My kids and I have been sick.  We haven’t been able to do much lately except sit around and sniffle in our misery.  Today though, we were all feeling a bit better and I had an urge to do something around the house.  I didn’t have much time or energy to do one of the painting or sewing projects I have going so I just had fun playing with this tablescape.  The stoneware is Mikasa.  It was the everyday china I picked out for my first wedding.  I don’t know if it is bad taste to keep it in my second marriage or not.  I loved it twenty years ago and I still love it today, so why get rid of it?  I don’t use it everyday now though.  It sits in my china hutch just looking pretty.  For everyday, we use the Fiestaware my (new) hubby has been buying me for Christmas every year since we got married.  Hope Spring has sprung in your neck of the woods and you all are feeling much better than we are .

     Here is an idea board I have been working on for redoing my master bedroom.  After having slept on the floor for a few weeks, I finally decided on a bed.  The above bed is from Ikea.  I love it because it is traditional yet modern.  I think it will survive many decorating and redecorating escapades in the future.  We actually went to Ikea last weekend and spent quite some time deciding on a bed we could both live with and sneaking in lunch (if you haven’t eaten at Ikea, give it a try, their Swedish meatballs are super yummy).  We were already to pick up our bed and head home when we saw how big the box was.  No way that thing was fitting in the back of our minivan.  So, we left empty handed .  My husband is going back this weekend with his Jeep and trailer.  Well, in the meantime I decided to do this idea board.  I did quite a few in design  school but have been winging it ever since.  I did the idea board this time so I don’t get side-tracked.  Besides the bed, I want a brick accent wall for the bed to go on.  The brick I have picked out is multi-colored but in soft cream, grey and tan.  I am going to keep my cream silk drapes and lamps.  I am also keeping the bridge painting (also from Ikea).  I want to get rid of our dated and worn blue carpet.  I have pictured here dark stained bamboo.  I am loving the bamboo because it is cheap, green and beautiful.  I want to add a jute rug.  This beautiful crystal drum shade pendant caught my eye on eBay.   I painted on of our nightstands this creamy white already.  So, this is the master plan.  In the near future I am painting the other night stand, getting the bed and painting the accent wall in my over-sized paisley stencil.  In the next few years, hopefully we can add the bamboo floors and the brick wall.  I’ll do a phase two post soon.   For now, below is phase one (minus the bed of course).

     I just wanted to share some of the Spring projects I have been working on.  Above is a sign I made.  I had all of the supplies on hand to make this, except the plywood.  I picked it up at Home Depot for about $5.50.    I found a really great website with free vintage holiday clip art Vintage Holiday Crafts for the images of the Easter Bunny.  I played with them a little on Photo shop and then printed them off on my printer.  The writing is from stencils that I have had since my kids started school.  The pretty paper is from a discontinued wallpaper book I got from Wallpaper Warehouse.  I just played around with the layout until I was happy and then decoupaged away.  I finished everything off with a couple of coats of polyurethane.  I used a eye hooks and twine to hang the sign up. 

     It was love at first sight with the cute, little, bluebird.  I got it at Thai Pan Trading but haven’t been able to find a spot for her to nest.  I think this will do until fall and then maybe can find a perch in my laundry room.  I made the nests above in about an hour (not including drying time) and for around $5.00.  The two little ones are just paper bags rolled down and spray painted brown.  The bigger one is made from twine.  To make the twine nest, I blew up a balloon and used it as a form.  I soaked my twine in a watered down glue mixture.  I just wrapped, and wrapped, and wrapped some more.  When the nest was the right size, I squirt more glue on and worked it into the twine.  This was an EXTREMEMLY messy project.  The kids didn’t even want in on this mess.  I was finally satisfied when the twine stopped poking up and stayed where I wanted it.  Then I just let it dry.  I tested the nest’s stiffness about four hours into the drying time.  I felt pretty floppy still.  I got out the spray starch and gave the nest a really good coating for good measure.  I let the twin nest dry overnight and in the morning when I tested, the nest felt perfect, so I popped the balloon.  The nest was almost perfect.  All it needed was a quick coat of brown spray paint.  Here is a close up of the twine nest.

     The little nests were loaded up with the plain plastic eggs from last year’s Easter Egg Hunt.  The eggs in the big nest were decoupaged with scrapbook paper.  The decoupage on the nest did not take only and hour.  It was pretty time consuming and not something I am planning to do again (small roundish objects are a PAIN).  Well, that’s it for now.  I plan on pulling my planters out of the shed and filling them with flowers soon, but that is going to have to wait until I’m sure it’s done snowing.

     This week I have been working on my bedroom.  I have done a few things to it since we moved in.  Last summer I painted it a light grey.   I added some new art last fall.   A couple of months ago I stole my husband’s nightstand to use as an end table in my living room and gave him a table that I think was a record table at some point as a nightstand. And last month I painted the door black.  I finally got everything looking the way I want it to look.  The only thing left was to paint the wall behind the bed a shade and a half darker than the walls (God bless the poor young man at Sherwin Williams who got me as a customer the day I wanted a custom color) and stencil a trellis pattern in the leftover light grey wall color over it. 

     Long story short, I didn’t make it to the stenciling.  We broke our bed (no, not that way, we aren’t newlyweds).  Trying to slide the bed back in place at the end of day one proved too much for the old bed and the wood frame split.  So now, we are sleeping with the box springs and mattress on the floor.  It now looks a lot more like the picture above (taken at one of the homes in the Salt Lake Parade of Homes 2010).  The old bed was a hand-me-down and not my taste, but I wanted to make do with it until I got some of the other to-do’s off of my list.  Now all kinds of fun and different options are begging for my attention.  Should I go more modern like this room?  Should I make my own upholstered headboard?  Should I get something traditional to contrast some of the modern elements I’ve recently added?  None of my other decorating decisions have been this difficult.  Usually I know exactly what I want.  This is the first time I don’t know where I’m going with a room.  Maybe I can learn something from this experience, maybe something wonderful will happen.

      St. Patrick’s day is one of our favorite holidays.  We always have fun making green smoothies and green pancakes for breakfast.  And no St. Patrick’s Day would be complete without corned beef and cabbage for dinner.  For this table, I mixed and matched dishes. 

     I got the green chargers from Target last Christmas.  I bought the white plates at All A Dollar.  And I picked up the leaf plates at Walmart last Thanksgiving.  The green glasses were a gift from my sister-in-law many years ago. 

  I mixed in some of my Fiestaware and added these mossy balls which I usually keep in a wicker basket on this table when we aren’t eating here.  For a centerpiece, I layered a green candle in a bowl my Grandmother gave me and placed them on top of a plate my sister gave me.  Happy St. Patrick’s Day!