Winner and maybe I'll be a loser?

I hope you had a wonderful and magical Christmas. We are contemplating having a New Years Eve party but you know how it is as Mommies and Daddies this holiday is more for "all the single ladies"... and single gents. I wanted to say thank you for all the kind comments on the drum giveaway. They really brightened my day and some (Nicole) made me laugh out out loud. As for the give away Drum roll please (do you get it... drum roll?) AWWWW so lame! :)

 Kelly said...

You are so creative and those drums are beautiful. I would love to win.
moodykelly at gmail dot com

Your parents have fantastic taste in names by the way :) Congrats! I will shoot you an email to get your address. 

Now as for the me being a "loser" I remembered the other day that I totally failed to mention that my dress was NOT selected in the Shabby Apple contest. It was actually pretty comical. For some reason I thought the results were going to be announced on Thanksgiving so I patiently waited until we were in Bali. (Side note: Being Irish I am totally superstitious and think I jinx things by watching them. Hence if BYU was loosing in football while I was at Uni there it was because I was watching the game, so I try not to check blog contests religiously for fear I will jinx myself, yeah I am that weird.) On Thanksgiving I nervously logged on to find out that no, I had not won and that {hello!} it had ended days before. I went in to tell my hubby and he says "yeah I know I just didn't want to be the bearer of bad news while were on holiday. The competition ended a few days ago." HA!!!!!! That guy can keep a secret! Anyway, I did receive some fun news from the company though and lets just say I may be posting some dresses to get your opinions as January rolls on. So, if you are keeping tally, I got the boot from Crafting with the Stars early on:

 was pummeled in the Knock off competition:

 

and now lost Shabby Apple:

Apparently I am a total glutton for punishment because starting in a few weeks I will be competing in "Project Run and Play".

I think it is healthy to get your bum kicked every now and then (or in my case every time ha!) I actually joined thinking "surely it will be with other amateur bloggers like myself".... I was so terribly wrong. I will be competing against extremely talented seamstresses. Several of which have very successful stores and clothing lines. You can check out everyone's profiles HERE. It looks like another bum kicking for SNML (my friend Elizabeth abbreviated the blog like that and I LOVE it)! Thankfully we received the themes early so I have BEGGED my friend in Jakarta to pick up something for me, okay bright green rubber boots if you must know ha! I just REALLY hope I make it to the week where the theme is retro because I have the cutest idea!! But lets be honest I am just amazed I am thrown in with these ladies. If you would like to follow along I would be thrilled! On the horizon is the promised notorious "green pants" tutorial:

Ha! Just kidding, but that story is pretty cute. Although The Sniches is my current fav. Anywhoo (get it who...Dr. Seuss? Man I am full of lame jokes tonight!) I will also be putting up the schedule for Apron week tomorrow. I am trying to get the first apron in before New Years. It is a glamourous one if I say so myself! Please send me any ideas or ones you would like to see made! 

To a Healthy New Year

I hope some of you may be reading this on a new computer, or Ipad or in some comfy new jammies, or like me with a tummy full of stocking yummies! I prepared out neighbor gifts yesterday and ended up having this for lunch:

Just looking at it now makes me sort of nauseous ha! But you know how it is, cookie for the plate cookie for me, brownie for the plate brownie for me, mini cheese cake for plate 2 for me.  Uh oh totally thirsty better grab a drink. I only had seven plates to make but I think I ate my weight in junk. I went the cookie plate route this year. I didn't have it in me to do anything bigger. But I figure the personalized cookies made up for the creative void:

We then totally spaced doing cookies for Santa... so he got a plate that was meant to go to a family who went out of town. "Yeah kids Igoe Family is code for Santa Clause" ha! Did any of you have any funny holiday mess ups? Hopefully just enough that you get to laugh about them and the rest of the time was seamlessly perfect!

Twelfth Day of Christmas: Bali Drum giveaway {Closed}

Alright, I cannot for the life of me figure out google docs (and thank heavens it seems like I am not the only one) So I have gone back to Media Fire... not a huge fan but unless I start taking advertisers it is the only free option :) So, the patterns for the Lady's Apron can be found HERE and the pattern pieces for the Tea and Crumpets apron can be found HERE. I am in the process of uploading the Potterybarn PJ's but our internet is soooo painfully slow and they are a lot of pieces, but it will get there! I am sorry for all the hassle and I am hoping this solves the problem. Please keep in mind that I am a mommy of 3 at christmas who is doing all this for the love of it so please be kind in your emails. 

I decided instead of making homemade drums (which is not all that original) instead I would do a fun give away, a pair of handmade drums from Bali. 

The artwork on the bottom is beautiful and I love that the imperfections make it one of a kind

The tops are smooth leather:

If you leave a comment on this post you will be entered into the drawing. The giveaway will be open until Monday night Timor time. I have really enjoyed doing this 12 days of Christmas and am looking forward to doing a wrap up. But that is going to have to wait until after Christmas. I hope you have been able to enjoy all the wonderful opportunities the Christmas season offers. We were lucky enough to go to our Orphanage yesterday and deliver the food purchased with the money gathered from a fund raiser at the boy's school. 

We were accompanied by a visitor at post who is here for Christmas. It was a special visit for her as she was adopted from an orphanage in Indonesia when she was a baby. 

I brought some items I had received from readers that I thought could be used by the children. Including a cute Hello Kitty backpack, some soccer balls and a teddy bear for each child. 

I also had some Frisbees that was hilarious to teach the kiddos how to use. After frisbee we played a little duck duck goose

The kids caught on quick and had fun running around

Then we moved on to London Bridges. 

The kids thought it was hilarious to be "all locked up"

I was thrilled that Alianza was wearing one of the skirts I had made

Doesn't she have the best smile?

The kids loved the candy canes and cookies our visitor brought

After we got them all wired on candy cookies and games they performed "We Wish you a Merry Christmas" in Tetum. 

We sang it back in English and then the girls performed their version of Jingle Bell Rock

They have started keeping a log of when people come to visit and it was great seeing all the different countries

They were all set with a Christmas tree and a huge creche. 

We are so lucky to visit with these amazing children around this time of year. Their tender spirits and kindness are wonderful examples of how we should be 

I hope your Christmas is as filled with love and happiness as ours in Timor has been. 

We wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from Timor!

Eleventh Day of Christmas: Piping, of the frosting kind

Sorry this post is so late but I have a great excuse...pictures to come with the last post :)

Before I was an avid sewer and photographer my dream was to open a cupcake store in my beloved Williamsburg VA. It is still a dream I hold onto and I cross my fingers that it will come to fruition when we retire. We are currently building a home there so that has got to be one step in that direction right? :) Anyway, I LOVE making cupcakes and if I do say so myself I am pretty good at it. What I am NOT good at is decorating them. I am awful at piping anything. With 11 pipers piping I thought instead of doing a tutorial (since I am awful at it) I would gorge my eyes on the amazing holiday piping ability of others and share some of the piping inspiration with you!
                                                                    (google images)

I have never ever been able to get fondant to taste good AND look good. It seems like it is one or the other, and how cute is that striped hat?!

Can't you just imagine diving into all that puffed, piped goodness? This is from one of my fav blogs House of Brinson. Gorgeous photography of food and other random items :)

How cute are these! Of course they are from Martha. I would LOVE to sneak into her prep kitchens one day and just hide in a corner and watch, they should sell tickets for that :)

(google images)

I thought these christmas trees were so stinkin cute! It has got to take a steady wrist to get these right. 

I just LOVE turquoise and orange so when I saw these at Saint Cupcakes I just about wet my knickers. How do you do a HUGE dollop like that?

Okay so this one isn't piped but it is just soooo cute! It is from my fav party blog 

One Charming Party. This site has exploded since Nicole Hill Gerulet started doing the photography. Nicole's was the first photography workshop I ever attended so I love seeing her work here :) You can download the little North Pole sign on the post HERE. I think it is a great way to use up all those mini candy canes you have lying around. 

Finally I had to include at least one of the amazing gingerbread houses I am seeing everywhere:

 This one is from the always fabulous Whipperberry. These ladies are amazingly talented. Plus how cool is that cake stand, I mean seriously wow. The details are out of control on this house. Look at the little bunting and the tiny birds on top of the trees!
Now that I am inspired I am going to go embarrass myself in the kitchen :) If you know of a great piping set that might turn my meager skills into mad skills I would love a link! I hope you all can settle in with a "piping" hot coco and enjoy your evening!!

Tenth Day of Christmas: Lords a Leaping Slippers

When I thought about "Lords a Leaping" I thought about teaching how to take good pictures of kids jumping. This is a pretty hard thing to do but when you do it right they turn out soooo cute. But um, honestly I don't think I would do a good job teaching it. So, the second thing I thought of was ballet shoes. When I think of leaping I think Ballet. I decided to make a knock off of my favorite shoes of Evies from the GAP that have a HUGE rhinestone on the toe and an elastic back. I wanted mine to be soft and more like slippers so she could wear them toddling around the house and her feeties wouldn't get cold on the tile floors.

You could do this in some super cute patterns. I really wanted a pair to go with this outfit though so yellow and green it was

I wish I had access to some suede or soft leather for the soles. I would totally suggest using some to make them a little sturdier and better for outside

These are loosely (very loosley) based on Heather Bailey's Bitty booties. These are a snap to make and I love that they take very little items to make. All you need is some scrap fabric (one for main one for lining), some felt, some bias tape and a tiny bit of elastic. The pattern can be downloaded HERE. Once you have downloaded your pattern and cut out the fabric accordingly we will start with the toes. We are going to be making a lot of fabric sandwiches. For the toe lay down one toe lining piece, one felt piece and then your main piece. Once you have sandwiched them together pin them in place.

Once you have the layers pinned grab a small length of bias tape and pin it around the top of the toe. I left a little bit without it at the end to make sewing easier.

Once you are all pinned sew the bias tape into place making sure to catch all the layers. Once you are done now is a good time to attach any embellishments while the toe is still easy to work with.

Now repeat with your second "toe" piece. Once are done set these aside and we will work on our heel. Again sandwich your lining, your felt and your main fabric. Then with the shorter slant to the top we are going to pin some more bias tape across the top.

Again sew it in place. Once you are done take your small piece of elastic and feed it through the pocket of the bias tape.

When you are done pin trim any extra elastic and pin the two ends into place. Sew across both ends to keep the elastic in place.

Repeat the process with your second heel piece. When done take your two heel pieces and your two toe pieces and we are going to connect them. Pin both ends of the toe right sides together with the two ends of the heel:

This might be a better pic:

Now sew down each end back and forthing at both ends. Repeat with your second set of toe and heel pieces. Once done we need to connect the top of the shoe to the bottom. I decided to take the lining of my shoe and cut it down a bit. This way I could slip it in after I sewed everything else and it would cover the seams. You can do this or you an include the lining piece in your fabric sandwich, either way works. What ever you decided once again stack your fabric up. Once you are done find the middle of your bottom and the middle of your top and match them up then pin all the way around. I would NOT advise pinning the way that I did. I was sticking myself the whole time I don't know what I was thinking.

Once you are all pinned sew all the way around.

Turn the shoe right side out, repeat with the slipper and you are done!!

Total chinche right? I hope to see lots of your cuties leaping around in them!