Category Archives: Crafts

$16 DIY Play Tent

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img_5394We wanted to build a cool tent for the girls. I looked all over Pinterest for something we could build. I found all sorts of great ideas. The first plan was a frame made from pvc pipes but I couldn’t find what I needed locally so I moved on to plan B.

img_5417This was so easy to build. I went to our home hardware store and found a nice young man to help me locate the wood I would need. We decided on two 2×1″ 8 foot pieces of lumber which they cut in half for me. So I ended up with 4 2×1″ 4 foot pieces. Then we went to another aisle and grabbed a four foot 3/4″ dowel. The frame cost me $14 and change.

I then went to our thrift store and found a nice pink single flat bedsheet for a couple of dollars.

To build the frame take a 3/4″ spade drill bit and after marking 6″ down from the top of each board drill holes in all four boards. Make sure they are centred. Make and X with two boards and shove the dowel through it, do the same on the other end.

img_5386We don’t have carpet so the wood just slides open so we screwed the frame together. If you want to be able to store your tent you can also add a stiff strap across the top of the Aframe at the width you want it so it can fold up. Or use bolts instead of screws for easy removal.

img_5535Next measure your frame. You want to measure the distance of the dowel between the two AFrames (red line), this will be how wide you want to hem your sheet. Next measure from the bottom of the AFrame up to the dowel and double that number (blue line), and add 3.5″. This will be the length of your hemmed sheet, and bottom pocket. My final hemmed measurements were 40.5×92″.

img_5537 Continue reading →

Ikea Kura Bed Climbing Wall Hack

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wallMy kids are climbers. They climb anything and everything. My four year old in particular. We also live in an apartment so we are limited on what we can build inside of our home. So I came across an Ikea hack of creating a rock wall on the Ikea Kura Bed. However it was just a photo with the supply list, so I kind of made it up as I went.

cuttingHere is my supply list

  • 3/4″ Piece of plywood with at least one good side. Cut to 41″ x 45″
  • 6 – 3/8″ bolts/nuts. The bolts we used are 4″ long and hang out about 1/2″. I think 3.5″ would work too.
  • 12 – 3/8″ Washers for bolts (one on either side of wood)
  • 12 Climbing Holds (I bought 2 packages of these from Canadian Tire, but you can buy real climbing holds also).
  • A drill, and a hammer, and different drill bits.

 

 

boltingI started by going to our local Kents Hardware store, grabbing my 3/4″ plywood and having them cut it right there at the store since we don’t own tools beyond a drill. Then I located my hardward. All of that cost me a little over $40.

My original plan was to buy actual rock climbing holds and multiple tnuts so we could easily move the rocks around the plywood. But with what we wanted and with what our budget was the playground holds were the cheaper option. You can still move these ones around, just not as easily.

DrillingSo here is what you do.

  1. We first held the board up to the bed and drilled 6 holes through the plywood and the bed railings. Make sure you are far enough away from any screws in the bed. We did 2 on either side and two img_5005along the top. After that we took it back out and took it outside.
  2.  Now we marked where we wanted our climbing holds to go and with a 1/4″ drill bit we drilled 12 holes in the wall.
  3. Flip the board over so you are looking at the back side of it, and hammer in the barrel nuts that come with the climbing holds. We actually had some issues with this. The barrel nuts didn’t fit well so we had to go back over the holes and widen them a bit.
  4. screwing in Flip the board back over and start screwing your holds back oninto the wall. We used both a hand held screw driver and our electric drill. The large bolts go into the barrel nuts (make sure you add your washers), and then you screw in the smaller screws to keep them from spinning.
  5. Take your board back in to the bedroom line it up and bolt it to the bed. Add washers on both sides of the bolts to make it more secure (or something, I have no idea. We actually forgot on some of them).
  6. Let Kids climb
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    img_5086    img_5085

 

 

Kool-aid Ice Dying

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ice dying

set upI have been wanting to try ice dying for a while now. A few years ago I made play scarfs for Capri for Christmas and they are one of our most used toys. That method involves boiling water and is not very kid friendly. Usually with ice dying you use actual dyes that are not safe for little ones to be using, so I decided to grab one more play silk to dye with kool-aid and ice (kool-aid doesn’t work on cotton just as an FYI).

We grabbed a foil roasting pan and cut some slits in the bottom, and put it on top of the lid that it came with with a bowl in the lid to keep the tin pan raised up. This allows koolaidthe ice to melt through and the scarf to not sit in dye water.

After soaking our silk scarf in a vinegar water solution we laid it in the pan and covered it in ice. Thankfully we have an ice machine so this was easy for prep.

Once the scarf was covered in ice we grabbed our kool-aid packages.  The girls each spread a few packages across our ice and I used the last couple to fill in any blank spots.

waitingSince it was a windy cool day we did our project inside which meant the ice melted slower. If it was not windy out we would have done it outside in the sun which would have speed up the process.

And the waiting game began. I had little girls climbing all over my table trying to stick their fingers in the ice and lick the kool-rinseaid powder off (now it is important to note you have to use un-sweetened kool-aid so I am sure this did not taste good).

After the ice melted for the majority and all of the dye was on the scarf we took it out of the pan and rinsed it in cool water until the water ran clear.

After that we hung it outside to dry.

 

drying And this is our final product

finished

We buy our silk scarves from The Dharma Trading Company. 

Getting My Craft On

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Finished

When the New Year was approaching I kept seeing people talking about their word for the coming year (2014), I had never thought of doing this before but I decide to give it a go. I could not decide on a word, I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to focus on, or at least how to bring it down to one word. But the more I thought about it the more I realized that our word for the year as a family is, “wait”. If you read my last post, you would know that Stefan and I just finished up our last service as the Pastor’s of our church, and now we wait and send out resumes in search of our new jobs in a new church. So our word is wait. And the perfect Bible verse that I have been going back to over and over again is Psalms 27:14, and I decide it needed to be put up on our wall so we could see it everyday as we wait. Here is a quick tutorial on how I made it.

framesFirst I had my awesome husband design it for me, because my artistic skills resemble a preschoolers.  Next I picked up 4 8×10 canvases from the dollar store, and I painted the edges black with some acrylic paint.

I printed off the pictures and cut them to fit the canvases, and pulled out my hand dandy bottle of Mod Podge. Because our printer is an ink jet printer I knew that if I used the Mod Podge on top of the prints that the colour would bleed, so I only used it on the back of the paper. If you want to coat the top of the paper as well you need to use a laser printer (most print shops use laser, or if your printer uses toner you will be fine as well).

hair dryerI painted on a thin layer of Mod Podge onto the canvas and smooth the paper out. With all 4 of them I ended up with bubbles and wrinkles, but after taking a hair dryer to them they flattened out and took on a bit of the canvas texture which was cool.

After they dried and the kids woke up the next morning I got Stefan to hang the canvases on the wall for me. I love them and I think they look great. It was a fairly quick project to do, and even though it is not perfect I love it.

So find some inspirational words or pictures and create your own canvas artwork for your home.

Spray Paint Fun

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I love going to the thrift store and finding awesome items. I love even more taking those items and spray painting them to add a pop of color. So for the last few months I have been waiting for nice weather to spray paint some items I had picked up over the Winter. So here are some photos for your enjoyment.

Doll Desk with Chalk Board Top

desk before

desk after

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Headband Holder for Girls

before

after

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mirror (still need to put it together)

mirror before

mirror after

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Touched up the Pink High Chair (This was originally painted 2 years ago but I needed to touch it up. You can see the whole process of the chair here)

high chair beforehigh chair after

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Process