Mother of All Wreathes

That title phrase is legit.  The beaut was borne out of an overambitious mind, a deep-seated passion for glitter, and the loving support of two gorgeous friends and one fly husband.

True story.

Bedazzled

Finished up some blingin’ projects today. There are no words. See for yourself:

To die for eh?  Don’t worry – there’s more where that came from:)

I know right.  My heart is beating fast too…

And my cellular is about 100x more excellent now too:

And because I had some leftover bling and glitter on hand…  What choice did I have but this:

I hear they’ll be all the rage this year for the holidays – blingin’ black ornaments…

*Sigh* Everything really is better bedazzled…

Chalkboard Wall

So we just redid our kitchen. And it’s like 98.4% complete.  There are 4 knobs that need washers before they can be screwed in and the island can’t be tipped right side up and rolled back in ’til we fix the dang caster (read: wheel) whose ball bearings came tumbing out when we were padding it so as to save the new sexy floor.  And the stainless sink is still covered in ivory paint - bums.

I know that was a mouthful but the important part is:  no whole kitchen photos yet, coming soon, instead – please enjoy our new kitchen chalkboard!

We just used 3 quick coats of Chalkboard Tint Base in Moonlight with a roller (they mix it right at the paint counter @ Home Depot for ya), and framed it with some purdy $7 crown moulding that I picked from Home Depot.   We slapped on a few coats of semi-gloss paint and our incredibly handy man, Dan (Handy Dan, I like it!) cut it to size and stuck that sucker right up there.  Want to know more gory details?  Or are you desperately trying to place this little crevice of our humble abode? How bout some unecessary labels?!:

Eventually (you know when we’ve got our lives at least a little bit together) we’ll probably give it a second coat of our Behr semi-gloss ivory and gussy up the edges where Dan caulked to close the gap that peeks into the black abbyss that is our random fridge cubby.  With green.  A two hour project that saved that crazy cubby and us several hundred dollars in demo.  And now we have something fun for all my obsessive lists.  Maybe someday they’re even be little Webbies to cultivate their inner artist via chalk there.  In the meantime, since I know you’re all dying to know how we afford to live in such home-improvement extravagance here’s a little list of your own:

The Big Budget Breakdown

• • • • Rustoleum Paintable Chalkboard: $12 and we didn’t even use half of it – chalkboard basement wall anyone?
      • Paint Roller: Free (we had ‘em to do the whole kitchen sillies)
      • Two 8′  Pieces of Crown Moulding: $5
      • Bit o’ Behr Premium Paint: Free (again, with the kitchen, you def. need less than a quart tho!)
      • Finishing Nails: $4 (we have a buttload left here too!)
      • Chalk: $3 (I splurged and got white and colors from Michales @ $1.50/box)
      • Eraser: Free.  Maybe because I didn’t buy one yet.  Where does one buy a chalkboard eraser anyways?
      • Gradiose Total: $24

 

See – toldja we were high rollers;)

And as with all newly painted chalkboards, since you’re not sure whether what you’re writing will every really erase, be sure to write something that you won’t mind keeping, posted on your wall, forever. And ever.

Falling into Wreath-Makin’

Hi kiddos. Believe it or not, there are some perks to changing seasons.  I know that’s obvious when its going from spring to summer for instance, but around here, it’s tough to see the joy in newly frigid and dark days.  ’Cept when it means you get to bust out the glue gun, boxed wine and ring up some wreath-diggin’ girlfriends.    Here’s how to make it happen:

1. Get together at about 8pm, so you have to make a mad dash to Jo-Ann Fabrics and stuff your cart full of goodies and sprint through the check out.  Supermarket Sweep style.

2. Buy excessive amounts of lovely autumnal foliage.  At our Jo-Ann’s all the fall decor was 40% off and then I was able to use a 20% off your entire purchase (including sale items!).  We literally had an overflowing cart (reds, yellows and pumpkins, oh my!) including tons of leaves, flowers, acords, pumpkins and 3 grapevine wreathes.  It came to $60 bucks.  Our bounty made four wreathes comfortably with quite a bit of leftovers.

3. Bust out the wine and snackies. And cover your kitchen table with your plethora of prettyful pieces.  But keep an eye on your cheese.  And vino.   They may just get buried in all that fall goodness and then you’ll be toast. Because we all know you can’t make wreathes without wine.

4. Lay it all out on the line (or wreath).  Do this however floats your boat, Kmitch and Sniff were careful little layers, putting each leaf in its general position whereas I am a piler.  I snagged the colors and textures I was going for into a giant pile and then worked directly from there.  You’ll also want to trim pieces down if they have extra stem or are coming off a big stalk.

5. Get your (hot) glue on.  Yay!  My favorite part.  The moment you’ve been preparing for!!  I use my handy little guy on low heat (Kmitch has battle scars to show how dangerous these suckers can be) and just put a healthy dollop around the base of what you’re stickin’ into the wreath.  Then shove it down into the grapevine, so it gets tucked away and is nice and secure.  Don’t worry a bit about those glue ‘hairs’ that will be everywhere, when you’re done they’re super easy to pull off.

6.  Work round and round. Once you’ve made it all the way around your gorge wreath, go ahead and fill in any baldie spots to get just the look you’re going for.

7.  Step back and admire that masterpiece! Congrats!!  You’ve made a *rockin’* wreath. And if you’re feeling particularly nutty, go ahead and make one for your momma too.  She’ll llerrrvvee it!

There’s our beauties.  Isn’t it wonderful how we can all start with the same pile o’ leaves and end up with 3 different, but equally incredible, wreathes!  Hoorayyyyyy!

Hoppy Hoppy Easter!

I hope you all have a lovely family, friend, and chocolate-filled Easter!  And above all… remember:

He is RISEN!!  Hallelujah!:)

Here are some quick easy Easter treats that don’t even require much in the way of instructions (please see also: I-swear-I’m-making-fun-things-that-I-just-have-one-second-to-blog-about=sad-times:

There was the easy-peasy cookie cake decorated with a little star tip and the Amazingest buttercream topped with some green sugar and malt eggs:

And then there was the fleur de sel caramel brownies all dressed up in edible Easter grass (the new and improved flavor… cardboard!)

*New recipe for those babies coming soon – with less caramel rocks and more ooey, gooey,chewy yumness.

And lastly… The Easter Wreath! All faux flowers, ribbons and fancypants Easter eggs from Michael’s as well as grapevine wreath.  $10 gluegun and sticks courtesy of Wallyworld.  Stick ‘em all together and… *tada*!

I think wreath’s just might be my new… lower calorie, calling!

And Katie-doll’s big and beauteous wreath!!  We owned that Michael’s and glue gun both!

Much gratefulness to Miss Wendylyn for the use of her camera.  Which makes everything look glorious…

... She makes me happy - can you tell?

No go eat too much delicious food and praise the Lord… for He is good!

Twas the night before moving.

Advance apologies for the inevitable typos and general lack of coherency.  My grey matter is too tired to think and my arms are too tired to move my fingers.  Yes that happens.

So you’d think hubby and wif would just be taping up the last box and sighing a big sigh of about-to-move-relief.  But in fact, hubby and wif are just stapling the last staple as our eyelids become unnervingly hefty.  Stapling?  No, not the boxes silly.  Rather the four antique chairs that we just reupholstered.  Because why not?  What else would we be doing the night before we U-haul it outta here?   Asided from the gazillion hours of homework that wif has, the second round of Thanksgiving food to be made (cupcakes and green bean casserole!), and oh, those unimportant boxes to be packed! 

But regardless of what we should have been doing… here is what we did.  And give all the idea/houndstooth cred to hubby, this little scheme was 100% his.

Also since wif hasn’t the slightest how to organize those  pretty pictures (courtesy of handy dandy new blackberry – of course the charger to the dead camera is about the only thing packed) and write under each one:  here is the lowdown. 

Hubby decided that he needed to have those ratty (ratty is an understatement -they were so bad they were RUSTY.  how does material get rusty you ask?  my point exactly) chairs in our new place.  Not only that, but they needed to be the first thing one sees when one enters the Webby home.  Not only that ,but he needed to stop packing go to Jo-Ann Fabric immediately to buy material.  Not only that, but it needed to be houndstooth.  Which doesn’t match wif’s Webby home theme in the slightest looks very unique, and dizzying mostly.  It only took about 3 hours and really – wif must admit, they look pretty saaaaweet.  The only stage that you’re missing is the battle with the staple gun and wif burning old doggy’s eyeballs out accidentally using Pledge to bring the chairs back from the dead.  Singlehandedly. And as you can see Aslan was incredibly helpful and was understandably wiped by the end.  Well done team-Webby.  I guess our guests will be pleasantly dizzied suprised upon entry after all.