Monday, December 31, 2012

2013


As I'm sitting here watching the party in Toronto on TV (because Vancouver is too lame to do any kind of event for New Years...) I am thinking how crazy it is that it is 2013. How was 2012 for you? Mine was full of some downs in the beginning and then halfway through definitely had some nice steadyness to it. I know steadyness isn't a word. Nothing too exciting happened in 2012 but 2013 is definitely a different story. Here is what I have to look forward to:

February 3rd: My Birthday (who cares if its every year right?!). I'm turning 21 this year so I'm planning on crossing the line to go spend the day in Seattle and go up the Space Needle!

February 7th: Taking a trip to Toronto for a long weekend to attend my cousin's wedding and have some visit time with my family as well since it was too expensive to go during Christmas!

There could POSSIBLY be a trip to Vegas in March during my spring break ... I think that is still up in the air but that brings me to my next thing to look forward to...

This is my veryyy last semester of school which is crazy right?! I finish classes in April and start an internship after that for 4 weeks (which I need to set up asap.. shame on me). So...

April: Done classes which means.... we move! To Toronto to crash at my Dad's until I'm done my internship and get a job. Once I'm in Ontario I will be able to jump full force into Wedding planning and this blog will have way more content on that (also it will be the 1 year mark before the wedding yay =D )

And the biggest thing I'm looking forward to this year.... a paycheck!

 2013 should be good!

So yes, Happy New Year to you. I hope whatever way you have to decided to spend your night, you stay safe and do anything you won't be able to leave behind in 2012 ;)

Gizmo is watching! lol


Friday, December 28, 2012

Guest Book

I had pinned a mass amount of different ideas for a guest book on Pinterest. I knew I wanted something different than the regular book people get. I did come across someone using Mixbook a while back but I didn't want to go that route. 

Well one day I was on Mixbook playing around putting photo albums together and I started putting together a guestbook with all our engagement pictures. I ended up really liking it so, I just ordered it. It was a really reasonable price too. It wasn't anymore than just getting a regular book from the store. We got it really fast too (I found out later it was shipped from Calgary or somewhere near there so that explained that... lol)

Here is a couple pages from it:


On the front page it has our names and the date we got married and all that and I didn't realize it at first but my Mom soon pointed out that it said May 24th, 2011. Oops... I thought that I was foobard because Mixbook wouldn't let me return this.. its not like they could resell it. But I decided to contact them anyway and they told me I could get a corrected copy, just had to pay for shipping. That was fine by me! So I was pretty impressed!

Friday, December 14, 2012

Adios Muchachos!

I am off to sunny Mexico tomorrow so my blog will be on a little hiatus! I will be back Christmas Eve and don't worry... I will take tons of pictures with my brand spankin new Nikon J1!






See ya! 

Sunday, December 09, 2012

DIY Coasters

Perusing through pinterest I have found many tutorials for coasters so I thought I will try this myself. And so I bring to you my version of handmade coasters! 

This is a very cheap project. The supplies that cost the most money last a really long time.


 So to start you need supplies... Some supplies in the picture I ended up changing.
  • Some kind of craft mat to protect your counters from the glue. I use the back of my cutting board because I don't have a craft mat at this point. 
  • The print for your coasters - this can be paper or napkins. I picked up two different patterns of Christmas napkins from Superstore 
  • Mod Podge. I had matte finish on hand but if I were to do it again I would use the glossy finish.
  • 4x4 tiles. 4 for each set or however many you choose to have
  • Sponge Brush
  • Scissors
  • Pencil
  • Marker
  • Felt
  • Fabric Adhesive
  • Polyurethane


To start, one napkin makes 4 different coasters as seen here. So I cut along the fold lines and then traced the coaster with the pencil. Don't worry about being too exact. 

Then I went over on the inside of the pencil mark with marker. This you need to be steady and straight and hold your napkin straight too because it will move. 

I then removed this white fabric from the back of the napkins and cut along the inside of the marker line. I keep mentioning the inside because it is better to have your design be short and have a white frame than the design overlap the edges of the tiles.

Apply the mod podge with foam brush...

Place the napkin on to the tile and put mod podge on overtop. Because the napkin was wet from the mod podge before, it wrinkled a bit but it ended up with a cool design in my opinion. You won't be able to see it in these pictures though. Leave to dry.  After it dried, I took them outside and sprayed 2 coats of the polyurethane and let thoes dry.


 Now you see here, the coasters are done. To the next step...


 In the first picture I put up I showed the supplies. Among that were these felt furniture protectors that we had on hand. I thought I could use them but when I placed them on, they were way too thick. It looked silly. So I went off to Michaels...


Bought some felt and some fabric adhesive. One felt sheet will cover a set of 4.

Gizmo decided to help out.... 
I just basically used my eye to cut, it doesn't need to be perfect, we aren't machines! Haha
As long as it serves as protection from the tile than its fine.  One day when I get one of those straight cutter things I'll be able to acutally measure and make it stellar :) 


I applied the fabric adhesive to the outside, you don't need to apply too much because this stuff is strong and it will seep out the edges.

 The coasters with the felt on the back!


And here is the finished and wrapped product! I gave a pair to someone at school for our secret santa. They were a big hit. It's the perfect DIY Christmas gift because you can actually use it and people appreciate the fact that you made it yourself too. It shows a lot of thought went into their gift :)