below

Since I was looking through old stuff when I stumbled on my fabric print, I decided to share an etching from the undergrad days also.



This was a lot of fun to make. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for this project so I kind of just made a silly/slightly creepy illustration and went with it. The best part about etchings is that I still have the actual plates they were made from so I could reprint this anytime. It'd help to have a press of course.. one day.



Well that's it. Just a short one this Friday. Showing you a little blast from my (fairly recent) past.

:)

Happy weekend!

stuffed shells

This is what my hands looked like while I was making dinner last night. So content. Try to ignore the chipped nail polish ;). Charlie came for dinner last night so I decided to make his favorite.. stuffed shells. It's super simple but a little tedious stuffing all those shells. Worth it though because all the cheesy warmth makes it such a good comfort food.

While your shells boil, get your cheese mixture together.


Take a heaping spoonful of the cheese mixture and stuff the shells. This part gets a little messy. I think I might try piping the cheese in sometime. It'll be neater and probably even quicker. Worth a shot!


When they're all lined up in the baking dish, pour your cheese and sauce mixture all over the shells.


Pop it in the oven. Have some wine and bread with pesto while you wait. I told you we like pesto around here. :)

When it comes out of the oven it'll be all bubbly and hot. Scoop out some shells and serve with some crusty bread. (And more pesto.)


So good. Perfect for a cold winter night. We're having "winter weather" warnings here again for tonight. Wonder how much we'll get this time!


Stuffed Shells
recipe adapted from allrecipes

12oz large shell pasta
2 eggs, beaten
32oz ricotta cheese
4 cups shredded mozzarella, divided
1 cup grated parmesan cheese, divided
1 tbsp dry parsley
2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 28oz jar pasta sauce

Cook shells for 8 minutes. They should be al dente. Drain and rinse under cold water. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, combine eggs, ricotta, 2 cups mozzarella, 1/2 cup parmesan, parsley, salt, and pepper. Mix well. Preheat oven to 350F. Fill shells with a heaping spoonful of cheese mixture. Line them up in a greased baking dish. When all the shells are stuffed and lined up, mix pasta sauce with remaining mozzarella and parmesan. Pour over shells, covering them completely. Bake for 45-60 minutes until hot and bubbly.

Enjoy with some crusty bread and a glass of white.


Now I have to go do some reading for class tonight. It's so weird to say that again!

airplanes

In thinking about what to make for my shop, I've decided to give an old project a new life. In my fabric printing class as an undergrad, we got an assignment to create a 2 yard print based on any kind of a map. After looking through tons of map images for some inspiration, I decided to make a map of air traffic.


I'm really happy with the way it turned out as it was one of my first prints but now it's just sitting in a drawer with some other projects. I've always wanted to do something with the things I made during school and I think I know what to do with this yardage now.

Since it was my first attempt at a half drop pattern, it's not perfect. There is way more white space surrounding every 10x10in image than I would have liked. I didn't measure correctly and they ended being too far apart, creating large white diagonals between diagonals of the prints. Because of this, I personally don't think if works well as a repeating print so I've been stuck on what to do with it.


I think I finally figured it out though. I want to cut the individual 10x10 prints out and make them into pillows! I figured I could make the planes the front panel and get maybe a blue canvas for the back to match the planes. [You might not be able to see it well in the pictures but they are blue :)] I'll have to see how they look when they're done but I think this could work! It makes me really happy because I hate to see things just sit and not get used when they could possibly serve a purpose.


Maybe I'll look through my old etchings too and see if there's anything good in there!

:)

snowball hat

Yesterday I left my bag at Charlie's which has my LIFE in it. I didn't have my computer charger, which allowed me just enough time to get a blog post up before the battery died. I didn't have my cell phone so I borrowed my mom's all day which was so painful. I don't even have a fancy shmance smart phone or anything (yet. hello verizon iphone.) but my phone does have a keyboard. A luxury I've come to take for granted until yesterday. Texting on an old flip phone is 10x more annoying when you're out of practice. This also gives me a little more sympathy towards my mom whose texting skills are subpar.

So what did I do without my everyday technology staples? Well, I got crafty. I did something I've been wanting to do forever. I attempted my first hat. And I think it came out pretty good if I do say so myself! :)


I was so pleased with myself that I wore it all day long. It's not perfect but it was a great learning experience to just do it. For some reason I have inherited tons of white yarn so I used that for the hat in case it was a total disaster. I saved the "good" colors for when I know what I'm doing. This is something I'm considering adding to the shop so I have a pretty good feel for what I want to do with it now.

Things I learned from this..
-how to decrease stitches better so the flaps will have a better shape
-make a tight braid for the danglies so that they are sturdier
-make the longest dangly pompom no longer than hip length so they don't get all wild when you move around but still act as sort of an accessory to the hat


I can't wait to try it again.

I definitely learned something else from yesterday though. I need to do more things off of the computer. I've been so consumed with reading, writing, and collecting inspiration that I think it's actually giving me a mental block. I feel so inspired when I look at things but then when I actually go to make something I feel like I don't have an original thought in my head. I'm so worried about my ideas being too close to someone else's so I freeze up. I think I need to just stop worrying about everything else out there and just step away and make what comes into my head.


Does anyone else ever get inspiration overload? What do you do about it?

a book a month

I'm taking on another thing from my list of 101 things. And just in time too! It's the middle of January and I haven't started my "book a month" project yet. This will be book 1 of 33. That's how many months are in 1001 days if I did my math correctly. This is a special book though, as it comes with a little shameless family promotion ;).


This book was written by my grandmom's brother, or my great-uncle, Bill Richardson. It is a memoir of his time as a POW in the Korean War. My grandmom, being as proud as she is, bought nearly everyone in the family a copy for Christmas. On Christmas day I couldn't help but take a sneak peak. I picked a random chapter just to read a few words and I couldn't put it down. It's so interesting and even more so because someone I know went through this. It's an amazing way to be able to learn about your family history. I can't wait to really get into it!



There are some family photos included in the book too. This is a clipping from a newspaper that featured a photo of my uncle's family when they found out he was being released. My grandfather is the first on the left. My grandmom is right next to him and her mother is next to her. As my grandmom says, her mom was quite ahead of her times. Note the strapless top!


This is another newspaper clipping of a photo of him being welcomed back home. Overall he was in the POW camp for just under three years and despite all of that he did two tours in Vietnam! I can't imagine being brave enough to go back into that situation.

So that is a little piece of my family history I thought I'd share with you. If you are interested in this sort of thing or have a family member who's a history buff and might like this, you can buy it here.

Happy Monday everyone!