DIY TEACUP CANDLES (EMERGENCY CANDLES)

I have been a little MIA in the last month because we had a forest fire, it was kind of scary, I won't lie. You can read about it here. I have never had to evacuate my home before, and we had about an hours' notice- let me tell you, you really realize what is important in a crisis. Fortunately, we had our important documents all in the same place, and it was a matter of tossing in medicine and passports. Oh, and John hadn't come home from work yet, so I was doing all of this alone, and as organized as I am- I really almost forgot about the cat... Pet owner of the year right here ladies and gents!

But we made it through, and thankfully everyone and everything was safe. But in the wake of our evacuation I realized we are woefully ill-prepared for other types of emergencies. We had no water/food stores, and didn't even own a proper flashlight that wasn't attached to our phones, until last week. So in addition to my other emergency prep, I wanted to make some emergency candles- but I wanted them to look good.  I had empty teacups just sitting in the cupboard and they needed a purpose in life. So that's how this DIY was born. I would estimate from my previous candle-owning knowledge, that these will burn for close to 40 hours each.

Supplies:
Scissors
Teacups
Soy Candle Wax
Flat Braid Wicks (at least 3" longer than your container)
Microwave Safe Container/ Double Boiler
Hot Glue/ Wax Adhesive

Directions:
1. Clean your cup and dry completely
2. Place your wick in the center of your cup and glue it down with hot glue. You can also use wax adhesive for this step. Support your wick with a pencil/skewer/huge ugly stick. I had a huge ugly stick handy as you can see.
3. Heat wax according to package instructions. This is where you will add dye or scent if you choose to. I added a few drops of lemon and orange scent.
4. Pour into container. You can adjust the wick to make sure it is straight after you poor the wax.
5. Let sit until the wax is cool until the candle is solid. (If you have an uneven settling you can add more wax to the top to make it a level surface.)
6. Trim wick down to 1/4″.

DIY PINBOARD

I have a box in my office filled with notes and cards that I like to keep around for inspiration. I find it helpful if I am stumped on the wording to a wedding announcement, need a reminder on a friend's child's birth date, or need an idea for a color palette. You'd be surprised how many small things you can find inspiration in. But first you have to get them out of the box. I have been meaning to make a pin board for a while and finally got around to it on Sunday, while watching the latest Mad Men. It really is that easy, it took about 20 min, excluding painting the frame. So here's how:

Find a great frame with character, I loved this one because it had some great carved details in it. I picked it up a few years ago at good will and it had been waiting for new life. I painted it white with some primer I had on hand but any type of paint will do on wood- prime before you paint plastic or metal.

Then I used an exacto knife to cut a piece of foam core to fit the opening. I had a few fabric remnants on hand and selected a black and white pattern for the inside. It had too much contrast for my taste- so I ended up using the back side of the fabric, which is grey and white.

Just pop the foam core into place. Arrange some cards and letters and pin them on! That's it, I told you so easy. And you can do it on a large or small scale. If you had a large frame you could duct tape your foam boards together to create a larger inspiration palette. I already know I'll be switching out the fabric panel all the time.

ECO OBSESSION: TRESTLE TABLES

My latest obsession comes in the form of reclaimed dining tables. Especially those with trestle bases. What is a trestle base? The trademark of a trestle table is its horizontal support beam, rested across two vertical legs. The classic traditional trestle has "X" shaped legs, while more modern style tables may just have slab legs or unadorned vertical supports. Don't you love them? Now, we don't have to drive through miles of farm land to find old barn wood to build our furniture. Many chain stores offer reclaimed wooden products, making it easier than ever to adopt a greener way of life. Here are just a few great options you could order from a catalog or online.

Vintage Fir Cross-Beam Table from Viva Terra

Emmerson Table from West Elm

Reclaimed Pin Rectangular Table from Williams-Sonoma

Trestle Salvaged Wood Table from Restoration Hardware

Or if you are more of a DIY kind of person you could put your work gloves on and try out this Farm House Table tutorial from Ana White Homemaker. This project seems to be blowing up, so many people have posted pictures of their completed projects. Some are touting that it only cost them $65.00 (imagine if you had the wood for free!) If you build this you have to send me pictures.

REUSABLE GROCERY BAG

It's Farmer's Market season. Our Farmer's Market is on Thursdays, so I usually hit it up after work. There are booths with homemade crafts, aprons, pies, oh the pies! And I always find myself without a reusable bag. Maybe it is just too much to remember as I am walking out the door to work in the morning, but week after week I find myself shoving peaches in my computer bag. I think this tutorial might save me from all that. Between the Lines Blog posted this great how-to on t-shirt grocery bags, that looks fool-proof! I already have a few shirts in mind, and they are so small I can keep some in my work bag for those forgetful Thursdays.

What you need:

- an old T-shirt
- scissors
- matching thread
- sewing machine

Instructions:


1. Take an ironed adult size T-shirt, right side out. (You could use a kid's T-shirt for a smaller sized bag).

2. Fold it in half as shown in picture 2.

3. Cut off the sleeves as shown in picture 3.

4. Cut around the neck-line as shown in picture 4.

5. Sew the bottom of the shirt closed using a French seam. If you're not familiar with the French seam,  you sew the hem closed on the right side, turn the bag inside out and sew another seam, sandwiching the first seam inside. Next, sew boxed corners, as explained here, in step 1. You could iron everything flat now, if you like.

6. Place the bag in front of you on a flat surface. Starting from the bottom, fold over the bag as shown in picture 6, about 2 1/2 inch, that is.

7. Now, starting about 3 inches from the side, with your scissors make 1/2 an inch to 3/4 of an inch cuts through all layers, leaving about 1 1/8 inch between every cut. Continue like this all the way to the other side and stop about 3 inches from the side seam.

8. Next, fold it over some more (an additional 2 to 2 1/2 inch) and repeat the cutting, but now right in between two cuts from the previous line, as shown in picture 8.

9. Go on like this a couple more times, depending on the size of your bag - I did 5 rows in total.

4th OF JULY ANTIQUING

Over the holiday and weekend we hit up all the great antique shows going on in our Valley. Here are some of the highlights. It was super hot this year so we kept it short and simple, but I'm still kicking myself for not snatching up some cool treasures... 

These bird feeders were the coolest DIY thing I found this year. They are made from old lamp parts and plates. Would be so fun to make.

This guy had so many antlers that he was basically giving them away. I had to restrain myself because I have been wanting to dip paint some gold for a while now.

I thought these chairs were fun.

This settee was $800.00 it had been reupholstered in a heavy white linen and the wood had been striped and didn't have a new finish. I kept thinking for $800 you could have made this a lot more fun! 

I had my eye on those old wooden crates, this vendor also had some great vintage dresses and aprons.

We get the sun motif around here a lot, but I was sort of in love with these hand painted tiles, I think theywould make great trivets, or a tray in the bathroom (which is what my mom got one for) 

Don't you love that they left some of the original metal unpainted on these bed frames?

I thought these wire trays were cool, but they were so big I couldn't figure out where I would use them in my home.

I am still mad at myself for not buying these great old suitcases.

This was one of my favorite booths, these gals were from Salt Lake and they had so many DIYed pieces, and great salvaged items.

This glass was all a great purple color and the guy at this booth told me it was exposed to UV light and because it had a specific chemical in it, it turns the glass purple. (I don't remember what chemical, all you scientists out there help a girl out)

This booth was full of great ski memorabilia and fun rustic finds. The guy was from Colorado and he made this table himself. I loved how he paired it with these great red metal chairs. It was so hot though, I didn't dare sit in them!

I thought this cart would have made a great coffee table, and it had so much more character than the ones at Restoration Hardware. I don't know what these buckets are used for- my best guess was picking fruit or smashing grapes.

This booth had so many awesome Eastern textiles and art pieces. I was a little obsessed with this massive horse, they had two of them!

ECO OBBSESSION: PAINTED NEON

Lately I have found some great thrift shop furniture pieces and I have wanted to give them a funky makeover. I usually don't ever go very bold with my color choices in my own home. But, the lines of these pieces below have convinced me I may have to go neon! All of the lines on these furniture pieces are classic design silhouettes, although some of them are actually new, it would be so simple to give a piece of furniture an update with a little splash of neon pink or yellow. I love the pink spindle bed and the yellow edges of that table!

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ECO OBSESSION: MAKEUP CADDY

Right now I am loving this great makeup brush holder from Lessandmore's Etsy Shop!And they have so many creative ways to use on old block of wood.

Such a great idea. I have almost no counter space in my powder room and all of my makeup brushes and bits and bobs are sitting inside of antique glass goblets. I hate tossing them into a drawer because they will only stay organized for about 3 seconds. The DIY possibilities are endless. I'd love something like this in my kitchen to hold my metal utensils. Check out this one to hold pens and scissors!

 This little bud vase is the perfect thing for spring. We have such a slow season here with the trees blossoming, but it is my favorite time of year. I love to see cherry blossoms mixed in with spring floral arrangements. Such a fun and clever idea. I could see a long one down the center of a dining table.

HOW TO BUILD A RAISED PLANTER BED

This past weekend we spent over at the parental's building two raised veggie beds. They didn't have much room in their actual yard for these planters so we decided to clean out one side of the alley and build them there. The only problem was- there was a literal mountain of dirt that had been there for who knows how long- and all of the pallet remnants from this project. So began the cleanup.

Once we cleared out all of the pallets and debris, we began pulling old pieces of cedar and lining them up on the road to figure out which pieces weren't warped. Using reclaimed pieces of wood allowed us to make both beds for just $20. We measured out the length of all the boards and marked them, and  we John used a circular saw to cut down all of the individual pieces. We used 2x4s for all of the sides and 4x4s for the corner braces. Two screws held each board to the corner joints, and one brace in the center of the longest sides kept the bed from bowing once filled with dirt. I realize these pictures make it look like John did all the work but I was there, I promise.

We ended up with the first bed measuring 123" x 69" because that made for the fewest cuts and was the perfect width to allow the snow plow access to the road in the winter. The second bed ended up being 100" x 69". To protect the seeds from scavenging birds we constructed a cover using PVC pipes. We used a 1" diameter pipe that was cut down and screwed into the bed with pipe strapping. This created a "holder" for the 1/2" pipe that we bent over the top of each box. The large bed had three hoops the smaller one only used two. And we did not cut the 1/2" pipe at all. At this stage I am pretty sure the neighbors thought we were making a covered wagon.

Once the bed was in place we drove a stake into the ground to ensure that the sides wouldn't bow once we started to fill it with dirt. They didn't bow at all end we just left the stakes in the ground so we could replace them with snow flags later in the season. At this point all of the "easy" work was over. Remember that dirt mountain, here's where it comes in. Because the soil was so rocky, we sifted all of it before filling the bed. I'd say we spent 4 hours sifting dirt for two beds, I hoped we would eventually find a treasure or a dino bone that would make us rich. That didn't happen... This is why we had rocks piled in between our boxes, and lining the fronts of each bed- that was the only place to deposit all of the gravel, and treasure. 

 

Once we had a good layer of base soil in each bed we added 3.8 cubic yards of peat moss, because that's how much comes in a bag! I am told the peat absorbs water and helps "fluff" the soil. That got mixed with the base dirt, more soil was added, and then we mixed the top layer with compost. Two bags of compost in the big box, and one in the small. Then we raked and leveled out both beds. There are a few trouble-making neighborhood cats so we covered the boxes with tarps until it is planting time, because we didn't need any surprises. 

RECORD PLAYER INTO TV STAND

I inherited this record cabinet after all of the speakers and mechanics were stripped from the interior. The doors were all fixed and the only interior access was lifting the top center to a compartment to reveal where the actual record player was hidden.  The drawers are just a decorative fascia, but the doors could actually be removed. I had been looking for a media cabinet and nothing else came close to the right size for the television. So, with a little creativity and hardware we were able to turn this baby into an actual working cabinet, here's how we did it.

1. I removed all of the doors and unscrewed all of the hardware, the door panels had metal and fabric stapled in the insets. We had to carefully remove all of the staples to get the criss-crossed metal out of the insets. I HATE sanding- so I never do it unless it is absolutely necessary. In this case the surface was fine to just prime and paint. So I just had to wipe down the surfaces with a damp cloth.

2. I used Rustoleum's 2x primer and their American Accents Ivory Satin. I painted 2 coats of primer over all of the doors and frame of the cabinet, followed by 2 coats of satin Ivory paint. Once the paint was dry I screwed in the new hardware and stapled a simple monochromatic paisley to the inside of the door panels.

3. John installed hinges on the right and left side doors so we could store dvds and all of our electronics. We installed shelves inside those compartments as well with some simple "L" brackets. I left the inside unfinished because only we ever see it and it didn't justify wasting the resources.