DIY Headboard!

So excited to share my new headboard with you all! I was looking around pinterest for a DIY headboard and saw a bunch of different styles that I loved and thought I would try to tackle one on my own.

It was..well easy for Andrew to help me put together but, on my own, it would have been a tough project. I'm not a really very good with tools.

Anyways, here ya go...

Here is our bedroom before our new headboard! 

Yes, we have a bed in the shape of a circle.

its Ikea.....

 ....... yeah, idk....But hey its a king sized bed with the rounded sides! Very nice for when you have a chihuahua who likes to kick at night! :)

 We ventured to Menards and found 7ft boards, dark cherry stain, long heavy duty nails and a paint brush.

 Andrew got to work staining the boards. I planned on doing this all on my own, however, he said my arms were to short to give it the right brush strokes..haha..whatever...

 It took about...an hour to get everything measured out and placed in the correct spot. It really felt like 5 hours. 

Andrew and I don't  make a great team because he is a tad OCD and likes to really plan things out and do it the right way..I like to just get shit done..asap! So, with his help....it might not have been done super duper quickly, but It was done correctly and it looks great. 

I just have a hard time waiting for him to get things done..correctly. :)

 This was about 8pm, after a long day at work..So excuse the crazy hair and no make up look that I am rocking here but the headboard turned out great! Bay and I love it...oh yea, so does Andrew!! THANKS BABE!!! ;)

All in all...this ended up being a $50 project with the materials we bought. Andrew also went back t the store and bought a stud finder which was another $16. I am pretty happy with it, considering every headboard I have found started out around $150!

It was easy and something fun we were able to do together..and by do together, I mean Andrew did it while I hung around and nodded my head when he asked how it looked! :) haha I love my man!


BTW, today just happens to be day 24, the last day of my advocare challenge! WOOOWHOOOO! I'll post a wrap up soon.

Karah xoxo

SMASH what?

Organizing, DIYers, SMASH books and staying busy. 

What a fun weekend it has been! Now back to Monday, a whole new week!

 

I am always looking for something new to organize around here and I never have any problem finding something to work on. Actually, I've got a pretty long to do list that I can work on during my short breaks between semesters!

I spent some time cleaning up the craft room last week and noticed that I needed to find somewhere for my hundred of sticker organizers to live.

 I was running out of space-I either needed to reorganize the closet in that room or find one place to store all of these stickers-stickers that I use for scrap booking and have been gathering for as long as I can remember!

I decided to no tackle that closet and to create a sticker binder instead. I have a couple of hanging file folder boxes and these little organizers full of stickers and scrap paper.

I took everything out and sorted by themes, placed in page protectors, stuck a sticky note with a label on each and placed them in a binder! Fast and easy to find and to do! I made a separate binder just for lettering stickers. I have a lot more of these and use them more often then the rest!

TA DA!!

Whenever I spend time in the craft room I get that itch to do something with all of my crafty things I love. You name it, I probably have it. Between painting, drawing and everything else I love to do, I have plenty of things to get it done! I even find Andrew in there looking for supplies when he is building his airplanes. 

He has his own space in the basement where he buildings things like remote controlled planes and cars.  We go out to the park a few times a week and he will fly one of his planes that he has been working on and then we will do our long walks! Here is one of his latest projects. 

Anyways, one of my favorite things to do is to climb in my bed, turn on a good show and surround myself with pens, markers, pencils, water colors, scissors, glue, washi tape, stickers and all of that fun stuff. I will find a book and start drawing,painting, jotting things down or doodling. Its a good way to spend my me time. :)

Little did I know that these books that I have been doing all of these things in for as far back as I can remember, like the middle school years, are now being marketed and sold in stores as SMASHbooks.Whoever came up with the thought to sell this idea in stores was a genius. Go them! 

When I hit the stores to grab some organizing supplies I was also on the look out for a new doodling book. I have hundreds of them from the past years.  I came across these SMASH books, which I have seen in the past but was not sure what they were. I jumped on pinterest and found some boards where people have shared their SMASH books. There is a whole world of these books that I didn't even know about. These look like fun so I grabbed one and thought Id try it out. Its kinda nice to already have a book put together for you and I just got started making it my own. I went with the "Pretty Pink" styled book!

Its a good relaxing way to get things on paper. Now, if they could just make everything water proof so I could do this in a nice bubble bath with a  bottle glass of wine that would be even better! ;)

Today is my last day of  summer break before going back to work at PAT and I only have two weeks until classes and my practicum start! Ahhh!!!  Its a bit overwhelming to think that starting this month I will not only be babysitting, but Ill be starting my work as a hospice social worker, back to being an educator AND back to being a student. Yikes.

However, before all that crazy stuff begins we have one last project to finish around here. FINALLY getting my DIY headboard completed! :) The boards are stained and ready to be put in place-as soon as Andrew is ready to put them there that is. Maybe this evening!

Here is a sneak peak! Look at my cute handy man at work! 

Ok, now back to my day of doing NOTHING, as it will be my last for at least a few months! 

Karah

DIY Preschool Educational Games!

Getting ready for the new school year!! 

At the end of each year we have to pack up our classrooms and all of our fun stuff goes into storage. Yeah...yeah..I get it..They need to paint the walls, work on the floors and so on over the summers but MAN...what a pain this process is!! 

But now we are at that time of the year where we got UNPACK everything AGAIN! This is also not a fun process. However, it is fun to get reorganized and have a fresh start. We will be back in the classroom on Monday and will be creating new centers, games, activities and so much more!

Here are some things that we have put together over the past couple of years... 

DIY games for preschoolers!

I hate hearing that children don't have any educational games around the house because it costs too much..Well here are some things that you can do on your own. You can pick up things from the dollar store, print pictures online or even draw them your self. We picked up a lot of these materials at teacher stores, target, dollar store..etc!

This color car game is a great game for those young preschoolers learning their colors and even learning their numbers! You just need to make a road, pick some colors and a car for each color! This book has about 5 cars and different colors in it and the first page of this book says, Who's in first? Here comes brown. Driving fast, he better slow down. You can have the child look for the brown car or look for the brown car with the number 1 on it! The second page goes on to say the same using different colors...

 

 Ten Little Daisies is a great game for your older preschoolers! Counting backwards from 10. You need 10 flowers and as you turn the page it takes one away, allowing you to count the remaining daisies on the pages that are left. 

Ten little daisies playing in a meadow, 2 walk off and now there are...Let you child count how many flowers are left and finish the story!

 A couple of Christmas books that we have made also! Five Little Gingerbread and Five Little Snowmen.

Color Match! Like the others, super easy to make on your own! You can crumble up some color paper if you do not have any pompoms around. But I took some colored pompoms, a close pin and colored spots on the spider! Let your child pick up the pompoms with the close pin and match them with the correct colors on the spider! Great game for working those fine motor skills that your kiddo will need to write their name and so much more! I like to store a lot of my games in these awesome zip bags!

You can find cards like these in the dollar section in the summer months before the start of the school year!

Again I used some clothes pins, wrote out a letter on each one to match with the letters below the pictures on the cards!

Here are a few other games we have made up! We took the 5 Little Monkeys book and put some monkeys in a tree for the kids pull off as we read the story! Just used a little Velcro tape! An ABC book where you can match the ABC's with the cup cakes by putting the cherry on top!

A couple of counting books! Both books go up to 10. These books are great for helping kids to recognize their numbers. You pull the paw print or popcorn pieces off at the bottom corners, again WE LOVE VELCRO TAPE, and lay them out for the kid to see. Let them count the number of sticks on each page and find that number on the pieces, matching them up!

 

 Here are some great things that I just picked up and target in the dollar section to make up some games for this school year! I also picked up some great books at Deals. All for just $1! You can't beat it! I laminate books that I find and use them with dry erase markers with all of my kiddos that I work with so I can use them over and over again!

 

I am also always on the hunt for great games that I can print up and make in the home with the kids I see too! I plan for my visits and pull from a collection of activity add on's. Last couple of years I have tried a few different ways of organizing these...My first year I tried to boxes that I found at target. I can use hanging file folders in these and move them around with me. My collection got too big and It became difficult to bend down under my desk to dig out hand outs and add on's!

Last year I used a folder organizer on my desk. It was just too much!!

Over the past couple of days I spend a few hours organizing all of my add on's/activities sheets in 3 inch binders! Each labeled and contains different things like actives for ABC's, numbers, colors, rhyming, classifying, matching, early cutting skills, early writing skills, animal sounds, etc.

I think I can place these next to my desk and grab a binder as I need something, find the hand out and grab a copy! Let's hope this is easier than the past two years!

And look!!!!! I found these cute pens while I was on a hunt for organization supplies!!

I think these will go just nicely with my NEW ERIN CONDREN LIFE PLANNER!!!!! I think I have another week before this bad boy will arrive in the mail. I am going crazy waiting. I love all things organization and her stuff is amaze-balls! (Yes, I love Giuliana Rancic too!)

If you haven't seen these awesome life planners then you are missing out. It took me hours to pick out my planner! You can see them here at www.erincondren.com!

Well, that is all I've got for now. I have about 100 other games that I might add here and there. But wanted to share how easy it is to make some great educational games for your kiddos!! :) I'll be sure to post the great things we make up in the next couple of weeks!

Karah

Past DIY Projects!

I love trying new DIY projects! Here are some things that I have attempted over the past year.

My next project will be a DIY headboard for our bedroom! Hopefully will be able to have this done soon!

Anyways,

Andrew and I have been in our home for a little over two years now. At first it felt like we would NEVER be able to finish every room! We started with one room at a time. First we did the living room, then the kitchen, our bedroom, the craft room and then our bathrooms! 

There is still so much that needs to be done, BIG THINGS like new counter tops in the kitchen, new flooring in pretty much every room of the house and updating our bathrooms! These are things that will take some time.

Here are some before and afters, what our home looked like at first and how it has slowly changed (and still changing)!

Got rid of that yucky green wall, wall paper, and white walls! It took a lot of painting and time but it was worth it! 

I painted the table in the kitchen an the coffee table in the living room!

Moving onto the craft room! This is where I hide all things craft and for school!

With a little paint on some old furniture, some stenciling and covering old canvases with some new fabric my craft room was finished! Well..almost finished!

Here are some things I did over Christmas!

I love getting into the holidays with making things! Andrew and I even made our own gingerbread house too!

Karah