Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Easy Valentine's Projects

Here in NC we are experiencing something we don't get to experience very often - snow.  And I love it!  So while we are hunkered down, enjoying our milk and bread that we frantically ran to the store yesterday to acquire - maybe a little crafting is a good option.  Monday I shared a glimpse of some of the Valentine crafts I had been working on, today I have a bunch more.


First up, a sweet and easy fabric hoop wreath.  Hoop wreaths are my new favorite thing.  For this one I used some leftover burlap, both felt and paper to make the little bunting and some little letter embellishments.  Of course, hot glue was my friend here.  No sewing required.

If you don't have a pattern punch, I highly recommend one.  This little garland was quick and simple.
After punching out a ton of flowers from some craft paper I simply glued two together along a strand of yarn.  These little garlands are now adorning our living room shelves.  My little deer also got in the spirit and is sporting a little felt rose boutonnière.  

These pinwheels are so sweet and simple.  I loved making them and you can whip a bunch out in a very short time.  Make sure you check out this tutorial - its awesome.


Another easy and simple, no sew option for a banner is knotting strips of fabric or ribbon on a strand of yarn.  I love the simplicity of these things.

We are getting pretty vintage up in here for Valentine's day.  To pull everything together I just walked around my house and stole things here and there that I liked and thought would flow together.  Such an easy way to change up a space and plus its free.


Slowing down for a moment and making something with your own two hands is such a mind clearing activity.  The theme of Valentine's day is love and I couldn't help but think clearly about the theme of our God - which is always and forever will be = Love.  His love is the only love and what all other loves spills out from.  We love because He first loved us.  What a beautiful thing to take some time to reflect on.

But God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8

Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. 1 John 3:18

For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39

Ok, I'm off to sled down some snowy hills, make a snowman, eat some snow cream and probably check out all of my favorite blogs.  

Thanks for stopping by!



Monday, January 27, 2014

Updating our Kitchen Chalkboard, plus a Valentine's Craft

I just like to paint things.  Nothing is safe in our house.  When I updated our little desk to navy it was pretty obvious I needed to update the kitchen chalkboard that hangs out with it as well.


Way back when, I found a nice sized piece of framed wood in our shed.  I'm really not sure what it was originally intended for but it looked like the perfect thing to turn into a chalkboard for our kitchen - so I did.  We have loved it but once again it was time for a change with some paint.  When our little desk received its navy paint update, the teal frame on our chalkboard was just not working with mint green walls and a navy desk.


I really considered white for the frame but I wasn't sold.  I checked our stash of paints and found a little paint sample I picked up a while back.


I'm pretty sure it was a pre-made sample that was on sale for $.50.  It was one of those, you never know purchases.  I can't help but always peruse the oops paint section at the hardware stores.  Sometimes there are decent colors to be had and at crazy cheap prices.  Matter of fact, our mudroom floor paint was found in the oops section. I scored a whole gallon of gray paint for $5.00 and then the nice lady tinted it darker for me.  So moral of the story, it never hurts to check out the paint when out and about.


A little tape around the edge and a couple of coats of paint and I was done.  Free, simple and quick.  I used a little foam roller and a small brush for the cracks.


As you can tell this chalkboard gets a lot of use.


I love the new update and I am loving the calmer feeling that we have going on in this little area of the house now.

Over the weekend Justin was out of town taking our students on their Winter Retreat so I took the time to be crafty and have a dance party.  I'm not normally one to decorate for Valentine's day but I got into the mood and couldn't stop.  I have some more to share tomorrow, but for now here is a little scrappy banner I whipped up - anyone can do this.


If you can cut with scissors and tie a knot, you are a crafter - fist bump.  I used old t-shirts, an old lace tablecloth and some ribbon...all from my scrap fabric stash.  Just cut a bunch of strips - they can be jagged and uneven it doesn't matter at all, t-shirt material is especially forgiving.  Then find some yarn, string or ribbon and tie all of your little strips along it.  


That's it, you have a sweet little scrappy, vintage looking banner to hang up anywhere your heart desires.




You can make these for any occasion and I have and will.  Tomorrow I have a bunch more Valentine's crafts to share with you, they are all easy too!  

Thanks for visiting, I'm off to celebrate my 33rd year today!


Thursday, January 23, 2014

Silas is 3!...3 months ago

I'm behind! But I'm ok with that.  We had so much fun celebrating Silas' 3rd birthday back in October and I had so much fun putting his race car party together so I wanted to share it on the blog.  I'm still getting used to him being 3!  What is this?  When I asked him what he wanted to do for his party this year, he said dinosaurs.  Well, we just had a 2 year old dino party last year so I asked him to give me another option.  Race Car's was it.  What else does this boy really like besides dinosaurs and race cars - maybe the red sox?  Maybe that should be his party theme next year!  I'm getting ahead of myself.


You really don't have to go crazy to have a really sweet and fun party for your kid.  I feel like we, as moms can get caught up in the hoopla of it sometimes.  But for me, I just really enjoy putting together some handmade elements for his party and then finding a few fun things to make it special.    So here on this table above, I found some cute race car lollipops, borrowed some orange traffic cones and found a clearance striped bed sheet at Target to use for the tablecloth.  Sometimes you just have to think outside the box a little bit.  


I love a good banner and this one was super, super easy to make.  I found the patterned paper at Target on sale, I think it was $1.50 for the pack and I also found a pack of pre-made letters and numbers on clearance at Target as well.  So I didn't even have to cut out anything!  It was just a matter of assembling and gluing.  Some ribbon from the dollar store and a few hole punches later and I had a sweet banner for his party.  And, it cost me less than $5.

A few other little things I grabbed for the party were these fun glasses from Target.  I love these!  I also like to buy supplies online since you have more options and usually can find some good deals.  I found a huge pack of these race flags, the cute mini snack cups and of course some fun striped straws, I can't have a party without those.


Another little handmade element for the party were these little race car tags.  I used them in several different ways and once again they were so simple to make.  I used the patterned paper I had leftover from the banner to cut out little triangles and found some cute race car stickers to put on them.  The little plastic milk bottles I found last year and was able to reuse them again this year!


I just love putting a party together, its so fun to do something for your kid that you know he will love!  Silas loved all of the race car elements and had fun using his on stash of cars to decorate for the party.  It was fun taking a moment to look back at his sweet party.  Thanks for joining me today!

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Baby Room to Big Boy Room Transition

Something has happened recently, Silas moved up in the world and moved into a real big boy bed.  It's been a pretty good transition so far and he absolutely loves it.  The big switch also brought about a little bit of a room shift.  We ended up deciding to switch over the spare room into more of a playroom for him, giving him some much needed space in his tiny bedroom.  With the new bed and room change I have a ton of new ideas in mind for his room; to take it from baby room to big boy room.  So before we get much further, here is a quick reminder of the old room...


And, now onto the current room state.  His new bed takes up a lot more space, it was actually his g-pa's bed, which was also my bed as a child.  I love that he is now using it too.  Its crazy how different a wall color can look at certain times of the day.



We moved a lot of things out - like his train table and other larger toys.  And, we have this awesome window treatment to shade out the sun - its called a fleece blanket.  It really is all the rage.

So, curtains and blinds are definitely on our list of items needed for his room.  I hope to bring in some fun artwork, hopefully a map and definitely add some sort of dinosaur element to his new space.  He obviously loves animals so that has to play out in his new big boy room.


This dresser needs an update as well and I would love to add some shelving storage above it and solve the crazy looking arrangement we have currently.
Which leads me to the next item of business, toy storage solutions.  We are still trying to work out a toy plan between his room and the playroom but I'm thinking he needs some sort of actual toy storage rather than random bins and boxes.


We are also thinking through a new wall color.  I put some swatches up to let Silas clue me in on what he likes.   Of course in typical boy fashion, he said all of them (which is equivalent to I don't care mom) -which was no help at all.  He did however narrow down our search to these four from a larger selection.  I believe color had nothing to do with it, the names are what spoke to him.  Color names like fossil, koala bear, squirrel, and schoolhouse slate.  He knows how to choose them.  Honestly, schoolhouse slate is a pretty great color so we are leaning that way but I'm still not sold.  Here is a slightly better idea..


He did let me know however that he likes blue, green, orange and yellow.  So if I can work all of those in I think that would be fun.

So for fun and inspiration I thought I would put together a little mood board for what I'm thinking for his new room.  Its really just a rough idea, but kind of the direction I'm headed for.

big boy room


Here are the links for the products shown above:

6. Wall Color - I'm thinking SchoolHouse by Martha Stuart
10. West E lm Rug - I really want this

This will be a slow process I'm sure, but at least the process as begun.  I can't wait to see how his room slowly comes together.

Hope you guys have a great day and are staying warm!!

Monday, January 20, 2014

Desk Redo Times 2

Sometimes you just have to change things up.  I'm like that a lot with our house, especially with bold colors.  I loved this coral paint choice a few years back but now I'm over it and wanted something more subtle.  Plus, I really just wanted to paint something...its kind of a habit of mine, and I'm counting that as a good habit.  Painting a little piece of furniture like this is such a simple and easy (and cheap) way to update spaces in your home.  Its a new year and time for some new paint.  Navy it is.

Do some colors just kind of make you feel anxious or tense?  I'm probably just weird like that.  I really do like coral, orange and pink but there is something also about those colors that make me tense up if I'm around them for too long.  Please tell me if you share the same color aversion as me.  If you know me well you know I like blue of all varieties, its my fav. So when I wanted something more soothing to my soul I had to go with a color that made me calm.  Blue is it for me.


I just felt so much better immediately when it was all painted.  I love it.  I just used a quart of navy paint , a small foam roller and a little brush to do the job.  Probably took about an hour and a half to do two coats total.  I also learned its really hard to capture the true hue of some colors in photos.  This navy is really darker and moodier in person.  But you get the drift.


Random painting tip, while you are waiting between coats use a plastic baggie or plastic wrap to keep your brushes covered and from drying out.  This saves you mucho time and headache.  When we painted our house exterior we did this - everyday for weeks.  We only washed our brushes out in the end after two weeks of painting and wrapping them up at night.  It totally worked like a charm.  Some people may be picky about brush washing, I am not one of those.  I am just picky about paint colors.


I love how the hot pink paper lined drawer looks with the new navy hue.  Probably even better than before.


So to up the game even more for this little desk I changed up the drawer pulls.  I have had these glass pulls forever and I can't even remember where I got them from.  They were being used on Silas' dresser but we have been updating his room as of late and these were no longer in use - so these were perfect for this project.


Oh, and this drawer has stayed nice and organized.  


Now that this little desk has a new look its time for a chalkboard update.  The teal isn't going to cut it anymore.


We have been up to a lot around the house and I can't wait to share more of the projects we have been doing lately.  Hope everyone has a wonderful week!