Bookmark Tongue in Cheek Tuesday

While all of blog land is shedding pounds, eating healthy, re-doing crafting rooms and WOman caves, I've been sitting on my rear-end seemingly doing nothing but making every fat laden main course and delicious looking dessert on my Pinterest boards.

I've cleaned out some kitchen drawers and rearranged some messy piles of stuff, but it's not anything picture worthy.

I started a dining room redo in February.  And then abandoned a dining room redo.

Where is Spring?!?!?  I'm putting all my hopes and crafting dreams in the belief that once I don't have to look at snow I'll want to create.

Last Fall my son wanted some book marks.  Before I was a blogger I would of just ripped a piece of paper out of something for him, maybe bought a trendy one at WalMart or taught him how to fold over the page corner.  Taboo, I know. 

Rusty old razor blade is a must have

But those are not good enough anymore when your mom blogs.  No siree.

You have to take to the internet and find out what the other blog moms are doing for their kids' book marks.  There are some really cute ones out there, but I didn't want him to get beat up.  (I couldn't find the original inspiration, but this one is pretty close at Green Paper).

There are also more awesome versions of the ones I made, but honestly I wasn't *THAT* into what they looked like.

I picked up these old Readers Digest books in a free bin.  I have lots of them that belonged to my parents, but I wasn't about to slice those up.  Free ones I'm not emotionally attached too are fine.

The process was very simple;
Razor blade the spine off, remove the fabric part of the spine from the book board, and Mod Podge it on to some card stock.  The only embellishing I did was with an old leather boot lace cut to pieces for the top.

The Podge as it dries

Let it dry.  Mine seemed to take forever - I must of used too much Podge.  I am not a Mod Podge Queen like Ms. Doos, I need her to give me lessons.  If it takes over a week to dry does that mean I used too much?

Flatten them under a heavy book.  If you try to do this before they dry they will stick. Duh.

A week of watching glue dry is a good way to develop patience, so don't use so much Mod Podge.

Old leather boot laces become the top tassel

Not only did my son like how they turned out, his older sister asked if she could have one too.  Completely free, unless you count the tiny bit of Mod Podge.  (I do question that *tiny bit* part).

I reused the spineless books too, they still sit in this same location except the table now looks like this.....

You can click over if you would like to see the table transformation.

Now that you have a bookmark semi-tutorial, you can "bookmark" next Tuesday as the third month of Tongue in Cheek Tuesday.

 

TICT has been revamped to debut as a once a month link party, but the rules are still lax, I mean really there are no rules.  We found out in February that lots of wonderful bloggers are pretty funny and would love to join in, but a little button only holds so many names.

Danni our design guru makes all the buttons, (insert clapping here) and notice she went with green for March.  (I wasn't sure she was ever going to run out of St. Patricks Day crafts).

Danni also posted all the information about Tongue in Cheek Tuesday, which I am going to pirate half of here, I mean seriously why should I reinvent the wheel right?

From Silo Hill Farm:

 I'm inviting all of my readers to join in a little fun next week.  The last two were so much fun, and so many people expressed interest in joining us, we've decided to turn it into a once a month link party.  Link on 1, be seen on all 5.  It's all in good fun and it's about making fun of ourselves.

The topic..... we're going to dish out some dirt, our own!  We're going to be sharing where we keep our junk.  We don't really have any rules, like you have to post a button or you have to follow us or any jumping through hoops.  Of course we'd love it if you did those things, (especially jumping through hoops - if you do that include a picture) but really we don't take ourselves too seriously.

If you want to join in we'd love to have you.  Just write up a post poking fun at your junkiest area and link it up at any of the following blogs on Tuesday March 12th.

Everyone's got a little Junk in their trucks, 

(or purse, or corner, or drawer, or on a table, or.....)  come share yours.

Kirb Appeal

Bliss Ranch

Silo Hill Farm

Mellywood's Mansion

Simply Vintageous....by Suzan

   


So there 'ya have it.  A bookmark to bookmark next Tuesday.  For me the problem will be narrowing down what trunk of junk I'm gonna make fun of myself about!

Linking up to Christina at IGottaCreate and the Wildly Original Party
Inspiration Gallery @CraftyScrappyHappy
Catch as Catch Can @MyRepurposedLife
Inspired Creations @EmbracingChange 
Under $100 Link Party @BeyondThePicketFence 
Saturday Night Special "Crafts" @Funky Junk Interiors

Avoiding my dining room redo with a bathroom tour

When I start a new project it goes one of two ways.... stay up for 48 hours working on it or leave it sit for a couple weeks... or five.  My latest project unfortunately is the latter.

"If" I had a vision for what I was doing on the dining room redo, I've lost it.

So in place of a dining room reveal, how about a tour of a bathroom.  I'm not cleaning it first so if you look hard you'll see dust.

Brawn's first attempt at poured concrete counters are in this guest bathroom.  Saved a bundle on his idea.

The floors are natural stone that match the pillars in our dining room as well as our family room fireplace.  The pottery is made by one of my kids, not sure which one, but I have narrowed it down to either #3 or #4.

Recall that little chest, I got it for I think $5.00 and gave it an up-doo - it had trains on it.  Now it holds my chalk paint and waxes, because isn't the bathroom where everyone keeps their paint supplies?   I use the little chair to sit and read to a certain 2 year old in training.  Last week she wanted to come in and read to me.  Cracked. Me. Up.

Our house has lots of rustic decor.  I love the white, crisp French look, I just don't have any of it.

This bathroom used to lead out to a deck that went to our pool.  When the kids were small they could access the bathroom without dripping water across the whole house, and all the pegs would hold the wet towels.  Now they hold tools.  You can still walk out on to a deck, but it no longer leads to the pool unless you jump over a railing and plunge 10 feet down.

The knobs went in the basket till I found something to do with them.  I may never move them.  We have a card playing friend who asks every time he uses that bathroom "what's the deal with the old door knobs?".  

He never asks about the vintage package of toilet paper.

I picked up this can last year at Junk Bonanza.  It would be great for so many things, but I parked it there for trash, and that's where it stayed.

 The legs on the vanity are from one of our Christmas trees that Brawn de-barked.

And while you are sitting and relaxing, this old original movie poster is directly in front of you.  The writing gives you something to read, unless a 2 year old insists on reading Walter the Farting Dog to you.

He held his knife at the frontiers throat....it's treasure in his arms!  Ah ha ha ha ha, old Hollywood is funny.

Linking up to a budget decorating party with Creative Cain Cabin
Open House Party @NoMinimalistHere

Guest Post at Kirb Appeal

The end of the weekend brings the last of my guest posts.  I'm over at Kirb Appeal holding down the fort at Brandywine while Kirby is in New York.   (Well actually I'm on my couch blowing my nose, but pretend would 'ya).

I was pretty mischievous at her place while she was gone, so you might want to make note of that in case you ever think of asking me to house sit for you.

And what does this old cash register have to do with my guest post over at Kirby's?  Absolutely nothing.

Some of the photos I used on her blog have swear words in them (shocking I know) and I didn't want to put that profanity on my own blog, so I'm using my antique candy store cash register as something to look at while you're here.

As I continue to wallow in self pity because I have a head of snot, pop over to KirbAppeal and smart off at Kirby, or me, or both. 

Guest Post at My Life As A Thrifter

Yesterday I had a guest post on a file cabinet makeover with Gail at MyRepurposedLife, and my guesting duties are not over yet, which is timely considering I have a head of alien snot and don't feel like moving off my couch.

Libation Station after a stain wash to tone down the purple

This weekend I'm getting around - on the internet only - and today I have a guest post with Holly at LifeAsAThrifter.  Holly just welcomed a new baby boy, so stop over and pinch his cute cheeks.

While you are there you can see the - up until now, never before seen, BACK side of my dresser bar.

Back when it was purple, yuck

That's right, 7 months later, you can finally see the reveal of the graphic that I painted on the back.  I used the logo from a local beer made at the Schells Brewery here in Minnesota.

And just in case you think I'm getting up off the couch any time soon, I'll have you know I have another guest post for tomorrow.  They just all happened to post within a day of each other.

If my cold ever goes away I'll come back to my own blog.

Guesting At MyRepurposedLife

How do you say it in the blogging world, 'taking a bloggy break'?  Yeah, that's it, I'm taking a bloggy break, because that sounds much nicer than the truth ... which is that the past week I've been tending to a head full of snot and sleeping every chance I get.

I live a glamorous life.

So, if you want to pretend I'm in tip top shape and not blowing my nose and hacking,  head over and say hello to Gail at MyRepurposedLife where you will see what I did to that rusty old file cabinet while I was healthy.

 Hint - I turned it into simple storage for my daughters cake tester supplies.

Cake Tester by daughter #2

The Dining Room Gets Painted

Coming soon to a dining room near ME........  

"The Transformation Begins".

You probably don't know, (but I'm about to tell 'ya) that I started blogging a year ago with the intention of redoing my dining room.  Lots of pine was really in need of an update.

It took a year but the dining room is now sporting some new paint, two shades to be exact.

Sherwin Williams Perfect Greige and the darker Spalding Grey.

Around these parts I'm pretty well known for not being able to pick paint colors. I suppose when you end up repainting a room three colors in the course of two days, the reputation is deserved.

So what did I do this time to get it right on the first roll?  I gave Brawn a handful of several variations and let him pick.   Of course I had someone else narrow those variations down for me, {thanks Kimberly}, so really I didn't pick any of the color, and that's why we only had to paint once.

I wanted something warm that complimented all the stones in our house.  I would love to pull together more of a cottage look, but I don't see that happening.  Depending on the lighting, the Spalding Grey can be more of a grey tone or brown - same with the greige.

We (Brawn) also painted the trim white.  He sacrificed his back for mine.

He is also a master paint tray craftsman.......

No  paint tray?  No problem!  Just cut an antifreeze jug in half and dip in your roller.

The paint's really been hitting the walls around here.  While this was going down, daughter #2 was painting her room, and son #3 was painting the boys bathroom.

Everyone must have Winter fever, that's the kind that makes you delusional from being cooped up and you pretend it's Spring.

I just hope I'm not posting a year from now telling you that we finally finished the dining room transformation!  Just shoot me if we are still working on it in June.

Some Honey's From Hey Girl

It's time for the Hey Girl Valentine link party features.  The party will come to a close on Sunday.  Participation has been so wonderful we wanted to give people a few more days to link.  Believe me, we'll be reading them!  I have to say I'm sad to see it end.  Each morning with coffee in hand,  I start the day with a smile reading all the links.  Next week will be so boring.

 They were all good.  They all made me smile.  

Babies, husbands, pets, and celebrities.
Sweet ones, touching ones, funny ones.
A few bare chests.

Each one Hey Girl'd with love.

I had a hard time picking, so I went with what spoke to me at the moment.

Wills Casa

 I stayed in my jammies and read blogs.  Because just like the photo says, those blogs weren't gonna read themselves!

Brawn would come home at night and I would want to tell him all about my day in blog land. 

Redoux Interiors

I knew I couldn't feature all 166 and counting links, so I wrote some of them down.

The Charming Zebra

 First I had the top 32.

"32 is still too many Bliss".

I had breakfast, lunch and dinner at the computer trying to pick.

Grasping for Objectivity

Even a cute baby can't deliver the truth any less harsh.

I got those 32 down to 10. 

The Backyard Bungalow

And the more I read, the more I wanted to add more.  And more.  And more.

It All Started With Paint

And I made an observation......... all the hey girl men have the most excellent smiles.  Young or not as young, they really all looked like the nicest guys! 

Debbie Doos Hey Girl'd By Me, Myself & I - Bliss Ranch
I should add Miss Doos did not endorse this photo,
nope I think Mike framed it instead. HA!

Some were so true they were absolutely profound......

Renew, Create, Restore

And clever, oh so many of you were clever.

I'm Sharon With You

Speaking of paints, I mean pants... just what is that coming out of those jeans?

Gemini Vintage

That one just made me laugh, and it wasn't the saying.  Gemini Vintage didn't notice the wayward "thing".  Leave it to me to point it out.

But at the end of each day I kept coming back to one.
One that made me giggle each time.

Only a dog could upstage all those handsome men and cute babies.......

Decor and the Dog

Thanks to everyone who linked up at one of the host blogs

 Ashley @ Domestic Imperfection

Bliss at Bliss Ranch
Chelsea at Two Twenty One

Kelly at The View Along The Way

Michelle at Decor and the Dog

I hope you all had as much fun reading as I did.  

Hands down one of the funnest link parties ever!

Happy Valentines Day to My own Hunk-of-burning-love

And how about a great shout out for Bliss Ranch from iVillage.... they have a whole Valentine thing going on for all the pregnant mama's out there and included a link to our Hey Girl party.  If you need some more laughs check it out, some pretty hunky model guys Hey girl'n expectant women.

Debbie Doos Get's Hey Girl'd

Just last night I posted about my wonderful lemon bars, and here I am doing another post less than 24 hours later.  What-up with that Bliss?

What on earth could posses me to do something so out of character?  Well you see, Miss Doos , as in DebbieDoos did a little teasing on me when she posted her Copy Cat Challenge features, and I can't let that go by now can I? 

So in keeping with the spirit of the Hey Girl link party (still going on by the way), I pirated without permission, these photos of Debbie and her handsome husband Mike - right off her very own blog.

Debbie must go through a gallon of mod podge a month, so it's only fitting Mike noticed this about her from the very beginning.

I'm willing to bet he knows if he stands still too long, he might get mod podged right in place.

And I am also certain he knows that nothing is off limits from her mod podge brush.

Of COURSE I'm linking this up to the Hey Girl party, I only wish I would of thought of it sooner!