Sunday Surprise

My Mister is such an amazing man. He puts up with all of my quirks -- my love of chocolate, my multitude of crafting addictions hobbies, my tendency to dance along to the music they pump into grocery stores and shopping malls, and my weird peel-off face masks. He even takes me to Goodwill after church most Sundays so I can peruse the furniture section and dawdle by the lamps.

This Sunday was no different. While I decided to pass on the lime green computer desk, I did come away with one surprising find -- my first vintage sheet!

If you're a fan of In Color Order, you may know about Jeni's love of vintage sheets. I can honestly say that I didn't know much about vintage sheets before now, but I've always loved the photos Jeni posts of her finds -- pretty stacks of bright, colourful floral fabrics that I would love to work into my quilts but that I can never seem to find. That is, until today.


I bought this sheet today just because I loved the bright, cheerful print. Once I got home I started doing some homework to see just what I had found, and I came across this post about vintage sheets that Jeni wrote which serves as a great primer if you don't know much about the topic. I read Jeni's post and immediately went hunting for the tags on this fitted sheet. Here's what I found:


Surprise, this sheet is actually vintage! In fact, if you Google "Fieldcrest Perfection vintage sheet" you can find a number of copycat sheets, including some for sale on Etsy. Hooray, my gut instinct was right after all!

I'm excited to get this sheet washed and pressed, and then I need to decide what I'm going to do with it. Something tells me it might be more fun to break into my first vintage sheet with friends, so keep an eye out as I might be giving away a few fat quarter cuts from this sheet in the future!

Lone Starburst Paper Piecing

Tonight during #talknt I'm working on a new technique: paper piecing! I've had four pages of the Lone Starburst by Six White Horses Studio sitting on my desk for weeks, and I've finally mustered up the courage to get started.


I'm working in bright, super saturated colors broken up with a delicate white-on-white pattern, with solid white in the center of the star. I was going to invert this, with a colourful star and white backing until I saw this pin today and knew I just had to have one of my very own:


Lone Starburst closeup

I have no idea why I put off paper piecing for so long -- it's easy and entirely addictive. I've got to go, #talknt is calling and I've got more blocks to sew!

Brownie in a Mug

This is just a quick post, because I'm burning to show you the details of my first sewing completion of 2013 but since it's a surprise late Christmas gift for a dear friend, I have to keep it a secret a little while longer. Instead, here's some chocolate!

Mug Brownie

This is a brownie in a mug (and some strawberry ice cream for good measure). Believe it or not, I've never even heard of these before. That's a good thing, too, because I'd be about 20 pounds heavier had I known of these earlier! But thanks to Pinterest, these are now a part of my life. The original pin can be found here!

The idea is simple. Blend a few dry ingredients (sugar, flour, salt, cocoa powder) in a standard sized mug. Add a little oil and water, and microwave for a minute and 40 seconds. Top with ice cream and indulge your chocolate craving!

A Cozy Sewing Nook

Happy New Year! 2013 has gotten off to an incredible start, and I'm glad for it. The Mister and I spent the morning starting some larger organizing projects, and I'm glad to see that we're finally getting the house back in order. It was looking pretty rough after last semester!

One of my big personal projects was to create a dedicated sewing and crafting space for myself. I've been inspired by many resources, but mostly this pin here:


The Mister and I recently moved into a new two bedroom apartment. We're using the second bedroom as a guest room, and I finally asked if I could "have" the closet for my own uses. The Mister agreed, provided I could find ample storage for everything we were hoarding keeping in the space. That was all I needed to hear -- as soon as we got home, I unpacked all of the stuff from the closet and got started! (And yes, it's all still sitting on the floor behind me. I'll clean it up. Someday.)

Here's where my progress is at as of tonight:


While it's not quite the same, I'm really pleased with it! We didn't install a countertop as they did in the inspiration picture because, well, we're renting. Instead, I played around with surfaces before settling on a folding table. This one is 4 feet long by 20" deep and it fits perfectly within a standard closet. It's the only thing I'm not entirely pleased with; I feel like the table has too much play, and when the sewing machine gets moving quickly the table tends to rock pretty badly. I'll need to solve that problem before tackling any large projects, and that table will definitely be the first thing to go if I can find a great desk while thrifting!

Sewing Nook

To the right are a couple of plastic drawer systems, stacked vertically to hold miscellaneous odds and ends for each of my crafting habits. I've also put up a corkboard to hold my current inspirations (or pattern details) and a pretty cross stitch alphabet sampler I found while thrifting a few weekends ago. I'm waiting on hardware to hang my new 60-spool thread holder, and other than that I'm done! My goal was simply to get this in working order; I'm going to try to leave myself some blank space so I can collect pretty inspirations and grow into the nook over time.


I have my little ironing station on another wall of the room. It may seem like a bit of a pain to travel every time I want to press a seam, but I have terrible luck around hot irons and plenty of scars to prove it. Also, this gives me plenty of room to set up my laptop or iPad near my sewing machine so I can watch Netflix blog while I work!

If you're looking to set up your own sewing nook, I highly recommend trying something like this. The table, plastic drawer organizers and cork board were all purchased at a local Walmart for less than $100! This layout also provides plenty of space to each side of the table for storage, and the closet doors close easily even with a chair tucked under the table.

Have you got a sewing nook in your home? Is it a closet like this, or a full blown sewing room? Leave me a comment below! I'd love to see how you have your space organized -- I'm always looking for new ideas.