Once there was this Funny Boy and this Artsy Girl: Craftiness

Showing posts with label Craftiness. Show all posts

Beautiful Illustrations on a Wall

Several months ago I mentioned that I had gone to a garage sale and bought a ton of children's books for 25 cents a piece, such a happy day!

I got them with the intention of putting some of them up on Ella's wall because I think children's books have some of the very best art and I want my children to be surrounded by that art.

Plus, you can't buy prints for as cheap as 25 cents a piece so this idea seemed very economical as well.

I finally got around to finishing that project and here is the end result!

The frames I got at a thrift store for about $2/piece and I simply spray painted them white.

And a few lovely finds on the internet lately:

Here is an amazing article that made me cry and that I never want to forget.

This is a really fantastic shirt of the U.S. that made me laugh.

Alaska is maybe my favorite.

You MUST follow this lady on Instagram.

I've mentioned her blog before, which I love, but she doesn't have a lot of time to post on it but she does post several instagram photos everyday and I cannot get enough of them!

I am seriously in love with her family even though I've never met them.

She is so completely honest about how life is.

Her daughter is insanely hilarious and adorable and the way she captures her brand new baby boy is perfection.

Her captions are so funny and the people that comment on her photos say the most amusing things, seriously, you have to follow her, she and her family are just so real and so fabulous.

Love this post and this post by Merrick on how to just add a few simple things to an outfit to make it look more put-together and how to use your summer wardrobe for fall.

Made this chocolate chip pumpkin bread recipe and it may be the best pumpkin bread I've ever had.

So you should definitely try it.

Another article I read and loved and want to be sure to apply to my family.

This is a lovely dance based on the tragedies caused by tornadoes and hurricanes and this is a cool one too about two brothers and I like this one based on The Giving Tree.

Peez.

First of all: I updated the "The Story" page at the top, so you can click on it if you feel so inclined.
Soon I'll get that Faves page updated.

I've been working like crazy to get projects done around our little apartment before a certain little boy arrives.

I'm so in love with painting furniture right now because it's an easy way to make a cheap find from craigslist look unique and cute and brighten up the whole room.

That bookshelf in the picture above was $10 on craigslist.

It was just a boring wood color and I painted it blue and then bought some black and white fabric baskets from Amazon to use as drawers to put Baby Boy's clothes in.

I love it next to the school bus yellow changing table.
And now can we just take a moment to talk about how awesome Amazon is?
It is seriously the greatest.
They carry EVERYTHING (including food, did you know you can order groceries from Amazon?) and you can look at reviews to figure out which brand you want the most and it has the cheapest prices and free shipping over $25, does it get much better than that?
I don't think so.

Above the shelves is this angler fish painting.
A bonus to being an art major is that you end up graduating with a ton of class assignments to put up on you kid's walls.
Is an angler fish too intense for a baby's room?

The other project is the little table above that we bought from Ikea when we were first married.

It used to be black but now it's teal and adds so much color to Lala's room.

She asks me all the time to help her sit at her desk so that she can read books, especially Brown Bear Brown Bear.

The red folding chair came from a children's consignment store for $7 and that dresser to the left I got from a thrift store for $40, I absolutely love it!

(Thanks to my brother-in-law I figured out why my pictures are blue, but I took these pictures before he told me how to fix them, so you get another dose of frosty blue photos).

Oh wigwam curtains, I just love you so much.

The word that Ella says most in a day is "Peez" (please).

She is constantly, and I mean constantly, saying "peez. peez. peez. peez."

And then I have to look around at what she is pointing at or looking at and see if it's something she can have or do.

Peez a bagel.

Peez play outside in 110 degree weather.

Peez play with toys.

Peez a drink.

Peez remove this wrapper that somehow got stuck to my foot.

Peez get the drink I threw in the farthest possible corner of the car while you are simultaneously driving 55mph on a windy road.

Peez put this diaper on Gerard.

Peez let me play with those pop-it fireworks I somehow found in your closet.

Peez let me eat whatever is in the trashcan because it just looks so much yummier coming from there.

Peez put me on that chair.

Peez take me down.

Peez put me back up.

Peez down.

Peez get me something, I don't know what but just keep giving me things until you finally give me something I like.

And sometimes I think, if she says "peez" one more time I will go insane.

And then it hits me, "Hey, I have a 1 1/2 year-old who not only says "please" but says please rather than throwing a tantrum for what she wants (we still have plenty of tantrums, of course, but they are much fewer than they would be otherwise because she knows that if she says please she is much more likely to get what she wants).

She also is pretty pro at saying "Dee dee" (thank you) when she gets what she was asking for.

So peez is good.

And here is a rather dashing fellow who has been very into bow ties lately.

He's pretty much a pro at tying them and his socks are always worth noticing:

New Blog Design and Some Projects

I have sat here and typed three different first lines to this blog post but I really just don't even know how to start it off so maybe I'll stop trying to be creative and just say what I really want to say: LOOK AT THIS INCREDIBLE NEW BLOG DESIGN!!!!!!

Is it okay if I say that about my own blog, especially since I didn't design it myself?

This beautiful and wonderful and just downright talented friend of mine, Amy, who I have known since clear back in the 5th grade (when we would make pets out of little dried white beans that we would color eyes on and build furniture for) is an amazing designer and she designed this whole look.

I am pretty much in love with it.

I would definitely recommend checking out her blog.

One of my favorite things is her moodboards.

In addition to the new design, a while ago Adam and I decided that we wanted to get a new camera to take pictures of our kiddos, so we started setting money aside and doing research and asking around and finally decided to get a basic "fancy" camera, a Canon Rebel T3.

If that doesn't mean anything to you, that's okay, it didn't mean anything to me until recently.

Anyway, after much waiting and price checking we found an awesome deal for the camera we wanted and we took the plunge and bought it!

And now we have to figure out how to use it.

We don't have a clue.

I've been watching videos on YouTube on how to use this gorgeous new picture-taking device and I have to pause the video to go look up words like, "aperture" and "ISO" and "shutter speed" because apparently those words are so basic they don't explain them in the video.

They just assume you know because after all you own a "fancy" camera, surely you wouldn't have bought it if you didn't know at least the basics of photography, right?

But I am determined to learn and eventually we will have gorgeous pictures of our children to show for it and so far it's been really fun trying to figure it all out.

As I tried to get a basic idea of how to use the camera I went around my little apartment and took pictures of things I love in it, I'm sure one day I will look back and laugh at how horrible some of these pictures are (I'm already flinching at how the lighting looks in some of these) but hey, that's okay!

So I have pictures of a lot of my latest projects that I've done around the house that I've posted on Instagram but am just now getting around to posting on here.

You guys, I am obsessed with home decorating blogs and projects these days.

Project #1:

This changing table for Baby Boy.

I hadn't been planning on getting a changing table, I never had one for Ella, I just used a changing pad on the floor and that worked perfectly but I saw this one at a garage sale for $10 so I decided to grab it.

It looked and smelled pretty awful.

But after lots of cleaning and scrubbing and Lysol and then some yellow paint it looks (and smells) a million times better.

I made this retro flannel cover for the changing pad.

And as a bonus I can use it as a visual to one day explain to my children what a cassette tape is.

(Ella calls that monkey "Elmo")

Project #2:

I saw this on Pinterest and fell so in love with it I had to make one.

It was a surprisingly fast project, just one Sunday afternoon and I made it completely out of scraps of fabric I already had.

There are several projects going on in here:

That is our table and chairs that we got from Craigslist for $50.

We painted the table white and the chairs green. teal, and blue.

We are in the process of collecting mismatched shaped chairs (that you can see against the left wall) that we'll also paint (yellow, grey, and coral) to add to the table.

That adorable garland was made out of paint swatches (this lovely friend taught me how to make it)/

And that chandelier makes me want to dance for joy every time I turn it on.

(Oh dear, looks like I need to straighten that candle)

That chandelier was my very first spray painting project.

I found it at a garage sale for $10 and it was just a brassy color before.

This is my go-to place for furniture refinishing and spray painting advice.

I asked Adam to hang it up for me, and even though he had never wired a light fixture before he said "yes, my love" and now it looks so beautiful!

And then these are just beautiful things that I love in my dining room:

And some more beautiful things:

Yeah, I found those Tillamook beauties for $2.50/each at Albertson's this week.

That new white chocolate raspberry flavor is pretty lovely.

These jars line the top of my kitchen cupboards and I just really love them.

Please take note of how effectively I used my camera to focus on that one jar in the middle but left the rest blurry, I'm feeling pretty impressed with my learning curve right now.

Now onto Miss Lala's room:

One day there will be something hung right about the bunting, like a picture or Ella's name or something else but right now it's just blank.

Tissue paper pom poms are so easy and add so much to a room.

Bunting isn't as quick to make as I wish it would be but it sure is cute.

That's a crib that I found on Craigslist (mattress included) for $50!

I bought a can of stain to cover up some chips and scratches.

I keep mentioning the prices of things because I love hearing where people got deals on things and how much it was because it motivates me to look in those places for deals.

Thrift shopping is definitely a game of patience and I think it helps to hear that other people are having success to give you the motivation to be patient and wait for the deal you really want.

Mmmk, now lets just zoom in on those curtains that I love:

I found this fabric on Hawthorne Threads, it's covered in teepees and wigwams and I just like it a lot.

Another beautiful thing in my little apartment that I love:

Triangle potato stamp pants

I've kind of been wanting a pair of leggings for Little Girl that have a pattern on them so I grabbed a pair of leggings that she rarely wears, carved a triangle into a potato and stamped her little leggings with fabric paint, kind of with a Bobo Choses pattern in mind (but a whole lot cheaper than an actual pair of Bobo Choses pants).

I decided to just stamp the front and leave the back blank.

Also, Little Girl got another mullet trim recently, into a little A-line haircut that I'm kind of in love with.

So when you pair the pants with the A-line, it looks like this:

And then she wore those pants and that A-line haircut to the animal shelter in town so that we could see the dogs.

She loved those dogs to death!

We took her into the cat room and she took one glance at the cats and turned right around to play with the cat toys and the cat food instead of those cats.

She had no interest in them whatsoever.

Adam, who believes that when you see a cat in the road you should speed up to run it over (he would never do that, at least I hope not, but he says that he would do that because he really dislikes cats) was happy as can be to see that his daughter had an obvious preference for the dogs over the cats.

The first thing Ella said to me when I got her out of bed the other morning was 'baddabah" (basketball).

Ella went to Adam's basketball game the night before and I guess it made quite an impact because she was thinking about it all night.

She sat on my lap, absolutely enthralled with the game.

This girl does not sit still for anything, except for basketball, apparently.

I said the word "scream" the other day and she immediately said, "No no no."

I had to laugh.

She knows what the word "scream" means!

And she toddles around with a bag of crackers in her hands and just eats them one after one as she walks around.

She also has secret cupboards that she likes to hide crackers in.

This morning, Adam found a bottle of maple syrup in a random bathroom cupboard, which Ella must have stashed there.

We have been singing "ABC" lately and now Ella goes around the house saying "Ahh Bee. Ahh Bee." (A. B.)

And then she says a whole bunch of other letters that don't sound anything like real letters in the alphabet but she sure is trying!

And her little high pitched, soft singing voice is the sweetest!

Kiddo Footprints

My sister-in-law, Lindsay, found this idea for using footprints in such a cute way.

We made these for my mother-in-law for Christmas.

Those are the footprints of the four grandchildren in the family.

We bought canvases and acrylic paint and painted all the kids' feet and thumbs to make the prints.

Some of the grandkids thought it was fun and others were less than thrilled but it all turned out so cute!

12 Days of Christmas for that Cute-Faced Boy

In October I saw a pin about doing the 12 days of Christmas for your spouse.

I really liked the idea of giving him a new little surprise each day and having him anticipate the next gift.

Some of the gifts were handmade and others were small things I bought that I knew he would like.

I liked that I could make it as cheap or as expensive as I wanted.

So 12 days before Christmas I gave Adam a bag of jelly bellies in 12 different colors (I sneakily tucked them in his lunch box that morning).

On Day 11 I gave him 2 tickets to a musical and $9 (which equals 11 items total) to go on a date.

And it just continued that way, each day.

It was fun to try and think of things that came in pairs or sets (like 5 pairs of socks equalled 10 total socks for day 10).

On day 7 I got really creative by giving him 7 (x5) date ideas in a date night jar (so really it was 35 date sticks but I could make it work for day 7 by saying it was 7 items x5.

I got the idea for the date night jar here and I'm really excited to start using it because there are both simple cheap dates and dates that take extra planning.

(Extra date ideas here and here).

And on day six I got him a set of dominoes with the instructions to 5 different domino games plus a puzzle to equal 6 games, so you can totally take liberties to make it fit the day you are trying to make the gift work for.

Ideas for good little gifts for men are here and here.

'Tis the Season for Snowflake Leg Warmers

'Tis the season for running around town (with your belly-button showing) and getting lots of shopping done

With only one shoe on (why does she always end up with only one shoe on? People are going to start thinking that we don't even have the matching shoe, we just put the one on to pretend she has a pair of shoes)

And running lots of errands means constantly slipping Ella all sorts of snacks to keep her happy at store after store.

And it's the season for running to the post office multiple times a week

And the season for leg warmers.

I have never really understood the point of leg warmers, if your child's legs are cold why not put on a pair of pants?

But now that I have a baby who rarely gets to wear pants because she ruins them with all her crawling I've realized that leg warmers are the best thing ever because you can quickly pull them on when you're running outside or doing errands but as soon as you're at home and she needs to crawl you can just pull them right off with zero hassle.

I made those leg warmers out of a pair of socks from Target that I owned but never wore and now they are used all the time.

Tutorial here.

This hot air balloon cardigan that my mom made me wear

Hey Guys!

It's been a while since I've blogged.

I've been busy trying to secretly confiscate my mom's phone, camera, and laptop and I've also been trying to redecorate this place by hiding all my toys in secret places, flinging my food on the walls and throwing plastic bags all over the place, so as you can see I've had very little spare time.

It's really a wonder that I even had time to stop and pose for these pictures, but I try to do little favors for my momma since she tries so hard to make my oatmeal just right every morning.

The reason my momma is taking these pictures is because she just decorated this cardigan for me.

Do you like it?

Me too!

She just sewed this hot air balloon on it and some green buttons and a collar.

And she put these shoes on me that she really likes, but she pretty much just puts them on my feet for pictures because it's not like I can walk yet.

Yeah, yeah.

I know.

I'm one year old now and I can't walk.

It's embarrassing.

All my friends my age can walk.

And my mom says, "I can't put any pants on you because you'll just ruin them with how much you crawl around so you better start walking before it gets too cold so that you can wear pants."