It's time to play kitchen.

One of my favorite toys growing up was my play kitchen. I have fond memories of baking up a storm, pulling out the fold-down table and sharing a delicious snack with my care bear, rainbow bright & Gem.
Imagine me dicing up a little treat at this state-of-the-art kitchen center.

Being that I'm so obsessed with the fuzzy memories of my tiny little culinary feasts, I've been researching play kitchens for Chloe pretty much since she was born. I have big plans to give her a fully stocked kitchen for her 2nd birthday including dreams of a beautiful wooden kitchen for our little chef, but to be honest, the plastic kitchens are striking my fancy more these days - they are usually larger, cheaper and come with more accessories. But nothing seems to fit the bill when it comes to the 'perfect' play kitchen: wooden, well spaced, plenty of doors/drawers/shelves, table included for serving up a mean tea party, a phone, doesn't include sounds, and has a sleek vintage/modern look...oh yeah, and less that 500.00 would be nice....and by less than 500.00 I mean it has to be less than 200.00.
I'd rather make a modified version of this...or this this or this or this or this or this or this. I just have to convince myself to commit to this seemingly monumental task.

more valentines

Since Molly shared her valentine creations I thought I would share a few of mine as well. I found tons of vintage valentine images online (I posted a list on my blog HERE). Mostly I just printed them all on cardstock and them cut them out and Jimmy gave them to everyone in the family. I took pictures of a few of the ones I did a little something extra to.

I just stuck all of these ones on my bulletin board with some other non-valentine things, but it was the easiest way to take a picture of them all at once. The one in the bottom left I found at an estate sale and it is the only real vintage valentine in the bunch. It says, "To Betty From Hermie" which I thought was great. I couldn't really part with it so I guess it was my valentine to myself.

Valentine.

Here is my idea of a great Valentine Decoration...
Frames from Target's dollar spot with vintage valentine's from a garage sale.

I plan on doing the same with Easter & Christmas cards I got garage sale-ing too.

Not the most exciting post....

but a post nonetheless.
Here are the new alphabet knobs (1/2 price at Hobby Lobby) I put on our butt-ugly dressers in an attempt to make them bearable. I hope to give them a paint job this summer --- any color suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!!

Before...ugly

After...minutely less ugly


Also - here is some of the rest of the room --- I have such a hard time decorating knowing that we are only here temporarily and come 2o11 we'll be headed for our 7th move in only 4 years of marriage. Ugh. So, while completely unfinished, unframed, unorganized...it's better than looking at blank walls!

I'm also starting a dusty little collection of black lacquer boxes.

FOOTLOOSE

So, technically, I "made" this. And while I didn't use scissors or string, it was test project using digital media. I think it turned out okay but I definitely need a new camera. I'm taking donations now...ha. Enjoy!

Chicago Footloose rough cut from Katherine Young on Vimeo.