Galentine's Day

One of the parts of my job in doing campus ministry is planning and having events.  This is one of my favorite parts!  Ever since I got involved with Cru I have always wanted to be able to plan a women's time event.  It seemed that I was never given the opportunity to do so.  This past weekend, I was finally able to - a Galentine's Day brunch!

I love hosting events and it was fun planning for it all.  I am so blown away for how it went!  After the event, I counted 17 people there!  I am so amazed and thankful at the turn out we had!  Women's time is something we do every now and then for just the ladies in Cru to hang out together.  There is usually some theme to the event.  I wanted Galentine's Day to just be a time for the ladies to relax, hang out, and get to know one another better.  We ate food, did a little content on God's love for us, and then had various crafts that people could do.

^^Tori put encouraging, up lifting notes on the mirror.^^

My roommates helped get the apartment decorated!

^^Stephanie decorating her cupcakes.^^

^^Tori getting the scones ready.^^

One of the girls that was attending has dietary restrictions, so I tried to figure out a menu that would work for her to eat.  I made scrambled eggs with just adding salt and pepper.  That way anyone could eat them and then we could add our own toppings on.  My roommates and I did some baking, but then I also got a special treat for the one.  It ended up working well!  Especially since you can prepare most of the food before everyone gets there - besides cooking the eggs (unless you put them in a crockpot).

I made monkey bread and a blueberry streusel coffee cake.  Tori made scones and Stephanie made cupcakes.

^^Tori's cranberry orange scones.^^

After we ate, I shared a little bit from a book I just read called "Come Rest."  I highly recommend the book!  Since it was a Galentine's Day event, I wanted to incorporate a little content on God's love for us.  I read the introduction from the book because it had some good points and then asked some questions.  I am so surprised and happy with the discussion we had - I thought it went really well!  People were willing to open up and share.

The rest of the time was just time to hang out and do any of the crafts that they wanted to.  People hung around much longer than I thought they were, which was awesome!  Everyone was just having fun and enjoying the time!

I had canvases and wood blocks to paint, yard to make pom pom garlands, and my roommates and I got one of the bathrooms set up to do face masks.

Here is where I got the idea for the wood blocks.  You paint the wood blocks and then glue on a clothes pin to make a "picture frame."

Molly brought henna.  The girls loved doing this!  It's basically doing art on your skin.

Stephanie printed off the Love Language test for anyone who wanted to do that too!

There was a door prize drawing.  I love the way it turned out!  I found the mug at TJ Maxx.  In it, I put a pair of fuzzy socks, a face mask, Burt's Bees chapstick, and some chocolates.  I put the mug in a silicon bag and tied it with a cute ribbon.

The things we did for this brunch would be fun for basically any gathering of ladies!

Shopping List

Groceries:

• Eggs (I got 36 eggs and between the baking and scrambled eggs, I am glad I did... could have maybe used more!)
• Shredded cheese
• Meat, such as ham bacon or sausage (I got deli ham and diced it up)
• Veggies (I ended up not getting these)
• Salsa/Pico De Gallo (I got fresh salsa)
• Avocado/Guacamole
• Baking ingredients for whatever you decide to bake
• Fresh fruit (I got oranges, grapes, bananas, and blackberries)
• Coffee
• Coffee Creamer
• Milk
• Orange Juice

Crafts:

• Canvases
• Paint and Paint Brushes (I already had a bunch of these)
• Wood blocks
• Medium sized clothes pins
• Hot glue gun
• yarn
• croqueting hook

Decorations:

• Paper plates
• Napkins
• Plastic silverware
• Streamers
• I would have gotten flowers, but because of Valentine's Day, they were so expensive.

My roommates did some decorating too.  One post post-it notes on a mirror with encouraging, up lifting notes.  Another got a Valentine's Day heart garland and the fun tablecloth.

I wanted to send the girls home with a little treat.  But, I ran out of time.  If I would have, I would have needed packaging - silicon bags and ribbon.

My Summer Sewing Project

I didn't have many plans or anything too exciting to do this summer, so I made a little list with ideas of things to do, mostly at home or nearby.  One thing I wanted to do this summer was to sew, like make a quilt.  A real quilt.  In junior high, I made a quilt with my mom's cousin Chris for a 4-H project.  It was a kit, so all the pieces were pre-cut.  Other than that, I did the WHOLE thing, including the quilting.  It was a lot of work!  Then a couple summers ago, I for some reason felt like making a quilt.  I ended up making rag quilts, and a bunch of them, but they aren't exactly real quilts.  Again, this summer, I felt like like making a quilt.  So, with my spare time, I made a quilt - the whole works.  I figured it would be a great learning experience, something fun to work on, and having a quilt, that I have made would be fun too.

I used this pattern from Posie Gets Cozy.  I purchased it online and then I was able to download it onto my computer.  The pattern suggested what materials to use for the batting and backing and gave all the measurements for fabrics.  There were step-by-step directions with pictures too!  It worked great.

I got all my supplies at Jo-Ann Fabrics.  I was a bit worried that they wouldn't have enough fabrics for me to select from that I liked, but they did.  I spent quite a bit of time in that store getting my supplies!  There were so many combinations of fabrics that I could have done - I can see how someone could get hooked on sewing!  I love the fabrics that I got!  I love that there is a mixture of fabrics - some more vintagey ones and then ones that are more bold in color and add a little pop to the quilt!

I am just going to go out and say how much I spent on this quilt.  I spent 168 dollars (about) and I ended up using some thread that we had around our house, so it could have been a buck or two more.  Quilting is expensive!  Though, some of the items I bought were first-time-quilter purchases, like the self-healing cutting board and rotary cutter.

I started my quilt as soon as I had the material.  The work went fast - it seemed that this project wouldn't take me that long.  But, then the excitement of it started to wear off and I didn't work on it for a while.  My fabrics, sewing machine, and the cutting tools all sat out for a while.  It got to the point where I just needed to finish it.  I really didn't have that much left to do, and once I got working on it again, I was soon done.

I made a full size quilt because that is what size bed I have.  I didn't know if I would put it on my bed, or what exactly I would do with it, but just incase.  As I started to lay the strips out, it looked like it was going to be HUGE, but as I began to sew the pieces together, the quilt became smaller.  I think it turned out to just the right size - not too big, not too small.

(I just snapped the pictures on my iPhone while I was making it, so they aren't the greatest.)

I love the way my quilt turned out... but, it is not one bit perfect.  And, I am ok with that because nothing I do will ever be perfect and if I expect perfection out of anything crafty I do, I just get frustrated.

For the quilting, I was to sew along one side of each of the quilt top's seams going the length and width.  I was able to quilt the length fine (well, it still isn't straight, but better than the width) because I had seams to follow.  But, when I went to quilt the width of the quilt, my squares didn't all line up.  I knew I wouldn't be able to sew the width very well, without anything to follow.  So, I laid some tape about every 4 inches along the width.  I did not get the tape down straight, and I was not able to sew straightly along the tape.  The quilt ended up being quilted down the center of squares.  But, that just makes the quilt more unique!  (I really don't know if this made any sense.)

Also, I decided to embroider a little "tag" on one of the corners of the quilt saying "summer 2015," but that got totally messed up.  This quilt isn't perfect, but that just makes it more unique.

Having sewn a quilt before helped greatly for giving me an idea of what I was supposed to do, especially with the quilting.  I still don't know what I am going to do with my quilt (I don't think I am going to put it on my bed anytime soon), but it is quite the accomplishment and exciting to have.

An Early Out

Yesterday we had an early out from school because the weather was getting bad.  I am super glad we did!  Yesterday was the last day of the semester, so we weren't doing much in school - especially in my last two hours of the day, which were the classes I got to miss.



I came home and really didn't have anything to do.  I didn't have any homework.  I need to apply for some scholarship so I attempted to do that.  But, I wasn't very successful at that.

My Mom had been sewing a curtain to go around a desk/counter in our basement.  Since the sewing machine was out my Mom suggested that I make an apron.  I have been wanting to try making an apron.  I used painter's drop cloth.  Yes.  I did.  It sounds weird, but it works!  My mom has used it for making many things, like curtains.

I quickly looked at an apron that we have, and that is all that I used to follow.  I think that the apron turned out pretty good for not really knowing what I was doing.

I embroidered an "M" on it.  Otherwise it would be pretty plain.  My Mom thought I should do a more natural color since the "fabric" I used is such a natural color.

This evening I got my first use out of it.  My brother wanted to have homemade pizza for supper and that can be pretty messy.  We used our pizza stone.  It was our fist time using it for pizza.  I tried it before, but since we don't have a pizza peel, I wasn't able to get my finished pizza in the oven.


I have to admit that Thomas came up with a good way to get the pizza, on the pizza stone, into the oven.  I think he maybe a did a little research on pizza making.

When using a pizza stone you have to heat the stone up in the oven.  So, without a pizza peel, Thomas got the pizza into the oven.  While the oven was heating up, he let the stone heat up too.  Meanwhile, he rolled out his dough.  When he was ready to top the pizza, he opened the oven, pulled the rack out, took the pizza stone out of the oven, set it on a cooling rack, and sprinkled the stone with corn meal (important!).  Oh, and don't forget to close the oven!  He put the pizza on the stone and topped it (careful, it is HOT!).  Then, to put the pizza in the oven, he pulled the rack out again, put the the stone, with the pizza, into the oven, pushed the rack in, and let the pizza bake.

A Weekend Get-Away to Grandma's and a Sewing Project

 Over Christmas break I did pretty much nothing.  I did do some baking, went to Grandma's for Christmas - but didn't stay extra, and then got sick - so I couldn't do much.  By the end of the break I was feeling like I needed to do something.  I needed to get out of the house.

My mom called my Grandma to see if I could come stay the weekend with her and Grandpa.  Of course I could.  So, on Friday after school and work, my Grandma picked me up to go up to her place.

On Saturday, my Grandma had a Lakselget luncheon.  I went to that with my her.  Lakselget is a group of Norwegian ladies.  Laks means salmon in Norwegian and salmon skim up stream.  The idea of this group is to be ones that go against the flow, like salmon.

The luncheon was at a gulf course.  They always have salmon, potatoes, and cooked carrots.  There was a white sauce for the salmon, a cucumber salad, and dinner rolls at each table to pass around.  And, someone had made krumkake to put out on each table.  The food was all very delicious!

After we ate, there was a speaker.  The speaker this time was a photographer.  She grew up on a four-generation farm in North Dakota.  Her ancestors came from Norway.  With her photography, she made a book documenting the history of her farm.  She was a pretty good speaker.  The "meeting" also had some fun Norwegian announcements (I guess that is what you could call them), a prize for the person with a paper heart under their saucer, and some birthday gifts for those with a birthday in January.

I thought this entire luncheon was pretty interesting and fun.

I have had this fabric that I have been wanting to make a skirt out of for a little while now.  This weekend get-away would be a great time to have my Grandma to help me with it.  After the Lakselget luncheon, we ran over to Jo-Ann's to get some elastic that we needed.  Then, I wanted to go for a walk/jog around the lake, since is was going to be the only semi-warm day for a while.  We also had to do a quick grocery run.  After doing some running around that day, we headed back to Grandma's.

That evening we had supper and worked on the skirt.

The only pattern we had were my two favorite skirts.  The beginning part of the skirt wasn't too hard, but the towards the end, my Grandma was doing something new, and I had never sewn a skirt before, so my Grandma did most of the work.

It is a corduroy skirt with a silky lining.  I love the way it turned out!

Originally, I was just going to stay up at my Grandparents' until Sunday.  But, then, on Friday, the governor decided to cancel school for the whole state on Monday because of the predicted extreme cold.  So, why not stay up there until Monday?  But, on Sunday morning my Mom called and said that maybe it wouldn't be a good idea to be out traveling on Monday in the extreme cold.  So, on Sunday, my Grandma and I hurried to finish the skirt so that I could get home on Sunday evening.  And, now I am just at home on this extremely cold  "snow day".  But I had a nice little get-away.

So... I Made Another Rag Quilt

 So, I made another rag quilt.  This one took me a bit longer to make than the ones I have made in the past.  My Mom asked me one day if I would like to make another rag quilt.  She had been going through our fabric and we had a lot of just the solid colors left.  She also had gotten some coupons to Jo-Ann's for flannel.  I said sure and that I was actually kind of feeling like making one.

I love the way this one turned out.  It is NOT one bit perfect.  But, that's o.k.  It is a rag quilt.

Adding it to the collection.  Now there are enough for everyone in my family.

You can follow my directions here on how to make a rag quilt.