Friday, August 30, 2013

Have a lovely weekend!

photo taken @ Marin Country Mart Farmer's Market , Larkspur, CA

Have a relaxing Labor Day Weekend! 


Kiraku / Japanese Tapas / Berkeley, CA

The best meal we had on our trip was on our first night at Kiraku in Berkeley, California.
It is a small Japanese Izakaya (tapas) place owned by a husband and wife (the Saitos). They serve traditional Japanese small dishes with a bit of flair. The chef Daiki has many years of training in French cooking, and his wife runs the front of the house.
  "Kiraku" in Japanese means to 'relax'.

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Road trip ( Part 1 )

We had an amazing time with family during our vacation! We took our road trip up north, cruising through many cities with all different vibes! My in-laws flew in from Hawaii to join us on our little adventure! We experienced quite a bit for a 7 day trip.

LAX - - > San Jose. (first stop)


Our first stop was the Willow Glen area of San Jose, California. It is a beautiful tree lined neighborhood with cute little shops with an old town feel. We had to take the kids to Powell's Sweet Shoppe
They carry all the old school candy we grew up eating!

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Mountains of Spice

The Himalaya Mountain Spice Shakers by Peleg Design are too cute!
You can purchase them here at the Marmelada TLV store .


Monday, August 5, 2013

DIY Outdoor Seating

We finally finished our outdoor seating! Here's the before and after photo.

When I first learned about this awesome cinderblock and wood outdoor seating on Curbly,
I was so amazed at how simple and ingenious this design was.
I instantly had to give it a try! The step by step tutorial can be found here at Kaylas Basement.

during...

What you will need:

12 cinderblocks (6 for each side)
4 pieces of  4" x 4" x 10 ft. lumber
concrete adhesive
cushions

How to:

*Tip: Make sure the ground is level before setting everything in place.

1. Start with one side.
    Set 4 cinderblocks vertically, and 2 that go on top horizontally.
    Allow approximately 8 - 9 ft. of distance before setting the next side of cinderblocks.

2. Feed the wood through one side to the other. Make sure you have at least 6 inches sticking
    out on both sides. If you want smaller seating, you may always trim the excess wood.

3. Once you are happy with the placement and size of the seating, temporarily remove the wood beams.
    Use the concrete adhesive to set the cinderblocks in place.

4. After the concrete adhesive has dried, feed the wood beams through the top holes of the cinderblocks.
 
We decided to paint the blocks to give it a bit of color.


We used Behr Paint in Island Oasis HDC-MD-09 for the cinderblocks.
We used about 2 small containers of the sample sizes in this color, available at Home Depot.
This amount will cover the outer sides of the cinderblocks only.


You can easily buy a cushion and be done with it at this point.
I recommend the "deep seating" cushion for this width, approx. 32".
They are available for purchase at such places like World Market, however, a cushion this size will easily cost you $200 or more, for the insert cushion plus the cover. I recycled a mattress pad (used for camping) that I found, cut the cushions to size, then covered it in leftover fabric from curtains I trimmed for the kids room.The curtain fabric was from Ikea, and it is just as durable as fabric sold for outdoor use.
I also covered four pillows in the same material.


I hope you have fun creating your own outdoor seating!