Sunday, January 20, 2013

Covered Button Tutorial

One of my favourite things to do (I've discovered), is to make things for the people I really care about. A few of the things that I love best about creating something for someone else is that you get such a feeling of accomplishment, you get to be creative and the gifts are unique, personal and show that you really thought of the person. That is what I think is the most important part of gift giving - not how much you spend but how much you think of the other person. I love making gestures to show in a physical sense that I was thinking of someone. Even if it is just a small gesture.
I saw these via Pinterest and its Pinterest for the win. Not only are they adorable, but they were easy to make (once you tracked down all the supplies and found the fabric you wanted to use). And who knew covering buttons would be so fun?

Finding fabric for my buttons was by the far the hardest thing for me.
Particularly since I don't sew and have no sewing knowledge. I thought I would just be able to buy tiny scraps of fabric, but turns out fabric stores arent really all about that. So I now have a ridiculous amount of leftover fabric. 
But it is possible to buy little squares of fabric or triangles of fabric (I think they're regularly used for quilting?) and use those. It'll still be too much fabric, but since I dont have fabric scraps, I took what I could find. 







With this step, it'd be nice to keep the button fairly centered in the fabric. You might have to push pretty hard to get the button down, but once you figure out how much you have to push, it goes pretty quickly. The excess fabric folds really easily into the center and I used my nails and the button pusher to tuck it down as much as possible.




See those adorable purple corduroy earrings? Yes they are adorable. And yes they were hell to make.
A word to the wise, keep in mind your fabric thickness. Particularly for the little buttons, I had a very difficult time getting the button back to snap on because the fabric was so thick. I ended up hammering the backs on.

Finding the earrings posts was quite a challenge. Turns out, not that many places sell them. But phoning around was useful.
The glue was bought at walmart. Easy peasy.

I started by trying not to have excess glue. But since the backs of the buttons werent necessarily completely flat, I decided I'd rather have some excess glue that would make the earrings a little sturdier, and make sure the posts bonded to the buttons.


I loved how these button earrings turned out. And I loved making little card boxes and giving them away to all my friends. Maybe I'll make a pair for myself at some point (since I really do have so much left over fabric), but it was just such a fun little project to do.

Saturday, January 19, 2013

Just the Tip of the Iceberg

I'd comment, but lets be real, I too have an ungodly amount of photos of myself that are just like this.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Crockpot Chicken Tortilla Soup


I ended up having to make dinner on a non-day off day (because yes, I can only manage to make dinner if I have at least an hour before it needs to be done and when I work till five, I dont really have time to get home and make dinner before the family needs to eat at like 5:30). So as always I turned to trusty Pinterest. This soup turned out sooo good (and its leftovers can be turned into a casserole). With really good flavor and not too spicy at all. Plus those onions! They were amazing.

In the Crockpot:
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
2 10oz cans of green chiles
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 can kidney beans, rinsed and drained
1 can corn or two cups frozen corn
1 onion, chopped
900mL chicken broth (I used one of those big boxes of chicken broth that looks like a giant juice box)
1-2 cups of water
1 Taco Seasoning Package

To finish the soup:
tortilla chips
sour cream
shredded cheese
fresh cilantro

This could not have been easier to make. I just put all the ingredients (onion, beans, green chiles, etc) in the crockpot and mixed them around (adding the chicken last and making sure it was partially submerged in the liquid mixture - which wasnt a problem since there was lots of liquid). Then I set the crockpot for low and cooked it for about 8-9 hours. Since I got home after it was ready, Nat broke up the chicken a little bit - which was super easy since it had been cooking all day. 

To serve we crunched up some chips, topped it with shredded cheese and since I like sour cream, I added a spoon full of that. I didn't have any cilantro, but I know it would have only enhanced the flavour. It was amazing (even though Dave doesn't consider soup a real meal). And seriously so easy. I think I could really get into crockpot cooking.