Car Litter Bag

A while ago I was in Elizabeth's car and noticed her cute little trash bag. I admired the design and quality of materials and told her that I had been meaning to make one. She told me she had intended to make one too, but then came across this one on Etsy and liked the design so much she decided it was worth buying.

Even though I'm a crafter and frequently look at items and say, "I could make that", or even more horridly egotistically saying, "I could make that better". I looked at the design of this one and immediately knew I was not going to best it. Hence, I opted to support another crafter and purchase her snazzy car litter bag.

The bag arrived quickly and was nicely packed, Allyson also packed along a cute fabric pin and a mini notepad with a vintage vogue pattern cover (pictured next to the cat in the first photo). I am pleased as punch with my purchase, and it's just what I needed to fashionably keep the litter in the car under control. Thanks to Elizabeth for the recommendation, and to Allyson for the lovely product!

References:
Allyson Hill's Etsy Shop
Allyson Hill's Blog
Lizap Designs


Plaid Bag

This is a cute bag my friend Jen gave to me that her mother-in-law made. I took it out this weekend for my trip to the Brimfield Antique Show. Great size for toting around my finds, and the straps are just the right length too that I can push it to your back to navigate narrow booths. Thanks to Jen & her MIL for a great bag!

References:
My Brimfield finds

Lovely Little Scissors

A few years ago I was at the International Quilt Festival in Houston and saw a great demonstration by Karen Kay Buckley where she showed how to make perfect applique circles. I bought her "Perfect Circles" templates, but didn't get the serrated scissors she had. Of course I regretted it and later came across these little Gingher ones. The micro-serrated edge grips onto whatever you're cutting to keep it from slipping - perfect for cutting tiny little applique pieces.And these things are super sharp. Love 'em, need to get a bigger pair at some point.

References:
Karen Kay Buckley

Dog Proofing the New Car

 Olive likes to stand on the center arm rest of the car to look out the window. She already ruined two arm rests on my old car so I decided I better make a cover for the new car before she struck again.

Fortunately I had a few yards of black vinyl in my stash. (Doesn't everybody?) Using a high tech pattern making method, I held two paper towels up to the side of the arm rest and traced the side edge, measured across, and I was ready to sew. It goes well with the interior, even did some top stitching on the side for the finishing touch.

References:
Olive the Dog
Spradling Vinyl
Why I replaced my car

Bread Bag Clip Necklace

I was in the third grade and sitting in an assembly in the school gymnasium. Next to me on the bleachers was a new girl who was wearing a bread bag tie bracelet strung on a rubber band. I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

I pulled out the collection from my kitchen drawer and strung them on a snake chain. Great recycled/green project.

References:
Bread Bag Clips (Kwik Loks)

Crafts Gone Wrong - The Bay Rum Experiment

The Tower of BoOze
A few years ago I decided that I was going to make the men in the family some cologne for Christmas. I had previously made some using essential oils and vodka and that came out pretty well. (In case you're wondering alcohol is the standard base for perfumes and colognes so vodka works well for the homemade variety.) I searched the web and found a recipe for bay rum aftershave. It seemed pretty straightforward - take some rum, put in some bay leaves, some lemon and lime rind, and a few cloves and let it all sit for a few weeks. I let it sit for a few weeks and promptly forgot about it.

Fast forward to some time in the future. Peter calls me at work. He's arrived home and has had a bad day at work and is looking for something to drink. I had some frozen fruit in the freezer and recommended he make up some sort of blender concoction to ease his pain. He likes that idea and had thought he'd seen some dark rum in our liquor cabinet, or as we call it, "the tower of booze". A few minutes later he calls me back, very upset. Somehow the bay rum experiment had found its way into the tower of booze. To this day I don't know how it got there. Really, I don't.

He'd put all the fruit into the blender and put in a healthy dose of the 'dark rum', apparently paying no attention to the odd bits of stuff floating in it. Suffice to say Peter got quite a shock on his first sip. He described it as medicinal, horrid, and gag-worthy. Oh it was bad. And that was the end of my experiments with homemade cologne. And Peter switched to drinking whiskey and keeps his bottle separate.