The day the firetruck hit my car

The day the firetruck hit my car was today. Yes, that's right. A firetruck hit my car. Now don't get too worried because technically the cars were parked and by "hit" I mean got an oversized door ding.  But "The day the door of the firetruck accidentally dinged my car door" is way less catchy. 

I felt bad for the guy because I could tell he was embarrassed and felt bad about the whole thing. I'm still not totally sure what was going on because I've never been in an accident before so I don't really know what's supposed to happen. Hopefully it won't be too hard to get it fixed.

I am a little worried about the elderly couple next door though. That's why the firetruck came originally, and I'm not sure what happened but I never saw an ambulance or anything. For the door ding, however we managed to assemble the firetruck, fire SUV, and two police cars. Hopefully the other neighbors don't think we have anything crazy going on over here!

San Francisco

Well this post has nothing crafty about it. I just wanted to give myself you a break from the tshirt quilt play-by-play. We went to San Fran a few weeks ago and had a great time! Hubs had a long weekend (I didn't, oh well) so we stayed Saturday and part of Sunday.

The drive there was pretty uneventful, but Hubs really needed to find a bathroom by the time we got there. Unfortunately for him some streets were down to one lane to set up for a parade and lots of parking was blocked off. Traffic was going nowhere so we decided to pull over and he would find a bathroom. We kind of pulled into a spot with a sign that said no parking that day because of the parade. We thought, no problem, he's just going to run in and run out and we'll be on our way.

So I'm chillin in the passenger seat and it is taking kind of a long time, but whatever. Next thing I know there's a police car behind me. Uh-oh. And then he honks. And then I start scrambling to climb over into the driver's seat. And then he honks and turns on his lights. Eek! I finally got back into the flow of traffic and he turned his lights off and stopped honking. Whew!

So now I'm driving, Hubs is in a bathroom somewhere and I don't even remember what intersection I left him at. I call him and he didn't answer (of course). I kept heading toward the hotel because I had no clue how to get back to where I was, thank you one way streets. And it's raining (this part is really worse for Hubs since the umbrella is in the car). Am I the only person that gets really flustered when I don't know where I'm going? Because I was.

Turned out none of the places near where we pulled over had a bathroom (including one restaurant...how can you have a restaurant with no bathroom??). So he ended up walking to a nearby hotel. I finally got turned around and picked him up on the side of the road. The rest of the trip was quite pleasant though. : )

We were planning on going to Alcatraz since we parked illegally haven't done that yet, but it was sold out. Guess I should've planned ahead on that one. We ended up touring an old submarine instead, which was really cool. And made me never want to live on a sub.

36 people to a room and no shower. No thank you. By the way, it was cold and raining - I don't just wear bright yellow rain boots all the time. We also saw the parade of giant plaster heads Chinese New Year parade.

Toured the Japanese gardens, loved this bridge!

Walked around Golden Gate park. Is this not the coolest tree you've ever seen? Ok, maybe not coolest ever but we really liked it.

And went up to Twin Peaks. If you go to San Francisco, you have to drive up here. The view was amazing! But bring a jacket...and probably a scarf...and maybe a hat and gloves. It's windy!

I'd shoot for a clear day though since San Fran can get rather foggy.

So that's it in a nutshell. And can you believe we walked everywhere, as in once we parked the car we left it until we came home and didn't even take a bus or a cab? Yeah our tootsies were tired! The bus routes were a little off because of the parade so we ended up just walking. Hope everyone's having a good week so far!

T-shirt Quilt - Part 2

Alternate Title - I will be interfacing for the rest of my life...

I did kind of a lot this weekend, so I'm really going to try to fill you in on the process without boring you to death. We'll see how it goes! If you missed the first part of this project you can read about it here.

The to-do list this weekend consisted of adding interfacing to all of the tshirt edges and sewing all of the squares together. Boy it sounds like nothing when I write it out, but I assure you this was a major undertaking. Mostly just the interfacing part. I'm not sure if it's me or my machine, but sewing knits does NOT work out for me. They stretch and end up looking all wonky. Since I wanted to avoid a lopsided, very homemade looking quilt I added a strip of interfacing to each side of every square.

I didn't have a whole lot of interfacing in my stash (maybe 1/2 or 3/4 yard), so I cut strips about 3/4" wide and the length of the square. Ok, technically some were 14" long and others were around 12" because I didn't have interfacing to waste overlapping on corners! Once I was tired of cutting strips had plenty of strips to start with, I started fusing it to the tshirt edges.

If you cut the interfacing a little bit to long (there is a tab sticking off the edge), you should definitely trim that off before you press the iron unless you really want fusible interfacing stuck to your ironing board. Oopsie : )

For some reason my iron has started to steam like there's no tomorrow even when I have it on the lowest steam setting. This is probably because my iron and I have a love/hate relationship....oh, who am I kidding. It's pretty much skewed toward the hate side. I'm not big into ironing, so the iron probably feels neglected. Perhaps it's still steamed (ahaha, sorry I couldn't help myself) about roof debris getting all inside the water chamber. (That was totally not my fault though - and a story for another time, sorry) Whatever the reason, my iron hates me and for this project has decided to soak everything.

Despite the fact that I was treating my interfacing like an endangered species, I didn't have enough. *Sigh* Thanks to my thrifty cutting this is all I have left:

I went to Beverly's and got some more interfacing (and passed on some beautiful fabric that was 1/2 off, it was heartbreaking). I had been using woven interfacing, but got some slightly thicker non-woven stuff for the rest (it was cheaper and seemed better for a purse which is on my to-do eventually list). I'd recommend the woven stuff though because as it turns out, the non-woven kind tends to show where you pinned it and leaves tiny holes.

Then it was finally, FINALLY time to sew! This interfacing extravaganza may have permanently scarred me. I do not want to interface anything for a long time...although when I do, I am going to be a master!

The rows came together pretty quickly. I tried to time it for you, but of course the one time I made sure to look at the clock, I also ran out of bobbin thread. So including winding new thread onto a bobbin, one row took a little over 15 minutes. You could probably finish one in a little over 10. It seemed much faster, maybe I was just getting a rush from sewing faster than I ever had before. I was seriously enjoying all straight lines! I used a 1/4" seam allowance, no real reason why. That's just what I picked.

I was a bad girl and didn't press my seams after I finished putting the rows together. Honestly, I just completely forgot until I was already sewing the first two together. Maybe watching hulu while I sew isn't the best for my level of concentration. : )

Next you're ready to connect the rows! I was getting more and more excited here because it was really coming together! Don't skimp on the pinning at this stage! Pin right sides together. I would suggest pinning near where the shirts should line up and then maybe one in the middle of each shirt. Mainly you just want to make sure all of the lines will match up.

I couldn't go quite as fast here because I was trying to be careful about making sure the edges lined up. That and there was a lot of quilt hanging out to the side after the first two rows. Don't freak out if you have some places looking a little funky and not laying flat at this point.

Now for some shocking news - I pressed those seams! It makes everything lay flat. Initially I was just pressing where I connected each row, but it looked so good I went ahead and pressed all of them! So unlike me! But I'm kind of seeing why people are always saying to press the seams because it looked much cleaner after pressing.

Ta-da!! I was so proud. : ) It actually looks like a real quilt! I found some king size jersey knit sheets on clearance at Target this weekend and I'll use one of those for the back. I'm still waiting on the batting I ordered to get here. Stay tuned for part three and the finished product! If you have any questions, please email me. I didn't write anything down as I was going so I may have missed something!

Painted Shelf in Action

I'm happy to report, the installation of the shelf I painted went smoothly. Much more smoothly than painting the shelf anyway.

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out now, and check out the sweet brackets I got at Home Depot. Nevermind that they were out of the cheapo ones I was planning on buying, at least they look cool. And they were simple to install...screw into the wall, screw into the wood and you're done.

I whipped up that fabric basket after I got the shelf up to corral various pens and scissors. Did I mention the shelf even level? Oh yeah, I'm patting myself on the back. :-P

This is where the magic happens people (hah!). Really though, I think the shelf adds a little something. This is as big as my sewing station is going to get because this is in our bedroom and I don't want it taking over the whole room. Even my husband liked it! Woohoo! Although I think he was slightly disappointed that I installed the shelf myself and didn't ask for his help.

For a how-to on the shelf, see the previous post. I can assure you it's more amusing than this post because miserable failures tend to be more amusing than boring old successes. I hope everyone has a super weekend!

Painting for Dummies

Unfortunately for me, I am the painting dummy. If anyone else is unfortunate enough to be as bad as me at painting, maybe I can help you. And if not, maybe my painting fail will provide some comic relief.

I'll just get right to it. Here are some tips:

• If you don't have one of those paint tray things (the fact that I call it a "paint tray thing" might be clue #1 that I am not good at painting), don't try painting with a roller
• Similarly, if you think you could substitute a couple paper plates for a paint tray thing, you are wrong - they do not work the same
• If your husband looks at you like you're crazy and says "don't do that" when you suggest using the roller when you have none of the necessary equipment, please please listen
• Even though you might really want to be done with what you're painting, like yesterday, don't paint three sides at once - you might have found a clever way to hold it up while you paint three sides, but how will you let it dry without holding it for hours?
• Don't ask me for advice about paint colors - I'm terrible...and indecisive, a baaaad combination for the task of picking paint
• Think twice before you use the paintbrush you got for free at a garage sale just because it's the easiest to reach...it might not be the preemo quality paintbrush you need
• Do spend time blogging about your failure and looking up potential designs to paint on your failure to try to cover it up instead of cleaning the house since company is coming over tomorrow - oh wait, no, do the opposite of that

If you haven't guessed by now, this painting adventure was pretty much a disaster. But I just realized I didn't take any pictures along the way. How sad for you guys because it was pretty funny. The ill-advised roller side looked a little like a tie dyed shirt (seriously, it was that blotchy). Both sides (streaky from cheap paintbrush and splotchy from roller) look decent now that they've had a second coat.

And if you don't have a painting sheet or tarp to put down, don't worry! Just use a cardboard box that already has a piece cut out to make a pattern for your tshirt quilt and since that won't be big enough, finish it off with a little bubble wrap!

Now to the cover-up job. Stripes, lines going every which way, a bird on a branch, and flowers have all crossed my mind when thinking of how I could minimize how much I dislike the paint color. Did I already mention I bought the paint probably 6 months ago for something else and never used it? What was I thinking with that color?? At the moment I'm thinking two dandelions although I have yet to find a decent picture to copy, if only I knew where my sister-in-law's wedding invitation was (if I even still have it) because I'm pretty sure what I'm thinking of looks a lot like the flower stamped on those.

Time to finish up this post after a good night's sleep : ) I started painting before I even had breakfast this morning and stuck with the flower/dandelion idea. I thought I better give myself some kind of guide while doing the stems so I taped one side.

And this is about the spot where I realized I probably should've taped on both sides because I wasn't getting a very clean line with my free garage sale paintbrush...

Oh well, I pressed on. And taped both sides for the next stem. Much easier! I didn't even have to be careful. Woohoo!

What was I thinking with the other paint color? Oh I don't know...apparently flesh colored paint sounded good at the time. I couldn't find didn't have any blue painters tape so I used masking tape. Probably not a great idea, but I only left it on for 15-20 minutes and it didn't peel any paint off so I'm cool with it. Just don't press it down really hard and if it peels your paint off, please don't hate me for giving you the terrible advice idea.

Now for the flower/dandelion head. Painted a blobish circle then found a small paintbrush (after much searching) to go around the outside. I'm not exactly sure how long this took, but I'm thinking around 30 minutes for both flowers. And then you're done!

After fretting about taping both sides, I actually like the one that I didn't tape on both sides much better. It looks more natural. Oh well, the good news is this is for a shelf above my sewing table and it will be pretty much covered most of the time. Did I even mention what this was for at the beginning? Oops, guess I was too carried away trying to share my vast painting knowledge with you all. Hah! So hopefully my semi-disaster will help you avoid the same mistakes. And hopefully my sewing box will cover up a large portion of this "artwork."

Braided Tshirt Headband

Well if this isn't an easy free project, I don't know what is. Now that I have a ton of cut-up tshirts (because of the tshirt quilt) I didn't want to just waste all of that knit fabric that was just begging to be used up. In an fortunate coincidence, I found the perfect project for some of the shirts last week on A Law Student's Journey. She saw a headband at Target and then gives a great tutorial here. Can I just say I'm so glad she figured out how to do it?

The weaving part was actually really easy (since I didn't have to figure it out!). It took me about 10-15 minutes to get to a length that would go around my head. I did change up how to connect the two ends though. Unfortunately I didn't take pictures (forgive me for still not being very good at tutorials!).

I'll do my best to explain it...and perhaps include an incredibly crude paintbrush illustration. After I had a length that would go around my head I untied the knotted end and laid the ends out. Then I matched up the ends so I could weave a row of all of them together.

Maybe that makes a tiny bit of sense? I did two "rows" using all of the strands combined. Then I experimented with tying all of those off (bad, bulky idea). So I decided the easiest way to minimize the bulk would be to untie and just sew a line across all of them. That worked out pretty well. I trimmed all of the ends down close to the stitching, turned it so that the ends would be against my head and not showing.

Outside of headband where I combined all the strands

Trying to show that it's pretty flat, but kind of a picture fail. The headband didn't want to lay all the way down. I can tell you that I've been wearing mine all morning and don't even feel it.

You can kind of see some of the stitching in the middle if you look closely.

I'm thinking this could be a good workout headband. It doesn't slip off, but also isn't so tight that I have a headache after half an hour. So if you have lots o' tshirt scraps...get busy! There are headbands to be made!

I'm also joining a link party over at Homemaker on a Dime for the first time. Check it out here.

BIG Project - Part 1

I started something big.

t-shirt quilt!!!

Hopefully not too big, but we'll see. I have a lot of tshirts...a lot. If you ever went to high school or played a sport or went to college or ran in a race or went on vacation you probably have quite a few as well. I don't wear all of my tshirts (most of these just didn't fit anymore), but I just couldn't bring myself to put some of them in the Goodwill pile. I've wanted to use them to make a tshirt quilt for a while, but didn't want to pay $150-$200 for it. Since I haven't had any major sewing disasters lately I thought I was up to the challenge! : )

I've researched how to make one and loosely based my method on what I've read. Really the only problem I foresee running into is that I don't know how to quilt anything (just a minor problem, right? hah!). We'll see if that turns out to be a deal breaker. I thought I'd post instructions as I go because if I wait until the end I'll probably never get around to it and no one would want to read that long of a tutorial anyway.

First, you need a template. I cut mine out of a cardboard box. My squares are 14" x 14" and you will probably want to check some of your smaller shirts first to make sure this will fit between the sleeves. I ran into a couple shirts (size adult small or child large) that were a little smaller. I would've gone 12" x 12" but then the finished quilt wouldn't have been quite long enough for me. I always get annoyed when a blanket won't cover my shoulders and my feet.

I ended up making one side "Up" on my template because after the first two shirts I realized my template was about 1/8" taller than it was wide. This way everything should line up nicely. I would definitely suggest doing this on a hard surface - as in not on carpet like I did. I'm hoping this won't come back to haunt me, but I don't exactly have a good hard surface to trace/cut on.

Sharpie was my marking tool of choice for this operation. Trace around your template then cut your squares (or in my case almost square, but technically a rectangle because one side is 1/8" longer). Then you're done with phase 1. Yay! I lined up my pieces so I could see what it would look like (sigh, if only that magically made it finished). I still need one more shirt to fill the hole at the top. I had one picked out but changed my mind before I attacked with Sharpie and scissors.

Stay tuned for the rest of the project. I'll update as I go along. I'd like to have a pretty thorough tutorial at the end of all of this because I didn't find a very comprehensive one when I was looking around. Just don't hold your breath for the next post because I'm pretty sure the next step won't debut any time this week. I hope everybody had a great weekend!