back to crafting

I'm having a strange time navigating our new normal. And I'm not the only one. Emma just goes with the flow but Tyler is struggling with 6 1/2 hours of school every day. He comes home absolutely exhausted. Tanner's a little sad because his best and most favorite playmates are gone all day.

And then there's me. I rack my brain trying to remember back to when it was just me and Emma all day. What did we do? We read a TON. We sang lots of songs. I played with her all day long. Tanner's attention span isn't quite what Emma's was, and he only lasts for a little bit in doing those activities. But MAN that kid loves books.

Anyway, I decided to update and change some decor in my house and also do some more crafts while Tanner napped. I blame Pinterest for my sudden desire to re-do everything I touch.

Spray paint. Oh my goodness, this stuff! I have lots of dark furniture in my living room and the accent color was red, which was just too dark for me at this point. So I chose a new color scheme and made these pillow covers. (Can you see how indecisive I am? I can't choose a color or two, so I choose FIVE.)

And I went on from there. Most things are blue/turquoise and yellow but I also threw in some green. I like how things are just a little bit brighter and happy. Red is a great color but I was so over it. (That lantern was spray painted from red, as well as the empty vase.) I also spray painted every single thing below. Maybe I went a little overboard. The dishes and plates were plain white, the candlestick holders were absolutely horrendous multi-colored and the star was black. (It's not such a bright yellow...it's a lot lighter than it looks.)

I found this large utensil holder at the thrift store. It was boring and plain wood. I brought it home, spray painted it, attached some Command hooks at the top, and now I have a much more functional jewelry box. Not bad for $1.99 right? My old wooden (cherry) one (which I loved because Spencer bought it for me years ago) is now fully functional in Emma's room. Win-win. However, I do think I need some more jewelry in there...

This part took me the longest. I had 5 different sized canvases and wanted to do some semi-original artwork. And by semi-original, I mean using a stencil. Martha Stewart has some great ones. This took so long because I could typically only complete half of one every day. You know, because of Tanner, whose goal in life is to be physically touching me every waking second. Anyway, I used the same colors again...but couldn't resist throwing in a tiny bit of red. I'm happy with them and once I get Spencer to part with our awfully ugly painting on the wall I can hang them up. I may do another in the Chevron stripes pattern - I am diggin it.

Not a bad way to burn some creativity juice. Especially when it all cost under $40!