Lenora's sweet vintage nursery

Check out my nursery on Project Nursery and give it a rating.

Eclectic, vintage, and pretty. That's how I describe my daughter's nursery. I had so much fun decorating her little space in anticipation of her arrival. She just turned one and it's about time I wrote a blog about her nursery and how it came together.
The room started as her brother's room, with superheroes painted on the dark periwinkle textured walls. This was not going to be an easy transformation. I searched my photos and could only find this action shot of the boys with one of the 4 superheroes in the background. (That's a Transformer arm and leg in the right top corner).





  
We started with a few paint color choices, including pale pink, peach, spring green, and a golden yellow color. I painted a square of each on the wall and looked at them for a few days. Surprisingly I liked the spring green, which was probably my last choice. It was so bright and warm in the sun and yet soothing in the nighttime. Perfect for a nursery. I used the quilt that I found at Land of Nod Outlet for color selection. It had many colors on it, stripes of different patterns, with magenta, peach, pink, gold, and green. I think it was called patchwork paisley or something like that.



                 To paint over the mural we chose a quality paint and we did not do a coat of white first. We did 2 coats of green and made sure and go over where the heroes were painted a few extra times. The end result was a gorgeous green, kind of pretty green, like new buds on the trees in the springtime. The color looked really nice on the walls and really gave the room an earthy feel, especially with the nice brown hardwood floors.

 

Once the walls were done, we added the boys' old white crib (good thing I saved that!) and dresser and a pretty little vintage side table. Now came the fun part, decorating! Pinterest was a big source of inspiration, in fact I had a whole board dedicated to decorating the nursery. In fact it might have made it harder for me because I wanted to do so many of the cool ideas I found. Scouring local boutiques, thrift shops, and discount stores (TJ Maxx, Big Lots) we found tons of great stuff  to make this nursery one of a kind. 

Peoria is lucky to have some super sweet small shops that have handmade or one of a kind items. Relics is an awesome local shop we hit up for some of the decorative items in the nursery. We found the sweet fairy print and statue there. Lost and Found is where I found the re-purposed frame turned photo display, which was painted pink and then strung with chicken wire. (I later added some branches and birds and yarn). Restoration is a very cool shop in the Sunbeam building. We found the shelf for above the changing table there as well as some vintage ballerina prints. The sweet vintage dress was from the Moss Avenue Sale, which happens once a year in June.

The dresser/changing table and the green wardrobe are both from IKEA. The lamp and the sweet fox, carrot, and strawberry softies are also from IKEA. I also hit up many a Goodwill, Salvation Army, and church thrift shop. That is where many of the knick knacks, frames, and other little pieces came from. The dollhouse is mine from childhood and I was so happy to break it out, though it will be a few years before she can actually play with it.                                                                                                                                                                                      

During December, a friend and I went to the Renegade Craft Fair in Chicago, where I found the    perfect art print to hang in the nursery. The colors were so complimentary to what we were using, and I loved the silhouette or the tree and children playing instruments. Next came the DIY projects inspired this website that was found on a pinterest pin. I thrifted some embroidery hoops at the local Goodwill and added some pretty fabrics and hankies. They were then hung above the crib. Super easy and cheap project that looks AWESOME! love this idea!

I really wanted a branch with birds as a mobile, but I couldn't figure out how to use it in the space. Instead I added branches and birds to the chickenwire frame/photo board. It looks really cool hung on the wall next to the embroidery frames and I like having somewhere to display photos, cards, and other items. The room looks so unique and eclectic, with all of  the neat vintage and handmade pieces.

I made the crochet blanket on the bed. I found the free pattern on ravelry, rainbow ripple baby blanket. I bought gorgeous yarn from a sweet local store, Fiber Universe. We took the sliding doors off of the closet because we wanted to utilize the space. We pushed the vintage bookcase in the closet, stuck in some baskets for above the head storage and bought a corner fitting hamper. I found the sweet maroon curtains and pretty embroidered bird pillow at the local Big Lots. 

               Check out my nursery on Project Nursery and give it a rating. Had a blast putting it together and now Lenora has fun playing and chasing her kitty around her room.

Can you feel the creepy in the air? Day of the Dead art project to kick off fall!

October is HERE! It's the most wonderful time of the year!! Well some of us think so! I love the fall, almost as much as the summertime, especially because of a little thing called Halloween. Dia de los Muertos is an awesome celebration of death, life, and family. Last year I did an art project with my son's 4th grade class that was a total hit. I found the idea on an awesome blog Modern Art 4 Kids, for Day of the Dead Skulls.
                                             

The craft was done on black paper with bright colors pastels. The kids were informed to draw a BIG skull, to fill up the page, then to decorate their skulls with colorful patterns, designs, and funky lines/shapes. They turned out amazing, and the kids had a blast. They were all different, gorgeous, creepy, and funny. Each one as unique as the child who created it.

 We did this project along with a lesson about Frida Kahlo, the passionate Mexican artist. The kids were very interested in the Day of Dead Celebration, which takes place on November 1 &2. Basically it is a holiday to celebrate and remember the loved ones who have passed away. This tradition goes back as far as the Aztecs, although today is predominately Mexican holiday. This holiday is celebrated by making little offerings for the deceased and basically having a party for them. Sugar skulls are plastic or paper mache or perhaps real, decorated with flowers, glitter, cloth, ribbons, gold, and silver, and beautiful adornments. These are not meant to be creepy or scary, but in fact to show that loved ones are remembered and not forgotten.It is really a sweet, wonderful tradition, that is something we could all benefit from.

There are some other great project ideas for Day of the Dead on the blog Deep Space Sparkle.

A Hoosier is not just a resident of Indiana....

      I'd been looking for years for a cool furniture piece to put in my kitchen, to display my junk but also look super cool. Junk shops, flea markets, church thrift stores, yard sales, and resale shops are the best places to find something old to make new. We are really lucky in Peoria to have tons of great thrift and resale shops. There are about 5 Goodwills in the tri-county area, along with 2 Salvation Army stores and 3 South Side Mission Marts, and tons of other hidden thrift shop gems. I found this awesome piece at a little thrift shop called God's Mission Thrift Store on McClure St, off Knoxville, in Peoria. It is a great little shop packed to the brim with good junk at pretty cheap prices. Like I said, the search for my kitchen hutch thing had been on for years, and I was really looking hard over the summer and into the fall. It was actually a pretty memorable day when we found this piece, because we had been to the doctor to find out the sex of our new baby (girl!!!). We swung by the thrift shop to kill some time and right inside the door was this cute, but battered up vintage hoosier kitchen.


It was a little rough looking, with some terrible tacky stained paper on the insides. It needed some TLC and we were the ones to give it. We snatched up the cabinet and stuffed it into the back of my car. Luckily it separated into 2 pieces so we could sorta stack it in there. 







The good things about the Hoosier, it had all the original hardware, which just needed shined up. Also it had a cool glass display window and a sweet cutout shelf too. It had a pull out iron table/work space that was in great shape with only one major scrape on one of the corners. It also had the flour sifter still in the top left cabinet....complete with some dusty old flour!
Our first thing to do was sanding. My dad helped me sand the cabinet doors until they were smooth and striped of much of the gunk. I had found a cool decorative paper on Etsy that was a retro 40's reproduction. It had a few different colors in it, and initially I wanted teal, but then, after my mom's suggestion, I decided on yellow. We found a pretty bright golden yellow paint at Menards and set to work painting. The paint was REALLY thin.
At first, any little variety in the color or texture of the piece was showing through the paint. We put on coat after coat after coat after coat of paint and then coat after coat after coat after coat. I went home and my dad continued to add coats of paint. Eventually the paint looked bright and smooth like we wanted. Next we had to measure and cut the paper to fit inside the cabinets. I really wanted paper on the backs, sides, and bottom of each cabinet. We had just enough paper to cover each cabinet with just a few scrapes left behind. We used a spray glue to attach the paper to the cabinets...that stuff was STICKY. Gloves were a must!

Here are some random shots of the progress of the Hoosier cabinet. It was about a week long project, with help from both of my parents and with my boys in school during the day. The final finished project was a super awesome kitchen hutch that I can proudly say is redone by yours truly. It was a fun but challenging project and I was lucky to have help from my parents and my dad's giant garage, tools, and
his painting expertise (he paints hot rods professionally).

I was about 7 1/2 months pregnant during this cabinet recreation, so I wore a mask when sanding and painting. It was a good project to help with the pregnancy waiting game!

 

A Hoosier cabinet (also known as a "Hoosier") is a type of cupboard popular in the first decades of the 20th century. Named after the Hoosier Manufacturing Co. of New Castle, Indiana, they were also made by several other companies, most also located in Indiana.

 Houses of the period were frequently not equipped with built-in cabinetry, and the lack of storage space in the kitchen became acute. Hoosier adapted an existing furniture piece, the baker's cabinet, which had a similar structure of a table top with some cabinets above it (and frequently flour bins beneath). By rearranging the parts and taking advantage of (then) modern metal working, they were able to produce a well-organized, compact cabinet which answered the home cook's needs for storage and working space. Hoosier cabinets remained popular into the 1920s, but by that time houses began to be built with more modern kitchens with built-in cabinets and other fixtures. Thus supplanted, the Hoosier largely disappeared. They remain common on the antique market, however, and are still used as supplemental cabinets.(wikipedia)

Finished product in my kitchen. It is a little more piled up with stuff now, but I admire it everyday! I imagine a mother in 1910 preparing a meal for her family around this cabinet, with a kiddo on her hip and bread in the oven. Love the fact that this piece of furniture has a history to it. Wish I could see where it has been.

Hello old friend

I've been majorly neglecting this blog for way too long. Got my laptop fired up for some late night blogging. Much has changed in our household since my last post 2 Februarys ago. We had a new little bumble-bee join our hive in March of his year. Baby Lenora Rose made our family complete. I've got lots of projects to post, but just have to find the time to get them all written up!  It had been about 8 years since my last pregnancy, so I learned a lot this time around. I wanted to attempt a natural childbirth, labor & delivery. I dove headfirst into all things NATURAL childbirth...books, movies, websites, groups, etc.  Childbirth and motherhood is completely inspiring and I had a ton of support from my husband, my family and all the wonderful women in my life. Hoping to share all the good (and bad) info I have learned on the subject as well as fun baby experiences, ideas, projects, and info. I also have some great nursery project ideas, crochet projects, and other crafting ideas I am hoping to share. Now if I can just get the little one to let me set her down for a few minutes I can get to typing. (:

Lawrence, Van Gogh, & Frankenthaller Projects

It's been a whirlwind of a year so far! Our house has been feeling particularly creative, with my impromptu gallery show, picture person projects, and now valentines day is right around the corner!

The first graders had fun doing a pattern project for Jacob Lawrence's, the Parade. We did this earlier in the year, but it would be a good one for Black History Month. I pre-cut strips of colored paper and they choose three colors they wanted to draw on. We talked about the print and the colors, lines and patterns. They were to make their own pattern, with characters in a parade, in the same style as Lawrence. Most kids stacked them in a line, although some staggered them more like the figures in the print. They had a blast drawing different parade characters. Since this project is basically drawing and gluing, it is nice and mess free! They were proud of their results. Thanks to my friend, Sharon, for this project idea!

In December, the kids learned about Vincent Van Gogh's, Starry Night. After learning about the edited version of Van Gogh's life, the kids painted their own Starry night with thickened paint on cardboard. I added glue & flour to tempera paint so the kids could really glop it on! They were instructed to create a landscape with a house or trees and a sky. I showed them how to use a fork or toothpick to draw into the thick paint to make a design. These projects turned out awesome! A bit messy, and they need to dry at least overnight. The kids had a blast and really got into painting. These projects went home right before Christmas, so hopefully some parents got a work of art for a gift.

The other day, I ran into an awesome website/book called the Anti-coloring book by Susan Striker. There are a few sample pages on her website that would be really fun to incorporate into a picture person project. The first one could be used in many projects, the 2nd one is specifically for Picasso.

<---A famous artist needs your help. The artist started this picture but was stung on the thumb by a bee. Turn the picture any way you’d like and finish it. 


What do you think this woman sees when she looks in the mirror?-------------->

The 2nd Graders learned about abstract art and Helen Frankenthaller, who invented the soak/stain art technique. It was amazing how interested the kids were in the abstract piece, Blue Atmosphere. The first image below is Frankenthaller, the 2nd was created by a 3rd grader.

They had me turn the print many times to view it at different angles, and they took turns telling me what it looked like! Then came the project. We threw a drop-cloth on the floor and the kids took turns dumping watered down tempera paint onto watercolor paper. They would tip the paper to make the paint run down and create drips and splashes, 3 colors total. They used sponges and brushes to gently cover the entire page and just let the paint soak in some spots and saturate the paper. They also decorated greeting cards using this same technique, for our school's spaghetti supper auction. This is definitely a messy project, maybe even an outside one. Have plenty of paper towels on hand and a space cleared off to lay the finished project to dry overnight.