I wear my shoes until they have no more umph left in them, which is typically for years. This past fall is when my fall/spring shoes finally expired. Over the winter I’ve just worn my boots so haven’t really needed to find new ones, though somewhere in the distance I can see spring popping up.

I’m not a huge fan of shoe shopping, I can never seem to find exactly what I want/need for the kind of price I’m looking for. I need practical shoes, but let’s face it, I want them to look cute too. My mom and I went to the thrift store on Saturday and I was pretty happy to see these. They were all in my size, practically brand new, and the perfect price. So for a mere $13 bucks, I am 3 pairs of shoes richer.

These are my favourites. I just love them.

On a side note, do you remember my granny square laptop cover? I love the cover, but I just haven’t grown to love the colours, so I have decided to sell it. It holds a 13" MacBook perfectly (not really sure about PC laptop sizing, sorry) and I’m selling it for $35 plus actual shipping. If anyone is interested, please e-mail me at jennifer@theprairiegirl.com.

Hope everybody had a great weekend. We’ve got a busy week here, and my brother is coming into town at the end of the week, yeah!

For the most part, I like winging it when it comes to crafting. Though I do use them, patterns make me nervous. I much prefer to tackle a project by figuring it out what needs to be done and doing it, minus a pattern.

I recently found an article of clothing at a thrift store that was fantastic in just about every way. There is one thing I want to change and that’s what these granny squares are for. Of course, the whole thing could be a complete failure, but I hope not. I should have it done by next week and I can’t wait to show you.

Oh, and after I laid these out, I noticed how cute they would be as a granny square wreath. I might have to work on some of those for next Christmas.

On a side note, my closet is almost done. Just one more stack to go through and then my clothes will be down to what I actually wear and love. Decluttering is so freeing, good thing, as I have lots more to do.

Which do you prefer, working from patterns, or winging it?

It always make me a little sad when I see things that were so lovingly made go for such a small sum. On the other hand, I am thankful that it wasn’t just tossed out, and now my family can give it a new life where it will be much loved and appreciated.

This past weekend Hubby ripped it out (more on that tomorrow) and we have purchased a new, bigger table. Because the table is bigger and there is not a lot of space, I have been keeping my eye out for some stools that would fit under the table when not in use.

We stopped by our local thrift store the other day and on my way out of one of the buildings I saw this poor, sad little stool. He was painted a bizarre wood-like colour and was covered in filthy old brown corduroy. He is super sturdy, and the best part was that he was only $1.50. I snapped him up and with a little bit of a clean up, some fresh paint and new fabric, here he is.

I really wanted some kind of a neutral-ish floral print so that it would look nice but still blend in with the table and other chairs, but since I couldn’t find exactly what I wanted and we need the stool now, I covered him in unbleached muslin. I’ll still keep my eye out for a different fabric that will work, but in the meantime, he looks so much cleaner and will be perfect for our needs.

I was so excited that I found exactly what I was looking for for such a great price. We are really lucky with our thrift store, it has such great prices, and this is the kind of thing that really gets me going. I really love taking something old and worn out, or just plain ugly and turning it into something that is useful and beautiful.

More fun stuff tomorrow, have a great day!

Download Pattern (pdf)

Supplies you will need:

• fabric scraps for body and wings
• yarn for hanging loop
• yarn for birdy legs
• decorative button for loop
• two buttons for eyes
• two buttons for feet
• embroidery floss for wing
• poly-fil or wool for stuffing

Cut out two body pieces and two wing pieces using the pattern pieces.

Center the actual size wing pattern piece on the back side of the wing fabric. Fold the fabric around the pattern piece and iron. Slip the paper pattern piece out. I’m sure there are better ways of doing this but it is what I ended up doing, feel free to do this however you wish.

Place the wing on the right side of the body piece and using a running stitch, attach the wing to the body (I removed two strands of the embroidery floss and used the rest so that it would not be too thick). Make sure to leave a small opening in order to put some stuffing into it. Repeat for the other side.

Add a small amount of stuffing into the wing and then finish stitching it up.

Crochet a chain of approx. 40 stitches (you can make it shorter or longer depending on where you want to hang it) using your hanging loop yarn. When you chain your last stitch, using a slipstitch, connect it to the chain about 2/3 of the way down. Finish it off leaving a tail long enough to stitch your button on.

Using the tail, thread it through your decorative button and secure it to the chain behind the button.

Crochet another chain using your leg yarn (I was using a thicker yarn so I only needed four stitches) to the length that you want. Finish it off leaving a tail long enough to stitch a button on.

Thread the tail through your birdy feet button and secure to the chain behind the button. Repeat for the other leg.

Place bird bodies right sides together and sandwich the decorative hanging loop in the middle. You want the single chain (the bottom, not the handle part) peeking out the top of the birdy head. Pin around the birdy making sure that the hanging loop is in the middle so as not to be accidentally stitched when joining the two sides together.

Using a 1/4” seam allowance, machine or hand stitch all the way around the bird leaving an opening at the bottom big enough to turn and stuff the bird.

Turn the bird right side out and stuff. I used a small chopstick to make sure the stuffing filled out the beak and tail.

Take a needle and thread that will blend in with your main body fabric and start stitching up the hole making sure to add the legs in as you go.

Take a moment to breathe, we’re almost done. Grab your eye buttons and some thread that matches the buttons.

I stitched the eyes by holding both buttons in place and starting at one side, going through the button, through the head, and through the other button and just stitched them both on at the same time. When I was done I wrapped the tails of thread around the buttons to hide them. You are now done with your birdy. I hope you enjoy him.

I also got two sets of Wee Wonderfuls embroidery patterns, the All Four Seasons Stitchettes, and the All Four Fairy Stitchettes. Last but not least, is a 1- year subscription to the British Country Living magazine, which I’m super, super, super excited about.

I had such a great birthday, and got some wonderful things. There is going to be a lot of fun crafting before Christmas and plenty to learn before spring hits with a new garden. Hope you guys are having a great week.

In order to turn it from a sheet into a shower curtain, all I did was measure for the proper length and then cut it off and hem it. Next, I added buttonholes to be able to hook it onto the shower curtain hooks. All in all it took me about a half an hour to make, and what a difference it made in the bathroom. I just love this print, it is so bright and cheery, and $2 for the sheet and a half an hour of time is my idea of a makeover.