October, 2011 | Chicken Scratch

I’m Alive!

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Oct 262011

I know it’s been a while, sorry followers (all 2 of you!). A lot has gone down and I’ll fill you in on it later. For now I thought I’d share a contest with you. Arrow Fasteners is holding a dream room contest worth $10,000. I’ll be honest, I’ve never won a contest or giveaway ever. But I entered anyway. You see I have a terrible bathroom. It’s shameful. I ‘painted’ a quick blueprint.

First off, the walls are two colors. Two horrible colors. One is a greenish mustard and the other is a rusty pumpkin-brown. Without the mustard I might like the brown. Together it’s like something you might find in a diaper. And it’s not like one wall is yellow and one wall is brown. Oh no. That would be understandable. Instead it’s a random patchwork of ugly.

Second, it’s a pretty long room and there is only one light. Where you ask? Over the sink where someone might like to apply make up? Nope. Over the toilet. My boyfriend is quite ok with this one. I am not (guess who wears makeup?). The light switch is also a pain in the booty.

That white box is the light switches. Did I mention that closet door doesn’t actually latch shut (see the door stop)? We hide the kitty litter in there because the cat likes to chew on the bag and eat the (clean) litter. Sometimes she gets the door open. Imagine stumbling into the bathroom (you have to pee) in the dark running face first into the closet door then getting your hand stuck in the towel ring. Good times people. Good times.

As you can see we haven’t even bothered to get towels that match the bathroom (the tan is from a set we got at the housewarming). The bathmats are new. We tend to keep the house on the cold side so I whined until we went to Bed Bath and Beyond and got the two mats and the ‘toilet hat’. Mike mocked our first toilet hat until he realized the cat liked to sleep on it. Then it became ok.

Bad pic but it’s the best I can do. It’s not awful. Its just boring. I’m a bubble-bath lover and I’ve yet to find a comfy tub. The best I’ve had was an old fashioned claw-foot in my college apartment. I miss that tub. I really want a tub I can relax in. Especially now that we have hot water again. Did I mention the week and a half where our hat water heater died? No? It sucked.

Over all it’s not something I see an easy fix for. If it was just the color I’d have painted it already. The whole lay out is bad. We can’t afford to move the toilet/tub/sink/remove the closet/add a light. It’s sad. When I show people the house it’s the one room I don’t even have a plan for. You know it’s bad when people pity you because of your bathroom.

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Sticky Love: NoSew DIY Magic

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Oct 152011

I’m in Love. Capital L Love. I shouldn’t even be posting. I should be cleaning. Party this Sunday remember? I’ve been on a rampage to finish (and start) projects to make my house look really, really good. One such project has led to my current emotional affair. I even took pictures on my phone and sent them to people. If it wasn’t raining I’d take it to my neighbors for a play date.

I’m a pretty crafty person. I can sew with the next-to-the-best of them. But… I’m known to indulge in a short cut or two. This is the perfect 10 minute (or less!) project. Due to the Crazy PreParty shenanigans I don’t have any in progress pics. If anything is confusing ask and I’ll get some up next week.

All you need is an iron, some fabric, a pillow case (I made this one but you could just buy a plain one) and some paper-backed fusible web. They have it at Joanns, about $2.50 a yard. You need maybe a 1/4 of a yard for this project. I will say while you’re there, buy more.

Step 1. On the paper side of the web draw out tree shapes and trunk shapes. Be creative, they don’t have to be based on actual trees. Cut out around the shapes leaving 1/8 to 1/4 inch all around each shape.

Step 2. Following the directions for your web adhere it to your fabric scraps. I used red, oranges, yellows and brown for my leaves and different browns for the trunks.

Step 3. Cut out around the shapes you drew. Don’t use your good fabric shears, this is paper after all.

Step 4. Lay the shapes out on the pillow case. Move them around until you like how it looks.

Step 5. Peel off the backing and start fusing, working from the back to the front. Over lap a little to make it look more forest-y

Step 6. Enjoy!

You could sew around each shape, and if you thing your fabric will be washed a lot its best for longevity. However… I’m lazy so I didn’t. I will be using this same process for some winter/Christmas pillows (That’s what I saw in the BHG Holiday Crafts 2010 magazine) and probably add some decorative stitching.

I love the yellow-checker board bubble-tree

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Save the Coleus!

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Oct 122011

Who doesn’t love cheap gardening advice? I know I’m always looking for ways to get that Fine Gardening/BHG/Martha OMG garden look without having to eat my cow for food (really she’s too cute). I’m not sure where I found this tip, I think it was Fine Gardening magazine. Honestly I read everything so I can’t be sure.

All you need is a coleus plant. Preferably one you like. You don’t even need to really own it yourself. Not that I encourage plant larceny but if a little piece happened to fall off while you were looking I wouldn’t judge. You want to pinch of a tip piece, two big leaves and then the center of small leaves.

These are a month or so old, you don’t want them this big

Then you stick it in a cup of dirt, water and place in a window. Keep it moist and voila! No more buying annuals (I haven’t yet kept one over the winter but people do grow them as house plants so I’m thinking it can be done). Nothing will happen for a while then BAM your kitchen window is a jungle. For plant newbies, south facing window is best if you have one.

DO NOT try to use a bigger piece, the roots won’t grow fast enough and the lower leaves all die. I tried this following a chicken-related plant fatality and I ended up with a sad looking plant. See the one in the bottom left? I rest my case

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Halloween Tour: Buffet

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Oct 092011

Update : Added better pictures of the mini-quilt

When you have an orange wall it’s easy to decorate for Halloween. Christmas? We’ll see.

There is so much going on in this one place that I’ll stick with the buffet and do the rest later. The buffet itself came from Salvo (Salvation Army to those not in the know). It was $45 and scuffed up brown with dirty hardware. Four cans of Valspar Almond later it was starting to come together. Slap on some Hammered Copper (my obsession) on the hardware and we’re good to go.

Here’s the fun part. Everything on the buffet either came from a garage sale, a relative, FREE or I made it. The entire set up cost less than $10.


This is actually on my dining room table, not the buffet (I cheat)

My favorite

I did the embroidery at work, I had a coupon so the designs were $1 each. The fabric was all scraps from work, I believe the dark brown is organic espresso (ooooh!), the orange and off white are denim.

As you can see I jumped right on TWO bandwagons this year.

I’ve been seeing stuffed fabric pumpkin tutorials everywhere. I think I saw this one but I didn’t really follow her steps. I used remnants of quilt-weight cotton and yarn for the pumpkins and rolled up pieces of upholstery fabric (from the TV stand cover) for the stems. I didn’t measure at all. That’s how I work. See something, do it my way. I think mine turned out pretty cute.

And the dead tree. I showed pictures of people with dead trees in their homes to my boyfriend. He told me no. So I did it when he was gone. I did use a smaller dead tree than planned. I needed the height to connect the buffet and ~~shelf~~ mantle. Right now I really like it bare but I might add a simple garland or some ghosts. Ideas? The crock was 75 cents and it’s filled with rocks I didn’t use for the fish tank.

I can not get a decent picture of the cloche to save my life. It’s actually a cheese platter from my boys grandma. It’s covering turkey S&P shakers. When you raise turkeys people buy you fake turkeys.

The right side. I got the candle sticks for $1 (for all 3!). I hate the color but it’s low on the list of crap to do at this point. The milk glass dishes both came from garage sales as well as the silver dish.

The plate in the center is a white turkey that came from a garage sale for a dollar (see a pattern here?). Any one else notice my cat slinking in to all these pictures?

The Shelf
The house where I grew up had an amazing huge fireplace with stone mantle. I miss it. The only thing I really don’t like about my house is the lack of fireplace (and the color of the bathroom but I can easily change that). The shelf was $25-ish at Lowes. This part of the display was more costly than the buffet part.

This is blurry but it shows the color of the wall better. I really like the shadows from the bat garland.

The lantern on the left is from Michaels. The little turkey dish, his name is Wilfredo, from Joanns. More of my little pumpkins and the Chicken. He doesn’t have a name, any ideas? He came from a garage sale. He was pink. I like this much better, don’t you?

I’m in love with these little crows from Michael’s. My cat loves to stalk them so I can only put them up high. The candle holder is from Pier 1, got in on clearance last year.

This little guy is on the wall next to the buffet. The shelf is from Hobby Lobby, it was $2.50 with chipping black paint. Guess what color it is. Go on. Guess! Yeah, the old stand by Hammered Copper. In another life I was a belly dancer and this is one of my genie lamps. The spiders were a gift from the boy (ain’t love grand?)

Hope you enjoy part 2!
Did you miss Part One?

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Halloween DIY #2 : Giant Lawn Spiderwebs

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Oct 082011

Long ago (my second post I believe, not really that long ago) I promised a second spider decoration. This one if for the great outdoors. I got the idea from my boyfriends family. Every year his mother criss-cosses and tangles yarn all across her porch to make a giant spider web, complete with a tangled up Barbie doll.

At our new house we don’t have a porch in the front of the house so I adapted it (made it easier to clean up and reuse too) for my house. We have 2 small trees in the front yard that I thought would be perfect for this little project.

All you need is some rope (I used white clothesline), scissors, an anchor point (I used trees) and something to attach the rope to the ground. I used landscape pins left over from a garden project, if you have tent stakes or even heavy wire that would also work.

First make a loop.

Next run the rope through the loop and tie one landscape pin to the end.

You can see I wasn’t really careful about clipping my ends, might trim them I might not, at this point it doesn’t bother me. Made a V from the ground to the loop back to the ground.

I used 2 V’s for the small web and 3 for the larger web.

Tie a knot to one outside rope and work your way to the other side by looping the the rope around the strings, tie a knot at the end and cut the rope. You could knot each one but I’m lazy and I wanted this to be done quickly.

Repeat until you like it. I did 2 rows on the small web and 3 on the larger web. You can jazz them up with spiders and barbies.

She had a creepy face so I covered it with a fabric scrap

Easy right?

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I’m almost 600 in, there are a lot of cool things listed this week. I must be hungry because I want to eat all the food!
Simply Designing

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Down On the Farm: Dorothy and Sophia

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Oct 082011

This is Dorothy. I bought her about 13 months ago at an auction. Her back story: she was the ‘family cow’ (basically a term for a non-commercial dairy cow who is used for milk production on a home –scale), her owner died and his kids didn’t want her. She looked so sad and confused at the auction. She was in a stall all by herself in a back corner. I was drawn to her immediately. I spent most of the day in the stall talking to her and petting her neck. The ‘real’ farmers probably thought I was nuts. We bought her bred, she ~~delivered~~ ~~freshened~~ had Sophia about two weeks later.

Sophia Day 2 – See how Dorothy is always trying to lick the camera?

I love my cow. When we bought her her name was Friendly, and she really is. She loves people. When someone new walks in the pasture she’s the first to run (talk about scary, 900+ pounds at a full run AT you) up and ~~slobber~~ sniff. Up until yesterday I have never lived with my cow. She has been at my boyfriends mothers since we got her over a year ago.


Dorothy and Sophia, left, Mable and S’mores, right. Couldn’t this be a card for a Mother’s Day Buffet?

Dorothy is my miracle girl. (Warning! Sad story with a happy ending)

The Cow Who Lived – New Years Day

Last year, on December 17, 2010 Dorothy almost died. She got out of her stall and got her head stuck under a board trying to get to another animals food. My boyfriends mother (BFM) found her laying on her side with her head stuck. She removed to board and tried to get her to stand up. They tried to temp her with food and tried rocking her back and forth but she couldn’t stand.

Mike (my boyfriend) called me at work and told me what happened. At that point I didn’t realize how serious it really was. I left work and drove over to meet the vet. He tried to rock her and then used a cattle-prod to test her reflexes. I felt horrible, like I was being shocked. She didn’t stand but she did move her legs. He eventually told us that she must have hit her back on the wall and injured her spine. He didn’t know if the damage was permanent and he couldn’t tell us if she would ever be ok. He gave us steroids and told us to come by the office for hiplifts to try and get her standing.

One of the worst parts of this ordeal was the weather. It’s December. In Central New York. Cold, Cold, Cold. Of course she somehow crawled out of the barn and was laying in mud (her body heat melted the frozen ground). I has begun compulsively reading anything I could about cow health and found out the bottom of a cows thermal neutral zone is 20 deg F. (That means an acclimated cow isn’t affected by the cold until it’s 20deg). My definition of cold changed. I checked the weather constantly. We made her an igloo. We piled hay bales around her for windbreaks and used a tarp to keep the snow off her. She hated it. The buckets and buckets of warm oat and sweet-feed mash I made helped a little.

The second vet that came out told us that as long as she was trying (eating) we could keep her alive but the longer she was down the less chance there was she would recover. Cows are large animals and their muscles can atrophy very quickly. Generally with farmers, if they don’t get up that day they turn into hamburger. Before you hate on them, realize that it’s HARD to be a dairy farmer, they aren’t making money because they can’t charge what their product is worth. The ones I know try their best for their animals, but if it comes to feeding their kids or meds for an animal that might not recover the kids win. Off the soapbox now…

This all happened right around Christmas, I spent a lot of time crying and screaming. We had some moments hitting rock bottom. It was so cold the tractor wouldn’t start and we couldn’t get her to stand. She didn’t seem to be making progress and it seemed like everyone else was giving up on her. I was literally crying all the time, in the car on my way to work, from work to BFMs house, on the way back to my house. Good thing I didn’t get pulled over right?

Mike and the Girls, she’s skinny and filthy but standing

Then the miracles started. We had a warm snap for a week or so before New Years. And she started moving. No one saw her so we don’t know if she was walking of crawling. I remember walking back to the barn to get aspirin (ever try to shoot a pill the size of your thumb down an angry cows throat?) and I walked back and she was 10 feet away from where she had been.

Fast forward 15 Days. New Years Eve. Walked out of the llama barn after delivering 3 goats (I am multi-talented) and saw a cow-butt sticking up in the air. I swear my world stopped. As soon as she saw us she lay back down. The next day we got the call that she was up AND WALKING. By the time we got there she was laying down (in the barn at least) but we got our miracle. She had lost a lot of weight and was very filthy. She had mastitis in one quarter (more farm lingo, bacterial infection) that we treated with antibiotics. My boyfriend and I had actually decided to ‘pull the plug’ if she wasn’t up by Monday, THE NEXT DAY. I honestly don’t know how if we would have gone through with it.One of those things I don’t like to think about.

Grazing, she gained back all the weight she lost and more

Fast forward again. October 6, 2011. My girl is home with her baby happily grazing and laying in the sun. It’s been such a long bumpy road. I feel like we’ve finally come full circle with her. She has an admirer, Fred is completely enamored. They keen touching noses and he stares at her like a little boy with his first crush.

Love is in the air

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Halloween Tour: Living Room

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Oct 052011

Check out Part Two: Buffet

The dinning room is a mess and the kitchen is still ripped apart so all you get is the living room! For now that is.

Stop one: The bookcase. Previously seen here.

Ignore the bowl, this is the only picture I got that didn’t have an awful shadow. It was moved to the buffet. I made the garland with my slice cutter. I used the Back to School card to cut out four different leaves in different sizes and added some ~~fancy-ness~~ dimension with watercolor pencils.

Stop 2. The TV stand.

Another leaf garland. Some pumpkins I bought last year on clearance and some flowers that didn’t make it onto the wreath.

Stop two: The Windows. These are the windows to nowhere. See the cat condo?

I love my trick or treat banner. It was supposed to be in the dining room but it’s too long. I like it here though, the three sections fit nicely. I cut the triangles from black quilters cotton and cut the letters with my slice (candy from the Spook Alley card and letters from Noel) from 2 fat quarters.

Close ups. I love the little candy pieces.

Stop 4. The coffee table.

Rocking the yo-yo runner. I used this, the extra-large yo-yo maker from clover. This was a stash buster (or a way to stay off Horders). The felt was left over from a wreath, the buttons from my boys grandma and the orange (it has pumpkins!) from something last year. The cloth was a remnant from Joanns, organza with velvet spiderwebs and iridescent orange dots.

The tiles in the window were inspired by this from pinterest.

Once again. Used the slice, either the spook alley or spellbound card.

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Uncooperative DIY Decor

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Oct 022011

Ever have a project that wouldn’t cooperate? This is the back story, I’ve put most of my decorating efforts into the dinning room and the living room is still a bit blah. I’ve got some of the more major things done, the hideous coffee table now has a cover, the windows have a valance and I painted the lamp base and covered the shade.

Before

This is sort of a tricky space to photograph, there is no direct natural light at all. The original color was actually brown (the flash bleached it out) and made the room look like a cave. My grandmother and I painted it literally the day after we closed on the house. My grandmother lives to paint. I kid you not, she and my grandfather showed up with ladders, plastic, paint trays and brushes ready to go.

Shame!

This is more or less what it looked like for the last 2 months.The ribbon rosettes matched the last wreath. See the horrible coffee table the tv sits on? It was my boyfriends for a million years before we met. It’s been the home of our TV since we bought it. The top is a wicker mat over a metal base and over the years its gotten broken and….. gross. For $9 dollars I bought 2 yards of clearance heavy-weight home decor fabric and made a cover.

Tada!

It has slits on all four corners. We keep the Wii and DVD player on the shelf under the TV so we needed to be able to get to them. When we watch a movie we just flip up the front. We tend to watch more from netflix via the wii so it’s not much of an issue because the wii bar in on top of the TV.

Now onto the uncooperative part…

We got two of these lamps from my boyfriends grandmother when she passed away in January. The shades I got a a garage sale for $1 each. I hate the finish on these lamps. Step one was to paint them. I used Rustoleum Hammered Copper. I use that for everything from the $3 shelf from hobby lobby to the frames for the cow pics.

After!

Once again this is pretty bad for color. The walls are actually a light creamy yellow color. I covered the shade with some leftover dark brown burlap. It’s pretty puffy. And if you sit on the couch you can see up the shade. I’m waiting for it to grow on me. Or to find a another cheap shade. It’s probably going to stay at least until the party. What do you think? Should I burn the shade? Keep it forever? Add something more?

I do like the way it looks all lit up…

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