Pinterest commanded me to make some blue raspberry Jolly Rancher-infused rum and it was pretty rad with some Sprite in it. I thought Jolly Roger would be a cool name but there's already a cocktail named the Jolly Roger. Then Michael Bolton reminded me of my favorite pirate ever:

...and we ended up with the Captain Jack Sparrow! Now to plan our next insanely expensive Disney World vacay...

Ribbon necklaces, floral headband and sequin applique hat, oh my!

Cuteness reigned supreme today at the Collinsville Splash Pad, where super hot mama Jessica was rocking the DIY even in the oppressive red dirt heat.  Check out her fabulous sequin applique hat:

I also had fun showing off this adorable headband. I don't have a tutorial for it...I bought it. But I bet it would be super easy to make.  If you know of a tutorial, hook me up with the link!

But here's my favorite part, a goodie for you!  Really, this goodie is for Jessica, since she commented on how much she loved my necklaces and thought she'd like to go home and try them...

I made these little necklaces on my lunch break the other day.  I still have tons of ribbon left over from that amazing garage sale of dreams where I found it amidst the clutter and chaos of broken toys and furniture and dirty-faced children dancing around in twice-handed down clothes as some Staind-clones blasted from a grease-slicked cassette-radio atop a stack of cardboard boxes.  We were driving by slowly when among the washed-out monochromes of a north side Tulsa summer junk sale, something caught my eye...vivid reds and purples peeked out of a low-lying box like pansies blooming in a landfill.  "Stop the car!" I'd squealed, and manically, almost immediately leapt across the unkind ground, bare feet gliding across broken glass and broken tar, and had with lightning speed shoved my hands into a box loaded with vintage notions and bias tape and ribbons and breathtaking lace...the overheated sellers had told me, "Three bucks.  Fill a bag."  I had to stop myself from having a scoronary.  Breathe.  

When they realized I had every intention of filling the bag to the level of stuffed, they tried to stop me, caught the glimmer that something was wrong with their valuing of the old shop-blackened Levi's at five bucks and what I had for such a price, but I smiled.  The deal was done.  These people were hagglers, just shy of nomads. No need to restate the obvious.  

I grabbed me treasure and jetted.  Arrrrrrrrghhh.

Anyway, I have tons of the stuff, so I made these little cuties inspired by this May Arts post:

Here is another pic.

They were soooo easy to make and took hardly any time.  Love them?  I do!

Table Collage Revamp for Roo

We love our neighborhood.  Our neighbors are amazing, lovely people and constantly doing nice things for each other and looking out for one another.  


Case in point, during the terrible ice storm of 2008, I was pregnant and giant and slipped on the ice.  Although our street was an ice-carved ghost town, three women rushed from various homes to my aid within seconds.  It was astonishing.


One of those women was our next-door neighbor Mary, whose son is former city councilor Eric Gomez, and they are both all around great people. Recently, Mary loaned us a little kid table her grandchildren had outgrown, an indefinite loan as she might want it back if she has any munchkin additions to the family.  Arthur loves it: it's just his size and he loves eating meals there, drawing, even reading the newspaper (we're not sure why or how that works either but he enjoys it nonetheless).  

The table is great, but the kindergarten classroom primary colors, its taped and battered reminders that it's been well-loved, and Arthur's own artistic additions to it were starting to grate on me, as the toddler hub has become a staple in the great room.  If the table was to stay, something must change. 

And then, as I was trying desperately to arrange the back room of the house, which has since Arthur's birth become our communal craft/sewing/music room (literally my violin hangs on the wall above my Singer and next to a giant Kustom amp), the Mod Podge spoke to me.

 I popped over to Mod Podge Rocks to see if I could find something similar to what I was envisioning, where I found terrific inspiration from cuteness diva Kristi.  A short phone call to my girlfriend Eva, a couple of Cuba libres and a dozen and a half stories about our adventures in the crazy Jamestown house in the 90s later, we had this in the works:

We pillaged my wrapping paper, scrapbook paper, paint samples (Arthur picks them out and "buys" them when we go shopping at the home store...he loves it and the checkout clerks are happy to "scan" them...I've been hanging onto them like any good Level I hoarder waiting for the right change to use them) and vintage greeting card collection for colors and patterns and even characters we loved and then mod podged them to the table.  Because the surface of the table is a bit puffy, they kept wanting to peel up, wrinkle, and bubble, so it was something of a challenge, but we were hardcore.


When we finished the job, we attacked our table with stickers and other clip art.  We even hit it with a few inked-up stamps.  After Eva left, I coated the whole thing with glitter podge.

Although we plan to coat it with the world's thickest layer of polyurethane, the final project looks like this up close:

I will probably finish the chairs later this week when I can recruit more Eva.  The best part is that it took about an evening and was super extra fun to have the kids help while we sat around chatting it up.

If you try this project, be sure to poly coat it, and post a link to pics for me!!!

Find lots of cool mod podge projects on Mod Podge Rocks.

A Challenge for My Friends...

This is a post inspired by a convo I had with Valerie from My Own Crafty Wonderland at her pillowcase party, which you can read about here, here and here.  Hubs and I are starting to plan our 10/14 for next May.  What is a 10/14?  It's 10 years married, 14 years commonlaw (Justin says commonlaw counts...either way, we're a truly lucky couple and we know it!).

Love is in the air...love is all around.  Justin's good friend, one of Arthur's godfathers, Craig, met beautiful Mary and their wedding is planned for the fall.  Normally, I don't look forward to weddings much...perhaps it's because I've been to so many, and been in so many.  But with Craig and Mary, this is going to be a very special time for us.  We love Craig so much, and Mary is sweet and beautiful and treats him so adoringly.  And recently our friend Sacha, who we adore, married the sweetest, funnest man, and they will soon be throwing a big bash to celebrate...romance is so contagious...I can't wait!

All this has us excited about planning for our big event: building our playlist, thinking about food and decorations and all the fun wedding things that ladies flip out over.  And it's very much like planning our wedding again...our original event was an unvitation kind of wedding...to dodge the lengthy guest list and traditional church wedding, we married on Beaver Lake at Circle of Light...65 guests and weekend-long party.  It was amazing.  We had a brilliant, lovely time.  Three days in Arkansas, back to Tulsa for a concert at Majestic (in its previous incarnation), and then off to spend ten days camping, hosteling and staying at kitschy mountain lodges.  It was a dream to say the least, but now we are looking forward to sharing our commitment with all of our friends and family.

Here's what we have so far:

The event will take place next May at the Marquee, thanks to the kindness of Sacha and Marc.

Kisha, who was one of my best friends in high school and remains one of the dearest, most amazing people in my life, and her husband Chris, suggested a handfasting for this party.  After they explained to us that this is a short, earthy sort of ceremony that can be performed in a non-religious way, but is a way to recommit ourselves to each other without all the vow renewal business, we agreed to incorporate this into our event, but we want to keep it light.

We also want to include decorations, music, and other ideas to make this a big, insanely fun party to epitomize the essence of our years together.  We want to include things we love, like scooters, concerts, etc.  After doing some talking about what we want the party to be like, Justin suggested that it should be like a Flaming Lips concert (at which, incidentally, marriage proposals have become something of a regular event). Together, we've seen over 200 concerts in our 10/14, and Flaming Lips shows are our favorite.

I think this is an insane, amazing idea.  Instead of the usual wedding sort of things, we'll have bubbles, confetti, energy, balloons, bright colors, et cetera!  SO my question to you is, what are some ideas you have for our event?


Here are some pics to get you started:

http://www.last.fm/music/The+Flaming+Lips/+images
Peace and Love!
K

Arthur in Wonderland...A Mad Tea Party Pictorial

Roo turned 2..happy happy boy, happy happy day!

Twinkle, twinkle, little bat...

'Twas brilling and the slithy toves

Did Gyre and Gimble in the Wabe

All mimsy were the Borogoves

(and the mome raths outgrabe)

DIY Wish List: Chandelier Necklace

Being a full time writing diva by day and domestic goddess by night leaves me little time for the delights of crafting, but my to-do list is a mile long.  Here's some of what I'm in love with/daydreaming about cooking up if I ever get a day off free of laundry and precious, sticky, stubby hands grasping so desperately and incessantly at my knees:

I am so super crazy about darling artisan Amanda Pearl's goodies.  She's taken grosgrain and vintage chandelier pieces and turned them into the most adorable necklaces.


I found a chandelier necklace tutorial on Ruffled Blog, but it's a little different.  Both are gorgeous!

Our life so far in numbers: a pictorial chronology of love and learning

Number of months apart that Justin and I were born at Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa.

I wish I had some scanned baby photos of young Justin. His eyes were as blue on blue as they are today and held a universe of curiosity; his hair was a mess of Tennessee sunset.

Justin was born to wonderful, talented parents and grew up with two of the loveliest brothers anyone will ever had. Each has their own unique style and interests and the three of them grew up to be some of the best catches around.

I grew up across town from him, back when the east side of Tulsa was much more rural. Although our paths never crossed, we both grew up with a passion for music, the arts, knowledge, and adventure.

Number of years ago that Justin and I became a couple. He was the best surprise of my life. We drank in the sky and sounds and earth and love. Every moment was youth and energy and growth. We became the people we are today incrementally, over a moment, an hour, a year, a decade. We didn't know then that we would essentially grow up together. We were so busy embracing the beautiful, drunken present that we never imagined the endless, breathless years to follow. The day he took me to the lake and we crawled out onto the rocks to inhale the stars and the water, the day he told first me he loved me, lives in my soul like a guardian angel.

The house number of our first home, the home we live in now, our perfect little hobbit hole.

The day in May 2001 when we wrapped ourselves up in this beautiful knot.

Number of years we spent together before Arthur came into our lives.

Arthur's birth weight.

Three, oh three, it's a magic number.

Number of years that Arthur's been with us.  We love this little monkey!