Crafty Friday: Sponge Prints

Several days ago I was trying to plan ahead for our Crafty Fridays, so I asked the kids their opinion on a few ideas.

"What about a mobile? We can make a cool mobile with old gears and mechanical parts and hang it in brother's room!" 

No answer.

"How about 3-D junk art? We could make robots out of cans and old mechanical parts and put it in brother's room!" 

Nothing.  

I think they started to figure out that I was using Crafty Friday to finish stuff for the baby's room. 

"Okay, what if we cut shapes out of sponges, dip them in paint, and print them onto paper."

"Oh, let's do that!"

  So, sponge prints it is.

All you need are some sponges, scissors, paper, paint, and an idea. I don't have to explain this one...it's easy peasy. My only advice is to pick a simple, graphic shape without too much detail. Finn's first idea, to cut out the shape of Mr. Thom [a friend] with his curly hair, wouldn't have worked so well. His second choice, a rocketship, worked out much better. Audrie chose to make a parrot.

As for the paintings I promised to list in my shop, well take heart! The day's not over. I will be listing these two soon after I publish this post.

I have quite a few more to list, but they'll have to wait until tomorrow. My body's rebelling right now.

Happy Crafting!

xo

nessa dee

Too Many Toys

Have you ever read this book...?

You should. It's good. Especially if you have kids that are reluctant to give anything away. We have closet clean outs quite often because 1. My kids have too many toys. 2. They have a hard time keeping their rooms clean, and 3. I find the clutter to be stressful. Now don't get me wrong...my house is full of clutter. It's usually hidden in drawers, under beds, or behind closed doors, and if I don't see it most of the time I'm okay. But it never fails, at some point the clutter seeps its way out of hiding and onto every bit of exposed counter space, or floor, and I eventually reach my boiling point. It's then that I threaten to give everything away...including my children. 

So, the other day I was heading to Finn's room to tell him that he needed to clean it up before I had a meltdown. We try to enforce the "put things up before you get more out" rule because Finn has the amazing ability to get everything he owns out onto the floor in about 5 minutes, and then, when it comes time to pick everything up, his arms are too tired and no longer work. Well, I walked into his room and found my two kids, surrounded by the mess, reading Too Many Toys. Oh the irony.

My hope was that they were learning the lesson, or that they could at least see that Finn's room looked just like Spencer's, but no. Instead they were picking out their favorite toys in the book, and I gave up.

I let them continue, and decided to live with the mess for one more day.

xo

nessa dee

Oh, and I'll be listing some new paintings in my shop sometime tomorrow. And since I've now mentioned this on my blog...I have to hold to my word.

Hello, Tuesday

We had a lovely Memorial Day weekend together, and since my husband was off work and my kids had a break from school, I decided I would forgo my usual Monday post. Why do I do the Monday posts? Well, as our school days got busier, and projects, work,  and extra-curricular activities got more extensive, I found that my blogging suffered quite a bit. I started posting every Monday to keep me honest, so to speak. It gives me consistency. But even so, I've found that my constants have to be a little flexible, too. So, instead of blogging yesterday, I found myself doing something so exciting that I couldn't even take the time to tell you about it; I was cleaning out my kids' closets!

Don't worry, though. It wasn't all fun and games here. We did take advantage of Dad being home and we made him go swimming, we cooked some good food, and had a few friends over. But now that it's Tuesday, we are back to our normal routine.

Here's what we've been up to...

:: My sweet neighbors generously let the kids raid their peach trees last week.

So my grandma, my mom, Audrie, and I spent the better part of Sunday afternoon peeling peaches to make cobbler.

I would show you the finished results, but I spent the better part of Monday stuffing my face full of peach cobbler and have only a mangled mess left. Perhaps when I attempt to make peach jelly, I will take a few seconds to snap pictures of the finished product before I inhale it.

:: We woke up Monday morning to find our second caterpillar had emerged from his cocoon. We didn't notice at first, but one of his wings didn't fully form. I couldn't help but feel responsible somehow, but I know that we didn't do anything differently this time around. Sometimes these things just happen.

Regardless, we think he's beautiful.

:: Audrie invented a new sandwich and insisted I post it on my blog. It's the barfing man sandwich. Enjoy.

:: I'm finally putting some finishing touches on quite a few paintings. I don't know why I have the hardest time getting past this point. I have so many almost finished paintings in my studio, but finishing those last few details have become quite a challenge.

It's probably my subconscious brain not wanting to ever let go of anything I make, hence why I have a closet under my staircase that's full of paintings I made in college. I'm too embarrassed to hang them up in my home, but give them away? I don't think so.

Happy Tuesday

xo

nessa dee

Sources for our stuff

I've been trying to keep up with the questions about our house, so I thought I would go ahead and post an addition to our source list on the house tour. When I made the list, I tried to include sources that people could actually seek out if they wanted a particular piece, and while I included some mentions to hand-me-down furniture, or Craigslist finds, I didn't want to bombard the list since most of our furniture was either thrifted, given to us, or carried with me from childhood. That being said, I'll will source some more of my stuff in hopes of answering your questions and addressing any future questions.

PIANO ROOM:
Piano: handed down from my grandparents
Rug: brand is Kaleen, the style is Bombay. I got it at a discount store [Marshall's, I think]
Chair and ottoman: Craigslist
Paint color: Distance from Behr
Curtains: Pottery Barn, they came with the house
Pillow cover: from either Syria or Iraq, gift from my brother

POWDER ROOM:
Stencil: from Hobby Lobby painted with Rhino from Behr. This room had wallpaper in it before, so we didn't have to compete with textured walls. In my past life as a muralist, though, I have stenciled over textured walls, and the trick to doing this is making sure your stencil is secured well either with painter's tape or spray adhesive, using a very dry brush, and pouncing the paint on. Also, latex paint tends to seep under the edges, so you can use something thicker, like acrylics to help prevent this. Just make sure you seal it afterwards.

BREAKFAST ROOM:
Table: Pottery Barn outlet, not sure if this design is still available, we purchased it 9 years ago.
Chairs: hand-me-downs repainted [for the second time]. I took the easy way out this time and spray painted them in Aqua from Rustoleum. The fabric is from Joann fabrics 

LIVING ROOM:
Union Jack ottoman: Home Goods

PLAY ROOM:
Box house in the corner: blog post about it here.
Correction on the yellow stripes: Citrus Zest from Behr
Armoire: antique from my childhood

AUDRIE'S ROOM: 
Bed, chest of drawers, vanity: Antique set given to us. Bed and drawers were painted in a soft white, the vanity color is Dragon Fruit, Behr.
Chair: trash find. I can't remember the color, but the fabric is from Joann fabrics.
Dollhouse: handmade, mine from childhood

FINN'S ROOM:
Chest of drawers: hand-me-down antique painted in Tomato from Glidden.
Map mural: painted in a shade darker than the wall color...I drew a couple of guidelines and the rest was free handed.

BABY'S ROOM:
Chair: antique found on Craigslist
quilt: made by my mom, grandmother, mother-in-law, and daughter

STUDIO:
Cubbies: garage sale find
Chest of drawers: hand-me-down
--both painted in Extra Virgin Olive Oil from Glidden, knobs from Hobby Lobby
Chair: garage sale find painted in Tomato, Glidden, and covered in fabric from Joann fabrics.

That's all my brain can conjure up for now. I hope I've answered all the questions. If I haven't, let me know.

xo

nessa dee

Crafty Friday: Button Collages

I have a confession to make. This craft wasn't supposed to be button collages. I was actually going to do a repeat craft of our robot collages we did several years ago. It was strictly for selfish reasons, as I wanted the kids to each create a piece of art to hang in the baby's room. Well, that plan flew out the window when my son started rebelling. He was in no way going to make a robot collage. So, I gave up and started helping him sew a robot toy instead, but while I was cutting material, Finn found arranging buttons on a piece of paper to be quite fun, or cathartic, or both.

 Either way, he ended up with a robot made of buttons. All you really need for this craft are lots of buttons, a thick piece of paper or cardboard to glue them to, and some glue. We threw in a few washers and metal lids, too. After writing a special note to his brother and signing the piece, he was done.

Audrie, on the other hand, opted to draw a robot and his dog, and then glue a few key pieces on for texture.

I love 'em both, and can't wait to hang them in the baby's room!

Happy crafting!

xo

nessa dee

Our house is on Apartment Therapy!!

I've been hinting that something big was going down at the Roeder house, and here it is:

We have a house tour on Apartment Therapy!!

[photo taken by Chris Perez]

I was contacted last month by Chris Perez, a contributor for Apartment Therapy, to see if I was interested in doing a house tour feature for their site. To say I was shocked would be an understatement, but I answered with a big, resounding YES! As soon as that word left my mouth, though, the nerves set in because at that point, we had three sample colors painted on our kitchen cabinets, two bathrooms with peeling wallpaper, a baby's room that hadn't even been thought out, an art studio that looked more like a storage room, the list goes on and on. So for the last month we've been working like crazy people to finish a lot of those projects. We still have a plenty of projects to tackle, but for now I am taking a long hiatus from house work and focusing on preparing for a baby. I've heard that it's a good idea to have things like a car seat, baby blankets, and enough clothes for the child before you take him home from the hospital.

You can check out our house tour right here. And be nice...remember, I'm pregnant and emotional, so lie through your teeth if you need to.

xo

nessa dee

Hello, Monday!

Today...

:: I'm enjoying our little art gallery between the kids' rooms.

:: She's liking her much larger bed.

[Hey look, there's the baby!]

:: He's reading every book he owns.

:: It's found a new sleeping spot in the baby's room.

:: And we're all loving our new picture of this sweet little one:

[A profile shot of baby boy sticking out his tongue]

Happy Monday!

xo

nessa dee