All's quiet on the western front

Yahoo had an interesting article Monday on the top five college degrees offering the best return on your investment. Hmm, so strange not to see my Bachelor of Music in Piano degree listed on there (just kidding)...

Thank you, thank you, thank you. (That's me, prematurely accepting all the praise from actually finishing a swap days earlier than the night before the deadline.) Yes, I have finished my apron and potholder for the Fall Sassy Apron Swap. It will actually be going out in the mail tomorrow and on it's merry way to some lucky lady. At least I hope she thinks she is a lucky lady when she opens it up and tries it on. It's hard to know when you make something for someone you don't know if they are truly going to like it or not. This apron is technically my first finished piece of clothing (it can be lumped into the clothing category, right?), and I was pretty tickled pink to have finished it and actually have it resemble an apron! (Click on any of the pictures below to see them bigger.)

The apron:


The button detail:


The potholder:



I've never made a potholder before so I just made it up. It is about 7" by 9", and I made it so it is both a potholder and an oven mitt in one (sneaky, sneaky). I even went to JoAnn's and bought Insul-Bright batting to make it that much cooler. I guess it is supposed to better keep you from burning your hands through the potholder. It is a bit wonky at the bottom, but the main thing is that it works, right?!

I kind of went a more "traditional route" with the fabrics, since I wasn't quite sure what my partner would like (her preferences given to me were pretty open). Years back I went through a big toile phase, but in the last few years I've purged a lot of it from my house. I still like it, though, and I obviously was unable to resist when I saw the Thanksgiving toile fabric. Seriously, it's pretty cute. One color my partner also mentioned liking was blue, so I tried to find a blue fabric to go with the toile, a tad difficult since the toile didn't have blue in it, but I was able to find a navy-colored small floral that blended well with the greyish tones in the toile. And you know me, I had to throw some orange in there. The whole thing is lined with the navy fabric -- I love things that are lined. The buttons were kind of a splurge, but I had to have them since I am a sucker for cute buttons, especially cute dark green maple leaf vintage-looking buttons! I used McCall's pattern M5643, and, having never really made a clothing item before, I thought this pattern was pretty user-friendly and would use it again (to make myself an apron, of course, selfish little thing that I am, haha). I even took the extra time to topstitch it in several places and to handstitch it closed in others so that it would lay better (my mom will be so proud). I sure hope that my partner likes it as much as I do, and I am very excited to see what someone has made for me!

My boy and I took a road trip yesterday to see my sister-in-law and her two boys. We had a great time at the sand park. Note to self -- ALL LITTLE BOYS LOVE SAND. As you might have guessed, we were still finding sand in all sorts of nooks and crannies all the way until bedtime last night. We also ate at my absolute favorite restaurant in her city, pretty much the best Mexican food I have ever put in my mouth. In her city there is a very popular Mexican restaurant where people can wait hours for a table, but there is a less known restaurant in the same area that was opened up by former cooks at the popular one. Not only is the food to die for, but it is much much better. Instead of the regular sides of rice and beans, you can also choose from Mexican style mashed potatoes (lots of garlic, yum) and a cream-styled corn with green chiles (not as soupy as regular cream corn though). And free sopapillas for dessert. We rolled our stuffed selves out of the restaurant, let the boys throw some pennies in the fountains, and then went back to their house for some playtime before the boy and I had to pack it up and head back home on the turnpike.

Wouldn't you know, out of all of that fun, the only picture I snapped yesterday was this one (while driving no less, shame on me, and no, I wasn't speeding):


Yipes! Our beloved 4Runner crossed over the 100K mark.

Okay, off to wake up the boy. My not-as-good-as-he-used-to-be-napper has been asleep for almost 3&1/2 hours!!! This used to be a regular occurrence, but notsomuch since he turned three. Yes, it has been a very good afternoon...