Newborn Photo Props

I decided to be crafty for the first time in a long time! Today was the first day off in a long time where I had ZERO obligations or plans. So I went to the craft vortex known as Hobby Lobby. My good friend Audrey over at Vintage Suitcase Photography is going to be photographing our little bundle of joy when she makes her debut. We want some "natural habitat" pictures and some more stylized pictures. Etsy has tons of great newborn photo props...but why spend upwards of $25 when I can just make this stuff myself? One popular trend is to wrap your baby in dyed cheesecloth, and many etsy sellers have matching headbands. I wanted to do something in Autumn colors and knew I had the orangish-red fabric to make flowers for a headband. A sort of peach color seemed like a good idea for the cheesecloth. And of course, in the store, the box of dye looked to be peach. But when I started dyeing...

Yeah, it was BRIGHT BRIGHT orange. Like, "go Illini!!" orange. Not to worry, I had plenty of earl grey tea on hand. Surely, that would tone it down, right? Wrong. It did help a little, but not as much as I hoped. Next, I added some instant coffee to the tea. The picture on the right is the result of that. It's getting much closer to a nice color, but still has a way to go. The cheesecloth is currently stewing in some super strong coffee and I'm hoping that will do the trick. If not, it's back to Hobby Lobby I go! And if I have to have a second go at it, I'm just going to skip the orange and dye it with coffee so it's a nice beige.

DIY Baker's Twine

Wow, it's been a year since I've posted anything! And what an eventful year it was. We moved twice AND found out we are having a baby. Our new place doesn't have an ideal space for crafting and I've felt so drained all the time, I just haven't really created anything. Which is sad, because I have multiple Pinterest boards filled with ideas. DIY baker's twine is one of them. I decided to ease back into being crafty, and let me tell you, this was the perfect project. Do you own tape, a ruler, embroidery thread, and markers? Can you draw sort of straight-ish lines? Then you can make your own baker's twine too! Ever since I discovered Divine Twine, I have longed to have it. It comes in so many different colors and is the perfect little addition to gift wrap or homemade cards and probably tons of other little projects. Sadly, it is super expensive and I couldn't justify spending the money. This lovely alternative is inexpensive and involves very little effort. 

And there you have it. I bought the spools at Hobby Lobby for $1.70 with a 40% off coupon. I only got four spools so for now these are all the colors I've made. But seeing as I bought a 12 pack of sharpies, there will be more colors in the future!

Inspiration: Anew Nature

It's a well known fact that birds + branches are my thing. It was, after all, the decorative theme of my wedding! I guess that's why one of my friends told me I should check out what Robert and Erica Karleskint are doing. And I'm glad I did! Because some of my other favorite things are good design and vintage furniture. The Karleskints combined all of my favorite things into a furniture re-purposing business that is aptly called Anew Nature. I had the great privilege of interviewing them to find out more about what they are doing.

How did you get started in refurbishing furniture?

We bought a piece of furniture off of Craigslist when decorating our living room, the girl we bought it from bought old furniture and refinished it. We thought "We could do that!" but did not really take action for several months, everyone was doing the "shabby chic" thing and we really wanted ours to be unique. I (Erica) really got into birds, trees, anything nature really, I painted huge trees on the wall in my guest room and did a mirror surround in our kitchen. We thought how great it would be to incorporate these two things together, and voila!

What is your process (both creative and technical)?

I think it is mostly searching out a piece that is appealing, having good curves and structure and then letting the creative process go from there. Definitely the piece inspires the idea of what will go on it. We lightly sand and then prime all of our pieces with the best stuff ever, BIN, love it, and go from there depending on what the piece calls for, painting, glazing, distressing etc.

Where do you find your furniture?

Most of our furniture has come from craigslist but we also look at estate sales.

Where do you find inspiration for your pieces?

Well, nature :) there is just something so powerful about it. It is old and new, it is beauty and joy, it is God's gift to us. Here is how we chose our name, taken from our FB page. Anew Nature is about taking the old, broken, and ugly and making it into something new, beautiful, functional, and lovable. When choosing a name for our side project, Robert and I really wanted to convey this idea of a new creation, a transformation of sorts, something God has done in our lives. Taken us from the broken people we were and made us anew. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new" (2 Corinthians:5:17).

How long does it usually take to finish a piece or set of furniture? Do you have multiple projects going at once?

On average it takes us about a week to finish a piece, and we always have more than one going, it is constant chaos, but organized chaos, Robert is really good at keeping me organized. Our house right now is so cluttered with furniture it is crazy! We work in our basement and so in addition to our home furniture we have about 9 or 10 extra pieces hanging around!

Do you see this as something might eventually do full time?

This is something we would love to do full time, is that doable? Not yet, but we can dream : )

So there you have it! If you want more information and pictures or are simply DYING to buy one of their fabulous pieces, head on over to their facebook page.

Book Pages + Clip Art + Thrift Store Frames

Remember that little preview I showed you of my pretty turquoise frame? I finally finished the project!!!

Here it is all finished and pretty. I spent months looking around for ornate frames at The Dollar Tree and thrift stores. I set a limit for myself (no more than $2 a frame), so it was quite a challenge. Surprisingly, ornate thrift store frames seem to be in the $4-6 price range. Anyways, after I found five 6 frames of various shapes/sizes/levels of ornate-ness, I spray painted them Krylon Ocean Breeze Blue. It turned out it was slightly more blue than teal, so I took a dry sponge brush and created a glazed sort of look with a darker teal color. It turned out exactly how I wanted!
Thrift stores are also a great place to find old encyclopedias! I like the ones with the yellowy sort of pages. I got one for 75 cents! Here is the part where I admit I didn't do this project alone. Gabe helped me cut out pages from the encyclopedia and tape them to regular old printer paper and run them through the printer. We printed stock images and clip art that I found onto the book pages.
It was a very easy and fun project...And yeah, it was actually Gabe who spray painted the frames *sheepish shrug*. I think it turned out splendidly! Maybe it will spur us on to get the rest of the living room finished.

Making Crock Pot Meals Even Lazier

I love my crock pot. Last winter, we used it pretty often. The only thing was, there was not a lot of variety in our crock pot meals. And you had to wake up early enough to cut up all the ingredients, or brown the meat first. It took WAY too long. But the pay off was still worth it...leave for work, come home and magically, dinner is all ready! Then recently a light bulb went off for me. I could use a day off of work to do all the cutting and hard stuff and put each unprepared meal into a bag in the freezer. Then all I would have to do in the morning is dump the contents of the bag into the crock pot. Brilliant! So I started looking for recipes where there aren't any stages like "add biscuits for the last 30 minutes" or "brown the beef in the seasonings and butter or whatever first". This morning, I only did two meals, but I found a whole bunch and intend to do more so I can use trusty ol' crock pot all fall and winter long!

Cilantro Lime Chicken

Ingredients:

1 16oz jar of salsa

1 packet taco seasoning mix

3 tablespoons cilantro

juice of 1 lime

3 lbs bonesless skinless chicken breast

Directions: When it's time to make it, cook it on low for 6-8 hours. Shred it up and serve with rice or tacos or some kind of salad. Pretty much whatever's easiest.

Beef Stew

Ingredients:

1 lb stew meat

2 potatoes cubed

1 cup baby carrots

(you could add celery, but I find it detestable)

1 tablespoon herbs provence

2 cloves minced garlic

if your husband doesn't hate onion, 1 chopped onion. or if he does hate onion, sneak in some onion powder

1 can/bottle of beer or 2 cups beef broth

Directions: Cook on low for 8-10 hours. If you WANT to do a little extra work here, you can combine 3 tbls melted butter with 3/4 cup flour to make a gravy. Add that to the stew and let it thicken for 15-20 minutes.

And there you have it, people. Do a little work one day so you can be lazy on the other days. It took me about 30 minutes to prepare both of these lovely little recipes.

Branching Out

I have a really close friend who, ever since it was time to start looking into college, knew what she wanted to do. She went to school for nursing, got a job as a nurse right after graduating, and is continuing her education in that field. I, on the other hand, changed my mind a good 5 or 6 times. I've always been envious of people who know exactly what they are made to do.

I love art. I love design. I love beautiful things and I am a creative person. I want to be a curator, or an art and antiques broker, or something equally awesome that is probably equally impossible to find a job in. Lately I have been considering going back to school for Visual Merchandising, but I'm starting to think that might not be a great idea. The other thing I've been considering is opening an etsy shop. Etsy is an online marketplace for all things handmade. It seems like it could be a good opportunity for me to make money with something I enjoy doing and for which I don't need a degree.

So today, I have been doing some research and trying to formulate a business plan. We shall see what the future holds!

No Sew Pillow Cover

See, I told you I would be crafting again in no time! I found this ridiculously easy no sew pillow cover tutorial and thought I'd give it a try. At least, it's ridiculously easy IF you measure twice, cut once. Fortunately, I bought PLENTY of fabric, so it worked out ok. First, you measure the fabric. It needs to be 2x as long and 3x as wide as your pillow. You don't really even need any measuring device other than your pillow. You just lay your pillow on the edge and then flip it twice for the length and three times for the width (I hope this makes sense).

Then lay your pillow in the middle of the fabric. Fold it up like a present and then tie a square knot. It's probably better if you go to the original tutorial since I didn't take pictures of every step. Really, I just wanted to show off my finished product!
I need a new couch slipcover to go with our new living room color scheme. I'm thinking grey...anyhow, it is very easy if you do all the measurements right.
And here is a little sneak peak of another project I started. I think the colors look smashing together. Hopefully it will be done soon!