Nautical Wreath: Yarn & Recycled Fabric

 The first weekend in August, my family joined my husband's family at the lakehouse in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin!

It was an absolute blast.

I'll give more on the trip later in this post...

For now,  I'm so excited to show this little "thank you" gift I made for my mother-in-law for hosting all of us for the weekend!

I've been wanting to make a yarn/fabric wreath for quite awhile. I just didn't have a reason to make one. So, when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped on it! 

 To make it I used a 14 inch straw wreath, lots of red & white yarn, various fabrics, my husband's old dress shirt fabric & buttons, and jute.

A few weeks ago, I walked into our pantry/laundry room and found something unusual in the trash. 

I pulled out a perfectly worn light blue button up shirt. 

My husband, had thrown it away!

Being the craft-a-holic and DIY project creator around our home, I began brainstorming what I could make with this old shirt....

 See the light blue rosette in the picture below? 

 Yep. That is the sleeve & a button from the cuff!

Considering the fact that I had no idea what I was doing when I began,  I love the way it turned out! Hope my mother-in-law likes it, too! :)

 Thanks to Jen over at Scissors and Spatulas, I was able to create a super fun wreath! She has some incredible talents and has created beautiful wreaths herself.  Check out her summer wreath & tutorial here.  Love it!

Here are a few pictures from our wonderful weekend trip to Lake Geneva!

We enjoyed boat rides...

celebrated my little bro's 22nd birthday...

enjoyed the refreshingly clear & cool lake water...

ate some delicious food...

watched some unbelievable sunsets...

loved on our Momma's...

(my beautiful mom & mom-in-law!)

and spent some good Phillip/Fowler quality time together!

Everyone had a great time & we're sad the weekend its over.

Maybe we'll just have to do it all again next summer?! :)

Southbound 35

Wow. We have been so busy the past few weeks! Time for a little update here. :)

For this part of the post, the title "Southbound 35" doesn't exactly fit.  Just pretend it's "Westbound 20." I know, doesn't sound quite as catchy, but maybe it will better your West Texas geography skills. So..what is Westbound on I20, you ask??

We went to ABILENE over Father's Day weekend to celebrate my wonderful Daddy & my 25th birthday!Can't believe I'm a quarter of a century old...wa waaa. I received lots of fun gifts, (including my new bike from my hubby!) had a blast celebrating by the pool & eating homeade ice cream!

We also had fun at the Riddle Reunion over the weekend!

Continuing on in our adventure....we celebrated the FOURTH OF JULY over a wonderfully long weekend in the Texas Hill Country! Thursday, we met Don & Sandy (Kyle's parents) in San Antonio. We enjoyed walking around the downtown and riverwalk area!

 Thanks random photographer guy from Arizona who helped us learn more about our camera & it's lighting features!

The next day, we drove out to Hunt, Texas to enjoy the Hill Country at the McCollum's Ranch. It was relaxing and absolutely beautiful! 

We hung out by the Guadelupe River. 

Kyle did some fishin'

Some went swimming...

...and it was fun!

Later that weekend, we attended the official Hunt Rodeo & Dance. I tell you what, it was THE place to be. Later, we swam all day in the pool at the house, got the guns out to "shoot stuff," went 4-wheeling, played catch phrase, ate way too much delicious food and got a little sunburned. Did I mention there were 6 dogs to keep us entertained? In case you were worried, there was NEVER a dull moment. We were busy having so much fun, I forgot to take pictures...oops! I guess we'll just have to go back sometime! :)

Fast forward another week, and we were headed Southbound on 35 again! Except this time it was to WACO.  My cousin, Courtney was in town with her precious 7 month old baby boy, Ethan! Patrick was away for a church trip, so she was visiting her parents in Waco.  Kyle and I hadn't seen Ethan since January, so we jumped on the opportunity to come to Waco to see the most handsome baby boy in the world! He has changed so much since the last time I saw him...and he has such a personality!

We went to "Oso's" the new frozen yogurt place in Waco!

It was delicious. Even Ethan got a taste!

Ethan thought he hit the jackpot when cousin Kyle ...or should I say, "Mr. Trickster," offered E a bite of his yogurt! 

Such a cutie!

Love you Ethan Joseph!

Moving right along, the next day John and Whitney Collins  invited us to go out on the lake with them on their boat! It was such a blast....we loved seeing Lake Lewisville. And, it was fun because Betsy Morris, an old Abilene friend of mine (who is also one of Whitney's college friend's from HSU) joined us for the day on the boat!  We got out the wakeboard and ski's & each had a turn...

This was Betsy's first time to ski! She got right up in just a few tries...

Thanks, John for taking this cool pic while I was skiing!

And, the most BEAUTIFUL sunset!

I think that is about it for now. Thanks for keeping with me for this marathon of a blog post! Now, it's time to pack for Alaska....we leave in 2 days!!!