Skirt Evolution

I’ve gotten out of the habit of making/buying Easter outfits for the kids each year. It’s probably because I make them (and me) and out fit in May for my Mother’s Day photo shoot.

But this year I thought MT might light something new and fun to wear on Easter. And I have had this skirt idea in the works for some time. So I whipped it up a few days before Easter.

It may look a little familiar. It used to be a dress.

Interesting that when asked to twirl she goes the same direction every time.

Which used to be a skirt.

The big question I have now is what in the world am I going to turn it into when she grows out of it this time?

Up To

It seems I thrive when there is lots to. I seem to find more things to add to my list of things to do. And, miraculously, I’m able to get most of it done. What doesn’t get done I let fall away and move on.

So amidst the cooking, the picture taking, and various other projects, I have been beautifying my home. It’s so fulfilling to see projects and rooms come together.

Here’s a peek, or two or four, of what I’ve been up to.

Found and hung these fabulous curtains.

Finished painting, well almost, the stairs.

Made this fun chalkboard using a garage sale frame and this stuff. Marvelous.

Created this table runner using burlap I’ve had in my stash for ages and a stencil I made myself.

While I was doing all that painting I decided to go ahead and paint some pinecones.

This might possibly be the favorite thing. I found this dresser at a garage sale probably close to a year ago. It was so sad looking, and dirty. I finally sanded and painted, and vacuumed, it up. The result. Amazing. Don’t you think?

It feels good to make stuff.

Happy Thanksgiving Eve to you!

I’m So Excited

You know the song.

And now it’s stuck in your head, right?

You’re welcome.

The reason for my excitement is this.

I finally got the picture printed (thanks Mom!) and hung. I’m over the moon excited on how it turned out.

I glued it onto the foam board with spray adhesive. Then I ran out and tried another kind of glue which totally ruined it.

But my mother is a genius and made me multiple copies. So the I told the kids I was having a glue emergency and we made a quick trip to the store. Then I flipped the board over and tried again.

And it worked!

And I love it.

I just can’t hide it!

Input

This post is rather selfish in nature.

I need some help!

The other day I took some pictures of the girls. I’ve been wanting to for weeks but haven’t ever been able to find the right time when everyone was in a semi-cooperative mode. Saturday, though, in the middle of an overcast stormy day the clouds parted, literally, and we were given a few moments of perfect light. I couldn’t pass it up.

I’m planning on having one blown up to hang on their wall.

Just one! There in lies the problem.

I’m having a hard time narrowing it down.

So I turn to you, dear readers.

What’s your favorite?

#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

#7

Thanks ever so!

HP: Projection

For the last installment of this fun little week, for my fun little room, I’m showing off a few things I’ve made for the room. And show you my list of what’s left.

As part of the “kids spot” I wanted a little bench for them to sit/stand on. I took, again from the playroom, a small cube shelf. It was dark red but I wanted it lighter. I went with teal. Spray paint is my friend.

And hot glue. I found the baskets at Target and they fit perfectly. I don’t have a lot of traditional patterns and so they fit in one of them perfectly. I put books and magazines in the other.

I took lots of tin cans and covered them with fabric. They look so much cuter. I knew I wanted a few flowers in the room to make things a little cheery-er. The Boy helped me pick them out and he was so pleased with his choices. So was I.

Organization, obviously, was a big project. I wanted things to be simple. To be able to see what I have. And I wanted it to be kind of fun. I sorted through all my buttons, safety pins, elastic and lots of other supplies and put them all into mason jars, which I had on hand. They are so accessible and I find myself using my supplies so much more. Things are no longer out of sight and out of mind. Which is exactly what I wanted.

As for what’s left there are two major things and a few not quite as major.

• A garbage can
• Some form of noise, preferably music (it gets a little quiet)
• A mirror (probably for the door)
• Make a cushion for the bench
• Get a light for the desk

Sometimes I can’t believe it’s done. I’ve been sewing up a small storm this week and having a clean pretty room makes it so much more enjoyable. Everything is so easy to find and that makes projects go so much smoother.  I just can’t say enough good things about it. I’m so glad that I did this. While I try hard to do things for others, it’s nice to do something for myself for a change.

And to think the ribbon almost stumped me.

HP: If Walls Could Talk

The walls of my room took some thinking outside the box. It took me  a while.

I knew I didn’t want to paint.

1 Because there is zero ventilation in the room

2 Because I’m lazy

On my one wooden wall I also knew I wanted a shelf. That was the easy part. The other two walls I was working with were white uneven cement. Tricky. I thought about painting a stripe with magnetic paint on one of the walls but, well, see above. So I stewed over that wall for a while and started working on the adjacent wall. That wall came together  much easier.

I had some cork board squares sitting around that I covered with fabric using hot glue. I stuck them up on the wall with some permanent sticky stuff.  Pretty sure they aren’t ever coming down. They add color and they’re functional. The square on the top right was my inspiration fabric for the room. I came across it while I was sorting fabric and a light went off in my head.

I also knew I wanted to have some printables with fun things to say on my walls. I found a bunch on different blogs I frequent. My sister made some and then I made a few more to fill up some holes. They’re uplifting, colorful, fun to look at and good reminders.

Which brings us back to that other wall I didn’t know what to do with. I finally decided I wanted to put metal sheets up that I could stick magnets on. Then I priced them and I walked back to square one. Then I decided to put up cookie sheets which led me to find the idea to put up oil drip pans. I searched around a bit. Even went into an Auto Zone to “test” my magnets on them. I felt like a total idiot but it was all in the name of my happy place. I finally found some that were large and not too expensive at Wal Mart. Still felt like an idiot with not one but two oil drip pans that I had no intention of using for their intended purpose.

I survived, though. I used the same permanent sticky stuff to put them up. They’re totally crooked but I don’t care. There are lots of seams in the cement and the surface is uneven so I had to take what I could get. They serve their purpose and that’s what matters.

The reason I wanted two was to have one for the kids to play with. Because they tend to follow me wherever I go (it’s hard being so popular sometimes) I wanted to have a spot for them in my space that they would enjoy. I found these letter and number magnets for free at a clothing and toy exchange done at the church. Miss Thing stands at the board and spells out anything she can think of and gets a huge kick out of it. And I love having her in there keeping me company. Sometimes.

Do you need something for the walls of your happy place?

Leave a comment with your email and because my mom taught me to share I’ll send one. Or both, if you like.

Peace out!

HP: Oh My Fabric

Turns out I have a ton of fabric. And ribbon.

Which means that finding some way for it to be organized was essential. Previously I had put most of my fabric in clear plastic drawers. It was color coordinated but I couldn’t really see what kind of fabric I had. It also was a huge mess when I went looking for something. It also was a pain to get everything back in its drawer. In one word it was a disaster.

First I took everything out of the drawers. Then took two toy cabinets the kids weren’t using from the playroom and stacked them on top of each other. The top one was missing a door so I took the other one off for open shelving. I do love open shelving.

I had seen things like this and wanted to do something similar. There is a place you can buy the mini bolts or another blog I found had bought a foam board and cut it up. I really wanted to use things I had around the house.

Since we moved in to our house a year ago we haven’t completely rid the place of cardboard boxes. So I took a few and started cutting them up. Then I wrapped the larger pieces around them. All the sorting and folding was a huge project. When it was finally done I was so pleased.

And so exhausted!

Next was the smaller pieces. I have this problem of finding things online but not really paying attention about things like dimensions and then getting them and they’re so off of what I had envisioned. Knowing this about myself I was vigilant in measuring my shelves and searching high and low for small bins that would fit into the space. I finally found some small bins from Bed Bath and Beyond that I thought would work. I ordered more than I needed a bunch and was so happy when they came and fit perfectly.

I loved being able to have a small window with a hint of what’s inside.

It was lots and lots of folding and sorting. But, again, when it was done, I was so happy.

While I did try (Amy!) to purge some of the fabric I had stashed there were still some scraps I wasn’t quite ready to be part with. I used quart sized mason jars, that I had on hand, to fill up with all the small scraps.

And while I wish I could say this is all my fabric. I can’t. Because it’s not. I have larger pieces grouped together in my storage area under the stairs. Things like my felt and tulle and the like. Even so I’m happy with what I have been able to do.

My ribbon collection was equally daunting. I inherited a large amount of ribbon from my grandmother. She had them sorted into zip lock bags according to color in a plastic bin. I’ve been going along with this but again also wanted to see what I had. I had seen this and really wanted to do it, since I had the special hanger, but couldn’t make the spools fit in a functioning way.

image source

So it was back to the drawing board. And there I sat for a long time. I started working on the pieces of ribbon I had not on spools. Which was, shockingly, a lot. I adapted another idea I had seen somewhere and got large popsicle sticks and wrapped them up with ribbon. It worked perfectly.

In my cleaning and sorting I found a long dowel that would fit between the two brackets (that were taken down in another room) I used to hang up my shelf (which I got from Home Depot). The idea finally came to me to put the ribbon on it.

The trick came in deciding which ribbon to put up. Since this isn’t even close to all of it. I did have a little person helping me. Although I did have to edit some of her choices. If I didn’t there would be whole lot more of the pink variety.

For the rest I used two more of the bins I used for the fabric. I put them on top of the fabric cabinet and while they aren’t as insight as the others it’s still very accessible.

It seemed like once I got over these two huge hurdles the rest was a little easier to work through.

Now I need to find stuff to do with all these things!

HP: Thrift Store Finds

When I started this project I also started lots of list. I had lists of things I wanted to make. Lists of things that needed reorganizing. Lists of things I wanted for the room. Lists of things to buy. I think I might have made a list or two just for my lists. At least it felt that way.

On top of the list was a table. I had to have a table that was big people height (as opposed to the little person table that was there before) and also big enough that I could spread out. I also didn’t want to spend the arms and legs of my offspring to get it.

Enter the $5 table.

Five dollars! You read that right. I pulled up to one of my favorite thrift stores to see this sitting outside. At that time there was a “sold” sign on it. As I shopped around they had taken the sign off. I was elated. The snag was that it had to be gone at the time of purchase. My mil and I quickly ran home to get her much larger vehicle (as opposed to my puny one) and got back in time to buy the table and get it in there (it fit beautifully by the way) before anyone else tried to buy it. I was giddy for weeks after this find. It has probably seen better days. The surface is pretty roughed up. For what I wanted it for, though, I couldn’t have find anything more perfect.

I also collected these plates and candlesticks at random times. Their height is what I love. Having odds and ends off the surface of the table makes me feel like I have more room.

This dude was 25 cents and I couldn’t resist.

This white board was a whopping $2. I love that its magnetic. I also love how cool my kids are whipping off all that I had written on it. The little dears.

This technically wasn’t a thrift store find. It is vintage and it was free. So I thought it fit in the thrifty category, though. For the past couple of months my mother-in-law has been cleaning/reorganizing/rearranging/purging her basement. She had two of these Coca Cola crates in the rooms downstairs and offered them to me. I saw this idea on Pinterest to put acrylic paints in them.  I love love how it turned out. I can see what colors I have and they’re easily accessible. And, you know, it was free.

I found lots of jars and bowls and containers at different time. I’ve come to learn in my thrift storing that going often and looking at all the shelves you can find some really fun things. And all together they turn into one amazing space.

Finally I needed a new chair. Many of the things I was looking for in a table applied to my chair. This one totally fit the bill. I found it for $5 (must be a magic number). Someday I may try to take it apart and cover it with some fun fabric. Let’s just say it’s on a list.

It’s amazing the things I can find at thrift stores, I think. I’ve found lots of different crafting supplies, fabric remnants, wreath forms, picture frames and probably lots more. It’s fun and usually pretty cheap and there is always different things to look at.

Feel free to ask questions! I’ll do my best to answer them in my week long “happy place” party.

Toodles!