Meet My Family!

This is the post I told I'd never write when I first started blogging...the one on which I show pictures of my kids. But Military Man & I have been wrestling with this decision (me way more than him) for a couple months now.

See I applied to be a product reviewer for the Mommy Moment blog and was selected (Yay! You can see my first post here) So when Jody asked me to do a review on some baby items since I had a baby I hesitated, talked it over with Military Man & we said yes that was fine. We use nicknames for the kids anyway so we figured a few pictures were ok.


So without further ado I'd love to introduce you to my family (this is my proud wife/momma moment where I exclaim how adorable they are so bear with me!)
First up we have Military Man aka Hubby:

This is minutes after Miss E was born back in June. How sweet!

Then comes Little Man (with his good friend Thomas the train!)

And lastly we have the littlest member: Miss E (get it? Missy)

This was just taken the other day for her 4 month 'Look how I've grown' pictures.

So there you have it- my family! I'm not sure how regular my posts with kids pictures in them will be because a lot of my crafts don't really have anything to do with them but at least now I will post about them when its relevant!


Have a Happy Day,




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Blog Update!!

Just a quick note to let you know that I have switched my feed settings to 'full' which means when you subscribe you will be able to read the FULL post in your reader of choice or email. Meaning you no longer have to click through to my actual blog to read the post! (although I'd love it if you did & commented! I always answer back!!) I had it set on short without realizing it and I am thankful to the reader who pointed it out!

Have a Happy day,

Happy Monday!!

Well, I hope you had a happy weekend! We had to go to a memorial service for my husband’s great grandfather :( We just had a memorial for his wife in May and now he’s gone too! Last year at this time my Little Man had TWO great great grandparents and now he has none :(

Tree Photo here Credit: joiseyshowaa

 

On a brighter and more consumerism in America note: I bought an iPad on Friday! I needed a portable computer of some sort since sitting at my desktop has become hard to do now that I am a mother of 2! I’ve had an iPhone for over 2 years now and thought that the iPad would be just the right fit for me. No download capabilities like a laptop but since I’m not away from my desktop for long periods (vacations and such) it’s not a big deal.
Because of the service & me playing around with my new ‘toy’ I don’t have any new projects to share so I thought I’d share some of my favorite reads from the last week or so:
Linky Love goes to:
Free Christmas Planning eBook & Printables from Organizing Your Way
How to Quickly Build up a stash of handmade cards from Mish Mash
Tea Party from Kara’s Party Ideas (I can’t wait to throw Tea Parties when the kiddos are older! & just for the record: Note to my family- See? I’m not even close to this level of party throwing! Not. Even. CLOSE. Aiming though. hehehe)
Free Preschool Shapes Printables From 1+1+1=1

There you go! Hope you have a happy week & I’ll be back with a project or review on Wednesday!
Have a Happy Day,

Celestial/Star Wedding Cake with Shooting Stars

Ok I did it again. I always say I won’t. Then I go and agree to it. Then I make the cake- feel like I’m going to throw up the. whole. time. and swear up and down that I am never. doing. this. again.
I made my second Wedding Cake. I think I wouldn’t be as nervous if it had been for someone I knew like my first wedding cake was.
Anyway it’s over and done with and mark my words: I’m never. doing. this. again. Ever. 



(Maybe.)


Here are some pictures! Some are from me playing around with my Polaroid app on my iPhone but it would always cut off the top of the cake so there are some ‘regular’ photos to show you the entire cake lol






Have a Happy Day,



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Frugal DIY Play Kitchen!

For little Man’s 3rd birthday party I decided that a play kitchen would be a good addition to our playroom! I didn’t have a lot of money to spend (none really) but I still wanted it to be cute! I found a possibility on etsy.com for a cardboard one and bought the PDF. I loved it but it required a lot more materials than I had available at the time. So I looked around and found some materials that I thought would work.
I first saw this end table that I was using as a cable box stand and nothing else. I grabbed that and replaced it with my file cabinet as the cable box holder lol
I knew I needed room for a sink too so I found an old drafting desk that the top ‘lift up’ portion of the desk was damaged on one edge but was long enough on the ‘good’ part to cover the top of the end table and then have overhand for the ‘sink’ portion.
So I had my handsome hubby cut down the desk top to the right size, cut the hole for the pie plate sink and screw it on to the top of the nightstand- lining up the edges. I caulked/used wood filler on the seam where the top of the end table and bottom of the wood came together. Then I taped off the half that overhang with painter’s tape and newspaper and spray painted the entire nightstand/remaining portion of desk top white. It took a couple coats and I didn’t do the back, the inside or the side under the over hang since those wouldn’t be seen. The reason I did this is that I wanted it to have some separation between the  stove/oven side and the kitchen side. It ended up looking like the sink is in a butcher block countertop- love it!

Next I took off the tape/newspaper and placed the pie plate in the hole. It has a lip and we measured the bottom of the plate (which is a bit smaller than the rim) so it fits in tight and the lip keeps it from falling all the way through.
I traced a saucer four times onto the ‘stove’ side of the kitchen and filled in the circles with black acrylic paint. Handsome Hubby drilled some small holes and fitted them with these little metal pegs I found laying around and that’s what we used to hold the ‘oven’ knobs on with. The knobs do come off but I didn’t want to glue them because I wanted them to be able to spin. I wrote the ‘temperature’ & ‘on’ ‘off’ with a thin line Sharpie.

Then hubby measured and cut plywood to fill the front of the end table for an oven door and he cut a ‘window’ in the middle for the oven window. I spray painted that white and we attached it to the kitchen with hinges at the bottom, magnetic tape to hold it closed and upright and a handle to pull it open with.  The ‘window’ of the oven is covered from the inside with a sheet of transparency film and it is just taped on using packing tape (so it’s clear and blends in). I might hot glue it on later but for now it works!
 

After that we just screwed the handles through the overhand/old desk top part of the kitchen for faucet handles and used Gorilla Glue to attach the wooden J (I painted it sliver first) upside down to look like a faucet. I would have loved to do a screw up through the bottom of the over hang into the bottom of the J but when we tried it started to split the J- so glue only was what worked for us!

I used sticky backed Velcro on the edge of the over hang and sewed the matching Velcro (using sew on Velcro obviously lol) to the bandanas to make a sink ‘skirt/curtain’
And that was that! I had everything but the hinges, handles, J and knobs on hand. The oven ‘knobs’ were free and the rest was all $1-$5 each.

 


So here are the materials you would need to make your own. I have linked to similar or the same products where ever it was possible!

Materials: End Table(I used one similar to this- only mine had two shelves)    
Pie Plate with rim (but no handles) (mine came in a pack of 2 and was similar to this)
wooden or paper mache letter “J” (mine is wooden- this link is for paper mache because I couldn’t find the right ‘font’ of J that looked like a faucet)
Kitchen or Bath Replacement Faucet Handles (mine are similar but couldn’t find them online)
Acrylic Black Paint
Metallic Spray Paint -Silver
Satin White Spray Paint
Replacement Oven Knobs (mine are actually from an old Helicopter)
Plywood (got mine at my local Lowe’s)
Sharpie Fine Point Permanent Markers
Wood to form ‘countertop’ (the same width as your end table from front to back and then about twice as long-mine came from the top of an old desk that part of the wood was warped. We cut off the bad part and used the good part)
Solid Color Bandanas - (Whatever Color you want)(mine are leftover bandanas from the Pirate Birthday party!)
Small Hinges (you’ll need at least two to attach the oven door with)
Magnetic tape (you can get this at Wal-mart or a craft store also)
Kitchen Cabinet Handle (this is similar to the one I used but I would have loved to use this kitchen cabinet long handle because it is longer-more like an oven handle)
Velcro (both sticky backed & sew-on)
Transparency Films
Packing Tape
Gorilla Glue
Screws

I hope you all find some interesting materials to make your own play kitchen! Just know that you CAN do it without spending a fortune on those wooden play kitchens they sell!
In fact, I’m not the only one who has made their own play kitchen.

Have a Happy Day,

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More Naughty Spots!

Hi all!! How was your weekend? Sorry for all these sporadic posts! I've got quite a few lined up to be posted starting at the end of this week but I had to pop on here and share my news:
I entered a 'design your own' vinyl contest over on If Your Walls Could Talk blog (the blog for SayItOntheWall.com) and my 'naughty spot' design is in the top 10!

Colors and font that would be used if I won! I'm sure it's customizable for colors!

Now I need YOUR help! Could you go and vote for me? I would get the first cut of the design and also I believe it will be available in her shop for you to buy too if I win!! How fun!



So please spread the word and go vote!!
Have a Happy day,

Pro-CRAFT-ination. Do you have it?

I tweeted earlier today that I had 'pro-CRAFT-ination' and it really got me thinking. I have a LOT of projects 'in process' right now and I can't seem to finish them before starting a new one.

I once heard that procrastination is the worst form of perfectionism- it's the paralyzing fear that if it's not going to be perfect why even start? Or you are too nervous it won't turnout perfect you can't even start. I believe I have pro-CRAFT-ination because I'm not afraid to start a new craft project but once it is underway I can't finish it because of this underlying fear that it won't turn out exactly as I envisioned it- aka: perfectly.

Yeah totally realized all that from a tweet.

SO I've decided to list all my unfinished projects here in a post and I hope to check in with you all weekly and be able to cross a project off! I need motivation to get 'er done! (ok that was totally lame and cheesy but I'm leaving it in!)

Here is my monstrous list:

1. Bathroom floor to be painted & sealed
2. Completely empty old craft room & put it into windowless room.
3. Move Lil Man into old craft room
4. Strip & repaint nursery room door & frame (lead paint detected)
5. Paint nursery walls.
6. Lay nursery floor. (currently plywood)
7. Try to reconfigure crib.
8. Make curtains for nursery
9. Make mobile.
10. Make Lil Man curtains
11. Finish lining living room curtains
12. Make playroom curtains
13. Finish fabric storage for playroom
14. Sew Velcro to play kitchen curtains to hang them.
15. Tank top refashion
16. Maxi dress refashion
17. Doggie door painting & install
18. Train table
19. Old window into craft room storage
20. Paint new countertop to match my painted laminate counters.
21. Finish sanding & sealing kitchen floor.
22. Paint trim, stair risers, & railings in dining room
23. Paint kitchen
24. Paint new light for dining room & hang
25. Make Miss E some dresses
26. Strip wallpaper & paint on hallway.
27. Type up & digi-scrap my recipes.

Ok there is more than that but I can't make you read forever. Just a note- most of the curtain projects & paint projects I haven't started yet so maybe I don't have pro-craft-ination on those.
Do you ever have pro-craft-ination? What one project have you been putting off just finishing??

Alright that's all I can type out on my iPhone right now lol! Sorry for the lack of photo- it wouldn't let me add one because I'm using a phone. Hopefully I'll remember to log onto my computer tomorrow to add links & pictures!


Oh and in case you noticed the slow down of posts: I took an unofficial and unplanned bloggy break & rested up while enjoying my babies!!

Have a happy Day,