August 20, 2014 by Stephanie

Fabric Covered Boxes

I showed our lovely shelves yesterday. Once they were made, I realized we didn’t have enough boxes to make it look how I wanted pattern wise. Our Walmart didn’t sell orange ones, and I didn’t want to wait to purchase them on Amazon.

So after consulting Pinterest, I got the idea to just make my own fabric box.

We had so much of the elephant print left over, so I figured it would tie everything around the room together a little more. And diaper boxes make the perfect cubbies.

So really, I didn’t feel like I spent any money on these since the funds were allotted initially elsewhere. Plus these diapers were a gift, so really it’s even better!

Also this was a project to keep my bed rest behind preoccupied but still sitting.

Here is how I made them.

Supplies: box, fabric of choice, hot glue gun

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First you need a box. Diaper boxes are the perfect size, but I am sure we all have gotten packages that hold equally perfect status.

I did not cut off the top flaps which others may do. We decided that it would make it a little sturdier to just fold and glue the flaps down inside the box. It’s not like they can be seen anyway.

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Then you want to cut out 4 squares of your fabric that fit the sides of the boxes. You will want to leave a little overlap on all sides so make them slightly bigger than each side you are measuring.

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I started with gluing the bottom first. See how the fabric hangs over the sides?

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Once the glue on the bottom is set, you flip the box and pull the fabric tight to glue it over the inside of the box. Be careful to make sure that the fabric is smooth before you start gluing, so it is really important to work fast with the hot glue gun.

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Then you will glue the overlap on the sides. I cut the fabric diagonally at the corners so it would lay more flat and you don’t have a lot of extra bunching happening. You will do this on the inside flaps as well. Basically just make sure all the edges of this square is glued down before you move to the next square.

You want to do the two parallel sides in a row: example front and back first.

Once you have those two sides done, the next two are a little different.

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You will fold the extra fabric over first before you glue it on the box. This make it have smooth lines and make sure everything is covered neatly. It just makes for more even seams instead of jagged cut fabric, because we all know you can’t cut fabric perfectly straight or without frays. I just lined it up to the box and then glued anything that was extra over.

Once you do this, you will start from gluing the bottom down and then pulling it over the top just like the first two sides.

I then hot glued down the seams to make sure they stayed down.

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Hopefully you can see what I mean about the seams being flat. Since these are the sides, I wasn’t too anal about making the fabric line up perfectly pattern wise. I did try to make them as close as possible. Knowing that they will not be seen as much, it was not much of a priority.

One other thing to note, you could see the Pampers logo through the fabric where the elephants were. So I first glued down some off-white card-stock to cover the logos so it wouldn’t show through the completed project. You may want to check for this before you start gluing things down to make sure you don’t have the same problem with your fabric of choice.

Let me know if you have questions. Because you have to work fast with the hot glue, some of these pictures aren’t the best with explaining. Sorry!

It is a really easy project, and I finished two boxes in a half hour.

No thanks to the dogs enthusiasm…

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While doing my research on how to make these, I saw that other people added straps, bows, and whatnots to theirs. I wasn’t going to go that in depth on it. But now that I know how easy this is to do, I may just save diaper boxes that have yet to be opened to try more elaborate coverings.

For now, I think they are perfect for the nursery!

Have you tried covering boxes like this? How much do you use Pinterest to decorate your house?

August 19, 2014 by Stephanie

Top Shelf Pick

Finding baby furniture can be somewhat depressing when you start looking at the price tags. Why does something so little need things that cost so much?

We had wanted to find a dresser that we could redo into a changing table. After going to most of the thrift stores in town and looking online at various options, we kept coming up empty. Even at thrift stores, dressers were costing up in the 300 to 400 range.

So we settled on making shelving units ourselves to fit our need, which we saved so much. We were able to spend about $200 for two full shelving units that were exactly what we wanted.

Plus then we get to have these handmade items to pass on to our kids. I still have the bookshelf my dad made for me when I was a kid, so I love the fact that we will have personal touches to add to our kid’s lives.

I am just going to let the pictures do most of the talking.

We splurged on the paint to make sure it was a little higher quality knowing it was going in a kid’s room.

We stained the tops of the shelves and then used the gloss to make them smooth and easier for cleaning (which should be a consideration for something we will be changing dirty diapers on).

These were the tops.

All of the wood.

Frame for unit one

frame for unit 2

They are pretty similar, but these legs are just one little touch that makes them different.

Tom sanded the tops to make them extra smooth. Then he used a router to make a rounded smooth edge.

I helped with the painting, but you don’t need pictures of the big ol belly struggling to reach corners.

Here is the changing table. The boxes hold everything from clothes to diapers and bath stuff. We got the solid fabric boxes off of Amazon with our registry, but they also sell them at Walmart. The elephant print box I made. I will have a tutorial here soon!

This is the extra bookshelf for all the knick knacks.

I love that Tom is so handy and can make these things happen.

The nice thing is that these can change easily to change for whatever the need is. So if we get more books for example, we can change the arrangement of things. I tried several dozen variations of things before I settled on where things are now. With the boxes you can change the patterns up easily!

We were a little nervous about all the white, but I love how clean and simple it looks.

Now we just need to hang things on the wall and put a rug down, and I think this nursery is complete! The goal is to have everything in place by this weekend, so hopefully we can make that happen considering my bed rest limitations.

Also, I am guest posting for my friend Tiffany today! Check it out here!

August 12, 2014 by Stephanie

Cribs: Baby Edition

So this might be somewhat different than a spotlight on MTV. No crazy lighting, trick doorways or indoor pools here…Darn.

The nursery is finally in a place where I feel like I can share things without showing our messy storage woes.

I am going to show you all it in pieces, because well, let’s be honest, it’s still not all together.

And we have 5 weeks to go, no big deal.

First up on the baby room show and tell: Crib bedding.

I don’t think Tom and I ever really discussed having elephants as the “nursery” theme. I think it went down something like me showing him a picture from Pinterest, and he said ok. And then here we are.

I have always loved elephants, and luckily Tom is fine with being on that train. We have them all over our living room, and our spare bathroom also has elephants stamped all over it.

It seemed like a great nursery theme, and people have been kind of running with it.

I can’t blame them. Elephants are the greatest.

When my mom was here in June, we made the crib skirt, blanket, and a small pillow.

I found some gray fabric online for sale, and it matches the curtains we already had in the second bedroom. Then we picked up solid orange and blue fabric here in town.

I showed my mom a picture, and she worked her magic with making it happen. She used a pattern from a different bedding set, and we (I mean Mom) tweaked it as we went to fit my idea.

It was my first time using patterns, so it was definitely a learning experience.

I did help! But most of it was all Mom.

Here is the layout of the blanket.

We made the bed skirt so it just lays on the springs/crib bottom.

So there is a white middle with the skirt on the sides.

You can’t see the blue all the way around because of the current height we have the crib and how it lays with the rails. Once we move the crib up or down to fit George’s demands, you will be able to see the blue more.

For the blanket we made two identical sides and put thin batting in between to make it thicker. We sewed the eyes of the elephants to add some strength to the middle parts and so the batting wouldn’t move around.

The pillow was just made out of scrap pieces and then stuffed to my heart’s content. I might make more pillows here soon if I get inspired before he is delivered.

I know the pillow and blanket won’t be in there when he is sleeping, but it will be nice to have for other things.

I wasn’t sure how I would like the brown against the gray, but I actually am digging it. We knew we weren’t going to paint the rocking chair we already had, so brown was here to stay, and I just hoped that the gray fit in!

We have lots of fabric still left over, so there are some other projects I have in mind, like huge floor pillows. That will come later though, possibly after a move.

It is super simple, but I love that. Babies don’t need crazy elaborate. Plus it was an experience making it. I am also pretty proud of us knowing that my mom and I did that instead of just going and buying it.

Although, we did buy the fitted sheet. Ain’t nobody got time for that elastic sewing…

Huge shout out to my mom for bearing with me as I struggled to understand patterns, freaked out about sewing machines not working, and feeling like I had the touch of death. She really made all of this come together. My mom is the best!

And in honor of elephants, today is World Elephant Day!

Here are some awesome elephant things for you to enjoy.

Elephant and Mirror

Eye Opening Facts About Elephants

Seriously the Most Adorable Clips of Baby Elephants

June 25, 2014 by Stephanie

To Infinity and Beyond

While we had the sewing machine out for the baby bedding, I figured I would work on a quick project that I have set aside since winter.

I have a handful of scarves that are an awkward length scarf-wise. I don’t get all fancy with my scarf tying, but the few ways I finagled these scarves they always looked awkward because they were too short.

So in the middle of this winter, I started using safety pins to make them infinity scarves. Doing so made them just perfect!

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Grace is an apathetic model.

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I had four scarves that I wanted to turn into infinity scarves. I just put the two ends together and sewed a straight line down the ends. It was a a little trickier than I had imagined to keep the fabric still for a straight line. I ended up having to use a lot of pins to keep them together so it wasn’t a complete zig-zag hem once I was done with it.

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So there you have it. An easy upcycle to transform normal scarves into infinity scarves. Now these four scarves that I hardly ever wore will probably see a lot more than the inside of my closet.

Have you been doing any fun projects lately? Any ways to turn around a piece of clothing that may have otherwise been dead to you?

June 5, 2014 by Stephanie

Sweet Potato Brownies

Yes you read that correctly. There are sweet potatoes in these brownies!

I saw this recipe on Pinterest a couple weeks ago, and combined with my craving for chocolate baked goods, I knew this would have to be on the docket to try out.

And as luck would have it, I had some sweet potatoes that were getting borderline too old too eat. (Have I mentioned before that sometimes my eyes are bigger than my appetite at the grocery store?)

Anyway, I thought this would be a great endeavor to fill a craving and not waste some of our produce. I used the same instructions this woman provided, but added my own thoughts to each piece.

Sweet Potato Brownies

Ingredients

1 cup cooked sweet potatoes
1 cup flour**
½ cup cocoa powder
1 tsp. baking powder
dash salt {1/8 t.}
½ cup sugar
1 egg
4 T. oil {coconut, vegetable or canola}
2 T. pure maple syrup or honey
1 tsp. vanilla
**Decrease flour to ¾ cup if you prefer more fudge-like brownies.

**I doubled this original recipe since I don’t have a small brownie pan, and I also wanted to use a full sweet potato. I also used coconut oil and honey, but you can choose your poison on these areas.

Instructions

Peel and chop 1 cup of raw sweet potatoes. Since they will not lay evenly in the cup, you want a lot more than what appears to be a cup. I just cut a whole potato and it was just perfect as I eyeballed 2 cups worth.
Boil, microwave or bake the potatoes until soft. I microwaved them in a bowl of water for 15 minutes. You want to be able to put a fork in them easily.
In a mixer bowl, combine ½ cup sugar, egg, 1 tsp. vanilla, 4 T of oil {coconut, vegetable or canola} and 2 T. maple syrup or honey.
Beat on high for 30 minutes with your whisk attachment until frothy. (I am not sure that 30 minutes is really needed for this. It never got frothy for me. It just got creamy.)
Meanwhile, combine the flour, ½ cup cocoa powder, 1 tsp. baking powder and dash of salt into a large bowl. Whisk them together to prevent lumps. Keep separate from wet ingredients for now.
Add the hot, cooked potatoes right into the mixing bowl with the wet ingredients.
Beat on high for 1 minute until the batter turns a lovely orange and there are just little bits of sweet potato. There were a lot of lumps in mine which I tried smashing with a spatula, but not all of them would go away. It will be fine once you bake it.
Now, with the mixer on slow, add your dry ingredients and beat on high another minute until thick and creamy.
Spread the batter into a greased pan and put in a preheated 350 degree oven.
Brownies are done when toothpick or cake tester comes out with bits of moist brownie on it. {Check at 15 min, mine took about 25 minutes total.}
Allow them to cool before cutting. Best if stored in the refrigerator.

This recipe took me about an hour to complete. And only about 5 minutes to eat two slices…

All of the ingredients

Finished Product

Here is my opinion of this recipe.

It’s the bomb.com!

Both Tom and I were a bit apprehensive about this since our last adventure of brownies were gluten free and tasted like chalk. (Luckily or unluckily, the dogs took care of them for us and ate the whole pan while we weren’t looking.)

So doing another “health craze” recipe was risky. Usually my baking is full of butter and not healthy things…

However, these did not disappoint. They are delicious. They are fairly thick, unlike normal recipes for brownies. They taste great though and don’t have a potatoey taste. (Which is good because most things potato taste like dirt to me right now…)

I will say that I like them better warm than after they have been refrigerated. Once they are cold, they resemble the thickness and taste of fudge more than a brownie. They are still good though this way, but it is definitely a different texture and I wasn’t able to eat a whole slice unlike the night before where I ate two warm slices…

We will definitely be making these again! Even better that they are healthier than most brownie recipes. Win!

Have you tried any good recipes lately? Would you have thought to put sweet potatoes in brownies?