Our House, Revisited.

Between traveling, visitors and some early snow, we actually found some time to attack a few house projects. My husband likes to call these "my projects" but none of this would get done without his help and in many of these cases, he does most of the work. haha. The house is finally starting to look like ours. (Although I always have more projects up my sleeve.)

Playroom:

Vinyl Decal - Easy to Apply.

Inspired by I Heart Organizing's birch tree playroom, I set out in search of a stencil or decal that would give it a jungle feel. When this Sissy Little decal came up on Zulily, I jumped on it. I had never worked with a vinyl decal before and it turned out to be easier then I had imagined. The walls in the playroom are textured, and that posed a bit of challenge. The first set of trees we tried to apply as a set of four - that was a mess. Cutting the trees and applying them one by one worked much better. The directions were easy to follow and turned out looking great!

Buttons and Ribbon for Fabric Box Labels

We completed the bench seating a few weeks ago - instructions here. I found fabric bins that I liked at IKEA. I was trying to figure out a way to attach labels to the bins. Velcro did not want to stick and my little one can be pretty hard on items. I found some cute green buttons in a variety of sizes and sewed them on to the front with a small clear button on the back. (The flaps on these bins turn up enough for you to be able to work behind them.) I then printed and laminated labels for each of the bins, hole punched them and used some ribbon to create a loop (using hot glue or a quick stitch) which was then slit and hooked to the small back button. So far so good. We will see if they hold but they look quite cute.

Dress Up Station with Mirrors

 We wanted to create some play stations around the outside of the room. I found some pegs at Home Depot to hang dress-up clothing on. (Please keep in mind my husband installed most of this stuff for me - haha.) I haven't had a chance to make the dress up clothing yet, but I do have this great little ranger vest some dear friends from Edwards gave us. These mirrors are from Wallchart (although I also saw them at Target). Little H loves looking at himself in the lower ones and he will grow to be able to use them all. They were easily hung with the Command picture hanging Velcro tape.

Hardware Activity Board

 My husband put together this great activity board. He has some additional things to add, but with the grandparents coming we wanted to get it up on the wall. We found that little H loves to play with the hardware on our family room coffee table, so this gives him something to play with in his playroom.
(More on this to come, when we get it finished!)

I used the extra fabric from the seating to make some hanging bookshelves. There are lots of instructions for these online. I used towel rods because it seemed easier. I found the towel rods at Amazon.com. I made three pocket shelves in three different sizes to accommodate different sized books.  We ended up hanging the two small ones under the chair rail by the tent and the one large one above the seating. I also added a small pocket to the front of the large one.

Large Towel Rod Bookshelf

Playroom With Tent

Finally - The Tent! I wanted a little fort in the room. Again, there are tons of patterns online. I used a pattern from Simplicity. I had major trouble with the cutting instructions - but was able to just do it my own way with the required fabric. The tent has a great little seating mat and pockets in the back for storing little treasurers.
It hangs from an eye-hook in the ceiling, but we also had to add an additional hook in the back to keep it from rotating sideways. It may actually be easier to just purchase a tent in the future, but it was nice to get the fabric I wanted.

The playroom still needs stuff on the walls and a rug, but it's finally well on its way !

Laundry Room 

Laundry Room Storage

I added some fabric baskets from Target to our laundry room shelves to hold everything. I used some ribbon an card-stock to label the bins. (Since we are cloth diapering, I also have to use the space to dry the diapers when its too cold outside.) This room needs some decoration... I'm still looking for something perfect.

Craft Area

Craft Area.

Hanging Fabric Storage

 This house had the best little craft area in the basement. Unfortunately, once I started setting up, I found that it didn't have a great place to keep fabric. My lovely husband hung some towel rods behind the lowered part of the ceiling. Using pants hangers, I hung my stash fabric so it also blocks some of the sun that comes in through this window in the afternoon. It has freed up quite a bit of much needed shelf space. It also makes me so happy to use my fabric as decoration, because it is so pretty. haha.

We are certainly not done with the house- although we are taking a short break from projects to host Jeff's parents, my sister and my best friend from Atlanta. (Plus a nice break helps me get inspired for my next projects!)

Happy Crafting!