I'm Amanda Blake Soule - mother of five, author of three books on family creativity, and editor-in-chief of Taproot Magazine. I live with my family in an old farmhouse in Western Maine where we raise animals, grow vegetables and make lots of things. I write about it all here on the blog. Thank you for visiting! my books & taproot magazine recipes, tutorials, & tipsThis stocking holder was so fun and it has a DUAL PURPOSE! Yeah, you heard me right! Once the holidays are over, take those cute little stockings down and you’ve got yourselves a little Instagram photo holder! How fun is that? This was really easy and for a building project, really inexpensive. I’m not saying $2 here but for all the wood and photo holders I spent a total of $20. I first headed off to Home Depot and got me a primed piece of MDF that’s 8″X6′. You could choose raw wood but I chose the primed because I knew I wanted to use Miss Mustard Seeds Milk Paint. I’m really a big fan of her paint.

It’s easy to use, dries quickly and it’s foolproof. I use my old NutriBullet to blend up my paint and I rarely have any lumps. I used to mix by hand and I was constantly getting clumps or unmanaged tones. For this, I used about 1/2 cup of Eulalie’s Sky and 1/2 cup luke warm water. I brushed it on it two coats with an hour between and no sanding. Afterwards, I applied a light coating of her Hemp Oil. It adds a great sheen and makes the colors a lot richer. I then had an Ikea DIGNITET Curtain Wire that I wanted to use for the stockings/photos. I used my RYOBI ONE+ Lithium-Ion Starter Drill, available at Home Depot. I measured about 3″ from both ends and 4″ from the top so that I had a center point. I needed to pre-drill some holes into the board so that when it was time to put it into the wall, I had some traction. Just like any Ikea directions, they are a blast to follow but the trick was to not make it too tight until you have it hanging on the wall and then you won’t whack your face with a tight wire! 

I just used some clothespins to secure the stockings to the wire. I won my RYOBI starter tool set from SNAP last April and I love it! The ONE+ system is so awesome and I tried to keep it hidden from my husband. He’s got his own work tools that his job has bought for him that cost a lot more that RYOBI but I catch him always using mine. He loves that they are all battery powered and they just depend on that same battery. It’s lightweight and the battery stays powerful all the way to the end. blue curtain falls paroles traductionI’m definitely getting over the fear of cutting my fingers off and using them a lot more often!ladybird blackout curtains It’s been a perfect addition to our family room over our couch and I’ve still got a bit to go but it’s getting there! the tortilla curtain works cited

I love it with my Advent Calendar I made this month too! Make sure you check out all the blogs participating in this RYOBI blog hop and see what wonderful holiday projects they’ve made! Make sure you head over to RYOBI Nation to sign up for their newsletters, I always get great inspiration!children’s drawings as art Children’s drawings are great to give some colour to your home. I love this idea of displaying drawings! This entry was posted in DIY + CRAFTS. essops curtains ABOUT The Style Files is Danielle de Lange’s daily weblog about design and (life) style. tumut curtains and blinds SPONSORS INTERESTED IN ADVERTISING?curtain rod brackets rona WISE WORDS & INSPIRATIONcirco shower curtain bright dots

UNIQUE TILES BY LONDON BASED SMINK THINGS A BRIGHT WHITE HOME IN THE NETHERLANDS DIY PROJECT: GIANT ARM-KNIT BUNNY A GREEN WOODEN HOUSE IN SWEDEN SEED HERITAGE PHOTO SHOOT IN MANLY (SYDNEY) A SPACIOUS LOFT IN WILLIAMSBURG, NEW YORK BEAUTIFUL OUTDOOR AREAS ON IBIZA, SPAIN THE FASHION FILES: STYLISH SNOW & WINTER GEARWHY hang children’s art on the refrigerator door? And as an exhibition venue, it’s better than nothing.“Art is made to be seen,” said David Burton, a professor of art education at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. “It’s sort of like food: why would you go through the trouble of cooking a whole meal and then not eat it?”Yet just because a work of art was created by a toddler, that doesn’t mean it has to look like it was hung by one.For displaying pictures on the wall, Dr. Burton likes Clearmount ZigZag Hangers. These roughly 2-by-2-inch squares adhere to the back of a picture. String some fishing line through the hole in the plastic hanger or mount it on a pushpin.

The ZigZag claims to be self-leveling and to hold two pounds — useful for the work of a junior collagist who lacquers with glue by the gallon.And though it may not be officially endorsed by the Association of Art Museum Curators, Dr. Burton recommends festive paper mats and two-sided foam Mounting Tape, by Scotch. “I think most parents can figure it out,” Dr. Burton said. Many couples manage to frame a special piece of their child’s art — say, a detailed survey of pre-modern fairy couture. Yet a few months later, the avant-garde of the second grade has moved on to ballerinas. For this, the Li’l Davinci Art Cabinet was invented. Try to get past the name. The inch-deep case, with its swinging glass door, stores up to 50 sheets of paper behind the picture in front. And it comes in a variety of sizes and finishes.Jessie Randall, 34, a shoe designer in Park Slope, Brooklyn, uses the Li’l Davinci to cycle through the drawings that her twins, Casper and Liam, 3 1/2, bring home from preschool.

It’s the kind of classroom where “the art generated is more expressive than literal,” Ms. Randall said in an e-mail. In other words, “I am not exactly sure what the drawings are of.” Alternately, a maximalist parent could hang all 50 pieces at once with the Ikea Dignitet system, a kind of peg-and-wire contraption with sliding metal clips. (Like a clothesline with brushed-steel mounting brackets.)One fan of the Dignitet is Jessica Johnson, 33, of Snoqualmie, Wash., a former elementary school teacher. Ms. Johnson is now a major collector of the prominent “puffy picture” artist Charlie Johnson (who happens to be her 3-year-old son). He works mostly in shaving cream and tempura. But his more commercial pieces employ glitter, and plenty of it.The Dignitet is “designed for hanging curtains,” Ms. Johnson said by e-mail. “But since you adjust the length of wire yourself, you can use it on a really wide wall, as we did, or you could have several short rows at the end of a hallway.”

What if there was a way to stack a child’s art in one tidy pile and yet display it at the same time? Apparently, this invention already exists. It is called a coffee-table book. Ms. Kriv, 49, an arts marketer, ordered a four-color hardcover book that she titled “Works on Paper.” It is 8-by-10-inches and has 32 pages.Ms. Kriv’s 7-year-old son, Eli Jort, painted the book’s abstract images of trees, flowers and ships at sea. But truth be told, it is Ms. Kriv who did the better part of the labor.“I think it took me about 40 hours, spread out over several weeks,” she said. Ms. Kriv taped Eli’s pieces to the living room wall and photographed them when the light was at its best. Later, she laid out the pages with a Blurb software download, paying special attention to details like the caption font.“My son just produced some amazing artwork before the age of 5 — after that, he dropped off,” Ms. Kriv said.“He still draws,” she added. But Eli has moved on to sketching battle-axes and portraits of Boba Fett, the bounty hunter from “Star Wars.”