ABC!

I just designed an alphabet poster for my daughter, so now I've got letters and typography on the brain. I love how a simple letter can look so beautiful, graphic and bold. As a designer, I have so much fun playing with different fonts, colors and negative space. With that in mind, here are some of my favorite 'typography/alphabet' themed finds on etsy:


White Wood Ampersand by Hindsvik


Paris Letters - 5x5 Original Photos by Little Brown Pen


Initial Letter G (from Antique Typewriter) by QA Create


Yellow Orange and Pink Alphabet Pillow by Pillow Factory


Wood Alphabet Blocks by August Grove

Stylish Storage

I have been a big fan of Sewing Momma on etsy for quite a while. Her shop's tagline is "Trying to make organizing pretty", and I think she has succeeded. These beautiful storage bins could be used to store just about anything. Here are a few of my favorites:


Large Comfy Storage Bin



Extra Deep Fabric Bin



Perched on a Branch Fabric Storage Bin

Love this!

I found this free printable alphabet bunting at Ruffled via How About Orange. It's so cute (and free) that I just had to share. I think I might print these out, attach some felt to the back and let Luca use them on her felt board.

Displaying Children's Artwork

We do a lot of painting at our house, and sometimes it can be hard to figure out what to do with all of the resulting artwork. I'm sure this has been done before, but I decided to cut out pieces of some of my daughter's paintings and frame them in a mat that I had leftover from a previous project (more on that later). And voila, here is the result:





I think it turned out pretty cute!

Birthday Bash

My daughter turned 2 about a month ago and I was so excited that I went into party planning mode months in advance. I really wanted to create a fun and relaxed atmosphere for my daughter and about 9 of her friends (plus their mommies). I also wanted the day to reflect her personality and the things that she loves.
My little girl is really into butterflies and her favorite colors are pink and yellow, so that made coming up with a theme pretty easy: pink and yellow butterflies!
I kept the decor simple. I made two butterfly garlands out of pink, yellow and white vellum paper. I got the idea here.


The one change I made was to hand sew, rather than use a sewing machine. This was primarily because I wanted to have a lot of control over the spacing between the butterflies.


The rest of the decor consisted of pink, yellow and white balloons, and some butterfly shaped confetti that I purchased from Paperika and sprinkled on the dining room table.


Every child received their own party cup to use (and take home with them). I designed some simple labels and stuck them on some straw cups that I found at Target.


Then I made some custom paper party hats (I used an old hat that we had as a template), and a special "2" crown for my daughter.
The menu consisted of my daughter's favorite foods: hot dogs, fruit, pretzels, veggies, guacamole and chips. It was the dessert that was probably the most labor-intensive part of the whole process. I made chocolate cupcakes with buttercream icing, and decorated them with pink and yellow fondant butterflies.


Then I made sugar cookies and decorated them with pink and yellow royal icing.


I got all of my recipes from the wilton website and read some excellent cookie decorating tutorials at prudent baby.
The treat boxes were small brown paper boxes that I sealed with round labels (bought at Michael's in the wedding section).


I stuffed them with teddy grahams and some fabulous recycled butterfly crayons that I bought at Gaddy Nipper Crayons.
It turned out to be a beautiful day, and my daughter had a blast, which made the late nights decorating cookies and sewing butterflies totally worth it!
Here's my little girl enjoying her cupcake:


Oh, and this was the invitation that I designed:

Modern High Chair: IKEA

While doing a little shopping at the Houston IKEA this week, this [straight out of the Jetsons] high chair caught my eye. I have not read any reviews for the Leopard, but after seeing that it retails for only $60.00 I am left feeling a bit silly for my foolhardy spending on my Svan.



The Leopard is not listed on the IKEA website, but here are the details:
The plastic base: black or white
The seat: red, grey, black & white (if you tire of one color, you can buy another for $20.00)
The tray is detachable

You will love this magazine...

If you were a devoted reader of the late great Domino, you will be very excited to learn about the brand new Lonny Magazine. Lonny is an online mag, whose mission is "to reopen the doors of accessible design." (in a time when shelter publications are turning their last pages).
And let me tell you, they have blown the doors wide open with a breath of fresh air. In fact, stumbling across Lonny (thank you decor8) is what finally inspired me to get creative again (after a much-too-long hiatus). I am now officially painting, creating and blogging again. Thank you Lonny!

P.S. You can check them out on facebook too.