Hearts & Hot Glue

I've never been big on Valentine's Day decor, but this year I'm warming up to the idea. I started with a wreath...

This was super easy to do, might be a little harder to explain, but I think the pictures are going to be a big help. I started w/ a flat wreath, b/c they fit so nicely between the door and the storm door, and they're so inexpensive! To get going, I busted out the hot glue gun and started glueing down the ribbon. I left a loop-ish sort of thing about every inch or so.... See?

Once I'd gone all the way around the wreath, I went back and glued down the loops...like this...

So this is what it looked like when I had finished messing with the ribbon.

Then I did the handy-dandy "in-half and in-half again" fold with the cupcake liners, and folded again at the bottom to give me a flat surface to glue to the wreath. (You've seen cupcake liner wreaths before, right? You know the drill.)

I used a combination of happy red liners w/ white polka-dots, and plain old white liners ~ about 2-3 red for every 1 white. It added a little dimension to the wreath that I thought was missing otherwise. This is what it looks like from the side.

A pic (again....b/c I only took one) of the finished product hanging on the front door.

See? Cute, right? And totally worth burning the dickens out of my fingers with the glue gun.

Loving Fall!

There are so many things to love about Fall! And that month or so of fall between Halloween and {Thanksgiving} ~ when we can bring out all of our "pretty" fall stuff to replace our "spooky" fall stuff ~ is my absolute favorite. This year, I threw together a quick little something for our front porch.

For {$2} I grabbed a straw broom and a leaf vine from the dollar store, hit 'em with a few dots of hot glue & Voila!

It's a great little punch of color for the porch ~ one that only took, literally, 5 minutes to put together (including the time it took for the glue gun to warm up! for reals!) ~ and I love that it was so inexpensive.

In the next few days I'll be posting more Fall-type stuff! I have always loved {Thanksgiving} and, as much as I'm going to try to get my Christmas decorations up and the holiday shopping finished at the beginning of December, I refuse to skip Thanksgiving!

Subway Art {Par-Tay}

Jen @ Tatertots & Jello is hosting a Subway Art Party! Swing on over and check it out ~ there's sure to be a {ton} of great inspiration if you're wanting to do one of your own but are having a hard time picking a theme.

Here is my version of Subway Art....

I made this as a Valentine's Day gift for the hubband, and used street names that have been important in our relationship. We met while we were both students at Bowling Green State University, so many of the street names ~ Wooster, Lehman, North Enterprise, Main St. ~ are from our time in BG. Other street names represent our parents' homes, our engagement and wedding, the births of the tiny people and our first home. It holds a lot of meaning, and brings back a lot of really great {memories} for both of us.

You can find the original post, including some tips & tricks, {here} if you're interested.

Another Project Finished

You might remember a while back I posted about a dresser that was free to a good home. Here is the {before} pic of said dresser.



I finally got around to doing something with it! I debated long & hard about what to do and where it would go ~ but I really couldn't figure out a place in our house where it was needed and would fit nicely. As luck would have it, tranforming our 3rd bedroom into my {craft room} meant that I needed something for storage of crafty-type things, as well as something to put a TV on, so... I painted her white and spray painted the knobs a lovely hot pink chosen by the tiny people. Here's the {after} pic!



I have to say that I'm not lovin' the knobs. The spray paint didn't take to them all that well. They'll do for now, but I will be on the lookout for replacements in the future. The TV is now happily sitting on top of the dresser, and the next craft-room-related {project} is well underway.

How's that for a cliff-hanger? ;)

Family Trees

I have to admit ~ I wasn't thinking about Father's Day {at all} when I first started this project. I was thinking about the big empty space on the wall in the half bath, and trying to figure out how to fill it. So I bought a big canvas...brought it home...and stared at it. I even bought paint ~ but had no idea what I was going to {do} with it. Stripes? Some other type of pattern? Hmmmm.... A tree? Trees. I'll do some trees. So I started painting the first tree....

And then it hit me...four trees, one for each member of our family! Cute! So I painted four tree trunks, limbs, etc....in varying sizes to represent the hubband, each of the tiny people, and myself. And {then} ~ a moment of brilliance (which doesn't happen often, so I have to celebrate it. ;) ). I'll have the kids use their {fingers} to make some of the leaves & we could give it to the hubband for Father's Day! {squeal!}

I used my finger to make some of my own leaves, too, then filled in the trees with more, brush-painted leaves.

It's not quite done yet. The hubband still needs to do some of the leaves on his tree, and then we'll hang it in the half bath to fill up that big empty wall.

Not too bad for a totally unplanned, {last-minute} Father's Day gift, right?

I'm linking up to a few places....so click on over & take a look-see at these fantabulous blogs!

,

Sumo's Sweet Stuff

Meet Peachy

Check out this little beauty...



Doesn't it look like it should be sitting on Blanche Devereaux's bedside table in an episode of Golden Girls? It's such a lovely shade of 80's sitcom {peach} don't you think? And, hey, if any on you lovely reader people live in my area, you can swing on by the DAV thrift shop and, if you're quick and lucky, you might just be able to scoop up it's twin! Don't lie...I know you're tempted. ;)

Anyhoodle, peachy here is a glass lamp. Because I'm not well-acquainted with the use of spray paint (yet) I googled to get some tips on spray painting glass and the information I found suggested that I rough up the surface, either with sandpaper or with glass etching cream. Now, I realize that my blog title can be easily shortened to SNDR....which looks a lot like what might pass for "sander" on a {vanity} license plate....but this girl doesn't hand sand. It makes my teeth hurt. So off I went to Lowe's in search of etching cream. That went well. Lowe's dude said he'd never heard of such a thing, they don't carry it, and hey...if he were me he'd skip the sanding and use an all-purpose highly bonding spray paint primer that he knows adheres to ceramic tile, so why not glass too? Awesome. Works for me. And it did! A couple of coats of primer, and then I busted out the main event. Here she is all pretty...



I painted the base {espresso} and the color I used on the lamp is {paprika} ~ both in satin. Of course, peachy didn't come with a lampshade, so I had to make a trip to find one. I'm pretty happy with what I chose, and I think she looks nice sitting in the corner of my living room.



Happy, happy, happy! :)

Welcome 2010!

We had a fantastic New Year's Eve - spent with good friends & good food, and the kids wore themselves out. More importantly, the Hubband let me sleep until a ridiculous and slightly embarassing hour this morning. Which is probably why I'm still awake at 3am. Tomorrow won't be pretty!

I promise a *riveting* post detailing the laundry routine sometime soon. But for now, I thought I'd share my latest favorite spot in my house. This is a wall in my kitchen. Yep - it's pretty orange-y. I've had the ledges up for almost a year, and I change out what is displayed on them fairly regularly. What makes me smile is knowing that everything on these ledges (with the exception of the "Keep Calm and Carry On" postcard) was made by me. I took the photographs, I made the "how wonderful life is" thingy, and I made the silhouettes of the kids. I'm proud of that. Not only does it save me a ka-ton of money (as does having the photos printed locally {usually at Costco} and mounting them on firmer backings myself) but it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy to know that I have had my hand - literally - in every bit of decoration in my home.

There aren't a lot of things about this house that I can say that I "love", but I'm thankful beyond measure to have a home, and I am doing the best I can with what I have so that my children and my family will feel love and warmth and comfort in this home....in spite of the clutter and the dog slobber on the front window...and the effing hampers.