Washcloth Bunnies

March 20, 2013

Today I’m sharing these cute washcloth bunnies over at Minted‘s blog Julep. Julep is a great resource for all things party and home decor. I’m attaching very cute customized Easter gift tags to these little guys this year. I hope you’ll head over to Julep for the full how-to instructions.

And this is your LAST reminder to enter the Minted giveaway I’m hosting. Visit this post for the details, but wouldn’t you love to have $150 to spend at Minted?

DIY

Gold and Pastel Eggs

March 18, 2013

I don’t know about you, but I am loving that Spring is here (well at least it’s here in California). I’m having so much fun pinning Spring and Easter ideas on Pinterest. I’m totally inspired by these gorgeous ombre eggs and these beautiful gold dipped ones. So, I decided to make my own version.

I love to use paper mache eggs for Easter (like my chalkboard ones). It’s fun to be able to take them out year after year and they are nearly indestructible, which is very important with an 18 mo. old in the house.

I took my color inspiration from this lovely modern art print, Stacks, from Minted. This piece reminded me of beautiful painted Easter eggs, so I putting it with my framed Easter cards and white bunnies. I painted them 3 shades of blue and 3 shades of green. Then I simply painted one end of each egg metallic gold. I tried taping them off with blue painter’s tape to start with, but then I decided I wanted something a little more free form. So, I just free hand painted them, making them all unique and one of a kind. I’m happy with the results.

Don’t forget to enter my giveaway from Minted, it ends tomorrow. It’s $150 to spend on whatever Minted products you want! Enter here.

Food & Drink

Shamrock Shortbread

March 15, 2013

Seriously, why did I make these? I think I have single handedly eat ALL of these Shamrock Shortbread. They’re buttery, tender cookies, dotted with milk and mint chocolate chips.

Shamrock Shortbread

1 cup butter (room temp)

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 tsp. salt

1 tsp. vanilla

2 egg yolks

2 1/2 cups flour

3/4 cup chocolate chips (I used a milk/mint chocolate mix)

Cream the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer. Add the salt, vanilla and egg yolks and beat until smooth. Add the flour and mix till dough comes together. Add the choc chips. Roll out the dough on a floured surface to 1/4″ thick and cut out your shamrocks. Bake at 325 F for about 12-15 mins or just until the edges of the cookie start to turn golden brown. Cool on a wire rack.

I don’t forget to check out my giveaway from Minted. It’s $150 to spend on whatever you want at Minted!!!!! Head over to this post to enter.

etc.

White Bunnies and a Minted Giveaway

March 14, 2013

I am so excited to share with you an amazing giveaway that O + P is hosting. How does $150 to spend at Minted sound? I wanna win it. This is just in time for Easter, but you can spend the money on whatever you want.

I’ve customized a few Easter cards this year to send out to family. But, I am also framing a couple of the cards as seasonal art. Minted’s products are so beautifully designed and printed, that they feel like a piece of art. I framed this sweet Kraft and White Easter Card in a simple white 5×7″ frame and I’m sitting it alongside my white bunnies. It will be fun to take out this framed card year after year.

The white bunnies are my little collection of thrift store finds. I bought these three bunnies for under $3 a each and then to give them all a uniform look, I painted them all a clean flat white. They were are varying shades of white with bits and pieces of color. I am happy with their new look. And I’ll be on the hunt for more.

So here’s how to enter:

1. Head over to Minted and take a look at all their beautiful Easter Cards and Spring Art, then simply leave me a comment below telling me what caught your eye or what you’d spend $150 on at Minted. It’s as easy as that.

2. And if you’d like to have any additional entries, leave a comment letting me know how you shared this giveaway with your friends (facebook, twitter, instagram, pinterest). Be sure to leave one comment for every share so that they are counted as entries.

The giveaway will close Tuesday, March 19th at 12 midnight PST. I will announce the winner Wednesday, March 20th.

DIY

St. Paddy’s Day Silhouettes

March 13, 2013

Mint and Gold it’s my lucky combination this St. Patrick’s Day. These sweet gold silhouettes are framed against a pretty minty green. They’re simple and clean, my favorite way to decorate. And the little boy especially, really looks like Dylan when he was younger.

This is truly a 5 minute craft. But, I have to warn you in advance, you will need to use a forever, fantastically awesome Cricut Machine to get these fabulous results. I’ve said it before, but I love my Cricut. It gives the most professional, clean results every time. But, for those of you who are not lucky enough to have access to one, this could be done the old fashioned way (like trace your kids shadow silhouette’s and then cut them out by hand).

I feel silly admitting this to those of you who are Cricut users, but I just started using Cricut’s Craft Room. I’m not new to Cricut, I’ve had my machine for almost 4 years now, but holy cow, I have totally been missing out using the old school cartridges. Craft Room is basically digital cartridges, and you do everything on your computer. You can even put together a whole page to cut out and then save the work and make another page. Then you simply hook it up to your computer with a USB cord and cut away. It is so much more versatile, a lot less wasted paper and you can even weld images and text together to make your own custom shapes. WOW, right?

I used Cricut’s A Child’s Year cartridge and cut out the boy and girl holding shamrocks. I cut the silhouettes to about 4″ wide on metallic gold card stock. My mint green mat and frames were both 5X7″.

How lovely is this on top of my green milk glass cake plate with some chocolate gold coins? And I love how metallic change in different lights. They give so much depth and texture.

If you want more of my St. Patrick’s Day fun, check out my Pinterest Board, and these posts:
Giant Geometric Shamrock
Gold Shamrock Treat Bags
Shamrock Floats
Cranberry Orange Irish Soda
Corned Beef with Honey Mustard Glaze
“Lucky” Printable Bunting

DIY / etc.

Toddler and Tween Shared Room Art

March 12, 2013

I’ve shared with you that I am attempting to give my girl’s room a little make-over. Not a floor to ceiling re-do, but more of a freshen-up and just add some details to complete the space. I want both my toddler and my tween to feel like this is their space. This week, I got the art prints that I ordered from The Land of Nod. I am beyond excited. I think they are going to add that modern edge I wanted for the space. When I saw my before pictures, I realized how bare that one big wall over the bed was.

I’m working on putting the art pieces together now to hang on that wall. I’m pairing my vintage horse prints from my Grandma’s house, with a beautiful batik I bought in Sri Lanka and the new prints for The Land of Nod. It may seem like a crazy combination of styles, but so far it’s working for me. I like the art that hangs in my home to have some meaning and sentimental value, and having a piece of my Grandparent’s home and something significant from our family travels is important.
I think taking the risk in combining these very different styles is what gives a space personality and a little funk.

The Amethyst print(my personal favorite of the prints I ordered) plays really nicely with the Sri Lankan batik. I love the vibrant colors in both and the organic shapes of the batik and the angular shapes of the Amethyst compliment each other.

This Flamingos print is modern and playful and the colors in it go so well with other accessories in the room.

I’ve got the prints all in their frames, and I’ve laid them out on the floor to work on arranging them in a grouping. I’m not sure if the vintage horse prints should be together or if I should separate them in the grouping. I’m leaning towards this first arrangement. What do you think? Also I think a picture rail could also be a good option for hanging this artwork.

I ordered frames to go with my Land of Nod prints. I’m really pleased with both the prints and the frames from The Nod Institute of Art collection. Both the frames and the prints (which are currently 20% off right now) are reasonably priced and I feel like I’m buying something unique that my daughters can keep and maybe even pass down to their girls someday, because all of their prints are limited edition. The Fur and Glasses print is pretty great, and it’s tween approved, because Denali LOVES it.

I’d love to know what you think. Do you like this grouping? What is and isn’t working for you? Do I need another piece over by the Flamingos?

I big thanks to The Land of Nod for gifting the Fur and Glasses and the Flamingo prints.

DIY

Geometric Shamrock Bunting

March 11, 2013

Are you feeling lucky this Monday morning? Well, you should be now, because I’ve got a FREE St. Patrick’s Day printable bunting for you. Simply print off the 2 pdf files on some card stock, cut them out and string up your LUCKY banner.

I’m sticking with my mint theme and I also added my geometric shamrock to both ends of the bunting.

To download the printables click here. If you’d be interested in having this made into labels (like my Valentine’s printables), please let me know. And if you do download and print out this bunting, please let me know by leaving me a comment here.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day and share the luck by pinning, tweeting, or reposting this printable to your friends.

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This Week

March 9, 2013

This week….. well, this is really a sampling of the last 2 weeks via my instagram.

I don’t often share a lot of my personal life here on O + P, but we’ve had a tough week and a half. Well, mostly Denali has. If you don’t know my daughter, she is the quietest, sweetest, kindest little girl. Denali is in 6th grade, and this year she started middle school. Anyways, to make a very long story short, she caught some girls in her class doing something they shouldn’t and so she reported it to the teacher. As a result, these girls threatened Denali in a very serious way (I am being vague for a reason). But, it didn’t end there. Even after suspensions, these girls came back even more aggravated and the threats and bullying continued. And as of yesterday, these girl’s friends are now picking on my baby. We are hoping this will end, but if it doesn’t end NOW we ready to make some big changes. The whole process has not only been worrisome for Denali, but it’s also involved many painful trips and phone calls to the principal’s office.

On the bright side, my parents were here last week for a few days. We got to celebrate my Dad’s birthday together. And my sister in law came from San Diego with my very cute niece and nephew. That’s his sweet little hands making donuts with my mom.

We also went to LA on Saturday. It was nice to get out of town. We hit IKEA and then went to West Elm LA and Emily Henderson was there with a Pop-Up Etsy shop. It was fun to meet her again (I met her previously at Alt). My kids loved the fancy drinks and treats and we played in the photo booth. And I might have ordered a new chair for our living room (eeeeek!). Then we headed over to The Grove and got some dinner at the farmer’s market.

Travel

Ireland: Day 5 (Londonderry and Sligo)

March 8, 2013

In anticipation of St. Patty’s Day, I’m sharing more of our trip to Ireland last Spring break. What an amazing county. Going back through my pictures last night, I was reminded of how fantastic our trip was and all the amazing places we visited. If you’d like to see more of out trip, I’ve shared pictures from Dublin, Newgrange, the Giants Causeway, and Dunluce Castle. And today I have pictures from the walled city of Londonderry and the countryside near Sligo.

We walked the wall on Londonderry. It’s actually very large and wide. And we wondered around shops and antique stores.

Then in the afternoon we drove through the peat bogs to a Bed and Breakfast at a charming little farm just outside Sligo.

DIY / etc.

St. Patrick’s Day Treat Bag

March 6, 2013

As a kid, I remember thinking chocolate gold coins were pretty much the fanciest candy you could eat. So, I’m filling little treat bags for St. Patrick’s Day with golden coins for my kids. I think these little goody bags with fit nicely into a lunch box.

To go with my love of Mint and Gold for St. Patrick’s Day, I added simple gold shamrocks to the front of these bags just like I did to my Shamrock Float bottles. These fun grid line bags are from We Love Citrus. (Visit this post to read about how you can get 20% off your purchase there).

On the back of the bag, I stamped a simple message for my kiddos.

I was on a time crunch, so I picked up these chocolate coins at my local party supply store, but I really wanted to order these fair trade chocolate coins for Divine Chocolates.