Small Rustic Clock

Well I am back, we have internet again, I felt so lost without it. 

Thank you all for sticking with me during the last crazy two weeks. 

Can I just tell you how exhausted I am? 

Moving is way tiring! 

But anyway, I have not done a craft in a while and I feel bad. Here is one I made a few weeks ago. 

I made this clock for my mama for her birthday that was three weeks ago. I brought it to her when we visited her in New Mexico a week and a half ago. I think it turned out pretty cute. 

I got a make your own clock kit at the craft store, I used a 50 % off coupon so it was pretty cheap with that. 

This is the box the kit came in. 

I wish I could say it was really easy to do, but this was the biggest pain in the butt project ever! 

The painting part was pretty straight forward and that is the fun part, where you get to be creative, but this kit was extremely difficult to put together. The pieces didn't fit together quite right, which if the pieces do not fit perfectly against eachother, it won't keep time. There was kind of a gap between the hands which was the problem so I eventually was able to find a tiny washer at Home Depot, and put that in the gap, so it kept time, but I still had to kind of play around with it forever to make it work. 

I want to make one for myself now, but I will not be buying this same kit. 

This is what the main wood piece looked like before I painted most of it. I painted the front brown. 

I then got some scrap paper and outlined the shape of the inside of the wood, then traced it on the back on the back of some cute cardstock and then cut that out (the brown paper is the back of the cardstock that I used, the rustic red paper with the circle things)

Next I mod- podged the cardstock on the wood. 

I then cut out some white paper and then covered it in brown ink. 

I mod-podged that onto the smaller square and then cut out the picture and put that on the paper. 

Then I put modpodge all over everything, including the picture. 

Let it dry for a bit. 

Then I glued the numbers on that the kit came with. 

Next came the hard part of putting the hands on and all that jazz. I was so frusterated by the end of it all, but it eventually did work. I hope it still is, pain in the butt gears! 

Here is what it looks like all finished.

Oh and then I thought it looked kinda plain so I put a bow on it. 

I wasn't so sure if I really liked the bow afterwards, but I had superglued it on (don't know why) so it was on there for good. 

My mom likes rustic stuff, so I chose a rustic barn red color for the paper. I like the paper I chose, it is totally her. 

My mom and dad are in the picture. My sister-in-law, Sam Pierson, took the pictures of them and the rest of my family and I last year (she is an amazing photographer.)

In case you can't really see, here is my parents in a larger photo. 

Aww, aren't they cute

Dang! Don't they totally look way young? No one can believe they have a daughter that is 21 (me). 

But my mom is 20 years older than me and my dad 21 years older than me. 

Happy 42nd birthday mom. 

She is going to KILL me now for saying how old she is. 

I can't resist, here is all of us, lil bro and sis included. 

Exhausted.

I am so sorry I have neglected all of you the last couple weeks.

Last week as you know, I was on vacation.

But we got back on sunday and found out that we were moving Saturday (yes, TODAY!!)

We are moving in with my mother in law, she just bought a really cute new house and offered us her basement to live in for a few months while we save for a house. Cause let me tell you, paying for rent and college tuition (without taking out student loans) does not leave much room for saving for a new home. So she found out she got the house on Sunday, closed on Monday and we have been packing like crazy and moving stuff little by little ever since. Today we have most of our stuff over at the new place, so we are moving the last odds and ends things and all our big stuff that wouldn't in our car.

We live on the top floor though, and I have been carrying stuff up and down those things all day, and I am sooo glad we are moving, cause I hate those stairs, they are Satan's stairs. But I swear climing those things the last week has really strenthened my thighs (maybe/ hopefully?!)

So we will live there for about five or six months while we save up for a house and then find a cute little town home to live in.

But anyway, I have not had a minute to think straight this week, so I am so sorry that I haven't posted. I try to post at least three times a week, but I have not even come close to that the last couple. Also we will be without internet at the new house for a week, so next week you may not really see me either.

But after that I swear I will be back on schedule!!

Thanks for bearing with me.

Almost Home Again

Not to worry, I am alive.

Well my vacation is almost over. I have about an hour left of it. Then I need to go to sleep and then wake up tomorrow, and we drive ten hours home. Then back to work on Monday. I don't want it to end. I love vacations.

Sorry I have been missing in action this week, I have been so busy visiting with my family and seeing the sites here in New Mexico. Not to mention eating my weight at all these restaurants my parents keep taking us.

Here are some glimpses into my vacation.

I will add more pictures next week to show you more of New Mexico.

{Bandalier National Park}

{My Family, my hubs was taking the picture}

{Me and Jeremy @ Tent Rock state park}

Well I hope you are all awesome. Wish me a safe drive tomorrow back to this state:

On the Road Again.

We are hitting the road and visiting this state:

New Mexico. 

Thats where my folks live, Albuquerque to be exact. 

My mom and dad, and brother and sister moved there last year for my dad's job. It is not incredibly far away, but still, its a ten hour drive or an hour flight. 

The land of the Rio Grande River, where they put green chiles on EVERYTHING, even @ McDonalds, and where you find lizards in your house that scare my mom half to death. 

So we are visiting them over my hubby's spring break. 

Since I will be out of town this week, I won't be able to post as much. I will still do a couple this week, but don't expect any more crafts this week, they will be posts chronicling my vacation in the desert land. 

(Yes, Utah is a desert, but it is cold here right now, and it only looks like a desert in Southern Utah where no one lives.) 

Wish us a safe trip. 

Fun stay put bookmarks

I love reading, and I am always losing my book marks. So I am always in need of them. I thought it would be fun to make my own and I came across these really cute ones at Bugaboo, mini mr. & me

Aren't they just the cutest? But I didn't want to use my ribbon, I like to keep that for scrapbooking, and my craft ribbon didn't really work, and I didn't have any cute big buttons, like really, all mine are super small... So I put off making these til I got some big buttons, but then the other day, inspiration came. Why not just use a rosette or pom pom instead of a button. So out came the fabric and the glue gun. 

These were so easy to make. 

First off, I took a long strip of fabric. I just kind of measured it against a normal sized hardback novel. It was about a foot and 1/2 ish. Sorry, I didn't measure. 

Next I glue gunned the edges inside of it as showing in the picture above. The seam is the inside where you don't see it. You could sew it really easily too and make it prettier, but I don't have a sewing machine, and the glue gun was sooo easy! 

I took each end and glued it to the inside, to give it a clean look on the outside. Next I took some hair elastics (I bought the pack at the dollar store) and then looped the fabric around it and glued as shown in the picture above. 

I made a cute rosette and then glued the rosette on the end that doesn't have the elastic. 

Click HERE to see how to make rosettes

Click HERE to see how to make pom poms

Now wrap your book mark around the book, the back part goes on your page you are saving, loop the elastic around the rosette/ pom pom.

DONE!!

{First book is The Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins, middle book is A Kiss in Time by Alex Flinn, and the third book is  Eye of the World by Robert Jordan, all great books in case you were wondering}

I also made two other book marks a red pom pom one and a lighter purple one and gave them to my aunts. 

Oh so thats what the sun looks like!

{Sun picture}

The sun is shining, shining brightly!!! I am so happy, I had forgotten what that thing looked like. It has been trading off between rain and snow here, and yesterday and today it is finally starting to look like spring.

You see, here in Utah, we get a ton of snow. I read an article on Yahoo the other day that said that Utah gets the third highest snowfall in the U.S. Colorado was the first and we were only an inch behind them. So we get a ton of snow!! Like a ton, it is not even funny cause I hate snow, really I hate that stuff. But we get all that snow and I have lived here my whole life, but I have never once got a snow day. How ridiculous is that?! Not one snow day ever! My family moved to New Mexico last year and already my little brother and sister have gotten about a week and a half worth of snow days because of an inch of snow, and one of them was due to wind chills. What the heck??! Wind chills? What is that? Totally not fair. We have feet of snow here and never once have they cancelled my school or work because of it.

My husband says it is because we get so much snow here that we are prepared for it, we have more snow plows and put ice down, so that is why they don't cancel anything here. But I think its just cause they want to be mean!

But anyway, we finally have sun shine here and I am loving it. I am sure we will get a few more feet of snow before it becomes summer, because we dont have spring here. We have Winter, Summer, a week of fall, and then back to winter.

But I love this state, it is my home state and I never want to leave it.

Well actually I could move to Southern Utah where it never snows, but no one lives there its just one National Park after the other...

Thank you for listening to me ramble and complain about snow...

I am sure in a few months I will complain about how hot it is here, Utah is a desert after all.

Red Rosette Wreath

 This week I made this awesome rosette Wreath. I am loving it. It was really easy to make too, it definitely took less time than the book page wreath as well. 

To make it you make a lot of rosettes about the size of my fist, to learn how to make the rosettes go to my tutorial that I showed you the other day Here. I then hot glued them onto a  medium sized cross stitching circle hoop. 

This is what it looked like. They fit perfectly actually. Then I made more rosettes and then glued them on top of the other rosettes. I did it so the top ones overlapped in the middle of the first row of the rosettes. 

There was a small gap in the wreath that was too small for another rosette so that is where I put the bow!

I have been totally obsessed with red lately. This is going to go in my kitchen. I have yet to find a spot for it though... I have too many decorations!! I need a bigger place. 

I actually did not have ribbon, so I just cut up some black fabric for the picture. I did it as a temporary fix until I could go to the store, but the fabric actually makes for a pretty cute bow, I think I might keep it on there.. 

It was way easy, rosettes are a piece of cake. And if you make them bigger they take up more room so you can do less. But every time I make rosettes I get major glue gun burns. I got a nasty blister from this baby! My finger was ouchy! 

Guest Blogger, Jacabean Designs.

Guess what everyone, we have the first ever guest blogger here at Loving Life, please give a big hooray to Jackie from Jacabean

Hi everyone! I'm Jackie of Jacabean Designs, and I'm so excited to be a guest here

today :) A little about me...I'm a full-time graphic designer. I love to read, scrap, craft,

bake, and have a serious addiction to sweets...especially chocolate! I'm married to

a wonderful guy who puts up with my crafting messes, and even gives me a craft

challenge from time to time. My favorite color is yellow. I love digital scrapbooking,

and also design digital scrapbook kits at Brownie Scraps. Want to

see what's new in my little corner of the world? Stop by my blog and say Hi: jacabean.blogspot.com.

I'm here today to share with you all a little bit about digital scrapbooking. First, here

are my top 5 reasons why I love digital scrapbooking:

1. I Can Make Multiple Copies

This is why I initially made the switch. A few years ago, I decided I wanted to make

a heritage scrapbook. So many family members were interested, that I figured if I

made it digital, anyone who wants a copy can have one. I'm spending the time to do

it, so I might as well get more use out of it, and be able to share my creations with

others, right?

2. The Undo Button!

So I've got this vision, and I'm trying that new paper cutter...and it all goes wrong.

Grrr...I just ruined that picture. Or how about, I'm writing a paragraph about that

special moment, get to the last sentence, and misspell a word. Argh! I hate that! And

I imagine I'm not the only one...at least I hope :) Anyway, not only can you undo and

try again on the computer, but many programs also have spellcheck! And you can

center your text, change the size, spacing, color, etc.

3. My Photos Are Digital

All of my pictures from the past 5 years at least are digital. So if I want some to

scrap, I've first got to print them. Unless you're super organized and think ahead (I

usually am not), you can't sit down and scrap if you find yourself with a little free

time. BUT if I'm scrapping digitally, I just pick out which photos I want to scrap, and

I'm ready to go.

4. An Endless Supply of My Favorite Things

I'm one of those wackos who doesn't want to use the last piece of my favorite paper,

because then, it's all gone. I know, it's a waste not to use it, but I'm weird that way.

With digital, there is an endless supply! Want to put 20 of that one flower on your

page? Go for it! Heck, you can put 100 if you really want, and it didn't cost you any

extra.

5. No Mess!

In my new house, I will have my very own craft room. Yay! However, up until now,

I've had a bin full of stuff. Okay, well truthfully, many bins. And when I scrap? The

living room floor looks like the JoAnn's craft department threw up. It would drive

my husband nuts! With digital scrapping, it's just my and my trusty computer...a Mac

of course, but yours doesn't have to be :)

Well, there you have it! Now, would you like to see some of my pages? I'll try to

show you a variety of styles. With each one, I'll link you up to the scrapbook kit used,

and the template too. Yes, I am definitely a template scrapper! I don't always use

templates, but I have very little time to scrap, and when I do, it makes things much

easier if I have a vision going in. There's nothing wrong with a little help, right?

This is one of my favorites. My favorite color is yellow, so I think that has

something to do with it :) This was made with Afternoon by Marni
Designs and Tempting Templates 7 by Rainy

Dayz Designs.

This one is definitely a little different from the everyday pictures. The kit used is

FlutterbyeFaery's Touch of Tan, and no template this time around. This one is all

me :)

 

This one is for my heritage album (as is the one above). It's created with Barren Beauty by PhotoCowgirl and Lazy Days
Templates 2 by Hornbuckle Designs

One last layout. Created with Soul Sister by Modern
June and Color Lovers 1 by Rainy Dayz
Designs.

And what do I do after I've created my pages? I get them made into books! I LOVE

the feeling of seeing my books for the first time. I actually got my 2010 album in the

mail from Winkflash recently, and I'm loving it. Here are a few pics:

That page on the right is a favorite of mine because the handcuffs, badge and whistle

are pictures of my hubbies actual police things. How cool is it to have those in

the book? Oh, and I know it looks like the book won't lay flat, but it will. This was

literally my first time looking thru it, and I ran to grab the camera right away. No

page protectors, but you could choose to print your pages and put them into a

traditional paper scrapping album with the page protectors if you like that better.

Ok, one last thing before I leave. I think I mentioned that I also design digital

scrapbook kits. The front cover of my book shown above is one of my kits (Smiling).

I've got a wide variety of kits in my store. Here are a couple:

Want to see more? You can check out my store HERE, and my layout gallery HERE. Have questions about

getting started? Stop by my BLOG

and leave a comment, and I'll answer the best I can. Well, that's all for now! Thanks

for reading :)

Wahoo, Thanks Jackie for being a guest blogger today. Aren't her scrapbooking pages amazing? It looks so easy too. I am totally wanting to merge into digital scrapbooking now.

I am a winner, and so very clever!

So if any of you follow Girl and a Glue Gun  (and if you don't, you need to go there right now, cause it is one of my favorites, Kim makes me laugh daily) you will know that there was a contest for whoever could come up with the best glue gun picture, Basically you had to put your glue gun in a funny pose or something.  And guess what?! I won.

Haha I am so happy, I came up with a pretty funny picture if I may say so myself. So go check it out HERE

Also tomorrow we are having our first ever guest blogger here at Loving Life, so stop by tomorrow, it will be fun!

Rosette Tutorial

So... Here is how to make perfec little rosettes for whatever crafty project you are doing.

I love making rosettes, they are super easy to make and really hard to mess up, you can make them messy or really perfect and not really messy . The tutorial is to make them really round, I will do a future rosette tutorial to show you how to mix it up a bit.

First you need some fabric, i like mine to be a bit frayed so if you want that, get a cheap cotton. Cut it as long and as thick as you want. The longer and thicker the fabric strip, the bigger your rosette will be.

Then I cut a square of the fabric out. I use this as my base. I build the rosette around this little square. I just use a little square to start out with, but if you are just beginning then it might be easier if you cut a big square out.

Now take your strip of fabric and fold it a bit at the tip, then start to twist and twist and then twist it around the tip of the fabric like you see in the picture above. Then take your square base and glue it to the back of the rosette tip. Then start twising around in a circle more. For a less messy rosette twist all in one direction. Keep twisting and glueing it all together as you go with your glue gun. Try and get the glue to be closer to the bottom of the rosette side so you can't see it when you are done.

When you are near the end you are going to have a tiny piece that is left over, simply tuck it under the rosette and glue it there.

EASY PEASY!

Later on this week I will show you what I am doing with this rosette and the twenty others I made just like it!!

Come See Me!

I am doing my first guest post ever today, so come and see me at Jacabean Designs today!

Chicken and Artichoke Pasta

  So this is one of my favorite dishes. I love this recipe, it is so good, full of flavor, and pretty healthy for you too, especially if you use whole wheat pasta. I actually made this on my first date with my husband. He got off work at like ten at night, and so most descent restaurants were closed, so we ran to Walmart got the ingredients and made this. Don't ask me how I got roped into making dinner for a first date, but he loved it, and maybe thats what hooked him, my excellent cooking, haha. But really, his college roommates who were living on eggs and ramen were very jealous. 

This recipe is one my mom adapted from a dish at Johnny Carinos Italian Restaurant. It is really simple to make. I just made it for us on Valentines Day (again, got roped into cooking on our date... Good thing  I don't mind cooking).

Chicken and Artichoke Pasta

2 Chicken Breasts

2 diced Tomatoes

2 Tbsp Capers

1 (15 oz) Can Artichoke Hearts

1 (15 oz) can Sliced Olives

2 Cloves Garlic (Minced) 

1 lb Angel Hair Pasta

2 Tbsp Olive Oil

1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning

Parmesean to sprinkle on top. 

Boil Noodles until done, strain. 

While noodles are cooking cut up your chicken, you can dice it up or you can cut it in long strips. Cook Chicken in pan with a tiny bit of olive oil and the garlic. 

Once chicken is cooked through add in the olives, capers, and artichoke hearts. Mix and heat up, add tomatoes, cook about 1 minute more. Add Tomatoes. 

Now take noodles and put in bowl, add chicken mixture to the noodles, add the 2 Tbsp olive oil and then mix up. (If noodles are too dry, add more oil)

Serve. 

(ok, I added too much Italian Seasoning, the cap fell off, but it still tasted good, but yeah...)

I would rather...

{Me}

Right now I am working with a little phone headset strapped onto my head.

I just called a customer whose response to my asking if he was there was 'Wow! what a voice you have!'

When I replied that I wasn't sure if that was good or bad, he said it was good and that I had a 'Unique' voice. I think that was his way of saying I sound like a seven year old. (My voice is super high...  : P    )

And I have a glue gun burn the size of Mt. Everest on my knuckle that is all blistery, EWWW!!

I wish i was was still in eating my weight in this:

{Cookie Dough}

 

{And no, I will not get Sallomenella if I eat it. }

 

 

And watching this show:

 

{24 Season 3}

I am on the 21st hour!! I am going insane here not watching it. And I have to wait until the husband comes home from school and I get off work to watch it. I am dying!!!

And I want to do this in bed in my pajamas all day with no bra and no doing of the dishes or laundry...

If only...

What would you rather be doing??