Pruning 101

It only seems fitting after such a wonderful Father's Day yesterday
to sing the praises of our amazing Dad
who came to the rescue once again this last week for his girls!
Pruning, not the fruit but the tree kind!

A few weeks ago while Candace and her little family went on their first ever

family vacation, I spent a lot of time out working in the yard.
Then when Candace got home we spent 2 whole days chopping
and hauling to the dump over a ton...yes a ton literally, of branches.

I admit it wasn't all work~

our duckies are growing so fast and it was fun to just be outside with them!

I went and got the kiddie pool, which at first seemed monstrous.....

it doesn't seem big enough anymore.
And of course along with us is squirrel #3, Fifi.
Yes, I said number 3.:)

When we moved here I wanted the exact opposite of my last home.

I traded in house size for a yard full of trees so I had my own private little retreat.

It has been wonderful but those trees~they are a lot of work and expensive!

So I have had to figure out how to prune myself because some Tree experts

charge up and over $500 per tree to come in.

Don't get me wrong~they earn their money rightly!:)
Since we can't hire our Dad out to come teach and rescue you

we thought we'd share one of the best sources we have ever come across

which was a video from This Old House!

Those guys are amazing~and hey the accents~who doesn't love em'!

This Old House's website is full of amazing tips on everything!
Another great article was from them is found here.
I love how their first tip is "Fight The Fear"!

photo from This Old House

My brother got me a Sawzall for Christmas

 and honestly that tool has been so well used!

It makes pruning easy and puts my mind at ease~the thought of my husband with a chain saw

scares the crud out of me!
This Sawzall makes cutting through those bigger branches so easy
and relatively safe.

Here are 2 tools that are must haves for your garden:

I really like the Fiskars brand and they are economical as well as being well made. You can find them at Walmart, Home Depot and Lowes.

Hand pruners~~for everything like roses and shrubs.

I picked up this set last weekend and they are delicious and just under $13!

Long handles pruners for larger branches and hard to reach ones!

Really easy to use and cuts even easier!

If there was any advice I could give, it's to have courage!  Watch a few videos and give it a try, you have nothing to lose, only money to save and a beautiful yard to enjoy!

Last but not least~THANKS DAD for teaching us how to work in the yard and forever being our Knight in shining armor.  Seriously he is the best Dad ever!

Pottery Barn Art Boards

In case any of you guys missed our guest post over at Infarrantly Creative

we thought we'd post it again here at home!

Here's our latest project we've been working on.

Do you recognize these???

Here's our source of inspiration~~

(image source Pottery Barn Kids)

These bad boys go for $169 a piece, yup each, so that would be a

grand total of $676 for 4.

Let me go grab my wallet......  

Yeah.

So here's where we started.

We printed off the picture and tried to measure them to scale.

If you don't own a quilting ruler, go get one, they are so useful!

We got 7 2x4 foot 1/4 inch MDF boards.

Home Depot was so good to cut everything out for us!

We used printer paper to make our patterns, which worked great

since it was already 11" high, we taped 3 sheets together to fit the 24" width

of the board and eyeballed the rest from there.

2 of the boards were cut into 3" slats,

1 was for the house tops

and the 4 remaining were for each house base. 

Each school house was 48" high except for the red one so we modified the pattern

to maximize the use of our boards.

I know looking at these it might seem overwhelming but remember...

YOU CAN DO IT!!!!

We know a lot of us get a bit nervous around tools,

but we Crafty Sisters really want to encourage you not to!

The jigsaw was one of the first tools we tried and it's pretty user friendly!

For this project you'll need:

A jigsaw, a drill, liquid nails or wood glue, paint,

sand paper and some clamps would be really useful!

(Although I have to admit my pantry was completely raided to clamp all of these down!)

We made the top portion 11 inches high.

Side slats were cut at 35 inches, the bottom was 24".

We used some 1x2" trim moulding for the chalk tray at the bottom.

It's easier to be exact with the roof line by layering the top piece,

 gluing it to the main house and then cutting it exactly. 

Less cuts, nicer finish.

Spray paint works best and gives the best finish!

Did you know that if you lightly sand between coats

it will make your finish look even better?!

Also following the directions on the back is always good (note to self).

Don't get too close and glob the paint.

It's better to do several thin coats then ruin it with one globby one.

Spray painting in cold weather isn't fun.

It stinks. Literally.

We're hoping the hubby doesn't notice the over spray of red on the garage floor.:)

Each house was then either inlaid with dry erase board,

cork board, or painted with chalk board paint. 

If using chalk board paint we recommend pre-painting the side slats and

then gluing them into place so you don't get chalkboard paint all over them.

Scared to cut dry erase board?  We were too!

Luckily we remembered a great tip we saw used on trimming doors to protect them from chipping:

Make sure to tape along the line before you score~

this will eliminate any chance for the finish to chip and flake up!

We also found a roll of white craft paper to hang from a dowel that

was held on by little corbels we made that attached to the base.

A little liquid nails holds everything in place

and spray adhesive worked great for the cork!

We attached "d" rings to the back for easy hanging.

All these things can be found at your local craft and hardware store.

We had to make one in pink for Nicole's daughter to display her

artwork and to organize her jewelery!

Candace's boys didn't need any coaxing to try them out either!

 These were pretty fun to make and actually pretty easy

but more importantly our kids love em'!

Plus our grand total was just over $75.

That's total....for 4!

Pretty fun huh?

Now, what to do next.....

Hello Pawn Shop!

I've heard stories of wives falling in love with their husband's all over again

when he bought her new jewelery

or flowers and a love note.

I'm a bit different.

Nothing says "love" more than seeing him

take the trash out.....

without me reminding him.

Or in this case, all that's needed is a trip to the Pawn Shop.

Remember how I told you guys to not be scared to go into them?

Well this week during my crazy efforts to fill orders as fast as I could

I killed my little jig saw.

Unfortunately I cannot live (or should I saw work) without this baby.

So in my Hubby's fix-it-hat style he swooped me up and we headed out

for our adventures in Pawn Shops.

3 stores later and with some smooth talking which he happens to be very good at....

I now have this "new baby".

Oooooh, I got it for a 1/4 of the normal price.

It has a laser light, a normal light, it twists, it turns.

I love it!

So Rest In Peace Skil Saw, you've officially been replaced!

Plus here's a super great tip we learned

quite by mistake!

If you happen to be a sloppy spray painter....

(meaning you spray yourself more than  your desired item like me!)

instead of having to wear your paint for the next few days

you can easily remove it with alcohol!

Here's my before and after with only 2 minutes of rubbing it off with a sponge.

Not bad huh?

Feels a lot nicer than the green scratchy pad from the kitchen!

Hope you guys are loving Springtime as much as we are!

A Bird House For The Perch

So finding a bird house for this perch was a lot harder to do than we anticipated.

Did you know all those pretty ones in the store are

"Decorative", "Not Meant For Outdoor Use".

So we finally found one at Michael's made from pine

and grabbed a simple plaque base to mount it on.

We primed it and decided to paint it to match my (Nicole's) house color.

People think I'm joking when I give directions to my home and

says it's the Pistachio Green one

on the corner.  Seriously when I told our Dad what color

I had picked out for it he thought I was nuts.

Especially with cream trim?

When he drove almost 6 hours to come help me paint it
(he's the world's greatest Dad ever!!!!)

he couldn't believe that it actually was pretty and worked, somehow!

We thought it would be fun to give the roof some bling

so we pulled out this embossed metal sheeting we picked up a few years ago

for pennies when a hardware store went out of business.

Back then we thought it would be cool for a magnetic board

but quickly found out

aluminum isn't magnetic.  :(

We made a pattern and cut it out with our metal snips!

If you don't have a pair of these snips get some!

We picked these up at Home Depot for about $15 and they cut like butter!

We nailed the roof in place and then screwed them onto the plaque base

and then onto the perch.

Not bad huh?

So now the grand total for the project is a whole whopping $11!!!

Not sure why the base is looking pink below

but hey at least you'll know which house this one belongs to!

A Bird House Perch

Is it worthy of a pretty bird house?

A couple of weeks ago one of my friends brought me

a cute catalogue that had fun letters in it

she wanted me to recreate for her.

Well, I couldn't just look at the letters~

We saw this cute Bird House Stand and

knew we had to make it!

It's from Chasing Fireflies.

We knew we could make it for less than the almost $100 price tag.

It doesn't hurt that Hobby Lobby has bird houses on sale this week so we just had to!

All you'll need is a baluster $3, some nails, some screws, some glue and some 1 x 6 or 1 x 12's.

Make sure you check out Home Depot's junk wood pile, where I picked up

these boards for .51 cents a piece.

Yeah, they're a little warped but when you cut them into 6 inch sections you can't tell.

We kinda eyeballed the sizes we wanted and chopped away on the miter saw.

It soooo doesn't have to be perfect.

We had an extra chunk of block wood we ended up not using.

We glued and nailed each section to eachother.

Then using a double sided screw, attached the baluster to the bottom

and then screwed a 2 inch screw to the top to hold it in place.

We forgot to take a picture of the big hole we drilled through the bottom.

We wanted the ability to stick it in a garden bed but wanted some stability too

so the wind wouldn't blow it over.

The hole is big enough to slide right onto a wooden garden stake

so you can have the versatility of it in the garden

or to put it flat onto the patio.

Oh yeah, don't forget the spray paint!

Can we say it enough.....WE LOVE RUSTOLEUM!!!!

The pretty birdhouse we got originally looked too small in scale when we got done.

Sometimes it's easier (and cheaper in this case) to buy one already made....

It ended up being about 40 inched tall

and less than $5 to make....Not Bad HUH!

Isn't it pretty????

So tomorrow check out to see what we end up putting on top of it.

Best "CRAFT-manship"

I think a Pinewood Derby car is

 " craft blog-worthy"-

 don't  you think?

I'm even tempted to find a  linky part to share my   our latest craft!

My son didn't win the race but he won "best CRAFTmanship" :) and 5th place.

We...as in me and my son worked hard the last couple of days designing, cutting, and painting his car.

My husband was the director/wheel-checker/giver of approval.

I know it's suppose to be a father/son bonding moment...but I just couldn't help getting involved especially when it comes to cutting wood and making it pretty!

My son's first time spray painting. He did quite well!

I was so proud of his spray technique!

He wanted two stripes- like a Ford mustang GT.

We polished the wheels with wet sandpaper.

I learned a lesson this time.

  It's all about wheels. 

 If you set them wrong you are toast!  I put one in crooked and  permanently messed it up.

Ahhh the pressure!

It was a fun night. 

No bad competitive feelings that happen sometimes at these races.

I have...I mean "we" have another year to perfect the winning car!

I only hope from now on that I'm

 not

 referred to as the "SHE-MAN" mom that likes saws and power tools:)

I got some strange looks from the other dads! ;)