Everything is not perfect, just because another did a project and had no issues or made that fabulous goodie or dish doesn't mean that the next will have as much luck. I make lots of projects and I have my share almost projects as well as fails. Part of what I do as a creator is go through that process of elimination. I don't mind admitting what didn't work for me. It never hurts to try something new and if it works, that is fantastic. If it doesn't work, then you know what to change the next time; if you decide to do the project or make that recipe again.
Where do I get my inspirations from?
o Things made growing up with my mom, school projects and crafts I did on my own.
o Seeing a fabulous set up in a magazine(often Pottery Barn) or in a store like Kirklands and even kid stores.
o I scour Google and Bing images for a subject that I am interested in creating and I brain storm off other peoples creations. This is normally my go to process and I often scan and wonder what I can make that hasn't been made already or even how can I change another project to reflect our families needs or interests.
o I also scan through Pinterest for inspiration.
***I never try to create something exactly the same as another. I like to make everything I do my own. It works out a majority of the time.*** I am an
over analyzer, so when it comes to projects around the net I often wonder how they did it and sometimes I try it out for myself...exactly as they said.
Most disappointing project of the year: Baking pan as a magnet board.
WHY? -It actually requires a old school metal pan not a typical baking pan that one normally has in the cabinet. I do not think I have came across one that says you need a real metal baking pan. I tried thick ones, thin ones, round ones, rectangle ones, small square ones, store bought ones and even the free ones that come on the phone book or a business magnet. They all just fell right off.
{Next}
Fruit Bouquet- I was like oh yeah, I am going to have the prettiest little bouquet. I actually made it for my neighbor that has no children or family near for Mother's Day. It was a mess and when I got the fruit and had the color scheme and design set up in my head, I failed to think about a few things.
1. How do you get flat fruit cut outs with round fruit?
2. How do you make all of the fruit stick together with toothpicks and it actually look neat?
3. How do you prevent the juice from the fruit dripping everywhere?
It worked just well enough to me to quickly get it to my neighbor to prevent a complete self destruction of the project. It is a good thing no matter how torn up fruit is, it is always good for something. Snacks, smoothies, cereal accessory and so on.
What happened? -I have it on my list to try again. I used 1/2 water 1/2 glue solution the last time and I dipped the yarn beforehand and then wrapped it. Super messy and just inspiration crusher. I was over it. What happened with the glue was it ended up leaving a glue skin after popping the balloon and it was just ugly and the yarn ball was unstable. I saw a new way to actually wrap then dip and I will try again with a mod podge and water mix. I know this is possible.
Sometimes it takes a few tries to get a project to do what you want it to.
I swear I really lucked out in the great man department. My husband and I was walking down the strip of stores and as we passed the corner of Sports Academy- a baby bat was right there on the cold corner of the wall sleeping. At the time his camera on his phone was way better than mine, so he offered to get the pic for me. I was so amazed, because I had never seen a bat in real life. Pretty cool, right!
This was my attempt at making homemade bread and stopping the store bread buying. I think that possibly I should have divided my bread into 4 section before the second rising stage. The bread was really heavy, but it was quite delicious. My daughter loved it, my husband and son....not so much. I was happy with it with the exception of it being pretty fragile and falling apart easily. I will try this one again. We buy way too much bread in this house; we have 2 school lunches and 1 man lunch a day. That is about 3 loaves a week.
Our sink was replaced in the bathroom this past year. It once had a floating sink that was higher and was replaced with a lower sink with a cabinet below. Well, when it was moved it had ugly drill holes so I wanted to cover them. I also wanted the kids to be able to see in the mirror when they brushed their teeth, hair and anything else they needed it for. I trimmed the board to size and it fit perfectly. I ended up putting magnets on the back of the mirrors and magnets stuck to the board to make the mirrors actually stay. They fell off constantly, so I ended up just taking them down and replacing them with a double mirror. I must figure out what makes the magnet paint actually work. It says paint any surface and let dry and you can even paint over it with another color or even chalkboard paint, but I have used it a few times and I must be doing something wrong because magnets won't stick.
Yes, almost laundry detergent. Why? -Well, I think it was just error in the process. I cooked it on the stove top and blended the rest of the ingredients and I just thought it wasn't thick enough, so I added more ingredients. My mom and I worked on this little solution to save money on detergent. However, it did end up coming together. It was more of a concentrate and ended up looking like a super gel. You know the only problem with this solution is that with all of the washing machines being
HE. I do wonder about how that would be possible with a
HE machine.
Lesson learned: BE PATIENT
I am loving the variety of hair braiding styles there are. It is absolutely amazing what people can do. I practice on my daughter anytime I can she will let me. She is just so pretty with fixed hair, however she is pretty impatient and can't sit still for one second. It is like taking a little kid to get their hair cut at the salon except there is no crying or hair cutting, just lots of wiggling and moving and wanting to walk off. I almost have it down, just a little more practice. I need to make it tighter and I think it will turn out the way it should. I just haven't figured out how to make it tighter. Any braiding secrets you want to share?
The chalk hair craze hit hard, but it was short lived. That is just not my type of thing. The last hair fad I followed was the 3 different colored layers of hair in like 2005. So, my super experimental and totally in the fads of now sister had her mind set on this. We tried the regular chalk pastels and found out it had to be the oil pastel chalk. We did the wet spray, chalk, flat iron to set. It was so super light. We tried a few times before we gave up on trying to get that vibrant chalk coated hair. It was messy and our fingers got stained from the pastels. NO GO on another attempt on this little doozie.
Wow, that is a horrible way to make dinner. My most scary moment of the entire year. This was a super crazy story. I always want my husbands dinner to be hot and ready when he comes through the door, so I keep it on low. I want it to be fresh for him after working a long hard day at work. Luckily, it took about 45 minutes to get him and get back home. If it would have been a moment later...we would have lost our house. I put the lid on the pot to keep the heat in, but obviously I forgot to turn off the burner. There was actually more chicken meatballs in the pan...many of them incinerated from the heat.
We drove down the driveway and got out and instantly we could smell something stinky. I ran to the door to open it and was instantly flooded in the face with white smoke. A really horrible white smoke that the instant you breath in it feels like pain. A sharp, stabbing and suffocating type of pain. The kids stayed outside, and my husband and I covered our faces and ran inside to turn off the stove, throw the pan outside, open all of the windows and doors. Thank goodness for 13 windows, 2 doors and 1 giant fan. I really think that the lid that I put on the pan before I left kept as well as the 2 cups of water to coat the bottom of the pan kept it from catching on fire and spreading to our entire house. The burner was a little damaged and the house smelled horrid. We actually left for about 3 hours before returning to the house after we opened it up. The kids room door had been closed so it wasn't bad.
I had just washed all of the bedding and couch cushions earlier that day. They all had to be rewashed as well as our clothes that were out or hanging. The walls had to be wiped down from base board to ceiling and everything else had to be cleaned. My house has never been so clean. The smell went away after about a month. We sprayed odor sprays as well as kept candles burning to contain the smell. We thank the good Lord above for having a home still to this day. I mean luck has nothing to do with it, it was a pure blessing. I have never made another chicken ball to this day!
Let's get chocolate wasted together. We were traveling back up to North Carolina after vacationing for a month with my mom in Mississippi and on our way back home we stop any place that looks interesting. We normally go the MS, AL, GA, SC, NC route, but this time we decided to drive north into TN for the route back home. It is longer even though it is less states to travel through. Anyway, we ended up in Athens, TN where there was a Russell Stover Factory Outlet. We had to stop....I mean you just can't pass something like that. I was surprised at the beautiful chocolates in the casing. We really got a great deal on the mountain of chocolates we left with. Anyway, if you ever want to get chocolate wasted, I am always available. GODIVA is my best friend!
