The winner of the Making Memories De*fined embellishments is....Lolis!
"Congratulations on your blogaversary! Thanks for sharing all your wonderful creations! Great giveaway!"
Thanks everyone who commented and congratulations, Lolis. I will be sending you an email and mailing out your prize tomorrow.
This week marks my 3rd anniversary of writing this blog! How time flies...now over 152,000 visits and 1163+ posts, the stats are starting to add up - I really can't believe it. So I thought I would do a little blog candy draw to celebrate. I picked up these 4 packages of de*fined word embellishments from making memories. They are printed on beautiful creamy stock so they can be decorated with colored pencils, inks or paints, if desired, to suit any layout or card design. Although they have adhesive backs, you can also leave the paper backing on the words so they can be tucked into pockets or cut into tags. Each pack has a different theme: friendship, all girl, adventure, and celebrate.
If you'd like to win all four packages, just leave a comment on this blog post. I will pick one lucky winner and post the selected comment on Monday morning. Make sure to leave a way for me to get in touch with you. Good luck and thanks for visiting Over the Kitchen Counter - 3 years strong and counting!
I was very excited to find out I'd won the blog candy from Carissa over at Happily Ever After Paper Crafter. Carissa is a super-woman: she is a mom, wife, design team member for Pumpkin Spice AND she works outside the home! I don't know how she finds the time to create such beautiful projects - cards, mini albums, 3-D projects, etc.!
I won a pad of jillibean soup holiday paper and some striped baker's twine. I love both and am sure I can use them in some cute cards and projects. Even though the paper is Christmas themed there are a couple designs (flowers, stars) that will work for any time of the year. Thanks, Carissa, for the great giveaway and all your creative inspiration! Check out the Happily Ever After Paper Crafter blog if you'd like to get some paper craft ideas for your next project!
Have you ever seen this game? It's called Perplexus Epic. My nephew got the original one for Christmas and everyone was waiting their turn to have a go at guiding a little ball around the maze track - by shifting, flipping, and twisting the sphere to battle gravity and get through the barriers. After the relatives went home we knew we had to pick up this highly addictive puzzle game. We ended up getting the Epic version - more difficult and larger obstacles to conquer! I swear it is the most frustrating thing to play with...it takes total concentration and a steady hand. You think you are doing well and then, bam...the darn little marble just falls off the track and you have to start ALL OVER AGAIN AT THE BEGINNING! I'm sure it is a good mental exercise and hopefully will ward of Alzheimer's. Hopefully that makes the aggravation worth it. And it totally got my son to put the Wii remote down! You can find more information about Perplexus here.
Happy New Year! I wanted to wish you all a very happy and healthy 2012. Thank you for taking the time to pop in and see what's new over the kitchen counter. I hope I've provided you with lots of ideas and inspiration over the past twelve months - for your kitchen and your craft room! I appreciate the comments, e-mails, and support and look forward to serving up another year of posts! All the best to you...
- Angie
Today is my big brother's birthday. He died fourteen years ago and I miss him all the time. He (obviously) was much older and I idolized him. With an incredibly generous personality and tender spirit, he left behind a charitable legacy in the poorest part of the world and I admire all that he did in life...and death. He would almost be a senior citizen today but I will remember him forever as he was...
I mentioned on Sunday that I washed one of my quilts for the first time. My biggest fear was that the purple and pink fabrics would run and spoil all the cream and yellow fabrics. The reason I finally did feel safe washing the quilt was because I received a box of Shout Color Catcher sheets. They are not available in Canada but one of my quilting friends was kind enough to send me a
box. They are small sheets, similar to dryer sheets. You toss one or more in with a load of laundry and the sheet(s) trap loose dyes in the wash so they can't transfer onto the other clothes. While I was interested in having these specifically for quilts, I think they'd be awesome in every load of laundry. My kids have been doing their own clothes since they turned 13 and they just dump everything in at once. Trust me when I say they are usually walking around with blue socks and underwear because of jeans in the load! Right now I'm hoarding this box of 24 (now 23 since I used one!) until I can get to the States and buy a case of them. I believe they are under $4 and by preventing color transfers and preserving the original colors and vibrancy of your clothes, I think they are a great idea and a great value! As I said, my quilt came out perfectly and I feel very relieved - thanks to the Shout Color Catcher and my quilting friend Jan!
Every home has what I call a 'cubby hole' - a dark, awkward space where people stash all their junk. For us, it's under the stairs and except for several head-banging injuries, is an excellent storage location for Christmas decorations, suitcases, folding tables, files, and our memory bins. These are large, heavy-duty, plastic totes where we keep precious memorabilia. Once in a while, every few years, we venture to the very back of the crawl-space and pull out the bins. This usually occurs when I get my anti-hoarding instinct and the room needs a clear-out for Goodwill and the landfill. It is always a side-tracked trip down memory lane when the lid flaps get opened and, after 'coming-to' as the over-powering stink of moth balls begins to dissipate a bit, all the junk from our yester-years gets reviewed. This last time in particular turned out to be very exciting for my youngest daughter since I uncovered several items of interest to her. I knew saving those Rocky Horror books and pins for over 30 years would be worth it at some point! She gladly took everything and proudly showed off her 'vintage' accessories! I also enjoyed showing her my Doogie Howser, MD t-shirt from way back in the 80s and she thought it was hysterical how young Neil Patrick Harris was (a.k.a. Barney Stinson from her show "How I Met Your Mother").
Of course my DH wanted to revisit all his old memories and while he was counting the MLB hats in his collection I had an interesting look through the baby magazine his mother was given in the hospital when he was born (early 60s). It is so funny to read (in hind-sight) what was marketed to and advised to new mothers. Do you know they were encouraged to feed their infants Carnation evaporated milk diluted with water and mixed with sugar!?!?!?! I can't believe it!
There is also a list of "I never dreamed..." and one that struck me was "that you oil a baby, like a sewing machine." Pretty funny! And some hints are just as applicable today as then...such as "don't put anything sharp into the baby's nose or ears"; "don't give the baby tea, coffee, beer, or wine of any kind"; "don't let anyone kiss your baby if you can avoid it but if you cannot, let the kissing be done on the back of the baby's neck"!
Every once in a while it's a good thing to remember our past, how much has changed, and how some things never change!
I've shared quite a few products on this blog in the past few months so I thought it was time for a follow-up visit to see how some of them have measured up with use.
In the Kitchen:
Carving Set: This set has proven to be amazing! I have abandoned my electric knife altogether and always reach for the carving knife whenever I have to slice meat. Excellent item - 2 thumbs up for this one.
Better Homes and Gardens Skillet These pans are phenomenal! I have used them on a daily basis since I received them back in May and the finish is exactly the same as when they were brand new. There are no scratches, the surface is still completely non-stick, they wash up so easily and I am thrilled with their performance. I am sure that by now I would have had to replace yet another Teflon pan but these BH&G pans are out-shining any I've used before! 2 thumbs up for this one!
Disposable Gloves I can't imagine not using disposable gloves in the kitchen now. They have not only saved my nails but really eliminated the gross factor when handling raw meat. I am still working through this box - they are lasting a long time - but I can't wait to try a different brand that hopefully has one consistent size of glove in the box! Thumbs up for disposable gloves...thumbs down for the Hero brand of gloves.
In the beauty department:
i-Skin Pore Perfecting System I loved using the i-Skin brush and it made my skin beautiful and soft. The only problem is recently it quit working! I put fresh batteries in and still the unit did not turn on. This was a down-side in reviews of the i-skin and I was disappointed that mine had the same problem. The switch seems to be the culprit and there is no way to fix it. I still use the brush and just wash my face with it in a circular motion but that makes the $40 price too high for a battery-powered brush with no power! Sadly, thumbs down for this one.
Pink Gel Coat (Really, all the manicure products I've used) Once I set my mind to growing my nails all the products I used helped me do it. The Nail-Tek treatment and T.I.P.S. conditioning oil were probably most used and most responsible. I was able to end up with 10 beautiful nails and got to play with so many pretty polishes. Essie was by far my favourite brand. I enjoyed having a perfect French manicure and loved the look. Sadly, I ended up with 2 very low breaks on my nails in August and had to trim off all the nails to match. They were just too low down to repair. Since then I have been quilting and have kept my nails short. I'm still using the NailTek and T.I.P.S but have not kept up with the weekly manicure of coloured polish and they are too short for a French manicure now. The products work...you just have to use them! I know now that I CAN grow them if I want to and for special occasions I will dedicate more time to my nails. For now, I've got too many other things to do!
In the Craft room:
Craft Room My craft room has been a dream! I love it so much and really am thankful to have the space to enjoy my crafting. Now that I am really into quilting the sewing section has expanded considerably but the space is so versatile and efficient I can expand and contract each area depending on what I'm doing. Of course, I would love to double the size and quadruple the cupboards but it is working out really well for me (and my family) just the way it is!
Sewing Machine My Janome 3160 has been wonderful! I love it sew much! I seriously never, never thought I would ever sew, let alone make quilts. The machine makes beautiful stitches and is so quiet. I have little to compare it to, but it is so fancy and sophisticated next to my old Singer. I am thrilled to have this new hobby in my life and am so proud of the quilts I've made so far. I've also met such amazing, sweet people in the quilting world - both in person and on-line. This is a great start to my quilting journey and I predict upgrades and additions in the future...(got my eye on an embroidery machine already!)
Craft Haul - I have bought too many craft tools and toys to list but they have all been terrific! Everything has worked, inspired, decorated, and produced. The punches, stamps, papers, Cricut cartridges, die cutters, adhesives, binding machines, trimmers and more have made my crafting life fun and easy! The only problem I have...is getting more time to play and create!
