The Sweet Treats Cafe

 

Good morning! I am excited to post on the cafe today!  You know the space underneath the stair case that becomes a catch-all for junk? I love it as a kids space. All of the bedrooms in our house are upstairs so I really like the idea of having a spot downstairs for the kids to play without looking like a nest of toys. Since we have the playroom upstairs I can just keep kitchen themed toys in the downstairs cafe. It took me a long time to come up with a theme. I thought about a castle among other things but wanted to keep it gender neutral.I finished the painting about a year ago but didn’t want to share it until I had made some more progress. Santa brought Addi a kitchen set for Christmas so it looks a little more complete.

 

                           

  I was not blogging a year ago so I don’t have any pictures of the process. I wish I had taking step by step pictures. My walls were originally cream. I first faux- painted over them with a damp rag and a glaze to get the old look.  I sketched all the bricks and cracks with a  pencil. I then used some brown paint  mixed with a glazing agent and sponged the inside to get it not so perfect. (NOT THE NASTY OLD SPONGE PAINTING FROM THE 90’S LOL.) I went over that with some of the original paint mixed with the glazing agent and some of the faux-paint mix.  The name was cut out of vinyl. The window box is an iron window box I found at Tiapan full of Styrofoam and fake flowers. I have a pair of old shutters in the garage I snagged up for this project but they wouldn’t actually open and shut with the window box. Do you think it would be fun to put them on the inside instead? Maybe a curtain?                       

                I found two of these chairs at a yard sale this summer for one dollar each! What a steal!

Do you remember these ones in Pottery Barn?

Not bad for a dollar and a little spray paint!

                                      

The table is covered up with a baby blanket as a table cloth for now. My friend Natalie gave it to me and it is the perfect size but I haven’t painted it yet! Santa got the kitchen set from IKEA. I thought it was one of the more gender neutral. There was a pink retro one that I looked at a thousand times but had to resist! The special board is just a piece of sheet metal I had cut and the edges bent. It is hung on the wall with mirror hangers. There is a little more area in the back where the staircase wraps around. It is somewhat dark in the back so I am looking for a cute lamp or some kind of light to add back there.

 

I am working on some fun pillows today for a friend so hopefully I will be back to post soon! Later!

A little Valentines, my cute kiddos, & a DIY collage:)

 

It is the last day of January already! I am really enjoying staying inside and getting a few things accomplished this month! I am anxious for spring but not too bad. Last week the kids seemed a little stir crazy! I thought we needed to get outside! We filled up some water bottles with food coloring and water and made snow art!

I took a few pictures of the porch while we were outside! I used the branches of an artificial Christmas tree I didn’t want anymore for the pots.

I finally finished my crepe paper balls. You can find the tutorial at House of Smiths. They are super easy but require a lot of time and patience! They were slow going with me. It took me a few weeks here and there because I am easily bored of doing the same thing. The Styrofoam balls are super expensive for some odd reason. I would suggest finding something random to improvise with. Maybe a ball out of the toy section or something? I used some wicker balls I got last year at a yard sale for a dollar! I got the cute bowl that they are in at the D.I. the other day for $2 and my niece made me the cute Valentines tile!

Here is the before pictures of some frames I found at the D.I. again.

I forgot to take a before of the mirror. Anyway, Here is the after! I just paired it with some things that I already had from the room before I re-painted that looked too small to go on the wall alone and a metal letter from Hobby Lobby. I still need to get two black and whites printed for the small black frames! I am looking for a great dresser or some sort of table to go under the collage on this wall.

Silhouette Giveaway @ All Things Thrifty

 

They are giving away a Silhouette at All Things Thrifty! Go on over and enter!  I use my vinyl cutter all the time but the Silhouette comes with a great online store that you can buy files for 99 cents a piece, similar to ITunes. I would love to win it! Go over and enter! Here are just a few fun project ideas that you can do with it! The possibilities are endless!

SCRAPBOOK PAGES

CARDS

APPAREL

VINYL

ETCHED GLASS

SKETCHES

TEMORARY TATOOS

PAPER CRAFTS

All pictures were taken from http://www.silhouetteamerica.com/. Check out the great website to see more great ideas.

Living room re-do

 

I am back and happy to be done painting! It took me an entire week to paint this room all together! Isn’t that terrible! My kids have had a case of the naughty’s lately and I have been finding it hard to get anything extra accomplished! I am very happy with how it turned out though! It was worth living in a weeks worth of disaster!

Remember the vinyl  tree from before?

This tree was one of the first things that I cut out of vinyl. I used some from a friend and it was glossy. I prefer the matte but thought it would do. TIP: NEVER USE THE GLOSSY ON ANYTHING THAT ISN’T PERMANENT OR SUPER STRONG! It not only peeled paint off the wall, but lots of texture too. I have never ever had the matte vinyl do that to anything.

So… I was freaking out! Luckily it was ten at night and my husband was fast asleep! I knew he wouldn’t go in the living room when he headed out to work that morning! The next morning I headed to the paint store and got some advice on how to texture. I knew it needed to be done before Brandon got home! I didn’t want him to see that my crazy vinyl had taken the texture off the wall! I told him after it was fixed, of course. To my surprise it was actually really easy to fix and kind of fun. I just took a lg. spackle knife and some drywall mud and spread it on and scraped it off. Then I went over it with a drywall primer.

I really love how the color turned out. I do have some naked walls now so I will be on the hunt for something to fill them!

 

I designed my layout for the pillows in my Create and Cut program. You then mirror the image and cut it on heat transfer vinyl, which you can find on www.signwarehouse.com. Silhouette also sells heat transfer vinyl.

I took this project to my moms and forgot to take step by step pictures. You don’t need transfer tape when working with the heat transfer vinyl. You just peel off the excess, flip it upside down and iron it on. The trick is to not peel it off until it is completely cool. If not you will ruin your transfer!

I found this cute ribbon at my favorite store, Black Eyed Susans, the other day! My cute husband let me run in while he stayed in the car with the kids!!!!

I am working on a few projects for V-day, but for now I just added some pink flowers from the dollar store in to the sweater vase (sweater vases in previous post… http://myoohlalaandi.blogspot.com/2011/01/bring-on-new-year.html) and used  some leftover red x-mas candy in my jar. I also found some fake rose petals left over from a craft project for the other jar.

The Carmickle and Stryder signs also got a quick fix since my kids had destroyed the bottom letters on each of them! They were done using pre-cut chipboard and double sided tape. You can glue the paper down to the letters and roughly cut them out. Use a finger nail file to sand off the excess. I then used distress ink (or a stamp pad) to rub the edges.

I would like to build up my blog and be able to offer advertising and give a ways. If you enjoy following it or know anyone else that would. Please pass it on to your friends! Thank you!

Goodnight! Love, Amanda

Technorati Tags: living room,grey living room,heat transfer vinyl,throw pillows,valentines day,name signs

Bring on the New Year!

 

WARNING: MAY BE THE LONGEST POST EVER.

I am so excited to start out this year with a fresh start! This last year has been a roller coaster and we are very excited that it came to end as well as it did. We learned a lot from Brandon's accident and the events that led along with it. When times are rough it only brings you closer together!. I think it will be a very exciting year for us! We will have an addition to the family in July, which we are super excited about! My goals for 2010 include:

*Cutting my work schedule back to 2 days a week after the baby is born!

*Making sure to get out and do one super fun thing once a month with the whole family!

*House Goals- Complete the upstairs décor as soon as we find out the sex of the baby!

*Repaint the downstairs living room!

*create a Pottery Barn inspired collage on stair wall!

*Paint the garage floor and organize the garage!

*Finish the gravel, the pavers pathways, and pour a patio and curbing!

*Possibly build a playhouse!

*Catch up the kids scrapbooks this winter while it is cold and I can stay inside!

*Finish the kids café.

*Expand the blog!

My Christmas is all down and the house feels much less cluttered! I love decorating for Christmas but usually jump the gun on it so by the time it is over I take the décor right down!

Here is the progress I have made since…

DIY Sweater Vases-

These were inspired by one of my favorite blogs. You can find the link and the tutorial at Under the Table and Dreaming! I found the vases and sweaters at D.I. (our local thrift store). I filled them with some of the filler that I took out of the Christmas tree!

 

Burlap Table Runner-

 

The kids and I stayed the night at my moms for New Years Eve and had craft night since Brandon had to work! It was fun. We didn’t get a ton accomplished that night but did make some progress yesterday!

The kids have taken finger nail clippers, silverware, and other things and distressed the top of this table for me. Wasn’t that nice of them? lol. I ordered touch up paint from the manufacturer and it didn’t even match. It kind of fits in with the rest of the décor but thought it would be nice to find something that covered most of it! This table runner was so easy!

I left the burlap the original width because the edges are finished and I didn’t want them to fray.

1-If you want to make a more narrow one you can cut it down and iron stitch witchery (available for $1.40 at Walmart) to hem it without sewing.

2- Cut four 5” strips off of the muslin.

3- Sew two strips together for each end.

4-Fold the edge of the fabric over and then iron it and run a straight stitch along it to hem the edge.

5-Finish hemming the ends.

6- Pin the ends of your strip to the ends of your burlap. Find you center and pin it down to the center of your burlap.

7-Work your way in pinning and pleating the fabric.

8- Using a walking foot, sew it using a wider seam allowance.

9- Iron.

10-Enjoy!

Vinyl Sign-

Remember this antique store find from this previous post.

Antique store finds

I found this window at a yard sale this summer! I want to turn it the other way and build a cabinet behind it to go above the toilet in the bathroom. Brandon and I are still a little gun-shy of the saw . I like it here for now.

I love the crystal branches out of the Christmas tree in the arrangement for winter!

Building up inspiration for my next project…

I am going to start re-painting my living room soon. Here is some pictures of it now.

I still LOVE my blue furniture. I have been in-love with grey for a while. I just wanted to find somewhere to incorporate it in my house!@ I think that it compliments blue very well. I have had this vinyl on my wall since shortly after we moved in and am over the idea of an “accent wall”. I want the whole room to be grey and calming. I also want to keep a vintage feel and maybe keep my brown curtains. I kind of feel like I have too, but if they clash they are out!

Don’t you love these colors together? Do I really want to get out of my pjs and brave the negative temperatures to grab paint today? We will have to see…. maybe another day.

I love handwriting fonts. You can find the ones I have used today @ http://www.kevinandamanda.com/fonts/!

Bye for now! AManda