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Wednesday, February 29, 2012

McKenzie and Rylee's Room

I'm still playing catch-up. Going back to the weekend after Valentine's Day, I painted the wall in McKenzie and Rylee's room {my precious little cousins, just in case you didn't know}. My Aunt Kim has been working on getting the girl's room all fixed up! She decided to do the room in pink, black, and grey. Perfect colors for two girly-girls! Luckily for her, the walls were already grey, so she didn't have to paint the room. She had their great-grandmother to make a quilt for their bed. It is so cute! Here is a picture...



So this fabric became the inspiration for the entire room. Aunt Kim decided since there were butterflies in the fabric that she would like to use butterflies on the wall. So she asked if I would like to come over and paint some on the wall. Of course, I said yes! I love painting stuff on the walls! So she found these plastic 3D butterflies at Target. You simply put these tacks in the wall and the butterflies clip on them. 


First I laid them out on the bed in the shape I was going to put them on the wall. This just gave me a general idea of how to place them. So once I go them up, they looked like this.


Aunt Kim had the idea of painting a colored butterfly behind each of the white 3D butterflies. She bought 3 different paints: Martha Stewart Specialty Finish -Black Textured, Grey Textured, and Pink Glitter.




I loved this paint!!! It was so cute, plus the textured covered in one coat! The glitter was a little thinner, so I painted a pink coat first, then painted the glitter over top. Once I got the white 3D butterflies up on the wall, I decided to paint the colors behind like a shadow. So I traced the shadow while the white 3D butterflies were still on the wall. Then just took the butterflies off of the tacks and started painting!


So here is what it looked like once I finished painting the butterfly shadows before putting the white 3D butterflies back up!


 The grey ended up being really dark and from some angles, looked black. Once they were all dry, I attached the white butterflies back to the tacks and TA-DA!!!





Oh, I love how it turned out!!! So cute!!! I think the texture and the glitter are what made this project look so cute! I don't think it would have had the same effect with normal paint! Of course, I had to get a few pictures of the munchkins while waiting on everything to dry!

Mac taking a picture with her "camera phone"! HA! Cracks me up!

Can you tell they had been eating Oreos? {Rylee's dirty mouth!}

Cutie!

Can you say, blue eyes?!

Let me just say Mac is 4 and she knew how to use Ana's Blackberry! Crazy, kids and technology these days!

Cuties!

Silly munchkins! It is impossible to take a picture of these 3 with all of them looking at the camera!

This picture makes them look like little chunks! Haha! Dirty mouths again!
So there is still work to be done in the girl's room before it is finished! It is going to be precious! I will post more pictures once everything is done!


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Tuesday, February 28, 2012

A Little Behind

So the past two weeks have been a little busy to say the least. I have been back to Gainesville two weekends in a row. So let's go back to the week of Valentine's day. I went back to Gainesville on Thursday because I filled in at Ben's dad's office on Friday. I went early Thursday morning because I had some errands to run. My sister had a birthday cake she was making for someone, so I told her I would take Jaxon with me. We told him it would be a date for Valentine's Day. So he kept telling everyone he was going on a date with Jill. When my brother-in-law asked where we were going for our date, Jaxon replied, "It's just a date!" haha 

I started out our date by giving him his Valentine's gift that I had made. A dinosaur jacket! So cute!


Jaxon loves dinosaurs and knows everything about them from watching one of his favorite shows, The Dinosaur Train. I just bought a normal jacket and sewed these felt triangles on it to make it look like a dinosaur.



I couldn't get any great photos of the jacket on him because it rained the entire weekend! {Notice the nasty weather out the window in the background}

The Valentine's Day card that I made for him.

So back to our date. I asked him where we should go eat and he decided on Moes, so Moes it was. He ate his whole quesadilla, chips and sour cream, and his cookie! {Jaxon doesn't eat well, so this is a big deal!} 




Then we took my wedding ring to The Shane Co. and dropped it off to have it cleaned and fused to the band.  It always amazes me how dirty it was after I get it back! It is so shiny now! Love it!

Look at it sparkle!
Of course, Jaxon insisted we go to Target to look at toys. So we did. 


We had so much fun! I am not gonna lie, that boy is wild and is a lot of work! But he is precious and I still loved every minute of that day!



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Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Happy Valentine's Day

Today was pretty much a typical day in the Martin house. Ben had a long day at school, so he was gone before I got out of bed. He left this for me by the coffee pot this morning....

My favorite!!!

I surprised him with a cheesecake I made in the shape of a heart and a homemade card.




Unfortunately Ben has a test tomorrow and the next day, so I will be spending my Valentine's evening watching this by myself.

My favorite love story! Perfect for Valentine's Day!

I spent most of my day cleaning our house since I will be heading back to Gainesville Thursday. Plus I get to work in Augusta TWO days next week!!! I figured I better get things done before I leave. I am so excited to go back because I have a Valentine present for Jaxon {which I will share after I give it to him}, and we are going out on Thursday for a late Valentine's date! I miss that little boy so much! 


This month is going to be a pretty hectic month for Ben. He pretty much has 3 tests a week for the next month :( I am already looking forward to his summer break! We got away for a little while this past weekend. Friday night we spent the evening with some of our friends, who we are doing a monthly dinner with. We are doing a different international cuisine every month. This month was French February. I made an eggplant dish and chocolate croissants. We went up to Lexington, SC on Saturday to see 2 friends from Clemson, Justin and Ryan. It was great to see them and to get away {although Ben studied the whole car ride there and back}. Other than that Ben did a lot of this...

I'm not gonna lie...I do not miss those days!

I worked on a project all weekend. I am not quite finished yet. There are a few things left that I need to do before I post. So it will probably be sometime next week before I get it up. This is all I am going to show you for now.

I know it's not much of a clue, but I will have it up next week!!!

Oh yeah, this is what Clemson did all weekend. Ha!

Let's just say Ben was not too happy about this. Yet, she continues to show up in this same spot no matter how many times you make her get down.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Valentine's Day! Thanks for reading!

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Whimsical Daisy Boutique

 My mom and my sister recently decided to start their own business, Whimsical Daisy Boutique. They both have always been very crafty and talented, so I think this business suits them well. I admire them for going out on a limb and taking this risk! I have always wanted to do something with my creativity, but so far I just can't bring myself to take this leap. Anyways, I wanted to do a post to share some of the things in their shop! 




Whimsical Daisy Boutique is a handmade children's clothing and accessories boutique. So far they have hair bows, headbands, hair clips, pillow case dresses, and burp cloths. They will also be doing custom embroidery. They are going to be constantly adding new products (including little boy items as well) to their Etsy shop website, which you can visit here Whimsical Daisy Boutique. I have seen many of the ideas they have and products that they are currently working on. They both do a wonderful job and stand behind their products 100%. All of their items are made from high-quality materials and the craftsmanship is impeccable. I promise I am not just saying this because it is my mom and my sister. Let's just say, I'm not the only perfectionist in the family!

Here are a few of the wonderful products at the Whimsical Daisy Boutique.

Are these burp cloths precious or what?! A great gift for a new mom! Boy and girl prints available!


These fabric hair clips are cute for all ages! I needed this orange one to wear to Clemson football games! These can also be clipped onto a headband! Love it!
Great craftsmanship!
Felt hair clips in three different sizes. So cute!
Absolutely adorable!!!
The Whimsical Daisy Boutique has an Etsy shop, which can be visited here and a Facebook page. Go on over to their Facebook page here and Like them so you can stay updated on their new products! They are going to be adding more and more to their site, so stay tuned in to see what they have in store! It is a good thing Ben and I don't have any children yet because I wouldn't be able to resist myself!



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Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Valentine's Day Shelves

I decorated my shelves for Valentine's Day! I thought they turned out pretty cute, so I decided to share them!



I made the wreath using pink felt and a pool noodle. I taped the noodle in a circle with duck tape to make a wreath form. Noodles are great for this. They are a lot cheaper than buying actual wreath forms. I bought a few on clearance after summer last year.


Then I covered it with some pink fabric by cutting 4 in. strips and wrapping them around the noodle until it was covered completely. 


I used a bowl to trace circles so they would all be the same size. Then I cut circles out of the pink felt. Make sure you have really sharp fabric scissors for this. It will make your life a lot easier, trust me! 




So then you will end up with these. I think I ended up cutting out about 60-70 circles. Now you are ready to make the felt rosettes. First you are going to cut the circles by starting on the outside and cutting in a circle all the way around until you reach the middle. If you want your flower to stick up more on the outside and have depth in the middle, then start out cutting thin on the outside and get thicker on the inside (the inside of the circle will actually be the outside of your flower). If you want your flower to be the same depth throughout, then cut the same all the way around. This is how I did mine.



So apparently, I didn't take any pictures of me making the rosettes. This is why I never share how I make stuff. Not because I don't want to share, I just get so caught up in what I am doing that I forget to take pictures. So I decided I would just use a piece of scrap felt to show you this part. 


Start with the outside of the circle and just start rolling the felt up, while keeping the bottom edge lined up.



Once you get to the end, you can either pin or hot glue the end to the flower. I just used a pin here since I was only making one flower.


This is what you will end up with. I ended up making somewhere around 65 of these. I used 2 yards of pink felt. I really needed more because there are empty spots that I can still see. I wanted to go ahead and get this up so I could actually enjoy it and blog about this year before Valentine's Day is over. But when I take it down I am going to go ahead and add more rosettes for next year because the gaps are driving me crazy. Notice the gaps on the inside on the left in this photo. I can see those in a lot of places and it's driving me nuts!


Also on the top shelf, I spray painted this wooden LOVE sign that I found at Marshalls. I found the frame at Goodwill a while back. I also sprayed it with the same gray paint as I did the LOVE sign. I printed the 14 on the computer, and I found the pink bird at Target.

The pink bird isn't as dark as it appears in these photos.

  On the bottom shelf, I displayed two pitchers with flowers and a frame with Valentine subway art. I created the subway art on the computer and printed it. I found the white ceramic pitchers at The Christmas Tree Shops for $4.99, and the flowers are from JoAnns.


On my kitchen table, I needed a centerpiece. I spray painted some tree limbs gray, put them in a pitcher I already had and hung some felt hearts on them. I got the felt hearts at Target in the Christmas clearance once they marked them 90% off. I got the pack of three for 10 cents! They had gold strings, so I replaced them with some white string I already had.





Sorry some of these pictures are terrible quality. Our townhouse is like a cave! ONE DAY...ONE DAY, I will have a ton of windows with natural light flowing in!!! I just have to keep repeating this to myself! haha Now that the holidays are almost over, I need to figure out how to decorate these shelves with everyday decor. This will be one more thing added to my long list of things to do!

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