Ragnar Relay Del Sol 2011

Well I just got back from another race! This time I went and ran the AZ Ragnar relay. My neighbor had a friend who had two spots open up on her team about a month ago, so we jumped at the chance to run another race. This was the first race I have run without Heber. He's still not up to par with his knee (ACL surgery last fall).

I only knew 2 people on the team when we left...but it was a blast and everyone was a ton of fun. It was the first relay race for 8 of the 12 people there. So our whole first van had never done one before...we gave them some pointers on the ride down.

Here is a pic of all the girls that ran on our team. Paula on the far right was our team captain...it was her birthday the day of the race and wanted to run a relay for her birthday. So she put this whole thing together.

Camille, my running partner didn't get to come either...but her sister Leslie was running on another team, so we met up with her to get a picture. She ran the same leg as me.

Here are some of our girls cheering on van 1 with pom poms on the side of the road.

Here I am chilling in the van after my 1st leg of 9.2 miles...Paula got us all flashing light glasses for our night run.

Here I am getting ready to run my third leg of 4.2 miles. Just waiting for my runner to come in.
We had 2 hours of sleep after our first leg and woke up at 11:30 pm so we could get to the next exchange to run our night run at 12:30am. Then we got 2 hours of sleep again at 7am and woke up at 9am to get the final van exchange at 10 am.

Lots of teams dress up in funny outfits and have funny team names...here is the MC Hammer team. There was also a "Victorious Secret" team...can you imagine what they wore? Let's just say lace and spandex, this included the guys!

Our team name was "Sol Invictus" so we were supposed to dress up as sun goddesses. Here we are with a 76 year old man that ran the race! He was so flattered that we asked to take a pic with him.

Here I am running my final leg of 4.2 miles. I ended up running another 5.2 miles after this because one of our runners had to fly home after our second run because her daughter went into labor. So all in all I ran 22 miles! I was quite proud of myself, I felt good.

Trying to hand off that slap bracelet in the shoot.

They give out fake Ragnar tatoos, which are always a huge hit.

Some previous Biggest Loser contestants were announcing at the start line and finish line...so here we are with Sunshine, Jessica, and Sione. They are all supposed to run on a team for the LA Ragnar in April. Super cool, my kids love watching Biggest Loser every week. So we watched all of their seasons.

Here is most of our team on the side of the road while Scott was running his first leg. The whole race was about 200 miles.

Here I am finishing up my first leg of 9.2 getting ready to hand off the slap bracelet. I got 8 road kills (passed 8 people) on this leg...7 of which were guys (we are now calling that getting "chicked"). I was super proud of my time on this leg...slight uphill grade the whole way and I managed to average 8:55 per mile....I ran hard the whole way. So for all of my three legs I averaged under 9 min. miles! This is the first race I've been able to do that. I couldn't wait to tell Heber.

Upholstered Rocking Chair (Pottery Barn)

This Chair is for my clients nursery. I love how bold the print is and how it turned out!

Before...another muslin covered chair with rockers.

After in a turquouise damask type print.

I notched up and over the rockers and finished it off with piping along the bottom edge.

Close up of the inside wing.

 Oh yes she did an ottoman to match.

Look at those two together!!!! I wish I could show you pics of it inside her nursery...but her husband is meeting me to pick it up.

Another After shot.

2 piece Sectional

This was a 2 piece sectional with attatched back cushions. I cut off the cushions and "boxed" them. Which means 2 rows of piping like on a box cushion instead of the single row of piping (pillow style) that was there originally.

The back cushions looked a little saggy before...but once I boxed them they filled out better, also the cushions can be flipped which helps distribute the wear.

Before...gingham was getting a little bit worn.. you can kind of see where I cut the cushions off, and notice the single row of piping on the back cushions.

See how the front of the arm tapered down...I wasn't sure how to make it look good, I played around with pleats and then chose to seam it...which worked really well. We also made the skirt taller and dropped it from the decking.

After...see the back cushions are now "boxed". She went with a solid tan twill/denim, that way she has a neutral base and can switch out pillows.

Here is the front of the arm where I seamed it to taper it out instead of doing pleats. I thought it would look cleaner that way.

Another after...I love how it changed the feel of the room..more calm and serene with her gorgeous blue walls.

I ran 9 miles on Friday to get ready for Del Sol Ragnar Relay next weekend. They changed the legs again.... so now my longest is 9.2 miles instead of 7.6. We all (12 people on a team) take turns running three times each. The whole race is about 200 miles. I am so excited to go and get myself another medal for my collection!

New pillows for my bed and front room

So I haven't been very good about making my bed lately...so I decided to make some new pillows, so it's exciting and new again. I am really bad about putting away my laundry and every night when I get ready for bed I leave all my clothes in a heap on the bench at the end of the bed. Then after two weeks or so go by and the heap is really big, I put them away...and they are all mine, nothing of my husbands. I think I am just so tired by the end of the day, it's all I can do to put myself to bed.

This is after I've fallen asleep on the couch and have woken up at 1am and drag myself up to bed. (These are the nights Heber's at work)... because the nights he's home, I still fall asleep while we are watching tv, but the difference is he gets up and takes my blanket away and flips the light on before he heads upstairs.

And I can say for the past week since I've had my new bedding...my clothes have gotten put away every night. My room is a lot cuter when it's clean.

I made changed my euro pillows to a solid gray.. then I found just enough of this green stripe in my stash to do the front of the standard pillows. I backed them with some tan linen. Then I reused the front pillows from my front room. I love when I can go through my pillow covers and find some that I can reuse.

I am still in love with the mini white linen ruffle. But I am definitely in love with the Menswear look right now too...so I figured I'd do a little of both.

I actually like the tan linen on the back of the stripe. I also love the stripe going horizontally (good thing, cause that's the only way it'd work with how much fabric I had).

Here's the whole bed. I still need to make the new cushion cover for the end of the bed...but that's for another day. The bench at the end of the bed was a coffee table.

Here are new pillows for the front room. The last ones I made (red ruffle) was just for holiday. I knew I wanted something different for the new slipcovers...so this was always the plan, I just barely got around to it. The stripe pillow was a homemade curtain from a thrift store that I got for $3. I cut it up and made pillows. The velvet pillow was from some fabric samples I got from Restore they were 10/$1....so I bought 50 different samples for $5!

This houndstooth pillow (turquoise/cream) was from my pillow cover stash that I had made a few years back.

Close up of the homemade curtain pillow (turquoise/brown)

The center of this pillow was from my 10/$1 sample fabrics

I pieced a bunch of the samples into a footwarmer for my bed...I liked it but it wasn't completely me....so luckily I had sewn a solid gray fabric on the back (reversible). I ended up using that side instead.

 Close up of the footwarmer.

Side note ....here is baby Milo with 2 of my boys and the twins. My boys are begging me to snuggle, so I'd better get going.

Chair and ottoman floral slipcover

Here's another chair I did for a client. Luckily she had bought an extra 2 yard piece that she was using as a makeshift tablecloth. I took it with just in case we needed it to get the ottoman done. I used every bit of fabric!

Before muslin chair...ready for a new slipcover.

After tan/cream floral...

Another after shot.

I liked this black gingham pillow she had on the bench behind the chair. I always think everything needs a pillow on it to finish it off.

Close up of the front.

I just finished making new pillows for my bed and front room, so I'll be posting those pics soon. I leave in 9 days to head to AZ to run the ragnar relay there. I can't wait to be in 70 degree weather running in shorts showing off my tan (white skin with freckles)!

My sister is having her baby on Thursday! Can't wait to meet baby Milo. I am taking her 4 year old twins for a few days while she has the baby. My kids can't wait for all the sleepovers we are going to have this weekend. I am going to get to hang out with a little girl! Imagine that, I am not sure what little girls like to do. Angie is going to send lots of crafting stuff. I might even help her sew something.

Chair and a half- Window pane fabric

I did this chair about 6 years ago for this client, and she was ready to change it up. She had gold/red before and now she's going for tan and blue with a little bit of a Menswear look. Her pillows hadn't arrived yet that were going to pull everything together. So I was a little disappointed that I didn't get to see the full finished product. She had ordered a new couch as well. The pillows were actually a Navy blue medallion looking fabric....it was the same fabric as the red pillows in the Sundance Cabin post.

Chair before...just muslin covered ready for a slipcover.

After in a blue window pane plaid fabric.

Here you can see the fabric a little better. Of course I matched up all the stripes.

Close up of the back cushion.