Phone Restoration

My grandmother had this old phone hanging in her dining room as decoration since I was a little girl. Several years ago, when my husband and I were first married I asked her on a whim if I could have it for our house. She said yes. It never got hung in our house and just sat in a box waiting and waiting. When we sold said house, I brought the phone with me in hopes of restoring it so I would DEFINITELY hang it in our new house when it is finished being built.

I need to learn to take more before pictures of my projects. Once we decide to do something, the project takes off quickly and normally finishes  quick too.

My dad and I decided to see if the black paint would come off the phone and we longed to see what was underneath. Therefore, my one "before picture" has the nice wood "stripe" down the side. 

Dad took apart the phone for me. I was in charge of putting all the parts and screws in a safe place for later.

This was still inside the phone. I took tons of pictures of this because I was pretty certain that this part was not going to be able to be salvaged in the restoration process.

First step was lacquer thinner to get the black paint off. It started off well. Later, I decided to go with an actual paint stripper and that worked much better.

After all the paint was stripped, dad took the sander to the wood for me.

After the black paint had been stripped.

We decided it would be nice to stain the piece. I used the Gunstock stain for this project. I think it will go very nicely in our new home eventually.

I did about 3-4 coats of polyurethane all over the phone after all the staining was complete. 

Here is the finished result. I am in love with it.

Dad shined up the bells the best he could for me.

I know EXACTLY where it will hang when we move to our house.
Now, I just have to store it once again till then.

DIY Train Table

My two year old is OBSESSED with trains right now. I thought about scouring Craigs List for unused train tables that would fit the bill. Last month we moved and in the process I saw my coffee table that I've had for many years. I thought this table would be ideal for a table that may or may not be a hit for a two year old.

 

 First coat. I figured out that the foam brush wasn't cutting it very well and switched over to an actual paint roller. It gave a MUCH better look in the end.

My five year old wanted to help so much. I gave him the task of painting the lake for his brother's gift.

This is what it looked like before lines were added to the street and the rail road sign finished. I also added about 5 or 6 coats of polyurethane to the top to try to protect the surface a little bit.

I love the finished product. Instead of the round railroad street sign that normally has an "RR" on it, I put my son's initials on the sign to personalize it a little bit.

The finished product.

Both the boys enjoying the table. They can't get enough of it! I'm happy to say that the table will be around for a while and used daily.

Train Cake Fail

My youngest son turned two this week and I had GRAND plans to make him a train cake. I have a really cool cake pan that is in the shape of the various train cars and engine. I tried to make a cake using this pan once before (several years ago) and it was a fail at that time. I figured that since I have some clue of what I'm doing with cakes/decorating these days, I would not have the same experience. Not so much I'm afraid.

First of all, I apparently filled the cake pan too full and this is what I found in the bottom of the oven. 

Cake was all over the place. What a mess.

 The idea is that you let the cake cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes and invert it and the cake will pop right out.

 That really didn't happen for me. Cake stuck everywhere. It looked like there would not be a train cake after all.

Plan B went into effect. Looking in the pantry, I found everything I needed for Rice Krispie treats. I cleaned out the cake pan and greased it well and went to work stuffing sticky Rice Krispies in the pan and praying that the end result would look something like train cars. In the end, it wasn't what I originally envisioned, but that is okay. It turned out just fine for my little one and he loved it!

I died coconut flakes green for the grass and piped chocolate pudding for the track. I used Life Savers, Fruit Roll Ups and other candies for decorating the actual train cars.

Counting Down...

I love counting down toward an important event/holiday/etc. Now that I have a kid that knows his numbers, I thought a universal countdown sign would be fun to have hanging in our house. I have gone through about 3 different versions of this sign and think I have finally made it the way I like it. I have a feeling that my husband is tired of me asking him to sand the sign so I can start from scratch every time!

It was so simple. We had a piece of scrap MDF in the garage that I asked my sweet husband to cut down to a certain size for me. I painted it with chalkboard paint so I can easily change out the "days" and the "event" we are focusing on at the time.

This was my first version. I thought it would be a good idea to use pre cut letters for the "days until." I hot glued them down to the board (not realizing they were actually stickers with a backing on them). The stickers began to peel away from their backing leaving a less than desirable effect. Thus, the first re-sanding project to get all the remaining hot glue off the board.

Second version. I don't have any better shots of this somehow. I basically freehanded the "days until" on this sign. I didn't make the letters big enough for the sign and I thought the painting was a bit sloppy. It lasted through the Christmas holiday sitting on my mantle (every day wishing I had done it a little differently). Thus, the second re-sanding project to begin so I could start from scratch in 2013.

Third (and hopefully final) attempt. For Christmas, I got a Silhouette. I've enjoyed playing around with it so far. I haven't had a chance to explore all the awesome possibilities yet. I cut a simple stencil for my "days until" script this time. I used a chalk marker to write the words on my sign. I'm pleased with the way this one has turned out. No re-sanding needed :-)

 After I got it the way I wanted, my husband installed the hardware on the back and it is now hanging on our wall in the eat-in kitchen nook. I love the way it looks and am excited to count down special dates in our family (most of all a vacation coming up in a few months!).

Star Wars Cake and Goodies

Sometimes, I just get tired of making cupcakes. I have these wonderful cookie cutters from Williams Sonoma and this was the time to use them! I made cookies for my son's preschool class. I was going to leave them undecorated but at the last minute decided to ice them. For no real prep time on these, I thought they turned out pretty good.

 For the party, this is the cake table. All we had was cake, cupcakes, punch and chocolate. 

What more could 4 and 5 year olds ask for??

I bought a Storm Trooper mold online to make the chocolates with.
I'm sure this will be reused for lots of things in the future!

Green "Yoda Soda" (lime sherbet and Sprite).

The cake I made. I used the cookie cutters for this too. It made things so much EASIER!

I decided (again at the last minute) that I should probably do cupcakes for the kiddos.
The whole fondant/cake thing doesn't always go over with them. So, the adults got cake and the kids got these.

I made blue light sabers and whipped up these cupcake toppers the morning of the party.

Here are my other posts about the Star Wars party....

Decorations

Wreath

Star Wars Decorations

We had such a good time at my son's birthday party! He had a great time and helped me everywhere he could in putting things together for his big day. Here is a sampling of what we did for his party. I got SO MANY ideas from other people that had done this before! This is probably the first year I have done something pretty "mainstream." It always seems that I plan parties that have no other ideas out there anywhere. Maybe one day I'll get around to posting about some of the parties we have done in the past.

Here is the invite that I came up with for the party. I tried my best to get the opening crawl incorporated and feel that it worked out pretty good. I made the back look like the hilt of the light saber and the other side has the actual wording. When you fold it up it looks like a light saber. It fit in a legal size envelope so I was a happy girl!

When I saw this idea, I knew I had to execute it. Granted we were entering the fall season and pool noodles would be just about gone. Somehow, I lucked into 6 pool noodles at the Dollar Tree just in the nick of time. When I went back for more, they were all gone.

We played a game with these jewels that could have gone on forever. Each kiddo got a balloon and they had to see how long they could keep it up in the air. Strict instructions were given that these bad boys were not to be used to hit others. I'm proud to say that there were no injuries from this part of the celebration!

 I knew that I wanted to make these finger puppets when I saw them on Pinterest. Lots of cutting and an anxious little boy ready to get his hands on them. The next morning, he said that I need to make more ewoks and storm troopers so he can have an army of each. I agree, but it will have to wait for a while! This momma is tired!

This is where my son helped with decorating. Next to the cake table, we posted these "wanted posters" that I found online and he wanted to display some of his artwork as well.

The kids table. Black tablecloth, stars cut out of Star Wars wrapping paper and silver wrapping paper, napkin light sabers, Star Wars crepe paper (found at Party City) and Darth Vader/Storm Trooper rings ordered online.

 These light saber napkin rings were a big hit. I found the original idea here. I didn't have much ink in my printer at the time so I improvised. Using the same duct tape and electrical tape I used for the pool noodles, I made the napkin ring holders. Again, really easy. I covered a piece of card stock with the duct tape then cut out rows. On the rows, I then put several pieces of electrical tape to resemble the sabers I made with the pool noodles. Just wrap each around the napkin and silverware and voila!

I found the banner at Party City. I couldn't resist. It had all the characters on it and made my son very happy (which was the entire point anyway).

I displayed pictures of my son on the mantle. This was him as a Jedi Knight this Halloween.

This was a picture of him with a Storm Trooper we took a couple years ago at a local basketball game. Again, my son wanted to help decorate....so one of his Star Wars books made it to the mantle as well.

What's a party without some legos hanging around?

 I'm proud to say that I did have at least one idea of my own that I didn't get from Pinterest. I came up with this Star Wars wreath. You can read about it here.

At the last minute, I saw a piece of art that hangs in the dining room. I had the wrapping paper out so I decided to temporarily wrap the art up for the party. It just added a little something to the room.

I saw these cute stickers and knew that I had to use them somehow for the pinata.

 R2D2....probably the funnest thing I made. I saw lots of ideas on the internet for this little guy. I used a small trashcan for this project and lots of free handing. I was never able to find an exact template that I could use so I just went with the flow and made it up as I went along. I was very happy with the final product. It proudly sits in my son's room as I type!

I'll have one more post to share about the cake and other food goodies I made for the day.