Drop Dead Cute

Hearts and Updates

With Valentine's coming up I've been getting a lot of hits on this post I did last year on these hearts. So if it's not too late, break out the crayons and get busy!

Also, I spent some time the other day updating a few things around here on my blog. I added some new links of sites I visit and friends blogs. I also added one of those following/followers things that I've been dragging my feet on but everyone seems to have one now that I'm finally getting with the program. So if you like to follow me (I know there's at least 3 of you) then click on that little guy and follow along :-)

Our Sanctuary

Here is a peak at my bedroom. It is not finished by any means but I've been wanting to share my headboard project. We decided we were going to make an upholstered headboard but my husband didn't want to try mounting it to the wall, which I don't blame him. These old plaster walls with cinder block immediatly behind makes it a pain to mount anything. Then we talked about making one with legs and mounting it to the bed frame. I did this once before but had loads of help. It's quite easy. Plywood in the shape you want, foam padding, spray adhesive, fabric and a staple gun. It's the mounting to the wall or making legs that gets a bit more tricky. Then my husband was off shopping at Costco one day and called me. Apparently they had a padded king headboard for something like $150, not in the fabric I wanted but all I'd have to do was staple gun some over it - and it would save him from having to build it. And that's just what we did (fabric is Tanya Whelan's Grey Marilyn Floral). We would've spent close to $100 anyway and this saved us the hassle. So not much of a project afterall. I love that I can just swap out fabric to my liking and my hubby liked how easy it was.

One helpful thing my hubs came up with all on his own was getting the rods that hide the power cords for the lights. They are fabulous. Sticky on one side to mount to the wall and you can paint them so they blend right in.

I finally got around to hemming up my curtains the other day and getting them up on the rods. We love how they allow the light to pour in. I *heart* my room and big bed but what I adore even more is all the cuddles, wrestling and giggles our family shares here.

Just for fun, here is a photo of the room when we bought the house. We refinished the floors, removed all curtains rods, painted, painted, painted and redid electrical and lighting.

Heart Potholders

I've had these heart shaped pot holders on my "to make" list for a year now and with Valentine's Day coming up I thought it was fitting to finally sew some up. I love the idea of the pockets your fingers and thumb go in. Getting the large mits on and off takes too much time and having the pockets adds just enough protection for my hands.

It's a Martha Stewart idea and pattern but I like the directions laid out here at Purl Bee. Much easier to follow. I followed the directions on the first two I made and discovered I'd save myself some cursing under my breath by just breaking down and using larger binding tape. You can use Insul-Bright (made for pot holders etc.) for the batting instead of the cotton batting that they call for in the directions. 

Or, if you're like me and scorch your cotton fabric pot holders often use ThermaFlec Quilted Heat Resistant fabric (seen here in this photo) and it has the added bonus of skipping a step because it's the batting and one side of the outer fabric in one. Maybe not quite as cute but certainly more practical.

These are my well loved potholders my sister made me. They have been through a lot as you can see. One of the loops actually caught fire one day...I think it's time to retire them. She made a mit to match with these little guys and I believe she followed the directions in Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing book.

Next I'm thinking of making an insulated travel dish carrier. I'll keep you posted...

Car Seat Quilt and Other Gift Ideas

My fellow Modern Quilting friend over at Threaded Mess generously made this sweet car seat quilt for Baby Asa. She did a beautiful job! I love her fabric choices and the two differect border colors going on with the homemade binding. Lovely touches. What a thoughtful gift to recieve!

A few other things worthy of mention...

Handmade Holidays over at Sew Mama Sew is back! Make sure to check them out everyday for the month of November for great tutorials, ideas and giveaways!

I just discovered the National Tie One On Day. It's a wonderful tradition that I think I'm going to start this year. Here's the idea..."On the day before Thanksgiving, November 24th this year, pause in the preparation of your own meal, wrap a loaf of bread or other baked good in an apron, tuck a prayer or note of encouragement in the pocket, and tie one on…an apron, of course! and deliver the wrapped bundle to someone without your bounty… a neighbor, friend or family member in need of physical or spiritual sustenance, a bit of recognition or just a kind word." Head over to Apron Memories to get the low down and enter her give-a-way.

Recieved a lovely catalog in the mail from NOVA Natural Toys and Crafts. Poured over all the pages. What beautiful things for little ones! I might just have to get one or two things for the boys for Christmas.

Mini Bathroom Redo

When we first moved in about a year ago we had a lot of work done to our house; carpets ripped up and hardwood floors refinished, hardwood laid in the kitchen and sunroom to match the rest of the house, tile floor laid in the basement, new paint throughout the entire house, tons of electrical work, recessed lighting, new fixtures, crown molding, new kitchen appliances and granite countertops, among a lot of other misc things. Since then, we wrote up a list of house projects, prioritized and agreed upon them and bit by bit have been knocking them out. Some big and expensive like redoing the main bathroom or  adding a deck, and some small and quick like making a sandbox or adding a doorbell.

We've had this eye sore of a downstairs basement bathroom which the previous owners just kinda slapped together I'm afraid. We called it the men's bathroom because frankly guys were about the only ones that didn't care what it looked like in order to use it. I hated going in there but since being preggers I have had to utilize it more often than I cared for just because it saved me from having to run up the stairs. We do have plans on completely redoing it but it's a ways down on the list and I just can't wait that long so we did a mini redo to make it bearable to use.

These would be the lovely "before" photos from a year ago. Yikers. The angle I didn't get, which would be over the sink, was bare. No mirror, no towel hook, no nothing, so you're not missing much.

This is what it looks like now. We used some leftover paint from another room. I had the mirror and picture from when we lived in the condo. I bought a tp holder, shelf, towel ring, light switch plate cover, new toilet seat cover, laminate tiles for the floor, baseboard trim, tension rod and fabric (I made the curtain), garbage can, magazine holder (it is still mainly a boys bathroom afterall) and a plant. The window was actually replaced in settlement, however, it still has yet to be framed out. For less than $150, in about a day and a half with my brother painting and putting up fixtures, hubby doing floor and baseboards and me accessorizing, it no longer frightens me to use it nor be completely mortified if a guest has to use it (only slightly embarrassed now). It is far from where I would like it to be but at least as the boys would say, they can "poop in style."

I've kinda surprised myself that I'm sharing my ugly bathroom with you all but I hope that it inspires at least one person to do something with their eye sore of a project. Even if you can't make it exactly how you would want it right now due to time, budget, priorities, etc., you can get some nice results with a wee bit of cash and DIY elbow grease.

Coasters

Finally getting around to putting a few things in my shop. Cross my fingers, I'll have it all in by the end of the week. For now, here are my coasters. I love these. I love the fabric and having these little guys out and about on my nightstand, craft table, desk, etc. They make great little gifts so if you're in need of a stocking stuffer, thank you, birthday or hostess gift or for your self, check them out in my shop.

A Revamped Office Chair

There is no rhyme or reason to my sewing projects lately. Just whatever seems to inspire me at the moment. I have this frantic need to sew and create things before the baby comes and it's just all spilling out at once. I already have a long list of projects that either need to be done or ones I want to do but for some reason that just isn't enough. I had this great idea yesterday that I'd go through all my craft books and make at least one project out of every book that I haven't made something out of yet. All my books are listed in the left column. At least I think they're all there.

Today's was inspired by Cath Kidston's In Print book. I've had this book for a while. It's one of the first craft books I bought but it's more for ideas/inspiration than actual instruction. The directions for projects are very loose and brief, assuming you already know how to sew. In fact there were no directions for this project, she just showed a picture of a chair she had redone.

Here is my boring craft room office chair from Ikea.

Here are my tools. I used the biggest chenille needle I had and upholstery thread doubled over.

Unscrew the back from the frame and lay on wrong side of fabric.

Pop off the plastic back cover. Make sure the back is centered on your fabric exactly where you want it.

Stretch fabric around tightly, folding under existing fabric, sew in place catching the fabric on the back side as well.

Trim fabric. Don't judge my uneven lines or fuzzy photos - I had a two year old asking me to uncap markers every 2 minutes.

 

Snap plastic cover back on and screw to frame. Pretty nifty huh?

Do the same with the seat.

A much more exciting and pretty craft room office chair!!

My little helper. He was in charge of the screws and screw driver. When we were all done he couldn't wait to get on "mommy's sewing chair" and spin himself around a few hundred times.

A Few Quick Sewing Projects

This is when I'm sooo glad I buy random fabrics I like but have no idea what I'm going to do with them at the time. I bought a small piece of this eyelet like three years ago. We gave our bathroom a facelift last fall, hung a fun shower curtain from Anthropologie and this piece matched perfectly. Yay! However it was so small. So after some very careful cutting, stitching and plenty of Frey Check...I have a sweet curtain for my bathroom. The tension rod and clips were a perfect solution to hanging it.

I also made a bathmat for this bathroom (no photo). I found just the right color towels but the only mats they had were the fuzzy kind my grandma had in her bathroom. So I cut down and sewed up a body towel and now we have cushy soft bath mat just the right size for our room.

I created this small laundry bag with a piece of leftover fabric from a tote I made years ago. We use cloth napkins and found that after meals they would accumulate in a corner on the floor by the stairs. A bit unsightly. Our laundry room is in our basement and the stairs going down are off our kitchen. I've utilized some of this stairway wall for my spices and hanging bags of root veggies...so why not make a hanging laundry bag? It has worked great for our napkins and dishtowels and I only have to haul it down about once a week.

Our guest bedroom gets the most glorious morning light pouring in and I wanted something very light and airy feeling for the curtains. One of the local West Elm stores were closing down and they had a crazy sale on everything. I scored two very long linen curtains for five bucks each. I cut off the bottom portion and sewed it under the top piece (which I hemmed) and gave it a layered look.

Now I have some not-so-quick sewing projects to get to, like a king headboard, king bedskirt, and a sofa to recover. Maybe I'll go make an apron instead.

Stained Glass Hearts

Here's a cheery little Valentine's project to ward off cabin fever from yet another snow storm...actually I think we can officially call this one a blizzard. It's brutal out there. Anyway, Martha has instructions. I found a template for hearts here (my free hand hearts never turn out symmetrical). I zoomed in to increase the size of the hearts when I printed. I would recommend having some help with these otherwise it's a bit time consuming. Jack isn't quite old enough to help with shaving crayons and cutting out hearts. This is a perfect project to do with kids that are old enough though.

 
I made two sheets, one of pinks and purples and the other with reds and oranges. Make sure your iron is low to medium. Mine was too hot on the first one and it wrinkled up the page pretty good. I used two strands of embroidery thread and knotted at every heart. I happened to have 8 mini suction cup hooks that worked perfectly for the window otherwise I suppose using tacks up at the top of the window frame is an option. Someone else mentioned tying them to a hanger and then hanging the hanger somewhere. Taping them to window would work too I suppose. I actually hung another set of these on the opposite window. They certainly bring some fun color into the room with all that white backdrop!

 

Jack's Banner

 I've been wanting to make a banner for Jack's room for months. He has a wall that's fairly empty except for some low shelves and it's been staring me in the face everyday saying, "When are you going to do something with me?" Well, since we're having a record snow storm, why not today?

A banner is a fun, simple and inexpensive solution. There are so many versions of this that can be made. I personally liked the triangles and pre-made bias binding b/c it was easy and fast. There's a great tutorial on Rhythm of the Home Blog. This banner is also a great reusable decoration for birthdays and other celebrations.

As you can see there's still a lot of empty space on the wall but it's so much better with the banner and I'm not so sure if I want to fill the rest of the space or not. It's a small room and don't want to overdo it. If we do anything it may be just a few of his artwork pieces framed since he's really getting into coloring now.

Sorry for the not so spectacular photos. I'm using my iPhone for the sake of ease. If I go get my camera and have to take the time to download yada yada yada...I'll never end up posting. Anyway, off to make peanut butter cookies for the boys!