Sophia announced with pride that she had cleaned her play kitchen. I was ecstatic as I have been trying to get her to really clean up for a very long time.  I wanted to see this immaculate masterpiece.  She stood in front of the doors and said “Look, All Clean Mom!”  Her words said one thing but her stance said another.

All Clean Mom!

 I asked if she could show me her kitchen and she told me I did not need to see the kitchen, just the floor in front of the doors.  I knew something was awry.  I asked how she cleaned the kitchen and she informed me with pride that it was “Just the way Daddy showed me”.  Houston, we have a problem.  Daddy has no idea how to pick up.  His mantra is out of sight, out of mind.  I give you Exhibit A.  No further exhibits are needed.

Daddy Showed Me How!

My husband showed her how to shove all her crap into whatever closet or bucket or niche was nearby and shut the doors.  He showed her how to hide the mess, not clean it up.  This is why he never knows where his stuff is.  I asked her why she did not clean her kitchen the way I do.   I was really curious.

A Clean Kitchen

She said cleaning that way is boring and takes too long.

Yeah babe – but my way actually puts things back where they belong so you don’t lose pieces or have things fly out of the closet when you open it.  My way is the mommy way and my way is the way we clean up around here.  Daddy is not so good at cleaning.  He fakes it.  This is like telling a lie.  You don’t want to tell a lie, do you?

Sophia said “No, but I like fun things and that is not very fun.”

Really?  Shocker.  Welcome to my world.  Wait until you have kids.  I am so going to say “I told you so.”

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Sophie and Miles Display their Silly Bling

The kids are obsessed with Silly Bands.  Essentially they are rubber bands that when off your arm take the shape of an animal or object.  Miles’ favorite is the purple Train.  Sophia’s is a purple and white castle and a pink mermaid.   When piled on your arm these bring me right back to the jelly bands and charm necklaces and yes, garbage pail kids of the 80’s and I can’t believe that my kids are old enough to actually participate in a fad. 

This Silly Band craze is so easy.  It’s about $5 for a pack of 24 similarly themed bands in multiple colors.  There are no nasty themed bands that I have come across although I am sure some perv makes them and I will admit some well loved bands do take on a definite phallus shape.  Oh well, that just makes it funnier for me when Sophie asks me why I am laughing at the inchworm and then follows up with “Mommy, do you want this one”?  No honey, keep your little penis.  Mommy is okay.

These Silly Bands are nothing like the last fad I can remember – the Garbage Pail Kids.  Doug Plug, Smelly Sally, Adam Bomb, Meg-A-Volt and the rest of the gang were nasty booger and puke and death inspired cards in the 80’s that me and my brother collected, traded and found absolutely hysterical.  I am sure our parents and parents the country over, feared for our generation.  These cards are disturbing.  I am always honest though – they are part of my childhood so I remember Bone Head Fred (his barber exposes bone on his skull) with fondness.

To be honest, the silly bands are totally positive.  I am completely stoked.  I  think they look cool on and I kid you not – these are teaching lessons.

Sharing:  If you have a majillion silly bands on your wrist and you wear them out and you meet a friend with no rocki’ bands of their own you MUST give that friend enough to rock some serious silly bling of their own.  This is not optional.  The kids do not get to take one measly band off.  They each must share a lot.  This has been a great lesson and now both Sophia and Miles love to give silly gifts to their friends and are even getting better with sharing other toys at home.

Appropriate Play:  All the trading and on and off is not good for school or temple or the dinner table.  The bands could also be a choking hazard for a little one so the kids are not allowed to wear these to school or to meals and they are learning that some things are really awesome and fun but might not be okay 24/7.  For some reason they are starting to get it and now remind me that it’s time to take our bands off.

Trading Skills:  Like baseball cards or sticker books, the kids trade these bands.  There are thousands of colors and designs and they want to get as many as possible.

Counting and Colors and Organization:  We count our silly bands.  We organize them by color or shape or theme.  We put them in special little boxes.  The kids enjoy tallying their numbers and announcing their wealth of bands in numbers.

So you see, these little bands are not so silly after all.  I am going to relish in this little fadwith my kids and enjoy the pleasure of a feel good fad before they are so old that they want to play with guns or get tattoos or any of the other crap that I am sure is in my future!

What fads are in your house?  What do you remember coveting as a child?  I would just love to know what else is out there and what I have to dread  look forward to!

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For Miles, it is his old bouncy chair.

It's Not Quite as Bouncy Now

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Sophia's Retro Play Kitchen

Monday is DIY day in bloggy land and this might be my proudest achievement to date.  It is certainly the one that has brought the most joy!

My daughter has always loved play kitchens.  She finds hours of fun in making dinners, having tea parties and washing dishes.  I think it is just precious.  Now my son plays too.  My heart melts.

When we go to the mall and “play” at Pottery Barn Kids, we spend at least 30 minutes with the play kitchen (and another 30 with a vanity – next project!) every time.  I think all of their little kitchens are to die for.  Having said that, my husband would actually die if I was ever to purchase one of these kitchen sets.  Currently the cost for a 3 piece kitchen starts at $450 and runs up to a whopping $879!  This does not include a 10% delivery and processing fee!

Here was the look I was going for from Pottery Barn.

PB Retro Kitchen

So, I searched the web, found some wood and decided to build her a large kitchen of her dreams!  I happened to have had an old closet that had tile in it from before we moved the laundry area so she also has a white tile floor and a WORKING SINK!  We love this kitchen and we build it for a total cost of less than $150!  Pretty good wouldn’t you say?

Here is where I started.  I found a set of plans for a wood play kitchen at Lowe’s.com and then modified them to be closer to the retro look I wanted.   The plans were cute and I followed the dimensions but rather than fake on the sink parts and stove knobs I found the real thing for this kitchen.   I also built a drawer for below the stove to store pots and pans!  The shelves in all of the pieces are closet shelving.  The handles were a bit expensive at $20 all together but they were scratched or they would have been a lot more.  I think they really add something cute and retro feeling!  I also installed a little white shelf in the extra space to hold silverware and pantry items.  The paint was a can of red oops! for $5.  It is a little brighter than the perfect red but man is it close!

We have so much fun with this!  I found bins at Target to store dress up and other toys in cute khaki and red above the kitchen so that all the imagination fun mess would be contained in the closet and the kids would need to ask before we play with this!

Here is where I started after I cut my furniture grade plywood found on clearance!

A Long Way to Go

Here is the basic box assembly of the sink.  All of the pieces follow the same simple assembly pattern.  After I did one with hammer and nails I got out the nail gun but it is possible with just a hammer!

The Basic Box

Little Oven

Working Little Sink

Working Plumbing

 The Fridge fits everything!  I love that I can keep all the food in the bins it came in.  It’s easy to clean up and easy to transport to the table for “parties” or cooking school!

Little Fridge

Old Laundry Closet

Little Kitchen in the Closet

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My princess loves her castle!  This is Sophia at the END of her birthday.  She is exhausted and still smiling!  And the castle still looks great after 25 kids playing in it!  There are pics of the finished castle in the daylight further down.  Enjoy and good luck!

The Background

Sophia wanted a princess party for her 3rd birthday and I wanted a party on a budget.  She said she wanted a castle and I found a way to build her one!  The best part – it was very inexpensive!  The worst part – it was really hard work!

It was totally worth it.  The kids play in it every day.  Sophia’s party was a big hit and her social schedule is now full of tea parties with her friends in the afternoon in the castle.  I love how much fun it is to watch them play with it and I am so glad that I did this instead of getting a bouncy for a lot of money that then gets taken away at the end of the party.

The Project (as completed by me) Requires:

• The Mr. McGroovy’s Plan:  He has a ton of other AWESOME plans for boxes.  Please – if you do not use the widgets send him something for designing these great plans!  They rock!
• 8 Large Boxes (Wardrobe or Refrigerator) – you can find free or very cheap boxes.  See Mr. McGroovy’s tips on acquiring boxes for free!  If you want totally free start WAY in advance.  I spent approximately $30 for the 8 boxes and started 2 weeks in advance.
• Mr. McGroovy’s Box Widgets ($24.99) and/ or
• Plain ol’ Nuts and Bolts (Plastic or Metal) long enough to go through 2-3 layers of box. (app. $5)
• Corner Brackets available at any Home Depot or Lowe’s (app. $5)
• Utility Knife with sharp blade
• Drill (Hand or Electric)
• Brown Spray Paint (to cover markings on boxes) ($3)
• Large Black Sharpie (app. $4)
• Gray Paint (Oops! Paint $5)

In addition to the above the project requires patience, time and lots of love.

If you want to be very special…

• Black and White paint if you want to add highlighting to the stones.  (I chose not to as I opted to make my own castle cake for the party.)

The Nitty Gritty How To:

The first few steps are detailed in my Curses!  The Castle! post.

1.  Find Boxes – 8 of Them (9 if you want to build a throne).  This project is easiest if you have 8 of the same boxes.  I did not.  What is cheap is not always easy! I used wardrobe boxes.

2.  Cut all the boxes using utility knife so they are all rectangles without flaps and all look the same (curse a little a lot).  Save the flaps.  My next “how to throw this cheap awesome party” post will include how to make these into swords, shields and magic wands for your complete royal party!

3.  Arrange lovely boxes in castle shape as per plans.  If your boxes have big flaps like wardrobe boxes they should be at the top (we will deal with this later) or you will be unable to make the cuts to the boxes.  I also marked which boxes were what because I knew I had to move them to the porch.

4.  Make your cuts as per the plans.  Don’t forget your door!  I also left one flap from the wardrobe box that I made a “secret” door by painting it to match the castle.  You can see this in the picture below in brown.

5.  Rivet (or bolt) your castle.  This is not as easy as I had thought it would be but it was actually much easier where I chose to use bolts (not in the crawling tunnels) because the screwing was a lot easier than the pushing and let’s be honest – I like to build things and I am more comfortable with bolts than rivets .

6.  Cover the box markings with spray paint.

7.  Cut out the entry way(s) and rivet (or bolt) to the top front of the castle.  I actually used two entries – one at the front and back of the turrets to increase stability.  You will see the two I did in the final picture.  I measured from the opening of the one turret across to the opening of the other and then made sure that the arch would be about 6 inched taller than Sophia.  With refrigerator boxes this will be less of a problem but your castle will be very large.

8.  Add any interior braces / supports.  This was not in the plans but I did not like how much the castle moved and I thought that with 25 kids coming over I would find a way to make it more stable.  Also, wardrobe boxes have a flap on the top of one side which has to go on the top so this was a great way to bring the two sides together!  On side has the rivets and one has the bolts.  It was a LOT easier to do this with the bolts.

9.  Paint your castle!  Kids can help here!  Use a foam roller for the best coverage and least waste of paint.  This was the easiest part of the whole project!  Sophia had a blast!

The Princess Paints!

Only One Coat of Paint!

10.  Draw Your Lines for Brick Layers and Windows.  I used a template that I made from extra box flaps so my spacing would be even and my windows the same size.  Still, this took a long time.

11.  Draw Your Bricks.  I made a brick template out of the extra cardboard as well.  Again though, this was painfully slow when I think about it and not that exciting.  There are  a LOT of bricks to draw.  I tried to be centered on the front entry way and then below the center of each turret and work my way around from there.  Then draw all of your curved edges so the stones look more realistic.

12.  Cut out your windows and add any special treatments to the castle.  I added some lovely window treatments and a walk through out of tulle.  Sophia loves it!  I stapled it to the back of the cardboard and it worked great!  It did not even come down during the party!  It also hid the inside of the castle (bare cardboard) from the front view of the castle.  This picture is from the day AFTER the party and the castle still looks GREAT!

13.  Let your kids enjoy it for as long as you have the space!  Here is Sophia’s first Rock Concert at the castle.  Hannah Montana is in the background thanks to her cousin Nicole!

I love this castle and it is totally possible for far under $50 if you start way ahead on boxes and already have the drill and such.  My total cost was about $75 for everything.  It would be less if you chose to build this without the rivets but them like I said, please send Mr. McGroovy something for his incredible plans!  I am reusing this castle, cutting off the turrets, repainting, and making it a western store for Miles’ 2nd birthday party with a cowboy theme.  Since I also made swords, shields and wands out of this I had very little else to get for an awesome princess party!  The money went a long way!  And we get to keep the castle!

Next Box Project:  A Vanity for my little princess’ room for under $15.  She is SO excited!

I am posting this to the DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land.  Please check out Kimba’s awesome blog and all the other fabulous DIY ideas…most for your own home and not your child’s play place.  Enjoy!

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Every year we go to New Orleans for Thanksgiving to see my husband’s family and enjoy this amazing city.  We love the family, we love the food, we love the music and Sophia…she will love the beads. 

I know this because for our annual gumbo party here in Charlotte we provide beads and sparkly masks for all the kids and any grown ups who drink enough hurricanes to think these treats are for them.  These beads and sparkly masks have provided Sophia and all her friends with hours of fun for the last year as she gets glammed up and looks like a Superhero with a very gaudy jewerly collection. From her first birthday on she has adored these beads.

Here is Sophie with her beads on her birthday and her friend Charlie at a barbeque a few months ago.  These beads are quite the hot ticket.

 

Now, to buy these beads in Charlotte was not as cheap as I had hoped and so I started thinking…If only those Bourbon street beads would be given to breastfeeding mommies when the girls pop out for lunchtime, we would be set for this year.  If I just nursed on Bourbon street the 6-8 times a day that Miles eats every day for the 5 days we are there I would have more than 30 glamorous necklaces for the kids to wear at no cost to myself! 

Before breastfeeding I never bared my breasts for the public but if it must happen, it would be nice to get some jewelry for it…don’t you think?