enJOY it
an archived personal and craft blog from Elise Blaha Cripe.
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April flew.
Like literally. I just watched my to-do list fold itself into a paper airplane and fly out the window.
Aside from a few days of feeling terrible, it was a great month. Good for the blog, that's for sure. But the shop needs some work. Maybe new products? Maybe a sale? Maybe a new lease on life? But my focus was really on the blog workshop and the craft fair this month and injecting the shop with adrenaline slipped.
I ran a lot. 53 miles. Training-wise, that was probably not enough, but still a lot. The furthest I have gone at one time is six miles. Which is GREAT if you're the Elise from two months ago, but NOT GREAT if you're the Elise that is training to run a half marathon in five weeks. Lots of work to be done there, that's for sure.
The apartment is a brand new person. An extreme home makeover has taken place in my living room. I am so excited about it. Even better, if you don't count what I spent with gift cards, I came in almost under budget. Almost. Close enough to call it. A few more pieces need to fall into place and it's "done."
FOR MAY :
Complete the living room transformation (& obviously blog it).
Release some new and exciting – yet to be determined – shop items.
Have a successful craft fair (& obviously blog about it).
Run 75 miles.
YIKES. Better get rolling.
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my iPad anniversary gift, the kindle app (you were right!), finishing The Hunger Games
in one night, staying up late to read as opposed to stress, artichokes, finding three mile runs to be downright easy (though six mile ones still make me want to cry), using a powerful paper trimmer
, gray stripes on the wall, fresh mangos.
Happy weekend.
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I spent Wednesday night and Thursday morning mapping out a good plan for my table at the Queen Bee Market. These iPhone photos are tragic, but I thought you might like to see how the table changed and finally came together. It still needs some finessing, more fabric and a run with an iron, but it's getting there.
Obviously, I need to work something out for the poster smash that is the right side. Looking at the photos, I think the posters look better (but not great) in take number 4 as opposed to take 5 and 6. I definitely like how the flower posters look in 4 and 5 as opposed to 6. But I like the left side of the table best in the final image.
The 5×7 print display will somehow be rigged to stand upright on the right. Behind the table will be the teal blue wall. Can you see it? Sort of?
SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEECH.
— picture the record stopping. Or the post getting edited. Or something.
I typed up this the post, previewed it and wanted to cry actually cried because the photos of the table were not clicking with the photos of that teal wall. At all. Unfortunately, I had just cleaned everything up to type this post.
I thought about it (and drank a beer) and decided it was worth it to reset the whole thing again, this time with the backdrop to see what was going to work.
And the above is what I wound up with.
BETTER, RIGHT? At least sort of? I am going to make fabric covers for the poster boxes on the right. And I am going to change out the fabric for the 5×7 print display too. I think it will help to make the background solid green and switch out some ribbon. Fortunately, I have enough fabric that it won't cost a dime.
I am so much happier with it. It feels more like Real Display and not a backyard craft show.
Okay, back to the post I typed —
My biggest victory was coming up with risers and then covers for them. I am at the end of my budget and really wanted to try and use what I had on hand for table display. I took various boxes that I use for storage and made fabric covers for them by basically wrapping five sides like they were presents and sewing the edges. Probably not the best plan ever, but the covers fit snugly and can be removed and stored while the boxes do their normal job in my office when I am not craft fairing it. I have a few more to make for the posters and then I'll hit everything with an iron. Most of these boxes are not really seen, just something that product can lean against.
We're nearly there! Just a few things to touch up as mentioned above. Thanks for following along with my progress. Knowing I had Blogland to share photos with stressed me out made me work harder on everything.
AND : if you're local …
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When Paul and I first moved in together, he was keeping his loose change in a pile on the counter. One of the first things I remember buying was a pink ceramic piggy bank at Target for him to start piling change into. It took four years (keeping in mind we raided it for parking quarters often) but it finally filled up.
And I decided it was time to fancy up the pig.
I had copper leafing supplies left over from this January art project so that's what I used to decorate him. Simple enough and maybe it's just me, but I like him so much better in metallic.
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Bread no. 8 : beer bread
Adjustments : I substituted 1/2 C of white flour with wheat. Always looking to get more wheat.
Notes : DUDE. I have never had beer bread before and stumbled on a recipe for some on Pinterest. Wanting to find a few more recipes I searched for "beer bread" within Pinterest. A plethora of photos came up with links to recipes. It was a perfectly edited search and I'll be trying it again for other things.
Review : I am willing to say this is the best bread yet. Super easy to make because there is no rise time and you can quickly mix by hand. We used Dogfish Head Midas Touch beer and it was perfect. You can definitely taste the beer, so keep that in mind. We made pulled pork for dinner the other night and this was perfect sandwich bread to go with.
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I shared a peek of our painting plan last weekend & am happy to announce…
…we now have stripes! Gray & white ones! They extend along the wall behind our TV and then around the dining table nook.
You might be thinking, "Elise, you're an idiot. You'll be moving soon, this was a lot of effort for a short lasting reward." And to that I say, "Good call."
But here's the thing : Paul's in the navy. We are always and forever going to be "moving soon." And I can be sad about it and just pin good ideas for a future house that we might own in twelve years OR I can just get over it and roll with good decor ideas. And gray stripes felt like a good decor idea. I am slowly turning our home into a place we've styled up instead of a place that we are just passing time in. And that makes me feel like I'm living and not just waiting for Paul to deploy and then come home so we can get on with the next thing.
Painting details : The wall was already painted white. I measured out ten inch stripes from the ceiling to the floor with painters tape. I made sure that the top stripe and the bottom stripe were white so I didn't have to do as much cutting in. Then, because we have textured walls, I painted over what would be the gray edge of the tape with white paint in order to make the tape line as clean as possible. After the white dried completely, I went around with a big brush and painted the inside of the gray stripes. And finally, I went around again with a smaller brush to cover the edges of the stripes. Before the last coat of gray had dried completely, I pulled the tape up and TA-DA – straight lines. The gray paint was BEHR Sage Gray.
This was a bigger project than I had anticipated and couldn't just be thrown together in true Elise style. The measuring was tedious. Painting mulitple coats was boring. But the result is pretty awesome. I am happy with our stripes. Paul is happy with our stripes. Paul is especially happy that he'll be deployed when I have to repaint the wall white before we move.
But seriously : worth it. I have one more project – painting and recovering our kitchen chairs – and then this living/dining room transformation will be complete. Hooray!
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Long, long ago, I mentioned a plan for our wedding table numbers.
I ended up scratching the design, but keeping the idea. Our new table numbers were folded gray cardstock that were stamped in orange ink with Martha Stewart foam number stamps. Guests at each table were encouraged to sign them knowing they would be opened on that anniversary year. (So we'd open table 10 on our 10th, etc.)
My parents mailed table number one's card (blurred for privacy) down and we opened it on Sunday before we went out to dinner. I actually cried reading what our sweet friends had written. I did not anticipate loving this idea so much, but it's crazy how something so simple can send you right back to the moment. I'll be tucking them into our guestbook (shown top right) for safe keeping.
I had anticipated sharing more thoughts about this first year of marriage but whenever it comes to actually typing up a full post – I've got nothing. Paul and I lived together for three years before we were married, so we were pretty well versed in "how to make a serious relationship work" before the "I do's" were said. One thing that we have changed this year though is just making more time for the fun stuff. We get outside more. We celebrate more happy hours. We talk to each other more. Paul's work schedule has gotten so much crazier, but mine has become flexible and the balance has worked out well. I can say for sure that this past year was our best yet. I am so grateful we were able to spend our first year of married life in such a sunny city that is so much closer to our family and friends.
top three photos by the goodness. And yes, we have orange roses at the moment – keeping the tradition alive since 2010.
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Do you remember that I am having a love affair with staining? Of course you do!
I have been dreaming of a project like this since before Christmas. I really wanted to hammer nails into small wooden pieces and wrap string in the shape of a star for decorations. But then one thing led to another and I was still scared of the hardware store at the time and so nothing got done.
But NOW, my project is back and better than ever. When we had the light pine wood cut down for the coffee table, there was a leftover square. I immediately started contemplating the most interesting shape to string on it.
At first I considered a "C" because that is our last initial. But that didn't feel right. And a heart felt too obvious. And a star felt too holiday. So finally, I landed on an ampersand. To me, an ampersand means LOVE. So that made it perfect. (I just realized, I should have told Paul this was his anniversary gift.)
To get the shape, I took a big piece of paper (actually one of my old calendar pages. This calendar has been the best investment of my life) and free hand drew an ampersand. Then I used a ruler to get the width of the ampersand equal in every space. Does that make sense? Basically, I moved the ruler around each point until the edges of the symbol were three inches apart everywhere. Then I cut it out, taped it to the newly stained board and hammered nails around the edges of the paper.
The last step was to wrap string around from nail to nail. At first, I wanted to create some sort of organized pattern, but that didn't really work. So instead I just wove the string back and forth wherever it seemed to look right. I used just one piece of string and then tied the ends together when it was all done.
I'm in love with it. It's big (almost 2'x2') and probably too heavy to hang on a wall. But leaning, it's killer. And it's fancying up our new living room that I can't wait to share with you.
This is project 5 of 26. I am attempting to tackle 26 personal craft projects before I turn 27 on 02.22.12. You can follow my progress here on the blog, on pinterest or on flickr.
enJOY it 