Standiford Family

I opened a bag of Dove chocolate the other day.  Besides finding some good chocolate I found some good words of wisdom.

“Do all things with love.”  That’s why my food always tastes good.

“Count your blessings not your worries.”  I’m trying, hard.

“Put your feet up and unwind.”  I’ll do that in a few days or tonight when I’m exhausted from Christmas prep.

“Bring your life to life: stop planning, start doing.”  I think I’ve already started that - kellaford.

“Happiness is the experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude.”  Is that possible to do?  Really every minute?

“Don’t judge others or yourself.”  Okay, I won’t judge myself when I eat another chocolate.

I love this little hat pattern.  (I altered it a little, adding ribbon and leaving off the flowers.)  I had to make it for a little cutie named Lily and maybe her cousin will get the second one.  I found a great new yarn at Hobby Lobby a few weeks ago when I went for another reason.  Isn’t that when you find the good stuff?  When you’re not looking for it.  The yarn is Naturally Caron Country.  This is my first time using wool.  It’s a great blend, only 25% merino and not the least bit itchy.  It has a great hand and beautiful stitch definition.  The best part is it’s machine washable.  I doubled the yarn to use the bigger needle called for in the pattern.

I just got my order for some Naturally Caron Spa which is a bamboo blend.  I have a sweater pattern all picked out.  Now I just need to make the time, meaning I’ll need to find some movies and TV shows to watch.

Today I sold my second bag!  A coworker/employee of the first buyer had to have one.  She ordered back in October knowing she wouldn’t get it for a long time.  She wanted one for her 70 year old mother who’s a little funky.  Shopping for someone I don’t know was a little bit of a challenge but I nailed it with my first choice of fabrics, also found at Hobby Lobby.  Here’s the finished product.

Mickey really liked the way this turned out.  I don’t think I’ve ever really heard him comment so much about a bag I’ve made.  Maybe I’ll have to make him something, but what?

Now that it’s gotten to where it was going I can write/brag about it.  I made a diaper bag for a friend who had her first baby.  The style was inspired by My “Bohemian Bag” and the first bag I sold.  I loved it so much it almost didn’t make it to my friend, not that I need a bag that big.

Love this fabric!

It has two stretchy outside pockets, one on each side.

And two end pockets for bottles, burp cloths, etc.  I can’t forget the great bow that can be let out if you need more room.

Five inside pockets to keep you organized.

Last week I made a new style of bag to add to my line.  I found this one and had to make my own version.  (I think I’ll have to do the handbag size too.  It’s so cute.)  It turned out a little differently but I love it.  Christmas is getting close and that means I will soon have all my Christmas projects done so I will start taking orders on the 26th.  You can e-mail me at kellaford@gmail.com.  Mickey’s also going to set up a website for me, www.kellaford.com, of course.  There’s nothing there yet but hopefully I’ll get a few hours of his time while he’s off work.

I will post another style in a few days.  It is being shipped and I don’t want the recipient to see it here first.

Here’s the new bag.  It’s called Modern right now since I haven’t come up with anything better.  If you have a suggestion for a name let me know.  The five pockets are in the middle of the bag so everything doesn’t drop to the bottom.

How smart am I?

With this unwelcome winter weather here already I have a very STRONG desire to hibernate.  Luckily for me I can “hibernate” in the basement office.  It’s “sunny” all the time and I can’t see a snowflake anywhere.  (It has almost everything I need.  (Junk) Food in the closet, drinks in the refrigerator, movies and music on the computer, and a bathroom not too far away.)  I started my “hibernation” yesterday after waking up to snow.  I did go to bed with snow on the ground but I thought, hoped, wished, it might have disappeared in the night.  No such luck.  I was in a foul mood which helped the hibernating desire.  I decided to spend all day in the office.  That was pretty much the case.  And in so doing I sewed two rag quilts!  They both have to be clipped but the long part is done.  They don’t have a loving home yet but soon will when I donate them.

Today the sun was out so Kade and I ran a few errands so I could stay in the rest of the week in case the sun doesn’t show itself again.  This afternoon I decided to work on some projects that I’d already started just so I could say they’re done.  The project I just finished is my Christmas cards!  Let me rephrase that so no one gets mad at me.  I finished the outside.  Mickey still has to take the family picture and I have to write the little blurb that goes inside.  I started the cards last month at a crop with my friends.  I didn’t want to print pictures so that’s what I decided to work on.  I also knew I would be terribly busy most of November and December.  Who isn’t?  In case anyone is curious here’s a picture of the supplies I used to make my cards.  I will post the finished product in December.  There are two variations of the card if you’re wondering.

I just want to thank my friends Becca, Vicky, and Tricia for all their support while getting the card started.  And talking/forcing me to use glitter glue.  I couldn’t have done it without you and the card wouldn’t have looked as good either.

Last month I finished the cable jacket I was knitting.  Soon I will get a picture of it.  I’ve worn it a few times.  It’s very cozy and keeps me toasty warm.  Now I have a stack of cable squares to sew together.  But I have a line of bags waiting to be sewn too.  There’s too much for me to do.  Maybe I’ll spend the entire winter in the office.

Last Monday my friend Janel had a baby girl named Lily.  I just had to make something for her.  I decided on a rag quilt.  Since I knew she was coming I started shopping for the quilt a while ago.  I found two cute print flannels and kept searching for a third print or solid to go with them.  I found a solid.  When I was cutting the blocks out I noticed the print flannels weren’t actually 44″ like most are.  They were barely 42″ which means I couldn’t get enough blocks out of what I bought.  I went back to JoAnn for more.  They only had a little of one of the prints left.  So I started looking for a fourth fabric to go with the others.  I bought one but didn’t love it.  I cut out all the blocks and started pinning it together.  I HATED it!  (It was either too pink or I didn’t like the way the fabrics worked or didn’t work together.)  I couldn’t give this to my friend’s baby!  So I went back to JoAnn, thankfully the flannel was on sale, and bought something totally different.  I loved what I bought and I LOVED the way it went together.  Here’s the end result:

I hope to get a picture of Lily laying on the blanket, someday.

Don’t think that I’m going to waste the other flannel.  The Relief Society, the woman’s organization in our church, has asked us to do some service for our community this year and report about it at a dinner.  I will make the rag quilt and donate it.  I’m also working with a few sewing group friends to make afghans to donate to Real Services.  As a family we are also going to adopt one or two elderly people and help them have a better Christmas than they would.  Should be fun.

Last Friday I sold my first bag.  A few months ago a friend of a friend, but now I consider her my friend too, asked me to make her a brown version of “My Bohemian Bag“.  It took a while to find the right fabrics but I did it.  I gave it to T. on Friday and she loved it.  She said there were at least three ladies at work that were going to try to take it from her.  I hope she can hold on to it.  Today I got an e-mail from one of her co-workers wanting to place an order.  Here we go.

After thinking about it for a while I’ve decided I’m going to start selling bags.  Even if the economy isn’t doing that great it will give me something to do, not that I don’t have enough to do already but I need a creative focus.  I decided if I’m going to sell something with my blood, sweat, and tears (sometimes literally) in it I needed to have my name on it.  Last week I ordered some ribbon from Name Maker.  It came in today.  Here’s my business name:

I’m so excited.  I’m putting it in the bags I’ve made right now.

If you’d like to place an order for one of my creations it may not get done until after Christmas.  I have a long list of things to make already but if I get time maybe I could get to it.  I can’t make any promises unless a sizeable donation comes along with the order.

Our Saturday was really busy.  We had two soccer games, almost at the same time.  Mat’s started first.  She played aggressively but didn’t score.  One day I hope she gets a goal.  It would make her so happy.  Meg’s game started about 20 minutes later.  I missed most of hers because I was watching Mat’s.  Meg got injured (fell on her knee) so she was on the sidelines for a while.  She went back in in the third quarter.  From Mat’s game I could see her running and kicking a lot but she didn’t score either.  She did play goalie the fourth quarter and again stopped everything coming her way.  I think that’s her best position.  She did say she needs to work on having a powerful kick but she throws it out of the goalie box so well we told her she didn’t need to worry about it too much.

We came home and most of us ate lunch.  I grabbed a snack and finally started painting the shutters I had Mickey take down about two weeks ago.  The weather has been too cold to paint so I waited for a nice day.  I got it yesterday.  It was almost 80 and the sun was HOT after enduring some days in the 50’s.  While I painted Mickey weatherized some wood on the deck off the kitchen.

He hung them up while I made dinner later.  (I wish I would have taken a before and after.  They were so faded they were almost pink.)

Since Mickey knew I had a lot to do yesterday he took the kids to see Wall-E.  That was a nice break for me.  Thanks, Babe.  I finished working on my lesson and gave the shutters a second coat.  Then I cleaned up and went to JoAnn for their Columbus Day sale.  Now this is a holiday that’s not really celebrated except by stores.  You’ve got to love it when they give out 50% off coupons.  I used 3 yesterday!

We then had dinner.  Not exactly the way I had wanted since our grill ran out of gas.  I had to bake the chicken instead.  It didn’t taste as good.  Then we, mostly Mickey, got the kids to bed and I worked out.  Then he came down and did what he had been waiting to do all day.  Play the Batman Lego game.  He’s finished the Star Wars Lego game so this is his new obsession.

It’s probably not the kind of bucket you’re thinking about.  Yesterday I finished a big black bucket bag (14″w X 12″h X 6″d).  I made it specifically for a church bag.  I have to take a lesson manual, scriptures, and things for the kids to do on top of my own personal items.  So I needed a lot of room.  I wanted something that would be durable and winter-ish.  I chose a suede cloth for the bottom and a polka dot corduroy for the top.  I saw this blue cotton and had to have it for the lining.

Here is the finished bag.  I’m sure I’m going to use it a lot.  I had some ribbon I wanted to use on the outside to make a bow but the ribbon was too thin to stand up to this huge monster bag.  Maybe I’ll get to use it some other time.

It of course has pockets.  They are BIG too.  I’ll get lots of stuff in them.