DIY Compost Bin...

Kevin has been dumping the grass clippings in a pile in the lawn, and I got a brilliant idea that we should start a compost bin. I did a little research online ala Google and I found this. It was so simple to do and it's been my project, I did it all my self! We bought a trash can at Fleet Farm for $16, we had bungee cords in the garage, along with a drill, so the total cost of this project was $16, instead of the $100+ we've seen for pre-made compost bins. So I've been putting the grass clippings in it, along with things from the house, like vegetables, fruits and egg shells. I know there are many more things I can add to the compost, but I need to do a little more research on all of that. I roll the garbage can once a day and keep it in direct sunlight to help speed up the process a bit. Hopefully it'll make some great fertilizer for our garden!

Adeline was helping me with the project, that is why you see her sitting in a chair in front of the bin, she wanted a "cheeseburger with your garbage can Mommy!"

Personalized Beach Towels...

My mom made these hooded beach towels for the kids for Easter. They LOVE them! So do I!! I told her she should make them and sell them on Etsy! I love that she monogrammed them all for the kids too, using letters cut out of towels from the hoods. They are so excited to use them in Duluth in a couple of weeks!

She started making hooded baby bath towels when Adeline was born, using a pattern that I had gotten from my girlfriend Jodi and she decided to make them beach towels using a half of a hand towel for a hood instead of a wash cloth like she does on the baby bath towels.

night light makeover

I decided to redo the girls' night light for their room. I originally made it about a year ago after Amelia's birthday getaway. Before:


After:

I'm still not 100% sure that I'm happy with it this way, but I love the versatility of these glass blocks, that it's easy to change around! I have a block that I got for Paul's night light too, we just need to find Kevin's bin of Legos from when he was a kid so we can put the night light together! Then I'll post pictures of his when I get it done!

DIY Christmas Ornaments

I had three drop-in's yesterday for daycare during the day, and I thought since it's December it'd be a good time to make these for a project. The two littlest ones didn't make them because they are under 1, but all of the other kids made them with assistance from me. I squirted all of the paint in the ornaments because I'm a control freak like that. Actually I was trying to eliminate a mess on little fingers and clothing! They had a great time making them and after the paint was swirled inside, I wrote their names and the year on them with a paint pen. It was a super easy craft and fun to make. Just have to be careful because the ornaments break easily if dropped.

The supplies---clear glass ornaments and acrylic paint

• Remove ornament top
• squirt paint in ornament
• replace top
• turn ornament to swirl paint and cover the inside

Finished product.

Ornaments the kids made---except for Stella---I made hers. Amelia didn't get her name on hers before I took the picture.

Paul has two ornaments because he insisted when the big kids got home from school that he needed to make another one and he wanted to write his own name on it. He did a pretty good job despite the "u" being upside down.

DIY Projects...

The last time I was at Crafts Direct (2 years ago) I saw these glass blocks with lights in them and I've been thinking about them ever since, I thought they looked really cool. Since we're in the process of moving Adeline upstairs to share a room with Amelia, I thought I'd make them a nightlight for their room. This is how it turned out, I think I'm going to still mess around with it a bit and try to adjust the lights inside it better and I may do something else for the bow on the outside, I haven't decided yet and I love the vinyl saying I picked out for it, it fits the girls perfectly.


I made this for my laundry room to cover up a hole that remains from the vent from the old water heater. Kevin's grandma use to have some random Home Interiors thing hanging there that just wasn't my style, though it remained until we remodeled the laundry room. I had bought another laundry room hanging a couple of weeks ago at Gordman's, I got it home and decided I don't really like it and it doesn't really fit my style, so I'm going to be returning that. So I've been searching for that "perfect" thing.

I found this vinyl saying at Craft's Direct, I really liked it and thought it'd fit well in my laundry room. But I was scratching my head on how I could use it, then I saw the 12x12 piece of canvas and decided that I'd paint it, apply the decal and hang it over the hole in the laundry room. I think it turned out really well. This is the end result.