I'm back with lots of DIY projects! First up is Chupi's nursery

I've been away from the blog for what feels like ages. I am so sorry, I didn't mean to be away for that long... time just flew and before I knew it weeks have passed.

The good thing about this is that I have managed to finish a lot of DIY projects and I will be posting them all these coming weeks and I finished Chupi's room.
Here is a quick preview of how it turned out.

The two IKEA Rast dressers ended up keeping their original pullers (see the previous post here for the original thought of adding Asian style pullers and more Rast DIY inspiration)
The Ikea rug I painted is a great colour adition and breaks up all the red really well (the original post on painting the rug is here)
The knitted monster travel pillow that I made for Chupi for using with our baby carrier was awesome during our 2 week trip to Sweden and Belgium in July. The 20 hour trip from Hong Kong to Sweden would have been impossible without it and a huge knitted blanket that I brought. She is still supposedly small enough to sleep in those travel baskets that the airlines provide, but that's according to the airline, not Chupi. She would not stop crying when we tried to put her to sleep in it (during the Easter trip she slept just fine in there but then she was only 3 months, now she was 7 months). So she ended up sleeping on top of me which made me completely immobile during most of the flight. Thank god for that extra little pillow and blanket to create some padding. 

I will be posting more detail photos of the nursery soon, so don't forget to check back later.

Interior design - DIY style

As promised yesterday...
here they are, my two favourite Interior DIY projects of the week.



INTERIOR DESIGN
DIY - Clear Side Table

First up is a DIY project by one of my favourite DIYers out there -Ivania Carpio from the Netherlands.
Ivania has a great original style and some of the most beautiful and clean designs.
You can find her original DIY projects on her blog Love Aesthetics.

find the full post and tutorial here

INTERIOR DESIGN - KIDS
DIY - Nursery lamp makeover

The second DIY project is for the little ones. It's by Project Nursery a great site for nursery design inspiration.

                   Before:

                   After:

find the full tutorial here.

My Mood Board - Let's not forget the little boys

There's been way too much girly stuff featured on this blog.
I hope that people don't take this the wrong way.
I am a firm believer in that everything that works for boys could work just as well for girls
...and what's wrong about a boy playing with dolls? Boys also have to learn about adult life through roll playing. And lets face it, all little boys don't grow up to be astronauts or cowboys, some grow up to be great fathers and husbands and hopefully so much more.

So even though today's posts are very gender stereotype I believe in letting the children choose what colours they like or don't like and what toys to play with, without us brainwashed adults telling them what's for boys and what's for girls.

I remember very well being secretly disappointed as a little girl when my father would come home from a trip abroad bringing with him little gifts for me and my brother ...my brother's boy toy was always sooo much cooler than the (usually pink) gift I was given.

Pink was my least favorite colour as a kid.

My Mood Board - Perfect little girls room

My iPad is overflowing with interior pictures but I hardly ever look at them.
That is partly due to my iPad crashing and closing down whenever I scroll through my pictures on it
...i need to have that looked at.

To get them out of there and onto somewhere useful (and where I might look at them) I will be creating themed mood boards and post one each Thursday. 
So here we go... 
it's Thursday(!) and today's mood board will follow Tuesdays posting theme ... it is an inspiration board for the perfect (in my opinion) little girls room.

Make My Room - Cupcakes and Powdered Sugar

Make My Room


Today's Make My Room post will be for the Mini princesses in our lives...
this weeks inspiration is Cupcakes and Powdered Sugar
You will get a peak into 3 little girls nurseries topped off with some retail therapy
... enjoy!

see all pictures of Emily's Artsy Traditional Nursery over at Project Nursery

find more details from Rylee's dreamy nursery at Baby Lifestyles

The full feature of Scarlett's room can be found on Chic & Cheap Nursery

1. Fuchsia cotton hanging lamp from Graham & Green  - £85.00

2. Cupcake plushie from SeeSueStitch on Etsy   - $14.00

3. Printed Quilts by Auggie  - $125.00

4. Steam Pug print by Doggleheim on Etsy - $12.00

5. Custom upholstered Chakki in designer fabrics from Serena & Lily   - $450.00

6. Large Pink African Basket from EA Déco   - €100.00

Custom knitted baby name blanket

Finally the blanket I kitted for Elin is finished and already I feel like making another one...
but you can never have too many blankets

My plan was to leave it without backing but I decided against it and added a cotton jersey banking which actually gives the blanket a really nice weight.

If you are interested in me making a customized  blanket like this for you then don't hesitate to contact me.

Knitted Monster Pillow for Benji's birthday

Here they are, the pictures of the finished pillow that I made for my friend Nina's son Benji.
We celebrated his 2 year birthday on Saturday with a very hot but enjoyable picnic.

I wanted to give him something that he could cuddle with, play with and relax with (3 wishes in one...like a kinder egg) so I made him a pillow, which I am sure is quite a boring gift in the eyes of a kid which is why I added a monster face on it, his name crocheted into it on the other side.

Unknown to all adults the picnic was being disturbed by an "ant invasion" and the pillow ended up being the perfect retreat.

Update on the weekend crafting

Weekend is long past and I managed to get some crafting and knitting done.

Two DIY kids projects
1. A knitted, personalized Monster Pillow for Benji, my friends son who just turned 2.
2. A personalized baby blanket for my little Chupi, Elin.

Both were first time projects and without bragging I think they turned out great, I will post pictures super soon.

I just love a good before & after project

I am on the brim of obsessional with before & after projects and Design Sponge definitely has some good projects to ogle. Like this Before & After: Chic Bohemian Nursery by Justina Blakeney. 
She has combined so many lovely fabrics and patterns and I am absolutely in lobe with the shaggy rug.

A DIY high chair for Chupi

We always said we were going to get the Stokke® Tripp Trapp® chair in a bright colour for Chupi once she got big enough...

suddenly she was big enough and we really needed a high chair but I knew it was going to take ages until we got our thumbs out of our a**es and go get her a chair.
So Sunday a week ago I thought I could DIY a high chair instead...and I did.
It took all bloody day but it turned out pretty cool I think (my boyfriend's parents think it looks like something found in an institute for the insane), I mean improvements could still be done now looking back on it but it works and Chupi seems to really like it. 
Judge for yourselves:

You can see in the background how the chair actually looks before covered with the "high chair".

This is what I did:

I placed two square foam pillows on the seat of the chair and covered them in fabric going around the underside of the chair seat and then added push buttons to attach it all the way around.

I covered the backrest of the chair with the same fabric and sewed it onto the pillow part also fastened with push buttons at back.

I sewed the harness part seen in the picture onto the backrest fabric with lots of push buttons to make sure it would fasten securely around her and that I could make it larger as she grew.

I shoved a pillow down the back behind the fabric for back comfort and softness and that was it.

It is easily removable with the snap buttons so it can be machine washed which is necessary as I have already had to wash it twice since making it.

Sounds complicated? It was a little complicated :)  - I didn't have the patience to create a pattern so I just started sewing and I wasn't smart enough to document the progress with pictures, but should anyone be interested I can probably come up with a better description on how to do it including both photographic and hand drawn pictures, just let me know.

DIY project - IKEA Rast dresser makeover

I have just bought 4 Ikea Rast dressers.
They are cheap and untreated and great for DIY and I am definitely not the first to DIY this dresser.
Below are some Rast re-creations from others...

1. Almost Makes Perfect
2. Me, You and a Wiener
3. IKEA’s Livet Hema blog
4. Design Manifest
5. AM Dolce Vita


I bought two dressers for Chupi's room and two for the living room as a TV stand and DVD storage etc. The ones in the living room are still plain and very ugly and I haven't decided what I want to do with them. The two in Chupi's room have already been painted and only need hardware ...that's where I got stuck.
I bought and added the hardware to one of the chests and now I cant decide if I maybe liked it better with the original knobs.

What do you think, original knobs or the oriental brass ones? 

I might go for something completely different in the end... I will keep you updated on how it turns out. 


The stripey guys on the dresser are my Sock Monkeys, I am a bit of a sock monkey maniac at the moment and have to everyone's amusement started a mini sock monkey production line.

To finish today off here are some more IKEA Rast hack by other bloggers

1. Design Sponge

2. I Suwannee

3. IKEA’ s Livet Hema blog

4. Design Dump

5. + 6. I cannot find who hacked these but they are using the  decorative fretwork panels from O’verlays

See how the other pair of dressers turned out here.

Painted rug DIY Project - before & after

The Rug for Chupi's room was completed this weekend, and I am pretty pleased with how it turned out. I wish I would have used a little but warmer yellow but I still like the end result, you can see the work in progress and finished result here. What do you think?

This is how it turned out:

There is still loads more to do in Chupi's room before she moves in (she is currently sharing a bedroom with us) , the 2 dressers in the picture are also a work in progress, actually more of a work with no progress... I changed the drawer knobs and now I am not sure if I like it so the project has halted and every time I pass them I think "What to do??"

    Check out these 20 blogs for more painted rugs:

     1. How to make a block print rug at Apartment Therapy
     2. How to paint an indoor/outdoor rug at DIY Maven
     3. Stenciled pattern rug at Pudel-design
     4. DIY zig-zag rug tutorial at adventures in dressmaking
     5. DIY turning an old rug into Chevron beauty at SAS interiors
     6. DIY Chevron rug at High-heeled foot in the door
     7. DIY painted IKEA rug at Charm Home Design
     8. DIY Geometric Rug at Classically Modern Nest
     9. Tutorial: Hand Painted Rug at Diddle Dumpling
   10. The great Rug adventure (foam stamped rug) at Ramblings around DC and beyond
   11. Ikea rug makeover at a little bit of everything
   12. Ikea rug painted with grey and white Chevron pattern at Hayley Anderson
   13. DIY painted faux Kilim rug at Forge
   14. Chevron Rug DIY at Mason Jar Champagne
   15. Chevron painted rug from Ikea at The House of Smiths
   16. DIY stamped rug tutorial at My Hands Made It
   17. DIY polka dot rug at katiecupcake
   18. DIY painted Kilim rug at The Gold Jelly Bean - I Love this one, but then again I love anything Kilim
   19. DIY Herringbone rug at All Things Lovely
   20. Lastly Jen at tatertots & jello has painted a ton of rugs.