Sentimental Treasures and an FOF!

We visited my great aunt this week, and she had this autograph book on her coffee table. It belonged to my great great grandmother back in the 1800's. So neat!! I thoroughly enjoyed flipping through the delicate pages and reading all the messages inside. 

 I was absolutely in awe at the beautiful handwriting! It is definitely a lost art. I just snapped a few random pics with my iPhone, but every single page was written beautifully. I suppose everybody wrote like that back then, even the men. I don't know anybody that writes like that now - what was so common then would seem to be a great talent today.

Another thing I noticed was the messages themselves, they were so much more meaningful than the things we write or text to each other these days. So beautiful!

It seems that our generation has lost much of the depth of our ancestors - we would no doubt seem very shallow to them. It's kinda sad how time marches on and things change so much.  Sure, lots of changes have been good ones, but some are sad. It was pretty neat to get a little glimpse into our history. That book is definitely a treasure! And it's in pretty great shape to be over 140 years old. 

 I haven't done any personal projects lately - I've been spending my "extra" time working on the shop. I did get a new style of tote bag finished. I had some requests for a ruffled denim tote, so this is what I came up with. I just listed it in the shop! 

I'm linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday.

Sneak Peek!

Progress is being made here at the old Parsonage! So I thought I'd throw a few sneak peeks out there while I work on finishing up the rest of it. 

 Today I'm working on making covers for these pillows that came with the sofa...

because really, teal velvet just isn't my thing. 

At the moment I have 3 finished pillows, and 4 to go. 

I think I can I think I can I think I can....

 I managed to get the whole room painted
 in one day (Woop Woop!!)...

with the "help" of my trusty assistant. ;) 

I only hope he never loses his eagerness to help. 

BUT...I think I can safely say that is the last time I will be painting anything while home alone with a 19 month old wild man on the loose. It was quite interesting let me tell ya!

Happy Friday, Y'all! Go to the Chari Tree to see other "Finished Object Friday" posts :)

Bathing Cuties

Finished Object.... Tuesday?? Ok, so I'm a leeetle late. 

As soon as I saw Jenny's  adorable bathroom art, I knew I had to make some of my own! I get that reaction with pretty much everything she posts.... Some people just get all the creativity and talent, I tell ya. 

(Hi, Jenny!) 

So, I got out the trusty camera, and took a few shots of my little guys.

They needed a bath anyway. 

Shoot, little boys *always* need a bath...

 They actually cooperated reasonably well. For once. 

(For some reason this one makes me think of a

 fabric softener ad - LOL!)

 I found me some cheap black frames for them, and hung them up in the guys' bathroom, which also happens to be the laundry room.

What could be easier than that?! Thanks for another brilliant idea, Jenny!

Linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday.  ;)

The Ugly Lamp Blues

Yep - it's another lamp redo! 

I had some pitiful little scrawny candlestick style lamps in the living room, and I've been wanting something a bit chunkier, but didn't want to bust the budget. That always kinda limits the options, don't it?! Thank the Good Lord for the Thrift Store - It came through for me again! I found a matching pair of these ugly country blue numbers for a decent price. Bless their hearts, they even threw in the bulbs! What a deal.

I thought maybe I could resurrect them with a good healthy dose of white paint. Well wadda ya know, it worked! 

Score! 

Now I just need to find enough time to finish the other one...

Linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday!

Happy Weekend Y'all =)

Master Bedroom Updates...

I've been doing a little tinkering in the master bedroom trying to update it smidge. 

I looked high and low for some pillows. I didn't really want gray, but not too blue either. I was looking for something like the wall color, and was really hoping to find something stripey. 

Then it hit me. Why not just *use* the wall color? Why not make some white pillows and paint those babies?! So that's what I did. Dug out some leftover wall paint, taped on some stripes, and brushed it on there. Easy peasy! They're a touch crunchy, but they're just up there to look at anyway, it's not like we actually use them. So it's all good. 

The next project was to make a burlap and linen banner to go over the over the bed. That was a super quick and easy project and I love how it turned out! The no sew part made it really good. I just cut out triangles, and hot glued them onto some twine. My crafting is pretty willy nilly - I didn't even measure anything. 

The preacher spotted these old doors sometime ago, and drug them home, making me very very happy. I roughed up 2 of them and propped them up in the corners of the room like so. Yes, I really need some bigger wreaths, those look kinda silly, don't they?! 

I'm linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday!

Pillow Love. (Pardon the pun...)

I've been wanting to make some of these pillows for. evah. I had downloaded the word art from Dear Lillie ages ago. Since then I can't find the downloadable template - either she removed it, or I'm just not seeing it. (But you can buy some pillows already made in her shop.)  I loved it as soon as I saw it. Boy, everything just sounds so much more romantic in French, does it not?!  

Our bedroom pillows were in desperate need of an overhaul, so I covered one of our old ones. The fabric is actually an old white curtain that I never really liked. It looks much better as a pillow! I printed the word onto some of that really cool printable fabric. (I got mine at Walmart.) The paper comes in 8.5X11 sheets, and I wanted a bigger word, so I printed it banner style, using 2 sheets of the printable fabric. After I ironed the it  onto the pillow cover, you could see the edges, so I stuck some ruffles and rosettes on there to hide them. I say you can't have too many ruffles. And roses never hurt anybody either ;)

I was really happy with how it turned out - and so easy! This was a great Valentine's project. I need a few other pillows for our room, and I have a some more ideas floating around for them. After all, I still have one more curtain, and it makes for some awesome pillow covering fabric. I have a few other projects in the works that I'll show ya real soon. 

Till then, Je t`aime!

(Linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday. Yeah yeah yeah....I know it's been awhile...)

FOF - But I Didn't Do It....

Can I post a Finished Object Friday project for somebody else? I guess since this is my blog I can do whatever I jolly well wanna, right?! We got the most precious box in the mail from our friend, Melissa. She made these adorable brother shirts for our 3 little guys, as well as a matching burp cloth with the baby's monogram on it - so cute!

I know I didn't make these myself, but they were so cute, I knew you'd all want me to share :) And Melissa, I think a tutorial is in order!! I'm guessing a cricut was involved, but I'd love to have more details. I can already imagine hundreds of possibilities... ;)

The big brothers were so proud of their shirts.

 I can't wait to dress the 3 of them up to match :)

As goofy as these 2 are, I think they'll be pretty good big brothers!

Thanks so much, Melissa - everything in the box was just adorable! And I really loved the "emergency chocolate". There's no pic of it because, well, let's just say I had an "emergency" ;) 

I'm linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday.

Finished Object Friday

I've had this trusty little mixer for years. Looking at it the other day, I just got to thinking...

I wonder what it would look like to 50's it up a bit, maybe with a new seafoam green paint job...

I LOVE it!! 

Hi, my name is Brittany, and I love spray paint.

"Hi, Brittany"...

But honestly, doesn't it make life so much more interesting?! I always find it amazing what a little color can do.  And I am now more convinced than ever, you can paint anything.

Happy Friday, y'all! And be sure to check out the other Finished Object Friday projects at the Chari Tree =)

Fall Photo Shoot

My poor blog has suffered much neglect lately. That means I've been BUSY! I did slow down long enough today to take some fall pics of the boys, before my leaf mulching man does away with all the fall leaves. So for my Finished Object Friday, I'll share a photo before and after.

This shot of Carson is SOOC (straight out of camera) :

It's pretty cute, but rather dull and lifeless.

 And this one is after a little tweaking in picnik.

Much more zippy and interesting! 

My wonderful hubs got me Photoshop Elements for my birthday this week, and I've spent hours trying to figure it out, and from all indications, it's gonna take a few more hours. Or more...

I did edit this photo in PS first, but it ended up pathetic, so I tossed it and went back to trusty ole picnik. It's like PS for blondes. I'm not giving up - I'm much too stubborn for that. I'll keep plugging away till it "clicks". 

Stay tuned for some more cuteness from our photo shoot! (I just need to weed through a few hundred pics...) I will also be sharing about some projects we've been finishing around the house in the next few days. I told you I'd been busy...

Linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday!

Designer Lamp on a Thrift Store budget.

The great operation-brighten-up-the-living-room is in full swing and I'm having a grand old time. (I told you I wouldn't be able to make it till Spring!) I'm trying to make it less formal and stuffy, and more casual and cottagey. 

First stop, the coffee table. Wanna sneak peak?

I think the game pieces give sort of a "hey-y'all-come-play-some-games" feel to it. It looks a lot less stuffy than the formal arrangement of red flowers. The fact that the red flowers reeeeally needed dusted had nothing to do with it. Promise. 

Moving on.

Remember the old brassy lamp?

Here she is today! (Also sneak peak #2!)

I loooove paint. Now it looks pretty and restful, and not a bit bold and brassy.

(I used some clean metal primer first, then finished her off with 2 coats of Krylon Dover White gloss. I really like the dover white, it's somewhere between white and cream.)

I'm ashamed to confess that this innocent little lamp gave me the willie-nillies. I got it all painted up and was so excited to try it out. I put in a bulb, plug her up, and I'm putting the shade on it, and it just randomly comes on and goes back off again, on and off, on and off...weird.

 Hmmm...scratches head...

Come to find out (Really it didn't take me very long to figure it out...Seriously. You can stop laughing...) it's a touch lamp, and every time I bumped it, it came on :) So not only is it pretty, it's convenient! I think that calls for a happy dance! And something chocolate...

Linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday!

Beachy Sign

Happy Friday y'all! 

I've had this little project finished for quite a while, but just remembered to share it. I found this cabinet door at the Thrift Store, and something about it just screamed "BEACH SIGN!!" to me. 

I made some stencils, painted on the letters, then sanded some of the paint back off.  See, there's this unwritten law that anything beachy has to be weathered. I'm just livin by the law here. 

Then I had to figure out what to do with the indentions where the hinges used to be. After wearing the old thinking cap for a while, I decided to drill holes, and tie some rope through them for the hanger. It worked!

We have a little hallway leading into the den, and that was the perfect spot for the sign. (That's also where the covered file cabinet ended up). It really dressed up what was once a totally useless spot. Oh, and the best part? It only cost me a buck! Woot!

Check out the other Finished Object Friday projects at the Chari Tree!

I also want to give an update on my friend, Connie - she's off the ventilator, and is making great progress! Thanks so much for your prayers!

Finished Object Friday - It's in the Bag.

*Edited to add*....I now have several of these totes for sale in my etsy shop, The Parsonage Queen for those of you who may not like to sew ;) So click on over and browse, you're always welcome in my shop!

Ok, now back to the original post ;) 

I first saw this glorified tote bag idea on Susie Harris' blog, and it was one of those I've-got-to-make-these-TODAY things. So I made one for my Mother-in-law for Mother's Day...

and I was hooked.

I enlisted the help of my Mom, and we cranked out enough of them to give as Mother's Day gifts to our church ladies. Of course, I forgot to take any pictures before I gave them all away. But they looked similar to this one, with just one ruffle.

There are a zillion ways to make fabric rosettes, and we learned by trial and error what worked the best.

Then I made this one for myself, just because I had some extra bags left over. And I couldn't resist.

Well, and because I really wanted to try making some rosettes using the twist and glue method.

I liked it! At least I liked all but the hot glue burn on my finger...owie.

Since I used fabric scraps I had laying around already, the only expense was the totes themselves. You can get them at Wal-Mart for 2 bucks each. How awesome is that?! And the possibilities are endless! You can let your imagination run wild.

I'm linking up with Chari's Finished Object Friday.

Happy Weekend!!