Pretty Little Mess Product: Dishtowels

I recently hosted a bridal shower at work for one of my co-workers who is getting married and moving back home to Canada. This is the gift I made for the happy couple.

I started making these embroidered dishtowels last summer, but only had Monday finished. I used the Pleasant Kitchen Dishtowels pattern from Alicia Paulson. Since I am too cheap to buy floursack dishtowels, I took a yard of muslin and cut it into quarters. This determined the size of my towels and the number I could make. Hence, Melissa and Albert only being able to dry their dishes on weekdays.

I transferred the designs from the printouts using a pencil. I chose to do the designs in a variety of embroidery floss colors instead of just black like the original design. If I was going to do all this work, I wanted it to be colorful!

I embroidered Tuesday and Wednesday on the train ride up to the Boyfriend's graduation.

Thursday and Friday were finished on the ride back to D.C..

I backed the towels with this yellow mock linen fabric I had in my stash.

I added little loops out of twill tape so the towels can be hung from a hook in the kitchen.

The requisite Pretty Little Mess Product tag.

Here is Monday stretched out for your viewing pleasure.

A close up of the design while hanging.

Up next: the Pretty Packaging!

Inside A Relationship

Originally uploaded by prettylittlemess.

Setting: New Haven train station
Scenario: Waiting for my train back to D.C. on Sunday. This past weekend was our last visit with each other until I visit him in Boston for Labor Day.

Me: Thank you for convincing me to move here.
Him: That's the nicest thing you could have ever said to me.

We both meant it.

More pictures from our roadtrip across the Constitution State are here.

Spending Moratorium: Week 1

*I plan on doing a little update every week on how I'm doing on my new venture.*

Disposed Income:

$15 @ UPS store- The Boyfriend offered one of my co-workers who is going to law school in August some of his old books. And then the co-worker repaid me, so this shouldn't even count. But, alas I strive for honesty.
$4 @ small Connecticut town candy shoppe- I bought chocolate covered pretzels and then left them in the Boyfriend's fridge on Sunday. This was very sad to realize once I got to the train station.
$5 @ Quiznos- I forgot to pack a lunch yesterday, and it was a kickball game day. I had to eat something substantial for lunch.
$4 @ Amazon.com- I bought the $3.99 download of the day after Kottke posted about it. My music needs a refresher after listening to most of my songs over and over during my 10+ hours on a train this past weekend.

What I'm not including in this list is dinner with the Boyfriend on Saturday night or the groceries I bought in Connecticut to make a Fourth of July picnic. This is because I'm not counting groceries or dinner as expenditures. But that might change in coming weeks.

Pretty Packaging: Legal Wrapping Paper

One of the attorneys I work for went to the University of Connecticut Law School, and this year is a reunion year for him. Of all the solicitations for this event he received, I saw a potential future outside of the recycling bin for one.

This little cartoon is about 5"x7" and had information about donating to the school on the back. I about died when I read the cartoon text. Since the scan is a bit hard to read, the path of the legal experience includes going "off to the Bar" after graduation, giving back through law clinic and hopefully making it to the Supreme Court.

The Boyfriend has been very involved with clinic activities as a student and is currently studying for the Bar exam. I'm not ruling out the Supreme Court for him either. I decided to turn this image into a sort of wrapping paper for his Coloring Book for Lawyers.

I scanned the image, and then edited the more University of Connecticut specific items out using Picnik since it is free and web-based. I then took that image into Microsoft word and tiled it by just copying and pasting a bunch of times. I printed it on a sheet of paper 11"x17". I only needed to use a little strip in the back to fill in where the ends didn't meet around the gift box.

I didn't want to tape the wrapping paper to the box, since I wanted him to be able to save it. I made a belly band out of a scrap of complimentary paper and stamped the obligatory mortarboard in the middle. The band kept the paper on nicely.

It took a few tries to get the printer settings correct; I had a few extra sheets with the same graphic printed in different ways. In the end, I used a full size sheet of the cartoon as "tissue paper" in the box. Now he has a poster size version of his career path to hang on the wall as motivation.

This was a big hit at the graduation present unwrapping, with everyone asking how I found such spot on wrapping paper. It did take some of the magic out of it to describe how I made it, but it was too easy not to share!

Coming To America

Originally uploaded by prettylittlemess.

When Katie came to visit last month, we took a roadtrip up to New York City. This was Katie's first time visiting the City, so we had a lot of things planned and more importantly, a lot of food to eat.

We stayed at the apartment of one of the attorneys I work for. He and his wife have a place just a few blocks from the Bloomingdales on Lexington Avenue. McKatie popped out of the master bedroom the first night and said "I've never slept in a bed (king size) so big in my life! It's like I'm Eloise at the Plaza!" I think she had some fun.

We also did some more touristy things, other than eating. I have never in all my visits to the City done the Statue of Liberty tour. It's only $12 and getting there via subway wasn't that bad. Plus, it meant Katie had to ride on a boat.

Lady Liberty reopened her crown viewing the weekend after we visited her. So we just took hundreds of shots of the Statue from the base. We were just trying to get her best angle!

Aught Nine, Save a Dime: Spending Moratorium

My consumerist experiences of late:

1. Having to be pulled aside at the Anthropologie in Rockefeller Center by the Boyfriend because I was getting increasingly frustrated with the manner the MALE sales associated was handling our request to find a $100 sweater.
2. Watching a J.Crew employee ring up my sale with her right hand and fiddle with her cellphone with the left. Then she reached over my left shoulder to take the shirt the guy behind me in line was buying before I had a second to move to the side.
3. The lack of cute and affordable quality merchandise in stores is a subject that the Boyfriend would probably pay me to never speak of again.

Basically, customer service in stores is pitiful, and I am getting increasingly annoyed with ways to spend my disposable income. It's time for me to take a moment and reflect. With a great deal of inspiration from these ladies, I've come up with a plan.

Starting July 1 through August 31, I will not be spending money. Here are my self-imposed guidelines:

1. I will not buy any clothing, shoes, or accessories.
2. I will not buy lunches out. I will buy groceries and pack my lunch.
3. This moratorium does not include the following purchases:

• Katie McKatie's birthday gift (August 16)
• The Boyfriend's birthday gift (August 16)
• My cousin Amber's wedding gift (August 22)

I already have the Boyfriend's gift (it just needs wrapped and shipped), and I know what I'm buying for the wedding.

My goal with this is to save at least $200 a month. My expectation is to have $400 more in my checking account on September 1 that I can stash into my savings.

Perhaps in that new savings account that I've opened nicknamed "Letterpress".

A Coloring Book For Lawyers

For the Boyfriend's graduation, along with the letterpress print, I gave him a sort of gag-gift. Because something that makes you laugh is always superior to something that causes credit card debt.

Introducing A Coloring Book For Lawyers! A co-worker of mine found this via a friend. He inner-office mailed it to me, thus making.my.day. And I knew immediately that the Boyfriend needed this for his graduation.

I took it to my office services department, and had them bind it with the spirals on the spine.

I also added a front & back cover out of our cheapy cardstock.

Here is the first set of pages, click on them to go to Flickr where I've made a note of the text so you can read more easily.

My favorite page in the book:

Here it is in the gift box with a set of markers so he can color the pages! More than one person said "Did you get him markers because you were afraid he would chew the crayons?"

Yes, and D.C. drugstores/convenience stores/Staples do not have an 8 pack of Crayola crayons readily available for purchase. Plus, the marker pack had a gray one, so the lawyer wouldn't lose his job.

I posted the pictures of the book on Flickr in hopes someone could claim authorship. This kind of genius needs recognition.