This WONDERfilled Life...

I'm back! On time!! Woo hoo!!! I have such a large list of things I still want to make this year and the weeks are dwindling away...this is Week 46...which means I only have 6, SIX(!!!) weeks left in my #52wonderfilledweeks challenge.  How crazy is that? This week's project is admittedly simple, BUT, so needed.  We live in a 1920's Chicago, brick bungalow.  We love this house.  The wood accents, the plaster walls, the old skeleton keyed doors.  But when the weather changes the house shifts and some doors don't stay shut.  Well, okay, ONE door doesn't stay shut.  It's the door from our kitchen into my horn studio which is the old back door to the house.  The door doesn't actually latch anymore...and come to think of it I could probably take the old lock off and see if I could fix it...I guess I'll add that to the house list.  In the meantime we've just dealt with it.  It's not really an issue unless we have guests staying with us because ...

We did it! It's done and it looks great!!! It was a great reminder to take my time when creating things, no matter the medium.  What am I talking about? If I were sewing something and the seams didn't match up I would most likely take it apart and trim what I needed to and re-sew it.  The end pieces on the window box are too wide...and therefore there are a few gaps in the bottom of the box near the ends.  I should have taken the time to trim them when I noticed the discrepancy as we were dry fitting them.  Lesson learned.  I thought it wouldn't bother me but the 2 hours I spent painting the box I couldn't stop obsessing over it...oh well. If you missed last week when we built the box you can jump to that post HERE . Phase two started with drilling 1/4" drainage holes in the bottom of the box and then sanding to get ready for primer and paint.  I used our orbital sander and some 60 grit paper to start with, then some 100 grit to finish.  If this...

Week 26. WEEK 26!! We're halfway through our 52 week challenge, and what better way to celebrate than to show off our latest project in a two part series! I am so freaking giddy about this project. Phase one turned out great and as soon as we're done with our little heat wave here in Chicago I'll get chomping on phase deux ! So are you ready for it? Drumroll...take a peak at our new.......... . . . . . . . . . . . . . WINDOW BOX!!! We own a 1920's Chicago Bungalow.  When we first moved in years ago we were obsessed with maintaining a sense of the period with the home.  I researched the old window boxes and discovered that they went by the way side long ago. You can read about the history of the Chicago Bungalow and the forgotten window boxes  HERE .  I then started to brainstorm ways to replace the missing box and had planned to reproduce it with concrete...years went by and I never had the time or will to actually make it happen.  Th...

Most of you reading this already know that Mick and I just bought our first home. We are so very excited to be sharing this adventure with everyone but before we take you on our renovation/improvement journey we thought it best to tell everyone how it happened that we got this particular house! Mick and I with the help of my Mom, Katy, have been looking at houses since late March. We toyed with the idea of getting a 2 or 3 flat and renting out the other units but settled on the fact that that would hardly be an improvement on where/what we were currently living in. Condos were appealing with all their shiny new appliances and granite counters but for the money were just not enough space and again there is the issue of having neighbors on the other side of a wall! Nope, Mick and I knew we wanted a house...so we searched...and searched.... Mom came down around Easter and looked with us...we saw some okay ones...but most were bad...one house we saw we really liked on Lowell Street in Chic...