DIY rainbow doormat
Remember when I shared how I made a $20 wooden doormat using 2×2 boards and a bit of rope?
Well, it was so much fun that I made a second one! Except this time, I grabbed whatever wood (heh) I had on hand, which ended up being a couple of 2x2s and 2x4s. Could I make a doormat from a mixture of the two? Of course I could!
I just cut them down to be the same length (24″ like last time), drilled holes in them (again, like last time) and arranged them in a pattern — two 2x2s, one 2×4, repeat.
Then I rounded up some brightly-coloured paints and gave them the full rainbow treatment! I just slapped one coat on each, and didn’t even bother to sand them first (that would come later). 
Once the boards had dried in the sun, I brought them back inside and roughed them up with my Mouse sander.* I love the way it brought out the wood grain and the imperfections of the boards through the bright colours. (Totally want to do this treatment again. ALL THE HEART EYES.)
Then I strung the rope through the boards (like last time), knotted the ends, and slathered on a quick coat of poly to protect my pretty little mat from the elements. Here it is, on our back deck. Isn’t it fun?! 
We still have one more door (my basement studio door) so I’m going to need to make a third one of these cute wooden mats. I just love them!
Our summer of Harry Potter
It was funny to admit that, at 34, I had never even attempted to read one of the Harry Potter books.
It’s sort of like how I’ve only ever seen one of the Star Wars movies. (I call it “Star Wars” but people tell me it’s “A New Hope.”) I didn’t really care. I also have not seen The Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Indiana Jones, X-Men or any of the Rocky movies.
(But I regularly get Doris Day songs stuck in my head and saw Spice World in the theatre seven times, so my taste is questionable.)
It seemed most of my friends and much of my family had read all of the Harry Potter books and loved them deeply. They hadn’t really appealed to me, I suppose. I’m not big on fantasy books or movies — um, except for that brief obsession with the Twilight series in my mid-20s.
I had only seen one of the Harry Potter movies and that was purely by mistake. I had been heavily pregnant and persuaded to tag along to the theatre, really only interested in the air conditioning and buttery popcorn.
What I knew about Harry Potter could fit on the head of a magic wand. I knew there was a wizard school called Hogwarts. I knew there was a flying sport called Quidditch. I knew people were divided into “houses” according to their personalities or something. And I knew when one of the books was released, people kept spoiling it by shouting “Snape kills Dumbledore!”
Our son recently turned eight and one of his best friends absolutely loves Harry Potter. She’s read all of the books and watched the movies, but he never seemed interested. Like mother, like son. But I could see he was experiencing the same niggling feeling of maybe missing out on something. I felt it, too …
Two days ago, I was browsing in the bookstore and decided it was time to hop on the broomstick — or whatever it is they ride around on at wizard school? I bought a paperback copy of the first book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
My sister was with me, and she’s a huge Potterhead (apparently that’s what they’re called) so she was giddy with excitement.
Our son wasn’t impressed when he saw the book, and was convinced he wasn’t going to like it. I said I didn’t know if I’d like it either, but it was time we gave it a chance. I sat between both kids on the couch and started reading the first chapter aloud — determined to read with plenty of expression and different voices to make up for the fact it didn’t have any pictures.
I’d like to say it was my enthusiastic narration, but I think J. K. Rowling gets full credit for capturing all three of us by the end of the first chapter. It really was just as good as everyone said. The writing was excellent — which I’d expected — and it wasn’t over-the-top witchy/wizardy, which I probably wouldn’t have enjoyed.
Already, I think I’ll remember this as “The Summer of Potter” — curling up with the kids on the couch and reading Harry Potter aloud. We’ve already decided we’ll watch the first movie once we’re done this book, and then move on to reading the second book. It’s a new world for all three of us, and one we’re immensely enjoying together.
As soon as I finish writing this, I’ve promised the kids we’ll read Chapter Five. It’s called Diagon Alley, and I think it’s where Harry is going to go “shopping” for school supplies like a magic wand. I hinted this last night when we finished Chapter Four, and the kids’ eyes lit up as I said something about how “the wand chooses the wizard.” I had no idea how I even knew that — it was one of those random Harry Potter quotes that gets embedded in your brain without even reading the books.
I still may never watch The Lord of the Rings, but I’ve learned to never say never. “Snape kills Dumbledore!” meant nothing to me when I laughed about it all those years ago, but now I can see how sad it’s going to be when that happens. The kids and I will all be crying, wearing our matching maroon-and-gold scarves, and sobbing “Noooo! Not Dumbledore!”
DIY barn quilt (without the barn)
Have you ever spotted a barn quilt? They’re huge wooden squares painted in simple patterns to look like an actual quilt. I haven’t seen many in person — despite living in rural Nova Scotia — but I immediately flipped for the idea. I mean, hello! I love painting and quilting, so this is pretty much a dream project for me.
One problem . . . we don’t have a barn.
I approached my handy husband about putting a barn quilt on the shed, which is technically a baby barn. I got an emphatic no.
At first I thought maybe he just didn’t understand, and promised I wouldn’t use pink or make it really flowery. Still a big no. No barn quilt, of any kind, was going to be permitted on “his” shed. Since it’s really the one area of our property I don’t decorate or organize, I decided to let it go.
I didn’t have a barn or even a shed, but I did have a pergola — the new one we built above our picnic table, which I wrote about a few weeks back. Could a pergola have a barn quilt? Sure it could!
I hopped online to my beloved Pinterest and did a search for barn quilts. I found one I loved right away — a pretty rose in different shades of pink and a yellow centre, with green leaves around the edges.
I printed it out in black and white and used a pencil to mark it into a grid. This is easy for barn quilts because they’re almost always combinations of squares and half-square triangles — just like real quilting!
Then it was time to transfer the pattern to wood. I could have started from scratch with a big piece of plywood, but I decided to reuse a wooden tray I’d built last year out of 2x2s to serve as a floating makeup table in our daughter’s room. Reusing things makes the earth happy, and it made this an entirely free project — win, win.
Remember when this was a floating makeup table in our daughter’s room?
I sketched a 12×8 grid inside the tray — using the existing planks to dictate the size of the squares — but my inspiration photo was only an 8×8 grid. That was fine. It just meant I’d have some breathing room on either side of the design. Using the photo for reference, I took a small ruler and divided some of the squares into triangles as needed.
Once the pattern was sketched, it was just a matter of filling in the squares and triangles with acrylic paint. (I used the heavy-duty stuff in tubes, but I could have easily used cheaper Dollar Store acrylics — it just would have taken more coats.) I started with the darkest colour and filled it all of those areas, and then switched to another colour.
Once I’d finished the last colour, I went back and did a second coat only where it was really needed. I also slapped some black paint on the “frame” of the tray, and painted the background white. It wasn’t totally covering the yellow and pink of the original finish, but whenever I’m painting something for the great outdoors, I’m never too finicky. I know the elements will rough it up anyway.
I decided to give Mother Nature a head start with the “natural distressing” and went at it with my palm sander for a minute or two. I especially focused on the black frame, since I liked how the yellow came through. Then I wiped off the dust and coated the whole thing in polyurethane, just so the weather doesn’t totally destroy it someday.
I screwed my finished barn quilt into the inside of our new pergola, and it’s a very cheerful addition to our back deck.
I may not have a barn — or a husband who will let me adorn the outside of “his” shed — but I can definitely see myself making more barn quilts. They’re so much fun!
Taking summer reading to a new level
Our son has been staying up late these days, but it’s for the best possible reason: he’s reading one chapter book a night.
I’ve always felt strongly about raising readers. I’ve loved to read since I learned how, but my husband struggled with reading as a child and now that no one’s forcing him to read, he won’t touch a book unless it’s to read to our son and daughter.
As we read to them as babies, I’d wondered if they’d take after him or me. Would they only read what they needed to read for school — and complain about it — or would they devour books in their free time and always want more?
Reading has always been part of our nightly routine and they certainly enjoy it. We would read to them before they could read and we started taking turns reading once each of them learned how. Then, after prayers and tuck-ins, they have always been allowed to quietly read for awhile until they go to sleep.
It has only been this past school year that our son has taken it to a new level. He’s outgrown the Easy Readers (which our daughter is now slowwwwwwly picking her way through) …
… and traded Berenstain Bears for chapter books. His favourite series is called Magic Tree House and he’ll snuggle up in bed to read all 110 pages before he goes to sleep.
Because he’s reading a book a night, we’ve been making lots of trips to the library to stock up on more. I don’t care how busy or tired I am. If he’s out of books, we will find time to drive down so he has a new one to read that night. Must. Not. Discourage. Reading. Obsession.
During one of these visits, both kids signed up for something called the TD Summer Reading Club.
They hadn’t done a summer reading program before, but a few library employees visited their school and apparently had an excellent sales pitch because the kids insisted on going that very day.
The idea is simple: the kids log everything they read (the book title and the amount of time they spent reading) either in a paper booklet or directly in their online account. (If kids don’t have computer access, they can take their booklet to a librarian to enter their stats into their account.) The time the spend reading is converted to points which can be redeemed for cool upgrades on their virtual robots. There are prizes, too, but we haven’t gotten to that point yet.
I don’t know if it’s the competitive aspect or that they’re excited to make their robots cooler, but both kids have been obsessed with reading as much as possible so they can add to their log. The first day we got home and sat on the couch together for over an hour as they took turns reading aloud. There were actual arguments over who got to read more!
Now whenever I wake up, I’m bombarded with requests to please add the books they read after I tucked them in the night before. We had to compromise that they would write down the titles in their booklets, and I would log into the parent portal every few days to update their logs digitally.
Our kids are reading more than ever before, and I couldn’t be more pleased. I only wish I’d been part of a summer reading program when I was a kid, because I would have killed that thing with all the Babysitter’s Club books I used to plow through.
The TD Summer Reading Club is Canada’s biggest, bilingual summer reading program for kids of all ages, and it’s offered at more than 2,000 public libraries across Canada. Visit tdsummerreadingclub.ca to learn more.
Bedroom decorating on a budget
I recently helped a client redecorate her master bedroom and we made a pretty spectacular impact with very little cash. I love how it’s now a space that expresses her fun, loving personality.
It all started with a dresser makeover. Since we redid her existing dresser for one of her guest bedrooms, she bought a new one second-hand and painted it a rich navy (Fusion Mineral Paint’s Midnight Blue). It came with two matching nightstands (all for $125), which she also painted. The dark blue paint is perfect against her pale grey walls, and it goes well with her dark bedframe.
Heather’s home hint: I’m a fan of contrast, so I like dark furniture against light walls and light furniture against dark walls. Not everyone agrees, of course, but my heart skips a beat at the idea of white furniture popping against dark emerald green walls. I also believe in painting furniture to match, even if it’s not technically a matching set.
One of the biggest crimes to commit against a big, beautiful dresser is to hang something tiny above it . . . and nothing else. This new dresser was the width of her queen-size bed, so it needed more than just a single frame floating above it …
Continue reading in my weekly DIY column, Heather’s Handmade Home …
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