Holiday Plate Stacker Snack display

Isnt this the greatest find???  It's 1960s, made from plastic plates, missing one, but appropriate hardware for 3 stacking plates!  I found this on The American Homemaker's Etsy Shop... who knows where she found it!

This is how it arrived.  I had asked her to package it in pieces for easier tranport.  The plates had a 1/4 inch hole drilled into them.  First task:  secure new plates and a 1/4 inch drill bit that could drill through glass/ceramic.
And this is what became of it:

The process started by marking out the centers of the plates and drilling small pilot holes.

It continued with the glass and ceramic drill blade which is best used with water.

One with a hole, 2 more to go.

As in all projects involving the husband, beer and a 2nd plate with the hole drilled.

Then it was just a matter of assembly...

Which was had a few issues since our plates were heavier and thicker than the original ones, but it turned out perfectly!

Shop at Angie's Etsy shop here. 

She has quite a variety of retro and vintage items.

Organizing and Scrapbooking Family Portraits

Some serious mess, right? At first glance, sure, but this is actually organization in work. I have a scrapbook in which I keep 8x10s of all the family's portraits.

Well, that's the idea, anyway. It hadn't been updated since 2006. For the last 5 years, I had kept the portraits for our 4 children in one box. 

But it is quite a bit to sort through when looking to put them in chronological order. How could I even have left them in a mess like this???

I started by opening the box and taking everything out.  Since it also held all the extra copies and went back 21 years to 1990, and since many of the sets were in non-photo-safe envelopes, I started  by emptying the envelopes and laying out matching photos in piles.

Piles and more piles.

Everywhere Piles.

Then I began sorting by year and returning the portraits to the box.  In this particular situation, I am using a Creative Memories Power Layout Box.  It is 12x12 and can hold large items safely for long terms.  Nope, not what it was made to do, but I never really used it for what it was meant, so this is a good use otherwise.

I took the opportunity to label it.  You know me, everything needs a label.

The sections inside are made so that things cant shuffle from one section to another, perfect for keeping the pictures separated.  I labeled each section with date, name and age and put the most recent on top.  With everything sorted, it was quite easy to complete the scrapbook pages with the remaining portraits. 

Finally finished, at least until next fall...

A Few Great Reads

Having our kids receive Kindle Fires for Christmas this year has prompted a new reading amongst us all.  Amazon routinely has daily deals for cheaper prices on ebooks, as well as tons of free books.  In addition to reading on a Kindle, you can also download apps to read on your PC or other devices. 


Free Kindle Reading Apps

These are the two books I have read since Christmas Day and both were exciting and enjoyable, keeping my attention through out the entire book.  I hope you enjoy them as well!


The Venom of Vipers
by K.C.May

A book set in the future where humans and becoming extinct from disease and turn to creating a new sub species of humanoid to try and cure the rest of the world.  Told as a friendship between a human and one of the new species, this novel is gripping and enjoyable through each twist and turn.

The Venom of Vipers


The Handmaids Tale
By Margaret Atwood

Set in the near future, this book deals with anti feminist views brought on by feminists who settled for freedom 'from' rather than freedom 'to.'  As the United States has been abolished and war has broken out all over, the story is told from the perspective of a young women whose life has changed immeasurably, who has lost not only her way of life, but her family as well.  She is located in a peaceful center within an area that used to be Detroit, but all around are unstable areas.  She is locked into a life of privilege, of sorts, but without personal freedoms.  Highly poignant personal thoughts and feelings are conveyed clearly and distinctly through this no nonsense diary of sorts.

The Handmaid's Tale 1st (first) edition Text Only

Best Ever Sugar Cookies

Best Ever Sugar Cookies

1 cup Margarine
1cup Granulated Sugar
1 cup Powdered Sugar
2 Eggs
1 cup Oil
1 tsp Vanilla
4 cups Flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Salt

Mix margarine and sugars together.  Add eggs and beat well.  Add oil and vanilla and beat again.  Mix dry ingredients together then add to other mixture.  Form a round ball, press flat with the bottom of a glass dipped in sugar.  Bake 12-15 minutes @ 375 degrees.

My Notes::  Butter is an option for these cookies, but they are better with margarine.  This recipe makes about 5 dozen cookies.  The dough is soft, soft soft, fluffy.  It gets a bit tedious with the glass/sugar method so I have also refrigerated the dough and used a scooper, dropping balls of dough into a sugar bowl, coating before putting on the tray.  This method is much quicker and the cookies come out more uniform.  This is NOT a recipe for roll and cut cookies.  These cookies are light and soft, crumbly after a couple days.  Perfect as is, also very good frosted, but dont expect to shape them.

Still Keeping it Real - Craft Room

Not to make you think I dont have piles of stuff of my own, I wanted to show you my craftroom this week:



Piles by the door of things I am shipping out, piles on both desks, project bucket on the floor.



Another view of the stuff shipping out, the project bucket on the floor and the pile of fabrics that need to be made into roman blinds, pillows and chair covers.



My desktop... Piles of scrap fabric, fabric for my next project, pile of papers I need to do today, and a corner of my desk completely taken over by a blog post project I havent finished yet.  Trash can is full too.



Pile of artwork on the floor, overly full filing basket.

That pile of artwork... Kathryn created all of this in a week.

That blog project I mentioned... this corner of my desk has looked like this for a month.

Keeping it Real

It is spring break. 

All week. 

I spent Monday zooming around cleaning the entire house, but I have done nothing since. 

Really. 

The most anything I have done is making dinner and loading the dishwasher. 

I have been L.A.Z.Y... I haven't blogged, I havent paid a ton of attention to the house or the kids or anything.  I have taken extra naps, given in to PMS cramps and attitudes, played games online and gone to bed early. 

I think this is what they call SLOTH.

It is Thursday and here is a glimpse of my clean and organized *cough* house.



Kathryn's room...this was clean and nearly spotless last night at 8pm.

Kathryn has enjoyed her vacation from school.  It has been in the 30s, windy and rainy all week so it isnt the best weather for playing outside, but she has kept herself busy with artistic endeavors of all types.  And her room shows it.  Last night I made her clean up just so I could be sure there wasnt food ground into the carpet, or glue... you know how it goes when you have limited table space and soooo many supplies.

At the end of my hallway, all extra items belong in Kathryn's room.

Not every mess is because of the week off... this pile at the end of the hallway has been there for a couple weeks, since we painted Kathryn's room.  These are odds and ends, mostly stuff that needs to hung on the wall by Hubby who hates putting holes in the walls.  *sigh*  Who knows how much longer this will stay there.



One of Two Dressers belonging to my husband.

  This is also not a result of the week off, but something I certainly could have cleaned up but didn't.  Sure, it is Hubby's dresser, but if I dont clean it, it will keep piling up until it tilts and falls off the side onto the floor.



Two of Two Dressers belonging to my husband.

  As if one wasnt enough, he has another one in the closet.  At least that one is behind a closed door... but equally stacked up.  That plastic bin full of junk?  That's all the stuff I took off the other dresser and didnt know what to do with -some 6 months ago.


My bedside table.

 I'm not saying it's just them.  No, I have piles of my own.  This is my bedside.  My bed is not made for today.  I have 2 extra pillows beside my table to use when I sit in bed with my laptop.  Under the table are two more, smaller pillows for when my back needs some additional support.  The basket is full of books and snacks.  The tabletop has meds I should have put away, meds that do not, ever, need to be on the table.  An extra pair of glasses is collecting dust here too.  And my daily planner... hasnt been opened yet today.  Oh, and the laptop... on it's little rolling table that I never use.  Dont miss the dust on the lamp and table.  THAT is classic lazy, isnt it?

I could go on and on... but for today I will stop.  How does your home look?  I try to keep mine clean and organized, not necessarily pristine, but homey, comfortable and lived-in without looking messy and cluttered.

Bucketeers

This is the IKEA desk on the left side of my craft room, attached to the 8 cubbie EXPEDIT unit from IKEA.  4 of the cubbies are hidden under the desk. 

I stuck buckets in them.  No, not pretty buckets that fill the space, buckets that cost a couple dollars at Walmart and are sold in the dish section.   I figued they aren't all out in the open, so who cares.

Anyway, these are Project Buckets.  Specifically. 

They are not Product buckets and they are not dump spaces.  Each bucket has a purpose and items that coorespond to that are inside. 

These four buckets are:

PHOTOGRAPH which includes stuff I need to get good photos of,

SEWING which has fabric for specific projects, not just fabric I bought because I liked it,

PAINTING, which has items to paint ranging from wooden items, ceramic and resin ornaments and paint palettes, and

RECIPE BOOKS which is an ongoing scrapbook project I am doing to put in print, with photos, all our favorite family meals for my meandering family.

So far this has worked out beautifully.  I know where to go when I have a project in mind and can easily find the items I need.  And it is also good for when I might just feel like painting but dont know what I want to do, so I can pull out the entire bucket and browse through it until I find something to do that suits my fancy.

There are 4 more buckets on the other side of the room with less prominant subjects in them.  I will show you those soon.

How do you organize your projects?