Saturday, February 26, 2011

Chair makeover

Late last year hubby went away to his brother's wedding in England for two weeks.
Hubby doesn't like change around the 1:1 house much so I decided to have a little furniture makeover fun while he was gone. I knew he'd be so happy to see us when he got back that he probably wouldn't notice a few new bits of furniture around the house.
My friend Frederica gave me the wine table and I quickly painted it and shabbied it.

I had a list of furntiure I wanted to find at second hand shops while he was away...this chair was not on the list.
But when I saw it I just HAD to have it - the price tag of $5 may have had something to do with that!
It was a very pretty shape...perfectly shabby.
(The power tools are not mine, lol! Hubby had the camera so I had to take the chair to my sister-in-law's house to photograph. I did get a little help while I was there with some other projects!)

What I didn't realise, when I so hastily bought it, was that it had at least 500 industrial strength staples keeping that ugly green fabric attached to it.
I almost gave up on the chair several times because of those staples, it took days to get them out using pliers and a chisel.
I wasn't going to paint the chair because it was really lovely oak but when I put it in the lounge it was just screaming to be painted. I can't say I enjoy painting life size furniture.

The upholstery is less than perfect - I'm hopelss with a staplegun on my own, it nearly shoots me across the room when I try to use it.
A friend gave me the toile fabric which was a furnishing sample. Amazingly there was exactly enough to cover the chair! Even though I added some extra padding I have to say it's not the most comfortable chair in the world.
I was pretty pleased with the result and hubby was very impressed so the chair was allowed to stay!

Only the spool on the left is really vintage. The other three came from the Japan shop and I aged them.
As for the tall blue weathered 'thing'...

it was another Op Shop find, here's what it looked like when I bought it. It's made of brass.
That's something I did enjoy painting!

Meet my sweet little niece Mia.
I look after her five days a week so finding time for mini's and other projects is a bit of a challenge these days! But there's plenty more half finished projects - big and small - around here at the moment...more to show you soon!

Thank you for all your messages regarding the Christchurch earthquake. New Zealand is a very small country and you'll find nearly everyone knows someone in Christchurch. It has been a very harrowing week watching all the news reports on the television. And still so very hard to believe that such a tradgedy could happen here.

Mercedes

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Earthquake in Christchurch

Thank you to all the people who have emailed me reagarding the devastating earthquake which hit Christchurch at lunch time yesterday. I live in Auckland (near the top of the North Island), over 1000 kilometres (over 400 miles) away from Christchurch (in the Canterbury region in the middle of the South Island), and no effects were felt where I live.

Christchurch is the same place that had a huge earthquake last year on September 4th.
Yesterdays earthquake was much worse and this time there are many fatalities and people trapped in collapsed buildings. Search and rescue teams are coming from across the world to help out.
It is a shock to all New Zealanders to see the devastation in Christchurch, it really isn't something we ever expected to see here. There are pictures and information here: New Zealand Herald.

My thoughts are with all the people in Christchurch.

Mercedes

Monday, February 14, 2011

Valentine's Day at the 'little' B&B...







Tiny tart by Naomi Machida.


Cream blanket by Sylvia.

Tray by Kim Saulter.














Heart cookies by Kim Saulter.

Mirror by Eva.

Cupcake by Kim Saulter.




Cake by Kim Saulter.




So who has got this little romantic love nest ready...
Well, I did see Mr Nylon there earlier today...

He's looking pretty pleased with himself but he's a gentleman (doesn't dress like one, I know!) so he's not telling who he's waiting for...that's for to you to guess!

The B&B is just a temporary roombox (the box actually belongs to Liberty and she wants her things back in it!).
I just decided to have some fun last week putting this little scene together.
Hope you all have a very Happy Valentine's Day!

Mercedes

From Christmas decorations to Valentine decorations

Here's a craft we did to 'pretty up' the house for Valentine's Day.

I was at my local craft store the other day and they were selling off the last of their Christmas decorations for $1 a bag. Each bag had ten decorations in it. These little hearts came in pairs - that was even better value!
So I got 40 little hearts for just $2.
At Christmas time they would have cost me $6 a pair - and they're only plastic.
So that's $120 worth of decorations for just $2 - BARGAIN!

We set to work painting them.
The crafting starts early in the morning (every day) at our house, this was before breakfast!

Rather than try and paint dots on them I painted some paper and puched out the dots with my little vintage hole punch - which I found at the Op shop for 50cents last week!

A coat of 'Mod Podge' made them all lovely and shiny.
I was going to hang them on a branch but I could find one I liked, so we just strung them up as a garland.

Liberty presented me with this sweet little roombox this morning.
It was her Valentine's Day present to me!
She worked on it with her daddy in the garage. She found a wooden box and painted it white then got her dad to add a piece of wood for the porch, which she had him score floorboards on.
Liberty asked me if she could borrow some of my dollhouse stuff, lol!
This morning she said she needed to go outside to get some fresh air ( I wondered why!) and she came back in with this precious little gift of love!

Mercedes

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Liberty's tea party in Miniature!!!

Today Liberty recieved the most fabulous gift in the mail from the super talented Kim Saulter.
Kim was so inspired by Liberty's summer tea party that she recreated it in 1:12 scale!!

So, so, so beautiful!
You may have heard our squeals of delight on the other side of the world.

Butterfly cakes on a cake stand that looks just like our real one!

Cupcakes!

Cream filled pastries!

Kim even made the Eiffel Tower cookies!!!

Perfection!

Jelly and cream in tea cups!

This is something Liberty wants at her next tea party!

Just so you can see how tiny everything is!



Kim knows that little girls like to play with their minis so she's left it up to Liberty to arrange everything.
I can assure you those tables will be rearranged every day!
(Liberty had her first ballet lesson today which is why she is wearing a leotard - she won't take it off!)

Absolute perfection from one of the sweetest miniaturists!

And we haven't showed you what Kim sent us for Christmas yet...let's just say we're working on a very sweet,  special little project!

Thank you Kim!
Mercedes and Liberty