Wood

My purchases after a shopping trip to the hardware store with my dad! Can't wait to start crafting!

Baby Room Art

I was watching Sarah 101 and was inspired to do an art wall in Boston's room. The art she used for that episode I already had and was planning on using the same art, but once I started looking around I decided I already had too much art in his room. Just before Christmas we did a photo-shoot of Boston and I decided those pictures would be perfect. 

I used frames I already had, they were purchased at Ikea many years ago at a really good price. This was the art work that the frames came with.

I originally purchased them to displayed graphic paper in the den/scrapbook room of my old condo.

        

I played with the layout and the paper selection. Since the walls in our apartment are light, I decided I wanted to mat the pictures onto scrapbook paper. I even re-used some of the paper that I originally used in the frames.

Next I hung the pictures!

A little secret... I applied masking tape to the back of the frames that didn't hang right. The frames are cheap and well... the hanger on the back wasn't always in the right spot. Check out this post by Becky Higgins for an easy way to hang a grid of frames. I personally didn't have the extra money to use those Picture Hanging Strips but it would have been way easier.

Necklace Board

I have finally finished this little project! I started it back in September but had a hard time finding pins I liked to hold the necklaces (small town). When I found out we were going to be moving to another city I decided I wanted to switch up my bedroom colors. I was so excited to do yellow and grey but it has been a nightmare trying to find yellow fabric that I love. I don't get it... I see all the time on design shows like Nate, yellow being used currently, but why is their no yellow in fabric??? I was extremely hopefully I was going to find yellow fabric and got paint happy right when we moved in September. I love the way the bench turned out... but it needs some yellow friends. If anyone comes across any lovely yellow fabrics online please let me know!


Here is my necklace board. I took a cork board that I found discounted (hole in the board) at Home Sense with this frame already attached. Added some fabric, painted the frame (it was pink) and added my necklaces. I don't have much jewellery as you can tell by the amount on this board. I am pretty plain... I want to be more fashionable but I find it hard to accessorize myself but very easy to accessorize my home! I remember when I first got engaged, a few girls from my church said, I am surprised Scott is marrying Tara, she is very plain and well... Scott isn't! I did marry a man that is very fashionable, but I love it! At first it was a little bit too much for me with his pink shirts and perfect hair. He has since gotten rid of the pink shirts, but still has perfect hair (his mom is his hair dresser). 

Will You Be My Valentine?

I saw these frames this week in the Michael's flyer and went and bought two for only $1.50 each! 

First I painted the back and sides white.

Next I found scrap paper that worked perfectly. (My mom bought me some random packs of scrapbook accessories and cut up paper at a garage sale in Edmonton and all this paper was in the packs... good find mom!) After cutting the paper to just fit to the outside of the frame, I than used spray adhesive to glued the paper onto the wood. 


Taking my knife I cut off excess paper and also cutting the heart out. At this point I realized I forgot to paint the inside of the heart... had to do this really carefully since I didn't want to get any paint on the paper.

I used sandpaper and lightly sanded down the edges of the frame and inside of the heart. *Make sure to move down with the sandpaper and not up. This step will fix any uneven cutting that happened especially in the heart. See a picture of this step here.


I look my embellishments (found them at Michael's this week and used a coupon) and mounted them on cardboard using spray adhesive to give it strength. 

I than Mod Podged the front and sides of the frame and the front of the embellishments. I wanted to make sure they had the same finish as the paper on the frame.


Next I had to pick from my small selection of ribbon, the perfect match (okay this is a huge selection... I have an addition). I glued down the ribbon using glue dots. I also took some craft glue that dries clear and added a small amount of glue to the cut edges of the ribbon to help prevent fraying.

Lastly I applied tons of these sticky lifter things (no idea what they are called) and raised the embellishments from the frame just slightly to give it some dimension.

Here are the finished frames! The first one is for my house and the second one is for who Boston wants to ask to be his Valentine... she should be receiving it in the mail shortly :)

Clock

My sister showed me this cute clock she wanted to buy and the crafter in me said, "We can easily make that ourselves".
We got our 40% off coupons for Michael's and went to look at clock hands. They seems too much money even with the coupon. Walmart Super Center was right next door and we found this clock for only $5.

Alyssa bought a piece of scrapbook paper and I used one I had at home. We have been blessed with a very talented father and got him to cut the round base. The picture above shows the back of the clock and how my Dad cut the insert for the clock hand base. Then using some other supplies I already had (vinyl, Mod Podge, Spray Adhesive, Sponge brush, sandpaper and paint) we made our clocks!

The things i learned from doing this project are:

1. Use spray adhesive to glue down large piece of paper and not mod podge. I didn't have the spray adhesive with me the day we started the clocks and my sister used mod podge and it bubbled! I used heavy objects to weigh down the clock and luckily once it dried it flattened.
2. After gluing down the paper and before applying mod podge to the entire clock, use sandpaper and gently sand down the edges. This step blends the paper better into the wood for a more even look.

Nativity Blocks

I saw this idea online and my mom and I decided to make them last year for each of my siblings, my husbands sister, my best friend and of course a set for ourselves.

We thought it would be the perfect craft that kids can play with and their moms won’t tell them not to touch. It isn’t fancy or anything, but cute!

My dad cut the blocks out and my mom and I painted and mod podged the characters on. The characters are stickers from the Me & My Big Idea collection which i do believe is discontinued now (I found my set on eBay). But new sticker designs are coming out all the time. I would recommend finding a digital set you can print as many times as you would like and cut out. 

Here is my set, sitting on my ugly fireplace... apartment is a rental so nothing I can do about the fireplace. Maybe if you look close enough you can see where previous renters used the wood as a nice place to put their dart board!

Here is my mom's display.

Here is a picture from my best friend Breanne's display. She is renovating her house and doing an amazing job at it. Check her out here.

My sister-in-law kids lost the Jesus block this year. It was a big joke in the family that they were trying to find Jesus this Christmas. So far, Jesus is yet to be found in the Simpson household ;)

Days Till Christmas Blocks

I know these blocks can be found everywhere from blogs to super saturdays (google super saturday crafts if you don't know what it is), but I thought I would share my version.

My sister who claims to not be crafty, did one with me. Here she is hard at work.

The supplies:

• 2 wood cubes measuring 3.5 inches
• 1 wood block measuring 7.5 inches long, 3.5 inches deep and 1 inch tall
• 12 pieces of christmas scrapbook paper measuring 3 inches square
• Mod Podge
• White Paint (or any color you choose)
• Sponge brush
• Letters that read "Days Till Christmas" (I got my vinyl lady to cut it for us)
• Numbers for block 1 - 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (I used my cricut to cut these out)
• Numbers for block 2 - 0, 1, 2, 6, 7, 8 (make sure your 6 can also be a 9)

The finished product!

Clock

My sister showed me this cute clock she wanted to buy and the crafter in me said, "We can easily make that ourselves".
We got our 40% off coupons for Michael's and went to look at clock hands. They seems too much money even with the coupon. Walmart Super Center was right next door and we found these for only $5.

Alyssa bought a piece of scrapbook paper and i used one i had at home. We have been blessed with a very talented father and got him to cut us our round base. Then using some other supplies I already had (vinyl, Mod Podge, Spray Adhesive, Sponge brush, sandpaper and paint) we made our clocks! 

Here is the finished product!

The things i learned from doing this project are:

1. Use spray adhesive to glue down large piece of paper and not mod podge. I didn't have the spray adhesive with me the day we started the clocks and my sister used mod podge and it bubbled! Once it dried it flattened but that might have been just lucky.
2. After gluing down the paper, use sandpaper and gently sand down the edges. This step blends the paper better into the wood for a more even look.


I love being crafty!

Thankful Thursday

Today i am thankful for my condo building and that fact it wasn't the one on fire in Calgary today.

Check out this link...
http://calgary.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20100318/CGY_Fire_Millrise_100318/20100318/?hub=CalgaryHome

I think this really hit home and i started crying watching the news. Millrise is just one community over from my community and the buildings are almost exactly the same. The only difference is mine is 1 year older and only 3 floors and this one is 4. But i do believe they are the same builder and shaped like mine. I couldn't even think what i would do or feel if this happened to us. My heart goes out to anyone that has been involved in a fire. It is just sooo sad!

On a happier note, i am also 32 weeks. I took these pictures on Monday after my sister reminded me it was the 15th of March and I am due the 15th of May... exactly 2 months left! And no my belly button has not popped, that is just a crease in my shirt.

People keep asking me if i am ready for baby to come and honestly, is anyone ever really ready? K, maybe people are more ready than i am right now. I am missing a lot of important baby items and also missing a lot of important information (which i plan to start learning Wednesday as my prenatal classes start). Oh well... I am taking 2 days off at the beginning of April and enjoying a 5 day weekend. I am planning on sewing a bunch of baby blankets and also start to organize baby clothes.

The baby bedding i want is on order and can take up to 10 more weeks. But the cushions to my rocking chair are at my friends house right now being recovered! I also want to paint the babies room so bad, anyone that knows me knows, i love color and decorating but we don't know 100% if we are going to be here in September and I don't want to paint if we are moving. We wont hear back from the schools till another month or more.

So am i ready, NO, but a few of the reason are out of my control. We are just keeping busy. Scott is focusing on his last classes and also applying for tons of internships for May. He has to do one to complete his degree. Scott also was called to teach seminary 3 days a week at 6:30 in the morning. He started when we got back from Arizona. He seems to be enjoying it, i just hope the youth are enjoying him!

I am just going to work and when i get home and on weekends i de-junk and organize. I am thankful for Scott's sister Amanda as she is letting us store a bunch of boxes at her house that use to be in the spare room.

Happy Thankful Thursday!

End of November, Brings December

Scott loves Christmas… and I have a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit! We went to visit my family last weekend and I am starting to feel a little bit of Christmas in me. My mom loves to take me to one of the greenhouses in Sherwood Park that has amazing Christmas decorations, which helped. Also my mom is almost done decorating already for Christmas! The main reason why we went up this weekend is my mom and I were doing a Christmas craft. I saw it a couple of Christmas’s ago and we were planning on doing it last Christmas but my mom’s dad passed away and we never found time. It is a craft for kids, a craft that they can play with and their moms won’t tell them not to touch. It isn’t fancy or anything, but cute! We made one for each kid in my family and I made two extra ones for two of my friends.

My sister and I were planning Christmas this year and what fun foods we are going to make and I have to admit I AM getting excited for Christmas. Early tonight we went and got our Christmas stuff from Scott’s parent’s house. I just need to do a little clean first and then I can start decorating!

This weekend Scott is going to be busy writing an essay, I am going to decorate and do some things around the house. We are also going to go look at this crib again tomorrow. I found one I like at e-children so we are going to take a second look. It is a really different looking crib, not your traditional looking… which is probably why we like it so much. And it is on sale… hopefully still!

I am looking forward to December 21^st… hopefully I am finding out if my baby is a boy or a girl. I am hoping for a boy. When i think about this baby i never picture it a girl, never look at girl things online and don't even bother thinking of a girl name (which probably means we are having a girl). We went to our friend’s house tonight and they did the pencil test on me to see what I was having... it said a boy! Now if only it looked reliable!

I just found this picture on my camera, this is how we told our parents we were expecting! I put the frame in a Crate and Barrel bag. My mom and Ruth were so excited to see what we bought them...

Nothing New

My visiting teachers came over this morning (who are awesome ladies by the way) and we got talking about our blogs... and i realized that i haven't updated it for a while. But nothing is exciting in our lives right now... so here is just a post of what i have been up to in my spare time. As most of you know I love decorating but we are trying to save up for New York this summer (which will be excited), so i have stopped buying new things and have attempted to try and update the old. These are my newest crafty projects....

Scott had this F in his room before we got married, so i made sure he brought it with him, when he moved in (other than his clothes, this was the only thing i think he bought). It use to be black, so i painted it white and added some blue paper to match our bedroom. I will admit, i messed up on the gluing of the paper the first time, so this is the second attempt.

I found this quote when we first got married and i wanted to add it to our bedroom in a cute way, at first i just put it in a frame, but a few weeks ago i decided to scrapbook it in a frame. It is also blue to match our bedroom.

This project i finished today. It is a pin board for my scrapbook room/office. I bought a cheap $30 mirror from ikea, took out the glass, bought cork from Michael's (with a 40% off coupon), mounted it on the cardboard the frame came in and covered with left over fabric from my apron. Now I just need to go and get some cute push pins.

This frame matches my other wire stuff in my scrapbook room perfectly. It was a great find. The wall color in the above picture is way off, as you can see from these pictures below, but i was too lazy to take it again.

Here is the apron i just mentioned, i got my friend to make me it around Christmas. I also got her to make one for my mother-in-law's Christmas present, but hers in blue flowers with strips instead of the dots. (All Amy Bulter fabric.) The picture isn't the best, but Scott is at work and i had no one to take the picture.

Well uploaded my pictures just now i found this one that Scott took of me. I remember him taking it and saying it was his favorite so far (he always takes pictures of me when I am sitting at my computer... he LOVES to bug me) but I never looked at it. I was busy focusing on working. I think the main reason he liked this picture so much was it had two of his favorite things in it. Me of course and a great shot of an apple computer.