10 Pins Tuesday

Good Morning!

I'm gonna try something new. I'm part of the masses that are addicted to Pinterest, and I wanted to show you what I've been pinning lately. So without further ado, here's the first addition of 10 Pins Tuesday.

 

1. The Avett Brothers, just play it while you check out the rest :)

2.  Giant cross-stitch art!

3. This crochet and drift wood piece is awesome! I kinda want to make it for my classroom.

4. Speaking of things to make for my class... this is awesome!

5. I want to make this for my niece :)

6. I want to make this for me :)

7. And this!

8. And these! Blend the following: 1 can pineapple w/ juice, 1 banana, 1 can coconut milk, 1/2 tsp vanilla. Freeze in pops 117 calories per pop.

9. These are magical.

10. Good-bye... from the cutest little ami ever!

already sore...

Last night my mom and i started on two projects I've been wanting to do.

1. reupholster my crochet/knitting chair and ottoman in the living room
2. make a new coffee table bench for Journey

I bought all the fabric and such last night, and we got everything cut... today I woke up kinda early and started sanding, sanding sanding... I'm already sore, and we aren't through yet. I really want to get this done today, so I can relax tomorrow.

Pipe Dream

Justin and I worked all day, and my pipe dream (what Justin started calling it), is finally a reality. Our giant fire place wall is now adorned with pipe shelves! I know what you really want is to see pictures, so here ya go...

 

TA-DA!!! I'm so pleased with how they turned out! It was a little iffy for a second whether or not they would fit, but even my midnight math skills are pretty good apparently. I'm kinda in the middle of transitioning our fall/winter stuff into our spring/summer stuff. The big geese picture in the before photos is part of our winter stuff. The empty frame is on it's way to becoming something colorful and fabulous. (Spoilers)

Ok, if you are not a total nerd like me, you might want to stop reading there... but I took lots and lots more pictures, and I want to post them!

 This is what the sky looked like for us all day... Which is not a bonus when you need to spray paint, BUT it never did rain, and I made it through. (YAY!)

 

Like pretty much everyone else who has made pipe shelves, I cleaned them and spray painted them. Most people go for black, but I am not big on black, so I went with gray. I used Painter's Touch, my absolute favorite spray paint, and my spray paint gun attachment. This is the first time I've used the gun thingie, and I will never do another project without it! This is the first time I've spray painted without A. having a sore pointer finger and B. being covered in spray paint.

OK, more pictures of my shelves (quick and dirty) styled up. This is "my" side. The top shelf has some of my favorite things, owls, driftwood, and a funky puzzle box. It also has the Laura George print Goggles. It was one of my first art purchases, because it reminds me of me and all the different glasses I've worn since Kindergarten. I bought her print Mustachios at the same time because it reminded me of Justin. (It's on "his" side) My second shelf needs some help, but for now it has a cool ceramic piece I picked up at a thrift store, one of my favorite sets of teacups, and two canisters from Delft Holland. I am really excited to finally have a good place for the All You Need is Love set I made Justin for Valentine's. The bottle collection all along the mantle is Justin's... he's been collecting them forever, and that is another thing I'm glad finally has a place.

 This is Justin's side. The giant orange flame vase came free with our dining set forever and forever ago. On the top shelf you can see Mustachios. The ceramic cross piece is called Resurrection, and it was made for me by a friend in a ceramics class we took together. She made three Death, Burial, and Resurrection, and I was really honored when she gave me one. Justin's second shelf needs a little help too. (I had planned to put books on them, but now I'm not so sure.) The three bottles are from our wedding. The middle is our unity sand. (Try lighting a unity candle on the beach!) The other two are Jone's bottles with sand from the beaches where we were married and honeymooned. The piece next to them, I bought at a craft fair from a really sweet lady who actually went out and found the letters of the alphabet in her area. I really liked her eye, so I picked out RANEY. (Our last name for those of you just joining us.) Then more and more bottles... and this isn't even all of them.

 This is my favorite view... it's like pipe shelf porn.

Here's the break down of what we did

1. went to HD in the morning to buy everything
2. cleaned the pipes and fittings
3. put them together
4. spray painted (1 coat primer, 2 coats paint)
5. we left the shelves raw (poplar)
6. assembled
7. attached to the wall
8. cleaned the shelves
9. applied a wood cleaner 
10. styled them up

We used lots and lots of flanges, which are like $5 a piece, so this was kinda expensive to do. It has such a big impact though. I don't know how much it cost, and I don't want to. Justin knows I operate on a thrift store budget all the time, and I get terrible sticker shock. We decided just using a bunch of flanges was way easier than using a paddle bit and drilling a hole for the pipes to go through. Also it's true what everyone who's been making these have been saying, these are really sturdy. I can't really give you a tutorial because ours were specifically for our space and wouldn't work anywhere else, but there are a bunch of good ones out there I could direct you to if you're feeling the pipe shelf love. I'm so excited about mine, I think I'll go make myself some tea and just stare at them awhile :) ta-ta

midnight math, mama, tea, sleepy Journey

Justin gave me the thumbs up for a project I've been dying to do for a while- pipe shelves! Unless you've been living under a rock (or you don't have pinterest, read the cool blogs like Apartment Therapy and Design Sponge, or seek out new interesting home design stuff... which is kinda the same as living under a rock) you have probably been seeing some pipe shelf awesomeness slathered all over the internet. For example here are some I've been pinning...

 

I could go on and on and on, because I seriously LOVE pipe shelves! (I won't though, I promise.)

If you are a long time follower of my blog, you might remember my behemoth of a fire place... if not, I will refresh your memory.

Well, since we decided to buy this place I've been wanting to put some built-ins over all the brick(brick, brick, brick) to balance it out. The fireplace wall is at least 20 feet long, and while it's always cute at Christmas time, the rest of the year it's this big expanse that taunts me, lol. I've thrown lotf of ideas Justin's way, but he wasn't crazy about any of them, until pipe shelves, because seriously, there is a coolness factor that transcends gender, style, age, class, all of it. (Ok, maybe that's taking it too far, but my mama likes them too, and we are opposites.)

I've spent the last few hours plotting, planning, calculating, sketching, comparing materials and prices... AND (mostly because there aren't 24 hour hardware stores) tomorrow is go-time! I'm sooo pumped to finally be getting the shelving I've been dying for in the living room. I'm soooo stoked! Wish us luck, you know there will be pictures as soon as possible.

what a freak!

Sooo, this is random, but I was just enjoying some before bed computer time. (you know pinning, catching up on blogs, etc.) and I hear snoring. I turned around to see this.

 Our dog is a total freak! There she is belly up on the guest bed snoring away. This really cracks me up because, at my three year old niece's request, I brought Journey over to my mom's yesterday for our crafty day. Journey was doing good til she got tired. This is a fancy dog, and she does not sleep on the floor. She kept trying to get up on my mom's couch, which is a no-no. Eventually I laid a blanket down on the floor for her. She rolled her eyes and sighed before she laid on it. I really think we are spoiling her too much, lol!

back in the saddle

I haven't really been going to the huge monthly flea market as much as I used to, but the weather has been so good, I pulled on some new shorts and flip flops and made my way up there today. I found some really cool stuff!

The first thing I found was this awesome geode.I can't wait to take it in and show my pre-k class. it was only 25 cents!

 My mom has a set of these tiny clamps, and I've been wanting some ever since I saw hers. I know both Justin and I will get a lot of use out of them. All four $1

 I always, always, always hunt for new and interesting necklaces. These two were from my favorite jewelry guy. They were $1 a piece. The top is twisted seed beads, and the bottom is the ultimate fall necklace. It is made of apple seeds and pretty beads.

 These were a pleasant surprise! I'm not a huge fan of red, white, and blue, but I love Indian bead work. I figure these will be fun for summer, or maybe someday I can use them as part of an Indian costume. Can't you just see long braids with these at each end? (I actually had to walk away for a second and put them in my hair, lol... I love them!) Both for $1

 There was a really cool booth with a whole bunch of Peruvian import stuff. They had LOTS of owls! I bought two. The colorful little guy in the middle is a whistle! He was $1. (The round one is from Korea, and my friend Min Kyoung gave him to me. He's a mirror. The cute little guy on the right was my first purchase towards owl collecting. I'm pretty sure I got him at the flea market, but don't remember.)

 The cute little guy in the bottom left corner is the other one I got from the Peruvian booth. He was $1. (I got the cast iron guy at flea market a while back, and can't remember where "weather owl" came from.)

 My little collection has almost out grown their house.

 I bought Justin a special edition whiskey bottle for his bottle collection. $2 I hope he likes it. I can't wait to show you what we are going to do over the HUGE fireplace in our living room.

 This is by far my favorite find of the day! Last month, when we went to the flea market, I met a local artist and fell in love with his style. He is pretty much the reason I made sure to go back this month, and I'm glad I did! I love this print! It's koi fish swimming in tye-dye-esque water. It's soooo fun and happy! I have no idea where to put it yet, but I had to have it. $5 (approx 16"x20")

 The same artist makes macrame jewelry, and since I don't have many bracelets (and they are so fun for spring) I picked out these two. The one on the left is actually red and turquoise, and the one on the right is pink and purple with pink glass beads. I could not get a color true picture no matter how hard I tried. $2 each

 These are the prints I picked up from him last month. They are called Lost, Found, and Reborn. They are really, really cool up close! AND YES!!! I know they are hung horribly, and it literally makes me twitch. I asked Justin to do it, and he just kinda slapped them up. He IS going to fix the spacing OR ELSE!!!

Yep, so that was my day at the flea market :) I had lots of fun. In other news, in a half-assed attempt to lose weight, I am taking Journey on a walk every day now. (I say half-assed, because we are walking more because we enjoy it than because it is exercise... although the possibility of weight loss is a bonus, it's not the goal.) It's been really fun and relaxing for both of us. It's also cool because we are getting out and discovering our town. Something new I've learned is we have a really cool old cemetery with graves from the 1800's. It's pretty humbling, and I like to go there every now and then.

Hello again

Wow, it's hard to believe I haven't been on here since November... but at the same time it isn't... There are a few things that have kept me away.

• PINTEREST!!!! I mean seriously it's a black hole of awesomeness that eats up hours and hours of my time!
• Problems at work. My TA got burned out balancing work and school, and for a few months now I've been stringing her along trying to fix a problem I had no chance of fixing. She stepped down this Friday, and now I am left without a partner. There are two perspectives, but I have to wait til tomorrow. Change is always scary... especially when 20 little ones are counting on me to provide them with consistency.
• Personal life... that's as far as I'm going with that on the great wide blogiverse :)

And true to my categorizing brain, they turned out to be three P's.  The three P's of non-blogging. Coulda been a preacher or something... oh wait, I'm a teacher... duh.

WELL. Here I am! And I've been up to ALL kinds of stuff since November!!! It's hard to know where to begin! I'm gonna start with today's big accomplishment. My sister requested that I make my fabulous niece Emilia a quiet book. They will be moving to Siapan soon, and the little (almost three) nugget will have hours and hours of boring plane rides on the way.

A couple weeks ago, Annie, said sister, came over for a crafty day, and we made the cupcake page.

 Complete with removable cupcakes, which will go in the oven. (Haven't made the oven page yet...)

Today I worked on the zipper pages.

 All of the zippers are functional :) I found them on a recent trip to the Goodwill outlet store in St. Louis. That's right I'm still thrifting :)

 I used tee-shirt paint for the letters... Was going to embroider them, but I have the paint so why not?

 I hand sewed all the zippers on... It took me about 4 episodes of Dr. Who. (That's right, I'm a Whovian :) Holla back if you are too! I only have Netflix though, so when I ran out of episodes I went back to the beginning and started over, in season 5... oh Amy and Rory.... gotta love it. Still miss 10...)

But anyway... Here is something I am still working on... mostly because seaming drives me batty, and I have to put it down regularly.

 It's my first motif afghan. It's going to be for our living room in the spring and summer. I started it last Spring. I hope to have it done soon... eh... but the seaming, seaming, seaming, endless seaming.

Also, I made this necklace for my bestie Tara for Christmas...

So, I'm still here... still crafty as ever... still a sparrow under His watchful eye. We are still working on our nest... but it's coming along slowly. We will be starting on the bathroom this Spring for sure, and thank goodness. I am so ready to have a proper shower and short hair for summer :)

ALSO!!! I have been going through great pains to revamp my classroom (which of course involves DIY's). I went to a really cool teacher training (have I mentioned yet how much I love my job, problems and all?) in Edwardsville, and my bosses asked me to bring back ideas. Me, bring back ideas, bah! They didn't know what they were getting into... or perhaps they did. But I have a few of my big projects done, and I'm really proud of them. Will post them when I can.