Wooden Peg Dolls

A dear friend of mine who's wedding/vow renewal is coming up (this Sunday!!!) asked me to paint these cute little wooden dolls to match her and her husband's wedding attire for their cake topper.

Super cute idea right? Let me tell you, my friend has poured all the DIY love she could possibly pour into this wedding...it's going to look and be amazing.

For inspiration, I checked out the works by the actual creators of the wooden peg doll cake toppers, Goose Grease, found on Etsy.  Check them out. They are seriously talented and provide custom cake toppers as well as DIY kits if you want to try it out yourself.

As far as what I used, I went to our local craft store and bought these little paints that flashed me back to school and some different sized paint brushes. I bought a few different sizes not knowing which would feel most comfortable for the details.

I started by sketching it out lightly on the dolls before filling it in with paint, that definitely was the way to go instead of just hoping for the best.

As I'm typing this post (after I have already painted these things) the thought comes to me that it probably would of been useful to use like a toothpick for some of the small details instead of a brush...ah well, it still came out good, but I think that would of given me more control than my mini brush. So here they are...

Chelsea's tattoos were fun to figure out...she doesn't just sport flowers on her arms, but the actual detail of her tats would of been nearly impossible to recreate on these little dolls...so I stuck with flowers. I should also mention that I am pretty obsessed with Chelsea's tattoos. :)

So there they are, and it doesn't give away too much of Chelsea's dress...I cleared it with her before sharing. :) It reminds me how I was a bridesmaid in another friends wedding and I didn't want Rob to see me, lol, eventually he was like I can see you, you're not the bride! Haha...I guess I just liked the idea of surprising him with my whole look. When I was the bride, I hid e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g. from his knowledge. I wouldn't let him see my shoes, my jewelry, a drawing of the dress, nothin...

Anyway...so there's a little craftin for ya. It was fun. Super time consuming, but fun and so happy to do it for my friends. I mostly worked on this while sweet Finn took a nap and while watching some Grey's Anatomy on Netflix. Holla!!

Three Months!

Little baby Finn is growing growing growing.

Sometimes we don't notice it, other times, we're like...whoa. This boy is growing and changing faaast.

Here's the progression of his monthly photos taken so far...

  

Look at that big boy! When he turns one I'm gonna compile these into a print and frame it somewhere. It's just so sweet to watch him change and grow so quickly, my goodness. Who knows how long I'll keep this up...I might be making him sit in that chair when he's 16! lol

Here's a synopsis of this past month:

Dear Finn,

Oh my sweet boy, you just keep growing and growing! This month you discovered your hands! It makes us laugh to watch you get mesmerized (and sometimes crosseyed) by your little baby hands. You also like to put your feet in the air now. It's so cute and I love catching you with both of them up at the same time. You still like to have conversations with us while laying on your back, especially on the changing table. Your daddy discovered that you like to get little spankings on your bucket! It always brings the biggest smile, it's hilarious. You also have a thing where you sometimes plank (stiffen your legs out) when we're trying to prop you up or put you in your swing, it cracks us up when you do that. You're getting so strong! You also gave us your first giggle! It was precious...my new goal in life is to make you giggle. Oh Finn, we love you so much. Happy three months to our sweet boy.

Xoxo,
Mama

So in love with this kid.

Our Family/Dining Room...Repainted and Sectionaled!

I don't really think sectionaled is a word but lets go with it.

Our family/dining room is coming together...there's still lots to do/purchase, but I'm just soaking up the recent changes. Here's where we left off. A purpley-gray color on the walls and no furniture in this room since we moved in (over 2 1/2 years ago)...

After a coat of primer and a coat of this light gray color called Moonshine by Benjamin Moore (color matched in Behr paint + primer in one)...we've ended up with this...

A little while back, we installed these bamboo roman shades. I love the natural look against the gray. Purchased these from Home Depot...

And here's our new to us super comfy sectional...

This lamp I purchased from Target (currently on clearance), I didn't buy it for this room, it was bought purely out of love. Photos don't do it justice. Yeah, I fell for the color of this lamp and the glass base. Where's it going to end up? Maybe our bedroom, I'm not entirely sure...but one things for sure, it's gonna go somewhere, and I'm gonna always love it.

Overall, it's a little bit brighter in this room, huh? As far as paint color, it was a toss up between Cement Gray and Moonshine (both by Benjamin Moore), but Cement Gray appeared to have a little purple in it, so Moonshine ended up winning.

I was so surprised how having the sectional in here actually made the room feel bigger, not smaller. I thought it was going to take up a lot more space but it turns out this is a hefty sized room. Very happy with that.

So what's ahead for this room? Let's see...

• Paint the end table...mainly because there's a lot of different wood colors already in the room, from the dining table to the piano to the shades...
• Get a larger scale lamp for the table (the one on there is a little too short and squatty, but I have another place for it in our house)
• Overhead lighting for sectional area?
• New blinds for large window and curtains to frame it out
• RUGS!!!...one for the sectional area and one for under the dining table
• WALL ART!!!...above the piano, in the dining room, and above the sectional
• Lighting for piano
• Pillows for couch with fun pattern
• Crown molding...it'll be the finishing touch. No idea how to do this yet, but it'll be worth it in the end.
• And as much as I hate to say this, we'll need to paint the ceiling and trim whenever crown molding enters our life...because after painting everything in the Moonshine color, it showed me how off white all of our trim truly is. Sad day...

So there's a little update of our family/dining room...trust me, I've be scouring the internet looking for rugs already. I've been dealing with the toss up of getting a nice rug that's a little more pricey but will give us more years, or a lesser expensive rug that we may need to replace in a few years. I'm just thinking of Finn and Jack and how much worse it would feel if a stain occurred on the expensive rug, instead of a lesser expensive rug. Yeah, I think I'm leaning toward the lesser expensive rug. It may not last as long, but I think it makes more sense for me.

Oh and I am loving that I am no longer walking into the house and seeing this...

But now this...

Yep, I can handle that.

And yes, that is our Christmas wreath.

:)

Finn's First Easter

Church on Saturday. A Darth Vader egg hunt Sunday morning. Breakfast at his grandparents house. A nap, then dinner at Nana's house. Family photos. Watching us grownups throw down at our egg hunt. (and me being the ONLY one who didn't win a prize...stop laughing Rob and Greg) Singing happy birthday to his cousin.

It was quite a weekend for Finn. And us too. But a good one. A really really good one.

These holidays will get more and more fun as Finn grows and can participate. But for now, we amused ourselves and Rob hid some Darth Vader eggs (purchased at Rob's gentle plea) at our house in the morning, and Finn and I went on the hunt.

Rob hid all the "eggs" expertly...

Finn had so much fun, and did quite well if I may say so myself...

We then headed over to Rob's parents house and had breakfast and opened baskets.

Then after a nap at home, we headed to Nana's house. There we took family pics...long overdue...

I intiated the photo session because I finally got a remote for my camera and a fancy awesome tripod for Christmas...love it.

Here's me and Jr testing out the remote...I can't believe this boy is 5 now.

My mom's backyard was in full bloom and beautiful. The perfect backdrop for photos...

For the record, this photo was initiated by Greg...lol...

And one with all of us and a baby who was quite over it...

Ok, now I have to send these photos out to my fam...happy belated Easter! Only a week behind.

Oh, we've also painted and have our sectional in the hizz-ouse! Yay! Will take photos and share soon. :)

Spring Cleaning Challenge! Week 2

Oops, so this post is a lil late. But I promise, this cleaning project occurred last week. We currently have lots of projects going on with our sectional possibly making it's arrival in our home shortly...needless to say, painting plans have begun. And I also have some craftiness happening which I'm excited how it's coming out and will be sure to share when it's done. Oh and lots of cuddling happening too. Love our sweet Finn.

So back to cleaning, here we go...

Week 2:

MASTER BATH STORAGE

First, let me state that our master bathroom is not very masterful. However, I still do appreciate the luxury of having our bathroom attached to our room...nothing like brushing your teeth while looking for clothes before running out the door for work...multi-tasking!

Anyway, so we have a bench that I purchased from Ikea a while back. I liked the idea of having a seat in there along with a shelf for some storage. Cause, let me tell you...pedestal sinks are cute and everything, but they lack in a major area called storage. So I have plans to purchase a bigger wall cabinet (the one currently in here barely fits anything and it's not really aesthetically pleasing to my eye. Just sticks out like a sore thumb and blah.

But anyway, this cleaning post is about our bench. And the mess that has landed itself on it.

Oh and here's my cleaning buddy...he was such a good helper...

For the longest time I've had the idea to use a long narrow basket that we already own and put it under the bench to store our shtuff and make it look a lil more clean and organized.

It's the little things.

So I pulled out that basket...and it was a bit of a mess...surprise surprise... :)

So I sorted through that...it's amazing how much I can throw away if I just sit down and do it.

So I got her all cleaned up and then sorted/threw away everything on the bench in the bathroom and organized it ever so sweetly in the basket. And here she looks now...

Much better. Maybe would have done a different color basket if I were shopping around, but I'm trying not to spend money if I don't need to. But do I neeeeeeeed to paint the family/living room?? Of course I do! :D

Here's a far away shot of the bathroom...one day I wanna gut this thing. Get a glass shower with shiny tile...and storage. Lovely precious storage.

Anyway, so that was a simple cleaning/organization project, but seriously it was one that I've been meaning to do forever. I also organized my bobby pins, however I thought that would be less than amusing to share on here, so I spared you on that one. :)

So there you have it. Week 2 tackled.