kirstencan

It only took five years...

Yup, only five years to replace our dining room curtains.  Really not too bad, right? ;)

Our old ones were green/white roman blinds with a checked valance - glimpsed here.  Made by the former owner.  (By the way, I'm keeping it real here, by not clearing off my table - click on the photo to see notes in flickr).

I used a linen blend fabric for the top of the curtain panels - I wanted it really washable - good thing, as I was sewing them up I noticed that someone had touched all the panels with chocolatey fingers!

The bottom fabric is Amy Butler Lotus, in Cherry.  My next project will be making a kitchen curtain (smaller window) entirely out of that fabric - it'll be cheery.

The project after that?  Repainting the dining/kitchen in a different green - probably the same as Monkey's room...

I made four panels, and each has a little embroidery design.  I wasn't nearly neat enough with my threads on the back, but oh well.  The house is a collaboration by Princess and I.  The bird is from a drawing she made for my birthday.

I originally wanted cafe curtains - only 2/3 the way up the window, but we get major sun in the afternoon, so I made them full-length.  They're attached by clips/rings, which also makes them really easy to open/close.

I'm pretty excited that they turned out - especially as I made them up as I went along, lined them, and I'm horrible at measuring.

I'm liking them!  They're lighter and more 'spring-y'.  More fun, and definitely more me than our old ones!

p.s. - We've had quite the cloudy/gloomy day today - not ideal for taking photos.  And, of course, now that I've posted these photos, the sun came out!  DOH!

Pigs and Curtains

Mommy, Look!  Pigs are in carbonite!

-Thomas

I thought that was pretty funny (and yes, it's a Star Wars thing).  He ran across this fun game (Pass the Pigs) the other day.  If you haven't played it, you should - it's hilarious to throw pigs like dice.

Okay, opinions, please:

I've decided not to hang Princess' old curtains in her new room. In part because I'd want a different shade under the valance, and because there's a desk under the window, it would be hard for her to pull the shade down.  Anyway, her room is painted lavender and white - we tried to match it to the lavender from her old quilt - my MIL made that one, too - all lavender, yellow and white reproduction prints (glimpsed here).

(she drives me nuts with how much stuff she keeps on the bed - but, hey, she makes it herself!)

Her new quilt (above) has more colors in it, so I wanted curtains that included a few more, too.

I recently picked up this yellow fabric for curtains - I was thinking just very basic curtains - 2 panels that slide to the sides.

When I see the yellow fabric paired with the purple fabric, though, I want to cut them all up and do patchwork curtains.  But I'm afraid it'd be to busy.  I'm leaning towards the plain yellow - or maybe with a purple casing at the top or something.

What do you think?

Transitions

Hall to playroom:

Playroom to Princess' room:

Playroom to laundry room:

Monkey's room to hall:

Hall to dining (I've never been happy with that green):

Do you ever walk around just looking?

Playroom - details

I wanted to show you a better look at the mobile I made for the playroom:

I painted an embroidery hoop red, and cut out lots and lots of circles (3 different sizes) from vintage children's books.

Everything is hung with red/white baker's twine.

It moves and sways a little with the slightest breeze, and I like how each circle is really different and fun.  Fun to make, more fun to look at! It really matches the decoupaged bookcase it's hung by too.

Another picture I have hanging is a shot of the three kids in front of Thomas (from this year's Day Out With..).  I actually can't believe how well it came out.  I found some semi-subtle Thomas scrapbook paper to back it with.

I covered all the outlet covers and lightswitches in fabric:  Dick and Jane or a stripe I used in the bunting.

Here's a better shot of our... art/picture hanger thingy.

Basically, I found a piece of wood in the garage, hot-glued wooden clothespins to them, and then painted the whole thing red (same color as the bookcase ).  Easy.  I tried hanging it horizontally, but the papers on top flopped over too much.  But vertically works well!  I like having a place to hang the kids latest coloring, or photos of the cousins.

The best thing is, since you know I'm a total cheapskate - none of this cost much!  Some cost nothing.  Woo hoo!

It's all in the details.

Playroom

So, I was waiting for a few more finishing touches (and maybe new carpet - anything but rose!) before showing you our new playroom.  Remember that?  But it's as done as it'll ever be! :)

Since it was a while ago, I'll just remind you that it was a longer/narrow room (with HORRID rose flowered wallpaper), and we built a wall in the middle so that Princess could have her own room.  The door above goes to her room. 

Then we painted (lots and lots) over the wallpaper.  I'm happy with the color - it's a very pale blue-green.  I tend to go 'medium' on paints, and I was kinda proud of myself for going this pale.

(left of the door)                (right of the door)

Please imagine the ugly (but we got it for free) play kitchen gone and replaced by this red IKEA chair.  AHHH, that's better, right?  Hopefully that'll happen soon.

More details tomorrow, but you can click on the pictures to see notes in flickr.

Originally I wanted the toy cabinets (IKEA, unfinished) to be red, too.  Eventually I decided that they'd probably be too high contrast. There's plenty of that without a giant red cabinet, right?  I decoupaged red dotted scrapbook paper to make the letters on the doors.  The cabinets have baby locks on them so that the boys have to ask to get something out - and to do that, they have to put something away. 

The train table rotates between trains, Playmobil and Legos.  The bins beneath the table hold engines + track, star wars stuff, and cars.

Not shown are the cubbies (for shoes and library books)with red-framed baby pictures of the kiddos above them, and the big sliding door with new white drapes (goodbye vertical blinds!).

For pictures I used inexpensive IKEA frames, put red-checked scrapbook paper in them, and on top of that put illustrations from cute books.  There's kind of a Dick and Jane/train theme going on.  On the left are pix from D&J, and on the right are some from The Little Train.  The framed Thomas poster was a hand-me-down from a neighbor - someday it'll disappear, but for now the boys love it - and it matches.  Some of the bunting fabric is D&J, too.

All in all I'm pretty pleased - it's a fun room, and turned out pretty much the way I imagined it - how often does that happen! :)

Monkey Projects

Monkey's room is coming along slowly.  I have a few projects planned that won't be done for a while, but here's a couple little ones that I finished:

These are pictures from the book 10 Little Sock Monkeys.  I found it for sale at the library once.  I tore out a couple of pages that won't be missed (much) and stuck them in IKEA frames with scrapbook paper behind them.

Here are the outlet/light switch covers we took off to paint.  They are scraps of Princess' quilt.  I just mod-podged fabric to them for her purple princess room.  I thought I'd have to buy new ones, but the fabric tore off pretty easily.

Obviously, I recovered them with monkey fabric...

And a little pillow cover I made with sock monkey flannel sent from Alisa for Miniswap2 way back when.

Monkey LOVES this pillow.

In non-decorating news, I saw two good movies yesterday.

My friend and I went to see Becoming Jane - which was pretty good, but a downer.  It's worth seeing, but I think I was a little disappointed in it.

Possibly better was the dvd I checked out from the library:  Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.  I don't know how I missed that 80's classic, but it was the first time I'd seen it.  Loved it.  I don't know what's better, the dinosaur hair clips (or the outfits in general), the end dance routine, or the nun on the pommel horse. 

Painting

Painting went pretty well.  All things considered.

Thomas only got into the paint once.  He repainted part of a freshly-green wall (white), decided the closet door should be green - oh, and the back of the freshly-painted white door to the room.  The closet was probably going to be green anyway, so I just finished the job. (That's what I get for leaving paint out so I can touch up).

Monkey found my touch up paint brush drying in the bathroom and decided to rub it into Princess' My Little Pony purple lip gloss.

Monkey got into the paint later.  Luckily he repainted a wall (green) that was already done - he got some on his clothes, but it's clothes I don't care about it.  I almost dressed him in his elephant shirt, though!  Close one. Yeah, we put a baby-lock on the door after that. 

I love the color.  We painted about 2/3 of the wall and repainted the top white (before pictures here).  I think I would love to redo my green kitchen in this green.  And I think I have enough paint...

Here's my problem:  remember how I wanted to cover the roller blinds?

Didn't work that well.   I used the spray adhesive, which seemed to work, but bubbles came up later and the blinds wouldn't roll up at first.  I think maybe because the blind is a light-blocking one, the fabric makes it too heavy.  My idea was to have the blue monkey fabric on the blind, with the bunting as a kind of valance.  Simple (yet loud), not asking too much, was it?

(For awhile I had to fold the blind up during the day.  But then it started working... ?)

So now I think I'll make a valance or curtain instead - rip the fabric off the blind and just try to hide the roller, you know?  So maybe a green gingham + white valance?  Green + blue monkey?  White + blue?  What do you think?  I'd love to use the blue monkey fabric.  It's only for so long you get to decorate your kids' rooms all bright and fun, you know?

Red Paint

I am SO sick of painting!
The last week or so has been chock full of painting.  First, 2 coats of (stinky) oil-based primer in the playroom, then 2 coats of 2 different colors in there - and the trim.
Then repeat all of that for Princess' new room.
And as of last night,  we are DONE!
Woo hoo!

I have been wearing painting clothes for a week and I have paint all over myself (that stupid primer doesn't come off skin easily!  I even got it on my eyelashes - I was just happy it wasn't my eye).

I'm giving myself a couple of weeks off, and then I'm going to re-do Monkey's 'new' room - I don't want him having to stay in a purple princess room for too long once Princess moves to her new room.  So I will be taking volunteers - who's going to come over and help? :)

**Also, SO sorry I haven't been very good at replying to your comments!  I love them, so - but have been SUPER busy!

...

Things are starting to come together in our two new rooms.  I'm happy with how they're looking so far.  I'm not going to show you yet, but here is a little accessory project I did for the playroom: 

I painted a little bookcase red, and then decoupaged pages from old children's books to the back.  Here it is without the shelf or books (but with a monkey):

I used pages from Mother Goose, Richard Scarry (of course), I Can Fly (one of the best cuttable books out there), an old book I got at the library sale - oh, and a couple of others.

The upper right is my favorite bit - the fire truck matches the red paint perfectly:

And here it is with the books - which the boys immediately started pulling out - I don't mind, though, because they were actually looking at them, not just pulling them off and throwing them, which happens, too.

So, yeah, you can't actually see much of the back with the books on the shelves, but it's all about details, right?
I like it anyway.

...

Speaking of red paint... (you're gonna love this one) Thomas was walking through the garage and picked up my quart of red paint.  Panicked, I yelled for him to put it down.

Oh, he put it down - he threw it!

Argh!  Red paint splattered over a bunch of stuff, mostly Thomas' clothes - which (of course) was his Easter outfit!  Minus the vest, thankfully, but still - I had to go buy a new white shirt for him.

Kids!!!

It's a good thing they're so cute.

Changing things up

We are in the beginning of our first fairly-major project on our house.  Princess needs her own room.  She's been sharing with Thomas for two years, and he gets into all of her stuff.  Having to keep some of her toys up where he can't get them (on her bunk bed) has been a pain, and adds to the clutter of that room in a major way.  Thomas isn't ready to share a room with Monkey, which was the plan.  It's a long story.

Short story is, yesterday we took the crib down (first time we've ever done that!) took the bunk beds apart, and started moving everything around.  First things first, Thomas got set up in Monkey's old room and Monkey's bed was moved into Princess' (current) room.  Here's Thomas' 'new' room:

I wanted a place where he couldn't destroy anything, plus have a really restful place to hang out, so we only have his bed, rocker (which will probably be moved into Monkey's room), play tent, beanbag chair, extra blankets (he loves old, heavy quilts), and a few books.

(The quilt on his bed was Aaron's - his grandmother made it). 
I picture a pile of pillows over by the bean bag so he can jump into them or just pile them up (he likes to do that).  It's now my favorite room, just because there's no clutter (besides the blankets).   He was so pleased with his new room that he decided to decorate it himself:

It's good we did this first, he loves his new room (he actually took a nap for the first time in weeks), and it gave him a place to go while his dad worked on phase two (which was quite loud). 

We are building a wall dividing our playroom - making Princess a room of her own (if small).  By 'we' I mean 'Aaron' of course.  And then I get to get rid of that horrid wallpaper that I despise so!  Oh, I have plans!

more painting!

so, i love my mom!  i emailed her on monday and mentioned briefly that it's too bad i won't have time to paint this week - i've had the gallons of paint for a few weeks already - and she essentially said:  hey, we can do it - i'll come help, and i'll bring the rollers (by the way - the BEST rollers - i'll never use another!), drop cloths, tape... 
so we painted!  my house is kind of weird in that it has a lot of not-90-degree angles.  i like it that way, but it makes it hard to decide where to paint.  that and the really tall ceilings...
anyway, we did it!  i really like the yellow - so much that i'm going to have to redo my green kitchen, now!  and my bathroom... what did i start?!