Author: kylachristine

Camping With Pups & Lessons Learned

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For my birthday this year, we went camping out at Curt Gowdy State Park. I really love that place! We’ve been accumulating camping gear for a while now, but haven’t actually made a trek until now. So it was our first experience camping together AND our first time camping with the pups. Lesson learned #1 – If you’re going to camp in Wyoming, where strong wind is the most common type of weather… make sure you don’t forget the tent stakes! Luckily, we weren’t too far out (that’s why we chose Curt Gowdy for our first trip… not too far from home if we needed anything or had any puppy emergencies)… so I ran home to get the stakes while Danny placed heavy objects on the tent to keep it from flying away and sat with the pups (and got sunburned). As soon as we started setting up… all Finn wanted to do was help… Zoe not so much. She was content sunbathing in the grass :)    Lesson learned #2 – pups WILL get themselves tangled …

My First Year of Sewing: A Review

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It’s my sewiversary! Ok, so maybe that’s not a thing. But it could be! :) On July 1st of last year, I got my sewing machine in the mail (yay!). I got the Brother XR9500PRW machine from their Project Runway series (got it on Amazon for $179.99 at the time – now it looks like it’s even a little cheaper). I bought it as a birthday present to myself because I wanted to try a new hobby. It had very decent reviews – and seemed to be highly recommended for beginners. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s been a great machine so far. Only complaint is the needle threading system – it worked wonderfully for a while (I thought it was the best invention on the planet while it worked!) then something got bent or off somehow and it doesn’t work anymore. To be fair, I haven’t really tried to fix it yet, so maybe when I do it’ll be just fine. Also the lettering/monogramming is nothing to write home about. But overall I’d definitely recommend this machine …

New-To-Me Salme Minna Blouse

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Finally (attempted) to get a few more/better pictures of my Minna blouse that I made for the New-To-Me challenge over at The Monthly Stitch for Indie Pattern Month. I’m still trying to master this whole taking pictures of myself thing. I LOVE taking pictures. But I also LOVE being behind the camera, if you know what I mean. :) So anyway, I went ahead and got a tripod, and just recently got a remote to use with the tripod… See… remote… still wasn’t sure if I was using it correctly at this point. But the pups were pretty interested in what I was doing. After just a couple of shots, though, they got bored with me and started running and wrestling around as they usually do in the back yard. For fear my camera was going to get trampled into the dirt… I gave up. The pups, plus the wind – it was a challenge getting any photos at all! Anyway… to the challenge. The second week of Indie Pattern Month was the New-To-Me challenge. The idea was …

Handmade Gift Exchange

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Sometimes I complain to myself because I can’t think of something to make for someone I know. Well, that mentality was turned upside down when I started brainstorming what to make for a complete stranger! Seriously. Never realized how easy I had it. :) I entered the Summer Handmade Gift Exchange put on by Craftaholics Anonymous. The only clues I had about my gift exchange partner were that she likes coffee and the color orange. Here’s what I came up with: Bow Clutch, with orange accents of course (made from this tutorial that I’ve been gawking at on my “Things To Sew” Pinterest board for some time). The outer fabric is actually from a thrifted shower curtain that happens to be the same shower curtain I have hanging in my bathroom. Can you tell I like the pattern!? :) You can’t really tell from the pictures, but the lighter color has a bit of shimmer to it. Also used it for the ABC bag I made last year. The inner fabric is a cotton I had from my grandma …

I’m turning 29! What!?!

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Tomorrow is my 29th birthday! I’m not sure what happened there. I was at work the other day discussing my/our birthday (me, one of my techs, and one of our volunteers all have a June 29th birthday… best day ever to be born!)… and very nonchalantly I mentioned something along the lines of “I can’t believe I’m turning 28!” Eeeek! I thought it would at least be a little bit longer until I genuinely started forgetting my own age. But apparently it’s happening… now! I got home that day and mentioned something about it to Danny. He then proceeded to break the news to me, although not all that gently. I am, in fact, turning 29. It’s awesome nonetheless. I love my b-day no matter what number is associated with it (ask me about that in 11 years… that opinion may change…). But I can’t even begin to say how excited I am about 29. It’s going to be a big year. Moving back to California… starting a new job… moving into a home with …