Blooming Projects

The last couple of weeks have found me doing some projects around the house.  A few of these I have needed to do for a long time and I finally got sick of having the trimmings for the projects sitting around without getting anything done so I just hopped in.

 

Our sad little kitchen needed a bit of life and over a year ago we bought the supports for a shelf for another project entirely which we ended up finishing another way.  So I salvaged the supports, whacked off a bit of wood and sanded and varnished to my hearts content.  Then I threw it all up over the door (no, I didn't throw up, I used nails and screws and things, that was a bad image). 

 

I put a newly minted flower arrangement on the shelf (because I didn't have anything else on hand to dress it up) and voila!  A bit of life and color for my otherwise drab kitchen. 

 

So as long as I was in the flower arranging mood (we recently had a relief society class on this that made me think maybe I could manage to put something together that wouldn't be too awful) I put another fall friendly vase full of beauties together for the living room.  It does brighten the room a bit and I like that (even though I won't be declaring my eligibility for flower arranger of the year any time soon).

 

Next, after several months of having a new bed frame for Aubrey sitting around the shed getting in the way at every opportunity, I decided to just up and take care of it myself.  The frame is fabulous, but it needed a little bit of TLC as the paint was chipped and old. 

 

So I sanded and sanded and sanded (not trying to remove ALL the old paint so much and trying to rough things up and help the frame willingly accept new paint).  The kids LOVED sanding, particularly Parker.  We all took turns and it was fun to have everyone involved.

 

Then it was time to repaint.  I figured this would be another great opportunity to involve the children.

 

I was wrong. 

 

Because this frame had so many rounded edges and deep crevices it was really hard for the kids to smooth paint on without gobbing it into bubbling messes.  We had paint drips running everywhere and I had trouble keeping up with them to correct the problems before they dried (and then I'd have to start over with the sanding...no thanks!). 

 

 

Eventually, to the dismay of the small people, I opted to just do the painting on my own.  The kids were pretty disappointed, but that's just the way life is sometimes. 

 

So after painting and then repainting, I finished up the project and Aubrey is pretty excited with the results.

This is her old bed (I know, it's a mess, that is just the way this child is.  She cannot do ANYTHING without creating mounds of clutter...but I still love her to bits).  

 

And this is Aubrey with her new, four post bed.  My brother and his sweet wife gave us this new frame once they decided not to keep it and Aubrey was really excited to swap out her old be for this more girly model.

 

She loves it (she says it is much nicer to sleep further from the ceiling and not have to climb down to use the bathroom). 

 

Yup, the absence of a bunk bed left more room to add art to the walls and she's already managed to transfer the clutter to her new digs, but that's just the way of things.  I really do adore that girl.  She is her own person and I love that about her (even if I get annoyed with the mess). 

 

 

Don't you love the ingenuity of using a spare kitchen chair as a bedside table until we get that remedied.  What a creative cutie.