Home Chapel part 1

Say what??

A HOME CHAPEL?

Yes.

So, this is something that I have wanted to do for a while now. Our downstairs is one of the messiest parts of our home and I hate going down there. Why?

Well, our rec (recreation) room is always chaotic, thanks to the numerous bits of toys and books which we try so hard to keep organized and stored away in our "toy library" (something I have to post about later). From the rec room to the laundry room is a narrow hallway that is so narrow, that even a hair band on the floor is, trip'able on. It also stores our deep freeze, so I have no choice but to brave this area of the house. Ugh!

Our laundry room, which has the best system in the world (also something I will post about on a later date), collects shreds of random paper crafts, among other annoying stick-to-the-sock bits, how on earth... I don't know?? I need to figure something out as soon as possible! Needless to say, the downstairs is a cold, unwelcoming place which I will tackle soon.

I have thought through and tried numerous ways to make the rec room more inviting, practical, spacious, soothing and restful. I have always failed. Whatever we try, fails. It ends up being "trashed" by the kids and we have to face the agonizing task of cleaning it up every Thursday, to welcome our children's piano teacher on the Friday. Gah!

No thanks!

But, ahha! Then it dawned on me, Simon has daily devotions with our children at least once or twice a day! Usually we have morning Bible study around the breakfast table and prayer time in our living room. What if, we had a room purposely designated for something great. I mean REAALLY great? What else could be greater than coming together in worship, learn about and pray to our God?! Jesus in the midst of us!

Could I really contemplate turning our messy TV room into a "chapel" with couches and lounge chairs for future Bible studies (women's breakfast or our church's youth gatherings) , our morning and post dinner devotionals? Would this room hold our precious prayer box and hymn books? Could we Youtube our favourite worship songs with lyrics on the TV and actually have a gathering in the middle of the week? Why, yes we can!

Why was I second guessing myself? What would people think?

Who cares! This will be amazing, I just know it.

So then I asked myself, what does a church outside of church look like? Does it need an altar of some kind, a cross, seating (preferably comfy), access to Bibles and prayer boxes. How, where? We already have our piano and guitars downstairs, so music will be sorted!

Where will I get the cross from?

Obviously I won't be buying it since I've already made a commitment with Simon to be frugal,  and a cross is not in the budget. So.....

You guessed it (or did you??), I made it!

This post is part 1 because I have not transformed the rec room into our "chapel" yet. Keep posted by subscribing and you'll see what the finished product will look like in part 2, -the BIG reveal!

Simon was so kind to cut out the cross for me from a sheet of Styrofoam which we had several pieces left over from my previous craft session (will blog later, too).

I found some gold adhesive to cover the Styrofoam with. Not easy, that's what duct tape is for. In Finnish we call duct-tape "Jesus tape" because it can do miracles. How fitting!

Next, I added burlap to dim down the shining gold. After all, we didn't want it to resemble the "golden calf". Just kidding. The glue gun was my best friend.

Now the fun begins.

Gluing the flowers. This was tricky. I didn't want to cover the cross completely with flowers, but I had so much I wanted to use!

I stuck with white flowers to resemble His righteousness. Purity. Holy. The red resembles the blood he shed for us, giving us new life. 

The gold that shimmers through the burlap, resembles the "golden city" and crown that awaits for us. The burlap resembles the humility and meekness that we need to put on, and let the gold (Jesus' light) shine through. 

Finished product, but not at it's final destination.

Click on the photo to view larger.

In part 2, I will show you the before and after pictures of our renewed and re purposed room.

Stay tuned!!!

Don't forget to visit my YouTube channel to see my vlog on this project (up soon!)

YOU Can Do One! - DIY Wall Decor Step By Step Guide

My husband is out of town. The creative bug has bit me. I'm bored of our bedroom, it's white and sterile and not the "boudoir" I would want it to be. We don't spend a lot of time in our bedroom, so we never thought of investing in the decor, since it felt like a waste of money -for us, so I came up with this idea. My husband doesn't know about it yet, but I'm sure by the time you are reading this post, he knows as well. This is how I did it, and this is how you can too!

First I thought about what I wouldn't mind looking at each night and then I 'googled' for ideas. In this case I 'googled' for images of Cherry Blossom trees. I took a pencil and while I was holding my phone in my left hand, I sketched as I saw fit. Yes, free handed, straight onto the wall. Trust me, it's OK -you can always erase it if it looks wonky. I didn't measure or even try to copy the images I looked at. I just took a rough idea of what the branches looked like and how they fell, then I sketched away! 

A good idea is to sketch eye level, any picture or frame looks best at eye level. My husband is tall, so i kind of estimated my way around.

 (These are very light, click to see them, or any photo larger)

I used a spirit level to draw lines on which I could use to write on. 

I decided to use acrylic (which I watered down a bit) paint for a few reasons. I am pregnant and can't be breathing in toxic fumes, I make mistakes, I change my mind often, I wanted to do it now, I can always wash it off if I'm unhappy or I can gloss it over, if it's just how I want it. This way, it lasts!

So I went through some verses I liked and I found Song Of Solomon 3:4, that goes well with us!

..." I have found The One whom my soul Loves"...

Then I decided on the colours. I went with our bedroom curtains, different hues of blue/turquoise.

I painted away! I'm one of those people who likes to finish it right away. Unfortunately if I stretch it out a few days, it will never get finished. 

If you paint over your sketching, there will be less erasing afterwards. Trust me, it hurts to erase pencil off the wall, ha ha!

Then... after the branches and text were finished I took some old laminated schedules and used them as stencils for my blossoms. I took a permanent fine point marker and sketched a few blossoms real quick. I tried making them all shapes and sizes.

After this I stenciled away! :)

I added some flowers around the picture, to give it a flowing effect. I'm hoping I succeeded! I took another brush and hand painted darker details inside the flowers and fixed my mistakes around the letters.

After I was happy with it, I hand painted finer details in the flowers.

Finally I went over the letters with left over black to give it more of a depth. I was done. It'll do!

Hope he likes it!! 

And now, I'll tackle the kids' room!! Try and stop me!

More DIY and Crafts ideas HERE!

Check out the mural I painted in our living room HERE!

Savour the Christmas Season - DIY Salt Dough Christmas Ornaments

For the salt dough recipe click here

We used acrylic paint.

I made all of us an ornament, each with our initials.

One for the front door.

After painting them, we sprayed the ornaments with clear coating. This way they received their shine and last longer.

Savour the Christmas Season - Gingerbread houses

We are savouring the Christmas Season by making our very own gingerbread houses. We had a blast making these, you'll see why! The end result is a killer!

I had ginger bread cookie cutters to begin with so I can't help with the design, but I can share the recipe which I altered for my "Finnish" taste buds. The mollases we get here (in Canada) isn't anything like we get back in Finland, so I had to make a few changes. I think it worked out well and tastes like the real deal. Almost.

Ingredients:

• 1/4 C molasses
• 1/4 C maple syrup
• 250g butter
• 1 C sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1tsp ground cloves
• 2tsp cinnamon
• 2tsp ginger
• 1T lemon juice/ 1tsp pomersanssin kuorta
• 3-4 C flour
• 2 tsp baking soda

Insturctions:

•  In a sauce pan bring butter, molasses, syrup amd spices to the boil, remove and let cool completely. Mix in eggs, flour and baking soda. Cover and let it harden over night in the fridge.

• Take small sections and roll them out flat with a little flour. If you find the dough too hard, warm it up in the micro 30seconds at a time

•  Cut out the parts for the house and place them carefully on a parchment sheet covered baking tin. Bake at 400F for 6-8minutes. Melt sugar in a sauce pan and use as "glue" by dipping the pieces in to assemble them. The melted sugar hardens fast, so be quick. Be careful you don't burn your fingers with the melted sugar, it hurts!

 VOILA!

•  Let the kids decorate, have a go yourself. Be creative, use colours, texture...

 We gave it our best, we really did. We ended up doing three houses that were just as pretty. Ha ha!