spooky halloween scene

We sent our oldest daughter to heritage school today.  It was fun dressing her up!  Each student needed to where period clothing and take their lunch in a pail with a cloth cover.  She will be experiencing a typical day in the late 1800's.  I can't wait to hear about her day!

Today I thought I would share my spooky Halloween scene I created above the TV area in our living room.

  I was inspired by Pottery Barn's haunted house candle holder and the scene that surrounds it. 

I was NOT inspired by the house's price of $99.99. 

What I think I liked about this is that it was not so Halloween commerical looking.  Children and adults can appreciate and enjoy looking at this.

Could I make something similar?  I could do it....I took several architecture classes and I built a lot of models.  I collected several cereal boxes and started to cut and then spray painted a few.  But then I came across these....

found here and they were cheap! 

I decided to give it a try. 

I didn't like how they were so uniform looking and definitely NOT at all spooky.  They needed some work.  I started with the little one thinking if it didn't turn out then it wouldn't be a big deal.  I cut and I ripped paper and I glued and I folded paper and then glued some more.  I was thrilled at how it turned out and decided to do the same technique to the middle sized house. 

I must say this took quite awhile!  Several days during several nap times.

And finally here's my spooky scene in our living room....

I did cut the backs off the houses so that you could see through them.  It lightens it up.

I did spray paint the tea lights also.  They were originally orange and really stood out.

You don't need to be perfect in your cutting of the windows and door.  It makes it look more haunted when it's not so symmetrical.

I made book covers out of coffee stained freezer paper.  Super easy project...I will post about that soon.

I had fun one weekend burning all these candles so that they looked old and creepy.

And finally the bat banner was just a bat shape found on the internet, traced on black foam, and a string hot glued to the back.

Originally I included pictures like those found in PB's theme behind my scene.  But since my space is a lot smaller it looked way over crowded.

Enjoy making your scary Halloween scene in your home! 

Thanks for coming.

Bye for now!

Linking up to these parties:

back to bunk beds

  Last weekend we decided to put our daughter's beds back to bunk beds.

When our little guy was born and the girls started sharing a room the beds were bunk beds.  After only a few short months we took them apart. 

I was not in favor of this change at all!  I definitely was the minority.  I liked them having their own beds to lie on at ground level.  Plus I had pictures and shelves displayed nicely on the walls.  If we were to do bunk beds then all those items would need to come down and be moved. 

Now having the bunk beds again really opens up the room and gives the girls plenty of space to do whatever.  My oldest has complained here and there of not having her own room.  But secretly she has said that she would be sad if she were to move to our finished basement bedroom.  She is on the top bunk and it gives her a space to get away to do homework or read, which has erased her need for her own room for now.

In all of the rearranging and taking down pictures and shelves, we have decided to update their room.  The girls definitely don't need to have ABCD wall art anymore!  Like a landscaping budget, we have little-to-none decorating budget we need to do this on very little money.  

So I thought I would show you our process.  It will probably be slow and take several months, but it will get done.  We need to create a space for them to call their own.  

To start I'll share some of my favorite ides that I want to include.  For about a year now I have been ADDICTED to Sarah's House, Sarah 101 and Design Inc, and addicted is an understatement!  I absolutely love how Sarah Richardson mixes the old with the new.  She will find vintage or just plain old and ugly furniture and give it a face lift.  She will also take a vintage quilt and totally update the room with fresh paint colors and fabrics.  When you see the finished room the old things blend so well with the new.  It makes the room look polished instead of old and outdated.  I love it!  I want to incorporate this idea into the girls' room.  I don't want it to be all matchy match, it needs variation just like the personality of these two girls that live within.

Sarah always has a "jumping off" point and it usually is fabric.  She pulls room color, furniture color and other upholstered items from this one fabric. 

I have furniture in the room that is painted, and I want to keep them painted white, along with roman shades that we need to keep.  The curtains are optional - I would like to keep them mainly because I really like polka dots and it also could be money spent elsewhere. 

Here are a few pictures of what the room looks like now. 

I loved the paint color back then and it went well with the princess theme we originally had, but now it needs a fresh updated color for two growing girls.  I'm not afraid of color but I was thinking of doing something neutral.  When I threw out the word "beige" my oldest was totally disgusted and pleaded with me for it not to be.  I want the walls to fade into the overall theme.  I don't want them to stand out. 

I SO can see doing wallpaper on one wall as an accent.  Handy husband is SO not on board with that one!  More than likely the room will just be painted.  BOO!

Now that we have bunk beds again it has opened up all this floor space.  We brought up a chair from the basement to watch TV.  I think we will ask relatives at Christmas time for new chairs so both girls can have a spot to sit.

I am just sick of all the clutter!  You can see some of it on top of the nightstand and dresser!  In this redo we need new storage ideas for the closet and probably just weeding through the things that are not played with anymore.  This is not a big room...how do other families do it?  We have personalized space in the closet for little trinkets and keepsakes.  Gosh, I guess we need to go through it almost every couple of months!

You can kind of see the bed skirt we installed on the lower bunk in this picture.  Sorry I didn't take more pictures.  I will have to do that and show how we did it.  It totally hides all the clutter under the bed.  It makes the room seem more bedroom like - something that we didn't have before.

I'll keep posting as we make decisions and as the room changes.

Thanks for stopping.

Bye for now!

texture, texture, texture

  This fall season has brought out the texture in me. 

As I look around my home, I am surrounded by things that have soft, rough, smooth an bumpy finishes.

I wonder why I am noticing these things at this time.?

Is it my nesting feeling that I have in preparation for the upcoming holiday and winter season?  Or is it my design style changing as I am paying closer attention in displaying things with different textures?

I believe it's a mixure of both.

Here are a few pictures I have taken around my home in making it more fall-like.

What textures surround you in your home on this Friday?

Thanks for stopping.

Bye for now!

sweater pumpkin

OK.  It's not really a pumpkin in a sweater. 

It's a pumpkin wrapped with that really thick chunky yarn that a person would use to make a sweater (me not included).  And "yarn pumpkin" doesn't sound as cool as sweater pumpkin. 

It never fails....when I am buying supplies like this yarn or fabric or even thread the wonderful ladies at the craft stores feel obligated to ask me what I'm making as I check out or having fabric cut.  Has this ever happened to anyone out there?  But I feel like I have to lie....I'm not using the materials as they are intended.  Plus describing what I'm making is just too long for craft store small talk.

OH-well...I guess I will just have to put up with lying or seeing they're strange looks on their faces for a little while longer.

On to my "sweater pumpkins"!

 

Here are the supplies you will need:

Thick chunky yarn - is what I used or try it out with any type of yarn or twine you might have on hand.

Dollar store pumpkins.

U-pins.

Thick twine for the stem.

Scissors and glue-gun.

*Watch Out*  For some reason I felt like I needed to take a picture of every single step, which I don't know why - this project is so easy, so there are a lot pictures!

Pop that top off.

While holding one end of the yarn with thumb, run a line of hot glue down one of the ridges followed by the yarn and then cut.  Repeat again on the ridge next to it.  I found the hot glue to be stringy on the yarn already in place.  Instead I just filled in the empty space with cutting yarn and holding it with my fingers.

I also thought I should paint the pumpkin before I did this.  It was SO not necessary to think that.  I added so much yarn there is no way you can see the pumpkin color underneath.

U-pin the yarn into place once section is complete.

Snip off extra at top and bottom.

Don't worry about seeing the yarn fuzz.  You will cover it up with the stem.

I alternated in different sections around the pumpkin. 

Then for the stem I cut pieces of twine and hot glued them together and onto the top of the pumpkin.

Add as much twine to fill in the empty voids to make a good stem.  *One tip* Cut the stem at the beginning to desired height because it was really hard to cut it down all at once.

There we have it!  It adds such texture to any fall decor look.

One more thing and this long project post will be done; this project took awhile!  I had planned on making this one and another during nap time, but I barely got this one done.

Enjoy making your sweater pumpkins!

Thanks for stopping.

Bye for now! 

Linking up to these parties:

 

tree love

  Can a tree make you happy? 

Looking at this in my backyard sure does!  All of our main rooms face the back of the house and consequently I see this tree when I look out the window.  I am a tree lover!  If I had my way (and the money) my whole backyard would be planted with different species of trees with several of my most favorites; pine trees.  We have a huge yard and little to none landscaping budget.  So this lonely maple tree will have to do for now, which I don't mind!

We had a fun weekend of picking out pumpkins at a local produce/tree farm.  It was unexpected in what this farm offered just outside our little city.  They had a hay ride, bounce house, and all the fall/Halloween decor for kids.  We even had our first carmel apple!  It was mighty delicious!

The past years I have sort-of dictated what they were going to be for Halloween.  I know it's sad....it's just this thing I do, I want them to all coordinate.  According to my oldest they have all had a "theme". 

This year I have turned over a new leaf (it's a costume for heaven sakes!)....THEY picked out their costumes.  As we shopped, the costumes ranged between $9.99 to $74.99.  Yikes!  Of course I steered away from the most expensive, but surprisingly they all picked reasonable ones. 

After they choose what they wanted, let me announce to you.....we have a "theme"!  Yeah!  And I didn't even plan it!  They are going as a devil, vampire and a skeleton.  All classic SCARY costumes! 

I like it when it all comes together!

Thanks for stopping.

Bye for now!