Chalkboard labels

ne of the items on my to-do list was to make chalkboard labels for all my glass jars. I have jars for everything- flour, brown sugar, icing sugar, regular sugar, ground espresso, coffee grinds, oxiclean, the list goes on and on. I thought having chalkboard labels would make them easier to differentiate and they would look cute as well. I was waiting for the weather to be nice because I was going to use chalkboard spray paint. 

What I used:

- Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Paint (I think I bought mine at The Home Depot. They also sell the paint can version, but I wanted to use the spray paint because I wouldn't need paint brushes. Plus, it was cheaper than the paint can)

- newspapers

- painter's tape

- sandpaper

- chalk

- glass jars

First I taped the glass jars with painter's tape in the size that I wanted it. Then I made sure to cover the rest of the jars with newspaper so that I wouldn't get chalkboard paint on them. I lightly sanded the area to be painted with sandpaper (you can also use a primer after sanding to make the paint adhere longer, but I skipped this part). I then laid the jars on their backs (to prevent any uneven pooling of paint) over newspaper to start the spraying process. Make sure to spray paint outside when it isn't windy as it could blow paint everywhere and even get small particles stuck on your labels. I sprayed the paint evenly, making sure to overlap on each swipe and I sprayed it 3-4 times after a few minutes of dry time. The paint dried in about 20 minutes, but I waited for about an hour before removing the paint. Make sure to peel the painter's tape slowly and on an angle to prevent any peeling of the chalkboard label. I did have some seepage of paint in some areas, but it was easily fixed using my finger nails. I waited a full day before actually writing on the labels. I prepped the chalkboard labels by first going over it with chalk (using the sides of the chalk) and then rubbing it off with a cloth. Afterwards my chalkboard labels were ready!

A quick snapshot I took of the jars getting sprayed outside.

And here's an example of one of the jars after I peeled off the painter's tape.
You can also see the chalkboard paint can to the left.

My jars after they have been labelled with chalk. 

Now I can tell which is the espresso grinds and the coffee grinds!

Inspiration wall

his May will mark our 4th year living in our house. I still can't believe how quickly time passed. Even though 4 years seems like a long time I'm still in the process of decorating our house. I want to take my time because I want it to look perfect. Also, it takes time to find the perfect piece for each room. I don't want it to look cookie cutter or haphazardly put together. 

Now that I'm home on maternity leave I'm constantly looking at all the spaces in my house and thinking of what I can do to make it better. There's still so much I have to do for my home office, but I've been looking at the wall behind my computer desk. It's been blank for a while now and I keep looking at it when I'm working on my computer. I was thinking of doing some sort of polka dot, washi tape DIY project behind it (you can see what I'm talking about on my Pinterest home office board), but then I decided against it. Then, I came across a cool print that I got from a photographer through work and decided to frame it. It's actually the backside of his photography print. I loved the 'A' and how graphic it was and thought it would look so neat in a frame. That gave me an idea to put up some sort of art wall behind my computer. I may add to the vignette later on, but I'm liking how it's looking. Now, when I look up from my computer screen I can see my vignette and it will put a little smile on my face :-)

Here's my computer desk. It's the white Parsons desk from West Elm. It's a little cluttered,
but I like having cute and pretty things around me for inspiration.
I still have to do something about the little cubby beside my desk. It is ugly, but it
stores all my junk and my huge printer. I may paint it a white to match my desk…

Some of my pretties- my Shim and Sons fabric bulletin board and pencil cup (that I use
to display my money plant or Lunaria Annua); my lovelydesign address file;
my Teatro Verde flower vase that I use for my pens and pencils; a ceramic plate that
my son made at daycare; and my staple-less stapler that I got from Paper-Ya in Vancouver.

Since the colour for 2013 is supposed to be an emerald green I changed my screen
saver to a green. It's a turquoise green, but still…

I love my heart mouse pad.

And my pride and joy- my Phillippe Starck Louis Ghost Chair as my office chair.

Here is the wall behind my computer before I put the artwork up. It's so… plain and boring.

Now with my little artwork it looks a bit more visually interesting.

I didn't want to put anything in a frame as it could look too done up.
I used washi tape to stick the other pieces.
The illustration of me was done by an illustrator I commissioned for the magazine I work
for. I had an extra sherpa proof from my printer so I used that to hang it on my wall.
The hot pink print is a print I got with my Kate Spade watch. I've been meaning to put
it up somewhere in my house because it is super cute, but didn't get a chance to… until now.

Another view.

I get a lot of promos from illustrators and photographers through work and I always store the ones that I like just in case. It always comes in handy when I'm hanging artwork up and I need an original piece. 

Mini craft project

ack in October we experienced a couple of blackouts where I live. Whenever we get severe rainstorms we tend to lose power. Usually we get power back right away, but the last few times we lost power for 4 hours. I realized then that I needed to have more candles in the house. I have a few Bath & Body Works scented candles, but I don't want to burn those for the sake of having light in the house as they are pretty expensive. I decided to stock up on a few cheap candles at the dollar store. 

I really don't like it when products are packaged unattractively. As a graphic design graduate I always want things to look pretty. I'm known for buying things just because the package is nice. Do you guys sometimes do that too?

So I had it down on my to-do list to make my own labels for the dollar store candles. Well, I've only had time now to work on them, but I'm finally crossing this off my to-do list!

Here is what the candle looked like with the original label on it. 

I measured the label size that I wanted and worked on a few mock-ups before settling
on this one. I always print out a sample on plain paper before printing it out on good
paper. That way I can change the size if I think it's too big/small. I also check the font size
and colour.

I chose a font that had a ribbon feel to it. So I used that same style on the label ends.
I thought the coral colour would go well with the green colour of the candle.

I have a 1.5" Xyron sticker maker and since my label was 1.25" high it was perfect
to run through it.

This sticker maker makes stickers out of anything you run through it as long as it is less
than 1.5" high.

Here are the labels after I peeled off the plastic top from the sicker maker.

Ta da!

Here are my completed candles.
I was planning on putting them in storage, but now I may display them because they
are so cute.

UPDATE I'm still very sick. It turns out that I got some sort of infection that's been making my throat really swollen and my eyes really red. I think I have a cold on top of that too. My voice is still totally gone and I'm very dizzy. I'm taking amoxicillin for my throat and a topical ointment for my eyes. It's made a huge difference in how I'm feeling today. I was so out of it that I almost hit a car while I was backing out of my driveway. 

Anyways, I'm planning a huge reveal in a few days. If you follow me on Instagram you will know what I'm talking about. 

Basement reveal… finally!

e finished our basement reno back in May (has it been that long already??) and I've been meaning to blog about the process every day, but midway through the process I got busy with life and now it's the end of November…
We are still not done with decorating, but I would like to share with you what our basement is looking like now. As soon as I make additional changes I will update later on. Warning: this post is photo heavy.

This is the doorway into our basement.

I decided to add a gallery wall going down to the basement with family photos
and my travel photos. I got the frames from Ikea. The frames are RIBBA frames and they
were around $20/each. I got the photos printed at Costco at 12" x 12". 

View from down in the basement.

This is the view going down to the basement. I have one 3-year old and a 4-month
old so that is why we wanted to finish our basement. We really wanted a play area
for the kids. However, we wanted to section parts of the basement for our
entertainment area, an office for my husband and a spare bedroom.

You can see we used a sectional to divide the entertainment space from the kids'
play area.

And this is another view of the other side of the basement.

Another angle.

We got our contractor to build us a built-in shelving unit so that I could display
some knick knacks.

I love displaying things around my house. You can say it's a passion of mine.

A close-up of the shelves.

I love my owls. They are from West Elm. The yellow lacquered box is also from
West Elm and I have pretty shells sitting on top of it that I brought back from the beaches
of Cuba.

Here's my washroom. Excuse the step stool and the red toilet seat. It's for my
preschooler ;-)

My bathroom vanity. You can see me in the reflection!

I love my bathroom shower. We chose subway tiles and the contractor put in sliding
glass doors.

My contractor also put in a built-in nook to put our shampoos/conditioner.

We have a huge shower head. It's hard to capture in this photo, but I absolutely love it.

I want to put frames up in the bathroom later on. 

And here is our spare bedroom. My in-laws stayed in here while they were visiting.
We couldn't afford a headboard so that'll come later on (I think).

Here's the spare bedroom closet. It had double doors as you can see and it's a pretty
decent size.

I plan on putting a console table along that wall with a round mirror above it.
I've been eyeing some pieces at Chatelet Home. They refurbish vintage furnitures and
many of their stock are French-inspired.

Another look.

There's a little window in the room so it does get some light during the day.

Looking into our entertainment area. The French doors lead into the office.
You can see how bright our basement is because we have a lot of pot lights.

I try to keep this area free of any toys.

On the other side of the built-in shelves, the contractor put a shelf area for us to, again,
display stuff. Initially he was going to put the dry wall all the way up, but we asked
him to do it only half-way. The pipes that controls the water temperature in the house
is under the shelf area.

I made my own terrariums and I bought the sand-blasted manzanita branch at
Home Sense (a discount home goods store here in Canada) for $39.99.
I have seen these exact ones at flower shops for over $150!

Close-up of my terrariums.
I bought the vase at Home Sense for like $5 and I used fake succulents and my
mini mushrooms that I had lying around. The black sand was purchased at
Michaels. I saw a terrarium that was already made at a home goods store for $200.
I took a picture of it and made something similar for a fraction of that price.

Here's my other one. I used green mushrooms instead.

Close-up of my manzanita branch.

Besides the leather sectional and the white, rectangular pillow everything here was
relatively cheap. The rug, one-seater, pillows were purchased from Home Sense and
the side table, shelf, frames were purchased from Ikea. We wanted to invest in a good
leather sofa so that's where most of the budget went for the furniture.

I love collecting pretty things because you never know when you need to display
pretty things around your house. 

Close-up of the shelves.

I always save pretty boxes because they make great display pieces.

My fake orchid from Ikea.
I love me some real flowers, but I wanted something that would last forever…
I have real flowers in other parts of the house.

My dog, Rosco, wanted to make a cameo :-)

The back of this white chair has tufting, but you can't see it with this pillow over it. I wish
the pillow was more of a rectangular shape so that we can see the detail on the
chair, but oh well…

View of the other side of the basement. That's where the bathroom and spare
bedroom is. We wanted the bathroom close to the bedroom so that it would be
convenient for our guest.

Our new flat screen TV. It's a Samsung Smart TV.

Here is my husband's office. It's still pretty bare. He needs a new laptop and some
desk accessories.

I put a gallery wall up in his office.

My father-in-law painted the stork painting. It's personally not my style (a little too old-
school for me) so I hung a gallery wall incorporating other pictures, illustrations and
even a little mirror to bring the focus off that one painting.

My daughter and son (dressed up as a dragon for Halloween).

I get a lot of illustrator's prints from work so I saved a few and brought them home
to hang.

My husband's office has a ladder to display all his soccer trophies. I wanted to spray
paint them all a glossy, navy blue so that they would look cohesive together,
but he wouldn't let me. I think the gold looks so tacky…

His office has the fuse box and the contractor hid it nicely with cabinet doors.

Here it is closed.

His office also has a doorway leading into our cold room. Initially we weren't planning
on finishing it, but then we changed our mind. We got the contractor to extend the
flooring and put up dry wall so that we could use it as a storage room.

We have our golf clubs and tools in here.

We also got a chest freezer as our refrigerator freezer is tiny!
I also store some of my son's old clothes in here as well as his old toys. I'm saving
the clothes for my sisters just in case they have a boy.

I forgot to show you the stairway leading up to the main floor.
The door to the left leads into our furnace room and the door the right leads into an
extra storage room.

Here is the extra storage room. We also got this finished. The back extends further
onto the left so it's actually a big space. We store our Christmas decorations and some
non-perishable foods in here.

And this is our furnace room. We didn't finish this room as there's no need for it to be
finished. We store our vacuum and sports gears in here as well as cleaning supplies.

Here's our snowboards. I miss snowboarding! Once my daughter is a little older I plan
on hitting the slopes.