Lesson 41: Sewing Pajama Pants

In only a semi-particular order here is my project of making Tyler some pajama pants that took place over the course of about 3 days...

Oh and I cut my hair...
There will of course be the token picture of Max as well :)
I asked Tyler to take some pictures of me since there were no pictures of the actual making of my wrap around skirt.



Here I am pinning the pattern to the flannel. It is navy blue which does not come across well in these photos.

You can see Max's ear in this photo because he was right there beside me the entire time trying to eat the pins.

He has some strange obsession with my tomato pin cushion.

It is a good thing I found my larger tomato. Previously I was using a smaller pin cushion that Max could actually fit into his mouth... and he did. I had to chase him down and yank it from his doggie death grip.

This is me sewing the front of the pant leg to the back.

This weekend was also General Conference which is an opportunity for everyone to hear/watch messages from church leaders. This is Max and me taking a break from sewing to watch conference.

Here is Tyler in between the conference sessions taking a nap. We watched the speakers via the Internet.

After conference was over it was back to work. Throughout sewing projects there is a lot of ironing. If you read the directions it will say things like "press" the fabric, I believe they say press instead of "iron" to make the project sound more fun.

Aw man, I have to IRON.... no way! Oh wait, I just have to "press" that fabric, well I can do that.

Max has been super possessive of his tennis ball today for whatever reason.

Tyler worked on physics while I sewed and Max guarded his tennis ball.

Ta da! The finished product! Looking good Tyler!

Tyler has approved both of these pics to be on the Internet :)
Max has not approved this picture.

Lesson 40: Stand by your man and his HPPV

http://www.greenriver.edu/news/hppv-competition-2011.htm

This link is for an article from GRCC from this past spring when the drafting and engineering clubs went to Eastern WA University to enter in the HPPV (Human Powered Paper Vehicle) competition. It was a lot of fun! My parents and I went and enjoyed seeing all the different vehicles. Can you spot the furry little friend who made it into the picture?

Lesson 39: Happy 7 month birthday Max

In honor of Max being 7 months old I put a ticker on the blog showing how old he is.

Jenae told me there is a timeline of blogging that most people abide by.... children do not blog, teenagers blog about boring teen stuff (hahaha), then young single adults blog about being single, newlyweds blog about being married, then about sewing, then about babies, or if they don't have a baby yet they blog about their dog. :)

So here is what Max can do and what he likes now that he is 7 months old:
He is walking all by himself.
He manages to almost sleep through the night and not pee on the bed.
His favorite toy is his new hedgehog that makes this noise that sounds like an evil chipmunk laugh.
He is eating solid food.
He can say grr, bark, grumble, and whine
Ducks scare him.

We are just so proud of our little man...dog.

Lesson 38: The Finished Product

It took working until 11PM last night but I finished my skirt :) It is just a simple wrap around skirt but this is the very first time I have sewed clothing for a human to wear. There are darts in this skirt which is also a first for me. I even wore it to work today.

My next project will be sewing sweat pants for Tyler. I went with my sisters to the fabric store this past weekend and bought some nice soft flannel and other supplies.

And for no reason other than I had this picture on my camera here is Max.

Lesson 37: Thee lift me and I'll lift thee and we'll ascend together.

Yesterday Tyler, Miranda, the babies and I saw "Dolphin Tale." It is based on the true story of a dolphin that was caught in a crab trap and ended up losing its tail. The dolphin beat the odds and survived. The story continues from there. Winter, the dolphin, even had a prosthetic tale developed just for her. It was amazing! There is a website you can visit to see Winter on a live webcam...

http://www.seewinter.com/

She is so cute. :)

I love inspirational stories of people doing all they can to better life. Plus this is a great family movie with an underlying theme of families being together forever which is cool because that is primarily what we as Latter-Day Saints believe.

It has been a great weekend full of spending time with my husband and my sisters... and Maxi Poo too :)

I have been working more on my skirt/sewing skills today. Sadly I have not even gotten to the actual sewing part yet. There is so much prep work to be done before even pulling out the sewing machine. I had to iron the fabric (see Lesson 35) and iron the pattern itself. There can be NO wrinkles. There is also the step of cutting out the pattern, laying the pieces out on top of the fabric and pinning. This all seems straight-forward enough but it is essential to keep the fabric flat so as not to throw off your eventual cutting. Copying the pattern marks onto the fabric is the step I am currently working on.

Tyler brought home these random sheet metal bits from work a while back. One is circle and the other is square. I asked why and he replied that he had made them at work while training on a new machine. Once again I asked him why he had brought them home. His response was that they are a souvenir... or a paperweight? .... Well today I put his "paper weights" to good use with holding my fabric still and it worked perfectly :)

Lesson 36: I love every little bit of my husband and puppy

Lesson 35: When God Closes a Door He Opens an Internet Window

I am bored....

Luckily there is a website called http://upsidedowndogs.com/

Essentially it is photos of people's dogs.... upside down. :)

Speaking of, after Tyler went off to work I was woken up this morning by a strange clicking noise. It was none other that Maximus Destructivus. He had chewed off half of one of Tyler's shirt buttons. I am telling the blog before I have even told Tyler.... so I hope that makes you feel special. I already sewed on a new button so we are good for now....

Tyler laid out his suit pants to be ironed a couple days ago. At this point in the marriage I am not sure if this was a hint for me of a reminder to himself, so I got out my ironing board this morning and went to work on the pants. I'm not sure if Tyler likes having a crease in his pants. Maybe all guys like having a crease, or you are just supposed to have a crease no matter what.... grabbing the first pant leg I made my attempt at ironing a crease. It looked blah and wonky. Midway up the leg the crease shifted to one side. Pulling the second pant leg across the board I decided to iron this one with no crease and decide after which looked better. The no-crease look did not turn out so well either. It was all lumpy and ick. The clock informed me that I was running behind for work so I threw the pants over a chair and called it good. That reminds me... I am really bad at ironing..... I had completely forgot since it had been so long ago that I had ironed clothing.

A point of reference for how bad I am at ironing is this: long ago when I was a teenager I noticed that my mom had layed out a huge pile to be ironed on the dining room table. Being super sweet and amazing I thought I would help her while she was gone and iron all the clothes.

Later that same night I walked into the room and found my mom ironing that very same pile of clothing I had just worked on hours before. "I already ironed those!" ... To this my mom replied, "You did? Are you sure?" ..."Yes," I replied a little hurt by her lack of noticing. I can't really remember what my mom said next, but I do know the bottom line was that the clothes were still so wrinkly they could have been mistaken for having just come out of the dryer.

After heading out to work today I texted Tyler and apologized for not informing him before we got married that I lack ironing skills. I missed that chapter in female 101.

Oh well.... at least there are people out there who are willing to take funny pictures of their dogs for my benefit...

Lesson 34: Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Yesterday I came home to this. Max had ripped up all my trust in him and threw it across the floor... also the stuffing from one of the couch pillows. In just about 4 hours Max had figured out how to unzip the pillow cover (without breaking the zipper), tear open the pillow within and scatter the contents across the living room floor.

To quote Miss Hannigan from Annie, "Kill, Kill, Killlllllll!"

Ever attempting to maintain my sanity I grabbed the half empty pillow and proceeded to pluck up every piece of cotton and shove them back in the shredded casing. A bright magenta was the thread already loaded into my sewing machine, perfect :) I sewed shut the gaping hole and zipped the pillow back into its case. The pillow now is missing one of its corners and looks awkwardly overstuffed.

This crazy dog is out to get me... but I will say this for him, he certainly likes to come up with new and fresh ideas every time he terrorizes the apartment.

Lesson 33: A Boring Post for a Fun Weekend.

The theme for this weekend was new toys for everyone. Tyler and I had to run some errands and we decided that poor deprived Maximus needed some new toys. He had completely demolished the majority of his play things up to this point. The first night Max spent with his toys he pulled a Mike Tyson and bit the monkey's ear off. The hedgehog's little "press here" label did not stand a chance either.


I bought a book on how to sew. Very exciting..... the first few chapters are dedicated to getting you all reved up to be a seamstress. The author advised creating your own work space which for me equals the dining room table. Also I was supposed to create an inspiration board using cork board and fabric. Here is my make shift inspiration board. Are you feeling inspired yet?

Tyler VOLUNTEERED to take me to Joann Fabrics to pick up some fabric.... I don't have a specitic project in mind just yet so I had no idea what I was looking for. Tyler picked out this print which looked great to me.

Tyler's present to himself was DragonAge I.... or something like that.... I don't know. He knew I was taking this picture of him. That is not what he looks like while he plays video games.... That is probably more the face I make when I watch the game as he plays it. ;)

This is just a picture of how Max looked when I woke up one morning.

Another day while I was home alone I noticed the apartment was quiet... too quiet. I called for Max and when he does not come you can be sure he is up to no good, most likely under the bed hiding out. I found Max like this and shouted, "I can see you Max!" At this Max scurried further in under the bed the solution to which is a nice long broom.

Lesson 32: It's a Wonderful Life

A friend asked me today if there was anything new and exciting in my life. After a brief pause, I shook my head, no. She also claimed to have nothing new and exciting happening in her life either. "I guess we are just two boring people," she added.

My response to this was, "Oh my life is not boring, it is exciting. I just don't think anyone else would think it is exciting." :)

Thirty minutes until my lunch break wahoo :)

My friend Jenae, the very same friend who flew in to visit me a couple weeks ago, is my email buddy at work. She is my only friend who consistently emails every day. Her correspondence is one of my small pleasures in life.

Max has developed this funny new habit or grumbling in the morning. He is only 7 months old. That is a little young to be a grumpy old man. He will grumble, grumble, BARK! grumble, grumble. Yesterday morning I looked at him and he was doing this with his eyes closed. I think he does not like the sound of the sprinklers outside. When I went to pick him up he looked at my, looked away, and grumbled. He is not is any pain... just being a pill I suppose.

Poor Tyler was not feeling well last night which lead to soup for dinner and our going to bed at 8:30PM. I love going to bed early so this was no sacrifice for me. Max on the other hand was running laps on the bed until I pulled him into my arms to calm him down.

Lesson 31: Sew What???

This past weekend I had the chance to go shopping with my two sisters. We were on a mission to find a wedding dress for my oldest sister Elspeth. It was successful. Elspeth got her dress with shoes to match and she looks great in them! Personally I was on the hunt to find a fun new wallet (the cheaper the better). I had no idea Hello Kitty was so expensive! $12 for a small Velcro billfold. Then I saw a fun book that gave me inspiration. Although I don't remember the name, it was all about how this girl finds things she likes and then she makes them herself. It also included instructions for the reader to do the same. I determined to go home and sew my own wallet. Once again my friend, Google, directed me to several websites with free wallet patterns and instructions. Tyler volunteered his grubby old t-shirt for the material and I found my Saturday night activity. It is just a small credit card sized wallet with an elastic strap closure. I love it :)

Yesterday Tyler handed me his camouflage jumpsuit and put in a request to have me use the material to sew a t-shirt for him. After verifying that he did in fact want a t-shirt made from this rough material I spent the greater portion of my afternoon drawing up a pattern I had copied from a sewing blog. I ended the evening with completely deconstructing the jumpsuit and calling it a night. I have my work cut out for me... literally.

Lesson 30: How to Better a Sweater

Recently I found a fun website http://www.craftstylish.com/. People can post all sorts of different craft and sewing project ideas on their own personal page and then other people can attempt the project and post pics of their creation. Turning an ugly sweater into a dog sweater caught my eye a few weeks back. This past weekend Jenae and I made the rounds at some yard sales and we were able to find this beauty. Jenae, the haggler, talked the owner down from $1 to $0.50. I love the way she talks money with people. "Do you want it or not?" Max humored me and allowed the still human sized sweater to be put on him. This I suppose could be the before picture.

Here is the after picture complete with his popped preppy collar.

The side view of Max as he sits in his favorite spot where he gets to stare out the window.

Work it! Work it!

This was a really fun project. I feel like I am getting better with my sewing machine and all the seams are finished. There were some bumps along the way where I would announce how my low level of intelligence was causing me to continually forget to lower the foot lever before sewing thus causing a rat nest of thread to develop. Tyler would then argue that I am in fact NOT stupid and doing a good job. :)

Lesson 29: If Invited to Play Mini Golf Be Sure to Bring Your Silly Friends

Whoever invented mini golf is a marketing mastermind. I have never had a fun time at this silly date night activity and yet I continue to return. How my friend Jenae would describe it is that you have to go with fun people and make up fun challenges. Except this is not saying that mini golf is fun but your friends are. Anyway my friends are fun.

These pictures are in no particular order but after mini golf we went to Red Robin and used our free dessert/appetizer card (see Lesson 5). This was not a filling dinner so we headed over to Applebees for half priced appetizers. It is fun being married to an ex-server. He knows all the inside scoop on restaurants... although sometimes I do not want to hear that some of the food I just paid for was microwaved.

Batting cages hooray! Batting cages, unlike mini golf, never cease in their awesomeness! I can remember a daddy-daughter youth group night where the dads and daughters had to answer questions about each other (similar to the Newlywed Game). One question was something about where is you daughter's favorite place in the world? My dad was able to match my answer with "the batting cages"! :)

I'm a bit out of practice (plus I was wearing sandals) so I stuck with slow pitch. Tyler tried his hand at the fastpitch and did pretty well for himself.

No set of pictures is complete without some dwonky pic of Tyler and me.

We had to hit the ball through this cave. One of Jenae's super awesome mini golf enhancing ideas was to stand over the ball as it rolled by.

My camera was taking forever to take a picture but Tyler had his arm shoved all the way in that hole to push his ball through. Ignoring my plea he would not shove his arm back into the hole for my picture.

Part of making up silly rules involves crazy shots that most often send the ball to no man's land. Jenae and Me :)

Some of the different rules were to kick the ball to the hole, hit it backwards through your legs, push it like a hockey puck to the hole, use a nearby rock as the tee, or just throw the ball with your hands.

Tyler demonstrating the proper way to play goofy rules mini golf.

Tyler keeping a safe distance since most of the time we would have no clue which way the ball was going to fly off.

Like I said, the ball had a tendency to wander off.

MAX!