My Birthday!

Yes, monday was my 36th Birthday and not much went on except I found a fabulous 26" sunburst mirror on craigslist for $50. I told my husband all I wanted was this vintage mirror for my day. It's so pretty, almost too pretty. I put it in our master bedroom and I think a room redo is in order. My regular computer is down right now so I don't have a photo to share with you. I will post one once I get it back. It looks a lot like this one above the fireplace:

(image found on High Street Market Blog)

Here are some other rooms with sunburst and convex mirrors to inspire you. A little history on the mirors can be found here at apartment therapy.


(cottage living)

(pottery barn)

(decor pad)


This type of mirror seems to be a staple for most designers. Don't you just want one too?

Slipcover Fix

So I purchased this cute little couch the first year we moved into this house. I bought it at a thrift store of course. The boys absolutely love it. It is pretty comfortable.
Look how little they were. Miss those days.

The blue ticking stripe does go with the colors in our house so I found a slip cover on clearance at Target a few months after I bought the couch. Of course the covers never fit exactly. Any time the boys sat on the couch the whole cover would be destroyed. It would drive me absolutely NUTS! Here is a picture of how messy it used to look. See the arms. I used to fold and tuck all the extra fabric. Such a pain.


So the last weekend I was determined to fix the darn thing. I found a tutorial made by Kelly at Much To Do With Nothing. Kelly is amazingly talented. I have been following her blog for a while now.
So anyway. I had some old fabric that I used to make a pattern. I just placed the fabric in different sections and outlined each form. Placed the pattern on the slipcover fabric and cut out the pieces. It all came together like a puzzle. I must say I am very pleased with how it turned out. It actually fits and I don't have to yell at the boys anymore to stop messing up the couch. Wooohoo!!!


So now my next project is to make slipcovers for these two green chairs.
My uncle gave them to me. They used to be his Mother in Laws. He was going to throw them to the dump. Can you believe that? I just love these chairs. But they need to be brought back to life. I thought about getting a bold patterned fabric and making pillows out of the same fabric to place on the couch. Tie the room together and make it feel more complete. What do you think? Any fabric suggestions for a resonable price. I want tans, reds, yellows and oranges. Warm colors.
Thanks and have a great day!

Compost Pile & Bits of my Garden

I started a compost pile a few months ago and just haven't been around to post. I kept waiting for my husband to help me out to make the perfect bin or spot. Well I couldn't wait any longer once I read Kelly Miller's post from the Tidy Brown Wren. Here is her post about Compost: making black gold in your own backyard. When I was researching on the Internet everyone kept saying you needed some sort of bin to turn it. Well those bins are quite expensive. Money I don't want to spend. Kelly's tips and advice are perfect for anyone who has a little 4 x 4 spot they could start a compost pile in. So I went out the next day (without my husband) and found some logs that were cut from trees we had down and sectioned off a spot with them. It's been a fun experience seeing everything break down. I have been teaching my boys about composting too. They like to help throw all the scraps in the pile.




As far as storing your scraps to throw in the pile I just use a big ice cream bucket that has a lid. Works great for me and I can store it under the kitchen sink. Kelly also has another post about a compost bin she keeps under her sink. Hers is very cute and made for composting. Thank you Kelly for all the tips and advice.

Here a a few peeks at some plants that are in my backyard garden around our fire pit. I started a lot of these from seed last year or a few years before.
Foxglove

Peony Tree I bought online. This was the first year it flowered after having it for two years. I bought it for $5 because it was an unknown variety. The flowers were so huge. Look how big they are next to my hand. I have pretty big hands with long fingers. Amazing.

Rustic Colors Rudbeckia from seed, Pixie Meadowbrite Coneflower from seed.

This is what it looks like right now. Rustic Colors Rudbeckia, Pixie Meadowbrite coneflower, Shasta Daisy, Snowdrift sage, Hosta, Limelite Hydrangea in the back, and more goodies throughout. A bit messy but I guess that's just the type of gardener I am. Plus the rain just squashed everything in a past month. Any tips on getting everything propped up again?



I will post some more photos later this week. I hope Kelly has inspired you to make a compost pile. She sure inspired me.

Inspired by BHG

My hubby had this ugly bench thing in the garage that he got from his old job about 15 years ago. It was taking up space in our new garage and he was going to take it to the dumps. Er, NO! I said,"Can I have it to make it into a garden workbench?" Yes sir eee, I got it. Well it sat all last year and this year I came across this article in June BHG.
It was the perfect plan for my ugly bench. It' not totally complete, still a work in progress. I need to get a new piece of wood for the top and cut a hole to place a grate for the dirt to fall through. But I was so excited to share the little bit I have now. I had the curtain rod laying around along with the clip rings. Bought some burlap & black spray paint from Walmart and she's almost complete. It just needs some eye candy now, then it will be done. I will post when I get around to making it look more pretty.
Before
After

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. This was my first little sewing project by myself (since taking a sewing class). It's so fun and addicting. We aren't camping for the next two weeks so I hope to get a few more things done around here. Hope everyone has a great Monday!

Happy belated 4th!

Hope everyone had a good 4th. This summer is just passing us by. I can't believe it. We have been camping every weekend and our poor house has been so neglected. I did manage to squeeze in a few projects during these busy times. I made these cute 4th of July pennants. I thought they were cute, but the peeps at the campground made fun of them. They said "they look like I clipped off my thongs and sewed them together." NOT COOL! Anyway, I wanted to share them with those of you at would appreciate them. I just found scraps of fabric at Walmart in the clearance bin and some scraps of fabric I had laying around the house. I didn't do anything fancy when I sewed them. Just sewed them across the top and done. I had two packs of bias tape so I cut those in half to get a little more out of them.



We camped the whole 4th weekend and stayed until Tuesday. Around the area all the camp sites combine and have a parade that goes through each resort. It's so great for our boys. For such a little parade they get tons of candy. Then later that night we went out on our pontoon and enjoyed some fireworks. Fun fun weekend! Hope you all were happy and safe.

I'm around, Been Campin!

Just been busy! I went to CA at the end of April to visit my brother and his wife and their new baby girl. She's a little doll. Since then I have just been going and going. The twins started baseball and our youngest started soccer. In between that we opened up our camper for the summer. We have been getting things cleaned up around there too. Last year was our first year having a camper. We have a spot in WI that you rent for the season. It's by a lake and some cute little bar/restaurants. It also has tons of ATV trails all around. Love it for a summer get away and place for our kids to have fun.

This is what it looked like when we first pulled in last year.

Then a deck:

Privacy Wall, Log Benches and a Little Garden:



We added a few more things but I forgot to take photos. I will see if I can find a few. Like string lights, a brick border around the garden, brick around the fire pit,mulch in the garden. Cute seat cushions I found at the thrift store for sitting on the logs. Solar lights.
The benches and fire pit. Cute boys too!

Our walk to the lake:

I will get more pictures next time we are up. It's fun to see the before and after.

It's also fun to decorate a little camper spot. A little home away from home. What do you guys do for the summer? Any special things you do?

I knew I couldn't do it.

Well, I tried to keep up with sketching daily but boy is that hard when you have ten million things to do every single day. Plus I get distracted so easily. I seriously can't focus on one thing at a time. I guess that's all a part of being a mom. Plus my little guys started baseball this week. Just one more thing to add to the list.
Hope everyone is having a good week so far and got your taxes turned in. I don't know why but we always wait until the last minute to do ours.
I did manage to get a few scrapbook pages done this week. I am so behind. I used to scrap a page a day. Now I can barely get one done in two weeks. Peppermint Creative came out with some new products so that got the fire burning. Some new templates help the process too by Ingrid at peppermint creative.
Here are those pages using Ingrid's templates. I modified them a bit.




Happy Thursday!

Sketch 4/7

I sketched from photos of my cat when she was a kitten. Our Sammy girl. When we bought her we were told that she was a boy. I guess most Orange Tabby cats are boys. Well about a month later after our "second" visit to the vets office the vet figured out Sammy wasn't a boy she was in fact a girl. Isn't that funny! I was very happy to have another girl in the house. I guess about 1-300 Orange Tabby's are girls. So I was told. Pretty cool huh! She is the best cat. Luckily we named her something that was gender neutral. LOL!






Digital scrapbook supplies found at Peppermint Creative and Designs by Dani

Update our home exterior

Now that spring is here I have been thinking about being outdoors and working in our yard. I love to garden and of course paint. One thing that has been bothering me is the exterior of our house. It just looks a little dated. So I'm thinking it needs some paint. Our home was built in 1992 and still has a lot of the original 90's features. So I need to liven her up again. I have been playing around in photoshop and getting some ideas for colors. Any suggestions would be great as well. Here is our house how it looks now during some seasons.




The yellow on our home is all aluminum siding so it can't be painted. But the shutters, porch, garage doors and everything else needs to be painted in my opinion. The shutters are made of vinyl. I have done a little research and you can repaint vinyl shutters. You have to buy a special paint that will contract and expand when heat beats down on them. Sounds like you can use Krylon Fusion or Rustoleum paints that are specifically made for vinyl. Correct me if I'm wrong?

First I was thinking the garage doors need to be painted the same color as our house. I think they stand out way too much as they are right now. My husband thinks they should be the same color as the shutters but I strongly disagree. What do you think?
Next I was thinking of adding white trim around the garage doors, gutters and the porch. Right now it's all the same color as the house.
Shutters and the door? What colors? I was thinking possibly black. Or a green that almost looks black. Like Essex Green by Benjamin Moore.

The front door I was thinking a red to welcome you or just the same as the shutters.

Here is what I came up with in Photoshop to give you and idea.


Here is how my hubby would like it. It looks funny to me. You don't notice the house all you see is the garage doors.


Here it is how it is today. Same photo not edited. Excuse our realtors van. Just a quick photo I found to work with.

Start of Sketch a Day

So it's been a while since I went to Art school and Design school. I graduated in 2001, got married 2 months later and had twins in 2002. Seems like once I had kids I felt I had to stop doing what I love. I know that's just me, it really is me because I know all of you still keep on going. But going from no kids then to two right away and not wanting to put them in daycare made my design life come to a standstill. I don't regret having them at all...no way. I just feel I spent all this time in school and never got to use it. I have kept busy while raising my boys. I taught myself how to use Photoshop and I would digital scrapbook almost daily. I have hundreds of pages to prove it. Here is one of my online galleries. I was also on quite a few Creative Design teams. Now that my boys are older I don't enjoy it as much, so I have quit many teams. I tried to paint children's art canvases after I had my twins but I didn't make enough money for all the time I spent. I wasn't charging enough to say the least. My fault. I had no idea there was an Etsy out there. I actually don't think there was yet.

So now I spend most days day dreaming about what I can do so I can pay off those stinking school loans. I was going to go back to work this fall when our youngest goes to kindergarten, but then I thought,"What am I going to do with my boys in the summers?" What do you guys do? What have you done? I feel it would be such a shock for my guys who have never been in daycare. It makes me want to cry. My thought was I can draw. I love to draw. Maybe I can start working on some art and sell on Etsy. What do you think? I thought I would start posting my daily drawings and improve my skills. I really don't have a technique or style yet. Still searching for that. Last summer I took a children's book illustration class. It was very insightful. It taught me a lot and made me realize that there is so much more to learn. If I work on my skills my style will then emerge.

Here is a sketch I worked on last night to get me started. A caned chair. I'm going to challenge myself to do a sketch a day. Boy that will be a challenge.


Thanks for reading my ramblings. Have a good Tuesday!

Remember These

I hope everyone had a great Easter! We certainly did. It was in the 60's. Quite nice for Minnesota weather. Here are the boys decorating thier eggs in the warm sun.




I also got crazy and made egg shaped rice krispy treats. I saw the commercial and thought it might be fun for the boys. They dunked them in chocolate and added sprinkles too.


Remember when I got these little jar lamps at the thrift store a while back.


Well a few weeks ago I stripped them down of their dated country funk and revamped them a bit. I just used whatever I had around the house. Spray painted the tops with some oil rubbed bronze. I think later I will try and do a little more with them. We needed a little task lighting in the kitchen without having to turn on the big overhead light. So I thought, "Hey, I will pop one of those cute jars right into the corner." I found some popcorn and wild rice sitting in the pantry and just filled it up. There are so many things I can put in there. Pretty fun.



Have a great Monday everyone. My boys don't have school today so I think we might go minature golfing. Yippee!