The rocking chair!

Here is the final post of my posting marathon tonight!  As I mentioned here I found a rocking chair in my alley this summer.  I loved the way it looked, but the seat was completely busted and some other parts were falling apart.  I asked Dave if he could fix it and he said he could, so in it went to our house.  And it sat in the living room for a very.long.time.  Well, only 2 months, but I was so excited to see it all finished that it seemed to take forever.  It was definitely worth the wait though, and I'm so appreciative of my hubby and all the hard work and long hours he put into this chair!

Check out the transformation:

Here is the chair the night I grabbed it from the alley.  It looks pretty good at first, but the seat was completely broken and
unable to support any weight.  I think we tried to prop it up for this picture.

 He braced the bottom of the chair

Up close of the braces he made

He used wood glue between the slats and clamped it all together

The part he hated the most about this project was stripping off the paint!

Here is the chair covered with Citrus-Peel.  This stuff was nasty!

See what I mean? Nasty!  It was soo much work for him. He had to scrape off each individual crack and cranny on the detailed spindles.

But was it all worth it? All the hours of work, the fumes, the sore fingers?  Well, take a look below and you tell me.

(Insert sound clip of Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus"

Check out this chair! Isn't it beautiful? My husband is amazing.  Just amazing.

Here are some more shots of the chair in our living room:

Please exscuse the nasty fireplace.  Unfortunately we do not own this place and can't fix it up!

Lovely.

My next door neighbor is AWESOME!

So for some reason, my next door neighbor has been leaving lots of vintage furniture in the alley behind her house.  We're talking dressers, tables, plant holders, chairs, and even a small couch.  Now when I was a girl I used to cringe when my mom would tell me that she would thrift furniture from alleys and dumpsters.  I thought it was totally gross and I thought that I would never do that myself.  Now I find myself scouring alley ways as I drive by looking for a diamond in the rough just waiting to be discovered and polished up.  So you can imagine my excitement as I began to see these piles of goodies right.next.door!

A few weeks ago I snagged a vintage circle table and was going to put it in my living room. However, I couldn't find the perfect place for it so I decided that my friend Kirra would love it just as much as me.  She did.  After the table there was a 2 week drought in the furniture flow next door, but 3 days ago it started appearing again!  On Wednesday I saw this chair sitting next to my garage door and I had to stop and snag it.

When I took this picture I had already removed the seat because it was covered  with cat/dog hair and was super gross.  I ripped off all the old material and padding and plan on recovering it (hopefully) tomorrow.  Can't you see the potential?

Even though my neighbor clearly doesn't want any of this furniture anymore and legally it's "public domain" because it's in the garbage, I still feel like I'm doing something wrong when I take the furniture.  Thankfully my garage is about 10 feet from the dumping ground so I will run out of my garage, grab the furniture, and run it back.  I usually then wait until night so I can walk under the cover of darkness from my garage to the back door.  It's totally not necessary, but it makes me feel better.  Dave just rolls his eyes and laughs while his sneaking, trash grabbing wife scurries around in the backyard holding old pieces of furniture.

Besides the chair above, I also found my beloved rocking chair in the alley behind my house.  If I can stay awake a bit longer I'll post the transformation that my amazing husband did on the rocking chair.

I'll leave you with the mental image of me sneaking around alley ways taking people's trash, Hahahahaha.

DIY chalkboard plates

Well, I certainly am on a blogging roll tonight! This is my third DIY post in the last hour of so.

Phew!

Over the past few months I've been seeing these all over the net:

These are sooo cute, and useful! 

I remember that I had some chalkboard paint from a project I did, literally, 5 years ago.  I wasn't sure if the paint would still be good, but I decided to give it a try!

For this project you will need:

-Glass platters/plates (I bought two white mismatched plates from the thrift store for $1 each)

-Chalkboard paint

-Painter's tape

Clean the plate and remove any sticky residue left from price tages (if you get them from a thrift store like me!)

Use painter's tape to mark off the inside edge of the plate

Paint the inside of the plate with chalkboard paint

In case you haven't used chalkboard paint before, here are few things you should know:

1. Once painted you must wait 3 days before writing on it with chalk.  I know, 3 days

seems a bit excessive.

2. After you have waited forever 3 days, use a piece of chalk and cover the entire

painted surface.  Wipe away the chalk.  This will leave a chalky residue on the

paint which will make normal writing come off easier

After waiting about 2 hours, remove the painters tape.  Some of the paint
seeped through my tape so I had to go back and scratch off the little streaks
you see here.

Hang anywhere you want using plate hangers or the super thrifty option found here.  I found a cozy spot for mine
next to my stove in the kitchen.

DIY earring holder

The same day I worked on my DIY pedestal bowl I decided to squeeze in another project.

What you will need:
-Picture frame (I just picked up a cheap one from the thrift store.  I knew I was going to paint it so I didn't care what it looked like)
-Chicken wire (FYI the politically correct name is "poultry netting."
-Heave duty staple gun and staples
-Picture hanging bracket (if you want to hang on the wall)

This is another simple project that can be done in a few hours. 

Remove the backing and glass from the picture frame

Paint the frame.  I love this light blue color!

Wait for paint to dry.  Have a cup of coffee.

Measure the width and height of your frame, then cut out chicken wire to fit.  You will want to cut the chicken wire so it is 1/4 inch shorter than the frame itself.  Be careful, it can scratch ya!

Use a heavy duty stapler and staple the chicken wire to the back of the frame.  The wood on this frame was pretty dense/thick/hard so I had to get the hubby to pound some of the staples down with a hammer.

Hang your earrings and you're done!

If you want to hang the frame on the wall, simply nail a picture hanging bracket to the back.  Easy peasy!

DIY Pedestal bowl

Since I love doing crafty-type projects so much, I thought I'd share some of them. I got my inspiration for making these pedestal bowls from Tip Junkie. 

I went to my neighborhood thrift store and found this not-so-charming candle stick for $2.00 and the salad bowl for only a buck!

To make the pedestal bowl you will need:

-Candlestick (doesn't matter the color/pattern, you will be painting over it)

-Bowl (this wood salad bowl worked really well)

-Gorilla glue, or any other strong adhesive

-Paint.  I used the $3 sample size of Behr paint and primer from Home Depot.  They will mix any color you want for only $3!  It's the perfect size to do a small to medium sized project.  I still have plenty left over!

This project is SUPER simple.  We're talking 3 hours from start to finish (this includes drying time). 

Paint the bowl and candlestick (ignore the picture frame for now, it will show up again in another project I post)

Use Gorilla Glue (or another strong adhesive) to glue the bottom of the bowl to the candlestick.  You can mark the middle before gluing it or just eyeball it like I did.  Let the glue set for an hour.


.....and that's it! Didn't I tell you it was SUPER EASY?

Fill with your favorite things and enjoy!

Family time!

Before I get to family time, let me again share how much I love fall!  Although there were quite a few rain showers this morning, the afternoon was blue sky and crisp temperatures.  Just lovely!  I even did a little fall decorating inside!

Fall decorations were 60% off at Michaels!  Flowers=$2, Pumpkin= $3!

Rachel helped me cut out some paper leaves to
add to my willow branches (which, by the way,
are from our wedding.  They cost $30 and I
have definitely been getting my money's worth!)

Pumpkin=$2, Pedestal stand=$2 at thrift store,
Candy jar=$3 (I mean, Halloween is coming
up...)

Rachel and Andrew will be traveling to Taiwan next week to see my parents.  This will be the first time  my parents have ever seen their first grandchild in person.  I mean, can we say BIG DEAL?!  I seriously get choked up just thinking about how that first moment will be when they get to hold him.  I told Rachel that someone better be there to document that first hug on video.  My parents are the most proud grandparents ever.  My mom has every picture ever taken (and published) of that precious boy in a photo album right on her coffee table.  I know.  I've been there and I've seen it.  We're talking picture printed and in album within an hour of them being published on Facebook.  Let's just say Rachel better get her fill of holding him on the plane ride because she's not going to be holding much of him once they get to Taiwan. I digress...

Click below for a video of me getting the giggles out of Andrew.  Oh, and in case you're wondering what in the world I am saying to him, it's "Clean bottom, clean bottom.  I'm cleeeeeeaaaaaan".  I had just changed his diaper.

Andrew Giggles



And what post would be complete without the addition of a Lily pic?  This great shot was taken by my hubby!

Entering the blogosphere!

Hello out there!  Anyone out there.....

This is my first posting in my first blog.  Ever.

I've created this blog mostly for my family to keep up with our lives, but if  anyone else happens to stumble upon this... enjoy!

Right now fall is in full swing in Chicago.  Fall is by far my favorite season.  All I want to do between late September and November is sip warm apple cider and read a book under a cozy blanket.

 It's also the most fun season to do crafts.  In case you haven't read in my profile, I. Love. Crafting.  I love crafting almost as much as I love my hubby...(my attempt at transitioning to family news)

The Ly family is moderately  busy, as usual.  We have many events going on at church this month so we have only a few free nights at home each week.  I've just started teaching an ESL class at church, and I am really enjoying it.  So far we only have 4 students total, but I trust that God will bring more if it's His will.  My two students are a married couple from China who already have a large grasp on English.  I find myself a little intimidated by their English actually.  Sometimes Steve (my student) will ask me questions like, "What is a conditional clause" or "What is the rule for knowing which preposition to use in a sentence." In those moments I find myself wishing I'd paid more attention in my high school English courses.  Overall though, it's a great time and I'm happy to be used in this ministry.

Dave is working hard on getting a food pantry set up at our church.  Last Saturday the team did a trial distribution and gave away groceries to over 50 people-in the South Loop!  There is definitely a need for this type of ministry in the area.  They are trying to get a partnership with the Chicago Food Depository which would give us a more steady supply of food and other items each week. 

I'll end this first post with a picture of our little fur ball whom we affectionately refer to as "mo-mo". Isn't she cute!!?