Painted Kitchen And Remodel Reveal

 I am happy to say my kitchen is finally finished! Mostly. Just some walls that need to be painted, but major renovations are out of the way. It has been done for a little while but finding the time to clean it for pictures has taken me a while.

Lacqure Painted Kitchen Cabinets

I'm so excited to have my kitchen cabinets painted! It has been on my to do list for a long time. The finish was wearing off and they were looking pretty bad. I researched and read how the paint held up for other people. Most people said the acrylic paint was starting to chip a little after about a year. We needed something stronger with the use our kitchen gets.

DIY Wedding Invitation Tutorial

One of our cousins (Doris) is getting married in September, so Emily has been helping her come up with ideas. Doris is doing a rustic elegant wedding, and is trying to do as many things as she can DIY! Emily has been working on her invitations, the last couple of days. It took a little while to figure out because we probably did it the long way.

We started by writing the invitation out in Word using free fonts from different websites! She got almost all the free fonts from Dafonts. So, after Emily wrote the wording out how she liked ( in Word), she then went to PicMonkey. PicMonkey doesn't let you upload and edit PDF files, so don't make your word format in Word and then try to design it in PicMoney, because it won't work. If you decide to use PicMonkey they normally have a free week of Royal, which allows you to use all the cute stuff! Find all the extra designs that you want to add to your invitation, and one at a time add them to the white board and save them. Then, go to back to word, with your invitation open, and start adding your decorations.

 This is the final invitation

Painted And Glazed China Cabinet

We bought a dinning room set that came with a hutch when we first moved into our house. We have outgrown the table but still use the china cabinet. Except I no longer like the color. It was a blond/pink looking color that matched our cabinets, and we're planing on painting those soon.

Painted Wardrobe

 A few years back I bought a huge furniture set at a garage sale. It worked great for a while in a room without a closet. Then we had a closet built in that room and we found new homes for some of the pieces. We conveniently set the big wardrobe down the hall in our room, since it was so heavy. It did not match with the rest of our furniture but it became useful for storing baby clothes. So it sat there for a couple more years.
The other day I was thinking that I should clean up the top of this wardrobe, since it is the first thing I see in the morning when I open my eyes. I  thought a collection of vintage stuff would look good up there, but not with the cherry color. So I decided to change that with a little paint. I am totally loving it and can't believe I didn't think about doing it earlier!

July Blooms And Gardens

 We have had beautiful weather here so far this summer! July is here and it's heating up. Today we're  headed to the pool, because summer flies by so fast and we want to enjoy the heat while it's here!

Before we head out  I want to show you what's blooming in my gardens.

Bridal Shower

 It's wedding season, and I want to show you some pictures from a friend's bridal shower we attended a few weeks back. The ladies who put this together did an awesome job! The flowers were beautiful, the food was amazing and we all had a fun time.

Vintage Engagement/Wedding Decor

This past week has been so busy for our family. We have been doing a lot of shopping in preparation for our daughters' trip overseas. Our church also held VBS and we all volunteered, and as soon as that was over we set up for my brother's engagement party. Monday morning we drove our girls to the airport and I'm ready to relax!
We actually had a lot of fun putting it all together and I want to show you the results. It was in the basement and there isn't much natural light so excuse the quality of photos.

What's Blooming in June

 I've been taking a little break from blogging after the birth of our tenth child. I have actually accomplished lots of stuff around the house (just nothing blog worthy). I have cleaned the basement, garage, and under my porch. We also stained the porch with help from the girls. I've also done some gardening, so today I want to show you my flower beds.
 

Crate Ottoman

I had some milk crates that I made into ottomans a while back and I really liked how adding a lid to them made them so much cuter! Now I  have some regular wooden crates I bought at an auction and I thought I would try the same thing with these.

Painted Shelf

 A while back I showed you my{Laminate Bookshelf}that I re-purposed and am now using as a shelf in my kitchen to display my vintage collections. Not long after that I added an old shelf that I fixed up and painted to add over the shelf.

 

Antique Chairs

 A while back we bought a lot of  vintage/antique stuff from a lady that was cleaning out her sister's basement and attic and we got a bunch of chairs. Some are not in good condition and I may have to re-purpose them, but here are a few that were easy fixes.

Itsy Bitsy Seamstress on Facebook

 [Itys Bitys Seamstress] now has a Facebook page! Stay updated on all the new items arriving in my shop. I would love to custom make a headband for your little one! If you have any questions or comments, you can reach me through my Etsy shop, or my Facebook page.

Post by Itsy Bitsy Seamstress.

My Mannequin Head

 A while back I bought a Styrofoam mannequin head for Julia thinking she could use it as a prop when she photographs her headbands for Etsy. She didn't like it so I left it on a table in the basement.  Sometime later I found it chewed up, no not the dog, our little four year old decided to chew the nose and poke some holes in it. So it sat down there until the other day I thought about covering it with dictionary pages using Mod Podge.

Painted Vintage Sewing Box

 I found an interesting item at an auction recently. It's an accordion style sewing box. I had never even seen anything like it, but I liked it and bought it thinking I would paint it.

Laminate Bookshelf Repurposed

 I feel like I hit the jackpot last week, but I don't play the lottery so I know it was God's blessing. My husband listens to a radio show called Tradio and someone advertised that they were cleaning out a basement and were selling antiques. I went with Emily to check it out and they had a lot of cool stuff mostly from the Thirties and at supper good prices!

Vintage Painted High Chairs

 It's weird how inspiration strikes me sometimes. I was leafing through an old BHG magazine and I noticed a high chair in the background of one of the photos. Then I thought I have two highchairs, I should do something with them!  Funny they've been sitting there for quite some time.

Milk Crate Ottoman

 I went to an auction a couple weeks ago and picked up two old milk crates, and thought about turning them into ottomans. I had already seen a tutorial on how to make these here , it looked easy and so cute. 

Two Chairs Get A New Life

 I love buying old chairs that need to be redone. I found this chair at a garage sale this summer. It was pretty sturdy and I liked the shape, but it was worn out. I re stained it and added new a new cushion and fabric. It is definitely  improved! This is the chair that Julia snatched up for her room.

DIY Ruffled Crib Skirt And Wall Art

I am getting ready for our baby and it's fun to have something new even if it is our tenth. I was really getting tired of the bed skirt I had. It was kind of short and I could always see the stuff that got stored under the crib(box of diapers, clothes or toys ). I decided I would make my own skirt out of my old king sized sheets.

10 Valentine's Day Ideas

 These are just a few cute ideas for Valentine's Day! 

New York Cheesecake

 Strawberry Nutella Poptarts

New York Cheesecake

This is the best cheesecake ever! I love everything about it. We sometimes add fruit to the top, or a raspberry sauce, but you can also do chocolate. My aunt gave us this recipe and it has become a family favorite.

So here it is: 

Teen Girl Room Re-do

Does anyone remember the teen's room we did last year? Well Julia has been talking about changing the decor in her room, so at Christmas she got a new bedspread. Her bedspread and some of her wall art went to her younger sister, who was happy to get it, and Julia started looking for ideas on decorating her room once more. I'm happy to say she came up with some really cute ideas that we could work with, and we didn't spend very much either! 

Girls Room On A Budget

It is cold here this week! Our kids are getting an extra long vacation and they are enjoying it along with the deep snow. My husband even got a day off work, which was nice since he was so busy before the holidays. We' re spending time playing, cooking up new things, decorating and moving things around in some of the girl's rooms.

 I'm so glad to be done with the room I started re-doing for two of our girls a while back! If you have been following along we were shuffling some of the kids around to make room for our tenth baby who is due in April. We found out it's a girl! That makes eight girls and two boys. 

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DIY Girls Headboard

Happy New Year everyone! I'm so excited to show you the headboard I made for our girl's room. I had been looking everywhere for a headboard. I looked on Craigslist, resale shops, and Goodwill. Nothing anywhere. So then I started to think about using the foot board I had already turned into a chalkboard.