Easter Egg Wreath Tutorial

My children love plastic Easter eggs, so even though I would prefer a classy grapevine wreath with some nice speckled faux robin eggs and maybe some burlap ribbon...I wanted them to be excited about this, so I went for the cheap plastic Easter eggs. Read on to see how to make this inexpensive and easy wreath!
I bought this foam wreath at St. Vincent de Paul for 45 cents--woohoo!
Then I covered it with ribbon from my stash...only to realize I didn't have enough of this yellow ribbon. I thought about covering the rest of it with orange ribbon, then I decided just to skip the ribbon altogether--so I removed all of this and left my wreath bare.
Next I gathered my eggs from Dollar Tree (I later went back and grabbed a fourth bag) and my glue gun and started gluing.
I just smooshed them as close together as I could. Make sure the eggs don't pop open! I didn't put any on the backside of my wreath, but I did do the inner and outer edges. I used 3.5 packages of eggs, but that amount would vary based on the size of your foam wreath.
I took some wired yellow ribbon from my stash and tied in around the bottom of the wreath and then tied a bow. I hot glued the loops of the bow down...and that was it.
It looks so cute on my front door (I looped ribbon around the wreath and nailed the ribbon into the top edge of my front door--the flat part on the very top, not the front of the door) and my children are thrilled with it. They told me it makes them get excited for Easter egg hunts!

Not bad for less than $5! Have you made a similar wreath? I'd love to see it! I know one of my Facebook friends made a really similar one--hers has tulle on it instead of grograin ribbon though. I love seeing how we can all use similar supplies and yet make projects our own!

I'm linking up to DIY Day at ASPTL.

Dropcloth Table Skirt

Our office area is a work in progress--but I've actually made progress on it, so that is an improvement! The picture above is from the very end of the construction phase of our house addition. We now have our family room furniture clustered around the rug in front of the fireplace--which left all that room behind the couch (around the other rug) for an office area. Up until now our office area has been (mostly) hidden inside an armoire in our formal living room. There also was a corner of our master bedroom that was overrun with scrapbooking items. However, I'm still not completely sold on the idea of having everything out in the open, so we didn't want to spend very much money on our office area...just in case I change my mind!
Instead of buying nice wood desks, we bought two folding tables at Costco for about $30 each. Functional, not too horrible looking...but they did nothing to hide all our stuff. I don't like seeing clutter and this is a lot of clutter! Well-organized...but still clutter! See those white bookshelves on the right--we built those using plans from Knock Off Wood. They're knock-offs of the Pottery Barn Cameron Two Shelf Bookcase.
Lots and lots of stuff--none of which I want to look at on a daily basis!! So, I decided to skirt the tables. I bought a beautiful brown damask on sale at JoAnn Fabrics--got it home and realized it looked horrendous with my area rug!! Not good! So I looked around at what I had at home and realized I had an extra dropcloth leftover from my dropcloth curtain project. A bit beige, but the price was right! (I think I originally paid about $9 for it at Lowes.)
It worked beautifully! I sewed (just straight lines--nothing fancy!) two panels for each table because my husband wanted a place where he could easily reach in to get things or put his legs when he's sitting at the computer. (I didn't really understand the need for a leg spot since he usually sits like a five year old with his legs curled up under him, but whatever, I humored him.) Then I hotglued the panels to the edge of the tables. I used a LOT of hot glue--so far it is holding on really well!
The area definitely still is a work in progress and needs some wall decor and prettying up, but I'm thrilled to no longer be seeing all that clutter under our desks/folding tables/cheap solution! I know it is a bit beige right now, but I think wall decor will help break up the beige factor--plus my Pottery Barn area rug has lots of big flowers--you just can't see much of it in these pictures.

More pictures to come after I make more progress! I'm linking this to Jen's Weekend Wrap-Up Party and Kimba's DIY Day.

Children's Artwork Display Solution

When we did our house addition (expanded family room and eating area) we turned our dining room into a playroom and have been very pleased with this decision. There wasn't a lot of available wallspace in the room as it is open to our "formal" living room but I did want to find a way to display some of my children's artwork. The only space available was a five foot wall above the piano.
It was the perfect length for a small curtain rod. I purchased this rod and the ring clips from Target. It is the same rod style that I used for my dropcloth drapes in another area of my house. My children are thrilled to have their artwork up and I love having it up. I know some people use art display systems from Ikea or Pottery Barn, but I don't live near those stores--plus this rod was very inexpensive and it matches (in color and general style) the curtain rods and chandelier that I already have in this space.
Yes, the rod is centered on the wall--it is hard to tell, but the wall turns a corner just a few inches beyond the piano. If you look at the trim along the floor, you can see that it is farther back than the piano. I'm still deciding whether or not the rod is too high. I like that the artwork is high enough that the children can't tug on it, but I'm not a huge fan of the empty space below it. I'm still pondering this one.

I linked this up to DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land.

Mama-Made-Sundress

I have a very happy little girl in my house and it's all because I spent one naptime working on a project for her. She now has a mama-made-sundress and loves it! It makes me smile to see how happy she is with it--she doesn't see the imperfections, she just feels the love I put into making this for her.
I'm not a fantastic sewer, but this truly was an easy project even though I made it without a pattern. I bought presmocked fabric from JoAnn's to make this sundress. I measured my little girl's chest circumference and then also figured out how long I wanted the dress to be. I cut the panel of fabric to the right width and trimmed a bit off the bottom. Then I hemmed it and sewed the dress into a tube. My next step was to make the straps--I just sewed two tubes (inside out) and then turned them right side out and sewed them onto the dress (after first trying the "tube" part of the dress on my daughter to figure out the placement of the straps.
That's it! Easy Peasy, Lemon Squeezy! (And yes, that is her own pose!) For more projects, visit DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land.

Spray Paint Your Kitchen Accessories

Last week I posted about starting our big kitchen cabinet makeover project--we're painting our oak cabinets white and adding beadboard and trim. I'd love to show you my finished kitchen...but I'm not finished yet. I'm not even finished with the first half of it! Ugh!
I did, however, finish a different project related to my kitchen. One of the comments on last week's post was that I should paint my spice rack white. This was a lightbulb moment for me! You see, I also have a wood paper towel holder that I've been thinking I need to replace because the wood is all dried out. But why should I replace it when I can spray paint it?!
I admit to a brief moment of hesitation over spray painting my Crate and Barrel spice rack...after all, it was a wedding present eight years ago. Then I remembered that I'm kind of tired of it anyhow. However there was zero hesitation about spraying that Target paper towel holder!
Woo! Way better! I'd love to show these to you in my kitchen...but the kitchen is in disarray and the counters are covered with cabinet doors. Stay tuned...the kitchen cabinet project is ongoing!

Kitchen Cabinets Part I

This is my kitchen...lots of oak and gold handles and oak...and more oak. Did I mention that I don't like oak? Now that we've expanded our family room (yes, I know I haven't posted "final" pictures of that!) and have a such a light and bright space with crisp white woodwork...well, the oak kitchen really doesn't flow with the space.

I've been planning our kitchen re-do for quite awhile, but I wanted to wait until the addition was done. So, now is the time! We spent the three day holiday weekend starting this project. We didn't get as far as I wanted, but we made good progress. I was hoping to get one side (the stove side) of the kitchen done. That didn't happen, but I do like what did happen!
My plan for our kitchen is to put beadboard on all the exposed ends of the cabinets as well as in the flat panels on the cabinet insets. Crown moulding will go on the tops of the cabinets and trim will be added to the bottom edge of the top cabinets. Quarter round trim will go along the base of the cabinets to transition to the hardwood floor. Everything will be sanded and painted a crisp white.
First we removed the cabinet doors and everything in the cabinets on one side of the kitchen. Then I started sanding the cabinets while my husband started cutting beadboard. We clamped up the first big piece of beadboard to see what we thought...and we loved it! Now my husband was beginning to see my vision for the kitchen!
I kept sanding and my husband kept cutting. I sanded all the doors using a random orbital sander as well as sandpaper along the edges. I primed and painted the old hinges with spray paint as we're hoping to reuse them. We attached the beadboard to the cabinet sides and door fronts using Liquid Nails and then my husband used finish nails and a hammer to attach the crown moulding and other trim pieces. Right now the budget doesn't allow for the purchase of a nail gun and compressor, but that sure would have come in handy.
This is my husband's first time cutting crown moulding--I think he did a fantastic job! Oh and take a look at the countertop. We have laminate counters with oak trim (yes, more oak!) that we're trying to save. I taped off the edge and primed it...and it is looking like it will work.
At this point the cabinets have one coat of primer. I'll be priming them again before painting them with some high quality white latex paint that I bought from Benjamin Moore. I'm painting everything with a brush. We have a paint sprayer, but it isn't a very good one because we don't have an air compressor (that whole budget thing again) and I decided that sanding out drips from our cheapo paint sprayer would be a huge pain because of the beadboard. So far the brush is working really well!
The beadboard panels fit perfectly on the flat surfaces of our kitchen cabinets. The faces of the cabinet boxes stick out just a bit on the front--so on the corners of the cabinets the edges aren't even. Does that make sense? Here's a picture where you can see how the beadboard just nestles right in there.
Still a lot (a LOT!) of work to go, but I'm already thrilled with how much better our kitchen is looking. I really and truly love what we're doing to the kitchen! Stay tuned and I'll post more pictures as we continue with the process.


Click the box above to go to A Soft Place to Land and see more projects! Or head over to The Shabby Chic Cottage for more Transformation Thursday projects!