Chevron and Turquoise and Owls, Oh My!

It's times like this when I begin to wonder if I'm really related to my sisters..... How is it possible that they (and my mom) are sewing geniuses when I can't sew a straight line? I kid you not! I'm super awesome at using the ripper to unstitch every single thread that I've EVER sewn. Then I re-sew, then I re-rip it out, til there's very little fabric left that is unscathed. It's beyond ridiculous. I'm beginning to think that I'm allergic to sewing....

Fortunately, I have very generous sisters/mom who feel sorry for my pathetic skillz and make me super awesome/ insanely cool gifts. This happy package came in the mail today & I couldn't be more thrilled to receive such an outrageously fun gift from my lil' sista Mandy! Get ready for the pics peeps. Put down your diet cokes (so you don't choke with crazy excitement), steady yourselves (so you don't fall off your chairs) and hold on to your socks, cause I'm about to fill your screen with some chevron happiness!



Squeal! Doesn't this little corner just make you happy? Who knew all it needed was turquoise chevron to make it purrrty? Let's take a closer look at the quilt my loverly sis made.... (big sigh, followed by huge smile) I mean first turquoise, but then she edged it with a fun chartreuse folks! S. T. O. P. IT! It's too good.....






As if that didn't make your heart pitter patter enough...... then come the owls!

Who00 (get it? Whoo Whoo? My jokes bring down the house with 2nd graders!) needs a boring backside of the quilt when you can have these funky little creatures to smile at! I'm super sorry Mandy I opened my birthday gift way early, but I can't possibly put it away and pretend I didn't see it! I'm just too happy! Love is not a strong enough description. More like stalker obsessed with my quilt! Don't be surprised if I find a way to wear it as an accessory. I'm thinking wrapping it around like a sweater adding a skinny yellow belt and finishing it off with ruffly flats..... perfect!

I'm linking to these fabulosa sites:
Blue Cricket -sorry can't find her button

Meaningful Gifts

You know I'm obsessed with finding the perfect gift, right? You know the kind that brings tears to the receiver's eyes when they open it? Yeah, that's what I want every gift I give to be like. No pressure right? The problem is, when you find that perfect gift and it's everything you hoped it would be, everything after that is just a let down. It's hard to just give a gift card after that! Oh the things I stress myself out with :)

So a few years ago I wondered "If I died, would my family know how much they meant to me? Would my brothers, that I don't talk to enough, know how much I adored them, and how much fun I had growing up with them?" So I began one Christmas to sit down and write letters to each of them. I thought it would be hard, since I have 6 siblings and it's tricky to stay close now that we're all grown up and living so far away. But as I wrote, the memories of shopping cart races, dolly bomb fights & glow in the dark tag easily came. And after I had written 6 letters to my brothers and sisters, I had a pretty good history of our childhood. I thought my parents would enjoy them as well and so I wrote them letters as well. Then, I compiled the letters and published the book for my parents to keep. Since I live far away, I don't have a picture of that book. But I did a similar one for my own children and hubby last year, if you remember. From my favorite book publishing site- shutterfly.com It looked like this:




Each child and hubby have a two page layout with a letter from me.

I typed up my hopes and dreams for each of them and of course I had to include my favorite photos of them. Photo's are my favorite gift of all time. They evoke so many emotions when I see they're chubby baby faces or remember how much they loved that particular necklace or always had to have they're hair a certain way.

Here is another way to show how much you care for someone:




The original idea was found here and I just love thinking of how fun it would be to open each letter and relive each memory. On someone's birthday, however old they're turning, you turn over a pen & paper to that many people. For instance, your dad is turning 60, you find 60 friends, grand kids, and family to write a memory of him. Compile them in a book like I did, or stack them in envelopes and tie them up pretty. The idea is simple, but so meaningful! It's the perfect time to start this, since so many families will be gathered together for Thanksgiving!

Mother's Day Gift Idea

****Warning****Mom, if you're reading this AVERT YOUR EYES! Atleast til Sunday!

Mother's Day leaves me stumped every year. What can I possible give my mother to show my gratitude for the insane amount of work she did raising 7 children? All the laundry that I threw down the 3 story laundry shoot (it was fun to throw things/siblings down that thing) that weren't really dirty, just too lazy to hang up. I shudder at how much laundry she did. All the meals she painfully prepared (and they weren't the heat up a frozen lasagna & pillsbury rolls dinners). These were gourmet, by ANY standards. Fresh fruit? Always! Fresh baked rolls & bread? What? You didn't have that? Oh, I thought that was on every dinner table. Fresh baked pies? Atleast twice a week. Fresh cookies or brownies? Um, daily! Lasagnas, chicken pot pies, Homemade chicken noodle soup, enchiladas, stir fry's. EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. We never ate out. We never had store bought frozen dinners. She never asked us what kind of cereal we wanted for dinner, like I may or may not have done on occasion. What I didn't realize until I became a wife and mother is how much time, planning and talent it takes to pull off this amount of work! And how incredibly thankless it is! I'm stumped mom, why did you do it? It couldn't have been because you had children who appreciated any of it! We just assumed that's how everyone lived.

Now that I'm a mom of 3. My standards are getting lower and lower. Dinners are complete in 20 minutes prep time or it's cereal. Dessert? No way, unless it's icecream or left over Easter candy. Yes, I was raised well but came up lazy when it comes to the insane amount of work I'm willing to sacrifice for my children who won't notice for another 20 plus years! So in order to thank my mom for the amazing dinners we had & she would still make me if I lived closer. Oh, how I wish we lived closer! My sister & I decided to make these fun napkin rings. My mom still throws fun dinner parties and we thought it would be fun to jazz up her table setting with something interesting. A conversation starter.




I wish I could take credit for coming up with this fun idea, but I'm pretty sure every idea has been taken and I'm happy to recreate the genius ones, like this. Renee and I found these forks at Canton flea market and we knew just what to do with these. This amazing blog, a brooklyn limestone, gave me the idea and here's my take on recreating it.

Step 1: Make a mold guide. Use a pipe or in our case different socket to round the handles. My husband drilled the sockets into wood and clamped down the wood to the counter. You could use any plumbing pipe. We tried two different sizes but ended up using a 1.5 inch pipe, roughly.

Step 2: Stamping the forks with the word EAT. We should have done this before rounding the forks but it worked in the end. We purchased a metal stamping set for around $10 at Harbor Freight.


Step 3: Darkening the letters. This is where I tried using a sharpie to fill in the stamped EAT word. It makes the word pop a little more. I had a hard time wiping off the excess sharpie on the fork though. That's when I remembered my scrapbooking trick. I wiped on craft paint, shoving paint into the crevices & wiping off the excess. Worked perfectly!

Step 4: Using your mold, guide the fork handles around the pipe using clamps to hold onto the fork and a hammer to make it smooth.


Step 5: Wrap them up with a cute set of napkins and wash away the years of resentment that your mother SHOULD have towards your incredibly unhelpful self. But because she's your mom & she used up all her mental capacity raising you during your teens, she's (hopefully) already forgiven you. Because you're 30. And you've moved out of her house. Hopefully. And if not, she still really likes you and finds you incredibly thoughtful & talented & stand up comedy worthy. Yeah, mom's are like that. One minute you've caused them complete and total public humiliation. The next minute, you can do no wrong....... I think remembering Mother's Day is the least I can do. I wish I could prepare a nice meal to go along with this, but let's be honest, her cooking skills didn't rub off on me.

Easiest magnet board ever....

You know how some bloggers out there totally make it sound like refinishing an armoire was a 3 hour project? Or reupholstering a chair could be done during the baby's nap time? Of course while doing these massive projects, somehow they (other bloggers) appear to have perfectly dressed children, immaculate homes and gourmet meals on the table every night. So you think to yourself, "heck, I could paint may kitchen cabinets." But when you try to accomplish it yourself you run into massive problems. So then you spend 5 days (more like 2 weeks in my case) trying to fix all the things that went wrong, spend more money buying more products to repair the damage that you may or may not have caused in your little "freak out tantrum" (that you may or may not have had). And when it's all said and done, you have finished a very large plate of brownies by yourself (I would never do such a thing) just to make yourself feel a little better, for a project that you, in the end, wish you had never started and don't really care for the finished product either! Just so you know, I'm not that nice of a blogger. I can't really sugar coat all the problems I have when starting a huge DIY project, I just sugar coat myself in chocolate as a reward afterward! So when I say this was the EASIEST PROJECT EVER, I mean it. Here are the supplies I started with: Mod podge & foam brush, heavier scrapbook paper & metal sign. (mine was from Hobby Lobby found in the garden section) First cut the paper to the size of the metal sign. Next, place a thin layer of mod podge on the metal and a small coat as well on the paper. Lay the paper down and smooth out the wrinkles. Make sure the edges have been glued down securely. Let it dry completely. Add a layer of mod podge to the top after it's dry for extra protection. I made easy magnets from stickers from K&Co and small magnets I already had. The stickers are self adhesive so no additional glue is necessary, but I added a little bit of hot glue just for added durability. Add ribbon (or pom poms in my case) if you want to embellish your sign and hang it! I hung this on the outside of my daughter's room so I could place personal messages to her. She loves it!

This would also be a really inexpensive birthday gift for a child's party. The metal sign was only $2.99 at Hobby Lobby so the whole project under $5. Match their room colors, add a photo or a birthday card and you just won yourself Cutest Gift award!

Letters to my family

You remember how ultra (pour on the cheese & pull out the tissues) sentimental I am? I am grateful however, that I'm not a hoarder or this issue could be catastrophic! For Christmas one year I decided to write each of my family members a letter telling them how I felt about them. The letters consisted of memories of growing up, how I felt the day they came home from the hospital as babies, the funny things I remember about them, etc. It was theraputic to relive these memories in my letters. It made me happy to remember how kind my brothers were to me, how creative my siblings were on lazy Sunday afternoons and how thoughtful my sisters were. After I compiled letters to all 6 siblings and both of my parents and mailed them, I then made a book for my dad. I made the book thru a book editor online. It was complicated. It was miserable. It took forever and I would NOT recommend it. While I think my dad enjoyed the book and having these memories written down (I definitely get my sentimental side from him) I thought the book binding process could've been better. I always wanted to make one for my own family but the task has seemed daunting to go thru the process all over again. Then I thought how easy it would be to do it thru my favorite online scrapbook company and complete it with pictures. Because you know how much I love pictures! The finished product came in the mail the other day and I can't wait to give it to my husband and children on Christmas morning. However, I don't think it will be quite the reaction I would want (no one is as sentimentally challenged as me) I think they'll appreciate it in their own way. It makes me happy to know that if something happens to me or my loved ones, I will have told them how much they've meant to me. These letters bring me peace and this book is one way to show my family how much I love them. I used http://www.shutterfly.com/ and here is my finished product.


Each child and hubby have a two page layout with a letter from me.

gift idea

So this is probably old news to most of you, but I squealed like a little girl @a Jonas Bros Concert when I saw this. It will surely be on my Christmas list this year! This company http://www.gelaskins.com/ makes cool covers for your phones and ipads. But did you know that you can upload your own photos? You can put your kids, grandkids, business info on your phone? The possibilities are endless. I'm so stinkin excited! I can't wait to order one for me, my husband & one for the ipad. The phone covers start at $14.95 and you can order matching wallpaper. I can't wait to get my family photos done to order one! One gift off my list- oh yeah! Just 77 more presents to go........

When I have grown a foot or two...Missionary tag

My friend Teri asked me to come up with a special sign for her son and nephews several months ago. Always willing to take on a new challenge, I was happy to oblige. Teri had a brilliant idea to create a missionary tag complete with the customized name. Along the bottom she wanted to add “When I have grown a foot or two…” lyrics from a children’s song our kids know quite well. Neither of us had seen it done but the picture in our head looked AMAZING.

So this is what I came up with.

The supplies were easy, I used a piece of wood that measured approximately 9.5” x 12” x 2” I liked the thicker width so it could stand on its own. The entire thing was then painted in 3 coats of my favorite black paint. As a sign-maker {I've been selling on etsy as Nestlings for over 5 years}, cutting the lettering is the easy part. I used a font called Serlio to make it look a little more authentic and more of childish font for the song lyric. For the do-it-yourselfer, I think a cricut would work but I've never used one so if it doesn't please don't hold it against me. Most of the time I’ll distress the edges, but this time I wanted it to really look like a missionary tag so I left it alone. Once the lettering was applied I sealed everything with a few coats of varnish and let it dry.

Almost makes me wish I were the CTR 8 teacher,I’d have gifts ready to go! {Kidding, that’s not a challenge I’m up for right now!}

I linked up to:

Great Minds Think Alike...My Start On a Quiet Book

Great minds must think alike Mandy. I also struggled to keep my kids entertained during the church service and thought it would be brilliant to make them quiet books that would give them activities to do. Aren’t they adorable? I started them over 13 years ago and they’re still not finished. All four of my kids are now too old but I’m determined to finish them by the time I have grandkids (it’s good to set goals right???).

Over the years there were two tricks I used to keep from spending the entire service embarrassed and exhausted. This will sound crazy but, I found my kids were on better behavior when we sat in the very front row. Seriously, we sat in the very front row that nobody sits in. No toys or snacks came out of the bag until the sacrament was finished leaving about 35 – 40 minutes for the rest of the meeting. If there was screaming and crying etc. I took them into an empty classroom and explained when we were in the service we could have snacks and toys, read books, or color, but if we went outside it wouldn’t be very fun. Then we didn’t talk. I’d ignore the screaming and crying except to ask if they were ready to go back in and have their snack, toys, etc… The hardest part for me is wanting to hang out in the hallway talking to my own friends. When I was consistent it worked the best, and of course it works better with some kids more than others.

Another friend who sits by herself with four young children makes a special treat for her kid that is divided into 3 pieces for each. When one of the kids starts fighting with another they lose one of their 3 pieces. Now all she has to do is hold up her fingers as a reminder.

My youngest has been the hardest. He’s actually really good at keeping himself entertained my only problem is the kid is a “loud talker” he literally has no idea how to use a quiet voice let alone whisper. Anyone have any idea how teach a 5 year old to whisper???

I tried to create some duplicate pages; many aren’t sewn together so I’ll send you what I’ve got. Maybe one of us can finish this project!

Avocado & Classic Black Photo clip Display

0324_3230a, originally uploaded by Nestlings.

One of my adorable friends had a birthday last week. You know, the kind of friend who makes you laugh so hard face hurts? Yep, that’s the one. She’s also extremely crafty and creative so coming up with a birthday gift I knew she’d appreciate was a little more difficult. Thank goodness her awesome husband bought her a Canon camera for Christmas because that gave me an idea. Monday I started working on this project and several steps later it was finished. Actually it’s very easy, just a lot of steps and drying time in between. Since I’m not really the modge podge type {thankfully Andrea taught me to not be afraid of it} this was a totally new project for me. A little sanding and antiquing came next. My friends at American Crafts hooked me up with this gorgeous scrapbook paper {thanks Jeff!}. Finally the top was coated in a protective varnish that took about 2 days to dry.One paper binder clip was attached to the top and I covered a button with linen to help camouflage the not so pretty clip. A gorgeous picture for the sample came from Blessed B photography isn’t she the sweetest baby?

Maddie is already planning one for her room!