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The journey of a thousand miles begins with...the perfect pair of shoes.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

V-Day decor, a tutorial, and you can call me Kate (if you want to)

The Christmas decor is gone and it's still winter. It's so.....blah. I decided to pretty things up (despite the fact that I am outnumbered by boys) for Valentines Day. Fortunately for me, Indy thinks V-day is still cool and loves everything I do. I love that kid. So, I mostly shopped the house (thanks Nester) and the 1 Euro store (like the dollar store in the States) and my beloved IKEA.

We have a chair in our entry way (for M to take off his combat boots before trekking mud through the house). It needed....something. I used Kimba's idea for a no sew pillow and made this cutie pie pillow from some scraps.



An apothecary jar filled with cinnamon imperials (I could eat every one of those yummy red hearts!), a scrap of pink ribbon, red books and an old lantern are on the entry shelf.


The entry table. The pink candle is sitting on a (red) copy of Romeo and Juliette.


More apothecary jars. The rose petals come from IKEA. The twine balls came from the 1 Euro store (3 for 1 Euro) and the porcelain flower under the cloche was a gift from M several years ago. He actually had a friend fly it in from Italy on his private plane.


Willow branches with red ribbon tied on and hung with paper hearts I cut out while watching TV. I'm cool like that. More twine balls and rose petals in the bird cage and a little piece of art I made on top of another red book.


Now, onto the tutorial for how I made the little piece of art in the above photo.

I printed off a bunch of lovey-dovey quotes on a regular piece of white paper with a fancy script.


A piece of red paper (left over from the hearts on the tree), and a photo frame (isn't Indy cute in this photo? He was 2).


I thought the white paper was too white, so I took my tea strainer (it had dried a lot from my morning tea, but was still damp) and tapped it all over the paper. Don't do this too much or it will smear the ink. I then patted it with a paper towel.


I cut it to fit the frame, put 2 cut out hearts in front of it and voila!

It was so easy and took all of about 10 minutes. Actually, gathering the supplies took longer than making it.

I got an email from Sweet Rue jokingly saying that I needed to give some kind of name so she didn't have to call me 'Mom.' I laughed and realized she was probably right. I don't want to use my real name because it is so unusual and I've only ever met 2 others with the same name. Also, my parents spelled it weird. Those of you who know me IRL know what I'm talking about. So, I thought and thought and thought (I didn't hurt myself, don't worry) and then it hit me: my bar name! When you were in college did you ever have an alias that you gave guys you met at parties/bars/the library/the caf that you weren't really interested in? No? Well, my friends and I did. The main reason I did it was because of the unusualness of my name, but all my friends had aliases and we had to know them, so if a guy asked we gave them the right (incorrect name). My alias was Kate MacNamara. I just liked the way it sounded. Say it. Kate MacNamara. Doesn't it sound awesome? I think so. It was given out (along with the wrong digits) to many a weird guy during my college years. If you feel that you have to call me something, feel free to call me Kate. I'm not giving you my digits though.

6 comments:

Fiona said...

Kate McNamara sounds like a lady detective. Like one of Charlie's Angels.

Love that framed piece - and everything looks very festive. Here, we're decorating with Kleenex and Dramamine today, but hopefully by Valentine's everyone will be hale and hearty.

Michelle said...

Visiting from I don't know where in the bloggy world...seriously, sometimes I just click and wind up at some really cool places. Like yours.

Great post today, and loved yesterdays (brings back memories from my travels abroad). Thanksies to your hubby for all he does for our great country! Cheers!!

KimAustin said...

Hey Kate,

How did you make that Pillow? I really like that a lot! My birthday is coming up in September! hahahaha The frame looks great, I really like your ideas, keep them coming!

Kim

Linda said...

That is a great name. I never tried that but, then, I usually didn't need too. Not that many guys interested. I guess I was too shy.

Melissa Miller said...

I have this exact frame! What a wonderful idea you had for it. Thanks for sharing it. :)

Rue said...

Well hi there Kate ;)

I did the same thing!! LOL I always attracted them too... yikes!

You did a really great job making everything so cute! I love the framed quotes :)

rue

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