Project Distraction

For the past month I have put off anything baby related. I was working on my projects and having a little love affair with my sewing machine...I heart her.  It's a fun distraction to create something for no real reason.  The ladies at Joann's Fabric know me already. They must wonder what the hell I'm up to all the time.  Anyway, here are some of the things I have been distracting myself with.

Sewing machine cover

Mod Podge and fabric covered box

Fabric covered boxes

I love my boxes. Don't love my lack of common sense to measure the depth of the cabinets, so they hang off the edge...o well.  I put the things that I don't use often in there so I can clear some space in my minimal cabinets. Gets the job done. The other boxes are for my cookbooks.

Plastic garbage bag holders

Of course I needed 3, one for the kitchen, one for my bathroom, and one for the baby's room.  By far the easiest and quickest of all the projects.

My recovered rocker. Took a while and is not perfect, but again...o well. At least it's not filthy like it was before. And it now has a zipper so I can take it off and wash it.  I still have to Scotch Guard it, another day.

Now that I have most of the projects out of my head (still have a few more ideas) I'm able to concentrate on baby things.  We even chose a name. I've been procrastinating for 9 months and it took us less than 5 minutes to agree once we had found the right one. Which is great because I didn't really have too much time left. Getting a little anxious to see how life is going to change around here. I've been trying to organize and streamline everything around here with what little energy I have left.  Hopefully the girls will adapt quicker than me.
Yesterday morning I found the girls playing with their baby dolls and Kayla said, "I'm pretending I have a lot of children, like you Mommy!".....lol

Inspiration and ideas for my projects came from the following tutorials and blogs
http://www.bhg.com/decorating/do-it-yourself/accents/easy-home-decor-crafts/?page=13
http://www.tipjunkie.com/bin-organization/
http://www.makeit-loveit.com/2009/06/sewing-machine-cover.html
http://www.makeit-loveit.com/2009/01/grocery-bag-holder.html
http://www.lilblueboo.com/2010/02/reupholstering-nursery-rocker.html

Finally done

I am finally done with the girls' room and all the projects I wanted to do for it. Now I can focus on redoing the glider...something that is probably going to require a lot of focus and time.  Here are the pics I already posted of the room when we got the bunk beds and moved all the toys in there. You can see them bigger here http://momentsofmomsanity.blogspot.com/2011/02/big-girl-room.html

Soooo, here are the pics of my handy-work and adventures after that.
First thing I did was re-vamp the curtains that were in the room.  The curtains were the first thing I made when I bought my sewing machine. I made them into tab curtains by sewing different colored ribbon on the top to match the colors in Kayla's comforter.

Next I put up a shelf above the toy bins.  Of course, I decided to put up the shelf at the most inconvenient time, 1 hour before bedtime, and when I was all alone.  I just wouldn't be me if I had the patience to wait until the morning when my husband was home to help. It was quite an adventure, let me tell you...I cursed myself a few times for my impatience.  First I had to drill holes in the shelf to attach the brackets. Naturally I attached them all the way on the edges.  Then I started drilling holes in the wall to put up the shelf.  Long story short, there are about 10 holes in the wall due to the fact that I have a crooked eye and I happened to be trying to drill into a wall that is part of the outside of the house and is reinforced with steel.  I finally had to redo the brackets on the shelf in order to avoid the steel beams.  Then I couldn't figure out how the hell I was going to put one side up and then get the other side up all by my pregnant self.  I wasn't willing to admit defeat and wait until the morning for my husband to come home...mostly because he would have freaked out when he saw all the holes.  So this is what I devised...

See the holes in the top right?

That is a very light book shelf, placed on top of the toy bin, and the only other sturdy thing I have 2 of in the house...sterilite storage bins. After I did all that it took less than five minutes to complete the project and I seriously wished I could have smacked myself for not thinking of it an hour earlier. I'd like to add that this whole hour I had the girls running circles around me, trying to touch the drill, the hammer, sitting on the shelf, and asking 50 million questions about what I was doing. But it came out great and level so I guess it was worth it...kinda.

Luckily I KNOW my husband will never touch anything on this shelf so I have time to eventually cover up the holes. He of course said I did a good job putting it up, right after he said "O, more holes in the wall."  The rest of my projects (except the closet, which I'll post separately) weren't as complicated. I made a toy bag for random homeless stuffed animals, a hamper for behind the door since there really isn't any other place for a hamper and these kids need to put their dirty clothes somewhere, and new basket liners. Overall, I'm happy with the end results, especially because it gave me something to do after the kids went to bed.

The other side of the bag is the aqua color of the hamper

Before and after: baby girl to big girl