DIY: Saggy Bikini Bottom Into Sexy Bikini Bottom.

I went to the beach a couple of weeks ago with my husband, Joe, and I noticed that all the young, tanned, and toned ladies there had these butt enhancing bikini bottoms (I've found them called "pucker butt," "ruched butt," "Brazilian butt," and "scrunch butt" bottoms, in case you want to get a better idea of what I mean). I didn't even have to ask Joe to check out those womens' butts before he said to me, "You would look good in a bikini like that!" What a great guy, always putting me first! I just love the crap outta my husband! (-;

That moment started me on a 4 day long quest for similar bikini bottoms. I was pretty sure they'd be expensive. By expensive, I mean that they'd probably be more than $10. I know. I'm cheap... I mean, I'm thrifty.

I noticed something while poking around online though: It didn't seem like it would be that hard to scrunch the butt on a bikini bottom I already owned. In fact, I had a black bikini bottom that was a tad too large that I was on the verge of getting rid of.. Maybe I could try to salvage them with a scrunchy butt!

This is all you need to enhance your bum!

I got my bikini bottoms, some elastic, a chalk pencil, and some pins. I also grabbed a ruler because I cannot draw a straight line.

The "before" shot of the butt.



I really need to sharpen my chalk pencil thingy.

 I started out my turning the bottoms inside out. I then found the middle where my butt crack would end up, and drew as straight a line as I could down the entirety of the bottom. I wanted my bottoms to scrunch down pretty far because I was using this technique to make them fit better, but if you just want a little scrunching on a bottom that already fit you pretty well, you might not want to ruch it as far down.

This is a terrible picture, but you get what I'm trying to convey!

Then I cut my thin elastic the length of my line. I'll admit right here that I thought it would be wasteful to cut the elastic that long, considering that when I sewed it to my bottoms, I stretched it out and ended up with some elastic left over. Do not cut your elastic any shorter, though! You need that extra part to hold onto!

OK, now that I've "Public Service Announced" you to death, back to the sexy bottoms:

I pinned the top of the elastic to the top hem of my bottoms. I had the chalk line as a guide, so I didn't pin the rest of the elastic down. I also sewed this very slowly on my machine so I'd get the straightest line possible.

Obligatory shot of my sewing machine, not actually sewing anything though..

I set my sewing machine to a zig zag stitch and started sewing. And remember, I stretched out the elastic as far as I could as I sewed so it would bunch the bikini bottoms.

There you have it folks! Hope you weren't holding out for a booty shot!! You won't be getting one!

And voila! Now I have a bikini bottom that not only fits, but accentuates my old lady butt! My butt is not naturally awesome and I don't go out of my way to make it look attractive (like working out or not eating fried foods). If my butt could, it would thank me for doing the absolute least I could to make it look nice in a bathing suit.

Joe was also pretty impressed that I was able to make these bikini bottoms look expensive and special, considering how cheap and bland they were when I started. And it cost me probably less than $0.25 worth of elastic.

And can I just admit for a minute, that I'm a bit of a show off. During my 4 day shopping search for a pair like these, my sister and I talked about how great scrunched butt bikini bottoms were. So, it was only natural that after I made my own pair, I sent her a picture of them and bragged a little about how incredible I am.

So, she asked me to scrunch a couple pairs of her bikini bottoms!! I was only too eager to do it for her since they were so easy, but next time, I'll keep the bragging to a minimum! LOL (P.S. She loved them!!)

Jill Can Cook: Pasta Dough

I've been wanting to get a pasta rolling machine for about a year now. I've gotten as far as pricing them online, but I knew I wouldn't really get the chance to enjoy it until recently, because my son is into everything and cannot be trusted on his own for 5 seconds at a time. But he's getting better.

 

So, I got one from Joe for Valentine's Day.

Technically.

I mean, he had every intention of getting me one but wasn't sure which kind or brand or even where to find one. So, I bought myself one for $19.99 at The Christmas Tree Shop and thanked Joe for getting it for me. Lol. 

 

Joe was very pleased that "he" got such a good deal on it.

Dork.

Anyway, I couldn't wait to get it together (SOOOO easy to do!!!!!!!) and find a recipe (also so easy; just a couple of ingredients!!). Quinn also couldn't wait to get in on it and help. So, here are our adventures in Pasta making. Oh and here's the recipe we used: The Restless Chipotle.

* A little footnote: I actually made this pasta dough and took all these pictures about a week after Valentine's Day! Talk about dropping the ball, I totally did on this post!

 

The Best Homemade Pasta Dough Ever

 

Ingredients

 

• 3½ cups all purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 4 eggs
• 1 tablespoon good olive oil
• About 4 to 5 tablespoons of water (give or take)

Instructions

1. Blend the flour and salt together.
2. Add the eggs, oil and half of the water.
3. Mix slowly, adding more water as needed until the dough can be formed into a ball that holds together. don't let it get too wet or it will be hard to work with.
4. Knead for about three minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic.
5. Cover with a clean tea towel and allow to rest for thirty minutes.
6. Divide the dough into 4 parts.
7. Roll each part out on a lightly floured board so that it will fit through the #1 setting on your pasta maker.
8. If you are rolling by hand just roll each piece of dough out until it is as thin as you can get it and cut into the desired sizes.
9. Rub a light coating of flour on the dough.
10. Put the dough through the #1 setting about 5 times or more.
11. Change to a #2 setting and put the dough through that setting two or three times.
12. Change to a #3 setting and put the dough through that setting.
13. Continue to make the dough thinner until it is as thin as you want it.
14. Cut into desired shapes and allow to rest for a few minutes more.
15. Place in salted, rapidly boiling water and cook until done - 2 or 3 minutes.

Notes

You can use whole wheat flour, semolina flour, or a combination if you like.
You can substitute vegetable puree for the water.
I'd suggest following the recipe exactly before trying any variations.

I was pleased to see there wasn't that much to do to get this puppy working!

That's a pretty large recipe, so I cut it in half, so I didn't end up with an insane amount of noodles! I also didn't take any pictures of the ingredients in the bowl because immediately, I ended up with this:

Doesn't look like much but it made a fairly decent amount of noodles.

And it wasn't until I started rolling the dough out that Quinn wanted to join in. I keep the kids gated out of the kitchen so when she started yelling, "Can I please jump?" I knew picking her up over the gate and into the kitchen would mean having a little talking shadow during the rest of this!

I rolled out this awesome circle shape.

Then cut it into quarters.

For the next step, I figured I'd let Quinn help. I put the dough into the pasta roller and let her crank the arm. She was in kid heaven!

You can tell she loves it by her creepy little smile.

This is one quarter all rolled out. You can see how we ended up with so many noodles!

We made some into skinny noodles and some into thicker noodles.

The thick ones photographed better.

I ended up with a couple mangled noodles that didn't separate  enough, so I put them to the side. Then I put the rest of the noodles into some boiling water.

When I turned around, Quinn was playing with the leftover pasta dough I had set aside:

I love how she looks so serious! P.S. This kept her busy for the next hour or so!

The great thing about the noodles is that they didn't take too long to cook. The not-so-awesome thing about the noodles is that I didn't have any kind of sauce or dressing available. I hoped the kids would eat them with a bit of butter, salt, and pepper on them.

How could they resist these delicious looking homemade noodles?!

The kids ate them. I ate them. I saved some for Joe in the fridge, but he never ate them for whatever reason. I don't remember since it was about 4 months ago.

Not bad looking noodles!

Although I liked the noodles, they were a little salty. I am not much of a salt person (which is weird since I LOVE ramen noodles and those are super salty). I think the recipe would be a whole lot better with half as much salt. Still, I give it an A.

I mainly wanted a pasta roller because I wanted to make ravioli and tortellini. I've owned the pasta roller for about 4 months and still haven't made the two things I've been dying to make on it! I've got to kick my butt back into gear! I hate that I've turned into a bit of a blob over the winter. Lucky for all of us around here, though, that we're getting nice weather!

 

 

 

Finished Project Series: My Thrifted Tables! Table 3...

A little recap:

I bought 3 tables from my favorite thrift store with the intention of spray painting them and displaying them in my house.

Remember these guys?

I showed you how I changed the heart tower from plain to glitter-ific! I also showed you how I pretty much ruined that little green table. Today, I will take you on the tall tables journey!

Joe, although he doesn't complain very often, he does complain. Recently he was complaining that he couldn't sit next to me on the couch in the evenings because he has nowhere to put his drink.We have a couple of tables in the living room, but nothing where Joe sits. Poor guy. We used to have an end table near where Joe sits, but the kids broke it (it was cheaply made to begin with, so no surprise there!).

So, when I saw that tall table, I knew I'd make it Joe's drink table. I REALLY wanted it to stand out from our other furniture though, so I bought...

Heck yeah!! My favorite color!

....burgundy spray paint! I sanded the top a little bit and did not have ANY issues, thank goodness. Joe, who was outside playing with the kids, cleaning the garage, and asking me questions about every step, was a little worried when he saw the color.

Me in action!

We had a nice little breeze that blew all the fumes away from me.

 OK, he was also taking a few pictures of me. I didn't even have to ask!

I ended up using almost the entire can of spray paint on this table. The other two tables didn't even use half as much. I'm thinking it was because I did a lot more coats to get the depth of red I wanted. 

I could not have been any happier with my finished product:

I'm in love!!

Now THIS is the end result I'd been hoping for!

Looks better staged in the dining room, but it's totally Joe's drink table!

In person, this table looks really expensive now. I bet if I bought this table in a store, it would cost me at least $50.

The beautiful flowers Joe got me for my birthday!

It's this table that really makes me want to keep searching out tables. I actually had a few more special ideas in mind to do to the little green table that I decided to wait on since it came out so poorly. I don't want to wait too long before I'm able to try out some more ideas, you know?!

I can't get over how much I love it!

And that's all there is to this series of tables. I actually have a bureau that needs to get painted and done up in a special way, plus a night stand that needs some attention. Keep an eye out! Now that summer is here, I'm sure I'll be working on them soon!

Finished Project Series: My Thrifted Tables! Table 2...

A little recap:

I bought 3 tables from my favorite thrift store with the intention of spray painting them and displaying them in my house.

Remember these guys?

Last time around, I showed you how I changed the heart tower from plain to glitter-ific! This time around, I'm going to show you what happened to that small little green table.

If you recall, the green table is the table that started me on this journey. When I first saw it, I knew exactly what I'd do to it.

When Joe, the ol' ball and chain, and I bought our bedroom set over 7 years ago, we only bought one night stand. Our old bedroom was tiny. It was hard enough to get the one night stand in there. He hasn't had a night table of any sort for so long that he could probably live without one for the rest of his life without ever having one. But, I love him and I'm happy enough to think of someone besides myself while out shopping!

The green table was the perfect table, but... the color... it had to go.

This is where my story takes a turn for the worst. The top of the table had some divots, so I grabbed my sandpaper and Joe found our electric sander and I got to sanding. I only planned to sand it a little bit. But the green paint started to peel off. I'm sure there's a perfectly logical reason for this. Maybe it was stained and polyurethaned prior to being painted causing the paint not to stick. Maybe they used oil-based paint. I don't know. If you know, you can let me know so I don't make the same mistake in the future.

Anyway, the paint started peeling off. The already non-flat surface was still not very flat, plus now it had peel marks and no amount of me peeling that old green paint made it look any better. I was starting to feel like this table would be a complete loss, but, what the heck. I figured I'd soldier on.

Primer, please help me!

After a couple coats of primer.

I'd hoped the primer would be the answer.

I was highly disappointed.

Again, I moved onto the next step even though this table was looking worse and worse!

Hello, lighter, more on trend green color!

I love how the table looks in this picture. The sun makes it look pretty artsy.

Alas, painting it my preferred green color didn't make the top any nicer. I wish I could get a picture of how crappy the top looks because it looks pretty crappy.

Joe, in trying to cheer me up, told me, "Now you have a good reason to buy a big doily or something to put on top of it! Plus, no one's going to see it in our bedroom."

Joe, truer and more cheerier words were never spoken. I haven't yet, but I'm going to buy the best doily to put on this table and that will be the perfect thing to salvage it!

In the mean time, I put some other random items on it to show how it looks in our bedroom:

We recently decided to redecorate the bedroom. This color will really tie some things together!

I didn't put it next to the bed for the pictures because I want to do a big bedroom reveal later!

OK, that's it for table number dos. I didn't want to leave you guys on a low note, so I saved the best for last! Stay tuned for table number 3, coming soon!

Finished Project Series: My Thrifted Tables! Table 1...

As you all know, my mom and I go on weekly (sometimes bi-weekly) treks to our favorite thrift store. This store has the absolute best prices of any thrift store in the area. We've really lucked out on clothes, shoes, books, housewares, toys, pretty much anything you can think of. The only thing we haven't really taken advantage of is their awesome furniture pricing.

This is not due to a crappy selection. It's due to the fact that the place is "cash and carry," which means, "you buy it now and take it home with you now!" And let me tell you, I don't have a big car. I have even less room in my not-so-roomy car after I've added myself, my mom, and my two kids with their car seats. As much as I'd love to leave there with desks, bureaus, armchairs, and rocking chairs, there's just no way to make that happen.

So, we rarely venture into the furniture section. That is, until one day a few weeks back, when a small green table caught my eye. I scooped it up and finagled it into my cart. I was just about ready to tell my mom what a great find I made when I saw a wooden, three-tiered, heart-shaped, tower-y thing. I grabbed that and with no room left in my cart, I went over to my mom and put it in hers. I also noticed another tall end table type table and put that with my stuff, too.

The picture I took to send my husband since he was at work when I bought them.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "You must've spent a small fortune on these tables!" Believe me, you'd be right if we were at any other thrift store. Tables like the ones I grabbed usually go for $5-$10 at other thrift stores. This particular day I got them for $1.10 for all three (Two were $0.50 and the heart-shaped tower was $0.10!!).

I could not wait to do some magic to them to make them my own!

A couple days later, I went to Wal-Mart and grabbed some spray paint for less than $4 per can. A few days after that, I took all my stuff out of the garage and got to work.

I was super duper excited to refinish these items!

Now, as much as I know you guys want to see all the tables from start to finish in one post, that's not going to happen. I am going to split them up into their own posts. I feel like it'll be easier that way.

First up: The heart-shaped tower-y thing.

When I first saw it, I was more impressed with the price than with the tower itself. I wasn't sure exactly what I would do with it. I thought it might be cute in Quinn's room, but I also wondered if maybe I'd sell it at a yard sale since the cost to refinish it would be so little. Just in case I changed my mind on it, I wanted to make it kind of neutral.

This might not be as neutral as I thought. Haha

I have never worked with spray paint before, so I admit, I have no idea what I'm doing. I picked out a silver metallic spray paint. Do you know what makes it look metallic? GLITTER!!! AAHHH!!!! Lol. After a couple coats of spray paint, this thing glinted in the sun.

I thought I was at a rave or 70's disco party! But, I loved it! And the more I look at it, the more I love it!

I told you it was glittery! Look at the shine!

I didn't think Quinn was going to care if I put it in her room or not, but I must've told her during the painting process it was going to end up in her room, because she started bugging me for it (I left it in the garage for a couple days to ensure it was dry enough to take inside).

She begged me for those tissues from the Dollar Store.

Joe was also impressed with how this turned out. Especially the fact that it only took about 5 minutes to spray paint the entire thing! He's never seen a quicker painting process. I'm also addicted to spray painting stuff now. Expect to see a lot more random items get spray paint makeovers!

So, that's it for this "table." Stay tuned for the other two!

Mother's Day Pictures!

I like to think of myself as a better-than-average photographer. I like to think that the photos I take are awesome, in focus, and no one's missing half their face. I love that I have all these great pictures to remember everyone by, but it's kind of a bummer when it comes to pictures of me.

Joe, my husband, is a decent enough photographer. He knows not to put his thumb in front of the lens. He knows when to zoom and when not to zoom. And as time goes on, he's really starting to get a "photographer's eye." I have faith that, at some point, he won't need much direction on how to take "every day" shots.

But for Mother's Day, I really wanted some nice shots of just me and the kids. I didn't want to pay a photographer to take pictures, so I relied on Joe. First, I got on Pinterest to look for poses that I wanted to emulate. Not because I needed ideas, but because I needed to show Joe exactly what I wanted. I picked out a few places around our yard that I thought would make nice back drops. I slaved over my hair and makeup for an hour. I picked out some semi-matching outfits for me and the kids. I handed Joe the camera. I crossed my fingers that this would turn out the way I wanted! Here is what we ended up with:

First off, Mitchell loves playing outside. We have this fabulously large back yard (2 and 1/2 acres, mostly flat land). So, he didn't want to stay in one spot for pictures. In the mean time, I had Joe take a couple of just me and Quinn.

I wondered if maybe I walked the kids around the yard, would Mitchell be inclined to join us? It worked a little.

 

By this point, we decided to go into the front yard, by one of our trees that was in full bloom. We took a couple of decent pictures there.

 

I've got to figure out a way to get both kids to look at the camera and smile at the same time, while I try not to move in any way so I don't make a silly face!

Although, sometimes you get a nice picture when everyone is looking in all directions. But other times...

.. you get this.. And I get a double chin. This one won't be getting framed or displayed anywhere any time soon, but I just can't stop myself from deleting it. We all look ridiculous, but I still kind of like it.

 

 

 

I am not even sad about not getting the perfect picture. I love all the throw-aways. We had a great time that morning.

This one is kind of close to the perfect shot. Now if I only owned Photoshop, I could Photoshop that pole out of the picture!

**Update!!**

One of my buddies saw my post and felt my pain, so he photoshopped the pole out of the shot for me! Woo hoo! Way better, don't you think?

And then this so-called "friend" dumped on my cowgirl boots! I thought I looked fashionable. I figured if anything, he'd dump on the fact that the grass is 3 ft tall and full of weeds! (It's more managed now, don't worry!)

Maybe if I had Photoshop I could just paste a stock picture of each kid looking at the camera with their toothiest grin on their bodies in each shot and call it a day! Haha

A little bonus info about this day: Joe was also in a matching outfit (khaki shorts with a blue/white polo). I have no idea why he chose to match us. Maybe he didn't want to be left out! Anyway, we all went out afterward to shop. We got a more than our usual stares from strangers. I wonder if people thought we were dorks! Lol. I'd like to think they were impressed by our matching abilities. I also bought a new cell phone that morning since I'd had the same cell phone for a little more than 2 years (do people keep their phones that long anymore?). I splurged and got one with one of those front cameras (not to sound like an old person, I sold cell phones for 5 years, but this was before the hugeness that is the iPhone).  Here are a few pictures from my phone:

Maybe the "sunshine rays in your face" picture is not a "thing" anymore, but I never had one, so I had to do one.

Then I let Quinn play in the dirt in her pretty dress. Oh well. That dress only cost me $0.25 while thrifting!

I tried to get Mitchell involved in a double selfie, but he was more interested in blowing me off.

We did this right before Mother's Day because we planned a huge BBQ for our family members. We had a great Mother's Day weekend! Here's to a nice start to our summer!!