Thursday, April 29, 2010

Message Board

We have plenty of message boards in my house.

It's great for tacking on coupons or phone #'s. Sort of like the face of a fridge.




Or how about when I crafted this one?


I use this one a lot less. I guess because I don't yet have a great place to put it...


The kids have one MAJOR rule at my house. (Well...at least my oldest does because he's the only one old enough to go places by himself...).

If you go somewhere, make sure someone knows where you are.

About 3 years ago, I had to quick run to the store. I grabbed my toddler son and went outside to get my oldest.
He was nowhere in sight...
I tried calling his name, I checked the neighbor's houses...
Couldn't find him...
I started panicking!
I strapped my little guy in the van and started driving all around the neighborhood, yelling for him.
(Got some strange looks on that one!)
I finally drove home so that I could call my husband....
There he was, crying on the front porch.
He never told me he left our yard to play with a friend, he came home, and I was gone! (Out looking for him, lol!)
That event was a great teaching tool. It showed him that my rules aren't meant to be mean, but for safety!
Now he always lets us know where he's going ;)

Anyways, so I figured I would help give my kids options for this rule. My oldest is 10, and before I know it, he'll be old enough to be at home by himself. I know that I need a good place to write notes to each other to communicate.
I remember writing my mom notes all the time, to tell her where I was going <3


My mudroom was the perfect place!
I was working with this:

Yes, I know I still have St. Patty's Day decor up.
See that lime pastel green color?

I changed it out to white.
That way if I ever get bored with the room color, I will never have to paint the door again!

Oh, just a warning, the picture quality on this post is going to be terrible. I was in too much of a hurry dealing with a setting sun to care about getting that "perfect" picture.

I found this old clipboard in my basement. It was my husband's.

I think I'm going to stop nagging my husband about being a pack rat.
I seem to find a lot of cool stuff in his "junk" bins =)

It even had a cool map of the city on the back.
No cool history on this one.
It was his clipboard from his pizza delivery guy days!


So I found a pencil and drilled a hole near the top.


I threaded it through, tied it off, then tied the other end to the clipboard.

I purchased some velcro and stuck that on the top and bottom.


Then I smooshed it on my door.


It's also a perfect place to write love notes to my husband!



Don't worry! I haven't forgotten about the playhouse! I'm just waiting until I get further along for more "WOW" factor!
It's almost ready for paint, so stick around to catch that!

I am also about to start 3 MAJOR projects, two requiring building permits. I have only a two week window between the end of my spring semester and the start of my summer semester (yes, I take classes in the summer!), so I'm going to try busting butt to get as much done in that window as possible!



Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Featured: Knock Off Wood

My patio table was featured over at Knock-Off Wood!




Ana makes great furniture plans! They are super easy to follow, and the results are amazing!
Check it out for yourself!
Knock-Off Wood


Thank you so much Ana for bragging about my furniture, again!
You're the coolest!



I do have a bunch of things lined up to show you, and one BIG surprise.
I have to go to work 5 hours early (plus...ya know...work my original shift. Blah....), so I'm a bit constrained on time today!
Stick around for more fun to come!



Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Cutest Dog Leash Hook!

Before I made my new mail center, I had a place for my dog's leashes.
It wasn't a great place, but it worked.


And I love my new mail center!

But I lost a place to put my dog's leashes.
I thought about adding a hook right here, but as you can see, that small wall would get pretty cluttered.


Then it dawned on me....
Why would I put the dog's leashes in the kitchen when I have a mudroom?
Wouldn't that be the best spot for it??

So I got a cheap wood plaque from Walmart and painted it white.


I screwed that into the wall using 2" screws.

Sorry for the blurry picture!
Anyways, I found this cute hardware at Menards. It was $3.99, which is a bit steep for a hook, but I loved it. Plus, the total only really came to $5 for the project, so I wasn't really that upset.

Cute hook, right?

I love how it turned out!


This is part of a recent mudroom redo that I've been undertaking.

This is the....3rd?....time that I've redone the mudroom since we bought the house 4 years ago. Haha!

The last time I redid it, a person at Walmart mixed my neon pastel paint wrong. Since I came home with a funky color, I just decided to go with it and make a modern mudroom.
I never loved it. I sorta liked it.
I even got compliments from it.

I'll show you the color of what the paint was supposed to be soon!
You'll get a charge out of the Walmart employee's mistake!

(Oh, and I'm determined to get the color right this time!)




Coming up:
-a vintage, more functional message system!
-playhouse progress



Monday, April 26, 2010

It's Good To Be Back!

Well, I'm back!
I see that we have some new people around here!
Welcome!

For those that are new, I was absent for a week due to my son's "Media Challenge" at school. No tv, video games, or computer for one entire week.
Let me tell you, that really is a challenge!

Since doing ANYTHING is better than sitting in front of a blank screen, we all exhausted ourselves this week!

My week:
1. Installed walls and trim in the playhouse. I can't wait to show you that!

2. Fixed our basketball hoop. A bolt loosened up and fell out sometime this past winter, and it was just begging to fall down off the garage and onto our vehicles!

3. Fixed my husband's tailgate trim on his truck.

4. Mulched my gardens for the first time after buying our house. Hehe, yeah, that's sad...

5. Planted a raspberry and blackberry bush for Earth Day!

6. Went to Milwaukee to watch a Brewers game (we got spanked!), then went to Chuck E. Cheese's on the way home!

7. Trimmed more kitchen cabinets.

8. Said "bye" to our very best friends who moved to North Dakota. =(

9. My husband cleaned our garage spotless! I didn't even ask him to! He rocks!



I learned a lot from this little experiment!
There's a lot more time in the day if you just shut off the tv!
The kids don't miss tv as much as you would expect. They had more fun flying kites with me!



Anyways, it's great to be back, I missed you all!
Stick around, I have lots of projects for you coming up!








Sunday, April 18, 2010

Vacation; Heads Up For This Week

Wow, I've had an amazing day!
My sister-in-law gets us tickets to Six Flags: Great America every year (well, for the past two years anyways, lol!) through work. Thanks E!
Since I had to work until close last night, we wouldn't be able to start our vacation a day early.
So we got the troops up at 5:00am, and were out of the door at 5:45am!

The kids had such a blast!
And it's pretty much the coolest thing ever that I inherited a sister-in-law that has a passion for scary rollercoasters as much as I do.
Here we are doing what we love:

Pictured: random boy, Elisa, me, random girl.

We bombed it back home after the park closed.
I have officially been in 3 states today!



On another note, I'm sad to tell everyone that I will be absent from the blog-o-sphere for 1 entire week.
I'm participating in a Media Challenge for my son's school. For an entire week, we can't watch tv, movies, play video games, use a computer (except for quick school purpose.)
Nothing.
Not even a little!


So, though I won't be posting anything from the 19th to the 25th, you can bet that I will be working hard on tons of things to show you when I finally can come back on my beloved computer.

No Facebook?
Ugh....
My poor neglected email....
Not really looking forward to this.
On the bright side, I really want to start a Family Fun Night, and this would be a great way to start it off!

So until April 26th!
I look forward to "seeing" everyone soon!


 





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