Menu Board!

I've seen a bunch of variations of these popping up in blog world, so I just had to give it a try. Every Sunday after the girls leave for their mom's, Josh and I sit here staring at each other hoping the other will decide on dinners for the week so we can hurry up and get the grocery shopping over with. I end up scribbling meals on a paper and throwing it on the fridge. However, my OCD h-a-t-e-s lots of clutter on the fridge. Perfect excuse to craft!

This came together easy peasy quick. I got the frame at the Dollar Tree for yep, you guessed it, a dollar. Scrap book paper and cardboard letters were a fun find at Joanns. 10 minutes later, viola! Our menu board.

Like my artistic "ooo I'll take pictures by the fire" shots?

Shelving fun!

So within a few weeks of Jack being born we officially out grew our home. However, we have it in with the landlord (love you Dad!) so we are going to stay here as long as possible while saving up to buy our (hopefully) "forever" home. So what do you do when you run out of room? Go up! No, we aren't adding a second story... but we have vaulted ceilings with tons of wall space just begging for something... shelves!

Our living room serves as our central command station... tv, computer desk, sewing desk, and the most perfect huge fireplace that happens to sit smack dab in the center of the only solid wall in the room. It's long and narrow and totally awkward but it's our livingroom! Josh's biggest pet peeve is his small computer desk becomes dumping grounds for all odds and ends (thanks, girls!) and he can't get to the basics - his pens, notepads, etc.

Light bulb! I can work in an excuse to go to Joanns AND solve the problem! I found this cute shelf and thanks to a coupon got it for $10. Some black paint helped it match our decor and in a few hours Josh was a happy camper!

I'm itching to think of something cute he can hang from the hooks... or I guess we could be practical and hang headphones and other computer cords up there.. but that wouldn't be cute. :)

Pretty Flower Wall Art

I'm starting to wonder if I'm creating a Friday night ritual. I spend all week finding crafts I want to try that come Friday afternoon I'm bursting at the seams and the Joanns & Michaels coupons I get each week are burning holes in my wallet. So Friday night off I went... first to get supplies for a top secret project I will be able to share after November 14th! Second, I got the goodies to make this cute flower wall art I found the tutorial for on Christina's Adventures. I will admit, it looks very home made, and I coincidentally wish it would have turned out more the color of the tutorials, because it would have matched our new bathroom much better! But all in all, I am pleased, and Kali telling me repeatedly how much she just loved it and it was so beautiful sure made my head large enough to keep it! Plus, it was so inexpensive to make, I could easily try for a new color.. maybe once I get a cricut. (in my dreams!)

Just for Brittany... here are my step by step (sorta) photos!

First I just painted a piece of thin plywood I got at Joanns.

Next I made a stencil heart with construction paper and traced it onto the back of some cute scrapbook paper I found, and cut them all out. My hand was killing me by the time I was finished. Oh how I long for a cricut...

Next I determined where the center of the board was and used a clear bowl to trace a circle around it so I could use it as a sort of guideline on where to start gluing the hearts down.

Then I got busy gluing. It's worth it to use a hot glue gun because the glue allows the hearts to stick up a little bit making it not so two dimensional.

Tada! I love the shimmer to the paper... I just wish the purple was a bit more muted. I picked out a fun button at Joanns and plopped it in the middle to finish her off.

All in all it came together in under an hour, fun Friday night project!

My First Craft From A Blog

So last week there were about 4 or 5 blogs that really caught my attention. I spent a ridiculous amount of time going thru all the different posts, ooohing and aaahing over everything, and decided on this craft to try first... it seemed the least intimidating! I got the idea from The Bird's Papaya, here's the post that convinced me to try it: Jute Twine Vase. If you have some time, just scroll thru her postings, everything is sooo adorable!

You'll have to excuse my pictures, I had all good intentions of taking some good shots in the afternoon sun... but by the time we got Jack home, dinner made, cleaned up a bit... it was 8pm. I tried for some mood lighting... but that just looked cheesy! So... here's the pic I sent from my phone to my friend to show her. (please feel free to ignore the mess on my sewing desk!)

Here's a close up in some super bad lighting, but it helps give you the general idea. I'm simply in love with this and at a high risk of having twine covered bottles all over my house in a very short amount of time!