last night i slept like a baby...a whole nine hours! yesterday was the baby shower and stayed up the entire previous night cleaning, cooking, sewing and more cleaning. there was no theme, just blue. i made fourteen of these tissue holders as party favors. two are in the back as props. i stuck little cards with "expecting tears of joy" and her due date in them. making one is fun, but more than ten never is especially at three in the morning. it went fast though. here's a trick...instead of sewing it with lining, i just used iron-on interfacing as a backing. this way there were no seams to sew and it came out tight and fitted. i figured since there would be many older women at the shower, i'd better make some non-funky fabric. for lunch i made tea sandwiches (thanks to ali for the ideas)...salmon & cream cheese, egg and chicken salad. making those itty-bitty things are harder than i thought. i also served tofu salad, pasta salad, pound cake, strawberries, cake and iced coffee. my father commented, "ohhh, lady-type foods" when i told him about it. it was different because usually here in hawaii, parties have major food...the two or three bbq-meat/kalbi of some sort, rice, potato/mac salad, sushi, poke, veggie salad and the list goes on. it was different and i think my guests enjoyed it. it was my first time as "hostess" for any type of gathering and i forgot to take a picture. once it started everything happened so fast.
below is the dining/living room painted. here is the before. it's amazing how fresh paint (or any paint in this case) does wonders to a room. i was having a big frustration with the dining chairs. i tried scrubbing them over and over but they won't change color. i should be happy the "old/dirty" color is evenly distributed. earlier, i was going to try and reupholster it myself but after taking apart one chair it looked big-time for someone as inexperienced as me. they used these strips of paper with nails to tack down the material so you can't see it from the outside. they were my grandparents chairs and they are pretty heavy-duty like most old stuff. we decided we should get it professionally done. i thought i could just redo it with a staple gun. i lack in home decoration therefore the white walls and open space. i serious feel lost with all the space and can't "see" what to do with it. although i'm partly attracted to the idea of more colors, strong colors, i'm a afraid. i think i need one to be on one of those home dec shows where they just do it for you. last night i was looking for inspiration at the book store and found a british elle decoration magazine. i wanted to buy it but it was the last one and all beat-up, hate that. oh, i know, the dining light looks way too small. husband installed it himself, like i said, our lack of home dec.
coming...pictures of my swap packages i received so long ago.
