until Halloween, and I haven’t even thought about costumes.

Pretty sure I’m about to get kicked out of crafty blogging all together.

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You’ve got about 3.5 hours (until noon PST) to place your bids on any of the items in the auction to benefit Operation Smile.  You can also make a donation directly.  The goal was 5 smiles.  We’re at about 4.5 right now…so SO close!

Here is the post where you can big on my pillow cover.

And the other items available can be found in the linky at the end of that post as well.

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First up, the winners of the nut cup giveaway (he he he) from Pick Your Plum are:

S
Jeanette
Dianna

Check your email and respond within 48 hours to claim your prize, please!

Can I tell you about my day yesterday?

It was not fabulous.

My keys were missing.  I don’t lose stuff.  Not stuff like keys, anyway.  I moved furniture.  I took off cushions.  I climbed under stuff.  I moved the piano.  And the stove.  And the fridge.  I was desperate.

It was getting late and I needed to get to the post office.  I decided to just take the spare van key and go.  At that very moment, Bennett did something evil to the deadbolt.  I’m not sure how or what, but the end result was that we were all locked out of the house.

Did I mention he was wearing Santa pajamas and no shoes?

I braved the post office anyway.  Then I got one of these:

Gotta do something to pass the time, right?

Once BC was off work and we could get back in the house, we decided to tackle the deadbolt sitch.  Have you ever tried to remove a deadbolt with the lock stuck out and the door locked shut?  It ain’t pretty.  I’m going to save you all a few swears and tell you that this little doohickey right here will retract it…if you can move it.  You might have to use a screwdriver and some sailor talk, but you’ll get there eventually.

And now my door looks like this, so that’s awesome.  And not at all redneck, right?

Did I mention that all 4 exterior doors have the same keys for both locks?  That means we either deal with multiple keys, or we buy 8 new locks.  Delightful any way you look at it, really.

We then resumed the key hunt.  I opened a drawer I had already gone through twice, including holding it upside down and shaking, and I saw this:

WHAT THE CRAP?

Who’s messing with me???

My money’s on this one:

You can’t trust a guy with shatter painted finger nails.

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This was originally posted as part of Kristen Duke’s Decorating with Portraits series.  I wanted to post it here, too, for those who missed it and because I want to remember/have a record of what I said and how I felt.

When Kristen asked me to post about decorating with portraits I was all:

My 5 year old has Asperger’s.  Because of that, he FREAKS out about pictures and we have literally no family pictures worth displaying from the last 5 years or so.  Any pictures I display are mom taken snapshot type pictures because at least he’s not rolling around on the ground/chewing on his shirt/screaming/giving a thumbs down/hiding behind someone/etc.

So, anything I could contribute would be using non professional quality photos/portraits.

How do you feel about that?

Kristen said:

I think that is an excellent perspective that is completely worthy to share!  This series isn’t just about displaying professional photos, but snapshots, too.  Anything that shows your children they are loved!  I know there are other mothers out there that are experiencing something similar.

I’m going to be super honest with you here…there are many days that Asperger’s kicks my trash.  It’s been a long 5.5 years.  It’s not easy for me to talk about, because I love my kid and I’m emotional and protective.  Plus, HOLY VULNERABILITY when I lay it all out like this.  BUT, Kristen’s right.  There are many, many of us in the autism club, so here I am.

Let me show you a little bit of what I meant in my initial response.  Here’s the last batch of family photos we had taken by my insanely talented friend Leilani.

Note the lack of willingness to make eye contact/look at the camera and him smashing his face up against me.

Oh, hey…how about I look sideways?

Pictures that emphasize Campbell’s problems (that word’s not sitting right with me, but I can’t think of a better one right now) make me sad.  I’ve come home from a photo session and sobbed more than once.  There’s a yearning for “normal” that I can’t put into words.  And there’s a want, maybe even a NEED, to document and display the happy times and not let autism define him.  How would I feel if all the pictures in my home documented my bad temper or my cursing habit?

So, if you come to my house, you won’t find any blown up canvas prints or a giant framed photo above the mantel…you’ll find lots and lots of pictures taken by me.  And I’m definitely not a photographer…just a mom that wants to remember the good stuff.

Welcome to my living room.

This display is a whole bunch of cheap-o IKEA frames duct taped together on the back.  You can read more about it here, if you’re interested.  I swap the pictures as often as the mood strikes (because 39 cents for a 5X7 doesn’t exactly persuade me not to).

On the other side of that wall, in my family room, you’ll find this:

I saw the clipboard treatment online several years ago and have been meaning to do my own version.  This post was just the push I needed.  (Details on how I laid out the clipboards here.)

And so, instead of remembering tears and anxiety (me, not the Asperger’s ), we remember birthdays with our best friends, karate kicks above our heads, football coaches with no kids of their own,  first days of school, stuffed animals can be our best friends, and that smiling will NOT get you off time out any quicker.

Celebrate the ordinary.  Be thankful for those moments.

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*****THIS AUCTION HAS ENDED*****

Let’s start this week off doing some good, shall we?

The delightful Amy from The Idea Room and Heather from Whipperberry are hosting a fundraiser for Operation Smile.  My contribution is a Jack Skellington pillow cover, that can be yours for a donation to Operation Smile.  The short version is that you leave your name and the amount of your bid in the comments on this post.  For the specifics, read on:

We as women and mothers delight in the joy of raising our families despite some of the frustrations and effort it takes.  We delight in hearing and seeing our children grow and learn, and we strive to put their needs before our own.  Their heartaches are OUR heartaches and their joy is OUR joy.  So imagine if you had a child who was beautiful and happy in everyway…but who did not have a beautiful outer physical smile to match the beauty of their inner smile?

Every three minutes a child is born with a cleft — often unable to eat, speak, socialize or smile. In some places these children are shunned and rejected. And in too many cases, their parents can’t afford to give them the surgeries they need to live a normal life.  Whereas, most of us are blessed to be living in nations and countries where we have access to basic services and healthcare for our families which is there to help us help our children to lead healthy and normal lives.

We feel that women everywhere have the same basic tendencies to nurture and care for their families and feel that automatically connects us as social beings.  A group of us wanted to be able to use this crafting/DIY community and find some way to give back to others, to be involved in something that was bigger than us and our blogs, and do something to actually make a difference in the lives of women and children who are just like us.

Operation Smile is a charity organization healing children’s smiles, one operation at a time.

Operation Smile, is more than a charity organization. They are a mobilized force of medical professionals and caring hearts who provide safe, effective reconstructive surgery for children born with facial deformities such as cleft lip and cleft palate.  Each operation costs approximately $240.

With this is mind, we created “Swap A Smile” to raise funds through an online auction of DIY and Craft Bloggers’ past projects.  We would love for you to join us in our efforts to give back to others who need help. It only takes a little bit to go a long way. Our goal is to be able to give at least 5 children new smiles and help them to live the life they weren’t meant to live.

image source

We reached out to some various bloggers and asked them to help us out with and unique charity auction to raise funds in hopes to be able to help a few children by giving them a smile.Each of these bloggers have generously agreed to auction off an item that they have made recently and shared with their readers on their individual websites.  Below you will see a list of all of the items that are being auctioned off.  You can access each item by clicking on the link or the image and you will be redirected to that persons site and the item that they are auctioning off. 

The auction will begin immediately and will end on Friday, October 14 at 12:00 pm PST.  Each item has been assigned a shipping cost that will be added to the highest bidding price.  The item will go to the highest bidder.   You can bid on an item by leaving a comment on the individual’s post leaving us your name and the price you are bidding.

If you are not interested in bidding, but would still like to help out, we have also made it so that you can donate any amount to help us out with this great cause!  Every little bit helps!

We will be writing a follow up post and providing everyone with a screen shot of the PayPal account and keep you updated on our progress so you can be sure that your money is really going to support this cause. 

image source

For more information regarding Operation Smile and their mission statement and goals you can read about them on their site OperationSmile.Org.

Crap I’ve Made

$4 will automatically be added to the cost of this item for shipping/packaging costs

To bid on this item, leave a comment ON THIS POST with your first name and your bid amount.

Check out all the other fab blogs participating:

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We’re making over Macy’s room, inspired by these delightful prints from The Handmade Home.

Our search for bedding was not going well (how come there’s no awesome bedding in twin size?), so I’m sewing.

I’ve got 7 rows completed thus far.

I really have no idea what I’m doing.

Like, once I have the top pieced, what do I do next?

Sometimes I don’t think things all the way through before I jump into them…

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They’re baaaaaaaaaaaaaack!

You know ‘em.

You love ‘em.

You give ‘em your money a couple of times a week because the deals are so fabulous.  (Is that just me?)

It’s Pick Your Plum!

Before we get to the free crap (and my bad jokes), I want to show you what their deal of the day is today:

Stamps that are perfect for holiday neighbor gift tags and for the rest of the year, too.

Oh, hey…check out that one on the bottom left.

SCORE!

Click on over and buy yours before they’re gone, and then come back for the rest of the post.  I’ll wait.

If you’re not already familiar with Pick Your Plum, let me give you the low down.  Every morning at 7 am MST, they post a new deal.  It’s some sort of crafty fabulousness and it’s always a great price.  Sometimes it’s vinyl…

sometimes it’s a set of owl charms…

sometimes it’s earrings…

and sometimes it’s nut cups.

Speaking of nut cups…have we discussed the fact that I had to take one of my children to buy a, uh, you know…athletic supporter because BC was out of town?  And that I was reading packages whilst the poor kid was hiding on another aisle?  And then I may have had to Google to see which direction things went?  There’s an eHow article, in case you ever need to know.  Just sayin’…  And yes we are saving for therapy.  Thanks for asking!

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  The free stuff.

Pick Your Plum.com is giving a 3 winners each a set of nut cups (valued at $40, 200 cups of goodness, 50 of each color)!

Did you know you can bake cupcakes or muffins in them?  Fun, right?

OPTIONS FOR ENTERING, do as many or as few as you like, leave a separate comment ON THIS POST on the blog (not on Facebook or in response to your email subscription) for each one:

1 – Get on the Pick Your Plum  email list to be the first to find out what the daily deal is.

2 – Like the Pick Your Plum  FB page.

3 – Share something you’ve done/said to your children that will probably require them to get therapy.

4 – Name your favorite nut.

Giveaway runs through the weekend.  Ready?  Go!

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If you’re of the Mormon persuasion, you know that this weekend was General Conference, aka church on TV.  For some reason, I listen better when I’m working on something.  This Nightmare Before Christmas inspired pillow was the perfect project!

I picked up a package of precut black and white 5” squares at Hobby Lobby.  I believe the full price was $5.99, but there’s ALWAYS a coupon/sale at HobLob, so you know I didn’t pay that much.  I used 16 of the 20 squares in the pack to make my pillow background (1/4” seams).

Then, I found a Jack Skellington image and used it to sketch my applique.  (Sorry, no pattern since it’s copyrighted.)  I used a heavy canvas fabric for the white part so that the prints wouldn’t show through.  I stitched the mouth with a tight zig zag.  (Applique basics here.)

I made a simple envelope back using some black and white striped fabric from some pirate costumes I made 4 or 5 years ago.  The finished pillow cover is 18”.

Fun, right?

Did you make anything this weekend?

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My name is Char and I have a serious problem with my email inbox.

How serious?

SEVEN THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED AND FIFTY.

Anybody have a similar problem?

Give me your best tips on taming the email insanity.

Ready?

Go!

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