revamped photo wall

After having Jonah, we now have so many photos that I want to put up around the house. He is growing up so quickly, so I want to make sure that we capture all those special little moments.

 Our hallway was the perfect place for a photo wall. I love how photo walls look when all different frames are used, but I didn't want to spend alot of money on frames, or alot of time trying to find specific sizes of frames.

So, I went down to my favourite second hand store and just picked up a few random sized frames. After a quick sand and a spray of paint they came up really well.

 Once I had all the frames cleaned and painted, I laid them out on the floor to figure out how I would arrange them.

 All up this photo wall cost me about $15! Quite a cheap way to dress up a dull hallway.

baby boy's bedroom

We had so much fun setting up the nursery for our little man. We spent a few months leading up to Jonah's birth searching for and collecting second hand and unique items. Here is the finished result...

We found this wooden cot on ebay for only $60! It had just been repainted too!

Paullie thought it would be cool to make a little skateboard shelf to make the room a little more 'manly'. We found this old mini second-hand skateboard and drilled a couple brackets into it, and then fixed it to the wall...so simple! 

I originally just wanted grey, red and white for the colours in the nursery, but a friend from work made this absolutely gorgeous blanket for Jonah. I loved the vintage pattern and really wanted to make it work in the room, so I made some bunting to go across his roman blind to tie in the blue and green in the blanket.

Again, with the second-hand vintage theme, we found this gorgeous tin plane on ebay. It looked perfect hanging above the cot. We make it fly back and forth when we put Jonah down to sleep...he often smiles at it!

 As we have quite a small house, storage can be a bit of a problem. I spent quite a while looking for old baskets, but ended up finding these beautiful grey baskets at a local cane shop that fit on top of the cupboard perfectly. I keep all of Jonah's clothes in these baskets that he has already grown out of...he grows too fast!

Another great second hand find was this buffet. It was the perfect fit for a change mat and works really well for extra storage.

This rocking chair was yet another second hand cheap find! We just painted it white, and I sewed new grey covers for the cushions. I added a simple little cushion made out of the same fabric as the bunting on the window.

 I wanted to add some photos to the room...and I found these simple white wooden frames at Kmart for only $9 each! I love a good bargain!

Jonah has already been given so many toys, and I'm sure we'll collect plenty more. These old suitcases make the perfect toy boxes. 

I originally wanted an old industrial light shade for the room, but couldn't find one under $200! This aluminium shade, and the lamp stand from IKEA work just as well, and for a fraction of the cost!

 This was such a fun little nursery to set up!

baby tie

We have been invited to a 'purple' themed party on the weekend, but my little man has absolutely nothing in his wardrobe that is purple! I had to think of something that was the right colour, but still very 'boyish'. This was when I came up with the idea of making Jonah a purple tie.

I found this amazingly simple little man tie tutorial by Very Homemade. 

 It was such an easy tutorial to follow, and i was a little sceptical when I read that it would only take half an hour, but it really did only take half an hour! And he loves it!

baby jonah

Jonah is finally here! Our little miracle made his grand entrance in May. He is absolutely perfect.

Needless to say, I have a lot less time for sewing, creating and blogging than I had originally anticipated!

DIY roman blind

For quite a while, I wanted to replace the old, broken wooden blinds in bubby's room with a white roman blind. I looked around at a few different places, and discovered it was going to be quite expensive to get a custom made roman blind to fit in this window. So...I began researching how best I could make one myself.

I found the Terrell Designs website explaining step by step how to make your own roman blind, and I thought it looked pretty easy for me to follow.

...and so I got started on my project. I must admit I did have a few meltdowns in the making of this blind. I don't think it helped that I was 7 months pregnant. The only issue I had was buying the wrong blockout material from the store, and giving them the wrong measurements...twice. Once I got my material sorted, it didn't take me long to finish the blind.

The Terrell Designs website goes through everything you need to know. From a Hardware Calculator (to work out exactly how much material and tools you will need) to a step by step instruction guide. All I had to do was measure my window, and off I went.

I'm so impressed with how it turned out. It's not perfect, but at least you can tell it's homemade! So if you're thinking about making a roman blind yourself, I think it was definitely worth it. I got to find the exact material I wanted, and it worked out about one quarter of the price of buying one.

a tin plane

After purchasing our cot, I wanted to put up a mobile straight away. There are so many mobiles out there, but for our little man I wanted something a bit different. I spent hours scrolling through Pinterest looking for inspiration, and one day I came across toy tin planes used as a mobile. Needless to say, I LOVED the idea.

 So then the hunt was on for the perfect toy to hang above our little white cot. As I discovered, vintage tin toys can be very expensive collectables, so it took me quite a while to find one that was not too expensive, and the right size for what I wanted.

 I'm so happy with how it looks in our baby's bedroom...I can't wait for him to see it!

homemade bookmarks & hairclips

I love pottering around handmade markets and seeing how creative so many people are. I must admit though, my favourite thing to do at these markets is to find inspiration for my own handiwork. I often come across fabric covered buttons used for hair ties, earrings and clips like these.

For a long time I've been intrigued at how people make these, until I discovered the secret for myself one day!

Bookmarks and hair clips like these are so cheap and easy to make.

I just did a little hunting on ebay to find 'self cover buttons' and 'jumbo paper clips with glue pad', or 'hair clips with glue pad'.

 The buttons I bought came with the tool kit, which was very handy.

 Once I had all my supplies, all I had to do was grab scraps of my favourite material and get creating.

I think these make the perfect little gift for any occasion.