New Passion

Good afternoon all. I hope we're all having very good days :)

When I opened up my Etsy shop it was so I could sell me typography word art, which I guess is not so popular. I have a lot of fun making them, but I don't feel like other people like them, and I've kind of lost the drive to make them. I have about 15 with the fabric in place and quotes ready to go, but no motivation to paint them. I started making magnets and that's actually been a lot more fun. I enjoy the monotony of cutting circles I guess. It's fun making those and I enjoy finding all kinds of different images to use. However, the thing I have had the most passion for has been my clocks.

I saw this image on Pinterest and repinned it about 9 weeks ago (according to my board). I thought the idea was simple enough and it looked really cute.

My inspiration.

Well, I had an embroidery hoop on hand, and with a few minor changes made this:

I am obsessed in love with making these clocks. Each one is so different and the options are limitless. I love finding fabric to use and then matching buttons. I even made my first custom order the other day! I just love these so much, and the best part is that people actually buy them! I just posted a new one in my Etsy shop. You should go check it out. I'll even give you a sneak peak of three other clocks I haven't posted yet :) I love these buttons clocks, what about you?

This is another clock that I sold. So cute!

This one is by far my favorite. It'll be hard to part with.

For sale RIGHT NOW! Go buy it check it out :)

Yes, those are EYEBALLS!

The Avengers

Can everyone do me a favor and go see The Avengers NOW? I've already seen it twice, one 2D and one 3D 9which was awesome) and I'm taking my mom next week for mother's day. This is seriously the greatest comic book movie I've ever seen...and I've seen a lot. Not only that, but it's just a really good movie. It's classified as a comic book movie because it has to be, but seriously, this is for ANY movie fan.

Now go see it. Are you still here? Why? GO!

The Life and Times of Katie S.

Good morning everyone! I'm sitting here at work today and I realized I have just over 100 days left of work. I also only have two weeks left of classes before I graduate with my associates and move on to NIU to get my bachelor's. At that time I will be jobless and living at home with my parents, but will undoubtedly be happier than I have in the last 4 years that I have been struggling to achieve my 60 college credits and start my journey into education. I can't even really explain why I'm so happy to be going to school full time again, except that my life choices the last 4 years have led to a lot of realizations. One of them being that no matter what, I do not want to be a secretary for the rest of my life. A second one being that I actually really like school if I'm learning things other than math or science. I can honestly say that I wouldn't even be here right now if it weren't for my boyfriend who, almost definitely, saved my life.

But here I am, 23 years old, too old and too young at the same time. I don't like mid-twenties. I'm not considered an adult to almost all the same people that think I am way too old to just now be ready to get my bachelors degree. Something I will not hold in my hand until I am 25 years old. I can't wait to be 25 years old.

I'm terrified and ecstatic at the same time. I'm so excited to go to school again. I'll be taking all the English, grammar, and education classes they can throw at me, and I couldn't be happier. I am terrified financially, and it's a fear that won't go away any time soon. In three months I'm going to be leaving my full time job so that I can go to school full time. I'm lucky to have the support of my parents through housing, but no one is financially ready for my tuition costs.

I'm trying to stay positive, and hopefully I'll be able to find a job before the end of the year, but I just don't know what the future holds for me. My boyfriend will be there for me, but he's going to school too. It just won't be the same. It's selfish to say that. I've been lucky to have any job for the last 2 years. I've been able to save up a good amount, but I started too late and I'm paying for that. I've never been the best with money, living paycheck to paycheck has been my life since I started working 6 years ago. I'm hoping that my Etsy shop does well. All of that money will be going towards school. I've never needed it more.

The future is uncertain. The world lost Maurice Sendak today. Just another reminder that time stops for no one. But Maurice seemed to live a good life, seemed happy. He got to do what he loved and he passed as a man loved by millions. If I can do what I love and pass a woman loved by tens, then I will have accomplished much in my life.

Here's to the future. Cheers.

DIY Chalkboard Mirror

Hello again! Hope everyone is doing well. Today I bring you a tutorial for something everyone is doing: a chalkboard from an old mirror. There are a couple reasons why I am doing this. One is because I am using a new product, chalkboard spray paint. The second is because this mirror is not removable, and I learned some hard lessons. Let's get started.

My new best friend.

First, supplies:

1. Old mirror
2. Chalkboard spray paint (or regular paint)
3. Frog tape, or any painter's tape
4. Newspaper

So the first thing I did was tape the frame with frog tape. I use frog tape because it's awesome, but you can use any painter's tape you want.

Then I covered the whole frame with newspaper. I am not a dainty painter so I didn't want any getting on my frame.

Then, I painted. Let me start off by saying that I LOVE the chalkboard spray paint. It's soooo much easier to use, and there are no brush marks left behind. The cons, however, are that more coats are needed and the spray paint does not go as far as a can of paint. But these are things I can live with! Now the really bad. Because this was spray paint I decided to do it outside. I will never do this again. I had to do 5 coats of paint because stupid damn bugs kept dying in my paint! So I would take them out with my x-acto knife, let it dry, and repaint. Oh my God, I am only painting inside from now on! Anyway, this is my painted mirror.

Ignore my stupid foot.

Then after it was all dry and there were NO bugs, and it was all smooth and pretty, I removed the tape. Then, disaster strikes again.

Ooooh, so clean!

The good: no paint on the frame! The bad: no paint on the mirror. I tried touching it up with chalkboard paint, but it doesn't match exactly. Now I had to go back, retape, and RESPRAY! Kill me. Everything turned out fine though, and the finished product is beautiful! Any questions can go in the comments.

You can see the missing paint on the bottom.

DIY Paint Chip Art

Good morning everyone! I hope you're all having a fantastic Tuesday. Today I'm bringing you my first tutorial! It's for a paint chip art piece. I've been seeing a lot of these on Pinterest lately and wanted to try my own. My Menards has really cute Crayola paint chips, so I wanted to try something with those. My first attempt was...a learning experience. There are a lot of things I am going to do differently the second time around for sure!

So let's start! First off, your supplies. For the project I used:

1. Mod Podge
2. Crayola paint chips
3. Dutch boy rounded square paint chips
4. An old picture & frame
5. Black spray paint
6. A sponge paint brush
7. Mod Podge roller and squeegee - optional (I don't know the actual names for these products)
8. Ruler
9. Chalk or marking tool

So the first thing I did was disassemble my old picture and frame. I don't have a before picture of this because I had already taken it apart for another project. Then I spray painted the picture black.

Next I laid out my paint chips to figure out which combination I liked best. This is what I went with.

Now, this is where everything went wrong. I don't know what happened! As you can see in the picture, I laid out my paint chips and marked where the squares should go. However, when I started gluing the Crayola chips down, somehow that third row had moved down too far and they didn't line up anymore. Unfortunately my mod podge had dried and I had to scrape off the yellow row, and I didn't have enough replacements and had to reuse one of the scraped off ones, and that left it too thin. Moral of the story, lay out the whole pattern to make sure it's right. Ugh. Anyway, this is me measuring it out.

And this is the beginning of me screwing it up! I don't know, they all lined up until the end. Whatever paint chips, you can't defeat me! So you need to put mod podge on the back of each pain chip and place it down (in the correct spot). If your corners start to curl up, just hold it down with your finger for a second. Also, if you have a roller and squeegee, you can run it over the rows to make sure they're flat with no bubbles.

Do this until you have three rows. Then put mod podge over the whole thing.

Then start putting down your Crayola chips. I really liked the way these all lined up. So pretty and colorful! Put mod podge on the backs of all these too.

And cover it with mod podge again!

At this point, just let it dry and you're done! The image I used was about 9"x13", but 8.5"x11" would have been big enough. Also not shown is that this was originally a framed clock. I had to disassemble the frame and then glue it back together. I used e6000, which EVERYONE SHOULD OWN. I also used too much mod podge on the last application and it dried not clear in between the corners of the squares. If you have any questions, just leave them in the comments below.

Embroidery Hoop Button Clock

Oh my gosh you guys, I saw the sweetest button clock on Pinterest the other day and I just had to try it out for myself! I'm thinking of doing a tutorial for this one because it was just so fun to make! I have the clock I made up in my Etsy shop if you guys are interested.

What do you think?

Tired

So I'm exhausted. I had to be up at 5:30 yesterday to see my brother graduate from the Navy yesterday (basic training). I got to spend about 4-5 hours with him before he had to leave again for Pensacola for another 4 months. I didn't think I had missed him that much until the day of graduation. The entire ceremony was almost 2 hours, and then finally at the end they're all standing in their formation being handed their coats and the speaker calls liberty and you just see 2,000+ people rush out of the stands to see their sailors :') I just remember hearing the word liberty and jumping up and running with my brother's girlfriend to go see him. We got down there and just started searching. It was pretty overwhelming seeing him standing there after not talking to him or seeing him for 2 months. Somehow, and I still don't know how, my mom was already there hugging him. I rushed up with Stacy (his gf) and we hugged him pretty hard. Then we got to go home with him and we hung out with family for a few hours before he left with his girlfriend for much needed alone time. It was a pretty emotional day, and I am surprised by how much I miss him. Luckily, once he's done with the 4 months in Florida he gets to come home for a week, so I'm looking forward to that a lot.

As much as I miss him, and the small part of me that wishes he never left, I'm still so proud of him. The training has helped him a lot, and I can already tell he's changed. As Stacy predicted, he left a boy and came back a man :) I already put on my "My Brother is in the Navy" bumper sticker on my car. Now it's just waiting 4 more years until he's out before I can finally feel like he's safe and in one place again. I'm pretty sure I can do it :)

My brother, the sailor!