A Shoebox Kitchen for a Little Mouse

Back in August, while browsing the new Cath Kidston catalogue, I found the most delightful crafty competition. You had to make a room from a shoe box and furnish it with only items from around the house, then send a photograph of it off to the Cath Kidston website.

Well, Bella and I were most excited about this, as I'm sure you can imagine. We started plotting and searching and rummaging. Fabrics were selected, colour schemes dreamt up and the kitchen cupboards were raided. Nothing has a box or lid now. Items were held up and examined for size and suitability, then ruthlessly added to the pile. Tea bags were decanted into jars, stock cubes now rattle about among the jars and tins, we only have eleven silicone muffins cases now...you get the picture. 

Next time John puts his "smart" shoes on, he will be confused and probably quite irritated to find them in the bottom of the wardrobe in a plastic bag. The box was sacrificed for Project Shoe Box Kitchen  (none of my shoe boxes were big enough you see...)

Would you like a little tour? From left to right...

It's is "wallpapered" in some Cath Kidston fabric, and the flooring is striped cotton fabric covered in sticky back plastic.

1. Little scraps of gingham make tea towels stuck to hooks made from pins. The poster on the wall is from a tin of travel stickers bought when I renovated an old suitcase.

2. The table top is made from the back cover of a notebook. I liked the laminated/Formica effect. The place mats are crafting felt and the plates and cakes are all buttons.

3. One of my favourite parts - the lamp shade is made from a silicon muffin case.

4. The stools are made from buttons topped with felt, and the legs are paper straws.

5. The flower pot, made from an empty cotton reel covered in ric rac trim, holds pipe cleaner stems and bead blooms. The drawers are three small match boxes taped together.

6. The sink is a square plastic lid from a bottle of moisturiser, and the taps are picture hooks.

7. The window was cut out with a craft knife, then I tidied up the edges by sticking double sided sticky tape around to make a window frame, then didn't peel off the second layer of tape. The view, torn from a magazine, is very different to the view from my kitchen window! A girl can dream... The roller blind is more gingham fabric wrapped around a straw to create the tube shape of the roll.

8. A brass roman blind ring makes a towel rail, with a felt towel.

9. The plate rack is made from part of the metal spiral from a spiral bound notebook, sticky-taped to some pink card and pinned precariously to the wall. More buttons for plates.

10.  The large range cooker is an empty tea bag box covered in plain white paper. Buttons make hob rings and drawing pins the knobs.

It was very much a joint effort. I did anything involving craft knives, scissors and extra fiddly bits (like unpeeling double sided sticky tape) and Bella did almost everything else herself, requiring some help here and there with holding things in place and fixing things. Bella likes to play with her mice in it, although it's all a bit wobbly. The plate rack had to go as it kept falling off the wall, but otherwise it's all ok.

It was a lot of fun. We are dreaming up shoe box bathrooms, bedrooms and living rooms, in different colours. I'll just need to buy some new shoes first...for the boxes, of course.

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Don't forget there is still time to enter my little giveaway, should you so wish. A huge amount of rain fell over our little island this week, causing much misery and stress for many people. Thankfully, we are all ok here - I hope you are warm and dry where you are.