If I Can Just Find A Lamp!

I got to writing my post for some quick mommy alone time this morning and, "BUMP", I heard my 4 year old jump out of his bed to call me to help him get out of his pull up and get dressed. So I took a break from my post for a few and now I'm back! 

Yesterday I was feeling a little under the weather so my husband rented a movie for me as a surprise. He rented Mom's Night Out. I sat up and watched it last night and it was cute. It was a little far fetched in some areas and cheesy in others, but overall it was cute and had a nice message that sorta hit home with me in a bunch of ways. I won't give away the story line too totally much but one point it made was that being a mom and taking care of her young is enough and important. When I was working outside the home I always used to say I could never be a stay at home mom (and I thought it for all different kinds of reasons!). Isn't it funny the things we say and the words we eat? I didn't want to be home and thought I would do horribly at it if ever I had the choice. I'm home with my children and have been for a while. Some days I feel as though I am failing miserably and others I feel pretty good at it. For the most part it feels good but it took a while to get to the point of being okay staying home taking care of our children. Anyhow, no matter what your job is, it's important, and as long as you do your best at it I think that's all that really matters!

As far as decorating goes, I LOVE this lamp shade below. I purchased it at Ross three years ago because it matched the rug and curtains in our play room. I just can't seem to find the right floor lamp to go with it. If anyone sees a nice simple floor lamp, let me know! I am on the hunt!     

Now it's time to run to the school because my hubs called - my oldest left his back pack and lunchbox at home by the back door. One thing I can say about being a mommy, whether you are working full time outside of the home OR if you're home with the kids, being a mom and having all the mom duties never ends! I better get to the school! Have a great day!

Lamp - Meant For Play Room But Now In Dining Room!

I'm excited! My parents gave me my Birthday present early and here it is! They asked me if I wanted it early or not and I said either way. What the heck if it's early! YAY for them coming to visit and YAY for them bringing it early. I love it!

 

 

I'm not sure if it will stay in this spot permanently yet or not. It was supposed to be for the play room but the kids still play lots of basketball in there so we're holding of on putting it there. Many objects in our house seem to be interchangeable from room to room - this lamp could go in several different rooms really, but I think it fits here!

 

 

 

Below is our cozy little reading nook with the new lamp added! What decorations or things have you gotten for one room but then decided they worked in a different room? Hope this finds you doing well!

 

 

Trying To Decide On Lamps

They say a  creative mind is a crazy one. Hmm. That includes indecisive, right? I've got THAT covered. I am so indecisive! My mind is always going on high gear and trying to change things until things are settled, which can be very annoying. I have this thing too where I come up with ideas for something, may it be a craft or piece of art or anything that you make with your hands, and I get stuck because I am simply fascinated by the mere fact that there are so many options and solutions to the final result.

So here it is folks. I got this lamp and told you I would show you a few posts ago. I got two of these lamps actually. I like them but sadly am already thinking about what I can do with them and how I can change them up. They're brand stinking new and I am already scheming on what color to paint them. This kind of thinking is why I rarely get projects done in any organized fashion. I spread myself thin and think of different ways to do EVERYTHING. I need to break out of that!

Honestly, does this lamp look Grandpa-ish? OR could it look beachy? I am considering giving it a nice cool coat of light blue to stand out more against the wall.  Whaddayathink?

Any opinion whatsoever?

Cute Find At Good Will

I have a confession to make. I hate clothes shopping and if I go out looking for clothes I usually end up looking at house stuff instead. I never did show you the $7.00 lamp I found at Good Will. I could prolly be on What NOT To Wear for my dislike of clothes shopping. I have the best intentions but fail miserably when I have to go buy clothes. 

So anyway, about the lamp - I thought I was going to spray paint it to change it up but I left it as is because I thought it was sooooo cute. I never used to go to Good Will for house things but you CAN find some neat things if you look hard enough! It goes great in our son's bedroom. It matches perfectly and if I ever want to change it up, I will! I especially like the whimsical shape of it. So what kind of things have you found?

Cover A Lamp Shade With Fabric

How are you? It has been a VERY busy week and a VERY busy weekend. I am sitting here doing one of my favorite things. I'm sitting watching HGTV and eating popcorn in peace and quiet. I adore our children and feel blessed to have them but some days it's just nice after they go to bed. If you have kids, you might understand. ; )

The week was jam packed with work, soccer practice, two games over the weekend and lots of yard work and oh a trip to the Urgent Care late one night because our almost two year old dislocated his arm. I think I have a few more gray hairs after this week. 

So I must share a fun project that got me into blogging! Do you notice all the awesome lamp shades in stores these days? I really like them and would take home so many lamps if I.) I had room and 2.) I had the money. A lot of the lamps and lamp shades I have seen are outrageous in price, which I just cannot see spending, especially if I can do it myself! 

 

 

So all you need to do this project is a neutral lamp shade, preferably white or offwhite, the fabric of your choice, adhesive spray in a can, a pencil and fabric scissors! It's so easy and so much fun. Be sure to do it outside!

 

 

Play with your fabric and position it around the lamp. Lay it on a table and using a pencil, roll the shade and mark the fabric with a pencil. Leave about an inch wider than the lamp. Using fabric shears, cut the fabric, spray the adhesive on and wrap the fabric to fit the shade. Spray the shade and lay the fabric. You can smooth out the fabric as you go. It's so easy to fix too because the fabric is very forgiving. The glue is tacky so you can pull the fabric off and easily re-stretch it if you need to! You'll need about a quarter of an inch on top and bottom to wrap the edges over the shade. Let the shade dry overnight. You'll have an awesome new shade when you're finished! Do you think you'll try this? I'd love to hear if you do!

 

Lightning Lighting

It's Tuesday night but for me it's like Wednesday night this week b/c I've got a 3 day weekend coming up. Yippee! I wanted to say thank you to all new followers and anyone who reads along! It is sincerely appreciated. I have many different simple projects I am working on and I post as often as I can! Here's a sneak peek at my last little project.

It has been a good week although I must be getting "blonder" with age. It's either that or "baby brain" that has gotten the best of me lately, I'm just not sure! Sunday I embarrassed myself terribly. I pulled out of the garage to run errands after being home for a little while from grocery shopping and drove up the street waving to several of my neighbors. When I got to the end of the street I stopped at the stop sign and then looked in my rear view mirror and realized I had a 12 pack of double rolls of tp sitting on top of my trunk. Now all our neighbors know what brand of toilet paper we're using. Leave it to me to be a lame brain! I guess it could have been worse but how embarrassing, and now I'm sharing it with you guys! Oh well, I'm sure I gave all my neighbors a laugh, I know I was laughing!

Oh I forgot to tell you that I saw Disney CARS II. Our son loved it. I kinda prefer CARS in Radiator Springs myself because of the charm but it was fun. One cool thing was that we saw someone driving a DeLorean (a replica of the Back to the Future car) in the parking lot before we saw the movie. That added to the excitement of seeing another CARS movie! 

On the CARS note, I did another small thing for the boys in the CARS theme. I felt like they needed a night light in their bathroom so I covered a night light with leftover fabric from the CARS pennant project http://keepitsimpleyay.blogspot.com/2011/06/so-super-psyched-about-cars-ii.html. Their bathroom decor is very simple so this was a small touch that added a little color that even jives with the wall color. I picked up a night light at AC Moore. You can follow the directions in my post http://keepitsimpleyay.blogspot.com/2011/01/easy-modern-fabric-night-light.html about covering a night light with fabrics and making it your own. 

I used Krylon Easy-Tack spray-on adhesive to glue the fabric down.You want to get the night light shade a little damp with the adhesive and then position the fabric over the shade, pushing out any bubbles or lumps to stick it down to the shade.

 My little paper night light is ready to be covered.

I didn't cut a particular shape out of the fabric, I just cut enough to cover the shade and then positioned it, pressing and smoothing out bumps and lumps.

After the fabric was stuck to the shade I used my sewing scissors and cut around the edges, leaving about a half an inch of fabric on all the sides. Lastly I rolled the fabric over the edges to hide them.

I look like I need a V-8 here but I think it turned out to be a nice little addition!

Go Lightning!

Easy, Modern Fabric Night Light

I got sidetracked, yet again, with another little project! Today I decorated a simple night light with fabric for the baby's room! I say sidetracked because it wasn't on my list of goals for 2011 but I'll be doing this from time to time or A LOT of the time. I have covered a lamp shade in the past and LOVED how that worked out so I thought this would be fun too. I'll be sharing the lamp shade project sometime too. I've got more of these to do!

A while back I replaced most of the night lights in the house with the new LED ones so we wouldn't have to change out light bulbs as often, and just like with the Christmas LED lights, I'm just not terribly crazy about them. We've gotten used to the "outer space" kind of glow of the LED night lights, but they aren't very warm and for a baby's room, it is hard to see what you're doing in the middle of the night.


On to the night light and I warn you... there are lots of pictures! 

I picked up a plain white night light at AC Moore last weekend. They're pretty cheap, especially with a coupon. As for the fabric, I already had the fabric! It's dark brown with light blue Polka Dots! I bought it on sale a while back thinking I could use it as curtains in the baby's room when he's a little older. The walls are a bright green so this fabric should be a good contrast!

I played around with the placement of the fabric before doing anything. I didn't want the dots to line up perfectly; instead I wanted it to be casual, yet feel symmetrical as a whole.

After deciding the placement of the fabric, I flipped the shade and fabric over. Starting from left to right of the shade, I traced it, marking the fabric and rolling the shade as I went.

 

I then cut the shape out of the fabric leaving about a half inch border around my pencil marks.

I cut two slits under the metal prongs.

I stepped outside to spray the lamp shade with the spray adhesive below. 

 

Once the spray was on, I began sticking the fabric onto the shade and rubbed it, smoothing out any wrinkles or bubbles. The adhesive is tacky and if you find you need more, it's okay to spray on more.

Once I smoothed all the bumps and bubbles, I cut the edges a little more, so I had about a quarter inch edge. You may want to make sure you have a little more than that to wrap your edges though.

Lastly, I wrapped the edges and cut slits in all four corners so they would fold and stick to the shade more easily.

 

I'm happy with the results! It's a nice, clean looking night light that serves its purpose well! It is a big safety factor, not to mention it was a cheap and easy little addition to the room!

Oh yes, I washed the fabric before I used it for this project!