Thursday, May 31, 2012

Throwback Thursday: The Chuppah Creation

A couple years back my oldest friend Bethami married her now husband Lenny and I made their chuppah, which I was both very honored and terrified to do.  I took a bunch of photos of the process and realized that I never showed them to anyone, so here goes...

Bethami and Lenny wanted a white chuppah because the temple is very colorful.  We did research and sent lots of emails and came up with the idea of a bed of silk chiffon leaves edged in gold.  The hope was that the entire top would be made of these leaves, but to be honest I bit off a little more than I could chew, so it ended of up being a boarder of leaves around white chiffon.


I started by drawing 5 different leaves and making templates of them.  Then I traced them lightly with a pencil onto the chiffon.  Because the chiffon would buckle in the sewing machine, I stitched the gold edging onto the chiffon with a piece of paper underneath it to keep it flat (if you're wondering, I used old Law & Order scripts).  The leaves were then cut out and the paper removed.  As the photo above shows, I needed lots of Diet Coke and Tootsie Roll pops (as well as help from a few friends who I begged to come over one afternoon) to get it done.


Once I hoped I had enough leaves (It wasn't till the night before I had to fly to the wedding that I realized that I could not do the whole thing in leaves - I held out hope this long...) I laid out the chiffon on my floor (which was just large enough) and lay out three rows of leaves, just overlapping slightly at the corners and stitched them together there.  Cash, of course, helped a lot.


Once the wedding day came, we only had a very short amount of time to get all set up before the ceremony. Thankfully, Lenny had some very awesome groomsmen, without their help there would have been no way it would have been up and actually looking good.  I owe them forever.  Rachel (Bethami's sister) and I basically stood there and directed them.  I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.  Bethami and Lenny seemed to be as well, and let's be honest, theirs are the only opinions who really matter.


Monday, May 28, 2012

Home-Infused Blueberry and Strawberry Vodka


Sunday night I checked in on my infusing vodka, which included tiny little tastes from each jar.  The pomegranate was very faint tasting, so I put it back in the fridge, but the blueberry and strawberry vodkas were very flavorful, so I decided it was time to strain them.


In order to control the pouring, I first dumped the mixture into a pitcher and then slowly poured through a strainer into a smaller Mason jar.  Then I labeled them, sealed them up, and put them with all my other liquor- it's that easy.  I am never buying flavored vodka again!
Friday, May 25, 2012

Follow Friday


                

This is my personal instagram account, but I like to take pictures of crafty things (and my cat).
Plus, I want more followers :)
Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Homemade Infused Vodka


I feel like a bootlegger!  Today I put all my internet reading to good use and started the process of making infused vodka (which I will used for my Olympic viewing party drinks).  If it works, then it's really easy!  Here's how to do it...


First- you'll need:
  • Mason Jars or a similar container that you can seal (I suppose old liquor bottles would work)
  • Vodka (please don't judge the brand I used, someone left it at my house after a party a few years ago, so I figured it's time to put it to good use.)
  • Fresh Fruit
  • Your everyday kitchen stuff (knife, cutting board, etc) depending on the fruit you choose
I am making 3 different flavors: Blueberry (for Olympic Sangria) and Pomegranate and Strawberry (for Olympic lemonade).  I just went ahead and poured all of the pomegranate seeds into one jar (I'm not sure if I needed that many, but I'm not going to use them for anything else), the blueberries I punctured with a knife so that juices can really get in there, and the strawberries I cut up.  After the fruit was in the jars, I added about 1 cup of vodka to the blueberries and 2 cups to pomegranate and strawberry each.

Then you seal them up and put them in the fridge.  I've read lots of different info on how long you are supposed to let them sit- everywhere from 24 hours to 3 weeks...  I will try something in the middle.  Don't forget that about once a day or so you should agitate the mixture.

Now we wait...

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

New Look! New Name!


New look and a new name! I procrastinated today by completely revamping blog! "Greye's Quilts" just didn't seem to be cutting it anymore, since it's pretty much all different quilts, crafts, etc. I chose "Greye's Craze" for a couple reasons- 1. IT RHYMES! 2. because I do become obsessed with making certain things for awhile, then it passes, and I become obsessed with making other things. I wanted to change the look of the blog and this is reminiscent of how I hope to have my craft area look soon enough.

Enjoy the new look! I promise I'll be back soon.

No Excuses

So, if you were wondering, I do still exist...  So much boring stuff has been going on: Unforgettable wrapping for the season, finding out we've been canceled, assisting on a play, apartment hunting only to realize that the market is way too high right now and deciding not to move, cleaning out all of my hoarding closets and donating an obscene amount of clothing, planning on how to rearrange my apartment, coming to terms with two of my closest friends moving out of NYC within two weeks of each other...

There should be a lot of crafty stuff on the horizon though- I am completely revamping my apartment which will include painting, redecorating, and making a designated crafting/quilting/sewing/working area (I promise to take lots of photos).  I also want to have a small viewing party for the Olympics (which is one of my favorite things ever) that will involve homemade decorations, taking a stab at making infused vodka, and themed snacks.  Once I'm settled I will also be buckling down on Jackson's t-shirt quilt, doing some fun craft things to put up on Etsy, and hopfully making some fun stuff for my "new" place.

Stay tuned... In the mean time, you can see all of the stuff I want to do here
(it's just my Pinterest page).