Super Bowl XLV Party

We had our sixth annual Super Bowl party last Sunday and I think it was one of our best ever.

We crammed eleven people (twelve if you count a baby) into our tiny apartment. It was cramped, but cozy.

Our team didn't win, but it wasn't for lack of spirit. (Can you find my cat in the picture above?)

Chuk got a bunch of Steelers paraphernalia from his aunt as a wedding present, which was totally random. It's been sitting in our basement for nearly two years, but it came in handy for the party. We had Steelers coasters, clappers, a rug, a blanket, and three Terrible Towels.

I almost forgot to mention the FOUR different kinds of Steelers glasses.

We got this football cooler for a couple of bucks online several years ago. Even I, the non-sports fan, think this is really fun. And because it's inflatable, it's easy to store, unlike all our other football stuff.

I got the football plates and napkins at the grocery store for 75% off at the end of the last football season. Normally, I don't do disposable, but I don't have enough plates or cloth napkins for eleven people. Sometimes you just have to compromise.

We served meatball subs on ciabatta rolls, chips and onion dip and football-shaped donuts. The football donuts are a tradition for us. We get them from Krispy Kreme every year. Guests brought veggies and hummus, and chips and salsa to round out the meal.

Cultured Date Night

Date night came a day early this week. Dinner at a Pakistani restaurant followed by Giselle at the Kennedy Center, performed by the Mariinsky Ballet, AKA the Kirov Ballet. Chuk got me the ballet tickets for Christmas. I love ballet.

On our honeymoon we saw the Mariinsky Ballet in their home theater in St. Petersburg do a bizarre version of Swan Lake, in which the swan lived. They performed Giselle in the traditional way though.

View of the stage from my seat during intermission.

Lest I become too cultured tonight with my international food and performing arts, I'm off to watch Jersey Shore. What can I say? I love me some ballet and JWOWW. I'm a complex individual.

Sofa Fabric

Yay! I'm so glad you all approve of my fabric choice. Here's a little more information on it. I got it at Ikea for $2.99/yard. (Actually, I got the first 4.75 yards at $1/yard because they rang it up wrong and I didn't realize until later.) Unfortunately, I don't see it on the website anymore, so maybe that's why it was on sale.

It does have a kind of canvas feel to it and it's reversible so I didn't have to worry about a "wrong side" when I was sewing. The thin stripes look black in the pictures but are navy blue, so it matches the navy accessories I already had in the room. I was a little nervous about sewing stripes because I didn't want them to be wavy, but the stripes actually helped me sew a straight line, so it was a good thing.

For the record, I had my sewing machine for over a year before I ever attempted to sew anything. I was totally scared too, but now I'm loving it. If your fear is holding your back, I say go for it anyway. Other than threading the machine and bobbin, it's totally not as hard as you think.

Easy Slipcover for People Who Don't Know How to Sew

I want a new couch. I love my couch and have major sentimental attachments to it, but it’s showing its age. It’s faded and stained and looks more shabby than chic these days. The reality is we’re not getting a new couch any time soon. Have you priced those suckers lately? The good ones are not cheap and the cheap ones are not good.

So like anyone who reads too many home décor blogs and watches a lot of HGTV, I thought, “I’ll just slipcover it.” I’m smart, no? Yeah, except the only time in my life I’ve ever used a sewing machine was in seventh grade home ec. class where I made a lumpy stuffed duck and broke the sewing machine in the process. That was the lowest grade I had ever gotten in a class until I got to college.

So if you’re adventurous and/or stupid a great first sewing project is slipcovering your sofa. Because I have no sewing skills, I invented a process for how to do this and then proceeded to think about it for two months before actually attempting it. To my surprise, it wasn’t THAT hard and looks ok.

Basically, I made giant pillowcases for the cushions. I laid the fabric out on the floor and cut a piece big enough to cover it with very little overlap.

Then I folded the fabric in half and pinned the side opposite the fold and an adjacent side. So now one side was folded, two sides were pinned together, and one side was open.

Sew along the two pinned sides. It’s two straight stitches in an L-shape, so it isn’t very hard. The longest part of this process for me was watching the instructional DVD that came with my sewing machine on how to thread my machine. After seeing like 22 times, I got it threaded.

I put the cushion inside its new slipcover to make sure it fit. It did, but the slipcover is inside out, so I had to turn it right side out and pop the cushion back in. When I put the cushion back on the couch I simply folded the extra fabric under the cushion so you can’t tell it isn’t fitted. This was necessary for me because I didn’t feel quite ready to take on a zipper yet.

It probably would look more professional with more seaming and piping, but given my skill level, I’m happy with it. Now to cover the body of the couch. Eek! Stay tuned.

I'm linking to Anti-Procrastination Tuesday and How To's Day.

Sweet Song for February

I saw a father-daughter duo singing this song on Ellen, which was super cute. It prompted me to look up the original artists. They are also super cute. There's just something about hippies jumping around that makes me happy on a Monday morning. Besides, they seem so earnestly in love which seems very appropriate to me in these days leading up to Valentine's Day.

Public Service Announcement: Barnes and Noble

If you are a bookworm or working towards a $100 holiday, today's Washington DC groupon might be for you. With it, you can get $20 worth of merchandise for $10 at Barnes & Noble. You can buy the Groupon for the next three days and the gift code is good for online and in-store purchases until April 11.

I have no affiliation with Barnes & Noble (in fact I won't be purchasing this deal because the library is even cheaper than this) or with Groupon, but I have used Groupon before and found the service to be easy to use.

Steelers' Fan

Get it? Get it? Get it? It's my husband's joke. He loves puns...and the Steelers. We have a Super Bowl party every year (this is our sixth!), but they're always extra special when the Steelers are playing.

This year, I'm changing things up by making a few decorations. Not many, and nothing hard, but this has been a tough week for Chuk at work and he has to work on Saturday, so I really want him to be able to let his hair down on Sunday.

To make the streamers, I took a piece of construction paper and cut it in half vertically. Then folded each piece vertically.

Keeping it folded, I drew short lines across the paper. These should be about half to one inch apart. I used the side of a deck of cards to measure and trace. It doesn't really matter. This is not an exacting project.

My hand looks totally deformed in this picture.

Next, keeping the paper folded, I cut along the lines until I was about a quarter inch from the edge. Then cut the next line from the opposite direction, again, not cutting all the way to the edge.

For instance, first cut the folded side almost all the way to the open side. For the next line, cut from the open side across the paper towards the folded side. Does this make sense? In the picture above I'm spreading apart the paper to try and demonstrate where I cut.

Using your lines, cut down the whole length of the paper, alternating sides.

Unfold the paper. Here if you stretch it apart a little, you'll see it looks like streamers. Continue folding and cutting until you get the length you want. This makes me feel productive while I'm sick and watching TV.

Hello Mr. Hangnail

To attach them together, I just place one segment on top of another and staple them together.

It would probably look better if you attached them with double sided tape, but I was almost out of tape so I used staples. No biggie. They're really not noticeable once you get them hung up.

I'm probably going to make two more streamers for my fan since it's looking a little bare in places. It only took me one and a half pieces of paper for each of the streamers above, so this craft is as cheap as it is easy.


Just like yo' momma. Get it? Get it? (Am I the only person here old enough to remember yo' momma jokes?)