Aunty-Crafter

This is how it all started...

Actually, it started at the Swap Shop earlier that morning when my mom, aunt, and I found these discarded window frames just waiting for us. We picked up 3 of them, and only Aunt managed to successfully transform hers. And what a job she did too!

Dad of course helped out by running the tool show and hooking up the compressor to the nail gun. He also of course gets major points for having extra Ballasters lying around which could be transformed into legs...



From idea to actuality in less than 48 hours is quite impressive, and I'm loving it! I'm quite jealous of this in fact, and I can't wait to see what she does with it in the NYC apartment that this table will now call home.

Four simple holes drilled in the frame, Ballasters cut down to size, inserted with a little wood glue, and then a serious cleaning and we have one amazing table!

One more crafter in the family now! We are proud!

The Gallery Wall update

A Gallery Wall is something that's going to evolve over time. That's the nature of it and I'm excited for it and it's progression.

Right now though, I think I'd say ours in the "growth" stage, and not yet at "evolution." Because now, if we have something we'd like to add to the wall, we add it without having to replace anything else, because there's still room for it to grow on the wall.

The first new addition to the wall is that top frame with the major glare in this photo. That used to be a silver frame that I used my new black paint to convert.

The picture in that frame is of me and my dad on a Father's Day fishing trip. I had hooked a Huge fish!! I had to get help pulling the rod because the fish was so powerful that I couldn't do it on my own. Just as the fish jumped out of the water and let us get a look at his massive size dad and I went to pull back on the rod, and the line snapped!!! Mom happened to snap a photo right at that moment, and our faces are in full shock in this photo.

The other new addition is below that one, and slightly to the right. This feature is my tribute to my Man and his Irish roots. I framed a picture of Guinness for him, and I'm pretty sure he'll love me forever for it :)

We're both on the wall and it will evolve with us!

Project Alert

There's nothing that gives me as much instant gratification pleasure as good project. Something that is simple, not too expensive, and start-to-finish doesn't take too long.

This week, I've been amassing items that will be a part of our wedding come June. But there's still 4 months until that day (thank goodness, I have too much to do for it to be any closer yet!). So my dilemma is, what do I do with all of that stuff until then?

I saw a nice big basket at a store a couple weeks ago, but my Man took a page out my own book and talked me out of spending the $25 for a large basket. So yesterday I put my crafting hat on. I had this big box sitting around from an order of items from the engagement party back in November. I measured the space where I knew I wanted to put this project when it was done, and low and behold my box was too tall.

So I brought out the trusty Leatherman knife and trimmed the flaps of the box down, and then taped them up to get the most height out of it.

With my box now the right height, I got out my fabric. I had stopped at JoAnn Fabric on my way home from work and luckily my 1 1/4 yards was just the right size. I chose a fabric with a little bit of texture that matched the living room where it was going to live, but not too much pattern that it would look busy, because the whole point of this project is to hide the clutter.

My next step was to get out my trusty clips (seriously I use these things for everything, from bundling wires to keeping bags of chips closed, they're worth the $4 at Staples) and start wrapping my box.

Once I had it all wrapped and the fabric trimmed I got out my mighty-mend glue and glued the flaps and the overlapped corners. It wasn't perfect by any means, but I ended up with a well covered box that fit perfectly in the spot I wanted it in to hide all the schtuff that I'll be accumulating over the next 4 months.

I call this a project success!

This is Life

I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth, I promise.

I was merely swallowed by the wedding planning Faerie for a couple of weeks. We've had some changes and some planning bursts, but after 2 weeks of insane planning and about 1000 phone calls, and finally some decision making, I'm thrilled with how everything is coming together.

I'm also thankful for a mom who's been a great sounding board and source of ideas. And most of all a fiance who has put up with all of these changes and my stress level.

And his patience is what makes me love him, even when he does this.....

Yes, that used to be our ice-cream scoop!

I Love to Cook

I asked for cook books for Christmas, and have friends over usually at least once a week. I have dinner leftovers for lunch most days, and I'm know in the office for my awesome lunches. In addition to DIY craft blogs I've been reading recipe and cooking blogs recently which has helped me with some new and fun ideas.

I was also able recently to combine two of my favorite things, and using a great deal on Groupon, I got myself a one year subscription to Bon Appetite magazine a couple months ago.

All of that goes to prove my love for cooking is true!

It also doesn't hurt that I have an awesome kitchen in my condo that can accommodate my every cooking whim.

One night this week I put pizza on the menu. My Man isn't at all into cooking, but he sure does like to eat :) I set out to make a pizza that was featured on one of my very favorite recipe blogs.

Her creative ingredient pizza was made with whole wheat dough, so it's a healthy pizza, and it turned these measly ingredients from this:

...to This:

And it was Deeelish!!

Another night this week I went to the store and picked up a really nice piece of salmon on sale at Roche Brother's. It was really big, and looked so good, I couldn't wait to cook it in my favorite mustard glaze.

But... I opened up the wax paper wrapping to find that this salmon piece had a bunch of bones in it! Sorry, Dad, hopefully the rest of my story will make you forgive me for bringing up the fact that there were bones in my fish.

I've seen on some of my cooking shows how they use these special tweezers to get the bones out of fish, and it works in about 2 seconds and they never find any other bones. Well, I'm not that talented, and I don't own special fish tweezers, so I had to improvise Magiver-like.

I used my Leatherman! And let me tell you, it worked like a charm.

It worked like a charm, and we ate the whole thing without any bone-in-mouth issues.
I certainly love that recipe! It's worth a shot if you ever need a quick and easy fish dinner.

Projects 2012

In order to not disappoint, and to continue the happy productive vibe in Casa de Condo, I'm here telling you about more projects that Mr. Man & I have put together these past few days.

The most noticeable is right here in the living room. We had discussed some changes that we wanted to make, so one ambitious Tuesday, I came home and found this:

Our TV was mounted on the wall, the end tables switched places to open up the corner of the room, candles were everywhere!, and the panels that my mom made for me 6 years ago to hide my scary dorm-room walls were lifted to heighten the room.
We have been enjoying this new view for over a week now, and love it more each day.

Anyone savvy enough to notice those 3 candles in the middle? This was my lucky winning pick from the Yankee Swap at work this Christmas. They are vases/candle holders, which means I can put anything in these and any candle on top of them and make it a beautiful focal point.

My first attempt at something interesting for these beauties was to strategically hang blue ribbon all around the edge and place bright candles on top.

It's not the most coordinated or interesting thing I've ever put together in my life, but hell, it's just the first phase, I'm sure there will be many more adaptations posted here in the future.

Friday Night Blues

To say that I had a horrible day at work Friday would be a huge understatement. My mission for this long weekend is definitely to put that day out of my head!

Step one was of course a glass of wine...but unfortunately, considering that I haven't been feeling well the past couple days, that was not an option :(

Instead, I popped an entire bag of Boy Scout popcorn for just me, and I took out a project!

I started with a plain picture frame, took out the backing and the glass, and sanded the wood to get rid of the glossy finish (thanks babe, worked like a charm).

I painted it black to get the uniformity to everything else we hang on the walls around here, and then began with a couple bright colors with shapes that pop.

At this point I was about half way through my batch of popcorn, and glass of coca-cola, and I started in with my pin-point brush for a second coat of paint.

I ended up using another DIY blog inspiration to use the frame, so instead of a photo in it, there's a blank piece of card-stock paper (it's a bit small for the frame, so don't mind the cardboard peaking out from the bottom, and turned it into a dry-erase board to be used for cute notes to be sent between Mr. Man and me.

He'll call me corny when he comes home and sees this... but I don't care :)

I like it a lot, how 'bout you?