Little Boy Chevron

Chevron, chevron, chevron!  This is a trend that can be found everywhere from walls, stairs, clothes, accessories - the list goes on.

It's taken me a few months to get up the courage to try it my hand at this simple yet powerful decorative statement {a little paranoid...Yes, yes I am!  LOL} but I have to say that I'm very pleased with my take on this.

I bought this unfinished wood stool to give as a baby shower gift for a co-worker.  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to complete it before the shower {she ended up with some great baby clothes} but I was determined to finish it and finally I have.

Unfinished square stool

After a coat of primer and  a coat of Krylon White Gloss spray paint, I was ready to measure the squares necessary to create my chevron stripes.  I used a light blue chalk to mark off the area.

Grabbed my painters tape to create the stripes.

I used Krylon Blue Bonnet spray paint to cover the top.  I learned a tip online that says to remove the painters tape after a couple minutes so as to keep the paint from running {I did this but still needed to do a few touch-ups}

Chevron strips in baby blue

And added a little color to the legs.

A touch of baby blue

As much as I liked this as it was, I wanted to add something else to it so I used vinyl to put a favorite 'little boy' saying on it.

What are little boys made of?

Smashing...simply smashing!  I love everything about about this project and I am so happy with how well it turned out {giving self a super-duper high five}.

What's something that you've been wanting to try?  Go ahead and give it a go...you might just be surprised!

Where we like to party!

What I Love About You....

Valentine's Day, like many other holidays, have become so commercial.  We shuffle around for days before {sometimes even the day of} trying to pull off the best gift to show our "love" for that someone special.  Well this year I decided not to fall prey to the hype.  I decided that this year my two leading men would receive a gift that really came from my heart...and my hands.

On one of my many trips to Michaels, I found this little chipboard booklet.  I liked it right away but wasn't quite sure what I would use it for at first.  When I was considering what I wanted to do for the little prince, I decided to make him a special little book telling him the things we love the most about him.

Chipboard booklet

Checking my stash of scrapbook paper, I found some that I purchased last year - these were going to be perfect.  I took one of the chipboard pages and traced the shape on each piece for easy cut out.

Red and white stripes - traced the shape

Red and white polka dots - shape cut out

I got right down to working on the pages.  Since this was going to be for my little man I wanted coordinating colors that would be more masculine, so I opted for some black textured paper and a smooth aqua paper as well.  I don't know about you but inspiration can hit me at anytime, so the idea to have a picture of each of us moving in for a kiss with him came to me while at work...haha!

A little lovin' for mommy

A little lovin' for daddy

Our sweet boy is a great reader so we wanted to add simple sentences that he could read showing him just how much he means to us and why.

Time to put the front cover together.  Using red paper with the word "love" in black on it, I cut out the words 'Happy Valentine's Day!' using my Silhouette.  I liked the paper because I thought it wasn't too girly, but I was slightly disappointed with it on the cover because you can no longer see that detail.  Oh well, that'll be a learning lesson for the next one...haha!  The heart and key are from Martha Stewart's line and I bought them on clearance at Michaels last year.

And here are the pages all put together.  Did you notice that the ring holding the book together is a different color?  Somehow I lost the one that came with it and luckily I had some here that I bought for school.  I hope at some point it will show up and I can replace this one...so not feeling that purple with his book {giggle}.

Now that man #2 was done, time to work on man #1.  I found a bottle at the Dollar Tree that was filled with flowers and a note - a message in a bottle.  I loved this idea but sorry Dollar Tree, that note and those flower petals were going to have to hit the road.  My sweetie deserved something sweet, so I chose to fill them with conversation hearts for a different take -- 'Messages in a Bottle'.  I stopped by our local cupcakery and picked up a chocolate cupcake for him too...yum!

And a little extra added touch....

'I Love Valentines' barcode

I hope you were able to find a way to show your lovies how special they are too!

Big Boy Bed Hack

When it was time to get the little prince his new "big boy" bed, we took a trip to Ikea to look for something that would work for his small room {also because I simply adore that place!}.  My little guy fell in love with a bed that he affectionately termed his 'ladder bed' but the rest of the world knows as bunk beds - haha!

He loves his new bed.  I've been working on creating an inviting space for him but wasn't sure what I would do with the bed until I found this bed on Pinterest from Ikea Hackers.  Sold!  Now I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

Welcome to The Blue Note Club!

His new hideaway

Can't have a club without customers, right?

The easy part of this hack was putting up the vinyl, thanks to my Silhouette machine.  The hard part - creating those curtains.  I'm not sure if I've said this before but let me say it now -- I HATE sewing!  I don't like doing it and I'm horrible at it and let's not even get me started on what happened when I tried to use the sewing machine - Oy vey!

I found the material at Hobby Lobby.  It's fleece and though I would have preferred a cotton material {which for the record has to be easier to sew than fleece...just saying}, I couldn't pass it up since it had all the music notes on it...so cool!

If you look close enough {please don't...haha} you can see that they are slightly uneven and a little too long.  This is a problem that will be tackled later, but for now it works and my son is happy with it.

He also needed new bedding since we had been using his baby blankets to cover him up at night.  So for Christmas, we bought him musical themed sheets and a comforter set.

Rock and Roll

Close-up - cool, right?

I found the sheets on Amazon.com, Egyptian cotton and they feel amazing and cost only $20 -- so worth it! Now I just had to find a great comforter set that wouldn't break the bank.  Walmart to the rescue!  $30 and this will complete the bed...Yippee!!!

Rockin' pillow sham

Love the guitar!

He is so happy and that makes me happy.  Now to figure out how to sew a hem on those dang curtains....


Where we like to party!

Valentine Love

UPDATE: My lovely Valentine carton made the cut on the CSI Project!

Happy Valentine's Day lovies and Happy 2nd Blog Anniversary to Little Blue's Room!

I can't believe that it was two years ago that I decided to begin this journey.  Okay, here is the honest truth -- I had NO idea what in the world I was getting myself into...LOL!  I'm not sure that I have a much clearer understanding two years later but I continue to try to learn as much as I can and I think as long as I don't give up {which I've thought about doing} then I'm moving in the right direction.

Well, that's enough about that!  Let's get down to what this day is truly ALL about -- Valentine's!  I have been busy over the last few weeks working on Valentine's for my best customer {and my little guy too!}.  She asked that I create something fun for her daughter's class.  She spent some time cruising the internet and came up with a couple examples that she loved.  I had my marching orders and I got right to work.

O"fish"ally the Best!

She decided that these would be perfect for the kids.  Her little girl is going to love delivering these little fishy's to school {pun intended...lol}!  Now something a little different for the teachers:

'Bee' Mine!

I am so pleased with them both, they came out bee-u-tifully!  Of course the true test is if the customer likes them and she does too {major score}.

I couldn't put my supplies away just yet because the little prince would need some for his class as well.  I wanted something different, out the box of sort and I found it -- thanks to the Silhouette blog here.  Check out this great and simple Valentine!

Not your typical Valentine for sure.  I used an almost burgundy textured card stock for the carton and paired it with a cream white textured card stock and coordinating pattern paper to create the hearts {there are two of them; white on the bottom and patterned on the top}.  I chose to pull out the green color to use for the arrow.  I then needed to fill the bottom with basket shred so the candy bag would sit up high enough.  Add another heart as a tag {not shown} and they are ready for delivery.  Cute - check!  Valentine-y - check!  Love it - check, check!

I hope that you have had a great time creating memories and showering love on those that mean the most to you this year.  From my family to yours -- Happy Valentine's Day!


Where we are partying!