As promised, here’s the other cocktail I made up with Drink of the Week. It’s called Deadly Nightshade. Muhahaha!

The drink is a mix of black current juice, current liqueur, and bourbon. We also added some grapes in the glass for a creepy garnish. It’s a bit more manly tasting than the Blood Orange Margarita, but both drinks would be great at a Halloween party. Recipe:

Deadly Nightshade

Ingredients:

1 1/2 oz bourbon
2 oz black currant juice
1/2 oz simple syrup
1/2 oz. creme de cassis (current liqueur)
club soda
8 or so grapes to garnish

Directions:

Shake bourbon, juice, syrup, and liqueur over ice and strain into cocktail or old-fashioned glass. Add some ice and a small handful of red or black grapes. Top off with club soda. Enjoy.

Happy Halloween!

I like this bird duvet from Dwell Modern (oh pardon me, I mean “Pearl Chinoiserie Duvet Collection”). I always love the botanical look.

This set would look great in my guest room. It seems to be on sale at $242 for a queen and $275 for a king. That’s not bad for a duvet, which is why I tend to make my own–they are expensive. But this one is pretty cute. Especially in the same room with a bookcase shaped like a tree.

Check out these gorgeous glass panels made from recycled glass by Daniel Maher Stained Glass.

They are made from serving bowls, platters, lids, and jars, among other things. Here is one in a room:

The panels, which are hand-crafted, cost between $1,000-$4,000. But unlike other recycled glass products I’ve mentioned, those prices seem reasonable considering how beautifully done the panels are. (Via Apartment Therapy)

Along with Drink of the Week, I came up with a nifty Halloween cocktail made from blood oranges. Get it? “I vant to suck your blooooood (orange margarita).” Halloween!

If you haven’t used this fruit before, blood oranges produce a beautiful ruby-colored juice that apparently reminds some people of blood. The margarita is fairly straight forward and very tasty.

Blood Orange Margarita

Ingredients:

1 1/2 oz tequila
1 oz Grand Marnier (or triple sec)
1 1/2 oz blood orange juice
1 slice of blood orange to garnish

Directions:

In a shaker, combine the tequila, Grand Marnier, and blood orange juice. Fill the shaker halfway up with ice. Shake thoroughly and strain into a glass. Garnish with a slice of orange. Voila!

We also made up another Halloween cocktail, which will be up later this week. Stay tuned.

I have now made two of these Buttercup Bags, a free purse pattern by Made By Rae that I posted a few months ago. I have to say, I am pleased with this pattern. It is easy to follow, the bag is adorable, and it uses up extra fabric quite nicely. Some of my loved ones just might be getting a Buttercup Bag this Christmas.

I like trees as decoration and I love bookshelves, so naturally I love this tree bookshelf from Korean designer Shawn Soh. So cute. (Via the style files)

I saw this lamp in a magazine last week. I kind of liked it, but then I discovered it is $229 without the shade, and over $300 with the shade.

The thing is, this is an easy lamp look to reproduce. You just need to paint the base of a lamp that color green and give it a high gloss finish. And the shade? Put some wallpaper on it.

I first got the idea of wallpapering a lampshade from a book on what to do with wallpaper, but it’s hardly a new concept. In fact, Redbook has a nifty how-to on how to wallpaper a lamp shade. They took the lamp shade from this:

To this:

And while I’m not a fan of the wallpaper they used–it’s pretty ugly–I do like this idea. With the right paper, you could add some a cool accent to a room this way.

Last month, I turned this old pillow:

Into two decorative throw pillows for my couch:

Here they are up close:

What happened was, I had this old pillow lying around. I was going to throw it out, but then someone gave me two embroidered fabric samples. I loved the design on them, so I decided to turn them into throw pillows, using the batting from the old pillow as filler.

I’m happy with the results, especially considering the frugal nature of this project. Because I re-used the old pillow, I didn’t have to buy a new pillow form from the craft store. The fabric was free and I had thread already, so the only thing I had to buy for this project was the brown backing, which cost $3. Therefore, this project cost me a total of $3, or $1.50 a pillow.

How To Turn an Old Pillow into Two Throw Pillows:

1. Wash the old pillow in the washing machine. You want to kill any bacteria or other gross stuff in it. Dry the pillow in the dryer.

2. Remove the batting from the pillow. I sliced open the casing:

And pulled the batting out.

3. Measure your pillows. To do this, I measured the decorative fabric.

They were 17 inches long and 10 inches wide, which seemed like a good size for a pillow. I needed to allow for a half-inch seam around the whole thing, which subtracts a half inch on all four sides of the pillow. That means that the end pillows would be 16 inches long and 9 inches wide.

4. Cut the batting to the finished size of the pillow. I measured the batting into two 16X9 inch pieces, one for each pillow. Then I marked it with a sharpie and cut the batting, like so:

I ended up with two separate piece of batting. This is the filler for the pillows.

5. Next, cut the backing of the pillow. I laid out the brown fabric that would become the back of the pillow, and then I laid my decorative fabric upside down on top of it, or right sides together, as they say. I pinned and cut a square out of the fabric.

Like the front of the fabric, it was 17X10 inches, allowing for the extra half inch seam. I repeated for the second pillow.

6. Now it is time to sew the pillow. With a sewing machine, I sewed a half inch seam down both of the long sides and one end of the pillow. I left other the end open. Then I pressed the seams with an iron, like so:

I turned the pillow inside out, and repeated with the second pillow.

7. Stuff the batting into the pillow. Since this is recycling something old into something new, it was a little lumpy and irregular at first. I had to spend some time pushing and adjusting and trimming the batting to make sure the pillows looked square.

8. When I was satisfied, I sewed the open end of the pillow up. To do this, I got a needle and thread. I turned the seam under and using a slip stitch, I closed the other end of the pillow. I repeated with the second pillow. Voila! Transformation is complete.

Hurrah!

A good idea to make your own clock–embroider a pattern on a piece of fabric and then use the embroidery hoop as the structure for the clock. Blissinateacup embroidered this wood grain pattern onto “thrifted brown wool suiting,” and then used “battery run recycled clock parts” to make the clock part. You can buy it on Etsy for $35.

One improvement: if I were making a clock like this, I would turn the embroidery hoop upside down and then paint it to blend in with the material. That way it wouldn’t stand out so much on the clock.

Actually, now that I think about it, this is a great use for those extra embroidery hoops I have lying around… (Via Apartment Therapy)

Sunday morning, I played around with some pumpkin waffle recipes and came up with a pretty good one. My husband says that next time, I should serve it with whipcream so that it would be like having pumpkin pie for breakfast. Here’s the recipe.

Pumpkin Pie Waffles

Ingredients:

1 c flour
1/4 c wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
2 eggs
3/4 c buttermilk
1/2 c cooked pumpkin
1/2 c sugar
3/4 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbs melted butter

Directions:

With a food processor, puree the pumpkin so that it smooth.

Combine the flour, baking flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, buttermilk, pumpkin, sugar, and vanilla.

Combine. Stir in the butter and fold until you have a good waffle dough. Pour onto the waffle iron and cook. Enjoy!

A couple of notes: I always use a mix of wheat and white flour when making pancakes and waffles because I like the extra flavor it gives the waffles. Regular white flour works fine. Likewise, I used roasted pumpkin, but canned pumpkin works too.