Our Master Suite
I have been meaning to post pictures of our master suite, but put it off because of this….
In some of the pictures I took the lamp shade was crooked! So I put this post on the back burner. I never got around to taking more pictures, and that was four months ago. Today, I decided to forget about the silly lamp shade and share with you our master suite. 
One of my favorite details in our bedroom are the walls. They have a beautiful layered background base with a hand painted cream stencil on top. The swirl design mimics the burnout sheers in the room
The dental molding that surrounds the room also hides the hardware for the drapes and the sheers.
All the drapery treatments are motorized and can be opened and closed easily from any wall switch in the room, I love that feature.
The carrera marble fireplace was something my husband and I bought at an auction in Atlanta. It is super heavy, and since our master bedroom is on the second floor, we had to reinforce the floor just for the fireplace.
I love the texture and gold finish on the vintage candelabras that sit on top of the fireplace
I love that we have two sitting areas in the room. One in front of the fireplace, and the other in front of the slider that leads to the backyard.
Napping Mat Straps
This week I had the pleasure of having a close family friend, Priscilla, come stay with us for the week with her 3 year old daughter and 5 week old baby boy. It was a whirl wind week, fun but exhausting. It has been so long since I had little ones around, 18 years to be exact. I just don’t know how all the mommies out in blog land do it! I have a new found respect for all you mommies who juggle their time to craft such creative things, re-purpose furniture, take pictures, blog and post about them, email, facebook and twitter. Not to mention all the other daily activities and chores it takes to keep a family. My hats off to you gals, now that I have had two little ones here for a week it just boggles my mind how you do it. You mommies rock!
Priscilla asked me to help her make or sew some type of holder for her daughter’s blanket and pillow she will taking to preschool next week. She brought the pillow and blanket she got at PB outlet and wanted to do something to match. We thought about making a bag, but she showed me ones she liked on Etsy {I needed a visual since I have totally forgotten about all things relating to a toddler} Once I saw what it was she was looking for, I told her I could just sew removable straps around the pillow and blanket. Oh and for the record, I am not a seamstress in any shape or form. But I am really good at faking my way through it. I take lots of short cuts, pretty much can’t sew or cut a straight line and continually have to use a seem ripper over and over again. So with that in mind, here is a short unprofessional tutorial of how I made the nap straps. 
I measured out 2″ on my fabric and ripped 6 lengths of about 50″ long strips. (see this is one of my short cuts. since I can’t cut or sew a straight line, ripping it is faster and it rips straight. I convinced Priscilla to go with the tattered edge look, so I wouldn’t have to hem the sides. thank goodness she agreed) Then I used my ruffler to ruffle all 6 fabric strips. I sandwiched the purse strapping in between two layers of the ruffles and sewed them together.
Then sewed the pre-made white ruffled fabric from Joanns to the top.
I sewed velcro to the bottom straps that wrap around the blanket part. 
Teacher Lunch Bag
Sometimes I come across the cutest lunch bags at Homegoods. I don’t work out of the house, so I am always bummed when I see them because I want one for myself. So I do the next best thing, and buy them for friends and family members as gifts and add my own little touches to them. They are roomy inside and also come with plastic containers that have cooler lids that you can put in the freezer to keep your food cold. And for the price of $12.99, I think they are a great buy. This particular one I bought for my good friend who is a first grade teacher and happens to have a birthday coming up. I thought it would be a nice gift after a having summer off to get her back into the swing of things for the new year. I needed to pretty it up with some bling and trim, cause she is that kind of gal.
The front looked cute, but the back was plain Jane. What to do, what to do…got it! I took an acrylic crystal {didn’t want to use glass just in case it might bang into something and shatter glass everywhere, that wouldn’t be good} and traced out the shape on damask paper and mod podged it on to the back. I attached it with a cute ribbon and hand sewed it on to the bag. Ta DA! Just what it needed!
Peacock, Chandelier, Damask Wedding Card Box
As I was browsing through my iPhoto recently, I noticed that I have a lot of pictures of projects I have done that I have never shared on my blog. I mean A LOT! I am turning over new leaf today, and telling myself that at least once a week I need to post past projects I have previously done.
So for the first post, I am sharing a card box I did for a bride back in January. She wanted to use it for her engagement party in New York and for her wedding in May. She needed ASAP {like within a week} and she wanted to incorporate all of her theme into the box. Peacock, chandelier and damask. Yikes I thought, how in the hec am I going to pull that off? 
Once I started pulling it together, I was pleasantly surprised on how all the elements flowed together.
The bride loved how it turned out and I was even able to express mail it to her in time for her engagement party. The chandelier even turns on and off! I have the battery pack inside the top box. You just push on the bottom of the chandelier and it turns on and off. Pretty darn cool don’t ya think? It is one of my favorite card boxes I have done. Sharing this with
You Have My Whole Heart Sign Finished
I finally finished my sign! Whew, glad that is done. I like the way it turned out, but it was such a challenge for me to figure out how to do the lettering. It took a couple of different tries before I found a system that worked.
I bought 3 pieces of wood fencing that were 6 feet long and had the wonderful guys at Home Depot cut them in half for me {I love this service}.
I found these 5″ stencils at Home Depot while browsing for the wood. As it turned out, they were the same letters my inspiration picture used!
I then bought pine 1 x 2′s and had them cut to size for the back to make a frame. {I kinda guessed the sizes of the lengths while I was in the store, and in the end I had to trim an inch or two off in order for them to fit} But this is how I put the frame together.
I pre-drilled wholes on the 1 x 2′s on each board and across the top and bottom { tip, this helps from the pine from splitting when you screw in your screws}. Then I screwed in 1 1/4″ screws to secure the boards to the frame. At this time I also screwed in heavy duty picture frame hooks and wire. {sorry I forgot to take a picture of the screws and wire on the frame}
Ballard Design Document Fabric
Got another catalog today from Ballard Designs. And once again I fell in love with this Document fabric that they keep showing on various items in their catalog. I couldn’t stand it any longer, it catches my every time, I am so drawn to it. I caved in… I went on their site and ordered two yards of the fabric. Big spender huh? It is 55″ wide, so I should get some good projects out of it. I am so excited to see if it is as cool in person as it is on their stuff. I could do a lamp shade, a memory board, a tack board, cushion covers, pillows…who knows! I just can’t wait for it to arrive.
I am also loving their laundry sign, $129, and those cute safety pins above it, $39 for all three pins, not a bad price I think. 
Think I might try using my new circut expressions machine to make one of these laundry signs for myself in brighter colors. But of course I have to finish my other sign first…which has become a real challenge to get it right, but I am up for it. I hope to have a post on it this week. Well, now I have to since I have actually put that in writing..oops. Oh but the good news is that Jen over at Tater Tots and Jello featured my practice sign on her weekend party wrap up post. Now that was exciting! I was honored. Thank you Jen!
You have my heart
I saw this picture on The Painted Hive and feel in love with the sign above the bed. I searched the Internet, and found a site that makes it, and it was $300! Ouch. So off to Home Depot I went to get the supplies to make my own, taking full advantage of their free wood cutting service. I laid out all my pieces and realized I had an extra piece of wood left over. Hmmm…maybe I should do a tester board before I jump into this big project. Plus I needed an excuse to try out my new Circut Expression
Now I am not one to shy away from something I completely have no idea how to do. Which would be this sign. I just went by the seat of my pants, and went for it. I first printed out the saying in a 2″ real size on my new machine {which I am totally loving!} on white scrapbook paper. Painted my board with the “oops” $1 paint I picked up on my Home Depot trip. Then I laid the letters on my board to position them.
