Etsy: Butterfly Mobiles

It's no secret, I love (or *heart* as all the cool kids are saying) Etsy.com. I don't think there is one single thing that is not available on the site, well, except may be carburetors (thank you spell check for not letting me write car-bor-a-tor). Nope, just looked, there are no carburetors for sale (however, when I entered "carburetor" into the search box a, um, "pipe" did pop up in the search result. But don't worry, the listing said "Pipes are sold for legal smoking uses only", so it's cool.)

I'm a big print & paper geek as most people know. I love anything letterpressed, screen printed, gocco'd or any other type of paper stuffs.

I was on a mission to find the "right" mobile. I have this habit of once I get an idea of how something is "supposed" to look in my head, everything that is not that exact thing just looks wrong. Most of the time makes me crazy but other times bring me great joy. This find was the latter.

Jenny Makes Mobiles made this sweet butterfly mobile out of little paper cutouts. I really just think it's the best thing since cream in a puff. There is no motor, so you have to spin it yourself, but as you spin, all of the tiny butterflies flit and flutter and look like they're flying in a halo over the crib. Like this:

You can buy it off Etsy for $30.00 (your money going directly into the artisit's hands that made it), or, you can buy this one:

from Pottery Barn for $85 and your money goes to some foreign land (well, actually you can't buy it from PB anymore, they're out of stock. **Update, I did just find the PB mobile on ebay for $180!). Or you can buy this one :

for the low low price of $60,000.

Some call it wasteful spending...I call it helping the economy.

What little things do you buy that just make your day?

Paper & Walls

Have you noticed all of the wallpaper being featured in design blogs & magazines lately? I just can't get enough of all of the big modern prints that are popping up everywhere, it surly ain't your granma's wallpaper.

When we bought this house a year ago, it was COVERED in wallpaper. Some might have called it "vintage" since it was 40 some years old. I called it, well, gross. It took me weeks (ok, maybe an exaggeration) to score , steam and scrape clean the paper & glue that had fossilized onto the walls.

Here's what the original wallpaper looked like in the kitchen and in the basement stairwell:

Horrific, no? Luckily I didn't have to waste too much water steaming it off, after the 6th hour of peeling, I just used the tears that ran down my sweaty face.

After I recovered from my wallpaper induced PTSD, not only did I slowly learn to love wallpaper, but I also took the plunge! Well sorta, ok, ok, maybe it was just a the inside of a built in cabinet and not an entire wall and maybe just a lampshade or two, but hey...it's a start!

So, the first wallpaper project involved the dining room built-in. The white cabinet in the corner of two gray walls needed a little "pop". The living room in our house is yellow so lining the inside of the built-in with a yellow wallpaper would be an easy way to tie the rooms together.

Before:

After:

One of the things I learned from my dive into the world of wallpaper is that you can't just buy one roll. You have to buy two at minimum. When I was finished with the built in, I still had just about a full roll of this stuff. Knowing that there was no way the husband was going to let me put wallpaper on the, heaven forbid, wall, I had another idea...

The breakfast bar needed two pendants above it to separate the space between the dining room and kitchen. Of course we couldn't find a fixture that both matched the kitchen hardware and wasn't stupid expensive. Finally, I just went to Target and bought 2 lamps with drum shades and sent the husband to Lowes to pick up a pendent light kit. I cut the paper to size and used removable (in case I screwed it up) adhesive to attach it to the shade.

Here's what the breakfast bar looked like before we hung the pendants:

And here is the result:

If you're looking to get some fun ideas about how to use wallpaper but don't have the stomach to commit to a whole wall, check out Wallpaper Projects from The Curiosity Shoppe.

DIY Magazine & DIYideas.com also has loads of fun ideas and inspiration.

I bought the black & white wallpaper in the picture above, I really had no reason to buy it except for think it sure was purty, but when an idea strikes, I'll be ready!

What DIY touches have made your house a home?

Blog Envy

What happens when you read your favorite "mommy" blog and your favorite crafter blog on the same day? Inspiration!

While getting my daily dose of Dooce.com, I really dug the wall flowers she placed above her changing table in her baby girl's nursery. They're from Umbra and just so cute. I love how they seem to float up the wall.

photocredit: Dooce.com.

The Umbra flowers reminded me of a recent post on the weddings and cookies blog (written by Renee of Ugly Kitty fame). She's experimenting with paper decor for her 2010 wedding.

Photo credit: weddingsandcookies.blogspot.com

Combine the two and *poof*! Paper wall flowers above the changing table ...

Where do you find inspiration?

Announcements Announcing...

Ella Juliet Jackson

4.4.09

She's given me a really great excuse for not showing my bloggy blog any love over the past year. However, many other craft/design/decor projects have be afoot and I'm hoping to capture them all (and anything else that I'm loving at the moment) here.

So I'll start with my first Ella related paper project:

Birth Announcements!

All of the paper came from Paper Source. For the card, I used a #10 Luxe note card in Fino White. The envelope is a #10 Luxe open ended in Blush. I did not use the button & string version, occasionally the button from the envelope can dent the note card inside.

The fonts used were Bickham Script, Bickham Script Fancy and Century Gothic. Each envelope was addressed to the recipient using Bickham for the names and the Century Gothic for the addresses.

***

head band by Blossom Heads

Stay tuned for butterfly mobiles, wall flowers, etsy prints and other nursery decor...