The Lilypad Cottage

a place for all things creative

By 38 Comments

Playroom Makeover

I have been slowly redoing our play room this last year.  At the beginning it was just sort of a mish mash of stuff that was in the basement of our old house.  We don’t have a basement being on the Lake, so we put the playroom upstairs and it is open for all to see (i.e. it needs to have a better cuteness factor than it used to!)

So here is the new room.

Let’s back up a bit and I’ll show you the before.

 

 

 

Eh –  kinda blah, kinda beige.  This sectional took up SO much room there was hardly any space for the kiddos to play.

So, we sold the couch on craiglist for $700 (I know right?), and got this new one on sale for only $400!

 

 

Since I had the leftover money, I bought these really fun beanbags from Pottery Barn Teen. These are so comfy, and more often than not, you will find the Mr. (and perhaps myself!) lounging in one.

Bonus – we can haul them out of the way for impromptu dance parties :)

I painted the one wall navy, and I love the way the white board and batten pops now.  Honestly, did you even notice it in the before picture? Nope!

The letter wall also got a makeover – here was my first attempt.

 

 

Eh – it just wasn’t coming together like I wanted.  I realized it was just floating out in space on this huge wall and really needed an anchor.

So, I moved it to this wall and put the IKEA storage unit underneath.  I also toned the colors down a bit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m loving the new nautical crisp vibe in here.

I also showed you our gallery wall on the opposite of the room here.

 

 

I got this table set from a thrift store for $100 – it used to be Barney purple, but now is a crisp white (which is usually covered in various shades of marker and glitter.  Gotta love Magic Erasers!)

I also recovered the seat cushions in navy seersucker.

 


I love these prints that I ordered from the Etsy shop Wallfry (they come in a zillion colors and sayings).

This room is still a work in progress – I have this huge wall to fill where the old letters were…

…and some obvious patch work to do, oops!


But I think I have an idea – stay tuned to see what I do with this…

 

UPDATE:  You can see what I did with this blue poster board and giant wall here.  I also updated the gallery wall here.

P.S. In case you think my kids are amazing well behaved super children who always pick up their toys – here’s how it normally looks.  We have 2 huge closets in the playroom…

Here’s what’s behind…

Door #1                                Door #2

Linking up at Coastal Charm
Savvy Southern Style 
Crafty Scrappy Happy 
Liz Marie Blog

 

By 7 Comments

Top 5 Pinterest Family Friendly Recipes

My kids are totally picky eaters.  It drives me nuts.  Dinner time can be a battle in our house, but I am at the point where I refuse to be a short order cook and make everyone their own meal.
The new rule is you eat what we are eating or you can have a pile of carrot sticks.  I’d say at least one night a week our daughter goes for the carrots…this week it was my attempt at Pad Thai that had her eating like a bunny…I actually joined her (it was a total FAIL!).
So when I do find something everyone likes to eat, it’s like winning the lottery!  A peaceful dinner and full munchkin bellies are THAT exciting to me.

Here are my top 5 picky eater meals

(click the picture to take you to the original link and recipe)

1. Crockpot Honey Apple Pork Loin from My Cross Fit Journey
This is so simple, delicious and healthy.  You end up with a really yummy applesauce plus the pork loin.  Bake up some sweet potatoes and you have a great meal.  My daughter loved this one!
 
2.  Spicy Tilapia with Dill Sauce from Scissors and Spatulas
This is not really spicy, but I still leave the spice rub off my kids portion.  They love the dill sauce though.  I serve this with quinoa with corn and black beans in it.  We are still working on the kids with quinoa. It is not their favorite, but I consider them eating fish a big win!
3. Best Pot Roast Ever from Marie’s Cooking Adventures
This is another easy crockpot recipe, perfect for a busy day.  Bonus you have potatoes and carrots right in there, so just serve a side salad with it and you’re done!
4. Sweet and Sour Chicken from Life as a Lofthouse 
Admittedly this isn’t one of the healthier meals since you pan fry the chicken before putting it in the oven, but it is delicious and I’m sure it is better for you than take out Chinese food.  She has a great recipe for fried rice to serve with it.
5. Taco Corn Bread Casserole from Debbi Does Dinner
Taco night is always a hit with my kids but this casserole switches it up a little.  The only thing I did different in this recipe is I always add a small can of tomato sauce to my taco meat to sneak some more veggies in (I have even added pureed carrots or sweet potatoes too, you can’t even taste it!)  

Now if I could only come up with an easier way to grocery shop with 2 kids!  You moms with 3 or 4 kids, hats off to you! I always feel like I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown by the time I leave the store. 
 For instance this week after surviving aisle after aisle of my son throwing 1 item out of the cart for every 1 I put in and my daughter randomly adding anything she could get her hands on – I finally lost it in the parking lot when my frozen turkey fell out the bottom of my grocery bag and landed in a puddle. 
 I possibly yelled “I hate you turkey!”…when I noticed a nice elderly gentleman staring at me…
 He offered to take my cart back for me – not sure if he was being nice or if he was scared of me…
Do you ever find yourself yelling at your poultry after surviving a grocery store run?

 And really I should have yelled at the plastic bag…the poor turkey had suffered enough.


 Please tell me I’m not the only one :)

By 37 Comments

Rub a Dub Dub

One of my favorite ways to relax is reading a book in the tub.  When we built this house I begged, pleaded and offered to sell my left kidney politely requested one thing, a big ole pedestal soaking tub.  But eek! there is definitely a price hike involved.  So in the spirit of compromise, I gave up having a tiled shower (we went with a fiberglass one) and we laid all the tile in the bathroom ourselves. We crunched the numbers and fit the tub in the budget (YAY)!

Isn’t she a beaut?  So worth every minute tiling this floor while 5 months pregnant!

 

Speaking of which, this hex tile is so fun and relatively easy to lay, it comes in big square sheets.  Grouting all those little lines is the only thing that is a pain.

The blah shower I covered up with a pretty Pottery Barn shower curtain.And oops if you look close, you can see the huge hole in the wall that I was trying to hide with my towels.  Let’s just say my shelves are now hung with sinkers and I have recovered from the middle of the night heart attack I suffered when these suckers fell down!

 

We pretty much have white cabinetry every where in our house but the master bath.  I love the way the dark maple contrasts with the white floors and counter tops.

Speaking of counter tops, remember how I wanted marble in the kitchen? (check out our kitchen here)

I got my wish in the master bath.

My fun IKEA shelves properly hung with sinkers :)

The view is pretty relaxing too!

The hallway leading from the master to the bath.

 

Now if I could just have a few minutes to soak in peace without my little muchkins banging on the door begging to “go swimming in the pool” too :)

 

Hope you have a relaxing place in your house to recharge!

 

 

By 7 Comments

Under the Sea – Costumes

I have mentioned before that my daughter’s career goal is to be a professional mermaid, so you can just about guess what her Halloween costume is going to be this year…

 

That’s right – Ariel, THE Little Mermaid.

 
 
 
 

and her brother, of course, needed to be Sabastian the Crab

 
 

or as my diva referred to him “My Crab Assistant”  as in “Crab Assistant get me some lunch!” :)

  (there was much debate in the house about whether Sebastian was a crab or a lobster, but a google search revealed he is indeed a crab)

 

I wanted to try and make the kids costumes for a change, so of course I hit Pinterest and found this idea for the crab costume from Woman’s Day

So cute right?  My little man’s costume had claws too but he refused to wear them (should be fun to keep mittens on the stinker this winter!)

This was super easy, the only thing I did different was hand sewing everything on rather than using a glue gun.  That would have been way easier, but this was such a cozy sweatshirt I hated to ruin it with hot glue.  Sewing it allowed me to easily remove everything.

 

 

Showing off his clawless hands :)

 

For the little mermaid costume I enlisted the help of my fantastic mother in law.  She is amazing with a sewing machine and I can barely sew a straight line.  I knew what I wanted to do and she made it happen.  

 

We dismantled a fairy dress-up dress that we had in the closet by separating the skirt from the top.  Then I picked up some sequined green fabric and we made a skirt with it.  We attached the top of the dismantled dress to the new skirt and attached the leftover bottom of the dress to the bottom of the sequin skirt.  The skirt was blue so we added another layer of green over top to make it more mermaidy…(my 4 year old’s word not mine!)

 

 

There is a slit up the back to a little above her knees so she can walk.  She wore leggings underneath also ( Halloween night is going to be freezing so we will see how many layers of long underwear we can squeeze on her!) The skirt is a bit similar to this one here I found on Pinterest.

 

We used some modge podge to glitter up some sea shells and hot glued them on the neckline.

 

The pink wig was leftover from her strawberry shortcake days.

 

Now let’s take a moment and enjoy my diva’s top model poses…

 

 It is impossible to take her photo without one of her “fashion girl poses”.  On school picture day her Pre-K teacher informed me the photographer had never met a student quite like her.  She showed the photographer her range of poses and after getting a “normal” photo FINALLY – she insisted she had more poses if they needed them… 

 

Yeah, she is definitely not lacking in the personality department :)

 

…and my attempts at photographing the 2 of them together…not moving…looking at the camera…

 

That’s pretty much like capturing a photo of Bigfoot – not gonna happen!

 
 
 
 
 

 

Just had to show the awesome face painting at this Halloween Party we went to, how cool is this butterfly?

 

 

I had so much fun making their costumes, BIG thanks to my favorite mother in law!

 

What are your kids going to be this year?

 

                 

By 3 Comments

Beachy Wreath

Ok so I confess this post is completely seasonally wrong, who is thinking of the beach and sea shells when you are busy with Halloween costumes and raking leaves?  

Well..me… 

 I wasn’t REALLY, until I was cruising around Ballard Designs website and I was inspired by their Beachy Wreath

We can totally make this!  For like $5, maybe a little more depending on what you can find around your house.

So here is mine.

 

 

Here’s how I did it.  I had an old wreath in the garage.

 

 

I bought 2 bags of Decorative Sisal from Jo-Ann Fabric ($1.99 each)

 

 
I covered the wreath with the sisal, it kinda sticks on its own, then I used some thin twine to wrap around the wreath to help it stay on.

 

Get your glue gun ready and plop some shells on there.  We had some shells that my munchkins and I had collected last spring break in FL, thank you Florida :)

 

 

 

I have no idea where I’m going to put it for now, but I have a zillion ideas for it next summer!  

 

I still love you though Ballard, see this cute little stool?

 

 

It’s only $49 and totally cute.  

 

And it looks right at home with my grandmother’s sweet chair.

 

(you can see the rest of my living room here)

Although, come to think of it, this was actually free.  My mom has one at her house and I commented on how cute it was, and magically the next week one showed up at my house.

Gotta love my mom!  

I mentioned I liked her new car too, but so far my driveway remains empty…

Anyways back to caramel apples and pumpkins, soon enough it will be sunshine and sea shell time again!

By 33 Comments

Fall Mantel

Hey, how was your weekend?  Ours was great – we had a fun family photo shoot (can’t wait to share the pics next month), and I got the chance to work on my Fall Mantle as well.  As I mentioned Friday,  I was able to reuse most of my Fall Tablescape materials for the Mantel where they are safe from little hands :)

 

Once again I went with (shocker) a white neutral theme.

 

 

 

These frames used to be black but I wanted them to look like old barnwood, so I used gray, white, and brown craft paint to get a wood tone look.  Then I scraped some off for a distressed look.

 

 

Now that I see this picture I realize there is still paint on the glass whoopsie!  Once again, I’m the laziest DIY-er ever.  I suppose I should have gotten out some painters tape but I’m always working against the nap time clock!

 

 

Remember how I spray painted these leaves to give them a little softer look?  They are still holding up just fine.

 

 

Here is a close up of our fireplace tile.  My husband wanted glass tile, and I wanted marble so this was our compromise…I still love marble tiled fireplaces, but this is fun too!

 

 

 

Thanks for stopping by!  Later in the week, I look forward to posting my first cooking post.  Wow, taking photos of food is waaaay harder than I thought…but I promise the recipes are good :)

By 8 Comments

Autumn Table

Hi there, everyone ready for the weekend?  I am!  But first I wanted to share one of the projects I’ve been working on.  My Fall Tablescape.

 

 

see doesn’t it look pretty?

 

Unfortunately this is what my tablescape looks like typically…

 

 

Still cute (!) but my “little mountain goat” makes it impossible to keep anything pretty on the dining table for now, so I only got to enjoy my tablescape for the duration of naptime.  

 

That’s OK though, I will be recycling most of it onto my Fall Mantle which I will be posting about next week!  I’m reasonably sure my little man can’t scale the fireplace yet…

I’ve just jinxed myself haven’t I?

 

Back to my tablescape, I made 2 versions because I was having too much fun.   For this one I used a large spray painted pumpkin, and some smaller grey chalk painted pumpkins.

 

 Isn’t this china gorgeous?  My mother let me borrow it for the day (sigh of relief my butter fingers didn’t break anything!) It was my mother’s great grandmother’s china (my great great grandma, are you following this?)  Extremely delicate vintage GORGEOUSNESS!

 

I spray painted (AGAIN painting everything white, I have a problem!) some branches and leaves lightly to get a softer green tone. 

 

 

I found these pine cones in the front yard.  The shell ball things usually sit on the ottoman in my living room (see here) but I liked the texture they added, not exactly autumnal but I like breaking decor rules. :)

 

 

This was my 2nd version with what I first thought was a turkey, then I realized it was a rooster but went with it anyway (I’m such a rebel.).

 

 

 

I’m thinking I’m digging the rooster/turkey one!

 

So that’s my Fall Tablescape (or it was) hope you all have a great weekend!  Can’t wait to show you my Fall Mantel next week.

 

 

 

By 4 Comments

Say Cheese!

This weekend I’m super excited that we are getting our family photos taken by my amazingly talented friend Kari from Zander and Breck Photography.  Check out her blog here!
She is responsible for my favorite pictures of my munchkins, like these newborn photos
Just to be clear, NO, he doesn’t normally sleep in a hammock (oddly enough I had several people ask me that!?!) :)

Forgot what a tiny little nugget he was.

 and these last spring

 Can’t resist a man in a tie…especially a clip on :)

Love her sweet smile!

 See amazing right?  Now to figure out wardrobe…
Recently I got the chance to do just that; one of Kari’s clients wanted some help coordinating her family’s clothes for their pictures and I had the fun job of helping out!  It was great and a little nerve racking to style an entire family.
I love to put outfits together.  My mom calls me her “high priced personal stylist” ie: she lets me borrow some of her cute stuff in exchange for advice. :) So lucky we are practically the same size, I hope I look half as good as her when I’m her age!  Sadly this does not apply when it comes to shoes…sigh…curse my big ole feet.
For family photos I tend to keep everyone in similar color tones, but I try to avoid being too matchy matchy.  I want everyone to stand out in there own way.  I love to use fun accessories like scarves or hats to add some extra pop.
Something else to think about is where you will display these photos in your home.  You want to make sure your photos compliment your decor.  If I blow the pictures up huge (which I LOVE to do, see here) I don’t want them to clash with the room, think of it like buying art (which it totally is!) for your room.

Or go easy on yourself and just order black and white photos :)


Can’t wait to share the new pictures…and update my blogger photo.  Kari clued me into the fact that it  looks like a tree is growing out of my head…it sorta totally does :)  This is why she is a good friend people!

Now I’m off to my closet to find something for myself!  Having one of those “I have nothing to wear” days as I sit surrounded by towers of clothing (please tell me I’m not the only one who does this?).

By 2 Comments

My Haven

The lovely Chas (and fellow Michigander) from A Woman’s Haven features different blogger’s house tours in her series House Haven Tours.  She has featured some amazing homes!  
I was so excited and giddy when she asked me to join these amazing bloggers and post my own house tour!

 So hop on over to A Woman’s Haven and take the tour here.  I posted a few rooms that I haven’t even included here at the Lily Pad Cottage yet. 
 And while you are there check out some of her great project ideas and some of the other amazing home tours.

By 1 Comment

Paint Your Own Fabric

Just a quick post today about fabric…I meant to post it this weekend but I decided to “unplug” and spend my time with my munchkins!

I hate when I have a vision in my head of what fabric I want but can’t find anything like it in the stores. 

 

I was having this problem with this bench in our master bedroom…

 

 

 

 
 I got this new throw pillow from Pottery Barn and wanted a wider striped fabric to coordinate with it. After searching thru the local fabric stores with my 2 very crabby darling angels, I ended up buying some cheap canvas and craft paint.

 I taped off some stripes with painters tape, filled it in with paint, and had myself some cute fabric.  I left a little of the white showing thru to give it more of a old worn vintage vibe.

And once AGAIN I painted the wood white.
This was the only BEFORE picture I could find of the bench (bad blogger!) and a little peak of our previous house (which we lived in for a whopping 6 months :) ).

The AFTER

 

 

This is such a cheap and easy project it would work great for throw pillows or drapes too!
Think polka dots, stencils, monograms, quotes…there are a zillion possibilities.
 Hmmm what can I paint next?
Now my favorite little man and I are off to story time :)

Gotta love his “cheese” smile!

Linking up at Cozy Little House here
 at Coastal Charm here
and at Stone Gable here

 

Privacy Policy
Top

Have The Lily Pad Cottage delivered right to your inbox

  • It's free and easy
  • See all my latest ideas
  • Never miss a giveaway

C'mon you know you want to...