Crafty Bangle Friendship bracelet

Do you remember those friendship bracelets that we grew up with? I remember sitting in the hall of my grandma's house sitting with my aunt making my very first friendship bracelet.


Today, I notice my little sister packing her little bag around with embroidery floss and thought back to that day with my aunt.

I love how some styles come back and this is one of those that I just love! Friendship bracelets come in every shape, color, and size. The possibilities are endless.

Today, I used some extra satin fabric I had lying to make my own friendship bracelet. It was super quick and easy to make. Plus, this bracelet can be taken on and off very easily because of the large knots that have some stretch to them. Perfect for my lifestyle. I now can easily and quickly change from mom to glam!

Giveaway! A Vision to Remember

This giveaway is now Closed for the winner:

Amy said...

That wass a hard decision! But I think I would choose the CAR SEAT TENT Addy Mae Rag Quilt blanket Cover amylrobinson81 at yahoo dot com Thanks everyone that entered!

 

There is a HUGE group of quilting bloggers that are going to be a group giveaway. Each blogger is giving away something quilt related. If you would like to see all the links to the blogs with giveaways being posted on the 1st of October please visit:

Fall into Fall Quilters Blogger Giveaway

For those entering in my giveaway you will be entered to win 5 patterns (winners choice) sold in A Vision to Remembers Etsy Shop.

That includes:

Addy Mae Car seat and rag quilt pattern

Easy Peasy Rag quilt and car seat tent pattern


John Deere rag quilt and car seat tent pattern
Riley car seat tent pattern
Ashlyn Rag Quilt and Car seat tent pattern
Rag Strip Quilt Pattern
Rag Purse or diaper bag Pattern

Rag small purse or scripture case pattern

Infant car seat soft toy bar pattern

2 different fabric flower patterns
Many appliques for the rag quilts including flowers, football, airplane, lady bug, and much more
Large John Deere rag quilt pattern

baby bib pattern
rag receiving blanket
rag ruffled receiving blanket pattern
belly band pattern

childrens art case pattern

rag crayon roll pattern

Disappearing 9 Square rag quilt pattern

Ways to enter:

1. Visit A Vision to Remember and come back and tell me what you would want with your gift
   
2. Follow my blog
3. Follow me on Twitter or Facebook
4. tweet, facebook, or blog about this giveaway (make sure to leave a link to your promotion)

This giveaway will be open until the 31st of October.

Essential Tools for Baking

This is the 2nd part in the series that I am doing on essential tools for...fill in the blank.
Part 1 Sewing,

Today I would like to share with you all what I think are essential tools to bake with. These are the tools that I would really not how to cook/bake without them. That also includes baking.

A good cookie baking sheet. These pans are not just for baking cookies, I toast bread, make brownies or thinner cakes, or bars, or making shake and bake pork chops or chicken, or insert whatever else requires a nice shallow large baking pan. I have the larger size and then also one that is half the size. They all get used a ton.
Notice how the edges of the pan are are browned but the pan still works great. It is definitely worth spending the extra dollars to get a GOOD pan to bake on

A Bosch. This is like a glorified kitchen aid with a blender and food processor. It works great. I use it to make bread dough, cookie dough, mashed potatoes and many other things. The blender we use for making salsa, milk shakes, smoothies. The food processor/chopper we use to shred bricks of cheese, shred and slice veggies, make hash browns.



There is also an attachment a food chopper that goes where the blender does. I don't have this part but I would love to. Instead I have this little machine and it only cost $10 at Walmart. We use it almost everyday. Seriously. To mash crackers, chop garlic and onions, mash cookies. Seriously I thought this machine would die within the first year of use and I did not know if we would actually use it much, but 3 years later this little thing is still chugging along.


Of course you need a variety of sized mixing bowls. I like to have a couple glass ones to use in the microwave and then also some plastic ones so the little ones can help without worry of breaking my nice bowls.
Then like I told you all a while ago, that these cookies scoopers are the best thing ever invented. They make baking cookies so simple and they always turn out great and perfect. Mine came from pampered chef but I have seen them around town at other stores too.
I think I have gone through one blender for every year I have been married. It always seems to be my hubby burning them up. We do use them a ton for making cake from a box, fluffing egg whites, making frosting, and whipping cream.
A whisk is always a good tool to have around. Especially if all the beaters to the hand mixer are dirty then I default to this little tool. There are many times that I don't really have to beat something to death but I need to mix up all those little crumbs that never seem to mix in very well and this solves that problem
Inevitably I use a rubber spatula when I am baking. I use them while I am mixing in the bosch to scrape down the sides sometimes and to scrape cake mix into the pan.



A rolling pin is really nice to use instead of a drinking cup. At least that is what I used to use to roll out my dough.
These are just a few of the tools that I find essential to my success in baking. Do you use any of these tools? What are your essential tools for baking? Do you use other tools to do the same job?

Check ME Out Saturday Week 35

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Seriously!?! You all have been participating in this link party for 35 weeks. I am amazed each week by the different items that people link up. Here are a few that I really loved this time

This Gooey Carmel Cake from Sugar Bananas

Between U and Me has a really fun wired pumpkin tutorial






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Link up what you have been working on this last week! I can't wait to see what you all have been up to this last week

Rice Pudding

image borrowed from here

I love rice pudding. My family often refers to it as Maggot Stew. I really don't care. It is just so good.

This is my family's recipe. My grandma has used this recipe, my mom has used this recipe, and now I use this recipe:

Rice Pudding
1/2 cup rice
1 quart milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 c sugar

Mix all together in a oven safe bowl. Milk tends to boil over if there is not enough room in the bowl to hold it all in so make sure to use an overly large bowl for this. If you are still worried about it boiling over then just place it on a cooking sheet to make cleanup a bit easier if it does boil over. Bake at 275 for 3 hours

I am not really a fan of it hot, but man it tastes good chilled. This last batch that I made I hid all of it from my family so that I could savor it over a few days. I just barely finished it off and now I am definitely going to be making me another special batch

Something that I am loving

I LOVE these beautiful wash clothes from here
Not only is her etsy shop, KitchenKitsch, beautiful but so is She!

Raggy Quilt Valence and Curtains

I have written a pattern for rag quilt curtains and a valence. I am looking for at least one person to test the pattern out for me. Please email me if you are interested boblyns at yahoo dot com...or if you would like me to make you a set of curtains without knowing exactly how they are going to turn out please email me :)

Best Ever Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

I love these cookies. They are for sure my favorite ones out there. The other reason that I love them?!? The cookie dough is amazing and it is super easy and delicious to freeze these cookies:


Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 c butter
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
chocolate chips
3 cups oats
1 3/4 cups flour

Cream the first 4 ingredients together. Then add the next 3. Followed by the oats, then desired amount of chocolate chips. Then add the flour slowly making sure to not add to much. I like to add the first cup in all at once and then slowly add the next 3/4 cup until I get the right consistency. If you add to much flour then your cookies will be hard.

Bake cookies at 350 for 8-10 minutes. I bake mine so that they are just underdone. Kinda like medium well for a hamburger. I do that because when you take things from the oven they will still cook as they are cooling off. Then my cookies end up being done just right and won't get hard.

Now is the fun part I like to bake 1 pan of cookie dough and then freeze the rest so that I am not pigging out on cookies for 3 days straight (that is seriously how good they are).

I like to use my pampered chef cookie scoop thing. It makes perfect little balls for cookies. Without this handy little tool I am lost when it comes to making cookies.

Then I put those little balls of cookie dough on a baking sheet as close together as I can get them. Then I freeze them until hard. Then I put them in a freezer quart bag.
When I am ready to cook some of the cookies I put however many on a cookie sheet that I want to bake and if I have time I will let them thaw a bit. If not then I bake at 325 for 10-12 minutes.

Essential Tools for Sewing

We all have our favorite sewing tools. Here are the ones that are most important to me:

1. My sewing machine. It was a Christmas gift from my parents a few years back. It is a Bernina 1008. It is the perfect machine for me. It is very basic. Not computerized, but man its a workhorse.
   

2. A really good pair of scissors. Mine are Gingher. My hubby and kids know that if you cut something other than fabric with these I might just come unglued. They are definitely expensive scissors but they are worth every penny.
3. Rotary Cutter. I have a fiskars version. I change my blade about once a month, but I cut yards, and yards of fabric also.
4. A cutting mat. The first one I bought was a package deal with my rotary cutter and ruler from fiskars. It worked great. It was 18 x 24 maybe? Well it worked great until there were ravines from me cutting in the same spot many times. Then I set my iron on the board not thinking anything of it but it warped it bad. So finally I broke down with my hubbys help and bought a much larger, self healing, reversible, cutting mat. It is 24 x 36 ish and looks like this:I love it. It works great for what I do. I use my cutting board everyday almost.

5. A cone thread stand. This thing is really great for using those large cone threads for your serger in the sewing machine. The cone thread is much more economical to use. You are not constantly changing out the thread because you ran out. Plus it costs a little bit more than the small things of thread.
I got mine at Joann's for $5-$10. You could use a coupon or buy it when they have their notions on sale for 50% off which happens fairly often. Definitely worth the money.

6. A small pair of scissors to cut thread. The scissors that I use came from my provo craft paper trimmer when I bought it. I actually have 2 pairs of scissors that are about the same size. One sits at my sewing machine and the other at my serger when I have it out.
7. Lots of extra sewing machine needles because I always break mine at the most inconvenient of times. I have had to call my hubby and ask him to stop by the store to get me more needles when he comes home from work. Then I wait very impatiently because it would be a waste for me to drive to town to just get needles when he will be coming home in a few hours.

8. Several extra bobbins. I think I have around 20 bobbins. When I am doing a bigger project before I thread my machine I wind up several bobbins of the same color. That way when my bobbin runs out of thread then I have some all ready to replace it without having to unthread my machine to wind another bobbin. Saves lots of time and frustration. If you don't have a bunch of bobbins already and think you might need some more make sure that they will fit your machine. My mom gave me some bobbins that did not fit my machine and many needles later I figured out it was the bobbin breaking my needles.

9. One of the best things I ever did when setting up my sewing table was to get a small set of drawers for next to my sewing machine with all the small essentials (like bobbins, needles, scissors, unpicker, ruler, calculator, etc). I got mine at walmart but I know lots of other stores that sell them to.
I am thinking I am going to get a set of drawers like this to sit next to my sewing machine for things like my regular cutting scissors, thread, velcro, elastic waistband, and all those other little sewing things that I need at the sewing machine.

10. A good place to store your fabric. I use those plastic drawers to store the fabrics that are less than 2 yards. I have 2 sets of them. For the fabrics that I buy by the bolt I keep on the bolt behind my couch, but I really need a bookcase to store them on so that I can see them. I have some fabrics that I keep forgetting about that are behind the couch.

If bolts would work well for you the fabric stores just throw away or recycle the cardboard pieces so just ask to take some home with you. I almost always leave the store with a couple of them. They are really handy for storing fabric on. It keeps it from getting wrinkled.

Do you have any tips or tools that are essential to you successfully sewing?