Projects for another day
I have so many things I want to do.  There are so many fun projects to work on and I just can’t wait to see the house in ship-shape ready for fun decorating projects.  I’m going to share a few of the diy/craft/decor projects I am looking forward to working on this winter while we take a break from the construction aspect of the house work, some of you may not know this but going through a custom home construction process is exhausting.
1) Poof
I may be a year or two behind the times but I still want to make one of these beautiful simple ottomans. Â I think a nice leather one would be great in the library room. Â A pink linen one may be just the dose of pink the master bedroom needs. Â Better Homes and Gardens has a nice pattern that should make this a quick, fun, and satisfying project.
Click on the image for a link!
2) Upholstered back dining chairs
LittleGreenNotebook.blogspot.com had a great idea. The talented Jenny Komenda saw this image from Style At Home and pointed out the possibility of upholstering the backs of some vintage dining chairs. The dining room needs upholstered dining chairs to offset all that wood panelling and this looks like a great, inexpensive way to make that happen. I’m thinking a round wood table, cream chairs, and a mid-tone upholstery either tan, green, or something wild like lavender. I need to keep my eyes peeled for a set of chairs with an interesting shape.
3) roman shades from mini-blinds
This trick has been seen on several blogs but I’ll link here to my favorite tutorial for this project over at welcometoheardmont.com
I’m planning on these roman shades in all the bedrooms, probably the den, the kitchen if necessary, and the closet/laundry room. I’ll probably do something similar but balloon-y for the bathrooms out of sheer fabric. They probably won’t be raised and lowered so the operability is not super necessary. This project is certainly on the list. We need window-covering and this is a cheap and easy way to get higher-end treatments. I’m thinking of lining the fabric with curtain liner so that the blind lines are even less visible, I also want to get gold coast curtains. I’ll let you know how that works out!
4) Family Tree woven blanket
I’ve been talking about making one of these for a while, I just haven’t gotten around to it. It would be a great quilt as well but I’m looking for a faster version.
You can get images printed into these woven throw blankets:
They cost anywhere from $75-$100 but what a great gift! This one from shutterfly is on sale for $71 which is the cheapest I’ve seen. Wouldn’t this be great with a large image of a family tree. You could do pictures or just names. The text would have to be quite large but I think it would be a very unique and tasteful way to personalize a space. Great grandparents gift as well. I am (almost) a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. I can trace my lineage back to a patriot in the American revolution: Beriah Bliss. I think having that all drawn out in a detailed family tree would be so cool!
5. Hypertufa Trough
Messy, dirty, and super fun looking, I can’t wait to do this! Maybe next summer.
6. Paper doll magnets
I am so not too old to have these on my fridge!
There are so many more but I’ll share those another time. Let me know if you venture on any of these fun projects without me. I’d love to see how they turned out!
Sarah
New Computer!
Last night, Stefan (the bf) picked me out a new computer. The one I currently have is about 5 years old. It is still chugging along just fine but it is time for an upgrade. It was in the budget and is a necessary investment. I’m planning on starting classes in the fall and though the laptop I have is powerful and still fully functional, I wanted something new that didn’t have the hardware kinks that my dell has. For example, the old dell only has 2 functioning USB ports, the cd rom doesn’t work anymore, there are some dead pixels in the screen, the up arrow only works about half the time and the whole case is a little wonky. I actually got some software recently that hooked up and syncd to my hi-tech oven and it can show me symptoms of bad oven temperature sensor whenever it is going wrong, something that my older computer couldnt do. That being said, I think I will miss the old girl. She was a good computer despite all the problems I’ve had with her. I would not be surprised if she has the longest battery-life of any 2010 dell d620 anywhere. She will still last about 45 min which is amazing for a 5 year old computer and a 4 year old battery especially one used as heavily as mine. I am a computer engineer after all!
I bought the new laptop from Amazon. It is an Acer Aspire TimelineX AS3820T-6480. I’m not sure why the model number has to be so long.  Let’s just say it is a 14 in laptop with no CD drive and weighs just 4 pounds. It is less than an inch thin at its thinnest point and is a great machine for the money. I won’t get into the specs as this isn’t a nerd blog but a craft blog but I will say that all the numbers are pretty big. The MHz, the GBs, the DDR are all good. It should be a very good solitaire and blogging machine for me with the added bonus of being able to run some Matlab every now and again.
Bringing it back to the Craft, Art, and Design world, here is a pretty picture!
Now I just need to find a super cute laptop bag for it. I’m thinking of making one like this one found on Better Homes and Garden’s sister site, AllPeopleQuilt.
http://www.allpeoplequilt.com/projects-ideas/bags-pillows/messenger-bag_1.html
It looks like a simple pattern that will be quick to make. Â I just need to find some awesome fabric for it! Â I’m thinking something like this:
and this:
What do you think? Â I’m excited for my new computer and designing my awesome new computer Bag!
Sarah
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Nice computer and super cute fabric choices for the laptop bag. I really love your diysarah.com site and your new etsy store. Good luck and I can’t wait to see the finished bag.
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I actually knew about almost all of this, but with that in mind, I still believed it turned out practical. Beautiful blog!
Finally – The Living Room updates
Let me first sound off about the importance of pillows.  Good pillows add personality and fun to any boring old room.  These are my boyfriend’s couches.  They are oversized, brown and though not hideous are definitely the kind of couches a boy would pick-out.  I’m not complaining.  They are comfy and were a great price.  The one main issue I had was the hideous pillows that came with the couch.  They are HUGE and super duper ugly.  Not much I can do about the size besides completely replacing them but the uglyness, that I can do something about.  I can’t believe it took me this long but I have replaced the ugly pillows with something more fun.  One pair is natural fabric with a strip of the curtain pattern and one pair is a pretty pink color.  The apartment is still a bit of a bachelor pad and we are building Custom Safe Rooms Texas so I didn’t go crazy with the pinks but those look even better.
Stay tuned to see the curtains and the ottoman slip-cover!
Sarah
Sophia
4/8/2011 | 12:19 pm Permalink
Reached your blog through Digg. You know I am subscribing to your feed.