Schoolroom is Finished

I planned on this project taking a week or two, but it was really more like several months. BUT I'm SO happy with the way it turned out! Welcome to our schoolroom/my newborn photography studio. Look! My bookcases match now! Step one: paint the bookcase.

 One of the first things I did was paint the entire room, agreeable gray. Perfect light gauge.

 To remind you of what it looked like when we first moved in, check out this post.

I got these 2 chairs at a junk store. One of them didn't even have a seat. Chris fixed that for me.

 

Like that plaid seat cushion? Sad thing is there was another layer that was even worse under that brown plaid!

 I had them all painted nicely, procrastinated putting on a sealant, then four boys happened. So I had to do a little more touch up a couple months later and THIS time I added the polyurethane.

 

I distressed the turquoise one a little and added some stain to it after. Love the way that aged it a bit.

 This black one we bought at a garage sale years ago and kept it in the bedroom.The red one was donated by my awesome brother in law. I painted it red - a crazy bright clown red at first, but dark walnut stain to the rescue to tone down. I added these homemade seat cushions because Zane and Caedon's desk is a little tall. Makes it more comfy, too.

I found this mirror at a garage sale this summer. I think I paid $3 for it. All it needed was a little paint.

 

My wall of garage sale finds. The desk was one that Chris and dad built several years ago. Here's that blog post.

The clock I made from scrapbooking paper. It's all about boys. Fitting for our home.

 Chris made me this arrow out of some fence in my parent's neighbor's trash.

A few things I made on the computer and printed...

I found these old records at GoodWill. 

 My timeline for school...

I got this simple chalkboard at Hobby Lobby and stained the frame so it wouldn't be so plain. I intend on putting our Scripture memory for the week on there. Right now we are memorizing the 10 commandments.

It was time for the little boys to graduate from their kiddie table and move to real desk. I wanted them to match our first desk, but didn't want to do all that work. So we bought these storage cubicles and cut off about 5 inches or so off the bottom and stacked 2 on each side of a board that I painted with chalkboard paint. The whole desk cost about $65 or so. And it's got plenty of storage. Each kid has a place for their books and extras in the back. The bottom cubby is the "mommy check pile". 

The curtains I found at Tuesday morning for $11, the throw pillow, I just covered an old one.

 Every kid has their own token jar (our reward system) and a tin with their supplies at their seat.

One of my favorite spots in the room. I made this calendar with our first school room that's stuck around. And I've still got my hanger with my reminders hanging from it. I feel like I still need something on the other side of the calendar, but I guess it'll have to wait until I find the perfect piece.

  I saw something (or some things) on pinterest to help me come up with this. I found the "Y" and the "U" at Hobby Lobby and told the boys to look for anything unconventional that we could use as an "O". It was a bit of a scavenger hunt, but Ben found this wreath. LOVE IT!! The "are" I printed off on my computer in mirror image, colored letters on the paper with pencil, then rubbed the paper to this piece of wood. Then I had to go back over it with a pen, but I had a decent outline with the pencil rubbing. The "LOVED" is a chalkboard that I can change however often I feel like. The old books, I had bought from Good Will a long time ago. We had the shelf and just needed the iron racks we got from Lowes.

 My newborn wall. This room has a wonder large window where I do my newborn sessions. I just pull in a bean bag from the boys' room and set up a backdrop stand. Mom gave me this old bookcase when we moved - I think my grandfather built it. I painted it turquoise and of course used my stain again.

 

I finally ordered some prints of my favorite newborn photos (I think I have a few more since that I'd love to add). The "love" was a seriously 10 minute project of bending some wire. I didn't really do it intending on keeping it. I just needed a filler there and I had wire. Lol!

 

 I got these baskets from the Dollar Store, perfect for all my little bonnets and hair tie backs. I've managed to stuff all my wraps in the Christmas box that I've covered with burlap.

  

Well, that's our schoolroom. I have almost a whole week to enjoy it being clean before we start school. Then it because our hub station once again.

Ben's Lego Room

So we've been in this house for about 9 months and I've finally decorated another room. Ben has had a "B" and one picture on his wall and 2 non matching quilts on his beds. Sad. When I asked what he wanted, he requested green and legos. So here we go...

His one green wall. I'm on a time crunch here, and the room was already tan, so I just painted the one wall. But I'm all about having an accent wall. I originally was going to make his bedding, but that quickly went south. I found these comforters at Kmart for under $20 each, Score!

This "poster" is one we made ourselves. The boys picked out which legos they wanted to me photograph with a little guidance from myself (I wasn't having that 4 armed creature blown up on the wall). I photographed it and had it printed at Staples as an engineer print for under $4. The blog I found with this idea suggested gluing to foam board, but then I remembered I had 4 boys. So I bought a poster frame on sale at Hobby Lobby for $10.

 Ben is constantly creating art for his wall, so I painted these old frames and hung them for him to tape his art inside them. I LOVE how this turned out. The dresser is OLD, but I gave it a new coat of paint, slightly yellower than opposite wall. I love all the different greens.

My artwork. :) It's kind of hiding behind the bed, but I couldn't find a better spot for it, so behind the bed it shall stay. 

 I bought simple navy pillow shams, but added the white stitching to give them a little more character.

 My pillows. I found images online, printed them, used them like a pattern and cut them out of fabric. Then hand stitched them on. Simple, but it did take several hours. Thank goodness for Netflix.

 My create sign. You should have seen me sprawling all these letter out on the floor at Hobby Lobby. 

 My little creative man doing his thing.

Star Wars Returns

I finally finished a room!! I started with the "big boy" room because I loved it so much when I did it in our last house, I decided just to do it the same way, SO not much REALLY new here, but I'm just happy to have a room completed - well, almost...

When we moved in, we bought the boys new bunk beds. They have the biggest room in the house, so I liked the idea of having extra bed space for guest...humpf...hint hint. I kept the same bedding which barely fits on the bottom full bed (twin comforter), but I didn't want to have to buy new bedding when I liked this one so much. The curtains are way too long, but I plan on hemming them next time I'm near a sewing machine. Hence the, "almost" completed. Note: Tuesday Morning carries inexpensive curtains.

The bathroom has a HUGE closet so Caedon gets that while Zane gets a smaller closet and the dresser. Their clothes are getting so big! That little R2D2 was Chris' when he was a kid. The book is the super cool pop up book that I got for an amazing deal on Amazon one day. It's really cool. The kids looked at it for hours when it came. THEN later, they found even more secret pages and pop ups in it.

 

I found this storage unit at Kmart for $18. The fake wood didn't match the rest of the room, so I decided to go funky with it and paint it bright yellow. I put some cute little legs on the bottom of it, but they didn't hold. I'm hoping to find a way to attach them back on, but better. I got a bit creative with their names this time (probably too much coffee that day). If the ribbon wasn't already on them, I probably would have left it off.

These pillows were from the old room. I had bought them at Target and added the character silhouettes.

So I know it's anti-HGTV to have an open bathroom in a room, but that's an old house for you. It's not changing unless we hit the jackpot. The mirror was painted this gold old lady color, so I decided to go a little wild with it, too. I'm still on the fence about it. I decided to add more Star Wars paraphernalia along the ledge in their bathroom. Luckily, we had plenty.

These canvases are new. My favorite is R2D2's head. Caedon felt he was an expert when helping with the X-Wing fighters. Apparently, I didn't do them correctly. I was just going off the print I found online. And the "FLUSH" sign, well, let's just say, I wasn't just being cute. BOYS!!!

Well, that's their room. I'm really overwhelmed by all the decorating that awaits me in this house. But I'm trying just to take it one room at a time. Now, which one to start on next?

Big Boy Quilt

Back in July, our neighborhood was throwing their annual block garage sale. We don't every time, but this year, we decided to participate. It seemed like a good opportunity to clean out the house a bit. I decided that since we were doing this garage sale, we might as well sell Jack's crib and transition him into a big boy bed. Our crib was cheap and basic, but had held all our babies and many babies before that. It's the first time our home had been without a crib (or 2) since Zane was born! 

Jack hadn't started crawling out yet, but we knew he would soon. Here he is the day after the garage sale, before we had gotten his big boy bed. He barely fits in the pack n play. 

A friend gave us the bed so that was a huge blessing, but I was having a hard time finding a comforter or quilt that I liked, wasn't girly, and matched his room. I gathered ideas from Pinterest, and finally decided how I wanted to make his quilt. We were planning a trip to Lubbock, so it was a good chance to stop by Joann's. I bought some fabric, worked like crazy for a few weeks, and made him a quilt for his bed!! First time I've made a quilt this big.

I bought flat sheets for the front and back, only $4 each at Walmart. Much cheaper than fabric and much wider.. After I made the front, I realized that the orange twin size was going to barely fit on the back with no room for error. I was scared that I was going to get off and mess up the whole thing. I couldn't figure out a plan, but then it dawned on me just to buy a bigger sheet. DUH!! 

Figuring out how I was going to make it....

Once I figured it out, it was really quite simple. If you look closely, it's just a bunch of triangles sewn together. I started with 7.5 inch squares, sewed 5 orange squares to 5 grey squares, then 5 orange squares to 5 white/turquoise squares, 5 white/turquoise to 5 leaf squares, etc, all wrong sides together so the seams would be on top and I could rag them.

Like my illustration? The grey line shows where I drew with a pencil, then the dotted lines are where I sewed, 1/2 inch on either side of the grey line. Then after sewn, I cut across where the grey line is, opened it up, and ironed open the seam. Then I had a bunch of squares that were half one fabric, half another. 

Then, one by one I sewed the squares together making 5 long strips. Then I sewed all 5 strips together.

I then added more of the grey sheet on either side of the chevron and my front was finished! 

I added batting, the orange back, and lots of safety pins. Now for the quilting. As I was drawing all these circles (traced different cake pans), I realized how insanely long this was going to take, but it was too late to change my mind. I hate quilting with a machine because the fabric always shifts and messes up the whole thing, so by hand it was. Up, down, up down. Lots of Netflix to save the day. I think I got through a whole season of Private Practice. I never counted the circles because I knew it was depress me, but I imagine there were over 50.

Then the binding. Oh that binding. I had originally bought some, but the color was just too bright. I finally decided I needed to just buy fabric and make my own. No fabric store in town had the right color, but we were making a trip to San Antonio, so back to Joann's. This Joann's was, and I'm not kidding, almost as big as our HEB!! To get your fabric cut, I had to take a number. Was ridiculous!!

I googled directions on how to make binding and literally it took less time then checking out at that Joann's. I didn't realize how thin it was going to be, but I really like it. More sewing by hand, more Netflix. 

I made the pillow sham, too. You can find directions for the sham and see where I got all my ideas on my pinterest board.

We also sold his rocking chair in the garage sale, and I replaced it with this bench I've used for photo shoots. I'm glad it has a home, now. I hated storing it in the garage. 

Jack did really great with the transition, and the garage sale went great, too. The boys sold some of their toys and make lots of money selling cold water bottles. I think they've spent it all now, though, but I think I've spent all the money I made, too.