A Few Random Things...

I am so proud of my husband!! I guess a bit of backstory if required.....

On Feb. 16, 2012 Bryan went to play church basketball. He had a bit of a chest cold, but they were short and needed him. He played fine until the start of the 4th quarter when he felt "funny" kind of hard to catch his breath. Believeing it had everything to do with his chest cold, he sat out the rest of the game.

After he came home, showered, he then told me he wasn't feeling well. Right away I could see his pulse on the side of his neck going a mile a minute. We called my parents to come stay with the kids, and a neighbor (thanks Alan) and my Dad gave him a blessing before we headed to the E.R.
Once there they took us right back to a room, then within 2 minutes he was whisked to the Cardiac Room with a heart rate of 220+.

They tried 7 times to get a vein, but with his heart beating so fast his blood wasn't circulating, making his blood pressure 75/? Finally they just put a line in his neck. Then after trying several kinds of drugs to lower his heart rate,they decided it was getting critical an they needed to shock him.
They gave him something to take the edge off, and shocked him 2 times. It was awful watching that, but everyone hoped it would help. It did a bit, but not enough. His heartrate was only down to 200 which was still too fast. The cardiac doctor that was on that night finally got there and administered some other drugs bringing it down to 160.

They admitted him to the cardiac unit and then continued to work to get it down. It was up high for about 4+ hours. When finally something clicked and it was normal again! We felt so blessed that when we went in the cardiac team just happened to already be there in the E.R. and the Cardiac Doctor on call  (Dr. Wang) happened to be one of the best in the nation!!

The next evening we were able to take him home with strict orders to rest. They also put him on a medication that kept his heartrate down, but also made him exhausted!! A little bit later he had a MRI that revealed just what the Dr. had thought, he had a congenital heart defect that when it took over it would make his heartrate continue to go fast. They explained it like a second band leader leading his heart too fast like caught in a electrical loop! The best way to resolve this was to go in a cauterize all the circut that was creating this effect.

Finally on Mar.26, 2012 Bryan went in for his surgery! It lasted about 4 hours and he only had to stay in the hospital over night. The next afternoon we were able to take him home and let him rest a few days. After a few weeks he felt better than ever. At his 6 week check-up he got the go ahead to excercise!

And then yesterday just 3 months after his heart surgery he ran a 5K. Thats one (of the many) reasons why I am SO PROUD of him!! At times we weren't sure he would ever be able to do this, but he did. And he did great too! I am so grateful how everything worked out and to have such an amazing husband!!

Until next time....

P.S. Can you guess what this is?? Nope. Not garbage. I am so excited about it, but you'll just have to wait to find out!!

Cool Summer Treat...I think so!

I just had to share with you this dessert! It's from Kraft, and it's almost like a dreamscicle with any flavor sherbet or sorbet you want! Yummy!

First here are the ingredients:

2 cups raspberry (any flavor really) sorbet (or sherbet), softened

            1 pkg. (1 oz.) Vanilla Flavor Instant Pudding
            1 cup cold milk
            1 tub (8 oz.) Whipped Topping, thawed
            1 cup fresh raspberries, or whatever fruit to match the flavor you are using!


To make it....

Spoon softened sorbet into foil-lined 9x5-inch loaf pan; freeze 10 min.

Then beat pudding mix and milk in medium bowl with whisk 2 min. Stir in whipped topping; spread over sorbet.

Finally freeze 3 hours or until firm. Unmold onto plate; remove foil. Let dessert stand 10 min. to soften slightly before slicing to serve. Top with berries.

And thats it! Super yummy and refreshingly cool! Enjoy!

Until next time....

Skirts and more skirts...

Okay I know I have skirts to show you, but I have to take the time to show you the cutest stuff! I recently did a trade, my first one. She picked a few things in my shop and I in hers and we just traded. This is what I got.....

A cute owl hat, ruffle lace leggings, and some bows. Yes, they are all for Lucy! She loves them, and I do too! If you want to check out Jacqueline's Shop, here is her information...

http://www.uniquecreationsbyjac.com/

or her Facebook page Unique Creations by Jacqueline

or her etsy shop http://www.uniquecreationsbyjac.etsy.com/

Okay now, on to skirts. I have been making lots and lots of skirts for the boutique in July...nothing fancy, just ruffle faric skirts.....here are a few, which is your favorite?

 Love the pink and purple Cheshire look or this one!

 

I love the tiny polka-dots on this one.

These are both colors that make me think of a Caribbean vacation! I also like the polka-dot elastic!

This one just makes me happy! I love that lemony yellow!

The red and blue are so festive. And check out the elastic on the red one....

Yep! Its super sparkly! What girl doesn't love a little bling!

Last but not least...I think this one is my favorite, I LOVE the rainbow elastic.... but my Mom and Husband don't agree. What do you think??

Until next time...

The Craziness that is Life!!

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. My husband had heart surgery. He is doing great now, and feeling better than ever!! My kids were all sick, then they "shared" it with me. Then my youngest broke out in hives everywhere. Although that is not an excuse, I'm going to pretend it is and get back to blogging!

I have had some new exciting things happen while I was away...

I started "working" for ruffle fabric.com. It's just once a week for an hour, but being surrounded by gorgeous fabric all the time, I really can't call it work! You should really check out her website and get some! So much fun! www.rufflefabric.com

Second, I have decided to do my first boutique!! Yea! I am teaming up with my 'little' brother, who by the way makes gorgeous wood crafts and furniture. It will be July 20-21 at the American Fork Steel Days Craft Boutique! I am crazily trying to get everything ready, and with kids and summer here, sewing isn't happening much! I'll have more information coming soon!

Well, that's about it for now!
Until next time....

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Okay so everyone has a recipe for chocolate chip cookies!! I am no exception. However, I think as we grow and change, so do our taste buds. (I really have know idea if thats true, but it sounds good right?) My recipe simply just wasn't cutting it anymore, so I went on the quest for MY perfect chocolate chip cookies recipe. I say "MY" because everyone has different tastes, ie. soft and chewy, thin and crispy, etc.

First I tried these... from Alice at savorysweetlife.com

Best Chocolate Chip Cookies EVER
Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 3/4 cups (12 oz) all-purpose flour *If at all possible, please weigh the flour
• 3/4 tsp. smallish-medium coarse sea salt
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 2 1/4 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 360 degrees. Cream butter, sugar, and brown sugar until it is nice and fluffy (approx. 3 minutes on medium-high speed on a K-5). Add both eggs and vanilla and beat for an additional 2 minutes. Add baking soda, baking powder, salt, and flour until cookie batter is fully incorporated. Finally add chocolate chips until well distributed. The cookie batter should be somewhat thick. Drop about 2 tablespoons of dough or use a medium cookie scoop and plop the batter onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 12-14 minutes until the edges are nice and golden brown. Remove from heat and allow the cookies to stay on the cookie sheet for an additional 2 minutes. Pick up the parchment paper with the cookies still on top and transfer to a cool non-porous surface. Allow the cookies to cool on the paper for at least 3 minutes before serving. Enjoy.

Notes

*please do not use table salt, the sea salt gives the cookies a nice flavor and hints of texture. If you only have table salt, use 1/2 tsp. *When using sea salt, you will get small crunchy flecks of salt when you bite into the cookie. If you do not like this taste, go with 1/2 teaspoon of table salt.
*I realized grocery stores sell bags of chocolate chips in 12 oz bags but this recipe really needs every last chip. Otherwise you’ll get cookies with only a few chips in each one and this recipe requires lots of chocolate to bulk the cookie up. You’ll need about 1 1/2 bags.

They were just as she described them, "you get a nice crisp bottom, but the rest of the cookie is soft and chewy." I used the 1/2 tsp. of regular salt and....Good, but not really what I was looking for.

Let the hunt continue, until next time.....

Ruffle T-shirt Dress

My sweet baby girl is 3 yrs. old but wears a girls size 7. Clothes these days try to make the kids look older than they are. However, I still want my 3 yr. old to look 3.

This past weekend, I had the challenge of finding an inexpensive, cute little-girl dress to fit her. After looking at seriously 5 different stores, and finding 1 that I liked, that was $35, I just gave up and bought this clearance T-shirt for $1.50. Then I headed over to hobby lobby, got 3 coordinating fabrics, and some tulle. (I got 1/4 of a yd. of 2 fabrics and 1/3 of a yd. of 1(a bit extra for a bow I thought) and then 1 yd. of the tulle. This came to $4.

Here's what I did....

I measured where I wanted the skirt to start on my little girl, added 1 inch, then cut off the rest.

I then took some extra white cotton I had. It was only 9 inches by the width of the fabric. I hemmed one edge, then started on the ruffles. As I measured, they had given me a bit of room to play with, so I had 10 inches and cut 2 strips 5 inches by the width of the fabric. I did this with all 3 coordinating fabrics, and set the extra aside. Then I sewed the strips together, hemmed and ruffled. I repeated this on the other 2 fabrics too. I wanted a full skirt but didn't want to spend the $$ for it, I cut the tulle at 5 inches by the width just to give it fluff. I ruffled 3 strips together and repeated 2 more times.

Then I laid out my white cotton and started with a row of tulle just an inch above the hem. I continued to add tulle then fabric until I got to the last row of fabric. It looked like this.

Then with right sides together I sewed the cotton edges together, leaving out the ruffles. (I sewed these individually after I sewed it on the T-shirt. Then you couldn't tell where the seam was.) I then sewed the skirt part onto the T-shirt. Just the extra part at the top was used. I wanted it to lay nice, and the ruffles would have been bulky in the seam. You can see it in the 2nd picture above.

Once sewn, it looked like this.

Then I needed to cover up the ruffles seam. I added a strip of ribbon, attaching it to the just below the seam of the ruffles and the T-shirt. It looked like this.

It still didn't look right, so I cut the sleeves off at the elbow and used the extra material I had reserved for a bow and added a bell sleeve. I also added a bow in front for "extra beauty"!! And I used some of the extra ribbon around the waist to make a bow and this was the end result.

A very happy little girl (and Mom too!!) Dad loved it too, especially cause the final cost was $7. Give it a try if you have any questions, feel free to ask. I know my instructions and pictures aren't the best, I should have waited for better lighting, but I am learning!!

Until next time....

Jean Blanket...6 years in the making!!

Okay...so I know I have been lazy!! I have been doing things, like this......

And I made this for my little girl!!

I made a few of these...

some of these...

And a LOT of these...

See so I did do something!! :)

Okay but for the post at hand, I wanted to share a project that begin a while ago, when my husband and I found ourselves with jeans that had so many holes in them they were near unrepairable, or had been repaired so many times, it wasn't worth it anymore. I decided to collect all the jeans in this sad state and make a jean blanket out of them!! Well, I got them cut into 9 inch squares, then they were boxed up and put away and never given a second thought. Three moves later, my husband dug them up, and that began this project....here's what I did, I hope you see it was super easy and it's already been loved by everyone!

To start I cut jeans and baby flannel into 9 inch squares.

The jeans were fun to decide if I would use a pocket, or a seam to make it more interesting!

Then I put wrong sides together....

And made rows of 8 keeping all the seams on the jean side, for fraying later...

Then I worked my way sewing each row onto the next until I ended up with this...

Sorry the kids were so excited seeing the scraps of things I had made for them in the quilt they insisted on being in the pictures. So all seams are on the back and it looks like this....

Again sorry for the crazy picture, my family thought they were hilarious!! :)

But you can see all the seams on the jean side. Then all that was left was to clip all the seams and sides of the blanket (oh I did sew around the edge of the blanket in about an inch). Now to fray the edges all it needs is a good wash and dry, however, this is a mildly heavy blanket, and I didn't want to dry it several times in my dryer just for the "look" of it. My suggestion, take it to a laundry-mat. The industrial dryers will do a great job, and it won't wear out your one at home!!

Think about it, I hope you give this a try, it is super easy and no one will ever notice if the seams aren't quite straight, they will just love it, like we love ours!!

Until next time.....