Shannen ❘ Spring is Here!

This is Shannen!  We had a couple minutes to spare before Bible Study started one Sunday evening, so I dragged her she came outside with me to take advantage of the gorgeous spring light.

 This was the first day this year it was warm enough to go outside with a t-shirt.  It ended up snowing for the rest of the week and remained quite cool up until this past weekend.  Welcome Spring!  

The light was so incredible.  I can't keep it in a bottle, but I can look back at these pictures and see this face and be reminded. :-)  Shannen, your laughter is beautiful. 

Awkward & Awesome Thursday: quatorze

AWKWARD

• Waiting for some friends in Starbucks next to this guy who keeps what sounds like $4 of change in his pocket...in pennies. Not awkward? Just wait.  He has an annoying quirk that makes him bounce his leg for minutes on ends.  It was like a heard of reindeer dancing a jig.
• Prom photos.  They're just hard to look at sometimes.  So we took so abnormal ones. :-)
• My socks.  The dryer eats all my nice white and black ones and continues to spit out the neon striped orange, pink, turquoise and purple ones with the cats on them that I got almost a decade ago.  Yeah.  They still fit.  No, they don't go with anything.
• Driving our 15 passenger van for the first time in a couple months.  I have developed a lead foot apparently.
• My friends being vague. ;-)  I love them anyway

AWESOME

• I'm going to my best friends' house and an awesome youth conference this weekend!!  So looking forward to meeting new people, growing in my relationship with my Savior, and just sitting in the grass with my sisters.
• Passed my Human Growth and Development CLEP test with only 14 days of study time!  WHOO-HOO!!! 
• I changed the oil in my car for the first time!  Fun stuff.
• This Christian counseling book I'm reading called Caring For Souls.  It's fascinating.
• Journals.  Letters.  There are so many things I don't want to forget about right now and so many people to encourage out there.  I'm so thankful for paper and pens.
• Learning some new piano songs!  I haven't practiced for myself in so long.
• I'm shooting a senior on Tuesday!  I love people.  I love taking pictures of people.
• The Frasers were just over for a visit!  I haven't seen them in over 2 years.  It was so nice to reconnect with them and hear about what God is doing among the Native Americans.  You can check out their blog here...

Peggy - Olive Knit Dress

Hey all!  Yet another sewing project for you all!  I know it is hard to believe, but I do actually have quite a life outside of sewing.  God has been so good.  Not only am I able to study full time with CollegePlus!  but I can meet with friends, study my Bible and devote time to prayer, but I also get to do extra-curriculars like sewing!  I've stopped waiting for the future and started living.  And it's great.

Pattern: Vogue 9668, view A

Supplies: The fabric was a gift from my dear Grandma Judy!  Thanks gram.  It is a beautiful mossy green interlock knit from Joanns.  It is medium weight and the drape is perfect.  I love it.  I'm so in love with kints right now. :-)  Oh, and she bought me thread, but that is it for this project.  Fabric and thread.

Right after I finished the dress I threw on a brown belt and some brown pumps, some lipstick and rolled my hair back.   It looked like I had walked out of the 40's.  The green color and the silhouette immediately made me think of Peggy from Captain America.  So maybe sometime this summer after my haircut I'll do a styled shoot with my Dad's old dog-tags.  We'll see.

The pattern is originally sized for weaves and has a zipper in the back.  To accommodate the knit I just cut the bodice back and waistband back on the fold.  I also cut the skirt front and back on the fold.  Knits just don't drape as well with seams in them. :-)

The drape is just perfect now.

The bodice, sleeves and waistband/midriff are fully lined with the same knit fabric.  It is pretty thick, but it is stable and warm.  These pictures we taken in the shelter of the garage because it was raining/sleeting outside and I would have gotten soaked.

My favorite part: the neckline!  It is so feminine.  I raised it an inch or so so that I wouldn't have to worry about it and I love it.

My least favorite part: The empire waist seam.  It is too high and just looks and feels awkward at times. The wide waistband is definitely getting smaller next time I make this.  The proportions are off.

Mississippi Mud Pie

We went over to a friend's house on Friday.  That happens about once a year.  Just saying.  Big families don't usually get asked over.  It's a lot of food and dishes.  So this was pretty cool.  We offered to bring a dessert, and I volunteered to make it.  So this happened.  It was pretty awesome.

We had made chocolate pudding the night before with a nifty homemade mix and had lot's extra so I decided to make something with that.  Originally I was thinking a French silk pie so I google recipes and this version of the traditional Mississippi Mud Pie resulted.

Dark chocolate shavings

Real whip cream

Chocolate pudding

Brownies

Oreos

Uh huh.  Yeah, if you ate a piece the size you see in the pictures I'm pretty sure you'd die. It is incredibly rich and oh so yummy!

1. Put a package of oreos in your food processor and grind them up.  Press into the bottom of a greased 10 inch spring-form pan.

2. Make up a fudge brownie mix and pour over the oreos.  Bake per box instructions.  It will take a deal longer that it says though.  Test with a toothpick and take out when baked batter is sticking to it (not dripping batter)

3. Let is cool!

4. Spread your chocolate pudding over it.

5. Whip just over a cup of heavy cream till it forms soft peaks.  Add 2 Tb of white sugar and beat into stiff peaks.

6. Spread whip cream carefully over the pudding.

7. Shave chocolate evenly over the top and refrigerate for at least an hour.

8. Eat. But not too much. :-)

Unadulterated Life

"Life is the messy bits."

There was an article floating around about not instagramming your "perfect life."  People put their best foot forward on the web.  It just happens.  In a sense it should happen because nobody wants to read you complaining about your horrible life, but no one wants to try to live up to your perfect life either.

Well, I'm not sure how I appear on the internet because only you can tell me that.  We do not live spotless lives around here.  There are a lot of mistakes and a lot of stepped on toes and a lot of grace.  GRACE.  What a lovely sound.  

We're just sinners, saved by grace.  To make my point, I thought I'd practice my freelensing and show you what our house is like today because, hehe, yeah, it was a BIG mess today.  Among other things we've replaced both our broken stove and our old fridge.  These installations took more time and effort than we anticipated and no one has energy to clean after a job is finished at 11pm.

Our old, and new, fridges!  Quite obviously still in construction. :-)  Look at that missing drawer!

Old broken electrical stove, and new gas stove!  Still getting used to the way it cooks...

There are books, scissors, glue and miscellaneous craft materials all over the living room floor from last minute project boards for school.

Furniture was moved quickly out of the way for the appliances and is left wherever is landed.

There are crumbs left from baking adventures...

and dry goods strewn all over the dining-room table, just waiting to be relocated.

There are dishes left undone.

So just in case you thought we had it all together... we don't always.  And that is ok.

Awkward & Awesome Thursday: treize

AWKWARD

• Remember when I matched that older guy at Toastmasters?  Yeah?  Well, we've matched the last 3 times I've seen him as well. This is REALLY starting to get awkward.
• Parking crooked
• Being sick and not having the energy to talk with your friends, so you sit there silent and somewhat moody.  My poor friends.
• I'm taking campaign pictures for my Brother and his friend victoria downtown and somebody walks by and offers to take a picture of all of you. Analyzing outfit...homeless "Thank you, but I'm just taking pictures of them today" and I can't afford to have my camera stolen today "It was very nice of you to offer!"
• Almost getting sworn off this old guy's property for simply ringing his doorbell and politely asking a question.
• Not preparing to play the piano because you forgot that you signed up... then taking requests and completely botching one of the hymns.  Why do they still want me to play?!

AWESOME

• Thunder and lightning.  Rain is fine, even delightful at times, but nothing is more soothing than rain WITH thunder and lightning.  Be still my heart.  I love it.
• Bible studies.  Sunday night bible studies in particular.
• Starting to shoot again!  I was so happy on Saturday and Sunday because I just went out and shot.  I was super rushed, but I just did what I could with the places I had and it was amazing.  
• My friends.  
• Jane Austen.  That woman was brilliant.  
• "Something I Need" and "Preacher" from One Republic's new album Native.  So catchy.

AVERAGE

• Passed my Western Civ 1 CLEP
• It's been raining steadily all week
• Working on College Algebra

Casey Rae ❘ Spring Portraits

Wow.  It has been forever.  I haven't posted a photo session here in months.  The truth is, I haven't taken photos in months.  Just after I started my education with CollegePlus! I went through a 3 month period of life re-arranging.  Spiritual formation.  Future evaluation.  Purpose.  Basics.

I've learned so much about myself and what God has for me.  During that whole time I didn't shoot hardly at all.  When I did my heart wasn't really in it.  Now I've come to a "spring" in my photography and a renewed passion for creating, capturing, and remembering.  On Friday I went out and shot some promo photos for my business with some friends and had an absolute blast.  I'm looking forward to challenging myself with new things!  Enjoy these portraits of Casey that I took. :-)  You may remember her as my first photography client EVER!  I took her senior pictures 1 1/2 years ago.

I'll leave you with my favorite. :-)

For more, check out the album on facebook.