Picture of the Day

This is a shirt I got Joe awhile back. I still think its hilarious.

Alayna

Merry Christmas!!

I hope everyone is having a safe and lovely Christmas today! I wish everyone lots of love, laughter, and cheer!

Hopefully I will be back tonight or in the next few days!


Alayna

P.S. I'll leave you with a picture of the gifts I made for my nephews. :) I'll have a tutorial up later!

Glitter Ornament Tutorial

I'm going to be wiping glitter off myself for the next week. Glitter is pretty but, I definitely avoid it due to it's ability to stick on everything but what you wanted it to...

But today I decided to throw all cares to the wind and play with glitter.
I needed to make an ornament for my one of my work gift exchanges (yes, we have multiples. A Secret Santa PLUS an Ornament Exchange.) Being the crafty type, no store bought ornament would do! So I set out to create one. While looking around at Target I came across some glitter swirled ornaments. They were quite cute. So I set out to find my supplies...but my Target doesn't carry glitter (I know, right?!) So I had to go to the Wal-Mart across the street and got all my supplies there.



Materials:
-any sized ornaments in any color. (I used small glass ornaments)
-Elmer's Glue
-Glitter to match your ornaments
-Paint marker in white (or whatever color you prefer)
-a paper plate to catch your glitter
-paper towels (to wipe of mistakes)

Step 1: Use your marker to paint whatever design you like on your ornament. Here I just drew squiggles. On my other ornaments I chose stars and circles.

 Stars

 Circles

  Step 2: After the paint has dried (it shouldn't take very long), apply your glue in any design you like. You could go over the stars or draw something in-between the stars if you like.

 For my circles I decided to just put dots inside my drawn on circles. The beauty of this project is that it is completely up to you how you want it to look.

 Step 3: Add your glitter. Hold your ornament over the paper plate and sprinkle (or dump) your glitter on the glue spots. When your ornament (and you) are sufficiently covered in glitter, tap off the excess. You will have some glitter that hangs around on the paint and other parts of the ornament. That's okay. When it is completely dry (and you are standing over a sink), you can blow the remaining glitter off.

 ANNNNNND your done!! Easy peasy, right?! Let the glue dry overnight to ensure no smearing. Then hang on your tree!

You could probably use glitter glue to save a step (and mess), they just didn't have any matching blues in the glitter glue so I opted for a giant pack of glitter and some plain ole' Elmer's Glue.


Questions? Let me know! 




Alayna

Whoa!

It's been awhile blog land! But, finals are over and I now have a month of nothing but craftiness! YAY!
I'm hoping to get a couple more tutorials up over the next week or two. I have ideas to do just about EVERYTHING but I'm trying to limit myself to one project at a time....it's not going so great, ha!

Yesterday, I got Joe to agree to take some pictures with me so we could send out Christmas cards. It went pretty well! It was chilly outside so we didn't stay out too long. But, I did get some really good shots of Sage by our trees in our backyard. :)

Picture time!!

 Joe was "posing" for some test shots. I had to set my camera on a stool and needed to get it set up before I could take the picture.

 More "posing". That is a single blade of grass in his hands. I never ask why. I just take the pictures.

 

 A good one of use sitting against the fence. My camera only had a 10 second timer so I never had much time to adjust once I sat down.

  

 We took a little break when Joe got a phone call from his mom. So I started taking pictures of Sage and Jasmine.
Above is Sage next to our lemon tree. Or as we call it Greystoke (the story behind our tree names after all my pictures).

 

 

I decided to test out my macro setting on my camera. I was pretty impressed actually. It's a nice picture of the single lemon blooming on that tree. It only started blooming last month...I think the tree is confused with what season it's in. 

 

 Here is Sage at the Simba tree. It's an Orange tree. She decided that her best friend needed some fertilizer. That's what she is covering up. Ha.

 

 Jasmine was playing in our little clover patch. She had just pounced on them when I managed to get the picture taken. She hates having her picture taken. As evidence by the 15 pictures I have of her behind. She didn't  know I took this one. I'm so sneaky, he he.

 

I managed to snap this one while Joe was just standing around and I was playing with camera angles on my new little tripod. I reallllly like this picture. He had has a stressful day and you can tell. (He's gonna kill me when he sees this...)

And finally one of us standing in front of the fence. I think this is my favorite one. We both look normal haha. I'll probably use this one in our Christmas card. :)

So I bet you're ready for and explanation on our silly tree names. Here's the scoop. When my parents cats, Greystoke and Simba, passed away, they agreed to plant a tree on top of them. Greystoke passed away in 2009 and he got a tree (I forgot what kind) but it didn't take. So last year we had to re-plant another tree. They chose a lemon tree and that's what you see there. Simba passed away just this last August. Sage and Simba were BFFs. She followed him around everywhere and just like the grumpy old man he was, he would have never let you know he enjoyed her company as well. So, now we call our trees Simba and Greystoke. :)

Hopefully I'll be back soon with some tutorials on my awesome suicide cappuccino and some other crafty goodness!

Alayna

Marcel the Shell With Shoes

I'll leave you with this today. It may not be everyone's kind of humor, but I found it amusing.


Hope everyone is having a great day!

Alayna

Haircut!

Said to heck with it and got a hair cut!!
I decided I wanted it short.
Here are pictures of the front and back!
I love my new haircut!

Alayna

DIY Nifty-Gifties

Points to those who got The Office reference above. :)

Here's a tutorial I found on Pintrest, a DIY Make Your Own Canvas Portrait, that I was really interested in trying. My boyfriend hates taking pictures...I love taking pictures. See my problem here?! I did manage to convince him to take a picture once...a long time ago. So I decided I would use that lone picture and make some art out of it. We are about to move and I'm trying to get a jump start on decorating and Pintrest has sooooo many good ideas. (I swear I lose hours of the day just gawking at all the neat projects!!) Anyways, here is the lone picture of us:

Handsome fella, yeah?! So I printed it out black and white (it's the only color we have in the printer right now, haha) and followed the directions.
Here's out it turned out

Not too bad! I did leave some paper behind, as you can see on Joe's face. I didn't let it dry before drowning it in Mod Podge.

And here is how I did it!

What you will need:

-Any sized canvas (I used 8 x 10)
-Photo in black and white (color should work as well, I just prefer black & white)
-Paint Brush
-Mod Podge
-Gel Medium
-Water


First I printed out my photo of the picture I wanted. In the tutorial it says that pictures with less detail will work better. I said screw that and chose this picture of my nephews at the Houston Zoo

Cute, right?! After I printed it out and made sure it fit on my 8 x 10 canvas, I brushed my whole canvas with a gel medium. I used Liquidex Heavy Gel Medium from Michael's for about $7 ( I had a 50%  off coupon).

 The picture below is what my canvas looks like completely covered with the medium.




















Next I laid my photo face up next to the canvas and I flipped the canvas (wet side down), then aligned the edges of the canvas to the photo. My photo was too big for the canvas so I made sure all the important parts of the picture were on the canvas then smooshed the canvas on top on the photo. I let it dry overnight. I tried letting the picture of myself dry for a few hours, but when I went to rub the paper off the ink was coming with it. It's best to let it dry overnight before attempting the next step.

 This morning I went to check on my photos (I did 3 at a time) and everything was dry! YAY! So on to the next step! You can use a spray bottle if you like,  I just used my hands. Take some water and rub it all over the paper. Make sure it is thoroughly soaked. You'll start to see your image as the paper soaks in the water.

 When you can start peeling the edges off no problem, your paper is ready to be rubbed. I just used my finger and rubbed like no tomorrow. Don't rub too hard or you will rub off the ink as well...and if you don't rub hard enough you won't get any paper to come off. Practice makes perfect.

 Keep rubbing untill all the paper has come off. This could take awhile. I snapped this picture after 30 minutes of rubbing and still had a ways to go.
Tip: I found that if I stuck one hand on the underside of the canvas and pushed up, it gave my other fingers a hard surface to rub against, making removing the paper a little easier!

 Here's after all the rubbing. There is still some paper on it but it adds to the charm! You can see there are spots that completely rubbed off but that's okay! I think it makes it look old.

Now to make sure you have completely removed all the paper you want, let it dry. I found that after I let it dry there was still more paper on the photo that I wanted removed. So back to the sink I went. Finally I had it all removed! When it was dry I brushed on the Mod Podge. Don't worry, it dries clear. I used the matte Mod Podge but I think the glossy would work wonderfully as well!

 Here is the print after the Mod Podge dried! (I put the canvas in from of my monitor and got that neat boxed effect!)
I think it turned out wonderfully!!
All that rubbing was well worth the effort! Now I have something that looks expensive but was  really cheap! :)








If you have any questions or if I didn't explain something right, let  me know!!



Alayna

Be Careful What You Ask For...

I asked for more pictures of my boyfriend and I together. So, he grabbed my camera and started shooting...

I laughed at these for 30 minutes, much to his chagrin.  Look closely at the top picture and you can see me giggling in the window :)


And this is just the beginning of how awesomely goofy he is!



Alayna

Self Explanatory

You get it. :D

           Titan
            Rajah
           Sage
           Jasmine

Embroidery

What I've been doing this weekend:

Embroidery! I really just got started on this piece.  I spent most of yesterday running errands, then I traced my designs onto my fabric.

Here's my stash:

I got the cute designs (and helpful tips) from the book

Doodle Stitching: Fresh & Fun Embroidery for Beginners by Amiee Ray






 and





Doodle Stitching: The Motif Collection: 400+ Easy Embroidery Designs by Amiee Ray




The second book comes with a CD you can print and adjust the motifs from. So you could create your own little embroidered scene or just piece together different motifs! They both have many projects in them, although I haven't yet made one. :)



Off to more embroidering!


Alayna

I'm still stuffed

Thanksgiving was terrific. I spent most of the day cooking and when I wasn't cooking I was embroidering or watching movies (or doing both at the same time!).  I cooked my very first bird on Thursday. Since there were only four of us eating this year I opted to go with a chicken instead of a large turkey since we also had a large ham my boyfriend was cooking. I tried a new technique (new to my family) of stuffing a herb butter underneath the skin of the chicken. Holy fish paste was it amazing.

So I started off making my herb butter. I really just added anything I wanted, but if you want to give it a shot here's the recipe:

In a mixing bowl add equal parts oregano, thyme, basil, rosemary, dill weed, and pepper (my butter was already salted). A dash of minced garlic and a dash of lemon pepper.

 (I used two sticks of butter and I had leftover butter. I'm sure you could use just one if you like.)
Make sure your butter has been softened, usually by letting it sit out at room temperature for 30-45 minutes. If you're in a pinch you can microwave it in 15 second intervals. You want the butter to be soft and mixable not melted.

Combine butter and herbs in a mixing bowl and mix thoroughly. You can use you're hands if you're feeling adventurous, I just used a spatula.
Since I made my butter about 4 hours ahead of time ( I had nothing else to do), I put it back in the fridge till about an hour before I wanted to put the chicken in. That give it time to soften back up and will make it easier to stuff under the chicken skin.



While the butter was softening up I started to prepare my chicken. First I took out all the innards and threw them out. I rinsed my chicken with cold water and pat dry with a paper towel.  After drying the chicken I salt and peppered the cavity and stuff it with a small onion (cut in to quarters) and a lemon (cut the same way).
I put the chicken in a dish and poured a little EVOO (extra virgin olive oil, for all you non-Rachael Ray fans), sprinkled the whole chicken with salt and a little bit more lemon pepper. Then I rubbed it all in. Made sure the whole chicken was coated. After that I separated the skin from the meat of the chicken. It was easy, you really just run your finger underneath the skin being careful not to break the skin.
(here's a video incase you need to see it click here )


I then started stuffing my chicken with the delicious herb butter mixture I made. I also slathered some of the butter on top of the chicken because I really had a lot of butter left over and didn't want it to go to waste. (Paula Dean would be proud!)When I finished with that I added some chicken stock into the cooking pan, added my chicken and put some onions around the chicken.

There's the back of my chicken all stuffed and ready to go.
Oh! And don't forget to tuck in your wings or they will get all burned and ugly looking. :)


I set my chicken in the oven on 375 degrees for an hour and it came out perfect. The meat was moist and very flavorful and the skin was a nice golden brown. Cooking times may vary, when the internal temp. reaches at least 165 degree in the thickest part of the chicken, it should be done. The juices should also run clear and not pinkish.
When the chicken is done let it rest for about 10 minutes. Then you can serve your delicious creation!


I forgot to take a picture of the chicken when it came out of the oven, my boyfriend was eager to eat. Haha.



Here's the whole spread. As you can see we are very fond of food in this family :)

I hope y'alls Thanksgiving was as wonderful as mine!






Thanks for reading!


Alayna