green chile and chipotle tortilla roll ups recipe

You know those amazing recipes from childhood that you just know by heart? The kind that aren't written down anywhere but are etched deeply into your brain? This is one of those.

For as long as I can remember, my mom has made these tortilla roll ups. Some folks call these "pinwheels." They are a fantastic party appetizer. A real crowd pleaser. And they are sooooooo simple and take just a few ingredients.

I of course couldn't leave well enough alone, though, so I added a special spicy ingredient.

tooth fairy pillow DIY - Star Wars style

My friend Jenny from high school reached out to me last week with an interesting request. Her oldest son, Dylan, was about to lose his first tooth. He is a very light sleeper, so the traditional tooth fairy method of sneaking into his room and slipping money from under his precious little head just wasn't going to work for them. Her request was for a tooth fairy pillow to hang on the door knob. Brilliant.

She said that he likes red, blue, yellow, and Star Wars, and left the rest up to me. Then creativity immediately struck.

Storm Toother!

(see what I did there?)

sunday stitch vol. 15 - sittin' on top of the world

It's finished! It's finally finished!

Talk about a labor of love. This, my friends, is Max's baby quilt.

Baby quilt? But doesn't he turn 1 in a few weeks?

Yes. Thanks for pointing that out. 

My sweet baby Max turns 1 in November, and I managed to squeak this baby quilt in while he is still technically a baby. I saw this quilt pattern in the book Let's Sew Together, and fell madly in love. It was the entire reason I bought the book. Thus far I've used the patterns in the book to make this robot and this rag doll, but the world map quilt is my masterpiece.

A few helpful notes on this pattern if you are wanting to undertake this project:

time to simplify (again)

Simplify has been my mantra for 2014 (hence the blog name simply crafted). We did a HUGE purge of stuff back in January. Our entire guest room was filled to the brim with clothes, shoes, knick knacs, and who knows what else. We had just moved into this house 8 months before and purged then. And now it's time to purge again.

Where does all this stuff come from?

About twice a year I find myself stressed and overwhelmed by the amount of stuff in our house. More stuff = more stress = more things to clean and put away = less time for the fun stuff.

This most recent urge to purge was brought on by two things:

My closet. I wear the same things over and over. I "never have anything to wear." Except that I do. Maryam over at hi-and-hello posted recently about her capsule wardrobe experiment, and that was the last push I needed. More on this later.

All the toys. This is a touchy subject. I'm grateful that my boys have toys and things to play with. I'm grateful for the loved ones who have purchased them for us and all of the love and kind feelings behind them. But it's a continual source of stress and fighting. The 3 year old doesn't want to clean them up. Ever. I don't want to look at a messy play room that overflows into every other area of our house. And I really don't want to be the mean o'l mom that's constantly nagging about cleaning up.

Our home should be a source of calm and peace. Not stuff and stress. I feel like I spend 80% of my life just moving sh*t around from where it's ended up to where it needs to go. Maybe I'm becoming a minimalist. Probably not, but something closer to it would be nice.

Also, I worry about my kids not valuing what they have. There is little need to care for their belongings because there are just so many things. If something gets broken, who cares? There's 100 other toys to replace it.

In the last few weeks I've taken 4 Rubbermaid tubs full of toys to the garage. Henry has yet to notice. That's how much stuff he has.

I'll share more as both of these projects unfold. I hope to have all of this under control before the holidays hit and the next influx of stuff happens (Lord help us). Any helpful wardrobe ideologies or toy control tactics to share?

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sunday stitch vol. 14: hound dog is the new sock monkey

Earlier in the week I shared with you how I whipped up a fox costume for the big kid. This costume smokes that one in the speed department, clocking in at a mere 15 minutes.

Well, to be truthful, I had a bit of a head start.

2 Halloweens ago, I made Henry a sock monkey costume. And it was amazing. Sorry for the blurry photo. It was 2012 and I only had an iPhone 4 or something.

I used this tutorial, in case you want to make your own. It uses actual socks, all pieced together. A labor of love.

Cute as it was, this Halloween Henry decided that he would be The Fox and Max would be The Hound. I like making their costumes by hand, so my plan was to find a brown long sleeved onesie and brown hat to transform into a dog costume. Much like my fruitless search for orange tights for Henry, I came up disappointed.

But then, light bulb moment. A hound dog looks remarkably like a sock monkey. It just has longer ears.

BINGO.

I pulled the monkey costume from the closet and began the transformation. I removed the red patch on the bottom with my seam ripper (lest people think a hunter shot the poor dog or that he had mange or something) and removed the red pom pom from the hat. I saved them, but I'm really not sure why. Just in case, I guess?

I cut 2 dog ear shapes from brown felt, folded the monkey ears down, and top stitched to secure. Done and DONE.

These two little guys are going to be pretty darn cute on Halloween. That is, if Max keeps the hat on and Henry keeps the mask on. Otherwise they'll just be kids in brown and orange outfits and look like they have a mom that didn't try. That's really the more likely scenario. Whatever. As long as they get plenty of Snickers for me to steal.

I promise I did not ask Max to pant like a dog for the photos. He did that all on his own. He's a method actor.

Got your costumes ready? I'd love to see pictures if you whip anything up for your kids or yourselves! Post them to Simply Crafted's Facebook page.

Be sure to check out other fun sewing projects over at hi and hello.

 


YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY:

simply crafted fantastic fox costume

sunday stitch vol. 13: all hallow's leggings

cowboy vest tutorial

super hero cape tutorial

quilt club: strip quilting

Quilt club at City Craft did not disappoint again this month. Our homework assignment was "strip quilting" which is to say taking strips of fabric and sewing them together. A simple technique dating back to pioneer days. It's fantastic place for a beginner to start. 

We have to talk about Kristi from Initial K Studio's quilt. It uses all 32 Kona solids from their latest release. You can read more about how she created it here. She named it "cascade" which is basically perfect.

Angela created a throw pillow using a log cabin technique. Learn how to do this in last month's study guide (see month #5).

I'm totally going to rat her out on the back of the pillow (right photo). She cut the fabric too small - been there - so she added a strip of fabric. It was still to small. So she cut it and added another strip. And another one. All of us agreed that the back was now cooler than the front and passed a motion to change the back to the front and front to the back. The motion carried.

Belinda is continuing with a monochromatic block each month. That quilt is going to be amazing when all 12 are complete. I wish I had the self control to do monochromatic quilt. But I don't. Color forever!

Charlotte brought a yummy fall paletted quilt top.

Cynthia did the log cabin homework plus a low volume (quilter slang for really light colors with tone on tone patterns) table runner.

I love everything about these blocks that Elizabeth created. She used metallic fabrics like Cotton + Steel to create these epic blocks. Oh my gosh, I want the quilt she makes with these in my life. Callie and Charlotte did a particularly nice job of showing off the blocks. Well done, ladies.

Jeana comes from the world of apparel sewing and quilting is a new hobby for her. She is taking scraps leftover from outfits to put together a throw quilt as a gift. I won't say for who, lest I ruin the surprise. Watch out, with all of that satin fabric, this quilt is going to be sexy.

Shannon is a brave soul. This quilt top used to be a completely different pattern; it was based off of a bobbin or spool of thread or something....At any rate, she hated it, so she got out her rotary cutter and hacked it to pieces and reassembled it into this beauty. She is woman, hear her ROAR. I asked if she burned her bra after that. She did.

Susan used 2 fat quarter bundles cut into strips to create this diamond quilt. A lot of bold, bright colors become more controlled when put together in this pattern. She says it's a bit too much pink for her usual taste. Pfft. Like there can ever be too much pink.

Another strip quilt from Susan using a 1930's color palette.

Hey, it's me! I used the study guide log cabin tutorial and modified it just a bit for my block on the left. I have TONS of vintage yellow fabrics from my Grandmommy's stash, but I sort of kind of hate yellow. Mustard is great, but everything else makes me nauseous. Until now. I freaking LOVE this quilt block. So much that I might just hack up all of my yellow and make more blocks and see if I can make an entire yellow quilt. It's like a little ray of sunshine.

The strip quilt on the right is another modified log cabin quilt that I shared more about in this post. It will be done in approximately 7 years.

The following are not strip quilts, but awesome all the same and completely necessary to share.

Angela shared this quilt top with us at our half square triangles quilt club meeting (and I nearly passed out because I loved it so much). She decided it wasn't large enough as-is for her 6' tall gift recipient (again, no spoilers here), so she added the blue and white triangles around the perimeter. That extra contrast totes makes this quilt. 

Yes, I said totes.

And this is the back. Check out that blue ombre. Purrrrrrr.

Martha must have spent a bazillion hours making this. I thinks she said it was more than 1,000 individual pieces of fabric. I admire her patience. You will never (NE-VER) see me make something this complicated. Go Martha!

This is about 1/3 of a quilt top that Martha is working on. All of the pieces are needle turn pieced. I literally had no idea what that was until 4 seconds ago when I googled it. Again, so much patience.

Charlotte's Michael Miller award winning quilt.

Oh, Belinda. After she saw my Birch Feather River quilt, she was inspired to make one of her own using the same fabric bundle, plus some solids. WELL DONE. Also, way to totally show me up. I guess I forgive you.

Great stuff this month. Next month we're working on Paper Piecing, which I've never done before. And I had to leave early last night so I missed Michael's demo. Not that I'm nervous. I got this.....

Here's the study guide (month #6) if you want to figure this out as you go along with me.

A reminder - anyone in the Dallas area is welcome to attend, even if you don't have a quilt to show. It's a fun time and you should check it out. The next meeting is Wednesday, November 19, 2014 at 6:30 PM. Would love to see you there. (pssst...there's wine and a 10% discount).

YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY:

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fantastic fox costume

As I mentioned in Sunday's post, Henry decided that he would be The Fox and Max would be The Hound from the classic Disney movie. I am pumped that I got by one more year without having to buy a highly flammable (and highly crappy) super hero costume from my arch nemesis, Party City.

Guys, this is really simple. Just some felt, some stuffing, some elastic, and basic sewing skills. In a couple of hours you'll have a super cute Halloween costume that nobody else will have. And you'll laugh and laugh at all the matching Elsa's and Anna's and give yourself a mental high five.

sunday stitch vol. 13: all hallow's leggings

This weekend I completed Henry's Halloween costume. He decided that he would be The Fox and Max would be The Hound.

And my heart exploded. All of my dreams of coordinating Halloween costumes just landed in my lap on a silver platter.

I laughed the entire time I was in line at JoAnn's buying my cheap-o orange knit for these fox leggings and felt for the costume. Why? Because 9,302 women were buying all of the blue sparkly fabric in the store making the same old Queen Elsa costume for their kids. Poor suckers. So much effort for your kiddo to look like the millions of other Elsa's that we're all going to see on Halloween.

Hahahahahaha.

That's mean spirited. I should stop.

Nope.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!

OK. That's out of my system. I'll share the tutorial for the fox mask and tail later this week. Today I wanted to gloat that I finally tried my hand at creating a piece of apparel using my serger - the leggings for this Fox costume. My plan had been to just buy orange leggings for like $8 somewhere, but finding them was about as difficult as finding the Lost Arc. They were nowhere to be found on the Internet for less than $25. And I was NOT going to spend $25 on orange leggings that may only get worn a few times. $4 of fabric and an hour or so with my machine would do just fine.

10 design savvy Instagrammers to follow

My Instagram feed used to consist exclusively of babies. I joined IG when Henry was just a few months old and all of my IG pals were people I had collected through a mommy forum app (the now defunct The Bump). We all made the move to IG when trolls started taking over our forum. I never looked back.

For years it was endless photos of adorable babies, which was alright. But when I was pregnant with Max I attended a lecture by Todd Henry who spoke about his book The Accidental Creative. He makes the valid point that being creative doesn't just happen; you have to work for it. It's a discipline.

The book is a good read and provides a great framework to foster creativity no matter what your job is, but especially for people in creative jobs. One of his points that struck with me most was the concept that you need to feed creativity by taking in inspiring, creative things.

Translation: wasting 4 hours a night on Facebook will NOT make you more creative.

To that end I took a harder look at what I was spending most of my (very limited) free time doing. It generally had nothing to do with design or making pretty things. It had everything to do with kids. That's obviously is an important part of my life, but it's not the only thing that makes me who I am.

This is all a VERY long winded way to say that if you're going to spend time on social media every day, why not include some creative, beautiful images to inspire you!

Here are my 10 favorite Design savvy Instagrammers to follow:

dominomag: Oh, Domino. No Design list should start with anything other than Domino in my mind. A small part of me died when the magazine went under a few years back. Thankfully they are back now and sharing the most gorgeous spaces on the planet.

sidney's downtown loft tour

There are exactly three people on the planet that I would allow to design my home with zero input from me: Genevieve Gorder (from TV), my coworker Marci (you're next on the home tour train, my friend) and the lovely Sidney who graciously allowed me and my assistant (Max) to photograph her amazing downtown Dallas apartment.

I shared a sneak peak of her place back in May, and thankfully she let us back in to do a full tour! She did a "fall flip" since then and moved some things around, which I now of course want to do at my house. Because I do everything that Sid does. Because she's my hero.

This apartment is as warm and welcoming as Sidney is. It's comfortable and squishy (not like Sid). It's perfectly, effortlessly stylish.