Guest Posting: DIY Kinda Girl

I'm over at DIY Kinda Girl today introducing my "little things". 

Head on over by clicking HERE and give DIY Kinda Girl some lovin'!

Guest Post: Delighted Momma

Hello friends and readers of Squeezing It All In!
My name is Lindsay and I am the writer behind Delighted Momma.
Heather has such a wonderful blog and I just love how CRAFTY and funny she is.
Have you seen her awesome readers wreath tutorial?! 
Cant wait to make that.


Today I am going to share with you a super easy and inexpensive way to make your own unique earrings!
So lets get started...

What you will need:

• Polymer Clay (you can find this at Michaels or any craft store)
• Razor Blade
• Krazy Glue
• Earring posts + backs. I got mine at Michaels.
  

Roll about 6 little balls of clay. Flatten them out with your finger.

Fold one of the flattened balls in half. This is going to be the center of the rose.

Place the other flattened balls all around the center piece.
These are going to be the petals.

Slice off the end of the rose to make a flat base for the earring post.


Bake the roses at 275 degrees for 15 minutes.

Krazy glue the rose to the post. This stuff is STICKY (duh) and I got it everywhere!
What should you do when you get it on your pointer finger?
Quickly tap your thumb and pointer finger together.
Wrong!
Don't do this unless you would like missing finger pads like I now have.
Bummer.

ALL baked and ready to wear!


Hope you all enjoyed this! Thank you Heather for having me over today!

Guest Post: DIY kinda girl

Hi there folks, I'm glad to be here! 
I'm a Heather too.  :) 
I stumbled across Heather's blog not so long ago, and was happy to see a familiar face! 
Heather and I lived in the same dorms our freshman year of college (go Cougs!)...in fact, just for fun:

Heather, my roommate Sharlyn and me over ten years ago

Aww, aren't we cute as freshman?!  Betcha didn't know I had that picture, eh Heather?  :)

ANYway, I make my home over at diy kinda girl, where I chronicle all my projects
(which I have lined up one after the other, enough to last 'til the day I die, it seems). 
I love the process of designing, planning and all around figuring out how to do something myself.
 As a result, I have far too many hobbies,

from papercrafting to crochet to jewelry making to sewing to making accessories to home decor to digiscrapping.....(In fact, I love digiscrapping so much, I just started a series on How To Get Started with Digital Scrapbooking.)

I'm also an avid reader, and do weekly (most of the time) book reviews on what I'm reading at the moment.

But most of all, I'm absorbed by my house! 
We just bought our first home in February, and most of my DIY projects of late have been devoted to that. 
My first project was stripping down every kitchen cabinet and restaining them, plus adding hardware and decorative molding.
More recently, I painted 7 very large laminate bookshelves.

Today, I have an easy peasy way to update an old plain pair of shoes.

So I had this pair of black ballet flats that were years old.  And I kinda hated them. But they are a sturdier model of the usually flimsy ballet flat.  Useful for skirts in the winter.

So I did a little surgery.  Clipped off the bow I hated, and glued snaps on the toes with E-6000 (best adhesive EVER). 
Why snaps on the toes? 
So I could make toe clips that didn't have to clip onto the shoe and bother my toes!

Anyway, so my shoes have been sitting there with snaps glued to the toes for months. 
Finally, today, I took ten minutes to make a little something to cover the snaps so I can wear them again!

I cut three different sized circles out per shoe, two of black lace, one of grey satin.

Singed the edges until the curled
(I use a little tea light rather than my lighter...gives me two hands to control the singing, since singing can often turn into burning!),

glued the three layers together, added a flower shaped button, glued it to the other side of the snaps, and popped them onto my shoe.  

Voila!

And the best part: since they attach with snaps, I can make as many as I want.
(Though it may take another few months before I get around to it...)

Thanks for letting me come hang out, Heather!  And if you folks ever want to com visit me at diy kinda girl, I'd love to have you!
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hahaha! How funny is THAT picture?!?!
Thanks, Heather, for your tutorial.
Go on and visit her over at diy kinda girl and show her some love!

see you later!

I have SOOO much to tell you guys!
Some seriously WONDERFUL news that I just can't WAIT to share with you,

Some CRAZY craziness that happened today - of course, it had to be the day before I leave for Family Reunion time!

And another cute tutorial for some 'little one' learning.

Unfortunately, I'm up to my eyebrows in packing so it's going to have to wait.
Tomorrow I jump on a plane with blue boy and green boy for the weekend.

The best part about this for YOU?...

I have two guests lined up for you while I'm gone.
They are going to share with you two fun tutorials to keep you going while I'm away.
Come check out their posts and click over to their blogs to give them some love.

I'll see you wonderful people on Tuesday where I'll get to share some of these goods that are bursting from my seams.

Something fun to leave you with

from one of my pinboards
I'm soooo making this if you can come up with a way to trim it!

Tutorial Guest Posting

Do you remember reading a recent "little things" list by the gorgeous Stacy from Not JUST a Housewife?
Here ... maybe this will help you remember:

(source)
Well, I'm thrilled to be guest posting over in her neck of the woods today.
I put together a tutorial that I'm SOOOO excited to share with you!
I'm pretty sure it will make you smile and maybe even giggle a little!
So go check it out!
Seriously ... click on over

Customizable His and Her Pillows

 Guest Posted originally on Not JUST a Housewife

Happy Friday to all you beautiful readers of Not JUST a Housewife!
My name is Heather from squeezing it all in.
I'm seriously squealing with delight right now to be here with you today!

Thanks so much, Stacy!

I want to welcome you into my world for a second before we get on with the tutorial business.

I don't know about you, but I have so many responsibilities in life it's hard to even keep track of them all, but one thing is for sure ... I am constantly striving to squeeze it all in.

I find joy in searching for the "little things" in life and love to encourage and motivate my readers to do the same.

What are "little things" you ask?
Here is the advice I've come to live by...

“Search for 5 'little things' that you are grateful for today, something that makes you smile – even for a moment. Something little. Something that could easily be overlooked. 

If you can’t find 5 things…just find one.”  -my angel Mother

"Little things" happen every day
they are the moments that most easily pass us by.

They are hard to see because there are so many.
We have to choose to find them and when we do…
they bring more joy and more love to our hearts and our lives…
they can change us.

The lovely Miss (Not JUST a Housewife) Stacy has joined our squeezing it all in treasure hunt for the "little things" in life ...
you can find her list HERE. It's just as amazing as she is -
go on and read it ... you won't be sorry!
I would LOVE for you to join our search too!

I also love to include my readers in my creating endeavors by timing my tutorials.
Timing myself helps me to "squeeze it all in" more efficiently and I hope it helps my readers to do the same.

(you can find these tutorials HERE)

Okay ... let's get on to the main reason I am here:
I have put together a special tutorial just for YOU today!
So let's get excited!!!
We are going to make customizable His and Her pillows.

I've seen so many wonderful His and Her pillows floating around, but I have been looking for something that had a little more personality and perhaps a little humor.

I've been drooling over ones like THIS and THIS and THIS and THIS.
Seriously ... I LOVE all of these and would probably just mop up my drooling mess and buy them all if I could.
But I can't.
So for now, I'm just going to let them inspire me to create this tutorial for you.

So, today we are going to take this:

and turn it into this:

You will need:
- approximately 1 1/2 yard plain material
(I used an ivory cotton blend)
- a material that you feel resembles your coloring and features
(I used felt and doll hair)
-rotary cutter (optional)
-scissors
-sewing machine
-thread of corresponding color

Let's start with preparing the pillow.
I'm not a fan of zippers on pillows so we are going to make a pillow with an envelope - type back.

I used 16x16 inch pillow forms so I cut 2 squares from the ivory fabric that measured 181/4 x 181/4 inches for the front of the pillow. 
Then I cut 4 (2 for each pillow) that measured 181/4 x 12 inches.
These will create the envelope-type back.

Now that you have your basic shapes, take the back pieces and fold over 1/2 inch along one 18 1/4 inch side.
Then, iron it down like this:

Then fold it over one more time 1/2 inch until the edge looks just like this:

Then run it through the sewing machine with a 1/4 inch seam.

Now, before we can put the pillow together, let's work on customizing the front of our pillows.

Here is a picture of my Mr.Wilson, altered using Photoshop, but Dana over at MADE has the best tutorial on how to get the same effect using Picnik which I think is a more user friendly program.

I initially used this print out to create a stencil for a Father's Day shirt you can see HERE.

Then, I outlined just the features I wanted to highlight.
You can easily do this with any picture of you and your Mr!

Then I cut it out, pinned it to my felt, cut it out of the felt...

and ended up with this:

I centered and pinned it on my 18 1/4 inch square
(you can see my folded mark in the middle)
and then sewed around all the edges.

Repeat all the same steps for your Mrs. pillow ...
Mine was more time consuming considering I have the curliest hair I'm sure you've ever laid eyes on.

See ...

Then, I measured a box around my felt Mr. and Mrs. measuring 11x11 inches and I stitched with the corresponding brown thread all the way around.

Then, I sewed all the way around again on the outside of the square I just stitched 1/4 inch away.
Like this:
(there's my curly doll hair ... makes for a pretty good likeness!)

Now we're ready to put our pillow together!

Lay out the front of your customized pillow and assemble all pieces right sides together.

 I placed one 18 1/4 x 11 (measurement after 1 inch seam is sewn) back piece on top of my front piece.

Then, the other 18 1/4 x 11 back piece layered over the first.
We should have a 2 inch overlap.

Pin in place.

And now sew together with a 1/4 inch seam all the way around.
Then, clip your corners like this:

Turn and iron flat.

Now we are going to top stitch around the outer edge of ALL layers to finish it off.
This will create the edging around the outside that I think really gives it a more elegant and complete look.

MAKE SURE you double check your measurements so you are absolutely positive your pillow will fit perfectly in there when you are finished!
If you followed all my measurements you should end up with an 3/4 inch seam around the edge.

And there you have it! Your Mr.  ...

and Mrs. customizable pillows!

Ahhh! Now everyone knows just where they belong! hahah!
Enjoy!

linked up with:

Freckled Laundry

I heart naptime

"little things" by Stacy

Welcome to the end of the week my beautiful friends!
That's YOUR cue to smile and blush a little.

This week really zoomed by over here ... how about YOU?

I'm so excited today because I get to introduce you to Stacy from Not JUST a Housewife
She is surrounded by lots of men in her home ... four little boys and a really great husband
(she will tell us a little about him soon)
She isn't only amazingly talented, handy with her tools, innovative and creative, she is also gorgeous!
See ...

source
She has some wonderful projects on her blog that I'm SURE you will fall in love with and want to do yourself.
The best part is : Stacy makes it feel completely do-able.
Here are a couple of my favorites:
Scrap Wood Lamp
DIY side table
Desk re-do

I'm so glad she was willing to share her little treasures with us today.
I KNOW they will make you smile!
Enough talking from me ... here she is:

"The older I get and the older my kids get (and the more kids I have!), the busier I get. In some ways it is a good thing. But in a lot of ways it is bad. I find I have less time to focus on the little important things. I am always trying to get here or there ( on time none the less) and sometimes the special moments pass me by. I think you do have to work at it. You choose to take the time to savor the tiny gifts that come unexpectedly.

1. My nine year old gave me a hug and told me I was the best mom. I could have said thanks and kept working on what I was doing but I chose to continue the conversation and we ended up talking about favorite family memories.

2. Sleeping in until 8:30! My kids (all four) unexpectedly slept in this morning. That NEVER EVER happens. Normally it is 6:30. Two hours of extra sleep is GOLD. It probably shouldn't even be on the "little" things list.

3. Seeing my boys dance and sing to music on the radio. They totally jam and it almost makes being in the car doing errands worth it.

5. My baby called the cows "dogs" today when we visited the farm. We were trying to do family pictures and he never looked at the camera. But it was fine cause we all cracked up every time he motioned for the cows to come over and yelled "Dog!".

6. I sucked as a mom today. Getting ready for family pictures makes me a crazy person. But my kids stilled hugged me today. My kids still smiled at me today. My kids still love me. Kids are so forgiving. They are such great examples.

7. I just realized I was on #7 and I think we are only suppose to do 5. Well, I am on a roll so I am still going to add this one. (Maybe I will get extra credit) I yelled at my husband when he told me on the phone that he didn't go to get his hair cut today for family pictures. Like, ape crazy. When I picked him up from work so we could go do pictures he smiled and told me how nice I looked. He never brought up the "incident". Love that :)"

See ... what did I tell you?!?!
You want to read more of her wonderfulness ... don't you?
Click HERE to find her ... I'm sure she will be so glad to have you!

I love when she said ...
"I think you do have to work at it.
You have to choose to take the time to savor the tiny gifts that come unexpectedly"

I couldn't have said it better.

Go find YOUR treasures today!
We would love to have you share them with us!
I promise writing them down will help you savor them!

send me yours ... whether you have one or one hundred.
squeezingitallin@gmail.com

the good ole' days...

There are many things I do that make me feel alive...make me feel like ME, 
but one of the things that makes me feel the most at home in my own skin I still have not shared with you...but not anymore.
Watch this and listen - Today I'm sharing my soul with you...
I hope you like what you hear!

Now that you've experienced that...go HERE and HERE. 

I've had the privileged to be invited as a guest contributor today. 

I hope you can apply what I wrote to your own life and feel motivated and invigorated to nurture yourself from the inside out.