Playroom Progress

This weekend was the linky party for completed Picture Perfect rooms at Donna’s Funky Junk Interiors, and I’d hoped to have the playroom re-do completed for it. Alas, that did not happen, but she’s going to continue this challenge once a month, so I have a few more weeks to finish all those details that I think will make the room super-sweet!

Mostly what I’ve done so far is clear out the closet, rearrange toys and toy storage, spruce up the crib/daybed/reading area, and get hooks up for dress-up clothes. The small wall area that had magnet paint was covered over in chalkboard paint.

These are the Mary Englebreit posters that inspired the colors used in this room. The one on the left is the alphabet, then at the bottom says “put ‘em all together” and “read”. The one on the left is a favorite of mine, “Books fall open, you fall in”.

This small green shelf is actually a plate rack that Jess got at Goodwill a few years back. She’d painted it black and used it in her first real house of her own. Right now it holds a couple of my favorite Eric Carle books. The toys on the top of the bookshelves are all antiques, but the kids play with them and love them! The horse was apparently Greg’s when he was a little boy – no information on brand or year or anything. The wind-up radio and wind-up clock still play lovely music. No batteries needed!

 

I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of the vinyl skull and crossbones that were on the wall above where we had Bradley’s changing table when this room was his nursery, so when it peeled off the wall fairly nicely, I stuck it on the re-positioned full-length mirror.

 

These sweet little cupcake paper flowers were made by my nieces this past week. They were thrilled to help decorate the wall! Bradley and I will make more this week since I want to sweep them up towards the ceiling. The idea is in the current issue of Family Fun magazine.

The chalkboard, formerly magnet wall. Bradley insists on still putting his magnets here, even though I hung the magnetic whiteboard on the opposite wall. Trim will be added around the chalkboard paint to finish it up.

The dress-up hooks are screwed into a piece from Brad’s (now Silas’s) crib. When we first got the crib, one corner piece had no holed drilled into it for assembly. I called customer service immediately and they shipped a new one, but it took a couple of weeks. We didn’t want to wait, so Greg drilled holes in the original piece and assembled the crib. It works great, so we had the one they shipped, and no use for it.  It works great for hooks for dress-up clothes and hats. The wooden stars are for beads and bags – at least they were last week while my nieces were visiting. So handy to have a place where everything could be accessed easily and put away easily.

For the crib/day bed, I found a body pillow case that was priced at what that amount of fabric would cost me, or less even, so I ordered it online. It’s pretty plain, so embellishment will be added. I did get one pillow cover sewn (the polka dots), and found that flower-shaped pillow in the closet. The girls arranged the animals and dolls before they left, when we picked up the room yesterday. ☺

The quilt has been trimmed of six inches around the outside edge all the around. I will trim it with a bright-colored binding. But what I really like about this is the checkered bedskirt on the bottom.

While I love the quilt, I want a bit more brightness to this little reading area, so I started a small afghan throw to put on it. This may take awhile to be finished, but it’s pretty fun to work on, so I’ll keep plugging away.

Aren’t the colors wonderful? The pattern is called Granny Stripe, the directions from Attic 24. Her projects and home were also inspiration for this room. As much as I love my calm and very neutral house, I do enjoy her very colorful one.

Some of the details left to do: paint the back piece of the crib and install it, paint the bookshelf, arrange the art display area, trim the chalkboard, paint the doors, and put up a few more wall art pieces. I also found the white chain we hung from the ceiling for Jessica’s stuffed animals when this was her bedroom, so I’ll probably have Greg put it up again. I’d love to find a brightly colored rug to use in here, too. It’s currently carpeted, but we plan to change that next summer and lay some kind of laminate. A rug will be needed for sure then.

Okay, all of that can be finished before the last Saturday of February, right? Then I’ll have to decide which room will be next – den? or guest/craft room? or both?

Snow Window

January is traditionally the month when I use some snowflake/snowman decorations in the house. Somehow that seems a bit incongruous this winter, though, since we haven’t had much snow. (Not complaining! The past couple of years have had enough white stuff to last awhile.) Temps have been mild, almost early-Spring-like, so I really didn’t get behind the snow stuff in the house.

Then a couple of weeks ago I came across this photo on a blog:

It inspired me to gather my blue glass canning jars and do something similar in my own kitchen window:

Instead of battery-operated candles and glass beads, I used some Epsom salt in the bottoms, then added some of my collection of crocheted snowflakes inside the jars, and draped a string of white lights behind them:

 

This is so pretty at night, plus I get to enjoy some snow without the cold, wet, muddy mess it makes!

 Linking up to Funky Junk Interiors Saturday Night Special and French Country Cottage's Feathered Nest Friday.

Picture Perfect Room (the “before”)

During this first month of the new year, Donna from Funky Junk Interiors has issued a challenge: concentrate on one room in your house that you want to make “picture perfect” and then do it.

(click on the picture perfect button to read about the challenge)

This challenge would apply to every room in my house, but for the purposes of this project and in keeping my sanity, I chose to focus on the playroom.

The playroom started life as Jessica’s bedroom, then playroom, then Bradley’s nursery, and is now back to being the playroom. The original incarnation as a playroom was more of a small-scale preschool room with “centers”, thus the word labels on the walls. Those will be covered up since the room has evolved a bit.

I have not picked up in there after Christmas yet, so here’s the view when you open the door:

Not horrible, but it doesn’t really invite play, does it? I feel like it more invites chaos – dumping and tossing and general mayhem. The reason I haven’t picked up yet is because:

a. Bradley pretty much just brings the toys to the living room to play unless there is someone in there to play with.

b. There was still some of Jessica’s stuff stored in here – her Little Tykes desk, the big keyboard, some big boxes of blocks, and a big Hot Wheels storage container full of tracks and accessories. (She and Scott and the boys have moved into a big house now, so that stuff is moved, too.)

c. I knew I wanted to re-work this room, and I was procrastinating…

True confession time over, lets go around the room and see what we want to do. First of all remember, this will be a “make do”/no-$pend makeover, with the exception of some paint and perhaps a rug. Also, this room will be gender-neutral, and baby-friendly as well as fun for toddlers and preschoolers (and who are we kidding – even my elementary-aged niece and nephews like to play in here).

1.) This photo is of the North wall, Northeast corner of the room. Right now there are stacked shelves for toy storage. I’m going to take at least the top set down and put it in the closet (now that there is room in the closet…). This gets rid of some of the cluttered look in the room and gives me a little more wall space to decorate. Totes and baskets will be labeled as well so everyone knows what toys go in which container.

The quilt will be altered to work as a bedcovering on the old iron crib. It was made by my great grandmother and is badly stained and worn around the edges. I’m just going to remove the outer section all the way around and bind it with a colorful trim. Yes, it’s an old quilt. Yes, I’m okay with altering it.

The M.E. poster is pretty much the color inspiration for the room. The walls will stay light blue, but the furniture is in brights, and the wall decor will be, too.

The side rail for the old crib needs to be painted cherry red to go along with the rest. I originally didn’t plan to use it, but Aunt Jan confirmed for me that it would look better to have a back rail on the bed. This will be a reading spot, so the body pillow will be covered and a couple more pillows added so it will be a snuggly place. It also will be a guest bed for little ones who come stay here, and I will use a safety rail for the open side of the crib when someone is sleeping in it.

I also have fabric to make a bed skirt since I will use the space under the crib for storage.

The Northwest corner: The closet door will be painted white.

The spot on the wall where I tried magnet paint will be covered over in chalk board paint. (That magnet paint was an expen$ive disappointment.) Above the light fixture I’ll hang a shelf to house some of the stuffed animals.

The small bookshelf will be painted – color yet to be decided – and the sweet little display shelf that is currently sitting on top will be hung above. I have some antique toys that will go there.

The Southeast corner: the valance is constructed of a cardboard box, covered in batting and a colorful plaid fabric. There is a plain white shade at the window. That will all stay. No curtains to entice little ones to wrap themselves up in or pull off the wall. I will install a hook for the shade pull. Right now I drape it on the hardware holding the valance.

Greg built that sweet little table last summer, and the chairs were $1 each at a garage sale. The chairs are a strong hardwood and I sanded and painted them that bright yellow, knowing I wanted to use that bright color scheme.

The vinyl skull and crossbones is on the wall above where we had Bradley’s changing table. I know a nursery doesn’t usually have such a motif, but Jess was going for kind of a “rocker” theme, and it worked for us. I guess it’s time to remove it, huh?

That full-length mirror is hung horizontally and has some peg hooks beneath it. I used those hooks for different hats for the kids to use for dress-up. I’ll re-hang the mirror vertically and I have something different for hooks.

As you can see, this corner is currently the “Art Display” area. That will stay, but will be better.

 

Okay, long post, lots of ideas, lots of work ahead. The Funky Junk challenge is to post the completed room (or progress if not finished) by the end of the month. I’d like to get the majority of it done this weekend since my little nieces are coming to stay the last week of January.

I guess I better get busy. Wish me luck!

Hot Drinks

Inspired by the many hot cocoa bars I saw online and in my email, I decided to set up a “hot drinks station” for Christmas.

I used part of my collection of antique Santa mugs, and set it up for coffee, hot tea, and hot cocoa.

Those two mugs in front were made by my mom in 1969. One has my name on the bottom, the other is Arlan’s.

Even though it’s been a very mild winter, I thought this sign was fun. The script is vinyl, cut with the Cricut and adhered to the glass. Then I just added scrapbook paper for the background.

We enjoyed this spot over the holidays with company here. I plan to set it up each year as a new tradition.

Now that the holidays are over, I put away the Santa mugs, but wanted to keep the hot drinks stuff set up – you know, just in case we get some winter weather yet.

So I replaced the Santa cups with the ones from my white stoneware, added the sugar bowl and creamer from that set, and a set of snowman salt and pepper shakers – those aren’t filled, but would be good for cinnamon or sprinkles for the hot chocolate. The tea bags and marshmallows are now in apothecary jars.

Some vinyl snowflakes on the wall, the cocoa jar, and the marshmallow jar add to the theme, as well as a wooden snowman wall hanging.

I love this fun little spot, and hope you will consider this an invitation to join me for a hot beverage!

Season’s Greetings on the Front Porch

After hanging garland and a wreath on the front of the deck, I pretty much blew off any more outside decorating for awhile. I got back to it yesterday, but it’s taken more than 24 hours to come up with the final display to greet visitors. In case you can’t stop by and say hi this holiday season, I’ll show you how it ended up.

It started with a few evenings of perusing the interwebs, looking at blog posts and photos on Pinterest for inspiration. I was really liking the simple, natural displays.

I gathered an old window that had been tucked away in a corner in the den, a faux greenery wreath, and the old high chair I painted and put on the porch last summer. This afternoon I shopped the house and was happy to find Dad’s ice skates hanging by a nail on the closet wall. There was a wire basket from Goodwill, a bag of pinecones the in-laws brought back from Texas in the Fall, and some random decorative “stuff”, and I was set. I love the layers, yet it’s simple and, I hope, welcoming: 

From our house to yours:

Merry Christmas!

(This post is a Make Do and Mend Monday project!)

Make Do and Mend

I got so excited to show Brad’s new hot rod Little Tykes car yesterday that I forgot about Make Do and Mend Monday. My contribution is a tad lame this week, but it’s something that makes a noticeable difference and I appreciate it.

We have steel doors, so no nails for hanging a wreath or sign or other fun stuff on the front door. Instead, I purchased some really strong magnets many years ago that each have a hook on them. Lots of times you can find them in the holiday aisles with the garlands and such in December. That’s where I found mine, so they were coated in a Christmas green-colored plastic. This Christmas green stood out like a sore thumb on the door, so everything I hung on them had to be large enough to cover up the magnet. I don’t know why it took me so long, but a couple of weeks ago I peeled the plastic off the magnets and painted them the same color as the doors. I love that they blend right into the door!

Next up, something pretty to hang on that hook…

Please join Heidi and a few of my other online friends and see what other Make Do and Mend Monday projects they've accomplished. They're really inspiring!

New from Old

Good Monday Morning! I’ve so enjoyed having Greg home for this long weekend. He took Friday off from his job which gave him a four-day weekend. We’ve completed a few tasks and had some fun as well as some good family time.

Ah, but that is not what I want to tell you about today. Besides being  Memorial Day, it is “Make Do & Mend Monday” where my friend Heidi encourages us to make-over, re-cover, re-invent, re-purpose things we have around our homes to make them useful and/or beautiful again. I have a few of these types of projects in the works around here, but my first was relatively quick and simple.

A few years ago I was gifted an old iron crib that belonged to my grandparents. It was used for awhile as a daybed/display area in the master bedroom, but it really took up more space than we liked, so I disassembled it recently. I’ll make use of all of the pieces, but one of the sides has become something completely new.

Here it is, standing on end. Do you see what I see? It would be a great place to hang more towels in the bathroom!

There is little storage in this tiny bathroom, and while I would like to put in a cabinet for towel storage, it just would crowd the room more. There is also a “regular” towel rack on the wall, but it doesn’t hold all of the towels I want to store in that bathroom.

As you can see in this next photo, the ends of this piece have a small “loop” and you would think that would make it easy to mount on the wall:

The problem is that it is turned the wrong way to hang flush. I considered using several options, and decided to just put hooks in the wall and hang it from the frame instead.  Those yellow arrows are pointing out the hooks that I hung it on.

You can’t even see them. I think this is the smartest way to hang it, too, since once the towels are hanging there, it is heavy.

I really like the way it looks!

Incidentally, those hankies in the frames next to the crib piece, belonged to the same grandmother. I love having little pieces of her in my home.

If you click on the link above or the Make Do button, you’ll go to Cranberry Chronicles where Heidi has listed more Make Do & Mend participants in the right-hand column. I “know” all of these ladies and they are all resourceful and talented in using what they have to make their homes cozy and welcoming. Go see what they’ve done and then take a look around your own home. What can you make new again?

Funtime with the Cricut

We recently celebrated Greg’s niece’s birthday and I wanted to give her a little something for her new apartment. I picked up a small, unscented candle and got out the Cricut to personalize it for her.

A capital “H” cut from black vinyl went on first:

Then I used some lime green, her favorite color, to cut “hannah”:

Using the transfer tape, I peeled the letters off the vinyl backing

 

and they were ready to position onto the candle. I centered the entire name over the capital “H”. Since the letters were on the transfer tape, I was able to reposition without too much trouble – you can see here I got the letters a little on a slant at first.

When the letters were positioned to my satisfaction, I rubbed over the lettering and then peeled off the transfer tape.

She seemed to really like it, especially with the lime green letters.

Yeah, I didn’t get the letters straight after all, but it’s still a fun little candle and a sweet gift that didn’t strain the budget at all.

While we had the vinyl out, I opened up the Cricut Expressions machine I had at home from the library. (I own a small, early version of the Cricut, but am able to check out the awesome Expression and a few cartridges at a time from the local library.) There was a spot on the dining room wall just begging for some kind of quote, and since Thanksgiving is coming up, I chose a line from a popular hymn, “We gather together to ask the Lord’s blessing”.

The Cricut Expression can cut 12 x 24” shapes, and I picked up a 24” mat at Hobby Lobby several weeks ago, so I was able to cut and transfer the entire quote with one piece of transfer tape.

The steps are the same as with the candle. The quote is cut and excess vinyl removed, then the transfer tape down over the top:

Here’s the spot on the wall. If you look closely you can see the laser level line so I get the words on the wall straight (yeah, I’m challenged that way…)

Aligning the text with the laser line, I rub the letters onto the wall, first with my hand, then I go over each letter with a wide craft stick.

Peel off the transfer tape,

And there it is – an appropriate sentiment for the Thanksgiving dining room:

The text is level, the wall hanging above it is not… I said I was challenged that way!

You’ll notice it’s missing an apostrophe in “Lord’s”. I did hand cut one from vinyl and just pop it up on the wall. There was no apostrophe on the cartridge I used to design the quote.

This vinyl is easily removable, though not intended to be reusable. If you order vinyl online, it’s pretty inexpensive, so changing quotes with the season would be very doable. I do like this one for the dining room, though, so it’ll probably stay awhile.

The Writing on the Wall

I love words. I like reading them, writing them, and mostly, speaking them. They’re a powerful tool when used correctly, and hopefully this latest project qualifies as such a use.

Many weeks ago at the gym where I work, we decided to add some inspirational vocabulary words to a blank concrete block wall in the gym. Rose, the fitness director, started a list, and Jess and I added to it, coming up with several dozen words that we thought would inspire our gym members to work hard and stay committed to their fitness goals.

This is not the first time I’ve put words on a wall in a public venue, but this time it was much easier. Instead of printing out the font, tracing it onto the wall, then handpainting, I used my Cricut and cut the words from vinyl. The vinyl adheres to the wall in a simple process, and will peel off without harming the paint when we’re done with it.

We started with wide expanses of purple(!) cement block walls. In this first photo, I have one word put up as a trial. I wasn’t sure how well the vinyl would adhere, but the paint has a flat finish, so it worked pretty well.

We did this wall first, putting up just a couple of words a day.

Then we moved to the other side of the men’s locker room door.

Then we went on to the other side of the wall, around the corner and down the hall.

You can see that I used several different fonts and letter sizes. Design Studio for Cricut was invaluable for designing words that fit the size of each brick.

Feedback from gym members has been wonderfully positive. When someone drags in early in the morning (I get up at 4 AM, so do not cry to me about getting up early!) I direct their attention to the wall o’ words and tell them to be inspired!