Our ugly house - the day before High School

What does every teen age girl need on her very first day of high school?   Her own well appointed bath room off course!

One of the buying features of our ugly house is that it had 2 1/2 baths.  When the 2 bedrooms were added on, the one large bath was split into 2 smaller baths, and probably bumped out some with the addition.  Also at one point the downstairs hall closet had been converted into a powder room. We can't do without a powder room, but the hall closet solution devised is not idea.  I hope to blog on our solution to that sometime soon.  In the meantime, back upstairs to the monkey's cramped bath.

For some reason, we didn't take a picture of her old vanity.  It was as ugly as this one only dark dark grey.

Her vanity just fit behind the door.  This was the only storage (no linen closet) and so not nearly enough for her.  Add to that a what was probably a first generation automatic faucet.  It wasn't hard wired but plugged into the wall and only turned on when you didn't want it to.  (ie wave your hands all you want, you cannot wash them.  However, accidently drop somehting in the sink, it gets wet.)

Well, the people who always have the ecomomical solution for lots of storage in small space is Ikea.

IKEA Godmorgon Series

Their vanity is narrow in depth and packed with storage solutions.  

What you see here is the vanity without the bottom drawer installed.  Brian needed one more part, but the hardware store was closed.  Good thing too, because he needed to be on a plane to CA before dawn, and probably would have stayed up all night finishing up.

here's the very lovely tall cabinet next to her vanity.  It's shallow depth, but fits 

Skubb boxes very nicely.  She picked turqouise and labelled them for her bits and bobs.  IKEA Skubb boxes

How fabulous are these drawer dividers

The center is a Skubb box that she can pull out to do her hair.  On other side are the Godmorgon trays that lock into the drawer sides.  One each side of the Skubb box, there's 2  bottom trays, side by side and one on the top that slides back and forth

Godmorgon drawer trays

One great feature of the Godmorgon wall cabinets is that they are mirrored on the inside.  Once the shelves are all in, we'll arrange shorter items on the bottom shelf so that the monkey can get a panorama view of her hair.

The turquoise helps to brighten things up.  She still has the ugly brass shower door and she stills hates the Alfonse Mucha mural.

Here's her preferred take on Alfonse Mucha:

Stashing the Stash

There's lots of buzz right now in the crafting world about all the new releases at CHA this week.  We drooled over the sneak peaks and now all off our favorite craft celebraties are back from the show and sharing their pics and videos.  Here's just a few:

Tim Holtz
Shelly Hickox
Paula Cheney
Richelle Christensen
Tammy Tutterow


Crafters love the process, not just the crafting.  That includes questing for new stash, sales, coupons, where to find the best on line selection with the lowest shipping. Added to that joy, is the sorting, organization and storing of said stash.

Last weekend I celebrated CHA Summer 2013. by using craft stuff, to create some craft stuff, to store new craft stuff.  HURRAY.   New seasonal intros usually means new TH movers and shapers, sixxlets, and there's some Memory Box Christmas dies that I have my eye on.

Step one:  Score a cheap and ugly frame from a flea market

Rip the paper off the back, pull out the tacks and remove the ugly print

Slather on Tim Holtz Crackle Paint

Then, walk Away - Seriously - For me that means find something else to do and come back in a few hours or I will mess it up. Same goes for Tim Holtz distress stickles and anything coated with Glossy Accents.  Just walk away

Okay, good girl.  Now come back and dry brush with Tim Holtz distress paint. Once that's dry - for this step, no worries,  you can use the heat tool - then use your fingers to smear some TH gathered twigs and black soot paint in the general vicinity of the corners.

Admire the messiness.  Now tape magnetic paper to the ugly print.  I buy the sheets meant for printers from Staples or whereever handy.  I tape it on first, then trim any excess.  I needed 2 pieces for this frame.  The join line won't end up showing.

The black side is the magnetic side, so this side is the top.  Wrap Tim Holtz tissue wrap over the magnet paper and tape to the back.

Flip it over, and ink the Tissue wrap  - the black shows through, but it looks perfectly fine.

Reassemble the frame and hang on the wall  Now it's all ready for your new Tim Holtz Sizzlets dies with stamps...

Christmas Tim Holtz Sizzlets Here

Halloween Tun Holtz Sizzlets Here

Here it is on the wall.  Next to it you can see something similar where I used sheet metal instead of magnet paper to store movers and shapers.  Underneath you can see my Distress Ink pad storage.  The one on the left is an old sewing machine drawer.  The rest are ancient wooden cheese boxes salvaged years ago.

If you are stopping by, leave me a comment and if you know of any great storage ideas, I'd be really greatful if you'd leave me a link.  I'd love to see it.

Back Yard bliss - just before the clouds rolled in!

So here it is - finished just before the clouds rolled in Sunday night.  The sanding and staining will have to wait until next weekend.

Backyard bliss - some assembly required

First - Find simple deck plans on Lowes.com: easy deck. Pergola comes later = next year maybe
Go to lowes and place your order for lots of stuff for tomorrow pick up

Day one- Go to lowes and pick up lots of stuff, unload it in your yard and get busy

Kraftman finally got to use his christmas present

This will probably be recorded as the hottest weekend of the summer = drink 15 bottles of water

Day two - things are coming along

Day three - repurpose rubble from front yard make over

Day four - has to get finished today.  It's looking good

TA DA! After.

And now - we're just waiting for grass to grow in some of the dug up spots that aren't to be replanted.  Jeff from Krishner's in Newtown was awsome through the whole thing.  We are thrilled with the outcome - Now, on to the back shed then the side hedgerow.

Our ugly house - curb appeal - still before

Still before - could it have gotten worse?  The new walkway is in.  The beds get bigger as more sod is removed.  Our driveway is full of soil, rock and mulch.  Very stinky mulch.  The good kind.  I see light at the end of the tunnel.

12 tags of 2013 April

So here it is just under the wire.  I followed Tim's instructions here timholtz.com/12-tags-of-2013-april/.

He's right, the effect is amazing.  I love distress paint.   Dabbing ig on the metal bits with your finger works great.  I smeared a bit of black on the edges to give a bit of definition.  I didn't have the same stamp so i substituted the butterfly from the SA spring sprung set.  I used some leftover packaging for the overlay using Stazon.  The stamp along the side is from one of the TH sets at Michael's.

Just when I think that ranger/Tim Holtz can't possibly come out with another product that I will need to have.....  distress paint is truly unique and the results are really lovely.