swatch storage

i created a place to hang our coats and store our shoes...but, what about the piles of hats, scarves and ever multiplying supply of canvas bags (you know, the ones that you buy for the grocery store but inevidably end up forgetting and having to buy more and then before you know it you wonder why you have so many of these damn bags!)...

so, i created a little storage for all that stuff and managed to hide my washer and dryer a bit from the outside world at the same time - my laundry is in my entrance way.

this storage is my 'signature' white box. yes, i know, i love white boxes! for this one i added a series of 1/2" holes that i placed paint swatches behind to get a gradient look. i added one row of black swatches to help blend in with my big black tree hook.

i hung the whole thing from the ceiling using hooks and threaded 3" stove bolts to hang the boxes from each other.

summertime relaxing

i have been la-zy! part of it has been imposed (my husband is in full swing beach volleyball coaching mode - which doesn't leave a whole lot of time for me to get away and work on my projects) and part of it has just been that i'm loving the summertime. as a canadian, the sunny days are especially precious to me - if you've ever spent 8 months wishing for nice weather you can understand! so, all i have to show for my week away are some photos of the place i have been spending all of my time...my back yard.


one of the great things about living in the country (if you can call 20 minutes outside of the city county!) is not having to worry about what the neighbours think! because i'm pretty sure our neighbours would think we were crazy. i mentioned that my husband was a beach volleyball coach so it may not seem too crazy that we have a regulation sized beach volleyball court in our backyard. add a trampoline, a big fire pit, a hammock and all sorts of space to run and play and you can see why i've chosen to spend more time outside relaxing than inside working!

stay tuned

i'm going to be another day or so with this one! stay tuned....

bathroom mirror

when i was a teenager my parents bought my sister and i the 'coolest' mirrors from ikea. i have dragged these mirrors around with me on every move since i was 18. they have been used in all sorts of different designs. this is just the latest.

i rarely work with hardwoods. but, for this design, i definitely wanted to splurge and work with mahogany. what a gorgeous wood to work with...makes it hard to go back to mdf!

this is a simple design made of up just four pieces of wood. the only details are a drilled out hole for a cup and making sure the top shelf is thinner than the bottom to allow for the mirror to rest on a slight angle. i hung the shelf up using l brackets (attach to the wall first, rest the shelf on it and then attach the shelf).


update - shoe storage



in last week's post i promised you i would upload a photo of the finished project...here it is, shoe storage and all.

i followed not martha's directions. her directions called for 2" l brackets for hanging...but, i think i'm going to have to swap them out for larger ones. the shelves are definitely drooping under the weight of the shoes (my shelves are a bit longer than hers were - and, i'm sure the shelf was meant for cute stylish shoes, not my and damion's big clunky sneaker collection!).

tree hook

ok, i may be going through a bit of a phase. i love the whole wall vinyl trend that is happening right now. big bold graphics on the wall are appealing to me. after months of struggling with a bulky (and an unfinished) storage unit i built for coats and shoes in my foyer i decided it was getting the boot. i wanted something simple and bold. this design fit the bill.


so, again, i set out with my handy projector and some black paint. added in some wooden handles painted black and a simple coat rack was born.

now, i had planned to show you the shoe rack i've built to go along with this...but, i ran out of screws to attach it to the wall! so, once i hit canadian tire i'll upload the finished project. months ago i stumbled on a very cool diy shoe rack design on the blog not martha. so, i've pinched the idea. stay tuned.

my old door

as much as a flop as my old storage unit was (truly, a huge flop) i really like the design i had for the door (that, btw, was never attached to the storage unit - yes, picture us moving a six foot tall door every time we wanted a jacket or pair of shoes!). here is a quick pic of the door. i made the holes using my big drill bits and put pieces of wood veneer behind the cut outs.


colouring

last week i featured the blog doodlage in my new feature - blog of the week. on friday RaShell posted about colouring, one of my favourite stress relievers. when is the last time you went out and got yourself some brand new colourful markers and a sweet design to colour? i'm telling you, you'll fall in love with it all over again!


crayola really needs to come up with a 'flesh' colour line! i can't find a 'flesh' coloured marker anywhere! so, for now my fairie princess remains painfully white! (kind of like me in a bathing suit!)

van's bench

when damion and i decided it was time to have a baby, my sister, julie, and her husband were deciding it was time to have their second baby. we both ended up pregnant within weeks of each other. she had her gorgeous 'little man, van' and i had eden (who is, of course, also gorgeous!).


as the kids got older, julie noticed that van was missing certain physical developmental milestones. after taking him in for tests and an appointment with the neurologist, van was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy type II. SMA is a rare genetic condition that affects the proximal (closest to the trunk) muscles of the body.

julie asked me to build van a little bench and stool (the stool is still in the works) for his physio exercises. of course. but, a cool kid like van definitely needs a cool bench. so, i photoshopped the vans sneaker logo and a funky graphic to produce this design. i projected it onto the wood and painted it black. julie is going to take care of the finishing touches (adding a bit of colour and varnishing it).


for more information on SMA visit the families of sma or fightsma.org.

i'm still deciding how to design the stool...if you have any suggestions, let me know.


new blog of the week feature

one of my new favourite pastimes seems to be scoping out neat blogs online. i get a little thrill when i find a cool new-to-me blog. when my cousin spent 6 weeks recovering from a surgery i sent her a new website everyday to help keep the boredom away. now that she's up on her feet again i've missed digging around the internet with purpose. so, i've decided to start a new feature here. every week i'll post a link to a blog i love. find it in the sidebar.

birthday fun

we celebrated eden's 1st birthday with family and friends over the weekend. i was looking for a reason to make these crazy pom-pom decorations i saw on martha stewart's site for awhile. so, with the help of my sister-in-law and mother-in-law we made a room full.

inpired by my favourite cupcake blog, i made a tower of cupcakes instead of the traditional birthday cake. yes, and the kitchen is still in one piece (if you knew how bad of a cook/baker i was you could appreciate that like my husband does!).

i made some monogrammed 'e' cupcakes for fun. i printed off an e onto a transparency to create the template. you can see that after close to a dozen i gave up on that idea and just started in with the sprinkles!

this cupcake was shown no mercy by eden! it ended its existence as a ball of mush!

dressing up work walls

i'm carrying on with a pom-pom theme....

when i returned to work from maternity leave i was presented with a very white new office. we are limited to what we can do to the space we are given (my day job is at a pretty conservative firm). wall vinyls seemed like just the thing. they have been popping up everywhere so i headed over to etsy where i found a shop called elephannie. i love my pom-poms!

starting out with a wall vinyl that has a hundred little parts probably wasn't the greatest idea. that's something i should have work up to. i'm glad i came into work early to put them up...i spent an hour struggling and swearing up a storm!

well worth it!