Bedtime Routine Subway Art - Really easy with no hand letter painting or vinyl cutting required

Oh I am so excited to share this with you. I spent most of today trying to figure this out and could not be happier. Well, except for the fact today was suppose to be my house cleaning day and that wasn't even touched. The sacrifices I am willing to make to craft :)

I have loved the subway art that so many bloggers are creating but I do not have a vinyl cutter and I cannot paint. So, I thought there was no way I could create one of these pieces of art for myself. That was until I was introduced to Mod Podge transfers. Visit The Cre8tive Outlet for an amazing PB knockoff using this technique!

I had always wanted to create something with my kid's bedtime routine on it for their bathroom and I thought this would work perfectly.

Materials needed:
Canvas
Paint (for the canvas)
Printer paper to print the text or image (be sure to mirror the image)

Method:
I created the Subway Art I wanted in Microsoft Publisher (you can do it in Word too) and then saved the image as a JPEG. Take the saved JPEG and flip it by 90 degrees/mirror it so the words will print backwards. Print the  text on your home printer (I have a laser jet) on regular printer paper. I have heard (through google searches) that photocopying works great but I don't have a photocopier :)

This is how my printed image looked.

I painted the entire canvas with two or three coats of white craft paint. If you want the background to be another color, paint it with that color. Just be sure not to use a dark color otherwise the black image or text will not show clearly.

After the paint on the canvas is completely dry (be patient because it will peel off if you aren't...I attempted this 3 times before it actually worked) cover the entire surface with a good layer of Mod Podge. Carefully place the printer paper (text side down) onto the Mod Podged canvas. Be sure you place it exactly where you want it because it will NOT come off after it is placed down.

So this is how it looked. See how you see that the text is now the correct way.

 Wait a few minutes and then start carefully wiping off the back of the paper with a damp cloth. I used a dish cloth that was wet but not sopping to gently rub off the back of the paper. The paper will almost dissolve and the text will be stuck in the Mod Podge. Don't rub too hard because you can scrub off the text too.

I removed the first layer and then let it dry a bit and then repeated the process again. If the letters seem to peel off, don't worry too much.As I said this was my third attempt so I kept going and this is what I ended up with. You can see many of the letters are off.

Let it dry and then take a black Sharpie to fill in the letters. If you want the text to be rustic, don't fill in cracks or missing pieces. If you are like me and want a solid letter, draw in the missing pieces with your Sharpie.

You can do a few thing now. You can do a glaze with a stain or white wash. I loved the look of this so I put a layer of Mod Podge on it and left it alone.

I love how it looks on the shelf in my kids bathroom and I could not be happier!

Total cost for this was $2 for the canvas. I had the paint, printer paper and Mod Podge on hand.

My version of the (ever so popular) burlap wreath and burlap flowers

My sister gave me this idea when I saw her last weekend.  She told me that she used the free burlap sacs and a dollar store wreath to make an amazing burlap covered wreath with burlap flowers. I thought it was a fantastic idea.  Since she didn't send me the photos of the one she made... I thought I would make my own. :)

This is extremely simple but a little messy. Here is a shot of my jeans while I was doing it. So be prepared to vacuum and clean yourself off.

I made the flowers first. You can find detailed tutorials all over the web on how to do this so I wont' bore you with great details. Start with a long strip of the burlap folded in half (I used a piece that had some color so it would show in the flower) and start rolling it. As you continue to go around, twist the burlap to make petals. Once it is to the desired size, glue the back with hot glue to hold in place. I then covered the back with a flat burlap just to make it pretty.

I then took another strip of the burlap and attached the one end to the wreath form using hot glue. Wrap the burlap around the wreath overlapping slightly. 

Once you have covered the entire wreath it may be a little messy (like mine) from burlap fraying. If you like the messy look, leave it this way or if you are like me and want it neater, trim off these pieces.

Attach the burlap roses to the wreath with hot glue. I used small strip of burlap to hang the wreath.

 

The total cost for me today was $0 since I had everything on hand. I guess if I am honest with myself, I did buy the wreath a few months ago for $1..so it cost me $1 to make.

Thanks for looking.

When life leaves you an ugly plant...create a beautiful arrangement

This needs to be filed under the "Please tell me what he was thinking" category.

We have had this long skinny plant in our formal living room that I was hoping would die for years. I really hated the plant but my husband loves plants and cannot part with any of them. This plant got so ugly that I decided it was time to get rid it of. I broke the news to my husband and he really did seem to be fine with it. At least that is what I thought....UNTIL I came home and found this on my kitchen counter.

Isn't it beautiful! Don't you love how the long branches stick gracefully out of the extra large mayonnaise tub! So by "lets get rid of the hideous plant" my husband heard "lets cut off the tops of the amazing plant and try to root it in a wonderfully convenient mayonnaise tub!"

I was stumped with what to do with the plant shoots.  Then I had an 'ahaa' moment. You know that moment you think of the best idea and wonder why you have never thought of it before. Well, my 'ahaa' produced this.

Now isn't that pretty!?! This solved so many problems.  Firstly, I have had all these items laying around my house with no home because they just never looked right. Secondly, I have a really awkward pie shaped ledge behind my kitchen sink that is big and I can never find items that look good there. And lastly (and most importantly), I found a home to my husbands green thumb experiment.

Do you remember a few month ago when out in the blog world someone came up with the ingenious idea of gluing a Dollar Tree hurricane vase to a glass candle stick? I can't link to the person who created it because there are hundreds of blogs that feature it and I do not know where it originated. I had some hurricanes left over from my last trip to the US and I had a short rounded candlestick from the Canadian Dollar Store and I hot glued them together. The reason I used hot glue is that I wanted the option to take them apart in the future if I ever needed to. I tied twine around the hot glue seam to hide the glue. Perfect!

I purchased the bell jar on clearance at a local home decor store and the accessories under it are from Walmart.  The covered dish was from a local thrift store. Originally the base was light oak with hand painted peppers on it so I spray painted it with ORB and called it a day!

One last look. WOW do my windows need to be cleaned.

Personalized Children's Canvas Name Wall Art

I have said it before and I will say it again...I am not artistic! I cannot paint or draw anything! But I love those personalized canvases that people buy for their kids. I thought "how hard could they be to make?"   Well for a person who cannot draw a flower without my kids asking what it is...painting my kids names on canvas is not easy! So I created a work around; a wonderful skill from my other life as a project manager.

To make the personalized kids wall art, I purchased the blank canvas at the Dollar Store and used my large collection of Sharpie markers to create the design. For those of you who do not have a wide range of sharpie colors, run to Costco, Walmart, Sams Club etc. and get them! They are great for touching up furniture that has been dinged by the kids and even more useful for crafts.  Sorry, I digressed there from the purpose of my post :)

You can paint the entire canvas with dollar store paint if you like but I wanted my daughter's to be white since her room is bubble gum pink. I decided on using black, bright pink and lime green as the main colors.

 I drew an oval where I wanted the name to appear and then using a good metal ruler, I made black lines of various thicknesses. I filled in between the lines with the colors I selected.

Once done, I glued ribbon around the outside of the canvas to hide the staples and then glued ribbon on the back to hang it from.

 

 Total cost $1 since I had everything else on hand. If you look closely it isn't perfect, but it is a million time better than I could have painted and at least $30 cheaper than buying one! So I am happy with it.

I have made these for some of my nieces and nephews too. They are quick, easy and cheap! Three of the main criteria for home made gifts!

What do you think?

 Stephanie

"Nobody puts Baby in the Corner"...Put those cheap Ikea Reeds instead!

Hey everyone. Can you guess what I watched this morning?!? We are stuck indoors after a wonderfully horrible snow storm so I thought I would share an easy decor idea that I absolutely LOVE! 

I had many decorating dilemmas when I moved into our new home. One that especially nagged at me was our dining room. It is a large open concept space that needed something. I didn't know what, but I just knew it did. Have you ever had that? 

I tried moving furniture, adding more pictures, potted plants (small and big), buying and returning so many things that did not work.

I will admit that my husband came up with this solution and I love it! I have to say this since he reads my blog and bugs me when I say I did something that he actually did :) .

We purchased the tall reeds from Ikea for $20 and the planter pot (aluminum) from Costco for (I think) $20 as well. You can do this with a glass vase as well, but I wanted the base to be more substantial. Plus as you know, all our lighting, door handles and vents (after painting them) are all oil rubbed bronze so this base matched perfectly.

We placed the reeds into the bottom of the pot and held them straight up. If you want the reeds to be spread out more, don't keep them tight together on the bottom like I did. We then tightly filled the base with crushed paper. We used paper because we did not want to make the pot too heavy so that we would not be able to move it. If you pack the paper in tight enough, it hold the reeds up great. We them put a little batting on the top to make it fluffy and covered that with moss. Like my kids say "Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy"

The end result gave me the height the room needed, filled an awkward corner and did not cost too much.

 I have to say it again, I love it!

Thank honey..one of the many reasons why I keep you around.

V-alien-tine Card Heart

Last week I posted the Butterfly Heart Valentine cards that my kids are making for the girls in their classes and I promised to post what I was going to do with the boys. So here they are...the boys Valentine Cards. I got the original idea from Family Fun and changed it so it was easier to make and so that each child gets a pencil.

I used the same foam hearts and technique to insert the pencils as I did for the girls. I used shiny monster/alien eye pencils for these one and one piece of green pipecleaner.

I used a sharpie to draw the eyes, nose, mouth and sayings on the inside.  You can write "You are out of this world." or "Happy V-Alien-tine's Day" or "There is space in my heart for you".

 

 Cute huh!

These work out a little cheaper than the girl's version because you are only using 1heart. So approximately $3 per class.

My Love for Chocolate inspired Our Powder Room Transformation

We moved into our 'new' house almost 2 years ago and we were left with some beautiful decor. The house was built 12 years ago but it could have been from the 70s it seemed so out of date! This project has been our biggest to date. Both as far as time and money.

This was our main floor powder room 2 years ago when we bought the house.

Don't you love the blue! It was so nice that it matched the peach and blue tiles on the floor. I failed to take a picture before my husband took a sledge hammer to them...sorry.  Let me walk you through our powder room.  The pedastel sink was so small, my 4 year old could reach the taps! Then do you see the lovely fake plant on the toilet.  Well let me give you one piece of advice when you buy a house...lift stuff like that up! We found a shattered toilet lid that was held together with packing tape. Oh yeah...packing tape. Then we had builder grade lights, and some lovely gold accent pieces.

Well my husband, boy do I love that man, demolished the bathroom and gave me the most beautiful main floor powder room anyone could ask for.

Here is my after:

 The walls look really red in this picture but they are actually Chocolate Brown. I am not 100% sure but I think the color is Benjamin Moore Chocolate Fondue.

We redid the tiles with a two tile size pattern and put a large baseboard on.

 I spray painted the hideous mirror to a beautiful black finish. This is how I made myself feel like I was saving money :) Small things I know. Oh have you seen my spray painted floor vent and door handles? Ugly brass and rusty white to oil rubbed bronze in at almost no cost and in no time at all!

We bought our new Kohler pedestal sink on clearance for $200 and the Price Pfister faucet for $65! I guess someone custom ordered them from Home Depot and then returned them. I was giddy when we left Home Depot. My husband still to this day does not know why I love the sink and toilet so much.

Oh and that is one of my refilled Bath and Body Works soaps. See my tutorial here.  
Aren't they pretty?!?

 Here is one last look :)

We are so proud!