Hey....I can make that!!

What do you do when you fall in love with a discontinued item? Make it yourself!!
I saw this adorable Amy Coe canvas for a baby nursery and thought it was such a fabulous way to decorate a baby's space without being too 'frou-frou' or 'babyish'...if you know what I mean. 
Love it....gotta have it! Where can I find it? Well....nowhere....as it turns out, it was discontinued!
Don't you hate that? It made me want it even more!! 

 I checked all the auction websites and googled obsessively until I could google no more. I was almost ready to give up on it....then I realized..."Hey! I can make that!!" 


So I did. And it was practically free! I had an old canvas under my bed and the leftover paint from the last item I fell in love with and decided to make myself (Sugarboo Designs pillow project).... then all I needed was to find the right font to print off and transfer somehow onto the canvas! Here's how I did it:

Step 1- Print off the outline only of the letters you need in the size you need (in this case I printed off 1 letter per page)


Step 2- Cut out carefully using scissors and exacto knife for the inside pieces


Step 3- Lay out the letters on the white canvas and secure them with tape once you are happy with the layout


Step 4- Using a sponge paint over the whole canvas with your chosen paint colour. This is kind of like a reverse stencil. So the area around the letters will be painted but the shape of the letter will remain raw canvas


Step 5- peel off the paper letters and Voila! you have your fabulous 'PEACE LOVE BABY' canvas!


(Optional)Step 6- With a small brush I added in the little specks within the letters by hand. I tried to match them as closely as possible to the original....not perfect, but not too shabby either!

 And here it is displayed on our wall above the baby's dresser    


(side note: this dresser is the  next project for hubby and I...it's not in bad shape but needs a little freshening up. Can't wait to get it painted with some new hardware and cute drawer liners. Stay tuned to see how it turns out!). 

Cute right?!

♥ Lindsay

Bittersweet farewell to my beloved Jetta

I know I shouldn't have attachments to 'things', but sometimes I can't help but be sad when something that has been in my life for 8 years is suddenly not. Yes friends....I am talking about a car! 8 Years ago (almost to the day actually) I bought a fabulous little black Jetta, who I affectionately called Jezzy (short for Jezzebel) and just last week I had to say good-bye. *sigh*.....I loved that car..... sure the speedometer would stop working from time to time, but it was nothing that couldn't be remedied by a few loving taps on the dashboard. And I thought for sure our inability to open the trunk at the border crossing was going to get us in BIG trouble....for some reason the border guard didn't like my suggestion of going in through the folded down backseat (who knew?) but after he realized we weren't lying, it was totally fine!! I know deep down that with a baby on the way, I guess it is kind of important to have a safe vehicle with a working speedometer and a functioning trunk.

 I don't know if it was the hormones or my fear of change....or maybe a little of both but I was really sad to see Jezzy go.... quirks and all!! 

 I do love our new Subaru Forester though!!! Isn't she beautiful? 

 Welcome to the family.....Freddie? Frankie? Farrah?

 Hmmmm.... this could be harder than naming our baby ;)

#6 New Car ✓

♥ Lindsay

Courtney? Really?

Well last night was the final night of the Bachelor....and I am not going to lie Jill and I didn't get much crafting done! We ate lettuce wraps and treatza pizza while we held on to the hope that Ben might pick Lindzi, although we already KNEW it was going to be Courtney. I don't know why I watch this show anymore.....I can predict the winner 9 times out of 10 and out of what? 20 seasons of the show? And only 2 marriages....not great odds....but hey everyone needs a guilty pleasure show right!?! Well last night Courtney was the chosen one. Really Ben? Not sure why the guys always choose the mean girl that "isn't here to make friends, but is here to win" ? Usually even if I am not particularly fond of the winner, I still love the proposal....but let's just say this year the highlight of the evening was the treatza pizza!! 
So, although I don't think this relationship is destined to be the third ABC televised marriage I do wish them the best and hope they truly found love. Guess we'll see in a few months....


♥Lindsay

Seattle Shopping Getaway

They say that the second trimester of pregnancy is where you feel your best and therefore it's the perfect time for one last mini-getaway with your spouse before baby! Although it would have been nice to escape to somewhere tropical, we were limited by time and money......so we opted for a mini road trip to the America version of Vancouver. I don't know about you, but the perfect getaway for me has nothing to do with distance travelled and more to do with what you do when you get there. With Ty doing his masters and the craziness in our schedules right now, what we really needed from this Seattle weekend was some quality time together! It was so nice to have a change in scenery, to be able to do whatever we wanted, not have to cook or clean....and of course throw in a little shopping and I am a happy girl! So that is what we did.....

We ate.

From my first breakfast in bed room service experience (so luxurious) to my guilty pleasure the Olive Garden and Tyler's guilty pleasure The Cheesecake Factory....

food was a big part of the weekend. 

I also have been on a bit of a lemonade kick lately (craving perhaps?) so I think I probably drank my weight in lemonade of all forms....plain, raspberry, frozen....you name it, I drank it. Yum! We even got to try out the famous Top Pot Donuts (Obama has eaten there...FYI) where I had the most delicious blueberry donut ever! 

So let's just say....we ate well in Seattle :)

We relaxed.

Since we don't have a television in our bedroom at home, one of the biggest treats for me when I stay in a hotel is being able to watch TV in bed! There is nothing like a cozy hotel bed for snuggling up and watching a movie before going to sleep or lounging in bed longer than I should with a coffee in hand and The Price is Right on the television. It's the little things....right?

We shopped.

It was President's Day Weekend, so between the fabulous sales and our trip to the Premium Outlets I had to really use my self control to stay within our maximum allowance of what we could bring back into Canada without paying duty. Let me tell you, the only thing that held me back from spending hundreds of dollars on baby items was my severe anxiety of crossing the border. Buy one suit at 50% off and get the second one free? Take an additional 55% off the already ridiculously low clearance priced items? I mean really....we just don't have sales like that in Canada! I could have literally outfitted our baby in Carter's gear for the first year of her life for a few hundred dollars. But, alas I am too much of a scaredy-cat to lie to the border agent (I mean really...they are government employees....who knows what they could do to me!!), so I came home with a small fraction of what I wanted to..... but still $250 worth of Carter's baby items for only $60 is pretty darn good!!  

Overall...a fabulous weekend getaway in Seattle with the hubby( #11 ✓)!

♥ Lindsay