It's A Boy!. . .and A Girl!

So my sister finally had her first baby after YEARS of trying to get pregnant. . . and he arrived in time to come to his own shower. My mom and I put the shower together and I wanted it to be something special.She named him Gideon and I just happened to find a book about a caterpillar named Gideon to base the shower around. I also had the guests sign the book at the shower with notes to Dawnette. Someone did that for me when I had my first daughter and I loved it.

I took inspiration from the book to make the invitations.

We sort of shared the shower with Dawnette's step daughter who is also expecting and was due a few weeks after Dawnette. She was having a girl (Nevaeh - she had her Wednesday, August 19), so I found a book with butterflies (to keep with the theme) and did a girly butterfly counterpart to all the Gideon caterpillar stuff.

I made banners for each of the babies:

And I made a cupcake tower with cupcake flags for each baby:

But the piece de resistance was the cake pops:

I made little caterpillars out of fondant to grace the blue cake pops:

. . . and candy melt butterflies to adorn the yellow cake pops:

And once they were assembled-- with a few little flowers to dress them up:

They were so darn cute you almost didn't want to eat them:

Most people actually took theirs home covered in little plastic bags and tied with ribbon:

And when everyone was gone I took what was left of the goods and assembled a few upside down cake pops just for fun:

. . . and then I took a bagillion pictures of my adorable nephew:

Almost as many pictures as I took of the cake pops!

Welcome Home Gideon & Nevaeh!

A Hint of Turquoise

Hannah has been begging for a blue room for a while now. I actually painted her room the same color as the rest of the house last year, which was a taupy off white. But no, she wanted blue. Recently we found some pretty bedding at Target that she loved. It has a light blue turquoise blue quilt and a white comforter with coordinating pillow shams. So I bought it and took it straight to the paint store to match the paint for the walls.

She was so excited she took pictures of me painting her room:

At first it almost seemed to be white, but as the paint dried, a hint of fresh blue appeared.

That dresser will have to go. . .

I even painted the ceiling. . . the chandelier is staying. I brought it from the last house.

The shelves are staying. . .

The color brightened up the room and set the tone for the new look. I can't wait to pull it all together.

Stripping in the Heat of Summer. . .

Hannah has been begging me to redo her room. She decided a year or so ago that she wants a light turquoise and white room. I got a vision a while ago and have been keeping my eye out for elements to fit the vision.

One thing I had been searching high and low for was an antique iron bed--can't you just see it piled high with crispy white, slightly foofy bedding? I definitely can. I searched craigslist daily and three times had to convince Hannah she did not need whatever bed Rob saw in some random store and offered to buy, right now. She has a weakness for the "buy it right now" temptation. But we pulled through.

Then a couple weeks ago I remembered that last year my neighbor was trying to sell an old iron bed. I had looked at it, but had not bought it because it was full and I really thought I wanted a queen because we had a queen mattress set already. Guess what? They don't make antique iron beds in queen and if you get an altered one they are a small fortune. So I walked across the street and asked if they still had it. . .

They DID! Yeah me. Plus it was lovely. . .

. . .or at least it would be once I stripped the paint and painted it antique white.

Which is just what I proceeded to do.

I scrapped and sanded and picked. . .

. . . through white, pink, red and green layers of paint. . .

. . . until I made it bare metal.

Then we sprayed it down with Rustoleum rust killing primer. . .

. . .and painted it antique white.

The actual color was Valspar's Porcelain.

It's not perfect, but it IS lovely.

I would have loved to have had it sandblasted and powder coated, but Rob thinks I will get sick of this bed in a couple years--so it wouldn't be worth it. He is so wrong. This bed was in my neighbor's family forever. She raised her daughter on in, had it before that herself, and before that it was her father's bed--back when it was new. I love knowing that.

It has history! It has character. It's going to look fabulous in Hannah's room.

Just you wait and see.

Hypertufa Pots

I finally made the hypertufa pots (sometimes called troughs) I have been talking about for over a year. . . and I LOVE them.  I may make more at some point, but the ones I wanted first were to line my front walk.

First you need to decide what forms you will use for your pots.  You can use buckets or boxes or a cooler or whatever, you just need to cover them in plastic so the cement mixture does not stick to it.  I wanted two the same shape and size so I used some very large cardboard boxes to make four smaller boxes--two to fit inside the other two with a 2 inch gap.

Next you need to ingredients:

Peat Moss

Perlite

Portland Cement (pure portland cement)

Mix and a 1:1:1 ratio. 

Add water a little at a time until your mixture is at about cottage cheese consistency:

Pour into bottom of box or other form and then place the inside box onto it and fill the sides.  At this point you could make dowels the thickness you want your pot to be (mine is 2") and stick them in the bottom--this will also keep your upper box in the proper place so it doesn't get too close to the lower box.

My upper box keep wanting to lift up so I filled it with a enough bricks to keep the edges even and the bottoms two inches apart.  I also placed logs around the edges to keep the sides from bowing too much.  If you have a hard container this won't be much of a problem.

Then you cover it with plastic and let cure for 24 - 48 hours depending on the size.  Mine was rather large so I let it sit for two days.

Remove from form:

The edges will be crisp where they met box or plastic.  To make it look old, like the old animal trough it is trying to simulate, I roughed up the edges and sides with a wire brush--Rob got me started:

See! No more crisp edges.  Now it looks older. . . and better.

While it is still kind of soft (it is not totally dry at this point) drill a hole or two in the bottom for drainage (unless you went the dowel route).

Now let is cure for 3-5 days, keeping wet by spraying down with water a couple times a day to help it cure.  Portland cement actually become harder and more durable when exposed to water.

Then plant!  Here is mine in front of my house filled with two kinds of sedum:

I am all about symmetry so I placed one on each side of the walk. . . the very dirty walk.  (Next project: Clean up front walk!)

Living in Washington I probably don't need to bother doing anything to encourage moss to grow on my pots, but I may anyway.  To do that, mix in a blender a chunk of moss with either beer or yogurt and brush on the surface of the pot.  I will let you know if I try one of those and it works.  For now I like the way they look and may just let them age naturally.

While I was looking for succulents to plant in my pots I came across instructions on making a living succulent wreath. . . I have become intrigued. . . I think I have another project on my to do list. . . 

Let me know if you try a pot and tell my how it turns out!

A Splash of Pink

One of the things I love about doing my kitchen all white is that I can add little splashes of color now and then for variety.  I love fresh flowers and I tend to get white flowers more than anything (Really, are you surprised?).  But now that my kitchen is all white, adding hot pink peonies, for instance, has a really lovely affect.

And to think I was disappointed when I learned my nine peony plants were various shades of pink instead of white.

A Vegetable Garden Journey Part 3

The beds have been filled with dirt.

My little seedlings were not 100% successful.  About a third died and many of the rest don't seem to be growing much.  I even broke down and bought a few replacement plants.  

I decided to plant everything I had left and see what happens.  I never claimed to be good at this!  What I lack in proficiency I make up for in enthusiasm. . . too bad you can't eat enthusiasm.

Obviously I have a lot of work to do to make my garden look lovely, but at least they are functional.  We plan on putting a couple more beds against the garage . . .as soon as Rob doesn't remember how much work the other five were! 

In the meantime, let's just hope my plants don't get eaten by the bunnies . . .and deer. . . and birds. . .and bugs. . .and moles.  

And Again with the Kitchen. . .

We finally got our tile installed this weekend--and I LOVE it.  It is really amazing what a little tile will do for a kitchen.  

Maybe I should have put the outlet covers back on before I took these pictures!

I ended up using a light grey grout instead of white--the white was whiter than my tile and made it look kind of tan.  

 My dad came up for the weekend with all his tools to help us.  (Thanks Dad!)

The grout was different than any I had used.  It was colored with glass rather than dye, so the grout does not need to be sealed and never stains.  

I still need to caulk and paint the window and door trim, but I see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.