Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Uh Huh Uh Huh

This year Dan and I decided to dress up as classic Sesame Street characters and freak the bejesus out of our friends. lol.  We told everyone that we weren't going to the Halloween/Skydive Gan year end party in Gananoque because I was on a course in Ottawa.  I actually was on course Saturday but only during the day.

After class, Dan and I snuck off down to our friend's house and climbed into our homemade Yip Yip costumes and thankfully got a lift to the bar with our friends.

NO ONE knew who we were.  We totally had them fooled and mega freaked out at points because while some of them hazarded a guess that it might be us or another couple that were late showing, quite a few people thought that we were just two random people from the town of Gananoque.  It was hilarious!

And we won first prize for best costume!!!  Whoop Whoop!!!  I mean "YIP YIP!!"

I'm in Orange, Dan is in Yellow.

This is me pretending to yell at Dan.  Apparently I was really convincing because he looks scared to death of me. lol.

We had so much fun at the party.  And the costume was relatively easy to make.  The Instructions were easy to follow and it only took us 4 different Fabriclands to find the right kind of material for both costumes.  We used a black-jersey-holey-material for the mouth.  We only needed one layer and wer able to see through it fine while no one was able to see back inside at us.  We also amended the instructions by attaching two of my squash racquets to form the mouth.  It worked really well because it allowed us to hold and move the mouth and still be able to drink our beers underneath.

Sooo much fun!!  Hope you all had great Halloweens too :-)

A walk in the park

I went for a hike out to the Old Mill in Gatineau Park this weekend to practice play with shutter speed since there's a really pretty waterfall there.  I was inspired by Darcy's posts for her "31 days to a better photo" piece.  It was going ok and I was starting to get it but my pictures weren't turning out quite as well as I hoped.  I wasn't stressed though cause it was a beautiful day and I was just out there for some fun anyway.  Then as I climbed down to the bottom of the waterfall I saw this beautiful creature:

I LOVE BIRDS!!  Ahem, actually, I love all the critters that roam the earth but birds truly fascinate me.  I struggled to get some pictures that I really liked because I had Dan's lens on, which was great because it has better zoom than mine, but it sucked because I had to focus it manually while I was balancing myself on one rock, my knee on another, and my elbow on a third.  I wanted to get the lowest angle possible.  Here's another view:

One of my favorite youtube videos is "How to Be Alone"  It's a truly lovely production.  Interestingly, I was at the park by myself and as a result I was open to meeting new people just as the video predicted.  I met a guy that was caught up in taking pictures of the heron too.  We hiked out from the mill together talking about photography and the photo clubs in Ottawa.  It turns out that he's a registered massage therapist at the sports physio clinic just down the road from my house.  WOO HOO!!!  I have just landed myself a new massage therapist.  So happy :-)  as much as I adore going out to Le Nordik, it is far and a bit on the $$ side because if you go for a massage obviously you go for the baths and dinner and wine and dessert too!

I'm heading to Jasper this weekend to hang with some old friends so I'm sure I will have lots of opportunities to take some pretty photos...fingers crossed they're not macro bear photos!  That would be bad.

How we made $$ replacing our old toilets

We have some pretty ugly bathrooms.  "Bone" coloured toilets and tubs plus those really old style basic builder vanities that all need replacing. 

 "Bone" coloured toilet...yeck!

We're saving up for all of that but recently we went ahead, splurged, and put in the new toilets...but it didn't cost us a cent!

 Here's the new toilet.  It's a bad pic so you can't really tell how much nicer it is.  It also has an elongated bowl & seat, which is apparently more comfortable for men...maybe now he'll be nice enough to put the toilet seat seat down ;-)

Here's why it didn't cost us ANY money....

This year we also replaced all the windows in our home.  13 in all.  We decided to get an Energy Audit done on the house before that big reno so that we could take advantage of the Provincial and Federal Government grants that are available to residential homeowners in Ontario.  Our toilets were evaluated at the same time and we learned that we qualified for a grant for those as well.  Knowing that, we decided that it was in our best interest to replace the toilets now and apply for the window and toilet grant money all at the same time.  This would save us from paying the Energy Audit people later in the year when we finally got around to updating the bathroom.

Cost - we paid $266.36 for two new low flush WHITE toilets.  They were 30% off at the Home Depot the weekend we bought them.  Score.  I was actually out of town when I heard about this sale during a very important hockey game that I was listening to on the radio.  I rushed home and missed the overtime period because we had to get to Home Depot before it closed.  It was comical though because there were about 20 people huddled around the customer service desk at the store waiting to find out who won.  Only in Canada!

City of Ottawa Rebate - We applied for and are getting a $120 ($60/toilet) rebate on our next water & sewer bill from the City of Ottawa.  This should last Dan and I for a long time.  Our W&S bill is never very high.

NRCan EcoEnergy Grant - We received a grant of $260 ($130 each from the Provincial and Federal Governments) total for both toilets.  The Energy Audit people took care of the paperwork for that one.


Overall Breakdown:

Toilets: $266.36
City of Ottawa Rebate: - $120
NRCan Grant: - $260

Final cost to me is +$113.64.  That's right!  I made money replacing my toilets :-)  

The EcoAudit itself cost $300 for both pre and post reno inspections.  Well, actually it costs $450 but you get $150 back from the Government as well.  So if you were only planning to replace toilets then the Audit is not for you.  BUT if you're planning other renovation activities then I seriously recommend checking into it.  You can check out the Government's grant table for residential properties to get an idea of what your refund will be.  The number in the grant table gets matched by the Provincial Gov't in Ontario...or at least it did when we did our audit.  I imagine these things change as budget priorities change or the money simply runs out of the program.

Just in case you're curious, we replaced 13 windows in our home so our grant for that was $80 * 13 = $1040.

Total grant amount = $1300.

How much can you save?

1 Million Pillowcases

Have you heard about 1 Million Pillowcases???  It's truly inspiring.  Here's the description straight from their website:

Calling all quilters, sewers and crafters! American Patchwork & Quilting is challenging you to join our efforts to Make a Pillowcase, Make a Difference. Every pillowcase can make a difference in your community. A pillowcase can provide comfort for a cancer patient, hope for a foster child, encouragement for a battered woman, or beauty for a nursing home resident.

To participate, find a shop hosting One Million Pillowcase Challenge events in your area. Once your pillowcases are complete and donated locally, log on below to enter how many pillowcases you made. Help us reach our goal of ONE MILLION Pillowcases.

One of the wonderful things about it is that people all over America can get involved with the project but in their own local communities.  It's brilliant and it's easy.  I want to do this in my city - Ottawa, ON.  Since this particular project is American and I live in Canada, I'm going to see if I can get a group of my friends going here as well.  If you're reading this and you want to participate with me, leave a comment and we can coordinate our efforts.  If you make some and you'd like to add some pictures, also leave a comment or send me the pictures through the blog and I will post them!  What a GREAT idea :-)

The website for 1 Million Pillowcases also has free patterns that you can download as well.  Here's one with a very cute material.

Who-who wants to join me??  ...couldn't resist the owl pun, sorry! lol

Re-Do Project RoundUp

There have been a number of projects that I've completed in the last little while that I never got around to blogging about so I thought I would do a RoundUp post and lump them altogether just to get it done and out of the way.

One of the things I've been 'slightly' fascinated with lately is the Salvation Army store.  And by 'slightly' I mean I spend so much time there that my boyfriend says I'm not allowed to go anymore. lol.  I kid, sort of.  I've been greatly inspired by the up do's and tutorials over at Centsational Girl.

Back in February my bestest friend of all time was coming to visit all the way from our hometown in Newfoundland.  Sadly I have no spare furniture!  But as they say "necessity is the mother of invention" or something like that so off I went to the Salvation Army to find some furniture intent to re-do them in amazing Centsational Girl style.  I bought a night stand and dresser for $80 and painting supplies for about $20.  I already had some at home.  I didn't take very good before pictures but here are a few in my garage.  The drawers have been removed and put to the side. 

Since I like Centsational Girl's style so much I decided to paint it using her favourite and most recommended colour - Heirloom White by Rust-o-leum American Accents.  Very pretty.  But first I had to sand and prime them.  I also used the primer recommended by Centsational Girl - Zinsser Cover Stain Primer-Sealer.  It seemed to do the trick:

Boy everything looks ugly when it's only covered with primer.  Nevertheless I carried on.  I attempted to do a vintage finish by spraypainting the corners with brown and then painting over them with the Heirloom White but it turned out awful so I added more and more coats of the Heirloom White until it completely covered the brown.  Here are the results:

 

Both pieces turned out very cute.  I was originally going to buy new hardware for them but in the end decided that the old ones still suited the new look so I kept them.  Deidre came and went that weekend and we had a wonderful time!!  That following week I decided on a whim to list them on kijiji.ca well wouldn't you know it I had someone buy them for $250! Ho-ly!!  Not a bad profit in a week.  Of course, I'd say if I had to pay myself for the time spent it would've been far beneath minimum wage but I did have fun and I learned a lot.

I also bought a small table for $5 from kijiji.ca, which I also refinished in Heirloom White.  Here's the before pic and I will edit the post later with an after shot.

I was on a roll. lol.  I also refinished a little tea light holder.  I used a spray paint for this project:

 

I also found a silver cake server at the Salvation Army.  You can see the $2.99 sticker in the before picture.  I polished it up all nice and shiny in less than a half an hour.  It's a bit hard to tell from the pictures but there was a BIG difference between the before and after.  I keep a look out for silver now each time I'm at the SA just in case.  It's too easy to get it looking good. 

 

That's all the re-do projects that I have finished right now.  I have a garage full of furniture though, which is the real reason my boyfriend says I'm not allowed in the SA anymore...until I get those projects finished!  I bought another nightstand/dresser set for $60.  I bought a hall table but I don't remember for how much?!  I received a tv stand for free from a friend.  I have a small decorative hanging cabinet almost put back together and we just recovered a corner desk off the sidewalk a few houses down from ours, which someone was giving away for free.  Gotta love good neighbours.  I probably won't refinish that piece but there is some assembling and cleaning required.  Fun fun fun. 

I'll post soon about some sewing projects that I've finished in the last little while.  Sadly I have not finished nearly as many as I've started!!

I'm "Earthy Casual"

Today I took the HomeGoods StyleScope Quiz to find out what style makes me smile :-) in hopes that it will help me navigate through the design world as I prepare to redo my Master Bathroom over the coming months...as I can afford it.  We've already replaced the toilets in two of our bathrooms.  More on that later.

 

So according to HomeGoods, I am "Earthy Casual."  I was surprisingly happy with the label.  According to them, this is what Earthy Casual people are like:

You're interested in creating a welcoming home where people feel comfortable and happiness flourishes. You appreciate the warmth and individuality of natural materials and handcrafted things and are inspired by colors and forms from nature. You love mixing up different textures and are sensitive to the tactile qualities of objects. Your style is grounded and solid, not flighty or frilly. And you are never taken in by the trend of the moment.

You value serenity. While there are probably a lot of interesting things in your home, they are joined by your taste or a certain palette that keeps them in harmony. You appreciate the beauty in simple forms. Whether fancy or plain, you appreciate things that are well made and function as well as they look. You also have a strong respect for the environment and craftsmanship. You care about how things are made, and how they are used.

According to HomeGoods, my biggest design challenge is organizing my front entrance...ok I'll get right on that.  I also need to focus on "my happy place," which is outdoors.  That will be a lot easier to do once all the snow is gone from our backyard!  I do like our backyard though.  It has a nice size deck, a few feeders so we can watch the birdies, a postage stamp size lot of grass, grapevines, and some flowers.  I would like to paint the fence this year.  I'll have to investigate how that will work with my neighbour...what happens if my paint drips onto his side of the fence as I'm painting?!  Do I have to clean it up?  I certainly wouldn't want HIS paint dripping onto my side so I suppose I should show him that same courtesy.  We also have to buy new patio furniture this year.  I used to have a set but I left them with the house I sold in Kingston since at that time I was moving into a condo.  I'm trying convince Dan to let me sell the BBQ since I am a vegetarian and haven't used it in 2 years but he continues to convince me every time I breach the subject that we need it.  At the very least we need a new cover.

Here are a few good books on backyard decorating that I've found:














So on the list of things to save up for to decorate my happy place are:
paint
furniture
BBQ cover
lighting
lawn mower (again something I got rid of when I moved into the condo but need again now that I have a yard...I used to have an acre lot = riding lawn mower.  Then I moved into the condo = no lawn.  Now I have a postage stamp sized lawn = perfect!)
oh and I really want a bird bath this year!

Here are a couple I like.  The bowl that attaches to the deck railing is my favorite.















That's a good chunk of coin for all those things before summer.  Eek!  I should start keeping my eye open for backyard things on freecycle as well.

Maybe the bathroom remodel will have to wait since HomeGoods assures me my "happy place" is outside and not soaking away luxuriously in my new and improved Master Bath.

Baby Changing Pad

Yippeee!  I finished another project.  It was close though...it sat on my coffee table 95% done for ~5 days.

I got this tutorial from Jill and it was VERY easy to follow, even for me.  It's the first time I've used iron-on vinyl, fusible fleece, and binding tape.  All very simple in the end but quite ambitious when I wasn't sure how it would go.

Here's what I did...sorry if it's not super detailed but Canada just went on the ice to play Russia!!!  GO CANADA!!

Ok.  So this is one of the things I did different from Jill.  She was lucky enough to have some really cool pre-laminated fabric.  Unfortunately the stuff they had at the local Fabricland was uuuugly.  That wasn't too big of an issue anyway because it meant I got to use two versions of the same pattern (interior & exterior):

This finished product is for my friend who has a baby boy on the way.  Her wedding had a tree theme last year so when I saw this fabric I just knew I had to use it to make her something she could use when the baby arrives.  I like this pattern as well because it's not the traditional 'boy' baby colours.  It's pretty but not too pretty that it can't be used for a boy either.  I also like it 'cause it doesn't scream baby, which I think is good because it's mommy that has to carry it around...and screaming baby needing to be changed screams baby enough already so you're accessories don't have to ;-).

Back to what I did different.  As I said, Jill used pre-laminated fabric.  I used the iron-on vinyl variety shown below instead. 

The instructions were pretty straight forward and while I doubted that it was really sticking when I peeked at it, it never did end up peeling so that was good.  I really like the grid (PAUSE CANADA SCORED, 1-0 CANADA!!!!) for ease of measuring and cutting the pattern.  I ironed on the vinyl and then cut the material.

In my doubting-it-really stuck state, I re-ironed it and it kind of splooged over one of the sides.  Not bad and really nothing to worry about since there would be binding tape added later.

Next it was time to add the two layers of fusible fleece:

I struggled with the fusible fleece momentarily.  You see, when ironing the vinyl you're not supposed to use steam so I assumed the same must be true for the fleece.  I tried ironing both sides to the fabric and it sorta stuck but not like I thought it should.  In a fit of frustration I decided to blast out some steam and woo hoo it stuck.  Yeah for me.  The fleece also spread out a bit, which meant I ended up with a little more on one side and a little less on the other.  I trimmed it off and it didn't make any difference to how my pattern looked.

Then I sewed the vinyl interior to the fleecy outside - wrong sides together.  You want to keep a very small allowance.  Otherwise you either end up trimming a bunch off or seeing the seam even after you add the binding tape.

Jill's next steps were to add the closure (sewing that was messy but thankfully my thread truly matched my webbing so it's not terribly noticeable) and to sew the 2 vertical lines where the folds would be.  Instead of pinning them while the pad was flat I decided to fold it and then pin it.  This way I ensured that the pad would actually fold in a nice way when it was done.

I'm getting quite excited at this point since I've done a bunch of work and it still looks like my example.  One of my fold lines wasn't very straight but in the end after trimming and then sewing on the binding tape you could hardly notice.  Phew!  Oh whoops, it's called bias tape not binding tape...that's what we call it on our skydiving gear.  Got my hobbies confused there for a sec.

Next was the bias tape.  I love this stuff.  It hides the ugly edge and makes it look very profesh :-)  Here's how you pin it on:

and this is after I sewed it on the vinyl side:

 

Then it was time to hand sew the bias tape to exterior.  I did little bits at a time since I'm not very good.  Honest to God my hand cramped after the first 10 minutes.  I did a little bit each night...that is until I didn't...then it sat, unfinished, mocking me.  Grrr.  Then the library came to my rescue.  A book that I ordered on another type of craft arrived (2-0 CANADA!!!!! WOOP WOOP!...bet you didn't think you'd get an Olympic play-by-play during your baby changing pad tutorial but I can't help myself - I'm Canadian and it's hockey for crying out loud - what's a girl to do).  Anyway, I told myself that I absolutely was not allowed to start the new thing without finishing this one (3-0!!  Out of Control!).

And I did finish it.  Good girl.  Here it is ready to go:

And here's a view of it unfolding:

 

I hope she likes it :-)  And that Canada keeps kickin' Russia's butt!! 

Skydiver Parachute Toy

I'm posting this parachute stuffie toy simply because I am actually a skydiver and this is so cute.  I might have to make a few of these and send them out to my friends' little boys. 

...after I do a couple of other things first!

Sun Safe Swimwear Giveaway!

I love these swimsuits from Panga Swimwear!!  They're hot and they will keep my pale, nearly transparent, skin from burning.  I wish I'd had one of these when I was in New Zealand in Dec/Jan where they can have 7 minute burn times in the height of their summer heat.  I wore SPF 75 the whole time.  As much as you like your tan ladies - skin cancer is NOT something to mess with.

"The Annie" is my favorite.  This photo is also my new workout-and-eat-well inspiration!  I know I would look waaaay better in this swimsuit over any bikini ;-P.

And lucky us, TheRubberPunkin is giving one away!!  Go check it out and enter to win.

Better late than never Valentine's treat

This finishing act was a bit of a cheat since my partner, Dan, is a chef.  Some of my favourite time spent with him is in the kitchen baking or cooking.  Mostly baking.  I like following a recipe so baking works for me.  We meant to make these on the weekend but ended up having friends visit from Toronto so we went skating on the canal and played our favorite Cranium Family Edition instead. 

Last night we dove into the cocoa, yum, and made our nanaimo bars.  Dan is from New Zealand and had no idea what nanaimo bars are or where Nanaimo is! lol.  A special Canadian treat indeed & especially nice to eat while watching all those Olympic athletes in BC (where Nanaimo is located as well) burn off 1000s of calories every second ;-).  And even though Valentine's day has passed we decided to make them pink anyway like these.  The recipe comes from Barb at http://vinolucistyle.com.  I have a really great recipe for raw brownies, which I'll have to post at some point, so I used the very, very, very expensive but SCRUMPTIOUS Raw Chocolate Cacao Powder that I had on hand.  Barb used a vanilla pudding powder but I used vanilla custard powder since I actually made my grocery list from the mybakingaddiction website instead but I would imagine that both would be fine.

Aside from eating the final delights, the highlight of the night was that Dan let me use one of his chef's knives to chop the almonds.  He hasn't sharpened it in awhile thank goodness as I am more likely to cut off my finger than actually chop the almonds!

In the end, we were sat in front of the tv with a cup of tea and these delicious little treats.  Dan liked them & requested that next time we flavour the middle layer with mint.  I'm thinking I'll try that for St. Patrick's Day!!  They were also a big hit with my co-workers during our coffee break this morning.

Did I mention I'm an amateur photographer as well?  If anyone has any feedback on how to improve my pictures, please advise.  I know, I know.  I should start with taking the picture in focus ;-)  But today let's just be thankful that I made the darn cookies!

My first post...beer!

Sooo here we are, my first post.  My apologies but it's not actually about beer.  In skydiving, whenever you do or have a first (first malfunction, first 100 jumps, first kiss in freefall, etc etc) you have to buy a case of beer for the dropzone.  This is a universal truth in skydiving and after you buy your first few cases of beer you start to learn that whenever you say "that was the first time I did 'blank'" it will shortly be followed by a chorus of "beer!!" from all the skydivers within earshot.  Of course, all alcohol is consumed post skydiving for obvious safety reasons!  Lucky for me, I am not skydiving at the moment and can enjoy this glass of wine as I write my first post instead.  Still, as a skydiver, I could not help but shout it out when I caught myself saying "My first post."  Good times.

If you have read my "about me" then you already know I'm a great starter but a not so great finisher.  Then it should come as no surprise that even though I was VERY excited to get started on setting up my blog (a task I know very little about) last night...that I woke up this morning thinking "ugh, there is no way I'm brave enough, creative enough, or interesting enough to keep this blog up."  Well I'm sorry to tell you this Mrs Self-Doubtfire but I am bound and determined to do this.  I'm brave and creative and interesting enough to keep myself entertained a few hours each week writing this blog and that's good enough for me, for now!

Right now, my goal is to finish the things I start out to do.  I am very good at this at work.  I often fail at this at home.  I'm not setting out to invent my own new and crafty ideas just yet.  First I need to lean on my blogs o'inspiration to show me all the beautiful examples of what I could be making.  I guess that means I plan to copy...in my own way.  They say imitation is the best form of flattery, right!  I know there are other women out there like me that want to 'make stuff' but don't have ideas of their own or the confidence to try to make their own designs.  This blog's for you ladies!  Enjoy.