Polish Brass with Ketchup (in which playing with food actually has a purpose)

So, I got this little tarnished brass sailboat at the thrift store for $1.99.

Not wanting to spend money (or brain cells) on chemicals to clean the brass, I turned to this natural solution: Ketchup.

Check out how it worked.

Boom. Take that, chemical cleaners! My mom is gonna be so proud.

Now I must go and wash my hands again. I keep thinking I’m at a cookout.

Great. Now I’m craving a hamburger.

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Gone Fishing, or Something (in which I sort of DIY some technology)

Surprise! Yesterday I went on my second plane ride ever and am in St. Louis on a business trip (ICRS, for my publishing friends and/or inquiring minds). It is also my first time in Missouri. I have high hopes…that I’ll be allowed outside at least once while I’m here. But we’ll see.

This weekend, I spent literally hours on this little graphic that I put on the right side of ye ol’ blog.

This totally counts as a DIY project, right? (I used this tutorial and these buttons and this magical program.)

Each button is clickable, so that means you should click on them…if for no other reason that to help me justify having spent so much time on this.

 

Also. Facebook is dumb and only shows my posts to a small percentage of the page’s fans.

But there is still hope for you.

First, like the page.

Next, hover over the “Liked” button and make sure “Show in News Feed” is selected.

Like this.

Then click “Settings,” right below the news feed thing and click ALL UPDATES.

Then we’ll be even MORE intimately connected! (Obvious goal.)

 

One last thing. I updated my list of favorite blogs. You can now access it at the top of the blog under the header or by clicking here.

I get back late Tuesday night. Please do not rob Ken while I am away. Also, I may have an awesome craft that includes the colors mint and gold (winning combo) going live Wednesday, so you should stop back soon.

Love, Anne.

Dad’s Kayaks (in which I am jealous of a Sunday School class of 12-year-old boys)

Father’s day was yesterday (hope you didn’t forget!), and this weekend, we celebrated the life of my uncle–a well-loved husband, father, and friend to many–at his visitation and funeral. Oh, and we also celebrated my grandparents’ 50th wedding anniversary! It’s been an emotion-packed weekend, that’s for sure.

Since I’m feeling pretty grateful for my dad these days, I wanted to share a few photos I snapped recently of one of the projects he’s been working on lately–wooden kayaks.

He and my brother John began building two kayaks a few years ago, and when they were completely and utterly successful, they kept going and are now currently building kayaks number 3 and 4.

The picture above is of one of the kayak tops. As you can see, it’s just a bunch of bits of wood glued together.

Here’s the second of the two kayaks currently being made–this one is a little farther along.

Once they sand away all the imperfections and the glue that leaks everywhere, they put on layers and layers of epoxy that bring out the richness of the wood and make the kayaks seaworthy.

They’ve made more progress on these, but I need to get some updated pictures. Until then, check these out–here’s the two kayaks they built a few years ago that I grabbed from my mom’s blog):

As a testament to my father and brother’s craftsmanship, they actually float! Proof:

Now I am definitely thinking I need to get myself one of these. Dad’s thinking about taking a Cadet class from church under his wing next year and building kayaks with them, and I want to be there. They made paddles last year with the class, so the sky is the limit. Think I can pass for a 12-year-old boy?

I have a pretty incredible Dad, huh? In more ways than one. 🙂

One Last Hey Girl and a New Face Accessory (in which I finally–and ironically–conform)

I was blown away last week by all of the nice comments about my hot husband on my “Hey Girl” post, so let’s consider this a bit of an encore, shall we? But first, let’s preface it with this delightful gif* from last week’s Community episode. Jeff is the ultimate hipster.

*A GIF is a graphical interchange format which is a popular format for image files, with built in data compression (got that from Google). It is pronounced like the peanut butter…there’s even an authoritative website called howtopronouncegif.com if you want to argue about it.

Here’s Kenny’s fictitious (or not so fictitious…) response to my newest face accessory.

Trendsetter I am not (though it is very sweet of Kenny to fictitiously say so), but I did get me some hipster glasses.

I got these  from Coastal.com, where your first pair is free. All you have to do is call up your eye doctor and get your prescription, chose your frames, and use the promo code FIRSTPAIRFREE. I did have to pay $13.44 for shipping and handling, but seriously, where else can you get glasses with prescription lenses for under $15 bucks? These are Joseph Marc in the color “tortoise” but are sold out now, but  if you’re in the market for some big ole’ hipster glasses I’d recommend that brand or their Derek Cardigan brand.

Ordering them was easy; now I just have to work up the courage to actually wear these in public. That will be the hard part. 🙂

In With the New (in which I forcefully shove my blog’s design into 2013)

I believe I’m stating the obvious here (at least to my 2 faithful blog readers), but the old blog look has gone somewhere far, far away.

Here’s the new look. My favorite feature? Drop down menus. Yes. My blog has now caught up to…well, somewhere around 2008, at least. Take a look around.

I also update my “about me” page, so if you want to give it a glance, that’d be fine.

I’d love to hear what you think! And I’m open to suggestions if you have them.