This is a post for Kim!

I’m semi-surprised at myself that I never posted this quick re-do project but better late than never! So this is the $30 Kijiji find that I turned into my rather “chic” kitchen table set up. When I bought this, the young mum who helped me load it in the car was like, really? You want this? For your house? Sure, no problem! No returnsies!

This table was so ugly when I bought it last year, I don’t even have a before photo of it. Seriously. But it was straight out of the 70’s - that brown wood, plus it had this itchy, awful like fibre-y upholstery that was orange and white and brown coloured, like kind of a plaid but worse. It was awful. And ITCHY to sit on. 

So I spruced it up! For about $40 to boot. I splashed on some paint from LLD, in grey and white, and then bought an 8’ x 10’ painters canvas for like $10 to cover the seats and then bought this nifty patterned fabric through LLD from Tonic Living (amazing Canadian fabric store, seriously!). I borrowed Jesse’s staple gun to “re-upholster” it and stapled the ba-hooey out of it - I didn’t do a very neat and tidy job, let me tell you. The back gives away the fact that it’s a total hack job. BUT no one sees the back as they’re up against the wall. 

We just recently painted the wall behind it this teal colour and love it - the splash of colour is crazy refreshing. Our kitchen floors are a grey linen tile, our kitchen cabinets are white (I redid them all using paint from LLD, btw!), our backsplash is white marble and our counter tops are butcher block, which is a nice cottage country feel. So the table and benches go great and the splash of colour on the wall adds a nice little something extra :) 

So VOILA! Trust your vision!

I was buzzing around the studio this Sunday while a bunch of amazing women refinished some rather radical projects and popped up to the attic to see what cool stuff I could try and take some shots of. Real safe to be crawling around an attic at 38 weeks pregnant. But here my artistic photos - loving my new lens and feeling kind of proud of how I’m getting the hang of it! 

Here is my first envelope for the Elevated Envelope Project (to find out more about the project, click here)

For my first envelope, I choose Rise of the Phoenix as my theme. Using match sticks with burnt ends, I made a tail of a phoenix. Get it? Rising from the ashes? Burnt match sticks? Bueller? Then, I took a high res photo of it, and attached that photo to a handmade envelope (constructed from 12” x 12” scrap book paper) using Mod Podge. Last but not least, I water coloured over it. 

I took so many photos, I don’t even need to write it down - just keep scrollin’ to see how it all came together!

The draft of my tail and the little piece of cardboard I would attach the match sticks too. 

Using scissors, I cut some of the match sticks to size.

This was the finished product. 

Then I made my envelopes! 

I folded in the corners of the diamond, all equally. 

I used this square template to make it easier. 

I cut little triangles in the corner of each fold, to make the actual act of folding easier. 

Here is one of the high res photos of the pheonix tail. 

My water colour set! Do you have one? You need one. Water colours are probably the easiest way to feel artistic ever. You basically just scribble the paint on. 

TA DA! What do you think The photo paper held the water colour really well, and even better when I had a layer of mod podge on it. 

Hope all my elevated envelope pen pal friends like it! 

This is my iPhone case. Booohhhrring. I got the iPhone 4S a few weeks ago and the battery gets eaten ALIVE every day and I had this Mophie case that has an extra battery back on the bottom (for when I’m out working on projects that require constant phone action and no time to charge the phone). It’s ugly. It’s huge - someone even asked me with a puzzled look on their face “What kind of phone is that?” IT’S AN iPHONE, you hipster. Can I just say though that the Mophie actually is awesome and I really like the case and the extra battery life.  If you’re constantly frustrated by your dying telephone, this might be the case for you! 

So yes, the battery pack is essential to my life. But the case is still ugly. It desperately needed some personality. So I figured I would dress it up with washi tape. Because, why not, really! I have all this washi tape and not enough reasons to use it :) So here are the colour combinations I considered - teal and white flowers with grey stick that have lavender squares on them OR floating hearts and clouds with bright blue flowers in a sea of pink. I also had this pack of washi tape stickers that looked like they might be about the right length - I pulled them out in case getting a perfect trim on the tape was going to be hard. 

I choose the brighter, more springtime flare! Hearts and clouds and flowers and fuchsia, right? Right. 

So after that, it was shockingly simple. I just laid out pieces of the tape on the back of the case and let it overlap the sides a little. I knew I would work on the perfect cut later. What helped was the case had ridges along the sides, so I could make a smooth seam with my fingernail and really secure the tape the phone. 

As soon as I had the whole thing covered, I took an extra knife and gently cut the tape along the seam. I wasn’t really concerned about damaging the case, because what phone case isn’t trashed anyways, and also you’d have to be pretty ruthless to really damage it. So I sliced carefully along the seam, the only difficulty really was putting so much pressure on it that the tape tore. But I got away basically scott-free on that. 

Two more small challenges that proved to not really be that challenging are both that the bottom part comes off (because that’s the extra battery pack that maybe you don’t always want to have on the phone) and the hole for the camera is round. But once again, there were small ridges that I was able to use as a guide when I was making my cuts, giving me PERFET precision. 

A challenge I decided NOT to take on was trying to tape the very bottom and the very top. I realize that would give it the total pro, ridiculous beyond awesome look but at the same time, it’s hard to fold tape over rounded edges and it didn’t have the ridges that gave me the nice seams so I left them white. 

VOILA! Now we just wait and see how long the washi tape lasts on the back of the phone before it starts peeling off. Sweaty hands, being thrown in my purse and wear and tear, I am guess it will last 3 weeks to a month. BUT that’s not a bad thing, because this was so easy that it gives me an excuse to change it up seasonally without having to buy a whole new phone case. Barf on that.  IF you wanted this to last way way longer, you could Mod Podge it. You could actually just Mod Podge it anyways, to harden it, because you could probably still peel it off the plastic later. So maybe add that step - Mod Podge!  (I will do that later as I am out of MP).  

As you can also see, the corners have some ripples but I don’t mind. Some people mind, and what you could do to avoid that is make slits in the tape to lay them flat. That is beyond way too much for me. 

Yay!!! How to make a bedtime story canopy!! An instructional video from Ikea, so that means it will be on the cheap end, yay!!! Except this video doesn’t really explain how to make it the canopy. How do you hang the canopy? This seems to be more of a mural…

That being said, I want the job to be the person who makes the stop-motion-animation craft videos…

I know - I sound crazy. But I have wanted to try making one of these for a while, and I have seen a bunch of tutorials that talked about how relatively “cost effective” they are to make, so - I figured why not :)

Tools:

- PVC Pipe - three 10’  pipe, anywhere from 1/2” to 3/4” wide (I would actually recommend getting 4, and you’ll see why) - $6 each, $18 total

- PVC pip joints - I got 6 T joints (you’ll see why) but you could get 4 T joints and 2 elbow joints - $1.50 each, $9

* So here is the thing - on the American Home Depot website, they show like 8 pages of PVC pipe options and joints and connectors but apparently, we don’t have the same kind of needs in Canada and our Home Depots carry like NOTHING. In fact, (get this) Home Depot doesn’t sell any of the small pieces of pipe (this PVC was in the electrical department, not the plumbing department) and they don’t sell ANY small plastic connectors anymore. And I purposely went to the BIG Home Depot out at the very end of Sarcee Trail which was a trek but I went because I knew they would have the biggest selection. The guy helping me managed to scrounge up the 6 T joints from a shelf that was holding like, remnant building supplies. It was like the River Thames for building supplies, it was sad. 

- Pipe cutter - because really, I wouldn’t be able to complete the project without them - $25 (UGH but they worked so can’t complain) The other option is to use a saw but I could see that getting incredibly messy and The Cpt and my mum would probably be mad if I was sawing around with PVC pipe so I splurged. 

* A lot of tutorials will tell you that Home Depot will actually CUT the pipe for you, which is what I went in hoping they would do. They used too, but they don’t anymore, apparently. There are some liability issues, I’m assuming :P So that is why I had to buy the stupid pipe cutters. 

- clamps, wide enough to go around the PVC pipe - $4 each, and I bought 2

- measuring tape, pen to mark 

Total Cost: $58 (would

Step 1 - Figure out your measurements. If you look at my original “sketch” below, you’ll see I wanted a backdrop stand I could break up into a number of pieces, in theory so it would be easier to store and put together. More on that later. So I opted for two feet comprised of four 18” poles, and two legs, made up of one 3’ rod and one 4’ rod each. Then I would have the perfect amount left over for the centre bridge and the top bridge - they would be anywhere from 4’ wide to 6’ wide. 

Step 2 - Measure and make your cuts! So each rod had a male and female end. I started on the male end, and made the first cut for the 3’. Then I made the second cut for 4’ and that left me with a 3’ piece with a female end. I did the exact same with the second rod. With the third rod, I did four cuts, 18” apart, which left me with a 4’ piece with a female end. So after all my cuts, I had 3’, 3’ and 4’ ends. 

Step 3 - Put’in it together. So the truth is, I thought that making the cuts would take a lot longer… but it didn’t! SO I figured I might as well test this sucker out.  As you can see from my sketch above, the joints work as follows:

- Feet: on either foot, you’ll have one T joint that holds two of the 18” pieces together, and the third, empty opening will point straight up to the sky. The 4’ leg pieces will fit into that opening. 

- Legs: there will be on T joint that sits on the top end of the 4’ leg piece. One empty opening will point towards the sky, and the other will point inwards, towards the middle of the frame. The 3’ leg piece will fit into the top part of the T joint. 

- Bridge: This is where really an Elbow joint would have been ideal but whatever, you take your last two T joints and fit one opening into the top of the 3’ leg piece and make sure that one of the other openings is point inwards towards the centre of the frame. There will be a third opening that points to nowhere. So then you take your extra pieces (your 3’, 3’ and 4’) and use them to make the arm of the bridge.

This is where things went mildly array - I didn’t have enough for my centre bridge. If I had made my cuts differently, I would have. I only want my arms to be about 4’ - 5’ apart, to make the structure more sturdy, BUT that’s okay. I can always go back tomorrow, and get another piece of pipe and make the two bridges from that. 

Nice face in that photo, right? 

Please ignore the abandoned furniture in our basement. We’re working on it. But enjoy the painted panels on the wall!

This is not a helpful photo, but you’re getting the drift of things…

So here it is all put together - I ended up only using the two 3’ rod ends because it was WAY too unsteady at 7’ apart. BUT I think at 4.5’ apart and with two bridge arms, it will be great. I decided to test it using this lovely afghan. 

So that all went way faster than expected - the whole project only took about 45 minutes! So I figured I would go upstairs and take a few snaps with my camera to see how my home made photo backdrop worked…

I took a whole bunch, but I was suffering from a bit of dead eyes today so I’ll post a set of photos another time. 

I used a light weight table cloth as my photo booth backdrop, and I think I need two more clamps to hold it “taught”. 

Here’s a shot of Baby Williams, with my head cut off. It will take a while to get lighting right and that kinda thing but so far, it worked okay! 

So you can see, it’s really too wide, even at 6’. I had to weigh down the feet with weights because I actually think they might be too long but I want to ask The Cpt. I think that a 4.5’ wide bridge will be good. 

There are the camps holding up the table cloth - I would do four total to keep it up there. 

So VOILA! Here’s my first shot with my photo booth! What do you think? Worked out okay! Has a few kinks but overall, worked out okay!! 

There have been some very special babies born in the last few months and some very special babies still to come! So I thought I might try my hand at an easy and useful craft that makes the perfect baby shower gift - baby leg warmers! I guess that for the first few months, babies wear these diaper onesies that make it easier to get them in and out of their diapers quickly. Who knew? So there are these leg warmers you can get for babies to keep their legs warm while they rock around in their diaper onesies. 

Well, these leg warmers are a little on the pricey side, if you ask me. But I found a great tutorial to make them yourself, followed it and voila! Now have a whole stash tucked away. 

Tools:

- knee high socks

- needle and thread

Cost: I bought two 3-packs of knee highs for $8 at Winners. 

Step 1: Cut off the feet of the sock. 

Step 2: Turn the tube of the sock inside out, and then make a little cuff at the bottom where the ankle would be. 

Step 3: Sew them together! Really you’re just basting them, but that stitch is strong enough. Make sure you cuff at the bottom though, because the top sock part has the elastic already sew in so it will stay up on baby’s thigh. 

Step 4: VOILA! Admire how crafty you are!

This project was not hard, but time consuming and one of the few times in my crafting life where the first way I did it ended up being the right way. It’s my seashell baby mobile! 

I wanted to do a sea shell mobile because I like how the light would reflect off the shells, giving off an interesting glow for baby that won’t blind him. The nursery gets so much light (it’s crazy) so this mobile will dance and reflect all day long. I picked a nice colourful ribbon because babies love colour and went to town! 

Tools:

• Embroidery Hoop - $3 at Walmart OR if you go to a thrift shop, you can properly find a nice wooden for 50 cents.
• Seashells - these aren’t even real, I got them at Pottery Barn like 3 years ago on sale - 50 little shell type circles for maybe $3 for the whole box? Because what else are you going to do with them, really? But this is whatever you want to hang from your mobile, could be paper cut outs, could be orgami birds, could Christmas ornaments, whatevs. (on hand)
• Fishing line - or yarn - or string - or lace - go nuts! (on hand)
• Ribbon of your choice :) (on hand)
• Variety of Super Glue (on hand)
• Scissors (on hand) 

Step 1 - make a loose measurement of how long you want the string on your mobile to hang, then add 6 inches to for room to tie it to the hoop. It’s hard to measure fishing line with an actual measuring tape so I just measured it against my forearm and figured it was good enough. 

Step 2 - Loop the fishing line around the loop and double knot it. Then, I put a dab of glue down to hold it in place. What was actually great about this embroidery hoop was that it had 8 evenly spaced markers on it (for some magical embroidery use, I’m sure) so I just lined up my fishing line with each little marker, making them perfectly spaced!

Step 3 - so in some stroke of genius, I decided it was a good idea to wrap the ribbon around the hoop before I put my shells on the lines. And I let the entire length of ribbon off the spool (which the cats had a field day with) and then just started wrapping it tightly around the hoop. I let the fishing line fill between the ribbon wraps, so that they could hang down, and tried to wrap the same amount of ribbon between each line, to keep my spacing (for example, between each fishing line, I wrapped the ribbon 3 times, no more or no less). 

When I had covered the entire hoop, I put some super glue on the base of the ribbon to secure it to the hoop. Then, I eye balled about how much ribbon I would want to hang the mobile from at the top, made a loop and glued the other end to the exact opposite side on the hoop, giving my hoop a hanging loop :) 

Does any of that make sense? Because I did not (could not) take photos during that stage.

 Step 5 - so now I have this lovely hoop with all this fishing - it was time to glue on my sea shells! This was easy and hard at the same time. Easy because it’s just a dot of super glue and then holding the fishing line in place until it dries enough. Hard because fishing line likes to curl, because the sea shells didn’t lay flat, they have a bit of a curve so I had to use two hands (and honestly, 2 minutes dry time seems like nothing when you read it on the package but it’s a long time when you’re hold something together) and hard because by the end, there were a lot of them.

VOILA! :) The bottom photo shows off the soft light reflection a bit better. I love it! I’m so happy!