Tan on Tan on Tan (And Baby Ferns)

Guys. I have a tan house. With tan trim. And a tan door. That's a lot of tan.

Especially when you consider that we were working with a dirt lot with little vegetation to be found? Sad, colorless, monochromatic house. I mean, it's really a lovely house, and I still pinch myself as I drive up to it... I live here! This is my home! But all the tan hurt my brain a little bit. I wanted something that looked welcoming and cheerful...
Obviously a bright color door was just the wink that our house needed, don't you think?

So I told my husband I was going to paint our front door something cheerful, and his response was, of course, what? Why? Whats wrong with the color it is?
But I plowed ahead, undeterred. I polled my friends, I gathered swatches, I taped stuff to the door and stared at it for days... And I decided on a really nice plum color that I was quite excited about, then I made the mistake of asking my husband what he thought of my color choice and he just sighed and said, Please don't paint my door purple.
Okay, first of all, it's plum, not purple. And it's a LOVELY color!     ...but I decided to go with something a little less bold, because in the grand scheme of things a door color is not a HUGE life commitment. So I thought I'll ease the hubs into it, and then we'll punch the color up a notch next year if I need more...

So I selected a lovely green called "Baby Fern" that was somewhere between an apple green and a muted ferny color. I put on the first coat... oh man, it looked tinkerbell city. But I remembered advice of some of my fav DIY bloggers, Young House Love, when they say the middle always looks crazy. This was not the end of the vision... this was the start with only one coat of paint. So I didn't panic yet.
It took three even coats for full coverage. I painted slowly and carefully and made sure to allow adequate drying time between each coat because I wanted the door to look smooth and streak/brush stroke free. Once it was done...

(Oh, Hai Charlie!) I was pleased with the result! Much happier.
But remember the crazy in the middle part? This is still the middle. Yes the green door is happy and brighter, but just the green door on the tan house with the dirt yard was honestly not a HUGE improvement. This still the middle... it's coming, it's coming, it's coming! And the more finished the yard became, the more the door makeover made sense-- Even to the husband and my father who weren't believers in the Baby Fern magic.
Oh, but also, while I was in the business of painting doors and distributing magic, I decided the back of the house needed love too...

Because this guy didn't even have any trim to boast! Saaaaaaad. But not to fear, a few hours and a few coats of paint later....

...and he was boasting a brighter outlook on life as well. Actually, ignore the bottom right corner of that pic where there's a sneak peak of beauty to come. (this pic was actually taken a few weeks later, oops.) But I was happy all the way around with what a quart of Baby Fern exterior paint did to perk up my house.
A few weeks later I was chatting with one of our neighbors, and she commented on what a transformation the exterior of our house had been through. She specifically mentioned how much she loved the happy green door, it made her smile!
It makes me smile too!
But this isn't the last you will see of that front door... more magic to come! What about you? Anyone else painting their door this fall???

Fencey McFencerson

Let me put a disclaimer, these next couple posts are going to feel a little incomplete... we were working on quite a few projects that I want to talk about separately, but they were all going on at the same time. So I am going to delay some finished product photos til the end... and also being very involved in all of this stuff myself, I don't have a whole lot of process pictures or tutorials for you (I was busy workin' kid!) so the next few posts might leave you hangin' just a bit. But you'll see it all come together in the end, and it will be worth it. Yay.

There is a lot going on outside our window these days!

So we are putting in a fence.
I know fences aren't for everyone, but we wanted/needed one for a couple of reasons:
    While we have a nice size lot, we are still in a residential area/neighborhood. Our lot backs up to someone else's back yard, we have a neighbor's yard on one side and empty lots on the other, which will eventually have construction. We wanted a little bit of privacy from all that closeness. We like having neighbors, we like our neighbors... we just... needed a bit of back yard privacy.
    We have a dog and kiddos* (*will have plural kiddos in december, and don't know if we will be done with two... who knows???) and wanted a safe contained area for them to play unrestricted. Also we have utility boxes in the back corner of our lot, and didn't really want kiddos playing in that area.
So us, a fence `was the right choice. However, it's not only functional, but we just happen to think a nice cedar fence looks really pretty and raises your property value... and we needed to put in a yard, and so first, we needed to put in the fence.

Before you build a fence there are plenty of paperwork things you have to deal with-- drawing out plans, taking them to the city, getting a building permit, getting utilities marked, etc. Those are important code and safety issues, if you are DIYing your fence, make sure you do all your city requires first. You don't want any surprises or accidents later.

The project started by ripping out the neighbors fence. It was a 4 ft fence that was a little rickety and gross looking. We talked to our neighbor before starting, and actually ended up replacing not just the shared portion of the fence, but his entire fence as well. (He paid the boys for it... so it was a profit that we set aside for another project). They knocked out the panels and pulled the posts, and then we freecycled the fence parts... and it actually was claimed by some friends of our about a block away. Reuse, recycle, and giggle everytime you drive by and see that old fence on someone else's property, guys!

After getting that knocked over they rented a hole digger and started carefully digging around the perimeter. I say carefully because there were quite a few utility lines they were working around.

Oh, there are the utility boxes we were boxing out... heh

Once they had the holes dug, they started putting posts and the frame in place. Carefully, slowly pieceing it together, leveling, digging, leveling again... until it was all setting just so... and then they concreted the posts in and nailed the 2x4 frame to it. For the frame they used pressure treated posts and 2x4s.

Everyone say Hi to my dad!

My Brother in law and our friend James working hard!

Once the frame was solid, the boys got to work putting up the slats. These are cedar slats. They look pretty and smell awesome while you work-- just a nice bonus there. We decided to use a nail gun instead of screws for two reasons, cost and time! Even the the best way would probably be to screw every last slat on, the fencing screws do not come cheap. For the amount we needed, it was going to run us about $400. For screws. Crazy. The nails in the air pressure gun, however were about $50, and we were able to borrow the gun from a friend, and... boy is it fast! Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop! in each post and you are done, as opposed to four screws, even with a power drill we'd have been there for days.

So the boys threw up the slats... okay not so much threw as carefully placed and leveled, while my dad started assembling gates.

They worked from early early that morning, until late that night. You can see that it's getting dark in these pics... but my boys are hardcore, they were going to get it done!

Hey look, they are still smiling! Actually I think they are smiling because this is the last board in my husbands hands... and look what they let me do!

The golden spike! I got to nail in the very last board in the back corner that hooked the two sides of the fence together! Woot!
And... here's that part that I warned you about at the beginning. I'm going to leave you hanging. There were several projects going on at the same time here, and so I don't have a finished project pic of anything without giving away everything, and thats no fun. But we finished the fence that weekend... and it is really beautiful and there are more beautiful things to come! Are you excited? I'm excited.
Okay.

DIY Mother's Day Mugs

(I know, 3 posts in a weeks time, I'm a crazy woman!)

Soooo... are you all ready for Mother's Day? Or are you (like me) still running around getting things together? Well, here is ONE MORE gift that doesn't suck that you can definitely throw together at the last minute. Get to it. You've got 4.5 days.
(Side note: Sam's Grandmas, would you kindly avert your eyes until after the 12th? Thanksamillion)

I needed a gift for Sam to give to his Grandmas. This one includes baby finger prints... but really could be anything you want it to. Take this idea, personalize it, spin it however you want.
Both of the Grandmas are tea fanatics. Hot or cold-- but mostly hot. They always are toting around their mugs or hot tea sipping away. So I thought a personalized mug to sip their tea out of would be fantastic. I did a little searching on pinterest for some help. I found this handprint mug, and I said YES! and I found this wine glass which made me laugh, and I thought well, you can sip wine, you can sip tea-- whatever your vice is, I think it works.

I happened to have a couple white ceramic mugs laying around because we recently got some new dishes, and each place setting came with a mug. Even though we wanted place settings for 12 I didn't feel like I would ever need mugs for 12... so we kept about half of them, and put the other half in storage. But when I thought of this project, I went ooh free!!!
If you don't have plain ceramic mugs laying around... you can get these at the dollar store very inexpensively.
The only other thing you need is enamel paint. I used FolkArt Enamel in Burnt Umber and Foliage, purchased at craft supply store for about $2 each.

 

I started trying to free-hand my lettering with a tiny paintbrush... and I just don't have a steady enough hand. So I wiped that attempt off and went for plan B: a stencil. I got out my silhouette machine and quickly make a vinyl stencil for my letters. the stencil is a leeeeeetle finicky to  get it to lay correctly on a curved surface, but I fiddled with it a little and got it good enough.

Then I just dabbed my paint over the stencil-- waited about a minute for it to dray a smidge, then dabbed on a second coat. I peeled the stencil off while it was still wet... there were a few places where it had bled a bit, but that cleaned up fairly easily with a cotton swab, or if it has already dried too much, you can use an exacto knife to carefully scrape away the unwanted paint.

You can see my lettering is not perfect, but I felt like it looked good enough. Again, if you have a steady hand and good penmenship, you could free hand the lettering and it would likely be much much faster. I waited for the lettering to completely dry before adding the baby handprints on the side. It took my husband and I wrangling the toddler to make the handprint happen, and even still it was chaos, and somehow the dog ended up covered in paint-- so i don't have pics of that part. But... grab a small hand, paint on a thin coat of paint, press straight down and pull straight up, and wait for your hand print to dry. Try to block out the screams of childhood trauma from your *willing assistant. (*and by 'willing', I mean a toddler horrified that his hand is dirty and he is being held down, and hates craft time with mommy even more than he hates naptime.) Oh, I also freehanded the little heart on the 'tea bag'.

To cure the enamel paint (make it permanant) the bottle says you can let it air dry for 21 days (um, right, because you planned ahead and have 21 days to sit on this project) OR you can let it air dry for 1 hour, bake it for 30 minutes and let it cool. Um, I'll take door number 2 please. So here are my mugs sitting in the oven (please don't judge my dirty gross oven). As per the instructions, I placed them in a cold oven, turned it on to 350 degrees, once it had heated I set my timer for 30 mins, and when it went off, I turned the oven off to let them cool. I came back a couple hours later and everything was cooled and looked great!

 And there you have it! These will be stuffed with some tea, tied with a ribbon, and should be in the mail today on the way to Sam's Grandmas for Mother's day. I hope they love them, I think they turned out cute.
This was another pretty inexpensive gift-- you know me, gifting on the cheap! I only paid about $5 for the paint. If you didn't have mugs, you might be in the project more like $8-10, but still that's only $4 or $5 dollars for a nice personal mug, with leftover supplies (paint) for more projects.

So that's it! I hope you have been inspired to make something handmade for your mama or grandmother, or any special women in your life this mother's day! If you didn't see my other gift ideas (with tutorials!) check them out here and here.

DIY Garden stepping stone

Today I have what I think is another great Mother's day gift idea, especially for those of you who have little ones. I am desperate to preserve the tiny little feet and hands-- already he is getting so big and those little pink baby toes are walking big-boy dirty toes and I can hardly bear it!
I made these for the grandmas last year (so excuse the date...) but I think they really loved them, and they are a sweet sentimental gift for the gardener or outdoorsy ladies in your life. (Because outdoorsy to me means sipping lemonade on patios, or my parent's golf course quality green lawn in the backyard.)

(See? Golf course beautiful)

Anyway, this was pretty simple to create, but here's a step by step because I love you:

You are going to need:
some concrete (I bought a bucket of QuickCrete at Homedepot for $7),
Plastic plant water drip trays (98 cents at home depot) (or you could probably use old pie tins)
Concrete Letter Stamps (I got these from amazon, but you could also look at craft stores or home depot, especially this time of year, for around $10 or less)
Mosaic tiles (or this sheet of bathroom mosaic, purchased at home depot for about $5)
Spoon or stir stick, bucket to mix stuff in, plastic sheeting and towels to protect your surface and clean up.

This is one of those projects where you will want to have everything ready to go before you start... because once that concrete gets wet, it goes fast!

Start by mixing your concrete per the instructions on the package. It may mix it a little thick, I actually added a little more water so it way smooth and spreadable... like creamy peanut butter. (Adding more water will increase your drying time, just FYI)

Next, scoop your concrete into your mold. I used 2 sizes of trays, an 8" and a 10". The 8" was perfect for a baby size foot... but any bigger you will want a bigger size (they sell 10" and 12" trays as well if you are doing an older child). Smooth the concrete out as best you can, and tap it a few times so it is nice and flat accross the top.
(See how there is kinda some water pooling around the edges there? Thats what happens if you add tooooooo much water. But never fear, it's fixable. After you have scooped, smoothed and tapped, take a paper towel and gently lay it accross the top of the concrete. It should suck the excess right up. Don't press or pat or wipe... just let it do it's thing and carefully peel it off the top)

Next press in your tiles. Work quickly-- give em' a good shove down into the concrete though so it will really grab on, if you just gently place them, they won't stick well. If the concrete is smeary on the tiles, it's okay, it will wipe off with water later. These little square tiles were easiest for me to work with... but if you have actual mosiac tile, or broken pottery, or those little flat marble things, or left over tile pieces from another project... all those would be great. Get creative, rock what ya got.

Now it's footprint time... grab your willing and cooperative 1 year old (riiiiiiiiiight) and squish those tootsies straight down in the middle of the wet concrete mold. (full disclosure: the print pictured above was attempt #32-- or something close to that number. If the first one--or first 31-- doesn't look like you want it, scrape, spread, smooth over the area and try again. Easy peasy.) If the concrete is getting too solid, try dribbling a little water over the top and carefully scraping, spreading and smoothing unitl it's a workable consitancy. Even still, try to work fast, it's only forgiving for the first 10 minutes or so.

Have yourstamps  ready. I chose to put my son's name and the year. But you could certainly put an I love you, or an inspirational quote, or whatever you like.

I started at the middle of my word to make sure it was centered, and pretty straight forward here with the stamps-- press them in, pull straight up and out. If there are lines from the edges of the stamps, smooth them out with your finger.

And there you have it! Now you just need to set it somewhere it can sit undisturbed for 48 hours. It will feel/look dry after about an hour, but you need to leave it alone for 48 so it completely dries and cures.

Still drying here, this is after like, 12 hours. The finish of the concrete looks a little wonky at this point, but it evened out. After everything is all dry, they should pop easily out of the plastic molds, and it's really for your garden:

Or your Golf course lawn:

These turned out to be great gifts for the grandmas, they loved them! I made one for myself as well... and someday if I have a backyard, or a garden, or a small spattering of grassiness to call my own (fingers crossed!!!) it's so going down there! Cute little baby Sam foot. It just makes me smile.
This project is a simdge more expensive than the last I showed you, because you will likely have to purchase most of the supplies. It's not hard to come by-- just not stuff you might have on hand. You could be in it $25 for supplies, but that was enough to make 4 stepping stones, which brings the price per stone to $6.25 which ain't to shabby for a personal and handmade gift that grandmas and mama alike will love... and it's better than a macaroni necklace. Right?
I hope some of you whip some of these stones up for Mother's Day this year, you still have time! And of course if you do... let me know about it, and/or share photos in the flickr pool. Thanks!

DIY Baby Swing gets all famous

Oh my gosh, you guys! I can't believe how much you all love this baby swing. Well, I mean, I love it too... but the online response (WHOA Pinterest) has been overwhelming!
Also, I was recently contacted but Amanda at Smart, Blonde, and Crafty, who wanted to build one for the spring issue of her online crafty magazine, how cool is that? If you want to see her version, you can check it out here: http://www.smartblondeandcrafty.com/diy-baby-swing/

The whole site is really interesting with a ton of ideas, and the online magazine is definitely worth a 'flip through' as well. So check it out!
I'll try to get back in the swing of things (heh heh, see what I did there?) soon with some DIY gifts... and maybe some Mother's day ideas. Recently my time has been a little consumed by a different sort of rather large project that I hope to be able to share some good news on soon. We'll see. Cross your fingers for us!

To see my original baby swing post, go here.
To see the updated post, go here.
To share pictures of your swing that you made, go here.

DIY ChalkVinyl Calendar

Over the past year that I have been a full-time SAHM/home manager I have been slowly trying to implement simple organization methods to keep our family clean, sane, and on time. It's a slow trial and error process... organization is not a part of my God-given skill set. (That skill set does include... making adorable babies, enormous mess making capabilities, and talent for making marshmallows disappear.) Not everything I try works for us. But we are slowly moving in the direction of organization.
Which is why I felt like we should get a large calendar. I strongly considered a dry-erase calendar, but those things are ugly and I was trying to find place I could hide it from view-- which was kind of defeating the purpose of my calendar anyway...
Then I was at my friend's home and saw this awesome chalkboard calendar painted on her wall. "That's great!" I told her, "...but I would be nervous about painting that on my wall."
"Oh, it's vinyl," she replied.
Where does one get chalkboard vinyl? Turns out you don't need chalkboard vinyl. You can write on normal vinyl with chalk quite easily, and it wipes off with a rag or tissue. For real. I was amazed. And said I must have one. So I got to work.

I used some black vinyl I had on hand... I got it at the craft store a long time ago (I believe it was cricut brand though). And I cut it into 3" blocks. You will need 35 blocks total. I also put a title block at the top which was 3"x12"
As you can see I went high tech with a ruler and a rotary cutter... My fancy silhouette machine was buried, but if you have one of those... by all means, make it easy on yourself. But cutting squares is pretty easy to do by hand as well, so no stress if you don't have the fancy tools.

Then I got out my laser level (see the pink-ish line above the black blocks?) and my sewing ruler for spacing. Each of my blocks has a quarter inch between them. I would put them down, and sometimes the vinyl my stretch of land a little wonky, but it was easy to peel up and reposition until I felt good about it's position.

After making my first horizontal row of seven blocks, I continued on to the next, using my level and ruler (and some masking tape!) as a guide and spacer....

Until I had them all up... then I just wrote in days and numbers and a month title at the top with chalk. Easy peasy.
Oh! And I learned a chalk trick from pinterest...

You can use a pencil sharpener to make a nice point on your chalk for nicer writing. (WARNING: if you have any aversion to squeaky chalk... don't do it. It squeaks and screeches in ways that will make your teeth itch... but it does make for a much nicer writing and drawing experience.) Also I have heard (especially with colored chalk) you can dip it in water for smoother, quieter writing and bright color! I have not tested this method though...

So here is my calendar in my kitchen, in a nice prominent spot so we can't miss it, or the important events listed on it. (Sorry for all the shiny glare in the pictures. Don't paint tomato red walls in a semi-gloss finsh, okay? It's a bad and shiny idea)

This was about a 30 minute simple project that I am pretty happy with. It's been up since the beginning of the month, and has already been pretty effective... so as long as I can keep up with the month change, I think it's a keeper. If it's not, though... it's vinyl that peels right off the wall-- no harm in trying, amIright?
Even though this isn't hard to re-create, if you doubt your skills or time-commitment to the project, I found this chalkboard decal on Etsy.com that is super cute-- so you could let someone else do the work. Even better.
Do you have any awesome calendar methods or organizational tricks for your family schedules? How do you keep track of your family's events? Done any vinyl projects recently? Anything else you want to tell me about? Leave me a comment...

Swingin'

 

Sam needed a swing.
He's almost seven months, he's sitting up like a pro, and he needed some backyard entertainment for Grandpa and Grandma's big backyard. Besides that, kids love swings. What kid doesn't love a swing? It was time.
But let me tell you what I hate... plastic stuff. Especially plastic stuff that stays outside and gets faded and dirty and gross. UGH. So I researched baby swings and decided I did not want plastic. A stroll through pinterest found several pretty wooden ones, but they just didn't look so comfy for my sweet little rollie baby. Then I found a picture of this canvas/hamock style swing, and I was all, YES! Then I saw that it was $135 plus shipping from Australia... and I was like... um, NO. (But if you have $135 to burn... you can check out Swingz and Thingz they've got some super cool stuff!)

Source: swingz.com.au via Valerie on Pinterest

But upon closer inspection, I uttered those dangerous words...

I could make that.

Right?

 So I gathered up my supplies:
1 inch oak dowels
25 ft nylon/poly blend braided 5/16" rope
Steel rings
steel carabiner
rope crimps
about 1 yard of outdoor canvas
Some tools: sewing machine, hammer, pliers, saw, drill press
Sturdy tree branch (still attached to the tree, thank you.)

I started by making the seat. I found this beautiful striped canvas at a fabric outlet, and I love it! I think I will start sewing exclusively with stripes, it's super easy to measure stuff... just FYI.

I cut the large piece 36"x14", the top piece is 14"x11", and the bottom leg piece is 6"x11". (I cut all my pieces from the same long strip that started 60"x14") The way they are laid out in this picture is the shape we are creating for the seat part of the swing.
The first step was to hem the sides of the two vertical pieces. You will be hemming the 11" sides. Here's how I did the hem for this project:

1. Iron over a 1/4 inch to wrong side.
2. Iron over another 1/2 inch to wrong side.
3. Sew two straight seams 1/8 inch from each side of the hem. You have a lovely finished edge, the double seam isn't necessary, but I think it looks really nice.

Next you are going to attach those two pieces to the long horizontal piece. Here's how I attached them and double enforced the seams so they would be extra safe for my little boy...

 1. I ironed over 1/4 inch then another 1/2 inch just like i did in the first two steps above. Then I measured and centered the vertical pieces and pinned them, wrong sides together, just underneath that ironed down hem.
2. Sew two seams, just as you did in part 3 above.
3. Now flip the vertical piece up over the hem you just created, and iron it flat.
4. Top stitch over the two seams you created previously, securing the vertical piece in that position and reinforcing your seams.

The next step is to fold over 3 and sew down 3 inches on all 4 sides (which I unfortunately did not take a picture of...) This creates the casing that your dowel will go through for the frame of the swing. This is the last step of the sewing portion, and your completed seat looks like this:

(note: for smaller children you may want to also sew a cushion or pillow to go behind their back. I made a 12x12" square pillow out of coordinating outdoor canvas to go behind Sam, it was the perfect size.)

Next you create the frame and ropes to hang the swing.
I used 1 inch oak dowels, and cut them to 16". My dad took them to his fancy shop and used fancy tools to put beautiful radius on each end, but that is not structurally important. You can just cut and sand the ends really well so no one gets splinters.

Next you will put a 3/8" hole 1" from  both ends of each dowel. You will want you use a drill press to get the holes exactly straight. You can stain your dowels at this point, if you so desire.

Okay, time for the ropework! I cut 2 lengths of rope (I used a braided nylon/poly blend that was 5/16") 10 feet. You need to use a lighter to melt the ends of the rope so it doesn't fray. Then find the center of the two ropes and thread them through your steel ring and pull it to the center. (When you purchase your ring, make sure it is weight bearing. Though it will never need to hold that much, ALL the materials I used for this project were rated to hold up to 200 lbs. Safety first!)

Then I used a metal rope clamp to bind the four ropes together. You can see an unused one sitting above the ropes, and I have only hammered two of the four prongs onto the rope. (just wanted you to see how this works.)

The completed clamped rope looks like this.The rope clamp is another important safety feature in this swing, without it, the ropes could slide freely through the ring and topple the swing and the little one inside. So be sure to include that!

Now it's time for the fun part... assembly! I was literally dancing about the house by the time it got to assembly. I was SO EXCITED to complete this project and get it up in a tree and a baby in it! So here's how you do it...
Thread your dowels through all four casings in the fabric seat. The front and back dowels will be below the side dowels.

Thread the rope through the holes of two crossed dowels, and create a stopper knot leaving a 2 inch tail of rope. (A simple overhand knot would likely be sufficient, but the stopper knot is a little more sturdy, and I didn't want ANY chance of those knots slipping out when holding my precious and breakable baby) (By the way... I did a ton of research before doing this project and learned a lot about knots and what kinds are appropriate for securing or bearing what kinds of loads... Anyway, I kinda feel like I earned my boyscout badge in knots. Is there even such a thing?)

Oh my gosh! You have a swing! Now you need a safe place to hang it from.  Pick a sturdy branch or beam. This little picture is from the original website where I copied my swing design from... an excellent and informative graphic so I will save my breath... (fingers?)

Again, make sure your carabiner is a weight bearing one. ours was purchased from the hardware store and rated to hold 200 lbs. Check the rating on any hardware you use--for your child's safety!

My dad also decided that Sam might like to swing on their fancy shady porch where we all like to hang out, so he got and eye bolt and hung that in their pergola. (this bolt, when properly installed was rated to hold up to 300 lbs. I know I sound like a broken record here... but when suspending your child double and triple check that all your hardware and rope is rated to hold weight and is installed correctly and safely.)

Okay, are you wiggling so much you can't stand it??? Because I definitely was at this point... my dad was tying knots to the tree and literally could not hold still from swing excitement! Check it out!

Okay, and now, brace yourself for gratuitous photos of cute baby swinging...

Favorite!

Sam loved it! He spent his entire afternoon just swinging and swinging. Then after dinner my dad moved his swing up to the porch... where he fell asleep, still in his swing.

Okay, take a few moments to recover from your cuteness coma, because I am certain you want to know about the price breakdown. Did we swing it for under $135?

2 - 1" oak dowels each 3 ft long : $10
50 ft nylon/poly blend braided 5/16" rope: $12
Package of 2 Steel rings: $2
steel carabiner: $3
Package of 2 rope crimps: $2
1 yard of outdoor canvas + 1/3 yard contrasting: $11
Total cost: $40

However... you'll note that I had to buy 50 ft of rope, but only used 25... And several things I had to buy packages of 2... and I had enough fabric left that I could make a second seat... so if I purchased more dowels and another carabiner, that would total $53... 

Making the approximate cost PER SWING about $26.50

I'd say that's a heck of a lot better than $135+shipping from Australia. Yes? SCORE.

This may be the favorite project I have EVER made. I know that's a pretty dramatic use of absolute qualifiers there, but I love this little swing so much... and I love it even more watching my little Sam swing and squeal with delight. Happy Swingin'!

(I also linked this too the Summer Pinterest Challenge at YHL if you wanna check out some other cool projects...) 

 UPDATED 3/1/13: Check out OSH Revisited: Swingin' for more pics and updates on the swing, and also for an explanation on how to add pics of your swing to the flickr pool! If you have created a swing for your kiddo, I would LOVE to see it! Would you please please share pics with all of us??? Please?