DIY Menu/To Do Board

I'm a crafter at heart, it is what I grew up loving.  As a child I was not one who wanted toys or played with toys very much.  When it came to my art and craft supplies though, that is where my heart was daily.  To this day I still love to do all sorts of crafts.  Thankfully, my husband doesn't mind and has even said that once we get a house I can have a crafting room (so long as he gets his gaming room of course).

It took me a while to get onto the whole Pinterest bandwagon but I am on there nearly every single night when I can't sleep.  Whether it be looking at crafts, fitness, beauty, and my last few days of tattoo searching, I find it a nice place to look at pictures instead of googling each individual idea.  One thing that I had found multiple places was a menu board.  Husband and I rarely get to eat meals together because of our work schedules but I thought if there was a way I could make it into a to do board and menu board I would have to try it out.

I started out with a plain old canvas bought from one of the many craft stores and used chalkboard spray paint to cover its whiteness.  Why spray paint?  Because I didn't want this to take me forever to do and spray paint dries FAST!  I also bought some letters from one of the many craft stores as well and painted those a nice bold color to pop against the black chalkboard paint.  To attach the letters I used the handy dandy hot/cold glue gun my awesome momma gave me during the craft crazy time of preparing for my wedding.

Supplies I used:
Canvas (I think mine is 12x18 maybe)
Chalkboard Spray paint
Wooden Letters painted to a color of your choice
Hot Glue Gun with Glue Stick
Colorful Chalk because white is too boring for me

Blank Slate

Something to write with on the board.

Because I LOVE color I HAD to have the colored Crayola Chalk.

The final product.

We are not the best menu planners but we are celebrating Christmas at Easter (more on that later) so we chose to have delicious food Thursday & Friday.

And there you have it!  This was probably the easiest thing I have ever made and looks great on our wall.  Next up on the DIY list is blogging about my completed Easter wreath that adorns our door!

Bman gave the approval since the board hangs above his food and water dishes.

Spring has Sprung Memories

Spring has always been a sentimental time for me.  It always reminds me of my paternal grandparents. I'm fairly certain that they lived for springtime.  The first official day of spring was yesterday and even though tomorrow marks over ten years since we lost my grandpa it is not a sad day.  This year also marks ten years since we lost my grandma.  They both lived wonderful lives with family, love, and laughter.

Gma Betts and Gpa Ed sometime in the 90's.

I am the youngest grandchild on both sides of my family so I think that my view of my grandparents is completely different than the view of my sister and older cousins.  They spent more time with my grandparents and got to know them better that I did as a child.  I remember my grandpa as being quiet.  He always had a great laugh and every single time we left their house my grandpa would go outside (even on the coldest MN days) to wave goodbye as we pulled out of the driveway.   My grandma was always happy even though she was a very stubborn woman (I'm told that I have gotten my stubborn ways from her).

Early 90's with extended family.

We would always see them on Sundays as they were reserved for church and visiting all of the grandparents.  Each Sunday we would walk up to the house and you could smell the roast cooking in the oven.  During springtime they would have Easter decorations everywhere.  I'm talking they strung plastic Easter eggs from the tree out front one by one until the tree looked as though it had brightly colored eggs as leaves.  They loved celebrating holidays with the whole family around even when you celebrate Palm Sunday as Easter (seriously awesome that we got two Easters, two Sundays in a row as a kid!). 

Grandma and Grandpa were so proud of all eight of us grand kids (and then their grandchildren through marriage)

I guess the underlining message here is enjoy the time that you have with the people you cherish in life.  And no matter what keep your memories of them strong.

The most recent "cousin" photo that is missing about 14 almost 15 people.

DIY Recovering a Chair

Instead of writing about my life this post I figured a DIY would be fun.  Husband found a chair outside last year in somebody else's trash.  His best thought was to bring it into our house.  I was NOT happy!  He uses this chair almost daily playing the Wii in our bedroom.  It wasn't in that bad of shape so I figured reupholstering it would make me like it a little bit more.

Supplies needed:
Chair
Fabric (enough to cover your chair)
Batting (optional)
Scissors
Pliers to remove staples
Staple gun with staples
Hammer

The original nasty chair that husband pulled from the trash.

Take the screws out of the backside and bottom side of the chair.  Then pop the back piece off. This is what you get.

Start removing the staples.  I think this is the most tedious part of the reupholstering process. 

You can use the fabric you remove to measure your new piece if you care to do so.

I wanted to add a little batting to create a little more newness feeling to the chair.

Once you have the batting to the correct size you can cut your piece of fabric. I try to leave enough room so that I can grab a hold of the fabric and not have to do a little dance of trying to hold fabric and not stapling my fingers.

Start with stapling the four centers.  Then staple opposite sides making sure to pull the fabric tight.  (I guesstimated how much fabric I needed at the store and barely made it on the seat of the chair!)

I may go overboard on the staples sometimes but I don't want to fabric to shift once it is put into place.  I hammer down the staples to just ensure that everything will remain flat where it is needed.

What it should look like once you have stapled all the way around.  For the corners I just leave them for last and then pull everything super tight to avoid wrinkles.

Trim off the excess fabric and staple the corners just a tiny bit more.  The extra stapling is pretty much optional.

Pop the newly reupholstered back into the plastic holder.  Reattach the back and seat back to the frame.

Lastly, enjoy your newly covered chair and surprise husband with the final results!  (He LOVES it!)

Close up of the fabric I chose for the back.

Close up of the fabric for the seat.

This reupholstering cost me a total of I think $20.00 and about 45 minutes of my time.  Originally I had hoped to find a really cool gaming fabric or something with Mario.  When I couldn't find that I found these nautical fabrics and couldn't decide which I liked more so I bought both of them!  I didn't tell my husband that I was doing this at all.  He is a good enough sport though to love me through my projects.  Coming up soon will also be my first door wreath for Easter!