A Pinterest Pin Done My Way

Lately I've been a little obsessed with Pinterest, a new site that lets you arrange the sites you bookmark like a pin board.  One of the projects I really liked was a way to organize and store earrings and I finally got around to doing it.

I made this one for Taylor, but I think I need one for me and Dee Dee is thinking she might need one as well.

To do this little project I painted a frame we already had.

Then, with Chris' help I stapled rug canvas to the back of the frame.  This was a little harder than I thought it would be because the squares were kind of big and my stapler kind of sucks. 

 Rug canvas is the material used for latch hook projects.  I originally had planned on using the plastic canvas used for cross stitch projects, which would have probably worked better.  Unfortunately I couldn't find a plastic canvas that would fit the frame I already had.  Since frames are expensive, I decided to get a little creative.  The rug canvas turned out to be a good choice.  The squares are large so it makes getting the hooks in easy and it's fairly stiff so the squares hold their shape while you are pulling on them to make the backing tight on the frame.

 

To hang the jewelry I used some fancy Christmas ornament hooks I bought on sale.   They are very pretty, but S hooks would have worked just as well, maybe better.  But they weren't just laying around my house like the ornament hooks were. 

At this point, I'm going to do a little bragging.  Everything you've seen so far, you probably have already seen on the net.  Maybe you've seen the next little step I did, but I don't want to hear this wasn't an original idea, so please don't tell me who thought of it first:)  Hook earrings weren't a problem, but I wanted Taylor to be able to hang her stud earrings as well.  (How twelve am I, the word "stud" makes me giggle).  To accomplish this I cut rectangles out of the aforementioned plastic canvas used for cross stitch.  I bought the canvas with the smallest holes available.  Then I ran a hook through the mesh of the plastic canvas and we put the earrings through the holes.  I was afraid that the small posts would slide right through, but they didn't.  

This was an easy sneezy project, I think it looks good and something that can be used for a long time. 

I need to do this for myself and the other girls in the house but one thing I would change is cutting the cloth a bit longer.  I was trying to accommodate the fact that this frame had a wire for hanging and didn't leave much material on the sides for stapling.  Next time I'm going to use a generous amount of material to make it easy to pull across the frame so there isn't any sagging.  It's easy enough to cut after you are finished stapling it all into place. 

Let it Snow!

When we lived in the apartment we made snowflakes every year to decorate the window.  This year we did the same, only we also decorated a lot of the doors as well as the big window in the living room. It also made for a lot of...ummm... snow in the living room!

Look What I Did:)

A little update.  I realized I hadn't posted pics of the finished stockings so here they are:)

One of my life long dreams... (Ok, maybe more of a goal) I've had for the last few years has been to cross stitch a stocking for everyone in the family.   I finished stockings for Taylor

 and Olivia

I started one for Chris and then lost interest for a while but the last few months I've been into it again and finally finished the stocking.

 In that time I also acquired a program that lets me design my own cross stitch patterns and so the stocking I stitched for Lucas is one of my own designs.  Now I just have to work on stockings for Dee Dee and myself:)

 

Early in the Morning

 

Early this morning Chris got up to see the eclipse of the moon.

Our Living Room, before the Holidays and Decorated for the Holidays.

This first year of decorating has been fun.  The new living room is bigger than the one at the apartment which makes it more fun.  It's especially nice that we no longer have to wedge the tree topper between the ceiling and the tree.

The living room when you walk in the front door, before. 

and after.

Across from the TV before, 

before,

and after.

Across from the piano.

and now.

Another before

after

and after.

Thanks for visiting;)

Halloween 2011

 This year Taylor wanted to be Flo, no a zombie, wait... Zombie Flo from Progressive!  The Progressive site actually provides templates so you can make your own Flo costume.  We printed out the tags, bought the apron and Chris stenciled it and then we bloodied it up.  A white polo, white pants, wig and hairband with appropriate gory makeup finish the whole thing off.  She's received a lot of great comments on her costume.

 

Lucas wanted to be a vampire.  I told him there wouldn't be any sissy, sparkly vampires in this house, so he went as Dracula.  I had made the cape a couple of years ago so all we needed to do was get a vest, a shirt and a little bling to finish off the costume.

Dee Dee wanted to be a zombie princess and then she wanted to be a doll, so we've done a couple of different versions for different events.

Olivia couldn't wait to try out the Cleopatra costume we got as a hand me down.  She looks great in it and gets a lot of oohs and ahhs over it.

And yes, that is some one's homework everyone is standing on.