Tea Tuesday?

It's been a long time since I had a Tea Tuesday post...mostly since I always have a super busy Tuesday and I don't often schedule my posts. Likely because I'm not very good at planning ahead. I'm sort of a fly by the seat of my pants type of girl. 

 I just had to show you the teacup candles I made. 

Once again, something I've been wanting to do for a long, long time but just never did...until now.

I'm totally in love with them. They turned out perfectly.  

I couldn't have imagined better results! 

Hooray! Love it when something comes out right!

 

Candlemaking

Continuing one with my need to melt things...I made some candles.

Over time I've collected containers and supplies at garage sales to create some OOAK candles.

This one in the tin is so feminine. It has a nice soft scent...not flowery as the flower on top would suggest. Just soft, sweet and slightly fruity.

For this one I placed chunks of a darker, broken  candle in the glass jar before filling with the new wax. I was hoping for a more dramatic look but what can I say...I'm experimenting.

 

"I like to melt stuff..."

I'm showing my age with that quote. 

Remember the show  

Friends: The One with Frank Jr. 

Anyway...I do like to melt stuff. 

We have piles of crayons. I think they are reproducing in the cupboard. 

I've recycled crayons many times with varying degrees of success. 

Cheap dollar store variety and the free crayons from restaurants contain too much wax and not enough pigment. 

The best ones are the Crayola.

My technique:

Spray mini muffin pan with olive oil to act as a release agent.

Melt in a 230° oven for about 10 minutes. 

Cool completely.

Color.

(I set the pan in the garage overnight to harden.)

Now we have a fun, chunky set of crayons to spark some renewed interest in coloring...hopefully.

 

Good clean fun

I successfully made soap!! 

I've been nervous to try it on my own but figured with the month of cure time for this cold process soap that I better get over it and do it.

This is a coconut oil and olive oil soap with no added fragrance or color. Figured I better start with the basics and work my way up. 

I have to tell you that I was super worried yesterday.

I never got a good "trace" before pouring it into the mold. 

So maybe I shouldn't say that it's a success yet....

I'll let you know in a month.

 

Fall wreath for mom

The other day, my mom said that she wished she had a Fall colors wreath for her apartment door. 

I took it upon myself to get something made up for her.

I salvaged everything including the straw hat out of the Fall decor/costume box. 
I think she'll be  pleased.

 

Wordless Wednesday #2

Apples, apples everywhere

On Saturday, a few families on the block got together to help harvest the apples from our neighbor's trees. 

It's a big job but the fruits of our labor really pay off.

This year 63 grocery bags of apples were picked.

The apples were all big and beautiful with very few blemishes or worms.

Amazing!

We took home about 6 bags worth. 

I set up shop in the garage so I could make a mess and not worry about it. 

Concrete washes quite nicely. 

 After countless hours of cranking the peeler, I ended up with 23 gallon size freezer bags of peeled and sliced apples ready for the next stage of processing.

So far I've dehydrated 10 trays of apples, 4 pans of apple crisp-ready to be thawed then baked and cooked up about 2.5 gallons of applesauce. 

And I still have a freezer full of bagged apples. 

I am going to have to can the rest of the applesauce I make since my freezer can't hold any more.

 

Green tomatoes aplenty

When I heard the overnight low forecast for last night, I decided to pick the rest of the tomatoes off my 12 plants. 

Now I have a plethora of green babies that I'm hoping will ripen over time. 

Any hints on helping them along??

 

Garden and treasured tea

It's that busy time of year. 

Getting the garden prepped and planted. 

I started with my herbs that hang along the deck. I was able to over winter both a thyme and a flat leaf parsley this year. Additionally I started seeds early this Spring and picked up a couple small plants at the greenhouse yesterday. 

We love having fresh herbs in our food.

I have 12 tomato plants this year of 4 varieties that I started from seed back in mid-March. 

Six live here... along with some green onions and basil I'm hoping will sprout.

The other six are in the "big garden". They are sharing space with green beans, snow peas, kohlrabi and jalapenos.

I got the fence up immediately this year so  the wildlife wouldn't get any snacks from me.

This morning I saw that one of my book purses was this Etsy treasury.

Just had to share...makes me happy when something I've created is appeciated.

Lots of fun stuff was featured....

Are you gardening this year?

Thanks for stopping by for Tea Tuesday with Kimmie and the gang.

 

Garage sale season!!

It's that time of year again! 

The garage sales have begun. I scored big time today. It was a moving sale. They just wanted the stuff GONE! 

I got ALL of this stuff for $4.00. 

Oh yeah! 

Once again this year I'm trying my very hardest not to buy anything new...aside from adhesives...

But rummage sales, thrift stores, garage sales and free bins are not NEW items. 

 

Garden 2012

 Preparation for this years garden has begun.  

All of my seeds have sprouted into these cute little seedlings...hooray!

I have 4 varieties of tomatoes, basil, mint, parsley, thyme and dill in one tray and petunias just getting started in the second. 

Not sure if  the flowers will be big enough by the time I want them outside but I had to try anyway.

The garden plot is waiting to be prepped as well.  

I haven't dared do any raking or hoeing since hurting my back. I've got plenty of time though, we usually don't plant anything outside until after Mother's Day. Then the chance of frost is pretty slim.

Can't wait to get the rest of the seeds into the ground! 

We love having a garden to eat from.

 

Doll sleeping bag

 

For Christmas this year, our daughter received an American Girl Doll. She's been wanting one for years. My only issue is that all the American Girl brand accessories are really spendy just because they have the logo. 

Yesterday I decided that I'd try to make a sleeping bag for her. I grabbed my box of blue scraps (once intended for a boy quilt) and started piecing. 

With a few measurements of the doll herself, I decided on my size.

I'd say it fits pretty well.  

Little J liked it a lot with the exception of the colors. I figured that would be the case so this one will be a gift and I'll be making another in the colors of her choosing.

I got to go crazy with my free-motion foot. 

I had to stop after breaking 3 needles and read up about what in the world I was doing wrong. 

Turns out I was moving my hands to quickly and pulling the needle out of alinement so it would smack down onto the footplate and snap.

 

Fridge facelift

So we have this old fridge that just keeps humming along mechanically but cosmetically it was getting really nasty looking. 

I used to keep papers, magnets and comics on it to cover as much as possible.

It was rusting from underneath the finish on the doors. I'm guessing that it was a manufacturing issue since the rest of it isn't rusting at all. 

I sanded all the rust and painted over it with Rustoleum paint.

I decided on dictionary pages to cover the fridge. My thought was...it's got to be better than the way it looked before. 

 

And in my opinion, it totally is!!  I still need to put a couple coats of sealer on top so I can wipe it down as needed. I picked up the Golden polymer medium I used as glue in the recycle center reuse room for FREE!!  Just two cheap foam brushes were purchased for this facelift. 

Yes, I know we'll eventually have to replace this beast but until then it's definitely a conversation piece in my kitchen!!

Holly and the Ivy

 

Well, the would be this Halle...not the Christmas spelling, which is the wrong spelling in my opinion. :-)

Anyway....I'm trying my best to root this ivy cutting that was given to me. Not like I really need another house plant but I have a hard time resisting them especially when they are FREE!

Stop by our hostess with the mostess, Kimmie's blog, to see what she and the rest of the girls are doing this last Tuesday before Christmas.

Picture this...

...my version of a necklace and bracelet organizer. 

I made one for my mom as well. 

Ssshhh...don't tell her...it's a surprise.

Bottle cap magnets

After working out and running errands this morning, I spent a good chunk of this afternoon putting together all these bottle cap magnets.  I think I'm a little loopy from the glue...need more ventilation in the basement!

You may remember a long time ago I had them strewn across my work surface.  

I bagged them up and stuck them away...promptly forgetting they existed.

Well, no more. 

They are heading to Texas along with all the other items I've been busy creating plus some oldies but goodies.

I still have a list of things I want to make but am running out of time. 

I hope I remember to take a picture of everything before sending it off.

Tea dye

The other day I came across this cool tea tin. Now I'm not a big fan of Jasmine or any floral tea for that matter but I did like the tin. Who knew it would be full of tea. Not wanting to actually drink it I decided to do a little experiment. I had some scraps of muslin so I heated some water and threw the muslin and tea in with it and let it sit all day while I was out and about.

It didn't get as dark as I believe black tea would have but the fabric strips are a nice aged color.

So what did I do with them you ask...  

a little layered fabric hair accessory for my girl.