Bar stool makeover

When we moved into our home 5 1/2 years ago I bought these very cheep bar stools from Lowe's for $24.00 ea. Of course I had been really drooling over some $150.00 bar stools from Pottery Barn. Let me tell you folks, I'm so glad that I didn't have the money to get those expensive bar stools when I wanted them. Since moving into our house I've had 2 more children and my then Innocent 1 and 2 year old baby boys have grown into active and imaginative big boys. The bar stools have been everything from fort beams to rocket ships. As you can see from the next two pictures below they have been well loved. Being a Mother of a 2,4,6 and 8 year old I find myself cleaning up about 20 spills a week. The rattan tops on the stools have definitely seen better days. I can't stand cleaning these things and trying to scrape spills and food out of the cracks. The last time I had to take one of the chairs outside and hose it off I thought,"that's it! These chairs need a makeover!" I decided to paint them in a bright turquoise color and cover the tops with something I could easily wipe off.

Here is what they started out like. The round screw holes are from my husband did to keep them from falling apart after all the stools wild kid adventures.

More than half of the chairs had strands of the rattan missing

 and some kind of gunk stuck in the cracks.

I took the stools out on the back porch and sanded and washed them off and then gave them each 2 and 1/2 coats of semi gloss latex paint. The paint had good coverage so the .5 coat was just to double check and hit any spots I might have missed. Oh...I also used putty to fill in the screw holes.

I have an upholstery staple gun, but with all the batting and original weaving on the stool seats we figured out it worked tons better to use a power staple gun. My sweet husband even pitched in and helped me cut fabric and cover the seats while I was still slaving away with my paint brush. My 5 stools took longer than I thought they would.

Stan did a great job folding in the corners. He was finished in no time at all. Originally I was going to use a cotton fabric and then cover it with plastic. I changed my mind after I found this very cheep...3.50 a yard felt backed plastic material at my local Walmart. I liked the pattern and it was way less expensive than buying yardage of a cotton print and plastic. And much more simple.

Ta da! My finished chairs. I adore them. They're bright and happy and now when the kids spill I can just wipe the tops right off! The kids love them too :) Some of the old chairs were getting a bit prickley on the tops and I had received a few "there's a sliver in my bum" complaints!

Isn't the black, white and turquoise a great combination?

I loved the color on the chairs so much that I decided to paint my pantry door too! :)

It felt so good to finish a project that makes my kitchen look better and makes my life easier at the same time. Thanks for stopping by. Hopefully I'll have some more projects to post soon.

Grace Notes Dickens Festival Trip

Before I knew Stan was coming home early the gal's I sing with called the Grace Notes had a trip to Salt Lake City planned. I didn't know if Stan would want to travel that soon after his long trip home from the Middle East, luckily he had a truck in SLC that he wanted to buy so we were able to kill two birds with one stone so to speak.

Here are me and the girls all dressed up and ready for our first performance.

Kia, Me, Shelly, Shelly and Celeste (who is about to pop as you can see) For those of you who don't know the Dickens Festival is an authentic 1800's themed Christmas festival. Everyone is in period dress and there are shops and booths to buy gifts and yummy food from. It's a fun Holiday tradition. Despite the fact that they didn't have enough mics for us I think our first performance went well.

At the very least it was lots of fun! 

On Sunday we had a performance scheduled up at Primary Children's Hospital. Stan and I left early and took the kids for a ride on the Trax.

 

We wanted to get to PCMC with enough time before the performance to see if our Favorite Nurse Nancy was on shift. When Todd was a baby he was Life Flighted to SLC and he stayed in the NICU for 2 months.You wouldn't even guess that now. So here is a picture of Todd meeting Nancy for the first time. He was so cute and gave her a great big hug. I think it's because we've told him about her so much and he's seen pictures so it was like he knew her already. It was very sweet :)

The kids really had fun ridding on the trax. What a bunch of hams!

We stayed in a hotel with an indoor pool and a breakfast buffet. It was a perfect little weekend getaway with Dad after his six month deployment. We all had a great time. Stan even got to bring home his new natural gas truck (new to us ;)  

Pvt. Dutton is Home!

Some of you may have heard by now that Stan's deployment was shortened by 7 months! That's right people...7 MONTHS! Because his unit's main duty was to help pack things up in Iraq they were all able to come home December 10th.

 As you can imagine Christmas came early for us this year. (the actual Christmas wasn't to shabby either). Since Stan has been home we've mostly just enjoyed being together as a family again. It's was nice to take some time off over the holidays, but now that it's January it's back to the real world again. Stan is back in school again this semester. And It's time for me to get our family going like a little well oiled machine again. I've missed writing on my blog, so posting regularly is one of my new year goals. Now that Stan's home I've been able to steel a few more minuets to my self here and there. I joined Pintrest a couple months ago and can I just say...I'M IN LOVE! I now have a whole list of projects I want to get done.

 My very first project was this yarn ball wreath. It's perfect for after the holidays and the red is in honor of Valentines Day :)

This project was super simple, but pretty time consuming. You need a wreath form (only 3.00 @ consumercrafts.com) Burlap to cover the form, foam balls, yarn and jute and lots and lots of hot glue.

First I cut the burlap into strips and glued and wrapped it around the wreath form. Then I wrapped the balls until the white wasn't showing anymore and then hot glued the end of the strand to the ball. Then I randomly glued balls starting with the larger sizes first. I love the way this wreath looks on the front of my house :) Now I need to re-stain the door! I'd better add that to the project list....

 My Aunt Suzanne and Uncle Brian came down to visit us a couple weeks ago,

 and Suzanne helped me buckle down and get it finished.

Thanks Suzanne xoxo

I also finished this earring organizer. 

This is something I've been wanting to make for a long time (even before Pintrest). I was searching for the perfect frame everywhere, when my friend Inger said I could have this one. I painted and antiqued it and then my hubby helped me staple some metal screen onto it.

It's so nice to have all my earrings right where I can see them. It's what I like to call "organizational art"!

Next up I have a serious make-over planned for my very worn out bar stools.

 I promise to post pics.



First Beach Trip of Summer 2011

These pictures are from our first trip to the lake after Stan flew out. It was nice to have my family down for the weekend. It helped my kids to not think about Daddy's deployment. We love the lake and we bought a state park pass this year so we could go as much as we wanted to. It was so worth it. We ended up going at least once a week and a couple of weeks even twice!

My Toddee digging a hole to China ;)

Or maybe just a little sitting pit?

Ok...I see the plan now.

Pack it on good and tight!

Take me for a ride Auntie Amber!

Gotta love Sand and Swimsuits up your bum ;)



Sophie says, I'm ready to go again....

Sunbathing with Pappa Todd

Who needs a swimsuit anyways?

Don't you just love baby bums?

 She looks like the coppertone baby with her little white behind.

200th POST!

Wow! On one hand I'm amazed that I've posted 200 times to my blog, and on the other hand I know it should be more like 400. I'll be honest with you, I really planned on having more time to post about my "Army Wife" life than this! Here's the bottom line....being a single Mom is very time consuming and quite frankly exausting. I really feel for all those single Mom's out there who are trying to do it all on their own. Especially if they have to add working on top of it. All in all my kids have been pretty good given the whole deployment situation. They got a little restless at the end of the summer. I think they (we) were all ready for school to start again and get a break from each other. I hoped the coming school year would keep us busy and that being busy would help the time pass a little faster. All I can say is be careful what you wish for! We have been busy and then some.....Since the begining of school the boys have started Karate and are loving it! The girls are doing dance and a fun music class once a week. I've recently been made a wolf cub scout leader and I teach my girls dance class and the age just above them. Oh... and I also lead the music in Relief Society ;) We try and Skype or chat with Stan online as much as we can. Being able to See Daddy face to face and hear his voice seems to make him feel not so far away. Even Sophie said, "Mom, It's not so hard as before (basic) to have Daddy gone to the Army camp because we can see him on the puter". so cute... My last post I promised pictures from Stan's farewell Luau so here they are. Happy 200th post day and thanks for reading!

Digital slideshow personalized with Smilebox

Saying,"good-bye".

I'm glad we've managed to stay busy. It's been 3 months since we said our Good-byes to our soldier daddy and I'm only just now posting these pictures. My Mom used her amazing skills and awesome camera to capture these great shots that I know we'll treasure forever. Now if we can just stay busy for 10 more months. Then I can post the amazing pictures of his HOMECOMING ;)

Our last hug....

As they walked through the flags their family could grab them for one last squeeze.

Layla wasn't really sure what was going on, but she didn't like it!

The boys were so brave. It wasn't until Stan was on the plane and we drove away from the airport that they broke down.

Doesn't he have a nice side profile?

Getting in as many hugs as we can.

Stuck like glue.

Getting in our kisses too! Notice how Layla wouldn't let him get one inch away from her.

I love, LOVE this picture. She's had the hardest time so far. Everyday at least once she breaks down for a second and says, " I miss Daddy".

That's Stan's Grandma Dutton in the back left corner. I thought this was a neat shot of her in the background looking on.

The last 3 months have been hard, but easy at the same time. When Stan went to basic we didn't have contact with him except for letters for weeks. And when he finally got phone time it was very random and short. These last 3 months we've been able to talk on the phone, use Facebook and Skype pretty much everyday. Using the video Chat has really helped. I constantly feel so blessed that I get to hear from him so often. Stan and I both have servicemen in our family blood lines. I draw so much strength by thinking of how strong they had to be when they were serving our country. Stan's Grandma Wright would wait 3 or 4 months to get a letter and then get a whole stack in one day. She would lay on her bed and read his letters for the rest of the day, and then still wonder if he was OK because of the delayed communication. I feel so blessed have renewed peace of mind everyday. My next post will be a bit out of order. I'm going to post some fun pictures from Stan's Farewell Luau.

The 4 month blogging hiatus ends!!!!

I'm sure my friends and family out there have just assumed that I fell off the face off the blogging earth. Really the last 4 months have been so crazy leading up to Stan's deployment that finding time to work on my blog was impossible. I can't believe how fast the time flew by between Stan coming home and his then leaving again. Stan's schooling, spending time with the kids and finishing our backyard were just a few of the things we had keeping us busy. My next few posts are going to be flashbacks to all the major stuff I missed while on my little break ;) Thanks to all my friends and family for the support and love we've felt this last week. For any of you that don't know we said good-bye to our wonderful, brave, soldier Daddy last Saturday. All things considering we've managed to stay pretty brave around here. I feel like the only way to get through this is to stay positive and busy. That's why I chose this background for my blog. It's patriotic and has major girl power! By the way I hung my kids new swing all by myself yesterday. NO MAN REQUIRED! lol I guess we're going to find out just how handy I am around here in the next 13 months....

Speaking of being handy and staying busy check out this beautiful wedding bouquet I was able to do for a good friend of mines younger sister. I've never done anything this modern before and it was a nice change of pace from the standard Martha Stewart ball bouquet. (I still love doing those too!) I have 2 weddings lined up for this summer already so I'm way excited about that. If anyone knows anyone getting married soon that doesn't have a florist picked out yet send them my way.

Valentine treasure hunt

Since Stan started school it has seemed like he's either at: school, working, doing homework, at scouts, doing homework, at the armory or DOING HOMEWORK! YUCK! I've been missing him so much. I've also been trying to not think about how the little time we have together before his deployment in June is being taken up by well....a whole lot of boring stuff! Today Stan had to leave for class around 6:30 this morning. He kissed me good-bye and left me a Valentine card on my nightstand. After he left I was so excited to read the card that I couldn't go back to sleep. After reading about his un-dying affliction (lol..have you seen the Little Rugrats movie?) for me. I noticed a little note at the bottom of the card that said, "Go put on some socks".

So expecting just a cute pair of socks (that I was seriously excited about, I have a sock fetish) I not only found 1, but 3 pair of adorable Valentine themed socks. With a note attached to them saying, "now go unload the dishwasher". I quickly ran downstairs and tore open the dishwasher to find......

This cute conversation heart letter. Now I know why he sent me that text last night asking me where I kept the glue gun. lol It was super cute. If you know my husband at all this is a huge stretch for him. I know he really had to think about this one. If he has a romance bone in his body, it's his pinkie toe. So you can imagine this completly made my day. My next clue was, "Now go do some laundry." I thought it was kind of ironic that he sent me to all my least favorite spots in the house. lol At least I'll have some fond memories to look back on the next time I'm sorting through dirty under-oos. This is what I found in the washing machine.....

A great big box of yummy Valentine chocolates. You can never go wrong with chocolate!

I love you sweetheart! Thanks for a fun Valentine surprise:)