DIY Cooking at Home

Hi there, everyone, hope you're having a great day! It's unseasonably warm here today for the last day of January, but I'm comin' at ya with some fun Valentine's Day crafts anyway. Martha is always good for a do-able idea or two. Here are a couple: Lollipop Heart Flowers Doily Flower Cards Meet the Dubiens gives a way to turn fingerprint hearts into a "love blossom" tree! Or paint their whole little hands for this cute keepsake (also from Meet the Dubiens .) Parents Magazine suggests making cute cards using letter blocks you probably already have. Make some heart-shaped cupcakes without a special baking pan.

I saw this idea on Pinterest , and gasped! Could it really be that easy? I had to try it. My husband and I were sick of our phones hogging prime real estate on the countertop, and I hated the dangling cord when we weren't using the charger. It was all just a major eyesore. So here's the inspiration from Make It and Love It . And here's mine! (Gosh, I need to up my photography game.) Nap Rating = 1 nap Skill Level = beginner Cost = minimal (I had all the supplies I needed on hand. Chances are, if you have kids, you have this exact type of bottle in the bathroom or on the changing table. The only other things I needed were Mod Podge, scissors, a marker, and decorative paper, which I also already had. So for me, this was FREE!) Instructions = Pretty much right on the money. Ashley over at Make It and Love It provides great instructions with wonderful tutorial photos. I did just as she said, except for a couple of things. I didn't sand the ink of my bottle because...

Oh my oh my oh my, why do I do this to myself? I've got no less than 15 projects going at once, not one of them near completion yet. I'm just gonna type it all out so you can see how crazy I am. I've got 4 (yes, 4!) lamps that I'm trying to refab in one form or another. Some are waiting for new shades, some need to be checked to make sure their wiring is safe, etc. Our entryway still needs the rest of its base molding, a new closet door, paint, a new light fixture...and I've got a mirror in the basement that's crying out to be hung, but why do that until I've painted? I've started painting cabinetry in our upstairs bathroom but haven't finished. I've got paint chips taped to the walls in 3 out of the 6 spaces downstairs but can't seem to decide on anything. The girls' artwork is A MESS and it's EVERYwhere. I'm trying to figure out a bulletin board wall for our youngest and an art station for our oldest. I've got fabric ta...

Introducing Copycat Crafting, a section of my blog I'm going to dedicate to trying some of the amazing ideas I find and pass on to you, dear readers. I love to think of myself as a compiler of information for all of you out there who want to inject personality into your homes and lives. I started this blog with a nebulous notion that I would tell you how I live MY life, and what I do to keep my sense of self through the very tasks inherent to being a mother. But as time passed, I became keenly aware that there was no way I could be the only source of content if I had a prayer of posting more than a couple times a month. So, I began posting ideas I'd seen elsewhere. But once again, that seemed a bit "been there, done that" by other bloggers, and I wanted to add some value-added content. So here I am, launching Copycat Crafting. I'm going to TRY (c'mon, you know life is going to get in the way sometimes) to reproduce some of my favorite ideas out there an...

DIY Hacks brings us this amazing idea to create the look of mercury glass using what sounds to be a pretty simple technique. I'm thinking of doing this to some candlesticks I have...but I'm not sure if the effect would be the same because they're not made of glass. I'm adding this to another in a long line of projects I need to try out...sigh. One of these days I'm gonna get it together, people, and show you how my own versions of my favorite Crafts of the Week turn out. In fact, I'm thinking of adding this as a feature to the blog. It's hard, as many of you who blog already know, to continually come up with original content. This way, I could feature a great idea from the web, copy it, and then show you how mine turned out with the addition of my own caveats and nap rating system, of course. I'm trying to think of a name for this new feature...Mimicking Mama? Copy Cat Crafter? Any ideas??

Hi all! So I may have mentioned before that we are in the process of revamping our entryway. Or you could've gotten a clue from my posts last week . Just thought I'd take a moment to share what we've done so far. This is not a before and after...it's definitely a work-in-progress-state-of-affairs at this point, so don't hold your breath for pretty, staged photos. But anyway... Here's a before shot of the entryway with the vinyl floors. The front door is new here, but I wish I'd taken a picture of the old one, which didn't have a window. It was dramatically darker then. And here's a pic of the awkward closet that we never used. It was too hard to open with the door to the garage and the door to our half-bath right there, too. We needed a family "drop zone." So here's where we are now. New flooring, which I love, and a built-in for all of our stuff. I like that it's tucked away behind that little half-wall so you can't...

It just so happens that I have a plastic mirror frame very similar to this one on Crafty Nest , except I love it as is. It's white hobnail, supposed to look like milk glass, I guess, but I don't care that it's plastic. The mirror broke years ago, and this is exactly what I had planned to do with it. One of these days I'll get to it, and plan to hang it in our daughter's room. In fact, ONE of these days, I'm going to tackle several of the projects I've featured in this spot and give them my nap rating. Now I just have to find more hours in the day...

Yeah, I usually post my Craft of the Week on Monday and it's now Thursday night, but whatevs. I was still nursing my holiday hangover on Monday and truth be told, STILL haven't gotten into the swing of things the way I usually do in January. But I'm back to blogging, so that's a start. Here are 5 ways to use washi tape by Apartment Therapy . I have yet to use this brilliant-looking stuff but see uses for it all over the blogosphere, so I'm gonna have to get me some. I especially like the table (pictured). Have you used it? Do tell!

We have been working on our entryway for awhile now. The first order of business was to remove an awkward closet and build a bench there instead (my husband's idea). But we still have a need for more storage and another spot to put on shoes and stuff so I'm on the lookout for inspirational pictures showing unique ways to create a family "drop zone" without turning our foyer into a mudroom. Here's some eye candy for ya... The colors are right up my alley in this one. Love the striped cushion and pillows. Perfect for a single guy or gal, but those hooks wouldn't look near so stylish with kids in the house. This one has more storage with the baskets up top and underneath and the neutral color scheme is nice. Love the board and batten behind this bench. Oh, and the owl pillow doesn't hurt. The pictures above let you know a family lives there. Got a lot of room? How about a bench-table combo? This space lets you drop and store everything in one nice, ...

When the calendar rolls over to a new year, I get antsy to take down Christmas decorations, move around furniture, put out new things, donate old things, find places for new toys, purge the forgotten ones, and just generally organize, organize, organize! Here are a few simple ideas from around the web to help you tackle some pesky problems. On the Banks of Squaw Creek offers an awesome storage solution for clothes and books...a dresser bookcase! The book shelves are actually just Ikea spice racks sold for $3.99 each. That's smart storage. I'm going to be using one or both of these ideas from Craft Gossip and House To Home for all my daughters' craft supplies. Check out this BRILLIANT use of a plastic baby wash bottle for taming your cell phone charger cord. From Make It and Love It ...thank you, I will! Speaking of cords, why not corral them in a basket you attach to the underside of your desk? Another duh moment brought to you by the folks at Martha Stewart . Got a lo...