it wasn't more than 2 hours later that she called me again about grandpa. Now, I don't mean to make a sob story, but it was pretty difficult for my family. I haven't had grandparents here on Earth for a few years, and seeing the game of skip-bo earlier between a grandpa and his grandkids got me pretty choked up. Needless to say, I hope our kids can enjoy having grandparents around in their lives.

Whew! Now that I've got that out...we also had guests last night! Justin's sister and her boyfriend came to visit! We took them to the Soulard Farmers Market this morning and nabbed a few items.

(Dani and Chance with their cherries, and Justin and I with some pasta that looks AHHH-mazing!

As you can tell it was a pretty busy day. I came home and cleaned up the house since I have to work tomorrow night. We have a pretty early morning tomorrow, since Justin has to set up for church and I have City Babies duty. I hope tomorrow you see at least a glimmer of God in your life!

Ham and rice skillet hodge podge....

For lack of a better title, this is the dinner I've made twice in the last two days. I know, it's lame, but we are still kind of out of sorts around here. Really, I just threw a bunch of stuff in the skillet yesterday because we had no bread, or any other fixings, really. Justin's dad had brought a pre-cut ham "loaf?" the other day, and we've been chowing on that. We've made breakfast sandwiches, breakfast tortillas, you name it. The latest creation was this skillet thing. I made it the other day but added just one thing this time to make it better.

I started with some olive oil, and sauteed some green and red onions, peppers, and broccoli. I added the ham all sliced up and then some rice from Trader Joes (we love their frozen rice, because you just pop it in the microwave and it's delish.) The last ingredient was Justin's favorite hot sauce.

NOTE: I typically hate anything hot, but the last few months I have been trying to branch out.

I tried a little of this on my creation last time, but it was just a little too much. So, I put just a dash into the skillet after everything had been mixed up and cooked it a little. It added a great flavor without making it TOO spicy. Yum!!

All in all, it took about 10 minutes, and made quite a bit so I can enjoy more for dinner at work tonight!