The miracle that is spray paint ...

I've known for years that a can of spray paint can transform just about any mundane object into a chic display piece, but it's been at least a couple of years since I put that knowledge to good use.  I chalk it up to laziness, but recently I've been inspired by the bevvy of great blog postings about this neat little trick.

For example, the good folks at Young House Love are always transforming some thrift store find into a Jonathan Adler knock-off for only a couple bucks!  Check out the hideous frog they transformed into something I covet in Something Crazy Happened, one of many of their postings about the wonders spray paint.

Another blog I recently stumbled upon, Pure and Noble Blogspot, shows a really clever technique for combining puffy paint (or hot glue) and spray paint with beautiful results (below).  Check out that posting here.

So armed with my new enthusiasm and inspiration I trekked down to my local Goodwill store and was delighted to find a pair of solid metal candle holders for $3.99 each (below).

 They reminded me of the ZGallerie antler candle holders that I'm slightly obsessed right now (below)!

I picked up some cheap-o metalic silver spray paint from Walmart and set about transforming my found objects with an aim to use them in my Christmas decor or tablescape. 

Mid-painting. 

And voila, the finished product!!  I think they'll look excellent topped with white candles or even some ornaments!  Stay tuned to see how they work in my future posting on Christmas decor and, until next time friends, goodbye! 

 

The BEST Basic Crepe Recipe

We eat eggs almost every single day, usually scrambled, but sometimes fried or poached.  Today I decided to get creative and try something different - crepes. 

Crepes aren't actually new to me.  I've been eating them for years, especially when I'm around my sister, Deanna, the crepe Queen!!  And I've made them a few times myself as well, when we were in France with Chris' family, for example, and had limited baking ingredients at the house we were renting.  I've made them with some success, but had never landed upon a fabulous crepe recipe ... until today!!!

I found a basic crepe recipe from AllRecipes.com and only tweaked it slightly to create perfect crepes.  You can find the recipe here.  The one thing I changed was to add an extra 1/4 cup of milk, as I thought the recipe was a bit thick and needed to be more runny to swirl easily and cover the circumference of the pan.

I sliced some bananas and smeared on some yummy Nutella and viola - a delicious breakfast treat!

I got this picture from CrumblyCookie.net and of course this is exactly what mine looked like :).   

Cute as can be customized DIY onesies

One of the girls in my mommy group is expecting her second, a baby boy to be named Henry, any day now so I wanted to make something special for her (or him actually!). 

I had a trio of brand new onesies in a pack so I decided to customize them for baby Henry.  I thought a mustache would be cute, plus an 'H' for Henry, and a German Shepherd because that is the family pet (and apparently the bain of my poor friend's existence due to incessant barking and shedding!). 

Here they are ...

And a close up of each of them ...

The process was easy.  I found images using Yahoo image search and printed them onto cardstock (regular paper would work too).  I then cut out the shapes and traced them onto 'Wonder Under' (about $1.50/yard at Walmart).  After that I ironed the Wonder Under shapes onto fabric, which I got for around $4.00 per yard at Walmart.  Next I cut them out, peeled the backing, and ironed them onto the onesies.  Then I used a small zigzag stitch on my sewing machine to stitch around each shape.   

Here's a great tutorial with detailed steps for creating your own customized onesies using a similar method to the one I used from the Small Fry and Co Blog.

Happy crafting my friends!

FlyLady's 31 Day Plan

Recently I discovered an amazing website, http://www.flylady.net/, whose goal is to help us create and then maintain clean and efficiently run households!  I have been struggling for months with creating (and sticking to) weekly routines, checklists, etc to help me manage my home, and this website offers a wealth of tips and templates for these activities. 

I've only spent an hour or so reading through the website's wealth of information, but have already become inspired to sign onto their 31 day challenge for 'baby fliers', as they call those of us just starting out in the arena of serious household management! 

Day 1 tells me to 'shine my sink' ... sounds easy enough, right?  So here I go, off to shine my sink and discover whether a squeeky clean kitchen sink actually is the beginning of household bliss.  I'll keep you posted. 

And check out FlyLady's "31 Beginner Babysteps" yourself to see if this is something you'd like to to do with me in month of November.  If you can push past the cheesy 1980's graphics, I think you will find a lot of good knowledge to glean from this site. 

Happy middle-of-the-week, friends :).

Small Changes Challenge Part II

First of all, yesterday was Halloween so I thought I'd share a few pics from our holiday.  The first was taken outside our friend's costume party on Saturday night.  We went as Grandma, the Big Bad Wolf and Little Red Riding Hood.

Clearly Lily was very frightened of the Big Bad Wolf ;)

Here she is looking so much the part with her little basket and hooded cape.  I made her costume and was really pleased with the results.

And now moving on to the main point of this posting, another 'Small Change Challenge' for the month of November.

As I mentioned in my first post Small Changes Challenge, I have decided to focus on achieving one small positive change each month.  They say to set yourself reasonable goals and I think one small change a month is surely doable, right?  They also say it takes 30 days to break a habit or create a new good habit, hence my decision to change one thing each month. 

The idea originally came from my decision in September to cut out all weekday drinking of alcoholic beverages.  I saw such positive results that I decided to keep my momentum going by determining to always remove items from my car in the month of October.  Well, October came to a close last night and I can happily say that my car has remained much cleaner (if a bit less than immaculate) since my adoption of this small change!

November's small change challenge will be ... drum roll please ... to read at least one Bible verse every single day.  I have both a Bible and a devotional book sitting beside my bed, so there is absolutely no reason I can't read one verse (or one devotional) before bed each night!  I had a Sunday school teacher growing up (Velma 'Mama' Hartung, God rest her soul) who always said, "Read your Bible every day, even if it's just one verse."  So this one's for you, Mama Hartung.

I'd love to hear what small change you are working on in your life right now!  Happy November, friends, let's make it count!!

A Clean House in 15 Minutes a Day

Ok so the title of this post might be ever so slightly misleading, but seriously, I have discovered my secret weapon to combatting the day to day messiness of a house with one toddler and a violently shedding dog and it seriously takes only 15 minutes a day!!!  So I thought I would share this little golden nugget of information with you :).

I think really good housekeepers and productive people in general all have one thing in common: they are good at setting aside chunks of time to combat a problem and then they attack that problem in the allotted time, doing as much as they can and then feeling satisfied with their achievement even if everything is not 100% completed. 

With this understanding in mind, I bought myself a $2.00 timer from Walmart and made myself a goal.  Each day, when Lily goes down for her nap, I set the timer for 15 minutes and then focus on doing as much cleaning as possible before the timer goes off.  I usually focus on one primary area, whichever one I feel needs the most attention on that day, as well as doing at least a few minutes of vacuuming, as vacuuming is something that must be done every single day in my house in order to keep the crumbs and dog fur within reason! 

My 'focus' area is usually one of the places in my home that, if left alone, would spread until it took over the entire room.  For example, the chair in my bedroom that seems to always be piled high with previously worn outfits, my sewing area (set up for now in my living room), or the kitchen table that always collects unopened mail, dog leashes, and everything else that I set down as soon as I walk in the door.  Everyone has these  places in their home.  For my sister, Deanna, it's her living room sofa that's always buried under a mountain of laundry.  For another sister, Susanna, it's the chaise lounge in her living room.  I hope my sisters don't mind me telling on them, but my point is that these 'hot spots' if you will are not anything unique to my household.  Rather, they lurk in every home I know, and the only way to combat them is to spend a few minutes each day working on them.

You would be amazed to discover what you can achieve in just 15 minutes.  In 15 minutes I can vacuum at least two rooms in my home, tidy away toys and other items left out of place, organize the shelves in my den and sweep my patio.  Every day my fifteen minutes is a bit different, depending on what needs the most attention.  When the timer goes off I finish whatever task I'm in the middle of and then stop cleaning to spend the rest of Lily's nap time doing whatever else I need to do (e.g. bills or correspondance), or just relaxing if I need some down time. 

Some key strategies to get the most out of your 15 minutes of cleaning:

• Eliminate distractions (i.e. do it while the kiddos are napping)
• Have an idea of what you're going to tackle before you begin
• Focus on one area/room at a time and finish that before moving on
• When the timer goes off, finish what you're doing as quickly as possible and then consider yourself 'done'
• Reward yourself after your 15 minutes in some way (e.g. spend a few minutes browsing a magazine, have a nice cup of hot cocoa, or sit and put your feet up or hop on your favorite blog)

Of course your house is not going to be immaculately clean in only 15 minutes a day, but I guarantee it's going to be a lot cleaner then if you spend no time dedicated to cleaning each day.  And of course this 15 minutes a day is in addition to the time we all spend maintaining our homes such as tidying the kitchen after meals, putting things back in their place after each use, etc.  So really, if you asked how long I spend cleaning each day the numbers would be much higher, but the "15 minutes a day clean house" refers to the dedicated 15 minutes of cleaning that goes above and beyond what is absolutely required each day.

I hope you find this tip as useful as I have found it and I'd love to hear your comments and your tips for fighting filth :).  Happy housekeeping and, oh yes, happy halloween, my friends :).

Cute Custom Clock for $4.00

Recently I came across a blog (http://www.wonderfuljoyahead.blogspot.com/) with a post about customizing a $4.00 clock from Walmart.  As I've been looking for a clock for Lily's room and the kitchen, and have not had any luck finding cute affordable clocks, I decided to give it a go.

Here is a link to the detailed instructions from the 'Wonderful Joy Ahead' blog

http://wonderfuljoyahead.blogspot.com/2011/10/clock-diy-make-over.html

And below are my results:

Kitchen clock

clock for Lily's room

I have yet to hang either clock, but wanted to share the project anyway, as I think it is pretty simple and a great gift idea in my opinion!  There are so many ways you could customize a clock using material, paint, fabric, you name it!  How about a custom silhouette clock (see previous post on how to create a silhouette here http://holidayhepburn.blogspot.com/2011/09/custom-silhouettes-in-five-easy-steps.html).  Or a classy monogram clock? 

One word of caution, however, if you decide to give this project a try ... the Walmart clock that I used (and the one used in the example in Wonderful Joy Ahead) does not have a removable battery pack.  When the instructions indicate to 'pop off the battery pack', this means yank it off and try not to smash it while doing so.  The battery pack in both of my clocks busted, but not so badly that they didn't work afterward :).

Hope everyone is having a fabulous week and happy crafting, my friends! XOXO.