Monday, 15 April 2013

Tin Makeover

Today I finally accomplished a little formula tin makeover that I've wanted to do for some time now.

As a mum of a 7 moth old bub I had a few formula tins lying around that I really wanted to repurpose. And so I have been cleaning them and storing them until I figure out how they could be repurposed into something more useful.

It just so happened that one random night when I was putting the dishwasher on that it occurred to me that I did actually have a use for one of those old formula tins.

You see I have an occurring problem with the dish washing powder coming out to fast, thus overspilling into the dispenser causing an excessive amount of powder to clog up the dispenser hinge stopping me from closing the lid.

As the formula tins have scoops with them it would make placing the correct amount of powder into the dispenser easier. I would no longer have to use that old paintbrush to brush away the excess powder in order for me to close the dispensers lid.

And so I got to work....

I grabbed one formula tin, a stanley knife, a ruler, some scrap booking paper, a blank label, some double sided tape and some contact.

 
I simply cut the scrap booking paper to the size of the tin








Stuck it on with double sided tape to hold it in place.








I then stuck the blank label in position at the front.








Then I covered it all with a layer of contact








And to finish I used the stanley knife to neaten up all the edges.









And there you have it.. my new dish washing powder tin!



Once a baby formula tin on the way out to the bin ... now an up cycled storage tin that lives under our sink getting used each and every day!

I'm so happy as to how this one turned out that I'm now looking around the home trying to find any excuse to make another. And I'm sure I'll do so as these tins could be used to store a variety of items all over the home - Kitchen for tea and coffee, Toy Room for crayons, Bathroom to store soap or hair accessories... the list would go on and on... perhaps I should give bubs more formula... I might need more tins..lol


Enjoy






Tuesday, 26 March 2013

Easter Gift Idears

Well with Easter only a couple of days away now I'm super excited as it's our little misses first and our very first as a completed family. I've been browsing the web in search for the perfect gifts for our little ones. Lets face it we really don't want to be filling our 2 year old and 7month old's basket with a heap of chocolate. So what does the Easter bunny like to give younger kids for Easter??
Take a look at my favourite picks below. I'll be giving not only our little ones a few of these but also the youngsters amongst our extended family these gifts rather than chocolate this year.

GIFTS FOR BABY
1. A gorgeous Jellycat Bashful Beige Bunny (from LimeTree Kids)


2. A bunny Rattle (from Peti Luxe)


3. A Bunnykins security blanket (we got ours from Target)


4. Some supper soft cute slippers (these ones were $6 from Best and Less)


5. A Baby Record Book. There are many beautiful first year book's available from a variety of book stores, Kmart, Target or Big W.



Looking for something DIY...

Why not sew up one of these adorable little bunny softies using the tutorial and pattern from the very talented Melanie over at The Crafty Cupboard.



GIFTS FOR TODDLERS
1. A Melamine egg shaped plate ( we got ours from Myer)


2. Egg shaped Chalk (we purchased ours from The Reject Shop)

3. Any Easter or bunny themed book. (Ours are 'Snuggle Time' and  'Snuggle Bunny' both purchased from Target)


4. You can find a variety of Easter/bunny themed PJ's in stores right now but we love these from Snugglebum.




5. A growing egg. I can not wait to see our toddlers face when he sees the little chick hatch from the egg. ( I purchased ours from Spotlight and are also available in blue)


Looking for something DIY...
Try making some pretty home made play dough in soft shades of lemon, strawberry and lime just like featured by Ness over at her wonderful blog One Perfect Day


So tell us.. What little gifts will fill up your kid's baskets this Easter?

Until next time smile, take care and be happy

Tuesday, 19 March 2013

Our Girls Nursery Makeover

Well its been 7 months since our little girl graced us with her presence and now its time to move her into her own room. Yes I admit I'm a bit selfish when it comes to bubs and I really find comfort in having them in our room. Our first bub Lachlan stayed in with us till he was 8 months old. However as our little miss is now sitting and pulling herself up it is no longer safe for her to be in her crib and so the fun of setting up her own room begins.
 
Before I started I did many hours of research (Pinterest browsing). I found so many ideas and wanted to do them all! Of course this was just not practical and the bank balance would never allow for it. So I started of with what we already had.
 
I had purchased a lovely cabinet a while back in the hope to turn it into a sewing storage space however since us moving it has not been used as all my sewing goods are still in boxes (disgraceful I know). So since it was sitting there empty I decided why not give it some love and use it as a change table. It works perfectly.
 

Next was to purchase a cot. Ever since having our first 2 and a half years ago I wanted a sleigh cot. So as our girl is our last bub I took the now or never approach and got what I wanted. I wasn't disappointed! I had a great little helper to put the cot together and it was relay simple.   
My little helper
Our little Miss exploring her cot
I purchased a tree wall decor stickers to put up on her wall. I really don't know how I was lead to believe that this was going to be an easy task. All I'll say is that I'm a person with a lot of patients nevertheless this put me to the test. Fiddly, annoying and grrr worthy is my conclusion.



Wall sticker not playing nice... crinkling
and bubbling at every opportunity
I survived and managed not to swear in front of the very repetitive Mr LJ. There was however a lot of cursing going on inside my head. None the less the tree and birds looks wonderful and I'm very glad I spent the day to put it up.


We were given spare birds so I found a home for them along the bottom of our blind. I also found a gorgeous dona setting from Target that matched perfectly for her cot.

 
In the corner above her cot I added two tissue paper pom poms along with a birdcage that I had purchased from Kmart some time ago. And to complete her cot area I hung up the netting that was once over my bed as a baby.




As our kids are lucky enough to have there very own toy room there was no need to have toy storage in Charlotte's room. However I decided to added a little play picnic corner to house some of her teddies along with her picnic tea set and a gorgeous vintage tray. I can see our little miss enjoying a picnic tea on her rug with her teddies sometime in the distant future.
 
 
And so there you have it.. our little girls nursery.
I'm sure it will be forever evolving as she grows but for now I adore this space and can not help but grin each and every time I enter the room.
 
Next job... to finish organising her wardrobe. Stay tuned!
 
 
 Till next time stay safe, be happy and smile

  
 








Thursday, 7 March 2013

Decorating for Easter


I'm super excited to share with you all our very first Easter decorating.

I've been looking forward to decorating for Easter for a while now and have had to be very strong not to go silly and buy everything I see, even though I really wanted to.

It was very hard for me to take the more sensible approach to decorating for Easter only buying a few items. I then browsed through what goods I already had that could be turned into Easter deco goodies.

And here is what I've come up with....


The first Easter deco to be put together was our mini lolly buffet. It was super easy with the gorgeous Woolworths bunny candy jars along with two jars I already had in our party cupboard. I placed all five jars on to a white tray (again already something we had) and to add a little colour popped some green tissue under the jars. I then filled the three smaller jars with m&m's, marshmallows and bananas, chosen to match our pink, blue & yellow colour theme. I also wanted something other than chocolate in each of these as I just knew our Mr LJ who is two and a half would not be able to keep his little hands off them.

In the other larger jar I put some berries & cream milky ways as they just sounded yum and I had to try them. I the RHS jar holds some polystyrene egg's that I painted. I had seen adorable spotted eggs around and wanted them so bad hence when I found that I had polystyrene eggs in the cupboard I knew exactly what I wanted to do with them. Lucky I had never gotten around to making the into Xmas baubel. (post on making them coming soon)

Included in our Easter buffet decorations is a cute little bunny tail bum. I actually got this idear from an Easter cake I had seen and decided to try make it into an ornament. It's suppose to be as if the bunny is digging into the table... I think it worked!

When I saw this free Easter printable from Love a Rhino I was so excited. It was just the piece of subway art that I was after. So easy just download, print and place into a frame - done!

Now to my big project.. an Easter tree.
I had drooled over ones in shops like Bed Bath n Table and adored others trees like the beautiful Clair's from The HOME She Made. But my challenge was to come up with one without spending any money. I had a Kaisercraft Fmily Tree on my 'to do' list for ages and had never gotten around to actually doing it. So I thought why not turn it into an Easter tree instead. And so I did!


Under our tree I have a Happy Easter hanging sign along with a small cute globe bunny.
 
 

To finish off I added one cute green bunny along with three little tin pails (purchased from Woolworths) and borrowed my cook book stand in order to hold our Easter reading and activities books. I left our believe wall hanging there as Easter is all about believing so I thought it was fitting.
 
And so there you have it.. out very first decorations to help us celebrate Easter.
 
 
 
Do you decorate for eater? If so what decorations have you added to your home?
 
 
Until next time take care, smile and be happy.
YKylie

Wednesday, 27 February 2013

Shopping For Easter Pt II

 
Have you started shopping for Easter yet?
As you have seen from my first post about Easter Shopping (here) I’m quite excited about all the wonderful Easter goodies popping up on shelf stores. So today I thought I’d share with you some goodies from two wonderful stores.. Spotlight and Bed Bath N Table.
Now I must warn you if you do not wish to visit these stores in danger of hurting the hip pocket than this post is not for you.. BUT if you’re after some idea of what’s out there then take a look.
First stop Spotlight...
Spotlight sure does have a great range of Easter goodies.
From assorted cello wrap and treat bags to moulds and cup cake sets anything you need for homemade gift giving I’m sure you’ll find it here.
 
I plan on getting my two and a half year old son to help with some homemade chocolate eggs this Easter and so I was extremely happy to see the great range of Easter chocolate moulds.
 
 
I already had this wonderful silicon mould that I picked up at the end of season sale last year however this year I’ve also grabbed the smaller mini egg moulds as this size will be perfect for our Easter egg hunt.
 
Also perfect for Easter hunts are these cardboard bunny foot cut outs. Lachlan is going to love following these to his surprise present from the Easter bunny. And I just could not resist getting my markers to them to add a little colour.
 
I just adore the little basket cello treat bags... What a bargain at 70c for a pack of 15. As I have no kiddos in school yet I’m not sure what the Easter gift giving situation is but I’m thinking they would be great with a few mini eggs inside as a gift for kids to give their classroom friends.
 
As we have no need for so many we opted for a smaller pack of 6 bunny gift bags that Lachlan can give to his small handful of friends he has right now.

Easter doesn’t have to be all about eggs, why not cook some cup cakes for an alternate to chocolate. I can see delightful little carrot cup cakes in these gorgeous cup cake wrappers placed on the cute bunny treat stand. 
 
Now this has to be my most exciting find!!
I wanted something other than a heap of chocolate to give the kids this year so when I came across these growing chic eggs at spotlight I almost squealed in excitement! You pop the egg into a glass of warm water and in 12-24 hours the egg shell will break. You then refill with cold water and over the following 24-48 hours watch the chick grow to full size. The kids are going to LOVE them and they are going to be so much fun I can not wait!!
 
Now my all time favourite shop for Easter decor... Bed Bath n Table.
I could spend hours drooling over the divine products in this store! In fact the first time I visited Bed Bath n Table’s Easter range it was too difficult for me to choose what to buy and so I left empty handed.
 
There are so many items that I could take home with me from adorable bunny figurine to the cute cake stands.
 
They have divine egg cups and mugs, and a gorgeous selection of soft bunnies.
Pink to yellow, green or blue they have decor in every colour with such a selection of goodies from foam eggs to ceramic pots and everything in between. I highly recommend that you go and have a look if you plan to decorate your home this Easter.
 
So there you go I’ve done the shopping work for you sussing out what’s out there now all you need to do is go and grab whatever tickled you fancy. I hope some of you enjoyed the Easter window shopping with me.
 
Until next time take care, smile and be happy
 
YKylie