What a busy last couple of weeks. I now have a new job and a huge pay raise with Liberty Mutual, a new internship with IndieBizChicks, and have applied to become a Book Club Babe with Blacksburg Belle (wish me luck). Over the last month my life has completely turned upside down.

I am also experiencing growth in my business for one of the first times since I started last year.

As you can see by looking at my store I have been launching new product and because of a wave of orders that came through, I will be launching even more by Monday hopefully!

I am at a place where I truly love what I am doing. All the glory to God for my business and my life in general. How cool that I get to do what I love even if it is in my spare time. Not to mention that people are wanting to pay me for it!

So many of you are here today because of the announcement on IndieBizChicks.com that I am one of the new interns. I can’t even put into words how excited I am to be starting this internship. There is so much that I can learn from Crissy, and I hope that there are some things you can learn from me too!

Over the next 10 weeks I am really looking forward to doing the best I can for you! I hope you enjoy what you read. I also hope that you can see a transformation in me.

Thanks for all the support, check out my store, and leave comments if you have any questions about me!

Sorry About that, I have actually been really sick all week, and I’m still recovering. Let’s get back on track this week with our guest being a good friend of mine Katie Greene of http://katiesmoneysavers.blogspot.com/

This is the story of the little crafty bar in the city. Like all country songs, it’s a sad, sad story. Oh, I said the bar was in the city. My bad.

On with the story! (With some guest appearances by some of my friends who commented on the photos).

We found a little hole in the wall bar called Blackwell’s, across the street from the Hollywood Theater in Portland, OR. We were totally minding our own business.

Heather: Bar + Crafts = WTF??

Regina: Sooo you’ve seen the book “Simple Times- Crafts for Poor People” by Amy Sedaris, right? It’s all this and much more. A few photos in the book actually made me feel nauseous…. It’s a must see if you haven’t already!

I had to go to the bathroom and was attacked by tacky crafts. I knew I needed to grab my camera.

I also grabbed Jenni. We were laughing so hard it was hard for me to hold the camera still to shoot this.

Yup. That really happened.

Jenni: And right here we have a stenciled bear framed in a spray painted embroidery hoop. 

Steph Anne: Laura Ingalls called and wants her art back.

How about the rug hooked rug in front of the toilet? God, this looks even more gross in a photo if that is possible.

Diana: Looks aside, that is a crafty bacteriafest. Ewwwwww.

Tamara: I’m dying to see the proprietor responsible for this mess

Steph Anne: I went on antibiotics after viewing this

We were dying over this. This piece of “art” was screwed into the wall and half of the frame is missing.

Jenni: Is only half a frame “minimalist”? Or did someone grab on it as they slipped on the hooked rug? Hard to tell.

A close up version of this beautiful piece of “art”.

As far as I can tell someone hot glued dried flowers to an embroidery hoop and called it art. There are also mysterious stains and cobwebs as an embellishment.

This is Jenni reacting to the condom machine next to the 1970′s country craft vomit on the walls. Good stuff.

• Works with Gazelle™, Craft ROBO™, Silhouette™ & BlackCat Cougar™
• Works with all Cricut™ machines (even the Cake Machine!)
• Works with Roland™ Cutters, Wishblade™ and more!
• Full Printer Support (Print, Print Preview, HPGL/Wireframe Printing)

Create your own designs. You are no longer limited to Cricut Cartridges.	Easy to move and size items on your Virtual Mat. It’s as simple as clicking and dragging to move and size your cuts.	Install on Multiple Computers. One license purchase allows you to install and use Make the Cut on every computer you own. Only one copy may be running at any one given time.

Cut TTF Fonts.Cut any True Type Fonts that are installed on your computer.	AutoTracing.Trace a photo to cut out. You can trace BMP, JPG, PNG..	Import and Export SVGs.SVG files can be created or download from many websites that offer SVG files.

Online Forums. Great way to get instant support or help others.	Automatic Updates.When updates come out you are notified within the program.	FREE UPGRADES & UPDATES for Life. When an update or upgrade comes out you won’t be spending any more money.

Above are the basic features as seen on ScrappyDew.com.

Now when it came down to choosing a program to pretty much hack my cricut, it was between Make the Cut and Sure Cuts a lot 2.

I first found SCAL (Sure Cuts a Lot 2) when searching for a way around cartridges, but as I researched it more, I found Make The Cut. Following are the reasons that I chose MTC over SCAL:

1. With MTC you get free updates where as with SCAL you pay for the updated products when they come out.

2. With SCAL, you have to edit your images in inkscape, save them, and then pull them into the program to be cut where as with MTC, you are able  to edit directly within the program!

3. The layout was super user friendly! I am able to complete my projects with great ease, and there are tutorials all over the internet to make using the program even easier!!!!!

Both products have great pros and cons, I hope that you can choose the one that best suites you!

So, as promised, I have pictures of craft room in different stages as I completed it.

Stage 2: Building the counters. So I know I skipped stage one, and that is simply because it was so horrific that I didn’t want to show you the pictures, I literally had a 70′s style table in the corner piled with stuff, you didn’t miss much lol. Here you can see me testing out my counter idea, it isn’t secure yet, but it getting there. I made them so they are floating and I won’t hit anything when rolling around the room. I also made them about 34 inches tall, which is much higher than most desks. The reason why, is that I am 5’9 and it is almost all upper half lol. This way I am not slumping over my work .

Stage 3- Organizing. Once the counters were secure, I started organizing. I got these great stacking bins at walmart for about $10 a piece! Without much trouble, I filled them up.

Stage four- Putting in the baby jars. So, I had a junk load of baby jars and had been planning on doing this for a long time. I screwed the lids to the underside of the shelf so that I could use the containers to hold small notions within easy view.

Completed! I love it, and now I can actually use it. Next step…. cover up the terrible wood paneling. Whoever made this a fad should be shot.

This is as seen on notmartha.org

The consistency of the chocolate mixture depends entirely on the amount of oil that gets thrown in along with the nut butter. Even when I’m using the same jar of almond butter, the results vary depending on whether I’m at the beginning (lots of oil) or end (getting dry) of the jar.

Use the wheat germ to create a consistency easiest to work with. Your hands will get a little greasy perhaps, but the mixture should be easy to roll into balls and not too sticky.

Ingredients

5 store-bought graham crackers, broken up into large chunks

1/3 cup almond or peanut or sunflower butter

1/4 cup chocolate syrup

1 – 3 tablespoons wheat germ

2 tablespoons brown rice syrup or Golden Syrup

20 miniature marshmallows

Instructions:

Step one- Put the graham crackers into the bowl of a food processor. Pulse the processor for about 30 seconds or until the crackers are broken into fine crumbs.

Step two- Add the almond butter, chocolate syrup, 1 tablespoon of the wheat germ, and brown rice syrup to the bowl of the processor. Pulse for 10-20 seconds or until the mixture starts to come together into large crumbles. Take a bit of the mixture in your hands and test to see if it will roll nicely into a ball. If it’s too wet, add more wheat germ a tablespoon at a time. If it’s too dry, add something moist like almond oil, chocolate syrup or brown rice syrup one tablespoon at a time. Run the processor for a few seconds after each addition to incorporate.

Step three- Take pieces of the chocolate mixture a heaping teaspoon at a time. Knead it a bit and flatten it in the center of your palm.

Step four- Place a marshmallow in the center and coax the chocolate mixture around the marshmallow with your fingertips. Once the marshmallow is covered up, round out the ball by rolling it gently. Serve or store in an airtight container. These freeze beautifully.

Yield: 20 bites Prep-time: 20 minutes

Where’s Your Pencil?In her book, The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life, Twyla Tharp offers some exercises that will help you develop a creative habit. One of her first exercises, “Where’s Your Pencil,” discusses the importance of having your most essential tool with you when you leave home.

Since reading this exercise, I decided that the notebook and pen combo is my essential tool as a writer. Last year I got into the habit of carrying a big tote bag whenever I went somewhere. The purpose was to get some writing done during unexpected pockets of time. The bag usually has a few notebooks and a handful of pens. (I go through pens like crazy!) There are some other things in the bag like a reference book or a magazine for inspiration.

I learned that I wrote more and I captured those fleeting thoughts when I had the bag with me. However, I don’t have any measurable results to see if it really has helped my creativity. If anything, I created more opportunities to write something down when I had the bag with me. There have been one or two instances when I wanted to write something down and didn’t have pen and paper. Very frustrating!

And maybe that is the real object for the exercise. It’s to train a person to get into a creative mode and record an idea whether it’s good or bad, usable or useless. I may not use all or any of the ideas, but the process makes me alert for anything that could be used in a story. I’m hunting for an idea rather than waiting for the idea to come to me.

I’m curious what others have as their “pencil.” I have a feeling they might be more high-tech. I imagine quilters use their smart phones to capture a color combination or business men use an iPad to record their thoughts when they’re trying to find a creative solution to a problem.

What’s your pencil?

Bio: Susanna Carr is a national bestselling romance author. Visit her blog at http://susannacarr.com/blog as she tries out other exercises and techniques to improve creativity.

These clever storage baskets are not only cute and handy, they’re also a secret recycling project. The sides and bottoms of each basket are stiffened with recycled cardboard! But wait … they have another hidden talent: they collapse and fold flat to store.

In the nursery, use them for creams, diapers, wash cloths and other diaper changing accessories. You could fill a whole shelf set with bright and beautiful baskets. And yet, why let the nursery have all the fun? We bet you have a lot of cardboard just waiting to be recycled. I see bread baskets and mail baskets and gift baskets … oh my!

Our sample was made for a baby girl’s nursery, using the stunning Patty Young Andalucia collection. For information on where to buy, read Stylish Baby Nursery: Designing with Bold Colors & Patterns. This article also includes suggestions for creating an alternate fabric palette that would work well for a boy’s nursery.

Sewing Tools You Need

• Any Sewing Machine (we recommend the Janome ThreadBanger TB-30)

Fabric and Other Supplies

• Fabric for outer box covering (Fabric A) – ½ yard of 45″ wide fabric PER BOX: we used Patty Young’s Andalucia in Petal Flora (box 1) and Earth Mod Blooms (box 2)
• Fabric for inside lining (Fabric B) – ¼ yard of 45″ wide fabric PER BOX: we used Patty Young’s Andalucia in Petal Jester (box 1) and Kiwi Jester (box 2)
• Scraps for binding – you will need two strips per box, each strip is 1¾” x WOF (width of fabric). You can use either a contrasting fabric or a matching fabric: we used Patty Young’s Anadalucia in Petal Jester (box 1) and Petal Floral (box 2)
• Chipboard, cardboard, or any heavy weight card stock (for box sides)
• All purpose thread in colors to match fabrics
• Leather machine needle (in addition to your regular needle)
• See-through ruler
• Chalk pencil
• Scissors or rotary cutter and cutting mat
• Iron and ironing board
• Straight pins

We’re going to use a leather machine needle in this project – even though our supplies don’t call for leather. A leather needle is a super sharp, heavy-duty needle for sewing through difficult materials. Leather is one example; we’re using it for this project to sew through the cardboard that makes the sides of the boxes.

Getting Started

1. Using your see-through ruler and chalk pencil, cut a 7¼” x 9½” piece of fabric from Fabric A. Then, cut a strip from Fabric A that measures 6½” x 33″. These pieces will form the bottom and outside walls of the box.
2. Cut two strips from Fabric B that each measure 1¾” x WOF (width of fabric). We’ll use this fabric for the binding of the box – the fabric around the top and bottom edges of the box.
3. From Fabric B, cut one 7½” x 9½” piece and one 6½” x 33″ strip. These will cover bottom cardboard insert and the inside walls.
4. From the cardboard, cut pieces as follows:
   Four pieces that measure 6″ x 3¼”
   Two pieces that measure 6″ x 8¾”
   One piece that measures, 6½” x 8½”

At Your Sewing Machine & Ironing Board

Creating the ‘walls’

1. Fold the 6½” x 33″ piece of Fabric A (outer fabric) in half, with right sides together, and stitch up the 6½” side, using a ½” seam allowance. Turn right side out and press seam open.
2. Using the 6½” x 33″ piece of Fabric B (inner fabric), repeat step one.
3. Place the sewn Fabric B piece inside the sewn Fabric A piece, placing them WRONG sides together and matching up the seam lines.
   
4. Pin the bottoms of the two pieces together, and stitch around the bottom, using a ½” seam.
   
5. Stitch down the existing vertical seam line created by the inner and outer fabrics. (This is the seam that was created when you sewed the fabrics into the ‘box’ – you should have lined these seam lines up in step 3.)
   
6. This vertical seam will create a starting point to measure the other vertical seams around the box. With your chalk pencil, mark additional seam lines at the following intervals: 9″, 3½”, 3½”, 9″, and 3½”. (In other words, you mark 9″ from the first seam line, then 3½” from that newly drawn mark, then 3½” from that new one, etc, until you end up back at the starting line.)
   
7. Stitch a vertical seam along each drawn mark. You should now have a total of six sewn vertical seam lines that join the outer fabric and the inner fabric with the wrong sides together. These vertical seam lines have created ‘capsules’ where we will insert the cardboard to make the box stand up. Quite smart, no?

Creating and attaching the bottom of the box

1. With the wrong side facing up and the edges of the fabric inside the box, pin the 7½” x 9½” piece of Fabric A to the ‘walls’ you just made. This creates the box bottom.
2. Align the corners of this bottom piece with the vertical seams on the wall, line up your raw edges, and match long sides to long sides and short sides to short sides. The raw edges of the fabric should extend to the outside of the box, and when you look into the box you should see the wrong side of the bottom fabric.
   
3. Stitch all around, using a ½” seam. After attaching, carefully trim the seam allowance to ¼” – we will be absorbing this raw edge into the binding in the steps below, so we want to reduce the bulk as much as possible.

Creating binding and attaching to bottom

1. Next we will create the binding for the bottom of the box. Find on of your 1¾” x WOF strips and trim to 1¾” x 34″ (this is the perimeter of the box plus 2″ for a tail we’ll use to finish our binding neatly). Fold the strip in half lengthwise and press. Now fold the raw edges in toward the middle lengthwise seam line, and fold together. Press. (Your raw edges are now inside the binding strip.
   
2. Repeat to create your second binding strip for the top. Set this top piece aside. Remember, you can choose to use either matching or contrasting fabric for the binding; you could even make the top and bottom bindings out of different fabrics.
3. Pin bottom binding strip to the bottom of the box, encasing the raw seam allowance inside the fold of your bias tape. Carefully pin.
4. Stitch binding in place, keeping your seam line a “scant” (very small) ¼” in from the bottom folded edges, but still being sure to catch both sides of the bias tape in the seam. Stitch all the way around the perimeter of the bottom, but stop about 1″ from the end for finishing.
5. We cut our original binding piece about 2″ longer than the perimeter (step #1 above), so you should have a slight tail at the end of your binding. Trim this to about 1-1½” (enough to overlap the start of your binding by about ½”). Fold under the end of the tail to create a clean edge and wrap around the start of the binding. Overlap about ½” and stitch in place, matching your seam line. Be sure to backstitch at the end of the binding to secure it in place.
   
   

Stiffening the walls with cardboard and attaching top binding

1. Insert the cardboard pieces between the vertical seam lines to stiffen the walls of the box.
   
2. Switch the regular sewing needle currently in the machine to the leather needle.
3. Pin the other binding strip to the top of the box, encasing the raw edges and the top of the cardboard inside the binding.
4. Stitch a ‘scant’ (very small) ¼” in from the edge of the binding.We are using the leather needle for this step because it is extra sharp and heavy duty for sewing through the cardboard. Attach the binding, following steps 4 and 5 above. Stitch slowly – your machine is working very hard to get through the thick cardboard – sort of like running uphill. You may find it helpful to lengthen your stitch length a bit at this point, so your machine can get the job done in less stitches.
   

Making the bottom insert

1. Lay the 6½” x 8½” cardboard piece on the wrong side of the 7½” x 9½” piece of fabric B. Fold the edges of the fabric over the cardboard, being careful to keep the fabric tight on the corners. Press in place and stitch (you’re stitching through fabric and cardboard again so you should still be using the leather needle in your machine) around all sides to secure the fabric to the cardboard. Stitch close to the raw edge of the fabric so it will lay nice and flat. Press again after stitching.
   
2. Insert the fabric covered cardboard into the bottom of the box, with the fabric side facing up.
3. To collapse the box, simply remove this bottom insert; the short sides will fold in between the cardboard panels, and the whole thing will fold flat for storage.

Hints and Tips

Alternate box sizes

You can adapt the instructions above to any size box.

1. First, determine the size you want the finished box to be, and cut the fabric to: the perimeter of the box plus 1/2″ all around (for the seam allowances) x the height you want the finished ‘walls’ to be. Cut one piece of fabric for the outside and one piece of fabric for the inside.
2. Determine where you want the corners of your box, and stitch four vertical seam lines in those locations.
3. Divide the seams on the SHORT sides in half, and stitch another seam line in this location (this allows the box to ‘collapse’ when you take out the bottom insert).
4. Once you know where the corners of the box will be, you can cut your bottom fabrics to the appropriate size. You’ll need two pieces: one for the box bottom (add ½” all around for the seam allowance) and one for the cardboard bottom insert (add ¾” all around to give you enough fabric for folding over the cardboard).
5. Then cut two pieces of binding long enough to fit the perimeter of the box plus about 2″ for finishing.
6. Cut cardboard for sides to size to fit in the ‘capsules,’ and sew everything together. Just remember, the bigger the box you hope to create, the stiffer the cardboard will need to be to support the sides and the contents.

I found this project at:

http://sew4home.com/projects/storage-solutions/370-stylish-baby-nursery-collapsible-storage-baskets