The Project Prowler

New Year, New Life!

2011-03-06T12:29:00.000-05:00

You all must have thought that 4 kids have done me in. Well, it takes a little more than that to stop this lady. . . and a little more is just what has been happening around here lately! I will give you the short version of the story:

Just two shorts weeks after having our little bundle of joy, my hubs got laid off. It was a devastating blow to say the least. But we tried to take advantage of the QT that we were getting with a new baby at home and Dad around. It was really something I could get used to, if we could get paid to sit around and play with our kids all day! Alas, that is not the case, and {because he's just so irresistible ;)} the hubs did a great job of scoring a few job offers. But wouldn't you know the offer that seemed to suit us the best was over 1,000 miles from where we were, and from any family, or friends that we know.

We made our decision and within 3 weeks were packed and moved and settled, with just enough time to celebrate Christmas, in (drum roll please) Arkansas! Yep. Bet you forgot that was even a state. We had. So with this new year comes this new adventure in our little spot here in middle America, or southern America, we can't actually decide (coming from the North East) if it feels more south or more west to us.

It has been culture shock for sure, but we are loving settling in and trying to feel like natives. We have already tried fried catfish and the BEST fried chicken i've ever had (I have not, nor will I, go so far as to try frog legs, but let me tell you they are a real food here, and people DO eat them!). We have become part of the Razorback fan club, we've already got our t-shirts, which seems to be a requirement for living here, that and a hogs car decal--(which we do not have). We have experience our first tornado warning and have spotted a place we would go in the house in case one decides to crash through our neighborhood. We have seen little chicken coops in peoples very normal suburban back yards apparently you don't need a farm to have fresh eggs! One of my favorite adjustments are the few 70 degree winter days! Definitely beats the 5 feet of snow that would have been dumped on us in New England! Things are different, but change is good. I have no doubt this experience will be one that will change our family for the better. So, while the projects may be a little farther between for the next little while while we settle in, I will try to keep updated, becuase my ideas certainly aren't slowing, and we will now have a new house full of new decorating and projects! So, don't give up on me just yet. . . it takes more than a few hits to knock this lady out!

Baby Number 4 has Arrived!

2010-10-13T14:05:00.000-04:00

Our sweet little girl arrived at the end of september, thanks to a wonderful and merciful doctor, who induced me a week early! And boy was it a good thing he did! She was our biggest baby yet weighing in at 8lbs, 6oz.! She is two weeks old now and so much fun to have around. We were able to bless her in her little blessing dress this past weekend, while the grandparents were here. So, here are some pictures of her all fancied up for the camera!

Blessing Dress

2010-09-16T16:20:00.000-04:00

Can I just say that my oldest daughter is turning into quite the project junky herself. I mentioned to her a month ago that i thought it would be fun to make a dress for our new baby girl to be blessed in after she is born. Like a Christening dress, a Blessing dress is usually fancy and white, but it doesn't have to be. And in the spirit of wedding dresses with a splash of color, wanted to do something a little different for our Autumn baby. So I told my daughter, we could make it out of cream fabric, and add brown tulle or a few tan ruffles in places for a twist on the normal Blessing dress. So she stopped me before I gave her all my ideas and said. . ."Mom, i have just the dress we can make it out of." I was kinda surprised that she would automatically look for another piece of clothing to make it from (since for once I was totally planning on buying fabric for it) and was nervous about what dress she was wanting to slice up. She came back with a hand me down dress up dress from her dress up bin, that I think at one point in it's life span was a very cute little girls dress, but had been picked up at a yard sale, given to my sister in law, and handed down to me for playtime. I looked it over and saw enough salvageable material, that I was getting pretty excited. It was lined with satin, had raw silk, and organza. . . which gave it lots of potential. I messed around with it for a few days and with some inspiration from my friend Cindy at Cranberries and Capers, who customized and shipped a beautiful Blessing day headband before I had even fully formulated the my dress ideas. (Here's what she sent. . . . she. is. AMAZING.)

I came up with a sweet petite fall Blessing dress, that has lots of different textures and warm woodsy colors that I am just LOVING!

And the best part, is it was totally free, thanks to my little project clone!

The Beginning

2010-09-14T15:51:00.001-04:00

It is time to really buckle down and get ready for this baby to come and live with us! So, we started rearranging things. You know, I am learning, with each subsequent child, all the unpractical notions of a perfect nursery, just the right bedding, or a dream space for your new baby, leave your head. Because you learn (and it has taken me 4 kids now to get it) that all the fluffy bedding, will be on the floor most the time, and you will use all those hospital blankets to keep them swaddled tight at night. And in a few short years you will want to change all those hand painted details in their room to fit a different gender baby or to go with their personality more. I know now that the best investments are the essentials, like good crisp sheets, because that is what people will see when the come into their room, or cuter recieving blankets because they will poop through them, and a good swaddle is your saving grace at night. All the pomp and frills are so fun, and I would do them again, but this time, I know that she will probably spend most her nights sleeping wherever will give us a good 3 hour stretch at a time. And as she grows the same sleeping arrangement won't always work, so we will switch her her around sharing with her siblings until we find just the right fit for two little personalities. . . and that is okay! All that being said, I have been sluggish putting her stuff somewhere, because i want to have the best access and with three bedrooms, she doesn't have the luxury of her own room. But i made it official the other day that she is going to start out living in the corner of our bonus room. That is her space. She has a dresser, and space to be changed and a space to sleep, and there is a comfy rocker to rock her to sleep. And she will just be a cute little nomad for a while.

But, baby stuff aside, as I lugged this old dresser across the upstairs from my bedroom to the bonus room, I realized this brown beauty was my starting place in home projects and refinishing:

This old dresser was hand made for my dad to use when he was a boy. It was old and rickety with a cherry finish. When my husband and I were newlyweds we acquired it from my grandparents house, and after a year or two we decided it needed a face lift. So, I went--completely unknowledgeable of what I was about to undertake--to Walmart and picked up some bison brown paint and some poly, and went to work. We added new knobs and although it was still old and rickety, it had a nice chocolate brown finish to match our bedroom. And we had a great feeling making something, we already had, work for us. I look around our house at our furniture--a vast majority of which is hand me downs, or garage sale, or more recently, made by the hubs--and it has all had our love worked into it in some way or another. It all started with this first little dresser whose refinishing work pales in comparison, now that we have learned more through trial and error. It has been such a blessing in our lives to have started working on these little skills of reworking old furniture and clothes to be something that is new, fresh, and exactly what we want. It started out by just giving it a shot. . . there wasn't much to lose. The dresser couldn't have looked any more out of style, so we just plunged in, and here we are 5 years later with a house decorated the way we love, and full of pieces that tell a story and have a little of our blood sweat and tears (literally) finished right into them. And this rickety dresser, our baby of the furniture, so to speak, is all grown up, and will probably need some more TLC soon, but it feels good to see it in it's current form, being used for our new baby for a while. We had we thrown it out long ago, we would have been one dresser short right now. So, if you are a blog peruser and you look at the things people are doing and think I could never do that, then think again! Your first few things may flop, but you will learn from it, and be so glad you have the know how to turn that $20 garage sale bed frame, with all it's cute little details and a bad stain, into just the thing you need for your little girls room!

Wishing Well

2010-09-08T09:50:00.001-04:00

My in laws have this pipe coming up out of their front yard. They were thinking it was a little unsightly, so they enlisted my husband to make a faux wishing well to cover it up. He gathered supplies before we went down there, and a couple of days into our vacation he had this little cedar beauty sitting in their yard. I love how it looks in it's natural wood state, all surrounded by the forest. I am never very good about thinking of outside decor or landscaping. It is something I wish I was better at. I thought it was such a great idea my mother in law had to get rid of an eye sore that isn't removable. It makes me want to drop a penny in and make a wish :)

Goodbye Summertime, You Will be Missed.

2010-09-02T14:59:00.001-04:00

Whoa, where did summer go? Even though it still feels a bit like summer here. Kids are back in school, and life is slowing down. And I am getting back into a normal routine. I feel like the biggest slacker on the blog front. It is one thing to have the posts and the pictures in mind, it is a wholly other thing to find a minute to sit at the computer and publish them. We had such a fun summer. And one of the most exciting months was July, where we went absolutely nowhere. I enrolled the kids in a little imaginative movement class for one day a week, and a friend of mine and I swapped Tuesdays to present a craft class at our houses once a week. We filled in the rest of the days with swimming, when it was warm, and activities when it was rainy (which wasn't too much. . .it was a pretty hot July!). But the activities and crafts we did added so much to our daily routines that I wanted to share the ones we did. Most of them we found on crafty little blogs, and the cost was minimal, but made for hours of fun! They would be great to do for bday parties, rainy days, science projects, or just to add some flare to the week.

Here are the links:

The Idea Room: Bouncy Ball

The Idea Room: Marshmallow Guns

You Tube: Cute T shirt Cutting- (we used this one Here)

You Tube: Tie Dying Designs

Make Your own Bubbles

Family Fun: Sand Castles that Last

Here are some pictures of the fun:

The finished bouncy balls. She noted this in her post, but they really aren't that bouncy. She has another one that we didn't try that is suppose to be more bouncy ball-like. We still had fun making them and letting them bobble across the kitchen floor for a few hours :).

Mini Marshmallow Guns. Not only were they fun to assemble, but my friend Kayla, who was in charge of this fun little activity, had targets to shoot at, and bottles to knock down. She even painted them at the end. My kids still sleep with theirs by their bed.

Make your own Bubbles. This is really a trial and error process I found. There are tons of recipes out there that are all basically the same ingredients but in looking at the comments on most it seemed like there was never 100% success rate for those using them. We could only get a few of the really big bubbles to come off our homemade wands. But the little bubbles worked great.

Sand castles were so fun to play with and make but my advice: Use a pot you don't care about to cook it in , and the lastablilty was a bit questionable, because once they dry they begin to crumble, so if your little

ones want to touch it after it's dry, it really won't "last" too long!

I wish i had pictures of the tie dying. But it was a bit much for me to get pictures while keeping my 2 year old from dying herself pink. But maybe i can get my daughter to model her shirt for a picture later. We cut our T's (for the girls) before dying them and they use them as cover ups for their suits, or layer them with a tank top. They turned our adorable!

Not all of the projects had the outcome that we thought, but they were all worth it, and the kids loved them all, whether they flopped or not. It's really all about doing something different and switching up a mundane routine. Anyone else do any fun summer projects with the kids? I would love to hear about them!

The next few weeks will be major baby prep! This kiddo is due in 5 weeks! We have some desks to assemble, rooms to rearrange and dressers to repaint and pass around to different kids, so look for some crunch time posts in the weeks to come :)

Rock-a-bye baby

2010-07-25T15:38:00.000-04:00

So, it is really getting close, the due date of this little bun in my oven. Just over 2 months away! Time sure is flying fast. And after that doozy of a project on the stairs and hallway I just finished, my ideas have turned more baby-minded. As I have started pulling things out from storage I am feeling like it is all looking a bit old and worn, and some of it just a little blah. Sort of like this:

Okay, so there is nothing wrong with this, and actually this isn't mine, but it has the same blah and boring look of the swing I had that was destroyed by a 3 and 4 year old jumping on it and playing all sorts of little games in it the last time it was out. But I am sure anyone who had a kid 6-8 years ago will remember those navy blue and cream plaids that Graco was shelling out for their swings, carseats, pack-n-plays,etc. I was happy to accept a hand me down from a neighbor to replace my old one, but the pattern wasn't much more exciting. The swing my friend gave me had the bonus of little dancing teddy bears in overalls. I was very grateful for a swing--teddy bears or not--because, hey, that's more money in my pocket that I can use for diapers, but I still wanted something a little sassier. I have noticed, with the coming of number 4 to our house, that our house is all about kids. We have toys and baby stuff everywhere. I love it, it makes our house home to have our kids things planted here and there, but with all the little nick nacks I am collecting are really a part of my decor and I want them to look cute and match my decor, dang-it! So, for a very minimal fee (I think it was about $15-- and could have been even cheaper if I could ever lay my hands on the 40% off JoAnn's coupons when I go) I got some awesome brown and cream zebra home decor fabric (I believe I only used about a half yard, but you would have to measure your own swing cushion), a yard of tan trim for the straps, and a yard of avacado-green ruffle. Although I spent a little bit more because I didn't measure for what I really needed (and i didn't even use a half a yard of the fabric) I think you could easily pick up the supplies, if you measured everything before you picked it up, for about $10.

My project began when my mother in law was here, and she pretty much did all the work on it while I got some rest (thank you a thousand times over). But what we did for the swing makeover was cover the cushion in the same fashion i did for the ironing board. My mother in law just cut it out using the cushion as a pattern and zig zag stitched around, adding the new ruffle in place of the old one. We changed over all of the old navy straps to nice fresh tan ones. And finally took the plastic off of the metal swing poles and sprayed them Krylon's oil rubbed bronze. Once it was dry we put it all back together and set it up in my living room. It's sophisticated with sort of a whimsical baby charm. I am loving it! It looks great, it matches and it's functional. . . yeah! *Just a note: Knowing this is for a baby, I didn't attempt to paint or change the tray or the seat or the toys. Luckily the seat, and trey and plastic bits all seemed to match what I was doing. . .the toys did not. Those darn toys actually are pretty stuck on there, and are still a bit ugly, but better safe than sorry with remaking baby stuff. So no one get too carried away with the spray paint ;)
*

I'm Pooped!

2010-07-02T09:27:00.000-04:00

It's DONE, can you believe it!?!?!? It has been a long two weeks. But we finished the stairs, AND the hallway. . . AND added a new little pottery barn style bench for the foyer. I must say, that the hard part was that we had to do all our work at night so the kiddies wouldn't touch the walls, or be in the middle of a mess, or have the exposed outlets all around. So after they would fall asleep we would work like elves until we dropped, then we would have to put everything away until the next night when we could do a second coat, or more poly or whatever the next night needed. It was tiring work for a prego lady and a busy husband, but we are so thrilled with the outcome. It was a while ago that my hubs and I pulled up the hallway carpet, so let me give you a reminder of the "before" upstairs hallway:

The new floors were nice, but still hardly enjoyable with the tattered, pale walls

until. . . .

{Ahhhh} MUCH better, huh!? And here are the stairs new stairs:

And, some close ups of the bench (good thing my mother in law was here to whip up an awesome cushion for it in no time):

I can't say enough how much I am loving the final product, and how much I am loving having this project behind me. It really add to the look of our house, and seems to make all the rooms around it look a little more put together. We have been working towards updating our hallway for a while (see Here and Here) and It feels like it is officially done, and I have never been so exhausted in my life :)

Some things I have learned while doing the stairs:

Most carpeted stairs have a pine tread that is not "stain-grade" so use a wood conditioner before applying the stain. It will soak in more evenly and richer on the soft pine wood.

Also, if you plan to paint as well, do in this order: pull up carpet, paint walls/trim, sand stairs, stain, poly, then apply a pre-painted beadboard and finish with touch ups. The order we did our project in wasn't the smartest. Doing the stairs first was what we needed to do to realize what really needed to be done with the surroundings. But I wouldn't recommend that. Our plan was sort of unfolding as we were working, so we had to do some touch ups on the stair treads after we were done.

Don't get hung up on the knicks or cracks or stratches in the wood. I was so worried about all the imprefections until I saw the Thrifty Decor Chic's stair project and read her advice. It is true, Once your stairs as a whole are finished you won't even notice it. Even with our lighter stain, now that the whole scene is finishes you can hardly notice that totally damaged stair near the bottom. It all blends in and it all adds character and charm. I didn't even fill the holes left by the staples. Stainable woodfiller really isn't as stainable as they say. It never stains the same as the wood, so we left it out, and the holes are much less noticable that way.

Sand really good. Even if it's a pain and even if you don't want to, just do a little more. It will look so much better. Also, use an orbital sander. Your life will be much easier. Our corner cat sometimes leaves vibration marks on wood that are hard to get rid of, but the orbital sander is fast, smooth and easy to use. We borrowed one, but I think, after seeing how well it worked, it will be our next tool purchase.

For those of you who are Interested the process for the stairs went as follows:
1. Remove carpet/padding
2. Use pliers to remove all carpet staples from the stair treads (if you are putting bead board up you dont need to remove the staples from the risers because it will all be covered, you can just hammer them in).
3. Use a sander (orbital is preferable because it works fast, gives and even sand, and can get right up to those edges where all the paint from the trim is dried to. I like to feel each stair as I go to know how much sanding i need to do. You want a smooth surface to stain.
4. Clean stairs with a vacuum and damp cloth to make sure all the dust is up.
5. Apply a wood conditioner per the instructions on the label.
6. Stain stairs desired color (we needed ours light so we only did one coat, but you may need more coats to get the richness you need).
7. After stain has dried (per the instructions on the label), place a high durability polyurethane over top. (we wanted to use the poly/stain combo, but the lady at home depot said that it was not great for high traffic areas or floors, so we opted to do a separate poly and stain. But the poly will say on the back label if it is suitable for flooring.
8. Repeat coats of poly several times sanding in between. We did 5 coats of polyurethane on our stairs. Make sure to do it at a time where you have adequate time to let it dry without stepping on it. Doing it before bed worked great for us, it was plenty dry by morning.
9. Paint bead board desired color.
10. Measure and cut to fit the size of risers
11. Apply with finishing nail gun.
12. Caulk any edges that don't quite match up and fill all nail holes with wood filler
13. Finish up with a little touch up paint over the filled nail holes and cracks, and you are DONE!!!

Now, let's here those carpets being torn from the floor!!! ;)

Painting myself in a Corner

2010-06-23T10:57:00.000-04:00

(pardon the dusty steps, we are still a bit under construction, but i just had to share the progress!)

Actually, I have been polyurethane-ing myself upstairs, every night for the past 4 nights. It is a funny feeling to be stuck in your upstairs for 8 hours, but, with 5 people living here, is the only way to live in the house, and still do the stairs. The stairs are really taking shape now. It was touch and go there for a few days, wondering if i would need to just order new carpet in the end. But now that they are gleaming from gloss and that rich honey color has sunk in, I am starting to look past some of the imperfections (like the one pictured below. . . that i found on the second to last step that I stained) that were bugging me while i was pulling out staples, and sanding the heck out of the treads.

Since the weekend, Hubby also put up chair rail in the hallway and stairwell, and put bead board or wainscoting on the risers. It is really taking shape now, and I am so glad i pushed passed the staining and poly stage to give it a chance, because I have hardly noticed the stairs that seemed so glaring with uneven stain soak-age, or surface blemishes. We are still trying to decide on a color for the top half of the wall. I want something in the brown family, but it can't be to dark, and I want it to match the existing tan that goes throughout the main level. . . . AND. . . I want to have it all done by Saturday. Hubby and I are exhausted at the end of each night. Not because of how much of the day we are spending on it really, but because now that school is out and the kids are home,and it is a main traffic area, only time to work on the hallway is after the kids go to bed, which lately has been 9:30-10 at night. So, we will be glad when it all comes together.

And since ADD always gets the best of me during projects and I can't just focus on one thing at a time; i started looking up some entryway benches wishing i had a cuter one than the one i removed to paint. It is one of those things i got years ago at a yard sale and painted black and set there, and haven't taken a second glance at since. But now that it is out, and everything else is looking so upgraded, I started thinking a nice cushioned, pottery barn type bench would be nice. So I sent my hubs THIS link, and last night before i went to bed, it was put together just waiting for me to sand and paint.

I can't wait to go to the fabric store to look for a cushion fabric! Isn't my hubbers the best? I love a guy that loves a good spontaneous project! Thanks Babe!

Call me Crazy

2010-06-14T22:00:00.001-04:00

No, seriously. . . this time, it may be true. This nesting stage always gets to me. I have done some pretty wild and detailed projects during this past stage in my pregnancies, but I think this idea takes the cake for maybe one of the oddest. . . and possibly most detrimental if it doesn't turn out the way I think it will. BUT. . . if it does work out the way I see it in my head, than I just saved myself a couple hundred buckeroos and, will finally rid myself of the horrid covering, that ~~currently~~ two days ago inhabited my stairway.

Just so we are all on the same page. . . everyone think for a minute of that thing you said you would do first when you moved into you house. Was it change a light fixture? Repaint? Change flooring? Fix a hole in the wall? Well..... is it still there???? I find I have a few simple things I thought, we can fix that, we can replace that, and some days i stare at those things realizing that it has been 3 years, and i am just as accustomed to them, as I assumed the previous owner was. Who knows, they probably hated it too, but other things take priority, and suddenly that rusted, vent cover doesn't seem so bad to live with for a while. Well here is a picture of what my item that bugs me everyday, but I have yet to do anything about (I really hate to even claim these):

(I was already taking a peak at what was underneath the carpet, that was actually not like that from the beginning. . .I'm not that bad)

In case it is hard to tell the dark encrusted stains that have taken up permanent residence on them, here is another view:

And although we did take action on some of the carpet the first week we lived in the house, by getting it out of the entryway it is a long slow process to rid ourselves of all of it in a cost effective way, while keeping some sense of uniform-ism to our house. But this staircase is that last high traffic area that has the white carpet and other day I was staring at it thinking, this. is. gross. I couldn't take it anymore. We caught a glimpse of the wood underneath when we redid our hallway, so I tossed the idea of ripping the carpet out, and staining the treads underneath to my Hubby and got his thoughts. We figured worse case scenario-- we replace the carpet. So, I started ripping. Meanwhile, Hubby sends me this link to an awesome blog (who knew he could get into this whole blogging thing?) The Thrifty Decor Chick, and she has recently done the same thing to her stairs. It was great to see it done, know it can turn out good, and know not to worry about little imperfections. Plus, I LOVED her walls with white and and the brown (well, she has tan, but there is brown too, it's a great combo), so I was definitely getting some inspiration from that. So, the staircase has been my night and day project for the last 4 days, and isn't finished (not even close). I will post updates as I go throughout the next week. I am hoping to have the stairs and the upstairs hallways done within two weeks (we have company coming, that always speeds things along. . .no one wants to visit a construction zone ;) ). Wish me Luck! And if it sucks, i may need to learn how to install carpet :).

Dresser Love

2010-06-10T20:42:00.001-04:00

Oh, was it years ago I told you I got an awesome dresser off craigslist that I was going to refinish? I had my idea in mind before I even picked up the pine-topped, crackle covered, country dresser from the house I was buying it from. I put it in my garage, and then {let the excuses begin} winter hit, and of course it was too cold to go out, and then the holidays, and then I found out I was pregnant and was too tired, and when I started feeling better, it was spring, and I was too busy with the kids, and then end of the year school stuff. . . . aaaannd then my hubs gave me an ultimatum. . . "If it's not done by the end of May, it is going to the dump." Well, turns out that was all I needed to get my tush into gear (He should have said that about 6 months ago when I bought it, haha). It was finished by the end of May, I went to put the drawers in place, loving my finished product AND. . . . the top drawer wouldn't fit. In fact none of the drawers would fit in that top spot. It must be the warm weather, because I'm pretty sure that wasn't a problem before, but I really wanted it to be a cute AND functional piece of furniture. So, the hubs stepped in, and trimmed down the tops of each drawer so they all slide in and out with ease. We just touched up the paint, dusted it off and brought it to our room tonight. I have been laying on my bed trying to blur out the mess of mismatched furniture around it because it adds such a regal touch to our room. I need a matching one now to replace our other, now sad and droopy looking, dresser. There are so many wonderful details I didn't notice or expect until I got working on it. Fun little holes and details that give it just the right amount of character. Oh, and don't get me started on how much I LOVE this stain with poly combine. It's a dream! I was worried it would be hard to get even and the finish turned out silky and smooth. I must say though, I had decided when I started (after seeing a table of my sister in laws) that I would try for a bit of an uneven finish to it. I know it seems like a weird idea, but there is a depth that that sort of finish creates that I am adoring right now. So, without further ado. . the dresser that took about 9 months to birth. It sure does fill my room with warmth :) I think this new arrival of mine {the baby} has taken less of a toll than this piece of furniture!

And the AFTER......

Don't you just love those little holes? Well, now I have a lot more furniture in my room that need the boot or a good creative eye to get it up to par with this piece of furniture or it may just drive me crazy, and no one needs a crazy pregnant lady around ;)

P.S. Next on my list of things to finish is the girls dresser, for which, I have already purchased a fun raspberry pink, so I am hoping to knock that out this weekend!

Fruits of my Labor

2010-06-09T13:38:00.000-04:00

Can i just tell you, I am no green thumb. I am quite possibly the worst gardener of all time. I am no good at watering, i never prepare the soil the right way, and i never research the plants I am putting in. Some things turn out no matter how bad you screw them up, and other things wither and die in a days time. You may wonder why i even do it. It just gets me every spring, i feel a need to plant. Not so much of a need that I actually figure out how to do it. I just plop some stuff in the ground that I dont want to have to run out to the grocery store for during the summer, and hope it takes. Last year, i was so excited to plant strawberries, because everyone in our house likes them, and eats them. Those two little starter plants produced about 3 strawberries each and the ants ate them half gone before we could even pick them! It was a dissapointment to say the least. But those little plants are perenials, much to my suprise, and those little guys reproduced into more than a dozen strawberry plants. It was taking up so much of our garden bed, i had to transplant them (which i was sure would kill them) and the just took to their new spot in the garden and started bearing fruit! For the last week or so we have been able to go out every day and gather up a bowl full of fresh, juicy red strawberries. It is definatly a must have in your garden and definitely worth the $6 paid for both the starter plants. Just be patient during the first year, and make sure you have plenty of room to let those guys stretch their legs during the off season, and you will be pleasently suprised!

Oh My, How Spring flies by!

2010-05-11T14:11:00.000-04:00

Woah, can I just say, I haven't forgotten about my blog. Time has just gotten away from me this season! Although i have been missing my project time, and my blogging time, I have been trying to keep my priorities in order, so it has been put to the side for the last couple of months while my hubs pushes through to finish his master's degree (woohoo!). But don't think that the gears have stopped turning. I have been eyeing all sorts of great little projects that I am itching to get my fingers on. And I have just found out that our little bun in the oven is a baby girl, so you can bet I will be starting some fun baby accessories soon! Here is a little photoshop trick I picked up to do some modern pop art (and a nice shot of my 19 week prego belly):

It was so simple! If you have Elements, just make a duplicate layer of your photo, change the hue to whatever color you want showing most, and then vamp up the saturation to the highest level you want. Continue the process saving each new color creation as a new photo (make sure not to save over the original) and then place them all on a new blank page however you want. I went with 4 duplicates, but i have seen it done with any number of photos, and even different photos of the same subject. It was fun to play around with!

How to throw a Teeny-Tiny Tea Party

2010-04-28T15:04:00.000-04:00

My youngest just turned two, and for her birthday party we had a Teeny-Tiny Two year old Tea Party. The guest list was as tiny as the items served. Because really, how many two year olds could you keep entertained at a tea party? So she chose her 3 best friends: her older sister, her older brother, and her friend from up the street.

Some Must Haves at a Tiny Party:

A Tiny Table

A Tiny Tea Set

Tiny Dishes

Tiny Foods

(Tiny pizza slices, mini granola bites, baby carrots, mini fruit leather, mini muffins, and mini chunks of cheese).

And a very tiny Birthday Cake

(two oreos frosted together and decorated), with a tiny scoop of ice cream (made with a mellon baller)

Then get ready for BIG smiles

(well, i promise the birthday girl was smiling at one point. . . i just didn't quite capture it in this picture;) ).

The Evolution of a Kitchen

2010-04-16T11:10:00.002-04:00

When we moved into this house, there were some awesome bits and pieces we loved, but it was like an unfinished puzzle. There were beautiful light fixtures, fans and paint colors in some places but others were just stark white, with brass fixtures and weird flooring. It was like someone has started on some great ideas, but wasn't around long enough to fill it all in. Our kitchen was one place that had a lot going for it. Great dark cherry cabernet cabinets, stainless steel appliances, a high end, huge sink with great modern antique fixtures. . . mixed with white roll out linoleum floor, white walls, a very ugly kitchen pendulum light, and the kicker, royal blue formica countertops.

Every time i would show someone the house they would see those countertops glowing in the bland kitchen and say, "woah, those are some countertops." Within the first week we were there, we did our best to sort of camouflage the blue. We knew, after just buying a house, countertops were not in our budget so we looked for a color scheme that wouldn't enhance the blue, or make it stand out more, but just blend it to an unnoticeable state.

We put in new flooring. {15x15 self-stick tile, installed on the diagonal}

Painted the walls a pewter color. Added a few rusty orange accents around the room for a complimentary addition.

Then added a tan backsplash.

We actually were really impressed with ourselves, and those countertops just blended in (enough) for us. Until lately. We started to wonder if we were ever going to do something about the blue. We tried to put our penny-pinching heads together and looked into cement countertops, painting the countertops, Ikea countertops. But it all came up the same. Not quite good enough for the kitchen parts that were there and higher quality. It wasn't like painting a countertop in a tiny galley kitchen with old cabinets and mismatched appliances, this kitchen was a finished piece, something that could actually be a good selling point if ever we needed to resell, and all it was missing was granite. I mean, lets be honest, no one is going to jump up and down to see a house listing that says "formica-painted-to-look-like granite countertops". We needed to finish the job someone started before us and make this a great little gourmet kitchen. So seth did his looking around, and found a beyond awesome deal through work, and now. . . we have granite. Are you ready to see these after photos?? Here ya go. . .

I just love the neutrality of it all!

I really don't want to put anything back on the countertops, my dining room table is a disaster, i just love the minimal look of these sturdy stone counters. (Except for my brownies, that i of course always stick on a pedestal dish when they are done baking, haha--okay, you caught me, i just did it for the photo, i thought it would look better than a half-eaten pan of brownies on the stove.)

It was not cheap, nor easy (there was a lot of travel to find the right granite, and we pulled our old counters off ourselves to save some $$) but nothing is cheap when it comes to countertops it was a steal of a deal that no home or kitchen center could have touched, and far less laborious for us than cement or paint. I feel like this new countertop has been a bit like a pregnancy. At first we were just really excited. Then after a bit, we were a little nervous about all the permanency of it, and if we could handle it, and about the time it was totally overdue, and we were wondering if it would ever happen, we were very sure we were ready. . . and couldn't wait for it them to finally be in our home. We brought our backsplash down 6 inches, which, let me just say, saved us about $300.

And it really gives our countertops more space to not have the lip of countertop going up the wall. So finally our kitchen is complete. . . almost. . . we still have that ugly brass light dangling above our kitchen table. It can't be long now before it gets the axe!

Easter Clothes, and Some Great News

2010-04-12T06:05:00.001-04:00

I had all the intentions of making my girls wonderful, frilly, pastel-colored Easter dresses. Then, my oldest said, "I want to buy one from the store." I thought it would be easy to convince her once I showed her some designs. Not too long after her declaration I found out I'm pregnant, and with that, it was decided. . . Easter dresses from the store! We are all very excited about our new little addition, baby number four, due at the beginning of October. I am glad to be getting back some more energy to complete some of the projects waiting for me in the garage. But, i am definitely moving at a slower pace as far as projects (and house cleaning, and laundry, and cooking. . . .) are concerned, but I won't be able to resist making the girls some spring or summer dresses soon, because I have a lot of good ideas. But, as for Easter, it didn't happen, but The Children's Place had some pretty sharp looking duds, and they turned out pretty cute I'd say :).

Easter Jammies

2010-04-08T21:19:00.000-04:00

I don't usually think of Easter as a time when you need to have special occasion jammies. But I have a friend who gives me her daugthers hand-me-downs for my 2 year old and they are always filled with these cuter than cute handmade boutique style dresses. This time around there was the cutest pair of spring/summer jammies that I LOVE.

Adorable, right?

I kept thinking they were so cute, it would be fun for my oldest daugther to have some to match. I knew with my husbands busy schedule there wouldn't be much time before easter to make a good by-myself fabric store trip, so I was giving up on the idea. But it kept naggin at me until i remembered that she also gave me a couple of yards or coordinating fabric (which she had actually made into crib sized top sheets, but my kids don't use top sheets) So, I thought I would put it to better use than sitting in the linen closet forever, and try to mimick her cute little boutique jammies (I know, i'm making clothes out of linens now. . . it's getting out of hand, haha!).

Mine version is definitely not as good as the original, but I tried to get in all the little details that made the outfit so unique.

I couldn't leave the boy out of the easter jammie fun. . . recognize that fabric? I had just enough for some jammie shorts, and matched it with a $5 Tshirt from walmart.

It was so fun to have them all cute and springy for easter morning, with their crazy bed-hed, and fancy little jammies for their easter egg hunt. It was all I had hoped for ! Thanks Amanda for my free spring jammies and great ideas ;)

Look at them so excited ;)

A Builders Dream. . .and a Mothers

2010-04-02T09:38:00.000-04:00

My friend sent me a link to this blog called Knock off Wood. It is awesome, the stuff that lady makes some awesome stuff. Not only does she show it on her blog, but she gives you the plans, all cute and drawn out, with measurements and amounts. We love to build stuff. . . let me rephrase. . . my husband loves to build stuff. I love that he does, and I love to tell him what to build and then help with the finishing touches. Coming up with the plans is really half the battle. We have been talking about making an outdoor picnic table for a while but haven't really put the gears in motion. Yesterday I sent him a link for this cute little kids picnic table. And without a word, he came home with lumber (and some wonderful composite decking boards, that won't splinter, or need to be painted, stained, or power washed. . . ever, for the top and seats.) Then with plans in hand, he watched the kids outside, and zipped this thing out all while i was making dinner. We changed the plans slightly to make the table top bigger to accommodate more plates on the table, and then today i noticed she added a new post with a bigger picnic table! We are definitely going to be returning to that site for more projects. I am thinking maybe a farmhouse bed frame for our bed ;)

don't mind miss nearly two taking off her pants in the middle of everything :)

Doesn't this totally make your heart melt?

It's finished! I just need to do my "finishing touch" work, which is painting all those non surface pieces of wood. . . I need some color ideas to go with the grey top boards, any suggestions?

This will certainly get lots of use, seeing as how right now my kids just plop their food right on the deck floor and eat away!

A Great Deal

2010-03-26T10:07:00.000-04:00

I am not too much of a sucker for a great deal. . . I mean, I love a good deal, but I don't want to buy junk just for the sake of a good price tag. But oh boy, I couldn't let this one slide. Sometimes a good deal is just so good, you figure it is worth the lesson learned if it turns out to be cheaper than a Kmart ironing board ;). So, i suppose my lesson will be learned, or rewarded, when my knew 7 pc. stainless steel Farberware Knife set shows up next week from pfaltzgraph.com. I got an email from a friend who gets deal updates from pinchingyourpennies.com and as I was glancing through I couldn't help but stop on what I thought was the best deal on there. . . a $3, yes that's right $3 Farberware knife set (Actually the best deal I thought was a 15 pc. Kitchenaid set, that was marked from $120 down to $12 with the coupon code, but apparently everyone else did, since it was sold out, so i settled for the second option). I will admit it is no professional set, but if you saw what we are currently working with, it is a definite upgrade. The original price was $45, which if you look for knives, you will note it is not high on the price spectrum, but heck, $3. . . I'm giving it a try. So if anyone else is interested. Go to Pfaltzgraff.com Search for the Farberware 7 pc. Knife Set, and use the coupon code: MAR2010 to get an extra 40% off, and there you have your $3 knife set. Or use the code for something else! I will let you know if I love it or hate it when it arrives, so this is a bit of a to be continued, but how could i not share a 40% off coupon code to Pfaltzgraff that may expire before I get it (the code expires March 31st)?

Happy Shopping!

Bold Colors, Awesome Furniture

2010-03-24T12:35:00.000-04:00

I was purusing my local craigslist to find some cheap furniture gems when i stumbled onto a link for an etsy site that had the cutest shabby chic, and french country furniture in the bold whimsical colors. The site is Serendipity Chic Decor. I was loving it. Teal salt and pepper shakers? I mean, it doesn't get much better than that, I just had to share!

After looking at these cute things, I am am certain that one of the dressers in my house will soon be a bright bold purple :)

Easy Peasy Bloomers

2010-03-22T05:00:00.003-04:00

I'm BACK! Sorry for the long break. It was a busy one, filled with visitors, trips out of town, and exceptional weather. And, due the the warm front that headed our direction, it was time to break out the shorts and skirts for a few days. My daughter loves to wear skirts in the spring and summer, and once upon a time I was near obsessive about finding my daughter some bloomers. As any of you with girl will know, after 24 mos. they rarely sell dresses with bloomers attached. But seeing as most kids in 2T and up still want to wear dresses to romp around in and need some diaper or undie coverage. I couldn't find any, so i started making them. Lots of them. I thought, I should sell them, because I know other people have this problem. That idea lasted for about a month, and i realized that they aren't cost effectvie item to sell. Anyhoo. . . long story short. Now that my daugther is getting older, I still want her to have bloomers on, but she is too old for the frilly ones i used to make. I found a great way to reuse her old tattered end of the winter leggings to make great big girl bloomers. I love how comfy they are, how they are snug against her leg, and how they make great summer pajama shorts too!

WHAT YOU NEED:

A pair of old knit leggings

(ours are usually, like these, really stained and beyond salvage for any younger kids use)

Scissors

Sewing Machine

HOW YOU DO IT:

First measure how long you want the bloomers to be, i just eyeball it, and cut the legs off of your leggings.

Set aside the top of the leggings, that now look like shorts. With the bottom leg pieces, cut the hem off the bottom, and then cut the legs open, so they lay flat. Cut each leg into 4 1-1/2 inch strips.

Sew 4 of the strips together, end to end. And repeat with the other 4, so you have two long, uneven looking strips. (when you are doing this part, if your leggings are particularly ratty (like mine were), you could use the wrong side, if they are solid color, or cut your strips around the dirty knees or any holes.

Now your ready to make some ruffles for the bottom of the bloomers. Take one strip and fold it in half, so the seams are inside the ruffle. Line the raw edge of the ruffle up with the raw end of the shorts (you don't need to turn the shorts inside out, sew the ruffle to the top and then it will fold down when you are done so the raw edge is on the inside). Start one inch from the end of the strip and start bunching and sewing. Just make sure you are only bunching the ruffle, and not the shorts underneath.

When you are about on inch from where you started sewing, stop. Pull the shorts away from the machine and cut off any extra fabric, leaving one inch loose on this end as well, so like the picture you now have unsewn fabric on both the start and end of the ruffle and a small space left to sew it to the shorts. unfold those two loose ends and place the wrong sides together. This will feel a little akward, but it's pretty quick when you get the hang of it.

Sew the wrongs sides of the ruffle ends together and fold them back in line with the rest of the ruffle.

Once you have folded it back line the raw edge of the ruffle up with the raw edge of the shorts and bunch it together to fit in the space you have left, to finish it off. Repeat all these steps on the other leg openining.

Voila! Easy Peasy (as my kindergartener would say) bloomers. Here are the ones I have made this way. It takes no time at all and you can make them in all different lengths to fit what you need!

So go out and enjoy the spring air and the playgrounds, because now you're covered ;).

An End of Winter Break

2010-03-09T11:02:00.000-05:00

Okay, so i haven't forgotten to blog, i have just been swamped with things. We are getting some new countertops and so the prep and planning for that has taken a lot of time, but when they get installed i will be excited to show off the finished result. We are also taking a little time off for some quality family time, so i will be back to blog next week with some great projects and hopefully soon, better kitchen countertops :) Hope everyone is blessed with a little sunshine this week, we have gotten some, and it was just the taste i needed to get out of my winter funk!

Back to the Machine

2010-03-03T09:56:00.001-05:00

It has been a while since i have sewn anything for my girls. They really haven't needed anything. But i always love a good dress designing challenge. A good friend brought me some old skirts she didn't want to see if i could make anything for the girls out of them. I was loving this dark blue violet fabric with lavender flowers. I sat right down and started cutting away at it. I used an A-line dress of my daughters for the basic pattern, and then i asked my daughter what she was hoping the dress would look like. She wanted some ruffles and longer sleeves. And I had in my head that I wanted an oversized flower on the front like some awesome dresses I saw on Shabby Apple (a great dress website).

So, with that in mind, i made this:

Into This:

Of, course not without having to redo the neckline so her head could fit through. But now in the back it has this sweet over-sized keyhole, with ruffle detail that I just love and may not have been there if it had fit the first time ;).

She's wearing it around with her fancy dress up Cinderella shoes. I think that means she likes it :)

Why I love Craigslist

2010-03-01T10:39:00.001-05:00

Because only through craigslist can you get a whole dining room set--table, 6 chairs, hutch and buffet for $75:

And then turn it into this:

I just got a dresser that I am dying to get my hands on. . . i just need the temperature to get above 40 degrees again :).

A Mouthwatering Blog

2010-02-24T13:55:00.000-05:00

I know food has nothing to to with projects per se, but since cooking always turns into a project for me it seems relevant. I had to share this blog that I am in LOVE with. It is called My Kitchen Cafe. I mean, i really think this picture above says it all. Don't you just want to dive into that carmel corn? That is what she posted today, and i am sure it is delectable. I know this without trying it Because the author, Melanie, and I must have the same palette. There has been nothing, on her blog, that I have not wanted to make again. I don't know how she does it, but she has great regular updates with mouthwatering pictures and vivid descriptions. She has a plethora of recipes in her archives. Everything I have made from there has been so easy, with common ingredients that I either already have on hand or that I would actually know where to locate in a grocery store. It has become an extension of my much worn family recipe book for no fail recipes. I just couldn't keep it to myself.

Some of my favorites are:

Chicken Corn Chowder with Sweet Potatoes

Homemade Pizza

Magic in the Middle Cookies

Manicotti

Hot Hoagies

Okay, really this list could go on and on. I just made some to die for blueberry muffins with a lemon sugar topping from there that I can't stop snacking on. It is just the kind of reference I need for my meals, because I just don't have the time to try out a bunch of new recipes without having a good referral for them first. And she has certainly earned my trust in her opinion. I have not tried a bad recipe from her site, yet! Happy meal planning!

More of our Hallway Upgrade

2010-02-22T05:07:00.002-05:00

Remember the laundry room we worked on a few weeks ago. Well, the new flooring in there was all in preparation for the new flooring that was soon to come to our upstairs hallway. It is a high traffic area with really, really light carpeting. The carpet needed to go. We didn't want to spend the money it would take to replace the whole upstairs, and we didn't want to have mismatched carpet butting up against each other either. So, we decided to install hardwood floors. We did it before when we first moved in, in our entryway, and so we knew what we needed and what to expect--a long grueling day (for my husband anyways), and the use of a lot of tools we don't own. Only this time, we used some of the hubby's connections and got the wood flooring for less than half the price we did it for the last time, in about the same amount of space. And we thought we had gotten a pretty good deal for the entryway from some sale flooring at Home Depot. But this current hallway we did for about $280, that includes everything, the pre-finished hardwood, the tool rental. We borrowed alot of the tools we would need from friends which saved us tons. And the prefinished flooring we got from a vendor the hubby knows through working in the lumber industry. My Husband took the whole day Saturday getting it all put in, and it was finished just in time to go to bed. We didn't get to creative with the color or width of boards because we needed it to match the wood floors in the rest of the house, but it sure does add an elegance and a charm to the upstairs. And the hallway looks so much wider. And better yet. . . no more traffic stains, hip hip hooray! Now we just need some paint for the walls. . . I am definitely open to suggestions! Without further ado, here are the before, middle and after pics!

Great Job Honey! Thanks for all the hard work, and for saving me from a life of carpet spot scrubbing!

Friday Fun

2010-02-19T10:43:00.001-05:00

Okay today's post is a bit of a hodge podge, I'll admit. But only because i had two great, but unrelated things I just couldn't wait to share in two separate posts. I was getting some great feedback on the jewelry board I posted a while back, and my friend Cindy (of Cranberries and Capers) was the person who gave me the wonderful idea. So, since it was her birthday a few weeks ago, and I was making a trip to visit her, I decided to make her a jewelry board of her very own! We had lots of fun going through all of her great jewelry and hanging it on the board. It matched her room perfectly {phew!}. I did hers a bit differently, and varied the shape, making it long and skinny, more of a portrait layout and I decided to try distressing the edges of her frame a bit since she has a more rustic style. Here are a few pics of it hanging in it's new home (which is much classier than it's previous home. . . my garage!):

Also, just for fun, my kids and I decided to get rid of some of the socks that have been long overtaking our sock bin. I really have a hard time throwing out clothes that are not completely worn out or stained beyond repair. So, we re-purposed them into sock puppets! Remember those scraggly little things we kids of yesteryear used to make out of tube socks? We got out what craft supplies and loose buttons we had and made one for each of the kids. I was disappointed that we didn't have any yarn for hair, but when i realized we had pipe cleaners I thought I would attempt to make a 'do that would work, and it was so much better. Because you can't do this with yarn:

They chose out their own style and parts and I, in a whirlwind of hot glue globs and excitement (theirs, and mine, of course), glued the parts on where they wanted them. They fell asleep with them, played with them, made little houses and accessories for them. Those socks may have only been worn a few times before the inevitable disappearance of each mate, but we surely have gotten our money's worth out of them!

The $30 Entry Table

2010-02-17T05:00:00.003-05:00

Have you ever looked at entry tables? I have, and most they are more than pricey. Even at my beloved hometown Marshalls I need at least a Benjamin to get a cute little occasional table. But they add so much style and class to a space, and give more room for fun decorating. I gave up on putting an entry table in my foyer and instead painted a bench I got at a garage sale. This was long before my refinishing days and I would have never attempted a table. But my sis, has been working on her entryway the last couple of weeks and keeping me up to date with her progress. I just loved what she did with this table. . . and for a steal! She found this table at Savers for $15:

Then she bought some cherry stain and refinished the top. She painted the bottom black, with some paint she had on hand, and then splurged on a great oil rubbed bronze knob for $5 (because why not, when you are saving your self $100 bucks at least in the end). And the end result is a beautiful $30 french country table with a modern edge. I am always amazed at what some paint and TLC for a piece of furniture can do.

And don't you just love those cute family profiles hanging on the wall? You can't see in this picture but they are all hanging from a rod with strips of fabric. It is a knock off she made from a picture frame set you can buy at Pottery Barn. . . yet another great cheap decor idea from the big sis. You can see where I learn all my tricks! And, I've got 8 more big sisters, just as thrifty and stylish as she is, to bum ideas from. Thanks for letting me share Adrienne, and for giving me some good ideas for the dresser awaiting some care in my garage.

Little Memos

2010-02-15T09:24:00.003-05:00

Does anyone else have little elves that come and steal every spare scrap of paper available for little arts and crafts projects? My daughter's teacher must seriously think we are crazy because I am always sending in notes on little scraps of handouts that she has sent home. She is probably wondering why i don't invest in a notepad. It is not that i don't buy them, it is that when i do, they disappear and I can never find it when i need it or if i do find it there is one giant letter from the alphabet on each page. There must be something exciting to a 5 year old about having all that paper stuck together to write one little thing on each page and flip back and forth.

Either way, I do need something in my kitchen to write little memos to myself. And since I have an ample amount of chalk thanks to the big mama chalkboard in my kitchen, i decided to make a little chalkboard baby, to set on my counter. I went to JoAnns to see what i could find and as i was in the wood aisle, i saw a few cheap little nick knacks that reminded me of a frame these clever girls at Shanty2Chic came up with. So I bought some similar stuff, and got to working.

I ran into a few glitches. The chalkboard I bought was a poor excuse for a chalkboard, seeing as how chalk didn't actually show up on it, and for a buck and change, you get what you pay for I suppose. Then to make a simple project worse my chalkboard paint ran out, and it really was such a small space I didn't want to go out and buy a whole quart for it. So instead I had this great idea to let it sit on my counter unfinished, and get in the way of everything i was cooking, for about a month. That is, until my daughter broke it because I was too lazy to use a screw to keep the post on the base (even though my husband told me i should, and i said, no this glue holds anything . . . i was wrong, sorry honey). I used only E6000 to keep in in place which works well for it just sitting there, but apparently does not withstand the force of a 20 month old in an application such as this. So it was fix it or flop it time. . . and I gave it one last go. I pulled out what I had during nap time and finished her up. So with black craft paint, some satin spray poly, and a screw in the bottom I now have a usable little memo chalkboard. (I was pretty excited at how well the black paint and satin poly work for a chalk surface. You could make a chalkboard out of a piece of wood with that know-how). So, finally my big mama chalkboard has a little baby on my kitchen counter, congrats big chalkboard, I hope you baby works better now. . . that is, until it too goes missing.

This won't help with notes to the teacher, but it will definitely improve the amount of little scrap notes I have lost in the stack of papers on my counter :)

P.S I've been featured today on TIP JUNKIE for the Jewelry Board. Go on over and Check it out!

And the Winner is. . .

2010-02-13T00:39:00.000-05:00

Thanks for all those who have joined the blog, and who entered the Cranberries and Capers $15 gift certificate giveaway! It was so fun to see all the comments.

Without further ado, the winner is. . .

AMY

who said:

"I love the cupcake pacifier clips...I put a link to the giveaway on my facebook and I am now a follower of your blog! Please enter me into the giveaway!"

Amy, you can email me at projectprowler@gmail.com to collect your prize.

Ironing Board Cover

2010-02-11T10:00:00.000-05:00

Let's be truthful. . . I really don't iron. I just buy wrinkle free shirts for my husband, and try to get my clothes out of the dryer fast if I really care to have things not wrinkly. But a few wrinkles add character and wisdom right? Maybe that only works with faces. My lack of ironing is why it took me 5 years of marriage before I decided it was time to invest in an ironing board. And invest I did. . . it was twenty buckeroo's for my wobbly, horribly patterned Kmart ironing board. Maybe $20 wouldn't seem like so much if it were cute, or even somwhat sturdy, but it is as cheaply made as it looks. Every time I use it I kick myself for spending money on something that has the quality and style of a dollar store item, but since I use it so rarely, i don't kick myself too often ;).

Why am I rambling about my ironing board, you may ask? Well, now that my laundry room is taking shape I am realizing that I can't stand the ironing board cover anymore. I can't bare to put that thing back in my nice crisp, clean space. While perusing Marshalls the other day, I found some great ironing board covers, but really, do i need to make my $20 investment a $30 one? I actually would have caved if any of them had matched, but since they didn't i decided to take matters into my own hands. I had some cute fabric and thought it may be enough, and it was just barely perfect.

So, to keep it sweet and simple, i laid the fabric out, put the old cover on top (my current cover has a drawstring, so it was easy to un-gather and lay flat). I cut out a new cover, pinned it with the edges folded under directly onto the old cover, leaving just the edge holding the drawstring exposed (it gets gathered underneath anyways).

I did a quick zig-zag stitch. . .

. . . and then gathered it back around my ironing board.

I LOVE it.

It is now crisp, and clean to match the laundry room. And I think I have ironed more in this week than I have in the last 6 months. Now, i can be at peace with my wobbly little ironing board. Even though the little rubber stoppers on the bottom fall off every time I pull it out of the laundry closet, and even though it rocks unsteadily with each swoop of the iron. . . it looks good and with an ironing board that rarely gets used, looks are all that matters.

P.S. The Giveaway isn't over yet, you still have until Friday at midnight to enter so don't miss out!

GIVEAWAY time!! GIVEAWAY CLOSED

2010-02-08T14:59:00.000-05:00

It's Monday and I am stoked. . . see I am so excited that I am using words only 1980's surfers use! There are two reasons for why I am all giddy. One is Kim, the author and creative mind at the Twice Remembered cottage, featured the Jewelry Board as one of her favorite "Make Your Monday" entries from last week. You can see her post here, along with all sorts of other wonderful ideas from all these nifty mloggers (mom-bloggers) out there.

And the second reason is Cindy, the maker of all things handcraftedly cute at Cranberries and Capers (the etsy shop I was raving about a few weeks ago here) has generously donated a $15 gift certificate to be used in her Etsy Shop. She has everything from pacifier clips, to headbands, to baby barrettes, to great hair things for mommy (I know because I wear them). You can have up to 3 entries, so don't delay! This deal is so good, I am keeping the giveaway open through Friday at Midnight so enter, and tell your friends!

So, here is how you enter:

1. Become a follower of The Project Prowler*

2. Go to Cranberries and Capers and tell me your favorite item.

3. Post a link on your blog or facebook to this giveaway.

Leave a comment stating which of these you have done (and a link to your post if applicable) and start crossing your finger, because the winner of this little item will be lucky indeed!

*just so there is no confusion, followers are not automatically entered in the giveaway. You must leave a comment as well to be entered.

And even though I can't enter I will tell you some of my recent faves:

Happy Monday,

Valentine Chandelier

2010-02-05T09:52:00.000-05:00

Five steps for an afternoon of fun:

1. Some stiffened felt, a heart pattern, ribbon, hot glue, and some bored kids.

2. With your kids, cut out hearts of various sizes, making at least 4 large hearts to put letters on to spell the word LOVE.

3. Have extra craft supplies/activities nearby for when your kids get tired with how long it is taking you to get everything just perfect.

4. Hang your hearts on your chandelier with ribbons of various lengths:

5. Use the littler felt hearts and extra ribbon to make a little heart garland for around the chain:

Enjoy your family fun afternoon, and sharing the L-O-V-E all through the season!

If you give a Prowler a Project. . .

2010-02-02T21:02:00.000-05:00

The Laundry closet isn't done, but it is looking LOADS {wink, wink} better. We have put the washer and dryer back in and I tackled half the laundry today. So, now that my kids drawers are overstuffed with clothes again, i can take a few guilt-free minutes to share the progress. This project is really starting to feel more like one of those cutsie Mouse and Cookie stories, you know those books, If you give a Mouse a Cookie, a Pig a Pancake, a Moose a Muffin. . . I have found myself turning into one of those needy little animals. Having the laundry closet looking so regal, with it's fancy flooring and rich walls, is really getting me excited for the wood floors. So, after we (and when I say we I mean my husband) got the tile finished, I looked at those cheaply painted, scuffed white walls and thought they needed some color. Of course, my feelings on the matter were not strong enough for me to want to drag all three of my kids out to look at paint samples. But as the day wore on, I found myself looking through our paint extras and by nap time I was setting up to paint the laundry closet Dusted Indigo. . a nice dark blue. My little guy helped the progress along, and I finished it up in time for my husband to replace the appliances before he went to bed.

And once the walls were blue I wanted some white containers for my shelf, and since I am in a small town, I am a slave to the local Kmart. . .blah. It is tiny, and I am sure after Kmart built it in the 70's they forgot about it, because most the time I feel like I am dusting off their overpriced items before I buy them. Alas, I go there anyways because it is close and convenient. They didn't have any white baskets or bins but they did have some of those clear plastic sweater bins, and I already had one, so I grabbed two more and then I needed some white flat spray paint. . . because that makes everything look better. So, I painted the outside of those for all my cleaning supplies. They still need another coat of white and some labels but I couldn't help but stack things in there to make sure they fit and to get a little snapshot for you all. In mouse and cookie fashion, now that I have my blue laundry closet I need an ironing board to match, and once I have an ironing board to match then I will probably want some vinyl lettering for the space above the shelf. Once the vinyl lettering is on the wall I will probably want a cute little bin for lost socks to go in so they don't end up piling haphazardly on the top of the dryer again. . . and once I have those things done. . . . I will probably want another project to do.

In case you couldn't remember what it looked like before:

Here it is now. . .

Did I mention that my laundry closet is in my upstairs hallway? It is really hard to get a good full view picture So, sorry you will have to settle for seeing the progress in little half pictures :)

Everybody has a little Dirty Laundry

2010-02-01T07:30:00.000-05:00

Everyone may have a little dirty laundry. . . but we have a lot of dirty laundry, and, thanks to this weekend's project, ours is going to stay dirty for another day or so. This weekend my hubby and I. . . .well mostly the hubby. . . started an upstairs hallway makeover. I know, seems weird. . . why the hallway, you ask? It's not that we have exhausted all our other rooms of decorating, no, no, there is still much to do in our house. But our hallway upstairs, from the day we moved in, has been bugging us. The way too white carpet needs to go, the laundry closet is a constant mess from being overstuffed with, well, stuff. And the walls have nicks, smudges, and lack that cozy color that we haven't decided on. But, what we have decided is that we are putting wood floors in the hall, since it is such a high traffic area, and tile in the laundry closet. We were going to take a few hours on Saturday morning to lay down some sticky tile, since really you only see a few inches of the flooring once the washer and dryer are in, but in a last minute decision at home depot, my husband decided to come home with a great deal on ceramic tile. So, he started on that little project neither of us thinking that it would be Monday night before we could put our washer and dryer back in. So with our laundry is piling up to the clouds, and appliance blocking both our linen closet and most of the entrance to our toddlers room, we wait, knowing that in a couple of weeks, we will have a new luxury, cozy, upstairs hallway. Maybe we will need to have a hallway sleepover really spend the time all our hard work deserves.

I don't even want to claim these before pictures:

Yuck. . I know, even seeing just 3 inches of this stained and outdated linoleum every time i opened the laundry closet was enough to bug us into action.

An action shot of the install.

The tile is in and grouted. We still need to put the quarter round in around the baseboards. The hardwoods will butt up against it (hence the extra untiled space) and we clearly need to paint, so if i want to tackle this. . .

. . .any time soon, I need to head to the hardware store for some relaxing laundry color, because my kids are now finding joy in seeing how high they can get their dirty duds to pile. I am pretty sure my son emptied his underwear draw in there. Won't he be surprised when he has to sniff out the clean ones today ;)

Well keep you posted! We are hoping to put the hardwoods in this week, can't wait!

BTW. . . today is my hubby's 31st birthday so Happy Birthday! I am sure all he wants is some clean laundry, right?

I {Heart} Hair Clippies

2010-01-29T10:19:00.000-05:00

Remember this adorable picture with my open toilet in the background {we are trying out 2000 flushes, not a bad product, my kids love the blue water. . . but i digress. . .}? See that cute little hair clip? My friend emailed me this link to the cutest hair clip tutorial over at The Purl Bee. We are going to get together to do them, but i had a few scraps of felt and i couldn't resist trying just one. It turned out pretty cute. It makes me excited to get some better felt in some springy colors so that i can have some to match more outfits. I will just say, i LOVE making clippies. It has opened up a whole new world of hair doing for my girls by being able to make bows, flowers, and now. . felt clips! It is nice to have a few supplies on had to whip up a few clips when you feel like your want your daughters outfit to have an extra umph (or your own!).

Speaking of clippies. . .I have a friend (well, she's really more like a sister) who started making clippies about a year ago, and where i just dabble here and there, she seriously became an expert. She makes, THE. CUTEST. CLIPPIES. They are better than a good deal. . . they are a GREAT deal. I am the queen of cutting corners and i am often realizing her clips are better deals than even making them myself sometimes (and hers are way better than mine). She is a very meticulous person to begin with, but each of her clippies are made with love and great attention to detail. She has been featured on numerous websites and in a few magazines, both online and print. She is currently being featured in Child Style magazine for her oh-so-adorable owl paci-clips that have created quite a stir in the mommy-made business world. Her clippies are being sold in boutiques around the globe, and to add to her great deals, she is even offering free shipping to her blog followers. So don't delay in checking out her etsy shop, or her blog to see all the new things. . . I certainly have my eye on some cute valentines day clippies!

90 pecent off!

2010-01-27T07:00:00.000-05:00

Let me just start by saying today was a bad project day. I sat down during quiet time to do a few little projects i had been itching to do, and one by one they all went down the tubes. . . not without draining all my usable time first. So at the end of the day, when i finished the piled high stack of dishes I had neglected all day, while my kids ran around the main level asking me for a treat everytime they ran through the kitchen, thinking if i had only done this eariler. . . I went out to the garage to throw a quick coat of spray paint over a 90 perecnt off christmas clearence wagon that i couldn't pass up. The outcome certainly brightened up my mood, but not before this little face had. . .

(I will blog Tmrw about her cute little clippy)

So, a few sprays of my new favorite spray paint color {oil rubbed bronze}:

Plus my 90 percent off Christmas wagon:

Equals:

A Bit of Warmth

2010-01-25T14:04:00.000-05:00

This time of winter always has me thinking about spring. This seems to be the time where there is just enough of a break from the fridgid winter temps that all the snow dissapears and I always get fooled into thinking spring is just around the corner. When, in reality, in New England the warm weather is far, FAR away. But i get on a train of thought none the less. And my train of thought goes like this: Spring makes me think of Easter, and Easter makes me think of sweet pale colors like those from little tulip buds or cherry blossoms. And the beautiful spring palette gets me thinking of Easter Dresses. And when i think of Easter dresses, I get all giddy thinking of my sweet little threesome all dolled and slicked up. It is hard to not think of all they ways they can match each other, or all the different styles and periods they can portray. Last year I got an image in my head of some vintage looking outfits like children in the 1950 might have worn. That proper little time period when after the town easter egg roll, all the kids would run to a candy shop and ask the man behind the counter (who would naturally be wearing red and white stripes, an apron and one of those little rectangular white hats) for giant swirly lollipops. Then of course, without staining their prim, crisp clothes they would sing and lick their rainbow lolly's while their bobby-socked feet would skip down the incredibly safe and low-traffic Main street back to the house. Can't you just picture it? I couldn't find anything like it in the stores. Well, i found something wonderful for my boy, boy things are much easier to buy than to sew. But the girls i had to design it myself. Here was the outcome:

I was either so impressed with myself last year, or the depths of winter funk is getting to my head, but I am thinking of trying to design them something this year. This takes some prep, so it makes it okay that i am easter dress "shopping" in January :). I have done quite a bit more sewing since so I made those dresses to i am feeling up for more of a challenge. So in my spring state of mind i went purusing through chasing-fireflies (it's like my PotteryBarn, for girls dress ideas--love it, but can't buy it, so may as well try to make it) to see some of their so-sweet-you-could-eat-them dresses. Here are my faves, You guys tell me what you think:

How can something so shapeless look so darn adorable? I dont know what it is about this hot pink trash bag that i love so much, but it really is so striking and bold, and not like any other little girl dresses i see, that i just can't help but like it.

This i just love and my oldest wasn't as excited about it as I am. . . I am hoping she changes her mind. I love the two layers, and how thin that organza is throughout the middle and how rich it looks with the ruffles and rosettes. And now that I know how to make rosettes, I could defnintely make this.

This looks like a Juliet dress. And what little girls doesn't want to look like a Shakesperean princess?

I seriously think i could make this one out of burlap and paint the circles on. I love the metallic against the coarse textured tan fabric.

I heart fancy dresses on little girls. There is nothing more hugable than a little girl in airy, subtle, tulle ruffles.

So this one is obviously for winter, but i could see it in some light whispy cotton candy pink chiffon, with dark pink rosette around the neck... i just can't get enough rosettes.

Jewelry Dilemma's: SOLVED!

2010-01-21T22:41:00.000-05:00

This is my dresser this morning. . . and every morning for that matter. It is dusty, i can hardly see the top, and more often than not it is littered with stuff. It is really the only usable surface in our room right now because we only have one dresser (Soon to be two because i have a great craigslist gem sitting in my garage waiting to have a makeover). I constantly mull over what to do with this mess, but the real clutter is all the jewelry. Don't get me wrong, it isn't too much jewelry, it is too much for my containers. Everyone of those containers on that dresser holds jewelry. Even that poor little picture has become a holding zone, because, well, it was set on the dresser, and it had a rim, and so it qualified for something to plop my stuff in. I really need to dust and i can't do that until i am ready to really clean, so i need a solution. I am currently on a big, bold jewelry kick and there is just never the right container for that--although my sister was reminding me of the Caboodles. . . that is a container that actually might work, but since I'm not thirteen anymore and it's not the early 90's I don't think I should own one anymore. So when my besty called me the other day and was mentioning a jewelry board she had seen hanging in the bathroom of one of her friends houses, my gears started turning and i couldn't let the idea go. What could be better than decor and storage all in one? The next thing i knew I was making a B- line to the fabric store to get something cute to be framed! I love it so much that i need to share step by steps with you. I actually did three at once, because my daughter needed one ;), and my son wanted to help with a project , so we turned his into a picture board and they helped with what they could. Not all steps are suitable for little children but with close supervision there is a lot they can help with.

WHAT YOU NEED*:
Frame

Board of some sort (cork, wood, i used soundboard {the stuff that goes behind drywall to make soundproof rooms}), cut to fit inside the frame

Fabric

Paint

Nails, Push Pins, or Tacks

Hot Glue AND E6000 craft glue

*This little side note goes for all my projects--I put what i use but be sure to see what you can use or substitute with stuff you already have at home so you don't have to buy supplies. If you have wood, laying around than no need to buy cork board, try to innovate so that the project costs less. This project only cost me about $5 because I worked with what i had!

1. Prep work: Paint frame (if needed). I spray painted mine with Krylon's Oil Rubbed Bronze color. I heart Krylon brand spray paint, the ease with which it goes on is totally worth the extra 2 bucks, and i have used plenty of the cheap stuff to know (although, the cheap stuff does last well enough, you just have to use more to get the same even results, so i figure it all evens out, but by all means buy the cheap stuff if you like it). And make sure your board it cut to fit in the frame.

2. Lay out your fabric and place your board over top. Cut your fabric with an extra 1 1/2 to 2 inch boarder around your board. (My board was distorting the color of fabric i chose so I am doing a white muslin underneath my green upper fabric).

3. Get your hot glue gun ready. My 5 year old helped me glue the edges to the back by taking a stapler and pressing the fabric down so we weren't burning off our fingerprints. While you are doing this be sure if there is a pattern it is lined up evenly with the board before you begin to glue, also make sure you pull it tight so there are no wrinkles in the fabric. Glue all 4 sides leaving the corners I have some pictures and instructions below for these steps.

4. Now you are ready to glue your fabric covered board to your frame. I am loving this E6000 glue, it is tough stuff, so i am using that. glue on the back of the frame and place your board on it. I went ahead and put some heavy books on each side so it would hold tight while the glue was drying.

5. Finally, it is ready for the tacks. I used these awesome little furniture tacks i got at the hardware store. They look antique and they were long enough to push in while leaving enough out to hang something over, and they were sturdy enough to hold all my chunky necklaces. Position the tacks where it will be best for your jewelry and hammer, or push them in place. If you have lighter necklaces you could use cork board and pushpins and then it will be easy to change around if you need to.

6. Hang your jewelry on your new statement piece and let your jewelry decorate your room instead of cluttering it ;).

The $3 Outfit

2010-01-20T11:42:00.000-05:00

I was at Marshalls yesterday and they had tons of clearence stuff. I am loving leggings for my 5 year old, since she is the queen of skirts and it is just too cold for bare legs, so i picked up a couple pair. I found this grey casual pair of $3 i really liked and when we got home i noticed she didn't have much to go with them. Since i am trying to clean out my unnecessary wardrobe items i started rummaging my drawers for something i could turn into a cute 80's baggy T for her to wear with these great leggings {heaven forbid my $3 go to waste}. I found this frumpy black, knit, V neck i got after having my youngest and got to cutting. I used a Tshirt of her's for my guide and (going a few inches longer) I cut a band off the bottom.

I wanted to keep most of that bagginess for the top, but then make a tight band to bring it in at the bottom. So I made the band true size and gathered the bottom of the remaining Tshirt. Then I sewed the bottom back in place creating a nice gathered affect for the T.

After I did that i had her try it on and i marked with chalk where her arms were so i could make the sleeves tight and then i cut off what i needed to around the arm and armpit and angled out as i went towards the bottom of the shirt so it would stay nice and baggy. I sinched the V by weaving a small unsewn piece of scrap material through with a big embrordery needle, and tied it in a knot.

I Just Love it! I only wish clothes for myself were that easy--and cheap ;)

Yesterday's Endeavor

2010-01-19T09:43:00.000-05:00

I have been doing a lot of tinkering with my photoshop elements lately. And yesterday during naptime I had this great idea to make a button for my sidebar. I have had a few requests and kept putting it off because {surprise,surprise} I didn't want to pay someone to make one for me, when all I really needed was the html code to be on the side of it. How hard could that be? I typed in a google search and came up with this tutorial, which seemed simple enough, but there were little problems here and there, extra characters added to the end, or the button showing up ginormous on my sidebar. But 4 hrs later, I think the little details are ironed out. I saved my $15 bucks and I have a button that says "i'm prowler a". Haha, jk, it is meant to be read "I'm a Prowler". I just need to figure out how to make the word prowler blink and we're in business! That will be a project for a different time far far in the future! So, all you readers out there, feel free to grab a button for your own blog or a friends! { If it is having issues, drop a comment, so I can iron them out}It's simple:
1.Highlight the text in the box next to the button and press {ctrl C}
2.On your blog under {Layout}, click {Add Gadget}, and add {third party functionality/HTML code}
3. Put the cursor in the big box and hit {ctrl V} or right click with the mouse in the box and click {paste}.
4. Save and enjoy all my hard work ;)

May the Force Be with You. . .

2010-01-18T14:05:00.000-05:00

I think this cloak just makes this $2.00 clearance Obi Wan Star Wars costume completely authentic. It brings a warmth to my heart to see my little guy wandering around the house looking like he was cut straight from the movie (sullen face and all). I knew when i got this costume from my sister, who bought it at an after halloween clearence sale, that it needed a cloak. I went to JoAnns and scoured their 50% off clearance rack for anything brown or black that would make suitable jedi cloak material. I found a great woven brown that ended up being $1.50 a yard!

I wasn't quite sure where to begin, i dont make many cloaks, as you could imagine, so i needed to get a good visual. When I start to make something without a pattern and I'm having a hard time really seeing it in my head, I draw a simple picture of what I want the end result to be from a couple of angles. Then, i break it down by adding in dotted lines where i would have to sew parts together. It really helps me visualize what i need to cut out. Then i can sketch the different pieces separatly and figure out how many of each piece i would need. Next i make measurements of the person I am making it for. And, with tape measure close by, I am ready to begin cutting. I use my very slim knowledge of sewing {that develops more with everything i sew} and sew the pieces in what i feel like would be the best order {even though sometimes i am wrong :) } I had planned on showing a tutorial but my pictures i took of the process are missing somewhere in this vast computer storage land. So i will show you how i draw out my patterns. . . it is very unprofessional, but it works for me and maybe it can give you some ideas!

Fun with the Kids--Clothespin Magnets

2010-01-15T11:29:00.000-05:00

I am going to admit that I am a fridge Nazi. I only let certain things on my fridge. I told myself if i ever got stainless steal appliances I was never going to cover it all up with papers and magnets. And now i have one, and so i have stuck to my guns. I do use the side of my fridge for a few things here and there since the side is black and it won't cover up any of the silky sheen of the stainless steal. But my magnets are not matching or even that strong and if I am going to have something hanging I want some form of unity for it all. I decided, after an eye-numbing jaunt from blog to blog, to make some magnets. I found myself mesmerized at Twice Remembered with her beautiful home photos and great makeover projects. On Kim's sidebar and in some of studio pictures I saw these cute little jazzed up clothespins and since I couldn't find the post for just the the clothespins (although i am sure it is on there somewhere, i just didn't need more than the snapshot) I just sat down and made some myself. I spent Sunday afternoon with my recently turned 4 year old and 5 year old working on these clothespin magnets and it was so fun. It was something they could all do, and it looked better with their help than if i had done it myself. Before you call them in to help, you will want to do a little adult prep work. My fridge is stainless steel and black, so I sprayed the sides that would be exposed on my clothespins with just one coat of Krylon black spray paint. While they were drying I used a clothespin to measure and cut strips of card stock to fit both of the flat sides of the clothespins I wanted to use. Once all that is done you are ready to bring in the kids for help.

HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED:

Spray Paint (for prep, if you want)

Clothespins (I am using the mini ones)
Scrapbook Paper
Mod Podge/small paint brush to spread it
Magnets (I used Rare Earth Magnets i found on Ebay, they are small and super strong)
E600 craft Glue
Sandpaper

HERE'S HOW YOU DO IT:

1. Once you have done your prep and your kids are ready to help. Get out a paint brush for your little helpers and have them spread a thin layer of Mod Podge on the flat sides of the clothespins. Since we all know a thin layer is all relative when kids are gauging, then you can place the paper on it and wipe any excess, repeat step on the opposite side.

2. Once they are all done, the first ones will probably be dry enough to sand. I was doing this step with my kids trying to make the painted sides and the edges of the paper look nice and worn, and my kids clothespins were turning out so much cuter than mine i gave the job up to them. I was being way to careful and organized about it, but their reckless method of sanding produced much better and authentic results. So they sanded them down for me. ( I wish i had a good close up picture, but my camera broke so i am back to the old one which is quite old and about as many mega pixels as a cell phone, so the pictures lately will be much less detailed until i can get a new camera).

3. After they are sanded down, brush them off with a very damp paper towel and have the kids Mod Podge over the rest of it and set it out to dry. My 4 year old had pretty much given up at this point so after my 5 year old painted the Mod Podge on, i took a clean brush and evened it out while she went on to the next one.

4. Once it is completely dry you can attach you magnets. I think that the magnets they sell at Micheal's aren't worth it. There is nothing worse than a magnet that can't hold anything, or ever worse, slides down your fridge without even having anything to hold. So I did some strong magnet research and found these great strong magnets on ebay in a variety of sizes. Just type Rare Earth Magnets into the search and you will find all sorts of disc and cube shaped little silver magnets that really are strong. A lot of them offered free shipping. I got 50, for $8 that are 1/4 inch, so tiny enough to fit on my clothespin without showing from the front, and it really does hold. So, if you use those, glue them on with the E 6000 craft glue, that stuff is like nails, seriously strong. But don't set them too close together to dry because the magnets will attract each other and it will slide them off the glue before it is dry.

That's it! Cute magnets, fun project, QT with the kids. . . hard to beat that!

A place to call home. . .

2010-01-12T23:47:00.000-05:00

This is my disgusting make up bag. My baby girl got into my dark blue eyeshadow, and everything has been covered in a film of City Night ever since. It has gotten to the point where I am keeping all of the cleaned off makeup by the edge of my sink, just cluttering up my counterspace, so i don't have to put it back in that nasty mess. I really needed a new home for my most used posessions. The more i thought about it, I realized that i never really buy makeup bags. I just stumble upon them. I either get them as a gift, or a bonus with my clinque moisturizer, and i really didn't want to start today. So, I thought, I have all this fabric, I will make a new one. I was starting to worry that it would get dirty and gross, but then i remembered the clear plastic i bought to cover my white kitchen chair cushions and i got excited! I dug it out of the basement and got to work making myself a new, stylish make up clutch, that has a wipeable interior.

HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED:

2 kinds of coordinating fabric (one will only be seen on the inside of the bag so you don't really need it, but if you have extra fabric laying around it is fun when you look inside the bag and see it looking cute in there)

Clear Plasic Vinyl (you can get it by the yard at walmart or joann's)

Sewing Machine

Pins

Velcro (approx 9 inches)

HERE IS HOW I DID IT:

(I tried to be really good at taking pictures so it would be easier to understand, hope it worked)

1. Cut out your first fabric, complimentary fabric, and vinyl each with these amounts and sizes (in inches) shown above.

2. Match up the pieces in each fabric and layer the matching pieces together in this order: on bottom, the clear plastic vinyl. In the middle, the fabric you have chosen for the outer fabric. And on top the fabric you chose for your inner fabric.

3. Sitch across the top (one of the long edges) of the two rectangle stacks and the top (the short 1/2 inch side) of the two triangle looking pieces.

4. When you are done stitching, fold the vinyl over so the raw edge is now between the vinyl and the inner fabric, and the top edge is a nice fold. These folded edges will form the top of your makeup bag.

5. Next start piecing it together on the machine. {I would pin it together first, since there are so many layers, so you don't end up having one bunched up wrong.} Attach one triangular shaped side piece to the short side of the large rectangular front piece. And continue around sewing all the 7 inch side together to make your bag edges. The two rectangle pieces will be opposite each other, and the two triangular shaped pieces will be opposie each other. Make sure all those nice folded edges are facing the same direction.

It will look like this at this point when the top part of the bag is all stitched together.

6. Pin the bottom pieces onto the bag. It takes a bit of working and maybe a bit of trimming to get it on there just right. Now sew along the bottom. When you come to a corner, lift up the presserfoot and needle, and reposision the bag on the next straight edge, making sure to sew from edge to edge so that your corners don't end up with little holes.

7. Turn you bag to the right side and work it into the right shape. Then with a zigzag stitch sew approx 9 inches of velcro just inside the top inner edge.

Nothing to it. . . ahhh, look at how clean that is!

A little tip: The when i was sewing the bag pieces together the vinyl would sometimes stick to my presserfoot, so i really had to force it along sometimes. I suppose a more meticulous sewer would make some bias tape {click here is a tutorial by the Angry Chicken on bias tape edges} to fold over the the edge you are sewing so it glides easier in the machine, but i just forced it along and it didn't even break my needle!

This lovely picture above will show you that my sewing isn't perfect, but when your makeup is all in there and you have a stylin, sturdy bag you don't even think about the little imperfections that may be on it. So, go clean out that crusty makeup bag {you know you all have one too}and make something new for all those things-you-wouldn't-be-stranded-on-an-island-without to go in.

There is Nothing Like The Pitter-Patter of Cutely Dressed Feet

2010-01-11T07:00:00.000-05:00

I have a friend who always has wonderful ideas for me. . and she was showing me the cutest shoes people were selling on etsy wondering if i could make anything of the same sort. I didn't even realize you could make shoes. I had never given it much thought, but the fabrics i was seeing people use for their homemade shoes were soo much cuter and more unique than the mary janes and leather shoes you can buy in the store. So i went looking around online and found this video with a corresponding free pattern. I went to JoAnns, (which happened to have 50% off their clearence fabric) and purchased some faux leather for the soles and some cute fabric for the top. Some helpful hints: I tried it out, and it was almost just as simple as the video makes it look. When you connect the sole to the upper part of the shoe the girl in the video says you have to do some manipulating to fit it together, i think that was a bit of an understatment. It was hard to get an even line to sew on at first, but after the first shoe was done i got the hang of it and the second i had assembled in a couple of minutes. Since my daughter is walking, i wanted a sole that would withstand some wear and tear, so i got a faux leather, and used a soft baby pink flannel for the second layer of sole, so when it was all finished i would have a nice sturdy leather (ish) sole and a nice soft inside. The pattern doesn't say what size they are, but after making these i am guessing they are a size 3. It doesn't seem like it would be hard to make bigger or smaller to fit It was pretty quick, i am excited to whip out a few more pair. Nothing like expanding your childs footwear for only a few bucks! It really is liberating to know how to make a pair of shoes, there really isn't anything that you can't make yourself.

P.S. Everyone had pretty good odds ;) but the winner of the giveaway is Melissa, cute little Tessa will look adoreable in this poofy tulle skirt. . Email me at projectprowler@gmail.com and I will ship it too you this week!

Yea, Yea. . . It's a Giveaway!! (GIVEAWAY CLOSED)

2010-01-07T14:14:00.000-05:00

My Project piles are stacking up, and when it comes to clothes i have so many things i want to do, and currently no child to put them all on, because their wardrobes are currently full. So, today i thought why not jump on the GIVEAWAY bandwagon! Today the give away is made by yours truly. It is a skirt made from repurposed jeans. . .that were once labled "mom jeans" by one of my friends. . .well, if it is possible for a baby to wear mom jeans. They were pretty bad, but i thought that they were in such great shape and i thought they would make a great skirt, so i set them aside. Then yesterday when i was looking for some girl clothes inspiration from one of my favorite little girls dress websites, chasing-fireflies.com, which i could never buy from, but i love to look and get inspired, and they had some great bustled skirts and dresses. I wanted to try one so i made those jeans into this sweet bustled skirt. The fluff is chocolate brown tulle that is lined with a supersoft pink felt. I love it, i tried it on my youngest and she loved it too, but she has enough skirts so this one is for you readers out there! Even if you don't have a little girl, chances are you know one that would look so cute in this skirt, so enter away! It is size 18 mos. but my daughter who is in 24mos clothes can fit in it with plenty of room, so i think it can span some sizes.

So, here's how you enter. . . you can enter yourself twice. . . First, just become a follower and post a comment to enter yourself once (if you already follow, then you can just post a comment to enter). NEXT, If you want to enter a second time, then put a post on your blog with a link to this blog and comment again leaving me the link to your post. The giveaway will close 12pm EST on Saturday, so don't delay. . . get the word out and get this great little number for your little princess!

New Year's Resolution #3: To plan better Meals

2010-01-06T13:38:00.000-05:00

I used to be so good at planning out my meals, and grocery shopping with my planned out meals. We would eat well balanced foods in abundance that my hubby would take to work for lunch the next day. Then my kids got older, and pickier, my hubby started going to school at night and I started making lots of Mac and Cheese and Chicken Nuggets (no one wants to bring those leftovers to work, ha). But to show you I had good intentions, When we moved to this house i made this chalkboard to go in the biggest wall in the kitchen. I was really wanting something on that space, knowing it would be near the table where little {most likely, messy} hands would be touching whatever was there, that was durable, cute and would take up a lot of space, and of course (it should go without saying) cheap. My oldest sister has a chalkboard in her family room that looks great and seems so useful, so I thought a chalkboard would be perfect. I imagined myself writing out the menu for the day all cute, like a cafe, and I would remember to add sides to the meals like vegetables or bread. . .

Alas, soon after we moved i found out i was pregnant and all that energy for making meals went right out the window. So i used the chalkboard for writing cute quotes, and drawings for holidays, and i have loved it for that too. We have even used it to draw out stories we are talking about, or teach the kids letters and numbers. It has been such a functional piece and i am always asked where i got it. Truth is, it is just chalboard paint with trim (chair rail) boarding it (which we already had in abundance), that i painted a rusty orange, nailed to the wall with a finishing gun. It cost me $10 and that was it. I had plenty of paint leftover for a kids chalkboard in our basement, and for a friend to use for a kitchen chalkboard of her own. I wondered if the paint would wear out, but its been there over 2 years, and through plenty of cleanings and it hasn't chipped once. There are so many uses for it, but for now, since there are no major holidays on the horizon, we are going to go back to the meals and see if i can keep it up!

(don't mind my creepy french chef, or crooked pot of boiling water)

New Year's Resolution #2: To be more organized

2010-01-05T07:00:00.000-05:00

My husband may say otherwise ;) but I think my main problem with staying orgainzed is actually having a place for everything to go. If i don't have a place for it, than it will just stay there, on the floor, kicking around until i move it to a dresser or countertop to create clutter and i hate clutter. So, I am not going to let my lack of places to put things be an excuse anymore. Saying, it isn't in the budget won't fly for me anymore because there are places busting at the seams with little gems that i can refinish and make my own.

I am starting with my kids books. They are everywhere. We just keep getting them. They LOVE to read, and we have collecet so many odd shaped books, it's hard to find a place that they can all fit attractively. There's this magazine rack style bookshelf at Pottery Barn Kids that i have eyed for a while. . . . need I say more? Of course it's cute, functional, downright perfect and. . . perfectly out of my budget. Let me say that I have asked my husband attempt some projects before, but nothing that required this kind of specific detail, without even having a 360 look at it. I showed him the picture and he was pretty hesitant about it. More tools than we had would be needed, the scalloped edges needed just the right saw, etc. But, after a few days he reluctantly started gathering the materials. One good thing about working in the lumber industry these days is we have aquired lots of wood. So we had a lot of stuff we needed and went to Lowes for the dowells. My Hubby took a few hours on a couple of saturdays and camped himself in the garage. This past saturday he unveilled his project. He is amazing (he is even without being able to build the shelf. . . but having it turn out, not only beautiful but functional too, adds to my amazement). His gamble payed off big, and it cost him under $30 {we were meant for each other}. He hung it up today in the kids room . . Isn't is dreamy??

So the moral of this story is, you never know what you are capable of making unless you give it a try!

New Year's Resolution #1: To be Better at Remembering Birthdays

2010-01-04T07:02:00.000-05:00

Here is a great solution for our first resolution. I saw the idea at my mom's house. On of my sisters made my mom a great little display for her family birthdays. It hangs on the wall with a cute little picket fence and flowers for each month. Ropes hang down from each flower and little bird and butterfly clips display everyone's name and day. It has been fun to watch as people get added to it, and see at a glance which month is packed with more birthdays. I thought my mother-in-law might enjoy one, but i did not know where to start, it was seeming a little overwhelming. I decided to engineered my own simplier version. I love the way it turned out, i think i may need one for myself now:) It took me the better part of an evening (since i had to let the paint dry) but it was quite easy.

HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED:

A plaque or board

Wooden letter

wooden discs

mini clothes pins

a strong bonding glue

12- 15 inch pieces of small rope or twine
drill

paint/brush

sharpie

HERE'S HOW I DID IT:

Start by sanding the board and the letter so you have a smooth painting surface. Next measure, mark, and drill your holes (you will need 12 along the bottom, one for each month). Drill up in the bottom edge of the wood in at a 45 degree angle so that your hole comes out the back of the board. Sand around the holes, and paint. I painted my board black and sanded it for a distressed finish. Paint your letter too, i did mine in a color called sand that is really just a glorified name for a light tan.

sorry this picture is blurry, i wanted you to see how the holes from the drill come out at the back of the board, it doesnt need to be pretty on the back, only functional ;)

While you are waiting for you paint to dry glue your clothespins on the wooden disks with a strong glue. Do this before you paint them so you have a place to hold while you paint, and you can get the edges easier. After they are dry and holding firm you can hold them by the clothespin and paint the front and sides of each disk in the same color you used for your letter.

By the time you finish with that you can probably put a second coat of paint on the letter and wooden board. Now that all your things are wet with paint and you have nothing else to work on you can stop to make some cookies for yourself. By the time your first batch is out of the oven you can snack on them while you finish up :).

Come back to your dried project and sand down the edges of your board and letter (if you want it to have a distressed finish). Tie a knot at the end of each rope and from the back of the board thread it through the predrilled holes. The knot will hold it in place at the back (you may need to tie the knot twice to make it hold better).

Next write the names of the months centered above each hole. For this step I actually painted the abbreviations of each month, but i was thinking there was probably an easier way than that, a paint pen or vinyl, but i was working with what i had, so i used a very thin but firm bristled paint brush and just took my time writing each month.

Finally, you can use the sharpie to write the names of your family members (or anyone who's birthday you want to remember) centered in each disc with the number day under each name. You won't need the month because it will hang on the month rope that it belongs to. When you write them all you can clip them in their place on the ropes. {it may be helpful for yourself, or the person you give it too if you have extra discs that are ready to go, so that as your family grows you can easily keep it up to date. Projects like this can fall flat fast if you have to go to the store for more clothespins, discs, and paint every time you need to update it, so just plan now to make extras so you will beable to enjoy it for a long time.}

To finish you can add any decorative touches, like the wooden monogram. Glue your letter in place or whatever else you might think of to make it match your decor and style and it's ready to go. Nail some picture hanging hardware on the back and place it on the wall. I think it is so nice not only to have your birthdays all in a handy place but to have a little spot in your home to showcase all those people we love so much.

A Little Break

2009-12-28T20:27:00.000-05:00

I'm taking a little holiday break {if you haven't guessed already}. I am enjoying this time we get to be together with family, and I am gaining a whole new set of ideas for the new year, so will be back to blog next week!! Hope you all had happy holidays and a great New Years.

A whole new ball game

2009-12-23T07:00:00.000-05:00

I recently discovered that my new computer came with photoshop elements. Woohoo! Not that I have had much need for it, but i started dabbling with it here an there, but I don't have a manual, and i hear people take classes on this stuff, and i just have no interest in getting that familiar with it. But, I just may change my mind. Yesterday i was trying to find a recent picture of my kids and i didn't really have one framable photo of all of them together. They had a photoshoot not long ago where they got awesome individual shots but the group shots of the kids weren't very successful. They were all tired of pictures by then and there wasn't one picture of all of them even looking at the camera, let alone making a presentable face. So I turned to photoshop and decided to go to youtube to find some good visual directions on how to transplant a head from one picture to another. {Just a side note, i am a very visual person, and youtube is AWESOME, I have learned so many skills from youtube videos--anything from fun hairstyles, to sewing, to making hairbows and even how to play quite a few songs on the piano. It's a great resource for learning things}. I used this slightly odd, but very helpful tutorial here {beware of the cheesy start up music;)}. I added a couple other fun coloring affects, and I think it turned out pretty good for my first time. . .

So now I am thinking this changes everything for picture taking! If I can do this what other fun photos can I doctor up, I may never need a group photo of us again, I can just cut and paste everyone right into this same backdrop everytime I need a photo, ha! Okay maybe not, it's always better to have a great original, but it is a good plan B :).

Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?

2009-12-22T12:58:00.000-05:00

Christmas is fast approaching, and I still have done nothing for my neighbors. I really have the best neighbors in the world, so I didn't want the season to pass by without giving them something. My original plan was so do a cute jar with a pretty arrangement of sliced oranges and lemons, a bay leaf, cinnamon sticks and a few cloves to use for a simmering potpourri {my sister-in-law gave me one a few thanksgivings ago, and it looked so cute and smelled wonderful!}. So, I went to the hardware store for jars, and they had them stashed in their upstairs storage room. I wasn't sure what size jars they even make (i'm not much of a canner), so the guy just had me follow him up there. I am feeling bad for making him go to all this trouble, so when he showed me a case of them i said that was it, and purchased them without looking too carfully. I realized when i got home that it was one quart jars, which are quite big, and not the jelly jar size i was looking for. I couldn't go return them after all that, so I needed to go to plan B. I went through a list of ideas that were starting to feel complicated this late in the game, but then I started wondering if i could fit a stack of cookies in there. It fit a dozen cookies perfectly. To guarentee their freshness I made them after dinner and once they were cooled i put them in the jars and brought them around. As i was assembling them, the brassy lids were a bit of an eyesore, so i went to the garage and grabbed my trusty white spraypaint and did just one quick coat on the rings while the cookies were cooling. While the paint was drying and cookies cooling I cut some Christmas fabric in circles that were big enough that the edges folded over the top of the jar, but not big enough that it showed from under the rings when it was screwed on. I put it all together and really loved the weathered look of the white rings. It came together better than I expected so I thought I would share.

Jedi Cloak. . . It's Coming. . .

2009-12-21T09:55:00.000-05:00

GOODNEWS! I finished my Jedi Cloak! I think my son is really going to love it. Santa and i have ESP and I just know he is bringing him a Light Saber and Obi Wan dress up, and since i am making my kids each something for christmas this year, i thought, he needs a cloak. It was quite cheap and took me about a afternoon naptime, and in between the good parts of the Survivor Finale to finish it, so not too long to do. Now for the BAD NEWS. . . i can't get a good picture of it until after christmas when i can put it on him, so, that is the project, and it is coming, with instructions you will just have to be in suspense until after the holidays to see it.

Framed

2009-12-18T12:50:00.000-05:00

{before}

I have been an antiquing fool lately. It all started with my piano. I thought the dark paint highlighted some features that, when it was monotone, were unsightly. So i keep trying it with other things, different color combinations, and it hasn't failed me yet. I cannot of course have everything in my house distressed or antiqued, so i am giving it as gifts now :). Hence today's post. An unnamed family member is getting this beauty for christmas. But before i cut the glass (i personally don't cut the glass, you know what i mean though), put a picture in it, and get the hardware on the back I am going to show how easy it is to do on any old frame (or piece of furniture for that matter). This frame is actually newly made by my hubby, but you can get any old wooden frame and make it look designer.

HERE'S HOW I DID IT:

-Spray paint a frame a light color. (do a couple of coats) I love Krylon's Almond color.

-Next take a darker color, i use those little craft paint tubes you can buy in walmarts craft section for less than 50 cents, and squirt some on a plate. If you have lots of crevises to your frame you can thin the paint with a bit of water. But if you do a flat frame like the one i have shown, just use it as it is.

-Take a paper towel and dab it in the paint. Then smear the darker paint over top of your finished frame appling it heavier where you want it to stay darker.
-Then Lightly with a clean paper towel wipe it off to remove excess paint. Start removing the paint in the areas you want to stay lighter. {Do these two steps one edge of the frame at a time, becuase the paint dries quickly and you want to be able to remove it from the places you choose.}
-Once you are done you can do any touch ups you need, and then let it dry. I dont even put polyurethane over mine because they are out of reach of the kids hands, but you could poly it for extra protection, then you are done! It looks awesome with frames that have all sorts of nooks and crannies, too!

{After}

Men's Shirt Makeover

2009-12-17T10:49:00.000-05:00

I am getting pretty sick of my wardrobe, so yesterday iI wandered over to my husbands side of the closet. I know the "boyfriend" look is back so I wondered if he had anything I could pull off. . . he didn't. . . but it did get me thinking. Some of his shirts could look decent (on me) with some alterations. So, i wondered if i applied the same ideas for the Sweater Dress, and made one of my husbands shirts smaller for me. So, I asked him which one i could possibly destroy and put it on and pinned it while i was looking in the mirror. I marked where my armpits were, where i went in at the waist, and where some darts should be in the back. Then i got to cutting and sewing. When it was done I used the scraps i made a tuxedo ruffle down the front next to the button holes. It turned out better than i thought, and i loved how it is longer, and the sleeves are longer than if i had bought it. Here's the finished product!

You Win some, You Lose Some. . .

2009-12-16T12:40:00.000-05:00

This time I lost. I was going to reconstruct this shirt of mine into something cute an sassy for my oldest to wear. She has this cute sparkly tanktop, and so i wanted a fun rocker shirt for her to wear over it. I went to JoAnn's and got some fun metallic angel wing iron on's for the back. Last night i cut, i sewed, and waited to make sure it was just right for her this morning before i ironed on the wings. It fit (and was mighty cute, i should add) So, all excited, she got on her jeans and tanktop and met me at the ironing board. We read the directions, we followed them carfully, and still. . . it burned! One wing got scorched onto the shirt. So, shirt and decals ruined, we can toss this project into the scrapyard. Half a Jay Leno show, and $3 wasted. It wouldn't be the first time my time and money was wasted. So, on to another project. . . hopefully with a better outcome!

Curtain Call

2009-12-15T10:45:00.000-05:00

I don't love working with large amounts of fabric. I have only made curtains once and we moved soon after and of course every place has different windows, or amounts of windows and since we were moving so often i gave up on curtains all together and stuck to blinds. But I found some fabric i just loved, and wanted to make use of it in my bonus room, so my ever-so-crafty mother in law convinced me to make curtains. She showed me how to make some valances that are super easy, and look so great. They have made my room so much cuter. I am not a very frilly person when it comes to my curtains, i like it simple, and these are simple to sew (it's just a rectangle), and simple decor. . . but it adds a lot of personality.

HERE'S HOW WE DID IT:

We measured the width of the window and cut the fabric it the width of the window plus half of that measurement. {If you want to have it really bunchy you can double the size of the window for you fabric} I think mine dropped down 15 inches, but you can do that side whatever your preference is, just remember you will be tying it up at the end and you will need to fold it over to make a pocket for your curtain rod, so you may want to have it hang just a bit longer than you think. I lined mine with a cheap tan cotton muslin so the sun wouldn't distort the front fabric.

With both piece of fabric right sides together sew around the edges like you were doing a pillow. Leave a 2 or 3 inch openining, so you can turn the fabric right sides, and then fold those few raw edges in and top stitch there. Then fold it over on the top, from front to back, just enough to make a pocket to fit your curtain rod. Sew a straight line, leaving the hole open on both ends to slip the rod through. Finally, you can iron it, Hang it and tie two ribbons around the whole thing you can either turn the bows to the back so you can't see them or leave them in front. Now go, dress up that plain room!

Where the Magic Happens

2009-12-14T08:00:00.000-05:00

It would be ideal to have a nice creative space that is overlooking a pond, or beautiful mountains. Mine, although a wonderful space, overlooks a grey wall. I love the color, but it has been needing something. I wasn't sure what, until i saw THIS wreath hanging in my friends house. I noticed it immediatly and asked her where she got it. She told me not only that she made it but that she had stuff for me if i wanted to make one too. Just a book and styrofoam wreath ring from the dollar store, and a couple dabs of brown paint. Now I love a $2 project but free is even better! Thanks for doing the leg work Kayla! Click here for the directions at Living with Lindsay.I put it together in bits and pieces while i was watching shows here and there during the last week. My five year old even helped. It was pretty mindless work, but it uses A LOT of hot glue so have a bunch of sticks handy. It is a wonderful addition to this beautiful large desk my husband made for me to do all of my little projects on. It's slowly becoming an inspirational space. Now for a few cute desk decorations and maybe one of those cute sewing machine covers and I'll be set!

How To Make Rosettes

2009-12-11T14:25:00.000-05:00

After making that Christmas Party Dress and adding that rosette at the end i was suprised at how easy it was and started thinking of all the possiblities for cute rosettes: headbands, necklaces, hats, scarfs. . . so i will show you how i made the rosette and you can decide what you want to dress up with it.

I made my original by sewing, but i tried it with a hot glue gun and that was faster, so that is how i will show you.

WHAT YOU NEED:

1 strip of fabric ironed into thirds, making the width less than 1 inch (you can choose your own length)

1 Hot Glue Gun

HERE'S HOW I DID IT:

I glued as i went, rolling the first part evenly and tight, then after rolling that a few times i started pinching the fabric as i went so it wasn't so neat looking in the end. When you get to the end of the fabric tuck it under the bottom and secure it with glue. Make sure you are liberal with the glue (not so libral that you have it oozing out. . . that won't be pretty) just enough that it stays secure. The width and length will determine how large and how far your rosettes will stick out in the end, so keep that in mind. The one i did in the picture is 1 inch width, and i would not do it larger than that, i would say half inch or less would be perfect to lay nice and flat on accessories like hairclips and necklaces. That is it. . . you just sew or glue it to a plain accessory. I was thinking it would be cute to dress up some of those one size fits all Walmart gloves that you buy in packs for a couple of bucks. A few tiny ones on the wrist. I my kids teachers will be getting some beaded necklaces with these on them. . . here are some things i have done with them. Have fun!

Christmas gifts on a Budget: T-shirt Scarfs

2009-12-10T08:34:00.000-05:00

We are nearing the end of the week, there are so many ideas and only so much time for me to actually get them done, pictures taken, and have them posted. And even though it won't make it in this week, i have a Jedi Cloak on my list of things to make, so when i figure it out, it is sure to be easy and inexpensive, cause that's how i roll. I just need to make it to JoAnn's with my 40% off coupon to get some fabric first. So be looking for that hopefully next week sometime if you are needing a good gift idea for a little boy. For today, we have a scarf made from a T-shirt {or two if you want to switch up the colors a bit}. You could do this for a boy or a girl, It would look so cute for a boy with navy, red and gold Tshirts or differnent kinds of camo.

WHAT YOU NEED:

Some old Tshirts (at least 2)

Scissors

Sewing Machine or Serger

COST: $0--or maybe a disgruntled husband after he finds out you cut up all of his beloved Tshirts.

I am starting with a shirt that i am not sure how we aquired but it is too big for my oldest and since no one has claimed it it is being reused! I am making a long skinny scarf, but you can make the blocks any length or width you want, just make them all even widths, so when you are done the sides will all be straight. Sew each block together and iron seams flat when done. That is the front. For the back cut long strips of equal width of another Tshirt (or heck now that we have rediscovered fleece, you could use that for the back too!). Cut enough that when sewn together the are the same length as the front of the scarf. Sew the backing strips together, and iron seams flat. Then with wrong sides together sew down the length of each side (LEAVE THE ENDS OPEN!). Then turn right side out, fold in each end and do a top stitch across it. You could even do something fancy like a zig zag stitch. DONE! How easy was that!? Not to mention. . . oh so cute!

Christmas gifts on a Budget: Makeover Your Playroom

2009-12-09T11:26:00.000-05:00

If you really want that WOW factor Christmas morning, nothing will make those kiddies eyes twinkle like a made over playroom. I was feeling like our playroom had no pazzaz. I could see why my kids didn't want to play in it, it was so boring! There were a bunch of blah plastic containers filled to the brim, and blase colors on the wall. So since my kids spend most of the cold winters inside, we decided to give our playroom a facelift last year. Since our kids don't like playing in our basement it was easy to keep it secret, but most of the stuff we assembled on christmas eve after the kids went to bed.

WHAT YOU NEED:
Some spare paint
Acrylic craft paints (they come in little tubes for 40 cents at walmart)
Spare wood trim
Maybe a window two (these are surprisingly easy to come by in New England, people are always giving away old windows after they replace them)
Creativity!

COST:

For ours, we only purchased the fabric for the awning, the curtain rod that is hidden beneath the awning, the cash register, and the play food. It totaled less than $30.

HOW WE DID IT:
We just sectioned off a part of the wall, and painted it* some spare tan paint we had in the garage. I wanted it to be something that they could not just see but also feel and touch and be a part of. So, we added real windows overtop of the painted windows on the general store that we got for free at a local lumber yard that had spare halves of windows, then we turned them sideways so they would be long and screwed them right into the studs (if you are going to add real windows make sure you know where your wall studs are before you paint what will go under them so they will be secure in the wall).

For the awning, I measured how big i wanted it, and hemmed it under before we needed to assemble it. Then we stapled the top end to the back of a piece of wood trim that was cut the right length, and turned it forward so the fabric then came down overtop of it, and we screwed the wood piece into the wall, but you could sew across the top and put it on a curtain rod and hang it. Then, so the awning came out a bit, i positioned a metal curtain rod (those really cheap ones that are meant for valances, and turn in towards the wall) about a foot below, so it would lay over it, and hang out a bit from the wall. You could nail the sides of the fabric to the wall if you want to make it nice and tight.

I painted a door with the acrylic craft paint in a chocolate brown. My husband then placed trim around the door to make it pop--so to speak (actually my kids thought we really had a store behind there, they kept asking how to get in!) and we had ourselves a little general store. We found a bookshelf in our garage that was about to go to the dump and painted it red to put some play food on (the crates the food are in are from the clementine oranges you get at the store this time of year). We also found another odd piece of furniture for their cash register to sit on, and i got some clearance bushels from walmart after the fall holidays for shopping baskets (i am sure the dollar store would have some cute baskets too).

Santa brought my kids a kitchen** and table for christmas last year as well, so now they can go straight from the grocery store, to their little home to make dinner for each other. It really has made our playroom so much more exciting. My friend, after seeing our basement, offered to make a cute little General Store sign for it. I have all sorts of ideas for more playroom fun, a small stage for their dress ups to sit next to, so they can perform for each other and with their friends, or a classroom with a chalkboard, and little desks. All it takes is a little time and a little creativity to make a space for your kids imaginations to grow in.

*I actually first saw this idea done on plywood boards that were painted as a little village and then screwed into the wall, so if you are in an apartment you could paint it on plywood and screw it into the studs {just make sure you buy some nail filler for when you move out ;) }!

**The Kitchen is that cute pink target kitchen, but, since i wanted something gender neutral, i got a can of cherry red Krylon (love that brand) spray paint and painted the 3 small pink pieces on it before we assembled it, no priming or anything, and it has held up great.

Christmas gifts on a Budget: Make your own Barbie Dresses

2009-12-08T19:02:00.000-05:00

Okay, next on the list is small, sweet, and could possibly save your fingers from hours of prying bitty doll clothes onto stiff plastic Barbie arms. That is, if you make some of these simple barbie special occasion dresses. The key is to keep it free of pant legs and arm hole openings and then your little princess can put them on and off all by herself.

Really what started me making these were that my 5 year old asked for Barbie clothes for christmas. But knowing her, i know she only loves the long fancy dresses, and as i looked around i was paying $20 for maybe 2 long dresses and the rest a bunch of shirts tops and shoes that would get lost. So, i thought, maybe i will try to make one, how hard can it be? Turns out, not hard at all! And, i am using up all these little scraps of fabric that i have lying around. I have made three so far, and none have taken me longer than my baby's naptime.

What you need:

Sewing Machine

Velcro
Fabric Scraps:
1- 5 1/2 X 2 inch piece of fabric
1-10X (however long you want the dress) piece of fabric hemmed

measuring tape, and scissors.

embellishments

COST:
$3 for velcro

HOW I DID IT:

For my smaller piece of fabric i fold it in half or in thirds lengthwise to keep from having too many raw edges to deal with. Then i fold over the ends of each length (see above picture--white stitching on the blue fabric) and hem, so if i have no raw edges that will need to be sewn after the dress is assembled. Next, the dress will need some darts to make the waist line small, so in the center of the smaller piece of fabric 3/4ths inch apart mark 2 lines for darts {NOTE: these measurements are for a barbie doll, but you may need to make your own measurements for another fashion doll.}

Next, take the fabric you have for the skirt part of the dress and the side that isn't hemmed sew a basting stitch, and pull the strings to gather the fabric until it is about 5 inches (or about the length of the bottom part of the top of the dress.) Then sew wrong sides together, and turn inside out and sew the skirt part from top to bottom, leaving the top part of the dress open for a velcro closure. If you sew up past the skirt, then the dress will not be able to pull up past Barbie's booty :). Cut velcro to fit up the length of the top part of the dress ( I couldn't find very thin velcro so i also cut mine in half lengthwise). Stitch on the velcro (or you could get sticky velcro to make it even easier) and you're done! Add any other embelishments {I added a big white bow to mine}. You could do ribbon straps or halter, add ruffles or flowers. Once, you get the basic idea down the possiblities are endless, so let out your inner designer and try out some new fashions!

Christmas gifts on a Budget: No Sew Blanket

2009-12-07T09:51:00.000-05:00

FIRST UP: Something soft warm and cuddly. Can be used as a tent, cape, eggshell, slide for the stairs, reading cave, fort, an island in the middle of boiling lava, but otherwise known as a blanket ;)

WHAT YOU NEED:

2 yards of fleece print fabric

1 pair of fabric scissors
1 good movie

COST: (depends on the deal you get on the fabric) But for me $8 ($4 for fabric $4 for shipping)

Okay so i know the idea of a no sew fleece blanket is nothing new. And i am also aware that fleece used to be found only in prints that you would find on grandma's old holiday sweaters. I once didn't want to touch fleece with a ten foot pole. But seeing my two older kids LOVING their fleece blankets has made me readdress this fluffy, character printed fabrick once again. And i have found that there are actually some super cute prints out there, and it really is so easy. My older two kids recieved these good sized blankets when they were born, and i put them up for later use because they seemed so big. I pulled them down a while ago, and they haven't been able to part with them. It is so fun to see all there many uses for them. So, now my youngest, who is a year and a half, is jealous. She pulls out here baby fleece blankeys and tries to get someone to tie it like a cape , but it's just doesn't work as well as these wonderfully knobby, large, easy to cuddle in blankets. So this is one thing on her christmas list.

I had a friend tip me off to cheap fabric cuts at etsy.com. So i checked there before heading to JoAnns. Just type Fleece into the search box, only make sure to change the area you are searching in to supplies, up popped tons of cute fleece patterns and some of them were so cheap. I got mine for only $2 a yard! Of course then you have to pay for shipping, but i thought it all evened out and i could do it without trekking into the New England cold.

HERE'S HOW I DID IT:

Put in your movie. Find a comfortable seat. Take your fabric and trim off any salvages that are unsightly. Cut slits all around the edges that are 2 - 2 1/2 inches deep, and a 1/4 inch apart. {When you get to the corners you will end up loosing a little square of fabric to keep it from looking funny} Then start tying each fringe in a knot on itself, like you are tying the end of a balloon. Enjoy the rest of your movie--That's it! Mine took me less than an hour.

Christmas Gifting: On a Budget

2009-12-07T09:23:00.000-05:00

It's Christmas time, and my project plate is full of inexpensive, simple, and adorable Christmas gift ideas. This week, i am going be posting kids christmas gift ideas. Sometimes i find that taking my time during naptime to make some of the gifts Santa may bring, is easier than trying to find a kid-free time to get to the store, and i spend way less when i am not hypnotized by big gleaming sale tags :)

The Stockings Were Hung. . .

2009-12-02T13:58:00.000-05:00

It took me a while to settle on christmas stockings, every year i would mull over what style i liked, and if i could find that style a few years from now if our family grew, or if i should buy out all of them to cover my bases. I never planned on basing my family size on what number of matching stockings i could find, but it was starting to get tricky. Plus, they're not cheap. It's a good $20 for a good stocking. So, after a couple of failed attempts i decided to start from scratch. I looked at the ones from the store and found details i liked {that i thought i could duplicate on my own} from the ones i was attracted to. I didn't want to start anything too fancy that i wouldnt have the energy to keep up with later, but i wanted them to be cute, and have a similar look, but each one being unique. So i went to the store, got some felt, stuck to geometric shapes and whipped out the first three in a few days. Then with each additional one, i still have the supplies, and it has still been just as simple as it was the first time. I made a pattern out of paper, and store it in a shoebox bin with the felt, and some thread to stitch it on, and I love pulling them out each year. My only criteria for the designs on the front are that they can be made from geometric shapes, so that i can keep it all simple, quick, and cute. And instead of embrodering names on each one {which i couldn't do if i tried} I stuck with a simple monogram. Spending less, and making it easy doesn't always mean it has to look cheap ;).

Christmas Party Dress (From an Old Skirt)

2009-12-01T16:49:00.000-05:00

My two younger kids, who care nothing about what they wear, both ended up with christmas outfits this year. It was totally by default; collected from hand-me-downs or last years clearences that are now fitting. My oldest LOVES clothes. I could shop for her even more than I could shop for myself {and i LOVE shopping for myself}. Alas, i am trying to be really good over the holidays at not overspend, and she really doesnt need a dress, she has plenty, but my heart tells me that she NEEDS a Christmas dress, because she is the one that really wants one. So, my gears start churning and i think, how can i get her a dress and not spend a dime. Do we have anything that fits that has velvet or sparkles?

Aha! It came to me as my daughter was digging in a bin looking for something and she found a red skirt of mine i bought at Bannana Republic a while ago. I hadn't worn it in at least a couple of seasons, and it was RED! The perfect start. I told her i would make her a skirt out of it {she always loves getting clothes made out of my clothes, I think because she likes trying on all my clothes when she is in my room, so having something she can actually wear out of my room makes her feel like we share clothes :)} and she said she wanted a dress. I wasn't sure if i would have enough material there for a dress, but i told her i would try.

While she was at school i started (and by the time she got home it was ready to try on, with only the straps and the sash left to finish {and she's only gone for half the day}). Whenever I am making something from another article of clothing i always try to use as many of the original hems, seams, zippers, etc. to cut out the hard part for myself, and because they usually do a better job than I. I finished that dress up so quick, and it is by far the CUTEST dress i have made! I had really low expectations so maybe that helps in the joy of the finished product, but it really was a synch, and it's got all the fun, fanciness of a wonderful holiday party dress.

Here's How I Did It:

I always start by taking measurements of who i am doing the dress for. {you would think by now I would have them stashed somehwere, but kids grow up so fast, why not just do it everytime!} I had a design in my head, and i had to tweak it to fit the material i had. I laid the skirt on the ground inside out and using her chest measurements (and allowing an extra inch or so for seam allowances, i snipped from the top of the skirt the exess on either side of the skirt. (this skirt has a zipper, and i wanted to keep that centered so i had to divide the extra width by 2 and take of a bit on each side. I went down to where her natural waist would be (for me that was 8 inches, and then stopped cutting. Took a straight edge and from that point i made a diagonal line to the bottom of the skirt, so i could have the bottom be as full as the skirt would allow. I took a pencil and traced the line on both sides, then continued to cut off the exess. The skirt was now 2 pieces of a dress, and i sewed them together from top to bottom, backstitching at either end for a nice secure hold. Since the fabric i cut off was not enough to make straps i went through my ribbon bin and found some wide groisgrain ribbon that was just the right shade of red, and sewed those in place for the straps.

Now, a spaghetti strap dress is no good in the winter, as cute as it may be, so i needed something else, so digging through the fabric bins i found some great faux raw silk chocolate brown material, and a 6 in spool of chocolate brown tulle. I knew the tulle had to be sticking out the bottom of the dress. So i did a basting or gathering stitch down the center of the tulle that i measured 4X the bottom circumfrence of the dress, and folded it along the stitch and gathered it to the right length. I then sewed that to the bottom of the dress along the seam that was already there for the hem, making sure it was sticking out of the bottom of the dress.

With the raw silk remnants i made a ruffled shrug, and a sash with a rosette for a fancy touch on the sash. I ironed the sash the width i wanted and handstitched it and the rosette onto the dress while i was watchinging our latest netflix movie, but it could also be done on the machine.

For the Shrug:

Here are what the pieces looked like that you need. You need two sleeves and two front pieces, make sure if you are using fabric that has a front and a back that the 2nd front piece is flopped from this one shown so that you will have two curved fronts to match either side of the shrug. You only need one back piece. I used a sweater of my daughters that had raglan sleeves for my measurements. It is a raglan sleeve shrug rather than an inset sleeve, raglan are much easier, especially when you are doing sleeves without a pattern. If you have never done this before, i would try it on some scrap fabric first so you can see just how it turns out in case you want to tweak it, and make the sleeves longer or the body of the shrug longer. Once you know what pieces go where and how they fit together it is much easier to design them to what you want.

Take one of the sleeve pieces and stitch the diagonal line from the back piece to one of the diagonal sides of the sleeve, and then on the other diagonal side of the sleeve stitch the diagonal line from the front piece. Do the same on the other side. The top of each sleeve on a raglan forms part of the neckline. After the diagonals are stitched then just under the arms and down the sides need to be sewn, of course with a shrug that is only about 3 inches of stitching. Make sure it is inside out when you sew. Then turn it right sides and you've got this (this is the front of the jacket, you may need to zoom to see the front panels, the fabric makes it hard to tell in pictures):

Now from here and you could put a binding or hem all the raw edges but i folded some fabric over and with a basting stitch made a ruffle.

Then i stitched it to all the raw edges and ironed the seams really well after so they lay down nice and flat. And Voila, a cute little shrug in about 30 min!

The Project Prowler

New Year, New Life!

Baby Number 4 has Arrived!

Blessing Dress

The Beginning

Wishing Well

Goodbye Summertime, You Will be Missed.

Rock-a-bye baby

I'm Pooped!

Painting myself in a Corner

Call me Crazy

Dresser Love

Fruits of my Labor

Oh My, How Spring flies by!

How to throw a Teeny-Tiny Tea Party

The Evolution of a Kitchen

Easter Clothes, and Some Great News

Easter Jammies

A Builders Dream. . .and a Mothers

A Great Deal

Bold Colors, Awesome Furniture

Easy Peasy Bloomers

An End of Winter Break

Back to the Machine

Why I love Craigslist

A Mouthwatering Blog

More of our Hallway Upgrade

Friday Fun

The $30 Entry Table

Little Memos

And the Winner is. . .

Ironing Board Cover

GIVEAWAY time!! ***GIVEAWAY CLOSED***

Valentine Chandelier

If you give a Prowler a Project. . .

Everybody has a little Dirty Laundry

I {Heart} Hair Clippies

90 pecent off!

A Bit of Warmth

Jewelry Dilemma's: SOLVED!

The $3 Outfit

Yesterday's Endeavor

May the Force Be with You. . .

Fun with the Kids--Clothespin Magnets

A place to call home. . .

There is Nothing Like The Pitter-Patter of Cutely Dressed Feet

Yea, Yea. . . It's a Giveaway!! **(GIVEAWAY CLOSED)**

New Year's Resolution #3: To plan better Meals

New Year's Resolution #2: To be more organized

New Year's Resolution #1: To be Better at Remembering Birthdays

A Little Break

A whole new ball game

Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?

Jedi Cloak. . . It's Coming. . .

Framed

Men's Shirt Makeover

You Win some, You Lose Some. . .

Curtain Call

Where the Magic Happens

How To Make Rosettes

Christmas gifts on a Budget: T-shirt Scarfs

Christmas gifts on a Budget: Makeover Your Playroom

Christmas gifts on a Budget: Make your own Barbie Dresses

Christmas gifts on a Budget: No Sew Blanket

Christmas Gifting: On a Budget

The Stockings Were Hung. . .

Christmas Party Dress (From an Old Skirt)

GIVEAWAY time!! GIVEAWAY CLOSED

Yea, Yea. . . It's a Giveaway!! (GIVEAWAY CLOSED)