Friday Finds: Rit Dyed Buttons

Check this sh*t out! You can dye white plastic buttons with Rit Dye. Who would have thunk? I can't wait to try this.

These bright buttons were dyed with Rit.

Easy tutorial over here.

And if you are what they have diagnosed as a "visual learner"...here is a video tutorial I found on YouTube:

Have a great weekend!

–Cassandra

Give It Away

Just when we're all feeling the money pinch, we’re bombarded with stories about people less fortunate than us. From the radio, the tv, and the web, we hear story after story of people who simply have a lot less.

Unfortunately, for most of us, our pockets aren’t as full as our hearts are and, as much as we'd love to be extra-charitable, there isn't much left over, after taking care of ourselves, to take care of others.

Years ago, I had a mentor who used to say that giving was about “time, talent, and treasure”. You could be charitable without having to empty your wallet. He believed that each of these ways of giving had equal value and that none of them should be considered less of a gift.

Once you start looking at your giving in this way - that it's not just about cash - you begin to realize how rich you are and how much you can do for others.

Before I had any income that wasn’t already earmarked for bills and daily survival, the one thing I had an abundance of was time and some talents that I thought might be useful. So I started my giving there.

I’m sure many of you think (as I used to) that you don’t have any time available to volunteer for anything – what with running the kids to sports and having to complete your honey-do list - but I’m going to challenge that thinking. I'll bet that there is one hour a week that you could take away from chores or watching television. Or, how about one hour a month? Remember, it’s not the AMOUNT you give, it’s the giving that matters. Your community center could certainly use someone one hour a month to help with cleaning or arranging the food pantry. You could take an hour and spend it sorting donations at the local charity. Or how about one hour a week to help a child learn to read? The possibilities are endless.

Once I realized that my time had some charitable value, I got a little addicted to giving back. I would get excited about a particular opportunity to help and pledge a lot of my time – only to discover that I hadn’t left any time relax and recharge. So, just remember to balance.

Now, donating talent is a bit trickier because it also comes with the donation of time. However, you’d be amazed at how much your talents are appreciated when they’re volunteered. Your skills can make a difference in someone’s life or for a worthy organization – whether it’s something you do as a hobby or a job.  Let me give you some examples of how my talents have been donated over the years.

• I wrote the web site for a non-profit organization.
• I’ve done marketing consultation for my local community center.
• I MC’d a variety of charity auctions.
• I’ve used my crafting skills to create items to donate to various charities.

Donating talent is particularly rewarding because you’re providing a skill or service that the organization may not be able to get for free otherwise.

If I had my choice, I'd give away a lot of money. But it’s hard to part with hard-earned cash – especially when there are bills to pay and (even adult) kids to support. Every year, when I do my taxes, I’m pretty proud of how much I’ve given away and then my tax guy gives me a reality check. According to him, I’m giving away about half of what I should be for my income level.  Yikes! But then I consider that my time and talent are as important as my treasure and I figure it all balances out to a pretty well-rounded year of giving. 

So... back to treasure. You know how National Public Radio always says “give as much as you can, every penny counts”? Well, they mean it!  Think of it this way, if every listener gave $5 annually, they would have $135 million dollars each year.  I’m sure that would put a big dent in their budget. So, what are you willing to part with to donate a little cash to a worthy organization? One fancy coffee a week? Here's the coffee-math: $5 a week = $20 a month = $240 a year. That’s a nice donation to a small non-profit or an individual that needs to pay bills or buy food..  I’m sure that there’s something that you indiscriminately spend money on…  coffee, lunches out, impulse purchases at the checkout line, magazines, etc. All you have to do is find a few dollars a week or a few dollars a month and commit them to a charitable organization and you'll have joined the ranks of treasure givers.

Finally, if you absolutely can’t find a way to donate time, talent, or treasure, you should go out of your way to look for other options. There are a million ways that you can make a difference from donating your hair to Locks of Love to adding the URL to a charity’s donation page to your email signature. You could donate old bikes to The Bicycle Project or train a service dog. How about cleaning out your pantry and taking all those non-perishable foods you haven’t eaten to the food pantry – making sure that they haven’t passed the expiration date, of course!  Be a pen-pal for an elderly person or donate your old holiday decorations to a local charity organization. Just find something that constitutes helping someone who has less than you.

Regardless of how you decide to give, remember to give yourself credit for whatever you do. You made a difference in someone’s life. Like the old tale about the flap of the butterfly wings causing a tidal wave on the other side of the earth, every action counts - no matter how small or seemingly insignificant.

- Santa Alex

Art Directed by an 8th Grader

Yes, the title is true.

This past weekend I did creative production work for my little cousin. He was over for a visit and a couple hours before he had to go, he mentioned that he needed to create a short video on Lewis and Clark for a school project. Of course I started in with a million questions about how he was going to dress his sets and what his script looked like..."offering" my suggestions (aka running completely roughshod over the poor kid). My husband gently reminded me who's project this was and I backed off. But I did tell him I'd love to help him with this project before he went home.


We only had a couple hours to get this done so we had to move fast. He had come with the idea that he wanted to use toys for actors, making it more of an animated film. I loved this. We built a set using part of my Halloween village accessories and part of our Christmas nativity scenery. "Little People" were perfect in proportion to the set so we went with the farmer for Lewis, a random pilgrim for Clark, and the teacher from the school set for Sacagawea. Sir Toppham Hat makes an appearance straight from the Thomas Train set. Use your imagination people, we only had a couple hours to pull this together!


My suggestion of making a silent film was met with enthusiasm and so we set to work. Believe it or not, this entire little film was completely created on my iphone with an app called Silent Film Director. This tool made it so easy. I will admit to having upgraded to "pro" for a few bucks more. They had everything I needed from editing capabilities to effects and music. I have never shot video and edited it before...but oh my, I'm sort of a monster now. It was serious fun.

This film is rough, there was no time for re-shooting anything (I accidentally shot it portrait instead of landscape) and the typography leaves something to be desired...but I think it's sort of cute so I thought I'd share it.


Here is my his film:

–Cassandra

Friday Finds

It's the time of the year for clementines - also known "cuties" or Mandarin oranges. Don't know why they're not called Mandarin oranges anymore. Maybe it's not PC enough. And, while I agree that they're pretty cute, I kind of hate how twee the name "cutie" sounds.

Someone told me that more clementine oranges are consumed on Thanksgiving than any other day of the year. This is a completely unsubstantiated claim but it wouldn't surprise me.


Anyway.

I found this really cool craft project that employes clementines and I thought I'd share it with you for today's Friday Finds. It's super-easy to do and the end result is really impressive. Clementines aren't just for eating! Woot!

How to Make a Clementine Candle

 

Magic Mushrooms

As I've mentioned on this blog before, my family is mainly meat-free. This lifestyle is not a problem for our small children who have never enjoyed the flavor sausage brings to pasta sauce or what fat from beef adds to your stew because they have no idea what they are missing. But, for my husband and I (who were both raised omnivorous) there has been some time of "adjustment".

We have researched and experimented until we collected a nice stable of everyday recipes that we recognize as home-cooking. Flavored seitan and TVP have been integral as meat substitutes in this process (as seen in the Sausage & Angel Hair Pasta and Tomato-y Vegetarian Chili we have shared here previously). What also has been a key ingredient in the kitchen is mushrooms.

I will admit, chopping mushrooms is a bore.

Today I want to share with you what we call our "Magic Mushroom Base". So far we have used it in both Italian and Mexican dishes to great success. Here's how it goes:

Magic Mushroom Base

1lb mushrooms of random varieties (we like to mix them up)

1 medium onion

3 cloves pressed garlic

2 tbsp butter

1/4 cup olive oil (plus more, keep the bottle handy)

2 tbsp tomato paste

Dice onion and saute in butter and 1/4 cup olive oil until transparent. Press garlic in and saute for a couple minutes. Add tomato paste and cook it until it starts to caramelize (which means it will start sticking to the pan, so as you stir you scrape the bottom over and over until the paste goes from medium red to a deeper shade of brick red).

The tomato paste getting deeper red.

Then it's time to add the cleaned and chopped mushrooms. Turn them over and over with a wooden spoon, coating them completely. If you feel like it needs more moisture go ahead and splash some more olive oil in at this point. Not too much though, you want to keep this thick.

Turning the mushrooms over and over.

If you would like your mushrooms flavored for a Mexican (we use Penzy's taco seasoning) or Italian dish (we use oregano and basil), this is the time to add your spices. Turn the mushrooms over and over until they are soft and sauteed completely.

Now what you have is a thick mushroom base that is a great filling for enchiladas, lasagna, sub sandwiches, etc. Anywhere you would use ground meat or meatballs. This is why it's magic. :)

–Cassandra

Plushies (not Furries... get your mind out of the gutter)

For the uninitiated, in modern parlance stuffed animals are called "plushies". I suppose it's because they are so rarely animals anymore. From UglyDolls to microbes, anything can be a plushie these days.

Jiker - pretty cute UglyDoll

This is a plushie of the herpes virus. I swear to god.

On Friday, our Crafting for Charity group had its fourth quarter meeting. After the debacle with the baby kimonos last quarter, Cassandra and I decided to do something different with our remaining flannel. So, inspired by our friend Emily at Bluestar, Ink. (please go check out her amazing work!) we figured we'd try our hand and some plushies of our own.


Cassandra designed a couple of super-sweet and simple patterns for us to use. One of our members had some fur left over from a Halloween costume so Cassandra decided to make a wolf:

Wolf

And she made a bunny for me:

Bunny

I didn't end up making the bunny evil, even though Cassandra left me the option by giving him pointy teeth. Also, she eventually added a 1/2 inch seam allowance to the illustration which was really helpful.

One friend, Erin, did the sock monkey from the book Craft Hope by Jade Sims. That turned out to be a pretty easy pattern - even though she made it difficult by purchasing chenille socks that were a b*tch to work with. LOL

I started my afternoon by finishing up the last baby kimono. I had to fix the hand flaps (I'd sewed them incorrectly) and add the tie closures. While I was doing that, Cassandra and Erin started their plushies. Cassandra did a lot of handwork on hers - embroidering the face and making the furry ears separate from the rest of the doll - and, well, Erin had the aforementioned struggle with the chenille. I kept my doll simple. I cut a front and back from the same flannel fabric then added a coordinating colored "face", paw pads, and inside ears. I machine-sewed the whiskers and the triangle nose, then added a couple of buttons for eyes. We all finished up at about the same time. And here's our final product!

The Usual Suspects

Wolf detail (love the chest hair!)

All in all, these were pretty easy to make. Now that we have the basic pattern down, we'll probably try to knock out a few more at our next meeting. Then they'll be donated to the Children's Hospital here in town.

On a separate note, on Saturday we delivered about 10 fleece pet beds to the Humane Society. We made these by taking the no-sew fleece blanket kits from Joann Fabrics, cutting them in half (to make two smaller "blankets") and stuffing them with a thin layer of polyfill. They seemed really happy to receive them. Also, our knitters are knocking out newborn caps at an alarming rate. At some point soon, those will be delivered to the NICU at one of our local hospitals.

Finally, our group got featured in our company newsletter. Based on the response, the idea is pretty popular so, hopefully, we'll inspire some folks to start their own groups.

- Alex

Friday Finds: LuSa Lotion Bars

Must be read with a 1950's announcer's voice:
Friends, do your hands get dry from office air conditioning or heat? Does wool drag on your skin when knitting? Are you embarrassed of your cracked cuticles? Then you need to try LuSa Organics lotion bars.

LuSa Organics lotion bars are joyfully made in Viroqua, Wisconsin with the finest ingredients available. Each hand-crafted bar is similar in size to a bar of soap. You simply rub the bar between your hands to apply the lotion and then massage into the skin. It's just that simple. Order today!

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My favorite LuSa lotion flavor is lavender.

I felt like I needed to write a radio ad for this lotion because I love it so much. At this time of year when I am knitting like a fiend, my hands can get really dry. These lotion bars are my constant companion. I can't recommend them enough for folks who do a lot of work with their hands.

There is something for everyone at the LuSa site. Those with children will love the "Sweetest Dreams" roll on oil. It is part of our night-time ritual.

I am fortunate enough to live in a town where I have lots of retail options to purchase the entire line of LuSa products but for those of you who are not, it's okay, you can order online. LuSa is an example of a small independent company producing quality products at a reasonable cost. There is no excuse not to shop Indy people! :)

Happy Friday!

–Cassandra