Birthday Boy Take 2

This time last year I was in a mad dash trying to finish up my then soon to be 4 year old's big boy room when we did this to his room:

Then I told you to ignore the fact that he still had a changing table for a dresser because I had big plans.

Then I kept you in the dark and did nothing with it.  For a year.  Because just like that my 4 year old is now about to be a 5 year old.  I can't believe it.  I digress.  So while I can't make him slow down I can update the area.

Brady has been asking for a desk for a few months.  He's entering kindergarten where I'm sure he'll be burning the midnight oil at that desk studying his ABC's, memorizing his sight words and learning to tie his shoes.  Anyway odd request for a not-yet 5 year old but his birthday is coming up and is something we'd need to figure out anyway.

It is a narrow room so I've been struggling a bit on how to fit a desk and a dresser into the space.  I considered using Ikea's new kitchen cabinetry, sans legs to build a desk that could also double as a dresser but while I still think it would be awesome, it became complicated and I'm running out of time/energy.  I think this gray cabinetry would have looked pretty cool with a wood top...

Ikea

Anyhoo moving on.  I've narrowed the options down to this (which I would stain):

Ikea

Love the price, like the style, unsure on the scale (it is 30" deep).

Or this (where I could be super lazy and just drop it in the room):

PB Teen

Love the style, love the scale, don't love the price.

So basically I've decided to spend more money and I STILL haven't addressed the 'changing table in a 5 year old's room' problem.  Buy new or hack what I've got?

Powder Room Reveal

Let's take a quick look at what we started with.  The room was very yellow when we bought the house.  It had a massive formal vanity, window trim for baseboards, brightly colored slate tile and (you can't see it in this picture) a very ugly pendant light.  A hot mess.  Since then it has been a few different colors.

I chose a dark teal printed grasscloth wallpaper from Spoonflower.  They custom cut it to the 4' lengths I needed above the bead board, labeled each roll and provided a legend showing which numbered roll corresponded to which measurement.

I've never hung wallpaper before so my parents were really generous and papered it for me while I was at work.  They said it was a 2 hour job.  They're such peaches.

Then we hung this gorgeous Parsons bone-inlay herringbone mirror from West Elm.

The sink, lighting, fixtures and bead board were all put in the day I went into labor with my now 6 year old so this was strictly a cosmetic upgrade.  Those are my favorite kind.

Green With Envy

The wallpaper is ordered!  So while I wait for it to arrive I'll search for some eye candy of green grasscloth and hope that my room will look a fraction as good as these do.

Source

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Source via Traditional Home

Powder Room

So as long as I'm resealing the tile I may as well redecorate the entire room right?  This room has only been four different colors in six years so it is screaming for a refresh.

I'm finally getting my grasscloth wallpaper.  Kind of.  Faux.  The room couldn't be any smaller than it currently is and half the wall is covered in bead board so it will not require much paper.  I've chosen this dark teal grasscloth from spoonflower.  A bit of a gamble ordering paper online that I've never seen in person but life's short right?

The bead board, sink, lights and fixtures are already in the room so it is really a wall paper and accessories refresh.  Here we go again!

Popcorn Crack

I mentioned this ridiculously amazing popcorn recipe in my post on cookie decorating.  You're welcome and I'm sorry.

Yield: 3 gallon sized freezer bags full

Ingredients:
3 bags microwave popcorn
24oz white chocolate chips
3 tablespoons of peanut butter
3 cups of Rice Krispy cereal
2 cups of peanuts 

• Pop the microwave popcorn.
• Microwave half of the white chocolate chips and half of the peanut butter until melted (stopping periodically to mix).  Then repeat the melting for the remaining chocolate chips and peanut butter.
• Mix Rice Krispy's and peanuts into a large bowl (the biggest container you can find...a 5 gallon bucket isn't too big!).
• Add one bag of popped popcorn (you may want to take out any seeds prior to combining.
• Pour in about 1/3 melted chip/peanut butter mixture over the popcorn mixture.  Mix with spatula.
• Continue adding popcorn and melted chips/peanut butter mixture until gone.
• Dump contents of the bowl onto wax paper--spreading in clumps.L
• Let mixture harden before putting it into a container

Cookie Decorating Party

Yesterday we invited some neighborhood families over for some cookie decorating in advance of Santa's arrival.  

We kept the afternoon party menu simple with popcorn (I'll share an amazing recipe in a future post), cheese & crackers, carrots & hummus and hot cocoa & marshmallows. 

I baked a few dozen cookies in advance, stuck them in the freezer and then thawed them the day before.  I made frosting using confectioner sugar, butter and almond extract and then filled condiment bottles with frosting (affiliate link).  I put the sprinkles, sugar and candies in cupcake wrappers so that there were no lines waiting for the sprinkles.  

I wrote each kid's name on a paper plate so we could keep track of each creation.  Ultimately it ended up being sprinkles and sugar with a little bit of cookie.  Some of the cookies were very 3D with the amount of sugar piled on them!

As long as we were loading it up with sugar why not shoot the moon and add whipped cream?

Probably the smartest thing I did was to snag a dozen bakery boxes from the grocery story to send the kids home with their creations.

With 15 kids under the age of 10 and a mountain of sprinkles I'm pretty sure I'll be finding Christmas sprinkles at Easter.  All in all the party was a blast.  Good friends and good treats - what more can you ask for this time of year?

Happy Holidays!

Crock Pot Hot Chocolate

Ingredients:
1 can 14 oz sweetened condensed milk
1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
8 cups milk
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips 

Directions:

• Combine milk, sweetened condensed milk, whipping cream and vanilla extract in crock pot and quickly stir. 

• Add chocolate chips to crock pot and mix

• Cover and heat on low setting for 2 hours. Stir occasionally.  After chocolate is fully melted, reduce to 'warm' setting.

• Serve and top with marshmallows.

Let the sugar high begin...