Feature Friday - Who Will It Be?

Glad your here! Even though I am brand spankin' new to this blogland (this being my 12th post) I have gotten so much from it.  Meeting others that share the same interests.  Being inspired and hopefully inspiring others in some small way.  Getting comments makes me smile and I'm happy whenever I see a new follower... (I think it's just awesome when I see a new face in my sidebar).  I always go to check out who you are.  I can't wait to see what it is we may have in common that makes me lucky enough to have you follow.  I try to post a comment, thanking you for what I still think is a huge gesture...this following thing. To thank my followers further and to let you know I'm glad your here, I am going to dedicate Friday's as a THANK YOU DAY! 

photo I took from a Target display

 Each Friday I will randomly pick 2 followers from my sidebar and do a feature on you - with a link to your blog. We'll call it...  FEATURE FRIDAY 

Here we go...the first 2 Features to kick it all off:

Maria is from Norway and has the prettiest blog.  She also has some huge talent making the most feminine looking wrist warmers which she calls pulse warmers.  Stop by and visit Maria here at Ide Kroken she's all about girly joy.

Kelly is from Much To Do With Nothing.  She's all about reusing and refurbishing and her reupholstery work is to-die-for.  She shares tutorials, and some amazing furniture transformations as well. She has reached 400 followers and is having a giveaway to celebrate - you'll have to check her out.


   

Crazy Cool Wordle for Shabby Chic Love

 Thank you all for the nice comments about my soon to be grand-baby.  I've missed posting here but we had a great time in New Jersey.  It seemed like just yesterday that I had lived there...not muched has changed - with the landscape that is.  My daughter, well she looks great and is now showing ...too fun. Since I haven't really prepared a post I thought I'd give a neat little app you may not have heard of.  All you "wordies" should love it.  It's called Wordle.  What you may not know about me is that I own a Home Staging company, and I came across this site when trying to make an interesting sign for a trade show I did. Here is one I created for my love of shabby chic...

 

Isn't that crazy cool?

Here are some tips when creating your wordle:

1.  The more times you type a word - the larger the word prints

2.  You can have it run in different directions - this one was 1/2 horizontal and 1/2 vertical

3.  You can change fonts, colours and background colours (of course I love the black & white)

4.  If you also love numbers 123 (for example) go into language and check "show numbers"

5.  If you want more than one word to stay grouped together use this symbol ~ between the words as in Shabby~Whites

6.  You can also input your blog addy or any other website address and it will pull the words directly from it

Here are some examples from the gallery (not mine)

~Obama speech~

~create one for Mother's Day using words that describe your Mom...I framed one as a thank you gift to my business coach using words that described her and she loved it~

~plain initials~

~earth day~

Have fun with it, and let me know how yours turns out.

  

 

It's A Girl !

:::

♫ ♫  I'm leaving on a jet plane...don't know when I'll be back again. ♫

Well that's not true, I'll be back.  I'm off to New Jersey to visit my beautiful daughter Gina.  She has just had her second ultrasound and they have found out IT'S A GIRL!  We are off to spend 4 wonderful days together.

I thought I would leave you with a few pictures of some gorgeous nurseries. 

...adorable

This was a vintage crib turned into a daybed

Jennifer Lopez - Twins Nursery

 

And of course, what well deserving new mother wouldn't want to have this delish room to retire to after a long day?

 Sources:  PeopleFrench LuxuryCountry LivingApartment Therapy  Have a beautiful weekend everyone!

Lipstick on a Pig? - Chair gets a Makeover

:::
Have you ever heard the saying "You can't put lipstick on a pig"?  I remember the first time I heard it I almost fell over with laughter.  Well let me tell you, this chair was a real oinker. 

I found it at the Courtice Flea Market two weekends ago.  As soon as I spotted it, I felt that excitment we have all felt rummaging through row upon row of vendors wares.  After seeing that Mr. Vendor only wanted 10 dollars for it, my husband was already carrying it to the Jeep.

I couldn't wait to get out the white paint.  Once I came home and took the necessary (for blogging) before pictures I started to dismantle the seat.  The material was wretched and smelled like...well you get the idea.

The fabric I used, although I think it's adorable and was an IKEA steal at $3.99 a yard is only temporary until I find an equally good deal on a perfectly delish French grain sack...(good luck with that I know...pricey).

If anyone knows who sells them for a reasonable price, please let me know.

Linking up to:

Interview with the fabulous City.Cottage Store

:::
I'm so excited to feature and share with you all, the most gorgeous little shop about 10 minutes from my home and how it changed my life.  The awesome Jenny Smith, owner of City.Cottage was so kind to let me do a mini interview. 

I recently found her gorgeous store and fell in love with the charm and beauty of everything there. From the second I walked through the door something inside me changed.  You see, for some time I had been feeling a little blue.  Maybe it was the empty nest syndrome I had been so miserably dealing with...heck, maybe the 45 year old hormones were in overdrive, all I know is as much as I wanted to snap out of it a year and a half of feeling this way was starting to feel like this was the new me and trust me, I wasn't happy about it.

Like I said, from the moment I walked into the sun filled City.Cottage I have felt uplifted and inspired to revisit my love of all things white, casual, cottage and shabby.  I can't explain how inspired and purposeful I felt looking at every square inch of shabby chic goodness.  I finally did leave her store with a handful of adorable robins eggs.  What Jenny doesn't know - is on that day she not only handed me my perfectly wrapped little bag of goodies, she gave me inspiration, purpose and a happiness I hadn't felt in some time. It was that very same week I started my blog.  I'm so grateful...Thank you Jenny.

Ok I digress ;-) enough about me, here we go:

When and what inspired you to open your store?

Other lovely stores.  I fell in love along time ago with a beautiful shop called White On White and everything changed from that second on, I went home painted EVERYTHING white and have not looked back.  People used to come into my home and say you should do this for a living, interior design isn't really where my heart is, it's creating a shop that inspires others to fill there home with beautiful finds, and NOT breaking the bank.

Photo:  City.Cottage

What advice would you give to someone wanting to open a shop?

Do it, dont give up and be patient and if its in the stars for you, it will happen. Also I believe it is a wonderful thing to do something different, that no one has in your town or city, that is what sets you apart and keeps the people coming back.

What is your favourite room in your home?

Well, I just moved into a great loft, with exposed brick, high ceilings and wood floors. It has been super fun finding unique stuff for my own home, and it's a work in progress.  I plan to post it all when I'm done. Recently I found the shabby-est old cubby on Kijij for $60 - dragged it home,  took 5 hours peeling, scraping , cleaning and painting it. Now I am in love with her.  I think you should love every room in your home and make it a place to retreat to.  I think that's why I love Cottage/farmhouse style so much.

When not running your business how do you like to spend your time?

Running my business, lol
Its a labor of love, when you own your own anything in life, it makes it hard to put it on the back burner. But it's all worth it in the end. I do not order anything for the shop, I find it all , paint it all and pull it all together. Thats the fun part for me, seeing it all together at the end of the day, and then seeing someone love it as much as I do in there own home.

Photo: City.Cottage

 

Photo:  City.Cottage

Photo: By Me

44 King Street East, Bowmanville, Ontario

Paris Dresser Pull

It's Friday!   happy ~ happy ~ joy ~ joy

I've been outside painting a great little chair I picked up at the Courtice Flea Market last weekend. I was hoping to post the pics today, but I've run into a snag. The seat in this chair - while at first glance seemed like it would be as easy as 1 2 3 to pop off and recover, has turned out to be a nightmare. It has a spring underside which is great (nice and sturdy) the not so nice part is I'm not sure something didn't once live in it. (ok, maybe a slight exageration).

So, as much as I wanted to post before and afters today...it's just not happening.

I will however leave you with the cutest little dresser knob I picked up at a great little shop in Port Perry.

Have a beautiful, lovely weekend!

An Ikea Day and Great Blog Giveaway

Today was a beautifully warm, sun filled day with a few hours squeezed in with Mom at Ikea.  I think she is starting to get the whole "White" concept.  I picked up a few great pieces which I'll share with you in a future post.

In the meantime I want to share - for those who may not know, an amazing blog which Aina has over at Modern Country.  Her style is out of this world and she is celebrating 3 years and 800,000+ visitors with a great giveaway!

Photo below (one of her offerings) visit her to enter and prepare to be inspired...

Source:  Modern Country

Vintage Subway Roll Sign?

11/29/10

2nd UPDATE:   The shop is set up and just about ready to add the first listings.    Drop by http://www.etsy.com/shop/wordology  for a visit.



5/12/10

UPDATE:  Custom Roll Signs will soon be available to purchase.  Feel free to contact me if you have requests before the store is open.

4/13/10

After yesterdays post, I was happy to hear from other "wordies" so I thought I'd share my recent project.  I've drooled for some time over vintage subway roll signs but couldn't bring myself to spend as much as $1,000 dollars (yes - you heard me right).  True to my frugal self, I decided it was the look I was after and not so much the fact that it was a great piece of history.  Why not make one? 

I was originally going to replicate famous Paris streets but decided to honour my husband who was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. 

The completed sign was made for a song which made me giddy.

Cost for design.......time at the computer designing
Cost for printing......fairly reasonable
Cost for ready-to-hang faming......well worth it
Cost to bring a little piece of childhood memories to my husband.......priceless!

Sign measures 4 1/2 feet by 1 1/2 feet.

Linking to

Chalkboard DIY - Perfect for Wordies

A new project came to mind incorporating my love of words. I'm a self proclaimed "wordy". Chalkboards are perfect for die hard wordies because in a moment they can be changed out as inspiration hits.

Armed with a foam brush and a can of chalkboard paint, my kitchen cupboard would become my muse. I can't lie...when the first stroke of black paint slid across my pristine white cabinet I had a moment of uh~oh. Determined to go on, I completed the two coats required. Waiting for it to dry my uncertainty turned into anticipation. What would my first scribbles be...

Since Paris has always been my dream destination, the image portion at the top was a no brainer.  To sketch the Fleur de Lis I had to cheat.  I printed the image on paper - then I traced it over with a heavy hand of chalk.  After placing it where I wanted, I rubbed the back of the paper - easily transfering the image.

  These great little chalk holders purchased from staples were looped onto some ribbon and strung on the end of the cabinet...ready to use.  A little retro looking, they remind me of school days. 

So what do you think?  Are you tempted to try it out on your cabinets or should I have stopped at uh-oh?

Linking to:

Pillow Talk

Happy Friday bloggers!

For as long as I remember, I've loved words and fonts.  I think that almost anything can be made more beautiful if adorned with these charming characters.  Pillows, artwork, furniture, mirrors - you name it.  The possibilities are infinite and the creativity is endless.

I have always searched out items that "speak" to me...pun intended ;-)  So while looking at my perfectly simple little Ikea bolster pillow, I decided to try an iron on transfer.

I headed to the nearest Staples and picked up a package of Avery transfer sheets for light fabric.  Then the hard part.  What did I want the pillow to say.  After playing with different fonts and placements I decided on ~You are what you believe~  ran it through the printer, ironed it on the pillow and voila.

I have to say I like the overall look but I wasn't expecting the background of the transfer to leave a square patch...I suppose I was foolish to think it would only transfer the letters (lol).  If anyone knows a way of transfering only the letters (the same was as vinyl wall words transfer) please, please let me know.

::: Stay tuned for next post showing how I turned my kitchen cabinet end into a chalkboard :::