Flower Arrangements.

It's about Memorial Day so I thought I would do a blog about flower arrangements. Whenever I am looking at pre-made arrangements, I always find something that I don't like about it. So I either pick out a bushel that I like or stems that I can make into my own custom arrangements. This is very inexpensive to do & pretty easy to complete.

Have fun with it! In this one, I just added some pre-cut shapes & painted them, put them on wooden dowels to stick them in the vase to add some visual attraction.First I am going to talk about what supplies you will need to do your very own flower arrangement (pictures below). Supplies that you will need is a bushel of flowers that you like or stems. My parents happened to pick these out for my grandma's grave. A cylinder to house the flowers & wire cutters. Most generally you might need styrofoam for the container but in this case I didn't since it was already in the cylinder. Be very selective on what kind of styrofoam you get. What I found out that it's better for beginners to use the sturdy foam not the gentle grip foam. You will notice the difference in textures in the pictures below. The sturdy foam allows you to remove flowers in & out of the styro foam alot easier than the gentle grip. The gentle grip is more for fresh flower arrangements because it hold moisture.

Once I got all the supplies, I clipped all the flowers off the bushel with the wire cutters. Once I finished with that I started to select the highest stems. Kind of like drawing straws. I stuck the tallers stems in the middle & then the smaller stems around the outside. I have been told that the stems should be twice the size as the container you are placing them in to make the arrangement look proportional. Alot of flowerists use hot glue to secure the stems. I have tried this but I am very picky on how it looks & I am not as confident on the placement. I have found that the foam holds the stems in place pretty well. Also this way you can always redo the arrangement if you wanted to.

All of this are arrangements that I have done for my home previously or have given them as gifts. If you have the time, this will save you alot of money.

All of these arrangements cost around $5.oo to $10.00.

An inexpensive way to make decals for your flower pots

Here are my ducks! Say hello to my little friends! Qwak Qwak!

Inexpensive way to make decals for your flower pots.

This is so cheap & really fun to do. I have posted pictures of the materials you would need to start this project. (above)For the first one I got a wooden dowel, doesn't matter what size, some pre-made shapes that I thought would look neat, you can find these at any local art/craft store, I happened to get mine at Michaels for only 5o cents, some stain, scissors, socks & a hot glue gun. What I did first is plug in my hot glue gun to get nice & warm, mine takes awhile to get warm. While the hot glue gun was warming up I cut the dowel into my desired height. Then I used the socks to stains the shapes & the dowel. Once the stained dried & the glue was warm I glued the shapes to the dowel in an order that I thought was pleasing. It's always good to match things up in sets of threes.

For the second one I used basically everything but the stain, socks & scissors. The shapes I found for the second were already painted. Had also found these at Michaels for only 29 cents. Pretty easy right? Have fun with this, make your own shapes, paint your own designs & let your imagination wonder. Above the pictures with the materials are the finished product. This adds a different dimensions to your flower pots, flower beds or even in a vase of flowers. Total cost of this project was 5 dollars for both.

The forecast announced today that it would be cloudy with a chance of Doggy Treats.

Do you have a four legged, furry friend in your house who loves dog treats? And when you go to store & have to spend an arm & a leg for treats? I don't know about you but I definitely came across this. I would go into the store & look at all these treats that I would eat if I was a dog. Kind of like McDonald's to a human. Junk. Yes sometimes it's nice to have a McDouble, with only ketchup & a medium Dr. Pepper. I would be the first one to admit it. While at the store, I would look at alot of the ingredients on the back of some of these dog treat labels & was made aware that these aren't what dogs need, at least all the time. So sense then I have been making alot of my dog treats from scratch. But don't think for a second that I wouldn't snatch up some of those store label treats whenever they were on sale to save me a week without making dog treats. Haha.

The first recipe that I tried was given to me by my partner, Kyle's grandma & his mother, Emily. Kyle & his family like to call their grandma, Nonni. Her name is Norma & I was told that when Kyle's brother, Jay was little he couldn't say grandma or Norma, so it came out Nonni & it stuck. I think that's so awesome! I am unable to post that recipe because I have lost it & have been meaning to get my hands on it again. So Nonni or Emily, if your reading this, hook me up! Haha. From what I could remember it was very easy & had a few more ingredients then the one I am going to talk about next.

This one is a dog favorite, as far as I can see. I found this while searching the web looking for something easy & had house hold items that I had around the house for ingredients. So I found this one:

Peanut Butter Biscuits:

1 1/2 cup water

1/ 2 cup oil

2 eggs

3 tbs. peanut butter (I was surprised about the amount; I was routing for peanut butter. haha)

2 tsp. vanilla

2 cups flower (I sometimes use wheat flower but if you don't have that regular flower is fine.)

1/2 cornmeal

1/2 cup oats

Directions: Blend wet ingredients together. Which dry ingredients together in a separate bowl, and then mix with wet mixture to form a ball of dough. Toll out and shaped as desired. Place on a non-stick cookie tray or lightly greased pan. Bake twenty minutes at 400 degrees. When finished, turn off oven and allow the biscuits to coll inside oven until crisp and hard. Then store in a airtight container. (Storing, is very important because I didn't do this the first & they were moldy by the next day) I put them in one of those cute containers, with paw prints & dogs all over & come to find out it's not all that air tight. So now what I do is put them in a zip lock bag & then store them in the container. Genius I know, right? Hardly. I also wanted to add that if the mixture is a little running, add more flower, I found out that you really can't add to much flower if you happen to make a mistake.

I also like to make these for friend's dog & neighborhood dogs. For special occasions such as Christmas, Halloween & May Day. Those are just a few times I have made treats for other dogs besides my own. My own dogs are a different story, I usually make them treats every other week. Some examples how this could make cool present for other dogs are shown above. There are recipes out there where you can make a frosting to decorate them with. I am currently looking into getting a recipe.

Good luck with this. If you aren't a good cook, your dogs will think that you are! There are recipes out there for homemade cat treats also. For those who are cat owners.

Ducks & Sketch of Firewood Rack & Work Station

The sketch shown above is one that I did that will be the firewood rack that I will be building with my friend Steve's help. I don't have the dimensions for it as of yet because I am terrible at that. But I am thinking that it will be as tall as a normal table top. The bottom left hand side of the rack is where the big logs will go, surrounded by lattice work to keep them contained & also add some visual stimulation. The bottom of this structure will be a pre-made piece of palette. The top of the structure will also house a palette for the floor. This area will be for sticks, brush, etc. To keep this contained I will construct a door that opens & closes. Also with lattice to help contain the sticks. To the right of structure is a work station, this area will be for cutting word, potting plants, or just another surface to sit something on. This will be held up by pieces of wood that will also add visual stimulation (inspiration from previous post). Hooks on the side will add functionality. This will be housed in front of a wood fence near the Chiminea. The circles hanging above the work station will be like the ones shown in the previous blog about firewood racks. This will house supplies for the fire or misc. tools. Such as lighter fluid to start fires and or pots for potting plants. This will also add a nice modern/visual effect. I need some suggestions those. Since I am all about making things on a low budget. What about if I made everything out of tree branches & stumps. Something like shown above sketch. (the bench). I couldn't find any pictures that I was looking for, so this will do. The problem that I am facing is that if I make it out of branches & stumps, will it last as long as something that it pretreated? Like lumber? hmm... I would really appreciate your feedback on this!!

Since I haven't blogged for a couple of days now. I am going to talk about another thing that I enjoy. My ducks! I have always wanted ducks, I don't know if I thought they were just cool animals or I just wanted some to see if they would follow me & I came to the conclusion that it was because I wanted to have them follow me. Which they don't! I have done alot of research on ducks in the past couple of days because I want to know what I am talking about when I blog about these interesting little creatures. What I have found out that ducks most generally won't follow you unless you are there during hatching. Which in my case, I am keeping that excuse. Haha. They aren't very clean pets/animals either. Atleast mine aren't. They are crazy about hoping into my hand tho. Once I get a hold of them they are pretty much calm. Oh almost forgot. I have a 'farm' duck (Donnie) which is the whitish, yellow dude, whom is a giant compared to the little Mallard duck(Gus/Gussie). Gus I think is a female so that's why I call him/her Gussie, gender neutral name. I am in the process of making them an outdoor pin to be in during the day. I found some examples online on kind of what I want to do. Mine won't be as big as the ones shown considering I only have two & these owners have many more. These pictures are at the top of the page. These are pictures that I have found by just searching the web. The woman that posted these did a great job on a budget. Since I only have two, I think that this should work perfectly. I am working on getting pictures of them up. But the camera that I borrowed to take the pictures is says batteries are exhausted. I hate that message. Grr. Frustrating. I am seeing about getting the charger so all of you can see Gussie & Donnie.

Thanks for all the followers so far. I really appreciate you taking the time to read my posts. Don't be scared to leave comments! Be the first & I will... ummm. ummm. I don't know. I will come up with something I am sure.

Until next time friends!

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there!

Yesterday I did some gardening with one of my good friends, Jamie. Waiting to get pictures uploaded to show you guys what we did.

It's Mother's Day, what are you doing for your mother today? Nothing is more precious than a Mother receiving a gift from their child/children that they have made. I had this really good idea for my Mom. I love wine & have kept alot of wine bottle around the house waiting for the right project to use them. So I have researching on the internet on things to use the wine bottles and found this website. http://www.gerardotandco.com/blog/recycled-bottle-torch/. This is a great website. I found the intstructions to make the torches as seen at the top. This was easy to construct & very good directions on what you'll need & assembly. Aren't these great? Be artistic with this. Add your own design to them/make them custom. Gem stones, paint them, etc. This is great for decks, along a fence line. Once lit this will be the talk of the barbeque. Costs only around $5.00 for all the supplies I went to HomeDepot to get all the supplies. (wine not included in that quote haha) I am working on some for my backyard. Posts on that to come. If you aren't a big wine drinker, I know that you can purchase really cool glass water bottles at any grocery store. I am going be making mass quantities of these so if you are interested in purchasing them let me know. Once I get some done I will post them. They will be alittle bit more custom with my twist on them. :-) Until next time friends. Take'r easy.

My First Blog/Firewood rack

Hello Everyone!

I am currently working on a project for my backyard. My partner and I had gotten a Chiminea (Mexican firepit/left) to put in our backyard. We have been wanting a firepit of some sort in the backyard for sometime. If you are trying to decide wether or not to get a fire pit (round metal basin with a metal net to contain fire) or a Chiminea(left). Get a Chiminea, the are both comparison in price. Why a Chiminea you say? Well it adds more of a focal point on your deck or patio, contains the fire alot better & ages very well & interesting shape. You can still do your occasional smores. My friend wants to try to come up with things to grills/recipes to do over the Chiminea, blogs on that to come. I have found on the web that you can get inscents to place in the Chiminea while burning. To name a few scents, Pinon, Juniper and Mesquite. But the main reason why I am posting this blog is because I am trying to come up with a creative way to store the firewood for the Chiminea. Right now we have it a really incovenience spot. So I dug up an area on the backside of the Chiminea, lined the area with plastic liner for flower beds, laid down mulch & added some rocks around the edge to add some curve appeal. While looking for some creative ways to display/store firewood. I found really interesting ideas & websites. Some of the websites that I have found during this search are, http://www.trendir.com/ & http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/. Wow! Great resources & information. Check'em out. I love the idea of having a firewood rack as a piece of functional furniture, yet weather resistant & something interesting to look at. Comfortable as furniture? I am not sure. She looks pretty comfortable sitting up there on the top right of the page. The other two pictures on the top left, are some that I had also found while searching. Seems like a pretty easy concept. I am working on plan to kind of make all of these ideas into one. Once I get something drawn up I will definately post the progress. I think that firewood racks shouldn't be something left in the background. Make it into something functional, interesting to look at & enjoyable to build. Be creative with this. I love things that are custom & sometimes out of the ordinary. You will find this out about me alot as time goes on.