Garden Toadstools

Inspired by Pinterest HERE ......

I saw these and fell in love with them. I just recently found some wooden bowls hiding in my garage! Isn't it amazing what you can find if you have a clean out!! 

Last year we got a massive grapefruit tree taken out of the backyard. The tree was chopped up into firewood so I grabbed a few logs and nailed the wooden bowls onto the grapefruit logs. There was one big one and 4 little ones.

Then I got the kids to work ....

First they painted (orange of course!)

They did about 4 coats before it was orange enough for our liking.

Then they added the spots

Hmmm how many spots do toadstools have anyway???

And then we let them dry. We finished them over a day.

The finished product looked awesome! The kids and I were VERY happy with them. 

The problem of how they were going to stick into the ground securely was solved with drilled holes, liquid nails and wooden garden stakes. I put one stake in each of the small ones and 3 in the big one and then pressed them into the ground.

They are pretty sturdy and look awesome! This is the bones of the fairy garden corner I am in the process of making .. any suggestions of what to plant I'm all ears!!!

Check out how I inspired my friend Jennie to make some toadstools HERE. They are such a cute and easy little project!! 

Inspired by Pinterest

I am really addicted to Pinterest.  I can spend hours browsing through the amazing ideas and beautiful things. Today on Pinterest I have 53 Boards and 2979 pins. It sounds pretty crazy! But I love it!!

And although I haven't done half as much as I want I have actually made things that I have been inspired by through Pinterest! So here is an update on what I have made .....

Inspired by THIS, I made this for the playroom ...

I have plans to paint it all pretty but I am undecided on the colours so might wait until I renovate the playroom and make it all matching!

Inspired by THIS I made this ...

I haven't decided if I want to paint the brown board white yet, I think I will leave it until I renovate the Craft Room, make it matching! (hmmm seems to be a renovating theme going on here!)

Inspired by THIS, I made this for my Mum for Christmas (sorry about the bad picture)

The original was made on wood, my one was done on a canvas

Inspired by THIS, I made these ...

For Christmas Day I decided to try out a few new recipes. I am always happy to find new yummy foods!!

there is:
Squid Dogs, Blooming Onion Bread, 7 Layer Dip, Autumn Chopped Salad, Cranberry Bliss Bars, Rosemary Roasted Potatoes, Lamb Kebabs & Crack Bread

Since I am slowly renovating/redecorating my house I am hoping that I will be able to make use of my pins a lot more!

Are you a Pinterest Junkie? Join our group on Facebook HERE and share your Pinterest inspired things!

Mairtown Kindergarten Art Auction

On the last day of term Abbey's Kindergarten had a Fundraising Art Auction.

Several weeks earlier the teachers sent one blank canvas home with each family. The Adults in the family were to create a piece of art to put in the auction.

Being arty crafty I volunteered to do a few more canvases, and there were a few things I wanted to give a go so two birds with one stone kinda thing!! I also convinced a couple of friends to donate their time and creative flair too! Thanks Becky & Nicola!!

There was some pretty AMAZING Art Work produced by the families! It was awesome!

This is what I made .. All inspired by Pinterest of course!


Originals HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE

Many of the children also made canvas Art at Kindergarten which weren't up for Auction but were for sale on the night. Of Course Abbey made TWO canvases so I had to buy them both! Lucky they were so awesome!!
Here she is posing with them at the Auction ...



It really was a fantastic night! Every single piece of art was sold and the Kindergarten raised $1600!!! WOW!! That is FANTASTIC! The money raised is going on developing some of the outdoor area which you can read about HERE

Check out the Mairtown Blog for their version of the event HERE

Inspired by Pinterest

How nice is it to have a roaring fire!!! We won't talk about the repairs that needed to be done before I could use my fireplace, or the fact that it is getting too hot for a fire. But ohh it's lovely!!

Ages ago I made THIS little drawer set for Abbey's hair stuff. I used 6 large matchboxes to make it which meant I had all the matches that came from those 6 boxes!! What was I going to do with them?? Don't worry Pinterest to the rescue!! Inspired by THIS (which originally came from HERE)I decided to make an orange version!




Of course it looks fabulous sitting on the hearth ... gotta love my bits of orange around the place!

And while we are on the topic of orange ....

A while back the lovely Leonie and I spent a whole morning going to every single second hand shop in Whangarei. I think there were 6 in total plus we also went to the Demolition Supermarket! It was a fantastic day and we picked up some AWESOME things! One of my bargin finds was this stool which I got for a mere $2!! Can you believe it!


I picked up some stunning orange & white fabric at a Spotlight sale and I knew that I was going to use it on my stool!!

So ....
Many coats of white spray paint, some foam, many staples from the staple gun and my beautiful fabric I now have a stool that looks like this ...


I am so very much in love with this stool!!! I am also pretty proud of my first try at upholstering! There is plenty more on the cards so I figured it would be safe to start out small!!

I still have a bit of that fabric left over so I will have to try and find a use for it!

And just because I can my first Before and After!!

Crafting up a Storm! A Pinterest Storm!

I have mentioned my addiction to Pinterest. So so many lovely things to look at. I have been busy making rather than pinning which I have LOVED!! I am sooo excited to be in my new house (which I own!!) in a couple weeks so I haven't been able to craft as much as I want. And today I started packing up my craft room *sob sob* So over the next little while I will have to pause my crafting until I get moved and re-setup. But I have sooo many plans when I get into the house! I have upholstering, painting, gardening, and sooo much more planned! I can't wait! But in the meantime I have managed to get a few things made which were inspired by Pinterest.

*Pin #1 Fancy Frames*

Inspired by THIS PIN I bought these frames from the Op Shop for $3 each.


The pictures were just paper copies which were kinda tricky to get off!! But I stripped all the paper off and cleaned it up, then I gave them a few coats of spray paint and added my own photos and this is what they look like now ....


I can not wait to find a home for them on the wall in the new house!! I am sooo stoked with how awesome they turned out!

*Pin #2 Fancy Lampshade*

This was actually inspired by a lamp at Abbey's Kindergarten (sadly I don't have a photo of that one) But I also have one pinned HERE

So over 300 buttons later, several lengths of wire, a fat lip and sore fingers I produced this .....


The more I look at this photo the more I think that the buttons don't match the orange of the base hmmm might have to fix that soon!!

Also I received a gorgeous Scrap Pack from Better Scrapbooking that I have been working away at .. mmm loving this paper!!


I can't show you the stuff I have been working on with this pack yet but watch out for it soon!

You may have noticed I have been orangefying a little bit .. watch out for a new Orangefying my world tab up the top after I move!

Addicted to Pinterest

I am totally addicted! There are the most amazing ideas on there! I also have lots of friends who are as addicted as me (well maybe not quite as addicted, not all of them anyway!!) A few of us were talking about how cool it would be to get together once a month and actually MAKE a lot of the stuff we have 'pinned' instead of just drooling over it!! So I started a group on FaceBook and we are hopefully going to motivate each other to make lots of amazing stuff!

Alisa is challenging herself to make more of her pins you can check her out over HERE

And I will also be updating when I make my pins here too!! So who's up for a Pinspiration Challenge!???!!??!



Come Join us on FaceBook at Pinterest Junkies!