Buffalo chicken dip

This is a new favorite recipe. 

2-10 ounce cans of chunk chicken, drained (or leftover chopped chicken)
2-8 ounce packages of cream cheese
1 cup ranch dressing
3/4 cup hot sauce like Texas Pete wing sauce
1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
celery sticks and/or nacho chips

Just mix all and put in a small crock pot.  Stir occassionally until it's well mixed.  Enjoy!

easy pillows



Both pillows on the chair were made this way.

 I just re-remembered this super easy way to make a pillow cover and I'm so excited that I may have to make several right away!  I think I did this when I had my first apartment, but since then I've make them with zippers and just forgot how quick and simple it is to do it the first way.

Just measure the height of the pillow form that you want to cover.  Add 1/2 inch seam allowance for the top and bottom.  That is the length of one side of the piece of fabric you will cut out in a bit.

Next, measure the width of the pillow.  You will be cutting out your fabric soon and it will look a bit like a scarf at first--short on one side and a little more than twice that long on the other side.  When you make the pillow, you will make two "back" flaps that will overlap each other, and you want each flap to be about 3/4 of the width of the pillow.  Allow an inch on each side for a hem.  So, if you have an 11x11 inch pillow, you would cut out a piece of fabric about 12 inches by 25 inches. 

the front

and the back

Now, sew a simple rolled hem on the two short sides and press the edges.  Place the fabric right side up on a tabletop.  Place your pillow form on top to check placement for sure, but you'll basically fold one side in to cover about 3/4 of the pillow.  Remove form and pin the one side in place.  Now fold in the other side, again to cover about 3/4 of the pillow and pin.  Sew across the top and bottom.  Clip your corners and trim seams.  Turn right side out, iron, and you're done!

Some hints:
If your fabric is thin, you might want to cut a piece of plain white fabric (an inexpensive sheet works great for this) the exact size as the pillow cover fabric and baste it to the "good" fabric to make your finished cover have more body. 

I sometimes skimp on the measurements a touch so the pillow really fills the cover and I wind up with a plump, cushy pillow.

If you don't want to make a run to the store or you want to save a couple of dollars, you can take a bed pillow, cut open one end, and stuff the filling into a smaller area.  Stitch the cover again, this time into a square, and you've got a pillow form.

You can easily decorate these and add embellishments any way you like!

pulled off another party




 

Last night was the Ugly Sweater Party.  It was a blast, but it took me all day to get things ready.  I made lots of food (trifle, meatballs, sausage balls, Buffalo chicken dip, steamer and so on).  I also had to get the contest stuff together.  As people came, we gave them an index card.  They had an hour in order to think of something about themselves that other people at the party probably didn't know about them.  They then placed them in the jar pictured to the right.  When everyone was finished eating, I read all of then entries.  The first person to guess the correct answer scored a point.  The one with the most points won a prize.

We also had each person vote on the sweaters--the funniest, the one I most wished I had found, and the truly ugliest.  The ones winning the most votes won.  Fun night.

recovering those old seat cushions

This fabric was actually pretty once.

Tomorrow night is our first annual "Ugly Sweater Party", so I'm getting the house ready.  You'd think this close to Christmas, everything would be in order, but I always have more projects on the horizon.  I'd also love to touch up the trim paint around a couple of doors, but we'll see if I get to that.  The seats didn't get re-covered in time for the Christmas meals, but they will get done for the ugly sweaters.  (I'll put up a copy of the invite in case anyone wants to adapt the idea.) 

We have three old chairs which I bought at a Thrift store at least 20 years ago.  I still like them, and they remain the most used chairs around the dining room table.  Every five years or so, though, I need to recover them as the covers become threadbare.

Before I made it to the store to look for an inexpensive fabric to replace the old, my friend Robin lent me some that I think I am going to love on them.  It was left over from a project of hers. . .  It's always a plus to have friends with good taste.

I'll put up some pictures to show how they come out.  I'll just take unscrew the seats from the chairs and take off the old fabric.  If you've never done this, just turn the chair over and get a long screw driver.  Unscrew the four screws that hold the seat to the chair.  Next, cut a square--or the shape of your seat--from the new fabric.  I usually leave a couple of inches extra on all sides to wrap around and staple.  

 staple it in place, and then re-screw the seat covers to the chairs.  When they are done, they look so much better and it's less work than others would think. . .that is unless you get the seats off and discover that the staples you purchased and have won't fit the inexpensive new stapler you purchased to replace the old good one that broke. . .and the staples that you send your husband to get don't fit either. . .

Oh, so much better!

bench from old chairs

I didn't really do all of this today, but it's one of my creations.  I found 3 old matching chairs at a junk shop.  They were $1.50 each.  First I removed the old covers, screws, and such and scrubbed them well.  From there, I re-glued a couple of loose spots and screwed a couple of places together to make the chairs sturdy.  Next, I primed them with some leftover primer.  Once they were white from the primer, I used wood putty to fill in a couple of gouges and places where I had added screws to make them more stable.  I sanded the putty and noticed that so much of the primer  had soaked in that I painted them with primer a second time.  After that had dried, I painted them with two coats of gloss white paint.  Next, I used a big piece of cardboard to make a pattern for the "bench seat" which I planned to use to connect the chairs.  On the pattern, I notched out spots to make it fit tightly.  I used the cardboard to cut out a piece of plywood to match the pattern.  I covered the plywood seat with some padding--actually, I split open an old body pillow and used the filling to make the seat padding. I covered that with a layer of old white sheet fabric and then used the green swirl fabric to cover that.  I just wrapped it around the seat and stapled it to the back.  Ta da--a new bench for our breezeway. 

I could have screwed the three chairs together to make the bench even more sturdy, but it held together well the way it was.

I'll post a picture of the final product.  I didn't think to photograph the chairs before I started--wish I would have!

photo photo frame

Well, it's Christmas day and not much time was spent on creativity--just lots of good time with family.

One thing I've got started is a photo frame for my daughter to give to one of her best friends.  We took a picture frame (the one pictured here is actually a mirror) that had a flat, wide frame and painted it white.  Next, I had my daughter go through her photos and pick out between 20-30 of her and her best friend. I copied them onto a couple of pages of a Word document with each photo about an inch to two inches wide.  I printed them in black and white on good quality paper.

Several pages of mini pictures

I also went through some online clipart and picked out several patterns in black and white and printed them.  If I had had any black and white scrapbook paper, I would have used that.

We cut out the pictures.  Some we left in small rectangles.  Some we cut out parts of the image.  Next, we used Mod Podge to glue them along with the black and white pattern paper onto the frame.  When it was finished and we liked the result, we coated it in a couple of coats of Mod Podge.  We re-assembled the frame and placed a large photo of the two of them in it.

It's nearly finished

Merry Christmas!

silhouette stuff

Today has been a day of wrapping presents and baking.  Tomorrow we clean and then it's Christmas!!



This is a computer print out of the original picture, darkened.

 

My creative thing today involves making silhouettes--I'm a little obsessed with them lately. 

I took a picture from a couple of years ago that showed one of my daughters standing on a deck in a vacation home.  It was already digital, so I darkened it to make her outline more distinct.  From there, I simply printed the picture in black and white on 8 1/2 x 11 paper. 

I then took a fine tip Sharpee marker and outlined her and the deck railing.  When I turned the paper over, the outline was distinct enough to photocopy which I then did. 

I used a Sharpee to outline the image and then turned it over.

To the photocopy, so I still had the outline copy in case I want to try something different to it, I used a wide tip black marker to fill in the areas in the picture occupied by her and the deck railing. 



I colored in the area with a wide tip marker.

 My next plan, which will probably have to wait until after Christmas, is to go to Staples and have them print it larger, maybe poster size, to see how it turnes out. 

I am also interested in putting a piece of clear contact paper over the image and cutting out the "black" area.  From there, I want to put what's left, basically a stencil, on something. . .canvas. . .wood. . .something. . .and then paint the cutout area in stripes or polka dots or some graphic design.  I'll add more when I do.