Meaningful Monday - When chores get done

What makes a perfect weekend for us - when project or chores get done and still get a chance to go out for dinner at the neighbors home and have a great evening.  That's what we did this past weekend.  We decided to add a pop of color in our House of Common room.  After Jeff completed the shutter project, we thought it would be nice to change up some walls and paint it the same red color as the shutters.  Once all dry after two coats of paint, we were able to hung some art work, clock, square cube shelves (we bought at a garage sale).  While Jeff was painting I did at least 3 loads of laundry (linens and our clothes).  Some of the items had to iron, yes you read it right, I still iron.

In addition to the regular chores, I decided to re-upholster the two folding chairs that we brought with us from the old house.  There was plenty of material left over from covering the bench cushion, so I use the same fabric for the folding chairs.  It is really amazing how much you can do during the weekend if you really set a goal and try to complete as much on your TO-DO list.  It was definitely a very meaningful weekend.  I was surprised that I was able to include a nap and watch a bit of tennis on TV. 

Sweetest Saturday - They are irresistible

It was time for me to do some baking again for an event that we are hosting at home.  At first I thought that maybe I should just serve some of the leftover treats that I made around the holidays.  Instead both Jeff and I decided to stay home that day and get busy in the kitchen.  Everyone in our group loves his chocolate chip cookies and who does not love them.  I made some mini and regular cupcakes.  The flavor - PINA COLADA with a cream cheese/marscapone frosting with sprinkles of toasted coconut.  The other treat I made was the very easy 6 layer bar aka magic cookie bar.  Remember that kind of layering 6 different ingredients and adding a can of condensed milk at the end, baking it for 30 minutes and you have the most decadent bar ever.  When I turned around, I noticed three bananas calling me and asking me to take care off them.  Guess what happened to them?  It became the very best banana/pineapple bread.  After baking it, I couldn't just slice them, I had to have the end piece.  So yummy.  What are you baking this weekend. 

Jeff's chocolate chip cookies

Pina Colada mini cupcakes with cream cheese/marscapone frosting.

Seven layer bar with graham crumbs, dates, pecans, marshmallow,
white chocolate chips, coconut and condensed milk.

The classic Sofia Loren Tiramisu

Flowery Friday - A belated spring collections

Everywhere I go, these variety of flowers are popping up.  I guess it's still considered spring because it is still the month of April.  Although the colors are very similar, I am sure they are a different type of flowers.  I am sure my master gardener friend from Brampton, Ontario will be able to tell me all of these ones that I have been taking photos of.  Most of them are from the golf course where I play, the others are from our front yard and some are from our backyard.  I have also taken photos from different locations in and around our city.  Here's a little quiz, can you name some of the flowers featured on today's post?  

Tots Tuesday - Just for the wee ones

Last week my friend from Vancouver came to visit for a couple of nights.  He brought his daughter who is only 5 months old.  The wee one was so quiet, so good and hardly cries.  That's right.  A very happy little girl who makes noise when she's hungry and sort of sings when she wakes up from a nap or around 5 am.  She sleeps right through the night, yes she's in bed by 800 pm and wakes up early in the morning.  We did not hear her at all through the night and even when she was up in the morning, she just makes this sound, like she's trying to talk to someone.  During the visit we caught up with our life stories but I manage to make a few items for the baby.  I made some bigger bibs, a couple of change pads, a diaper/wipes travel bag and a couple of those NO sew fleece blanket.  After they left, I noticed they left one of the baby bottle in the fridge.  Since I will be shipping it back to them, I decided to make a few more items for the baby.  Check out all the items for the wee one.  It will be nice to see them again this summer when they travel to the interior BC and stop for a couple of days visit.

This is the first item I made within half an hour. Her very own pajama bottoms.

Travel diaper/wipes/extra clothes bag.

One of the two blankets we made. My friend and Jeff completed this project.

Left over fleece made into fleece toys.

The extra fleece that we trimmed from the blanket now becomes a toque.

Woody Wednesday - Home made shutters

It has taken all this time for Jeff to finally complete this project that I had given him to do.  When we moved into our home, the windows in our entertainment/family room had this awful looking drapes. It was dark and the fabric was made of pretend leather and pretend suede.  So now you could imagine what it looked hung in that room.  It made the room so dark and so uninviting.  That's when I said to Jeff we have to do something about that.  At first we thought of installing the really nice blinds but it was way too expensive.  Later we thought we should just find some drapes that are on sale but it has to be lighter color and an easy care type fabric.  After not finding anything at all, Jeff thought he would just make some wooden shutters that would replicate those bi-fold doors.  I asked if we could paint it red to match our front door.  We shopped for the wood, the hardware and then the paint.  Jeff started working on it and we thought we would add some small decorative wooden stuff.

We found some small wooden stars and a couple of wooden maple leaf from Michael's.  We also bought four decorative stuff from the antique shop, but Jeff ended up not using them. Now I am sure you wanted to see the finished product.  Check out the photos of Jeff's work of art. 

Special Sunday - After all these years

It is a special Sunday because it is the birthday of my childhood friend.  A truly special friendship that lasted this many years.  But I have to tell you the rest of the story.  Maybe I have shared this but I will revisit it again since today is all about her. The friendship began at Kindergarten, that's right, we were 5 years old.  We lived in the same neighborhood and attended the same school from K-Grade 3.  Unfortunately their family moved to the bigger city and I did not see her for many years.  While attending a basketball game for our university team (similar to the NCAA), we saw each other and caught up with our stories.  What was interesting was that she recognized me from behind because she noticed the birthmark behind me left knee.  I was standing to cheer for our team and that's when she realized it was me.  After that we did not see each other again.  Her family moved to the USA while our family moved to Canada.  Many many years has passed but every now and again I wondered where she might be.  Not until late July of 2016 that I decided to do what everyone does when they are searching for someone.  Lucky for me, it did not take long to find her.  I was not sure if she would remember me so I did something old school.  There was an office address and I sat down and wrote her a letter, attached some copies of old photos from the past.  I waited patiently in the hopes that she will contact me.  Then one day in August I received a phone call and it was her.  We were both so happy to hear each others voice and we talked for a very long time as if nothing it was just yesterday.  Last April 2017 we did a road trip on our new RV and stopped by to reconnect with

her.  It was such as amazing feeling seeing your childhood best friend for the first after all those years. Now we continue to communicate using the latest technology.  I am so glad that I did my research and reconnected.  Today she celebrates her special birthday with her family and I know that we will see each other again sometime this year or next year.  Happy birthday my dear friend!

Tulips Thursday - But actually it's crocus

The first day of April arrived and with it came the snow.  Was it an April fool's joke?  Well, maybe, but I didn't appreciate it because it is supposed to be spring, not winter.  It only lasted a few hours and by the middle of the afternoon, the snow had melted.  The next day was a beautiful warm sunny day and I took time to inspect the flowers the were popping up in our front yard.  I wondered what they were and immediately thought they were tulips as the petals were still closed.  There was some white one and some pretty purple ones as well.

I decided to take a photo and send it to my friend, the master gardener.  When she responded to my message, I found out they were actually crocus and not tulips.  The other good information that I got from her is that these crocus will come up each spring.  So I thought, bonus.  I won't have to do anything except to make sure we water it and maybe add a bit of vitamins or food plant.  Check out these pretty flowers.  

Tricky Tuesday - No pattern sewing

If you do some sort of sewing, when was the last time you bought a pattern. OMG they are ridiculously priced.  You might as well pay a little more and buy whatever it is you wanted to make. Between the price of pattern, fabric and notion not including your time for making it, is it worth it?

Well, sometime it is if you want to make something special for someone.  Also if you think you can wing it and make that particular dress or skirt or whatever.  This week I am attempting to make a summer dress for a 7 year old girl.  I decided to make it and it will be a special gift as she will be receiving her first communion.  She is a very sweet girl and I know she will love this dress.  Going through my left over fabric collections, I found one that will be enough to make a simple dress with a bit of accent.  When she stopped by to give me a Kinder Surprise for Easter, I decided to take her measurements.  So the photo I will share is my drawing/design of what I will attempt to make.  The second photo will be the fabric I will use to make the dress. The tricky part is that I have to do it without a pattern and I will apply her measurements right on the fabric then proceed with the cutting.  Remember my other blog, MEASURE TWICE - CUT ONCE.  Unfortunately I have been busy with another order (see apron), that I will not be able to show you the finished dress.  But hopefully I can share the finished product in a couple of days.

This is for one of our neighbor. She ordered it for one of her granddaughter.

This is my drawing of the dress I wanted to make.  No pattern.

This is fabric I will use for the dress. 

The completed dress ready for delivery.

Surprise Sunday - It makes me happy

Surprise, surprise, surprise.  These 3 same words I always hear when I watch the old reruns of The Andy Griffith show.  Since we are talking about surprises, I wanted to share my 3 recent surprises.  I love surprises even if it's just a small kind or a bigger kind.  But I am not good for keeping a surprise.

For example, if I see something that my daughter might love, I will get it and send it to her but instead of keeping it as a surprise, I start getting worried if she has not receive it, so basically I ruin the surprise for her because I would ask if she got the package.  She on the other hand, is very good with surprising me. Like she would send a package and not tell me and usually the surprise is a real surprise because I was not expecting it and in addition the item is truly amazing. Here's what I got last week for Easter.

Another surprise came in the mail and it was an Easter card from one of my BFF from Ontario. I'm so thank she still thinks of me and now I have to sit down and write back as she lives getting a surprise snail mail from me.  In life all this small things that makes me happy and others as well.  Maybe you too can enjoy sending someone a small surprise.  Have a great Sunday.

Tasty Thursday - Just yummy

Just for today, I thought of just sharing yummy photos of treats or foods that we (family) made last week. Hopefully you get full just checking out each of the picture.

Jeff made some mini chocolate cupcakes with vanilla cream cheese frosting and oreo crumbs dusting.

My very first try making deep fried fish with home made batter.

My daughter shared this photo of her own version of mini eggs cookies.

My second time making this using a different recipe - Cinnamon raisin pecan sticky buns.

Just a piece of yumminess, soft and moist and sticky. 

This is the Double Down from KFC - aka chicken and waffle. 
So filling I ate half for lunch and half for dinner.

This photo was shared by my sister. Her home made buns - just looking at them - I can tell they are fluffy.

Measuring Monday - Measure twice, cut once

"Measure twice, cut once", the message that is embedded in my mind after I heard it from Jeff's dad.  Not only does it apply to carpentry, it applies to sewing, crafts, etc.  So yes, I was doing a lot of this because I was making a cover for our cushion for the window bench in our master's bedroom.  It had been over six months since we moved to our home and it was about time to get it done.  Luckily for me, there's a store in downtown Vernon that sells awesome foam that you get cut to whatever measurement you needed.  Also what is nice about that store is that they have a variety of foam for whatever purpose you need them.  After the foam was cut and paid for, we headed to Fabricland to purchase the material to make the cover for this cushion.  I timed it well since they were having an anniversary sale and the outdoor fabric and upholstery fabrics were also on sale.  There were a variety of colors and patters but my eyes were fixed on a particular design and color.  The salesperson who helped me was very good at figuring out what I needed and gave some great tips on how I should do it.  But of course when I got home, I knew I will have to do my own way of making the cover.  So the project began, I measured twice and cut once.  I sewed the two pieces together and placed the fabric on the foam, similar to putting the pillow on a pillowcase.  The two end part of the cushion cover was stitched by hand and everything was completed in less than two hours.  I still had an afternoon to do more so I made a skirt for a little girl who lives across our home.  She was very happy to get it and wore it for Easter Sunday.  After dinner, I decided to make a new wreath for our door for Spring/Summer.