Dollar Tree Craft

Well, things has fallen back into place after the craziness of the holidays. When a new year starts off I run out and get a few calendars. I carry 1 in my purse that I log all my assignment/exam dates and I keep one in the kitchen where I write down birthdays and things that we have planned. Many times Kent wants to do something but is not sure if we already have something planned that day. The kitchen calendar is really for his sake. All he has to do is flip to a date and he knows what we have going on.
I stopped at Staples to pick up a few calendars and was shocked at the prices; $7.99 for a small pocket calendar and $20.00 for a spiral bound monthly calendar. Not only were they expensive they were ugly too! No way was I going to pay that. I stopped by Dollar Tree and found just what I was looking for. They weren’t pretty but I knew I could fix it.

With scrapbook paper, ink pads, stamps and some Mod Podge (all things I already owned) I fixed these little guys up.

Not too bad for $2.00.

I'm linking up with:
Blue Cricket Design
Between Naps on the Porch

Craft Group

Last Saturday I had a few girls over for some crafty fun. We had a blast! Here are a few pictures from our little get together.

I have no idea what was said but evidently I thought
it was HIL-arious and my Mom was not so sure.....out of control! :o)

Jennifer and I acting silly!

Let the crafting begin! We did 2 different types of flowers (burlap with lace and black and white check with black tulle). We fastened a clip and a safety pin to back of each so they could be worn different ways. Oh and just an FYI I haven’t decorated my dining room yet. Just in case your wondering why there is nothing on the walls.

My sister-in-law Kim getting her craft on!

We gave my Mom a hard time because she had a HUGE glue gun. I told her, her crazy big glue gun could be our craft group mascot. It was out of control! I should have taken a picture of another glue gun next to it so you tell just how big it was.

It was great to see how everyone took the project and made
it their own. No 2 flowers were alike.

Nikki made a little flower collage which I LOVED!

Jennifer brought a bunch of butcher paper that we taped to my dinning room table. It worked out really well. When we were finished we just rolled it up and threw it in the trash. We used some extra tiles I had left over from a
project as resting place for our glue guns.

I had so much fun hanging with the girls! Hummm what should we craft next month?

Once a Cabinet Door Now a Tray

I found this tossed out cabinet door at Goodwill.

It needed a little love and I had some extra love to give so I turned it into this……..

I started off by removing the hinges and giving it a good coat of spray paint. Once the paint was dry I Modpodged some scrapbook paper in the center
of the cabinet door.

I looked high and low until I found and image online that I wanted to use, ripped a few pages out of the phone book, and used them to transfer the image onto the cabinet door. I talk more about this technique HERE.

After the image was traced I found my black paint and went to town. Once everything dried I added drawer pulls, (aka handles for the tray), sanded it down a few areas and wiped a little stain over the sanded areas
to roughen it up a bit.

And there you have it, an old cabinet door gets some love and I get a new tray. I think we both win in this situation. :o)

Before and After

I'm linking up with:
Tales from Bloggeritaville
Blue Cricket Design
Southern Hospitality

Linking up with:

So I Have this Really Talented Niece ……

Her name is Trori. She is 16 and super creative! Tori just started a blog last week and I’m already blown away. I knew she was crafty but man look at what she’s come up with.

And yes, she can even cook.

I’m so proud of her! Stop by her blog to send some love and
see what else she has going on.

Cleaning the Blinds

There has been a lot cleaning and organizing going on around here.

I got this bad boy cleaned out

We can finally get to our plastic containers without them all falling out of the cabinet.

When we moved into our home we lined all the shelves and drawers with linoleum tiles. To read more about it click HERE.  

And I finally cleaned the dreaded blinds in the kitchen. They are awful, I mean really awful! We have 2 windows in our kitchen. The oil from cooking mixed with dust and made a nice paste on our blinds. It was a disgusting. I tried scrubbing them, washing them, nothing would get it off. So I opened them just right so I couldn’t see the how gross they were and forgot about it; or tried to, it still drove me nuts.

  I bought some of this                                  to clean this ………..
          
and thought hummm I wonder if it would work on my pasty blinds? 

This picture doesn't capture just how gross they were.   
 

I gave them a little spray and wiped them down and like magic
the nastiness was gone! Look closely at the paper towel….yuck!
 

I can now leave my blinds open and not have a freak attack about how filthy they are. If you give this a try be sure to open the windows and wear a mask. I skipped the mask and I pretty sure I lost what brain cells I had left that day.

Just Because…….

(Above is a random picture I took while we were getting things set up for the next shot. I don’t think Taylor even knew I took it.)

I have a few odds and ends that I wanted to chat about. Warring this post will be a little random.

Craft Room: I finally started on my craft room! I’m sooooo excited. I’ve been dreaming of my craft room for long time and it’s now becoming reality! I’ll share some pictures along the way. I’m doing a French theme with black, cream, and a goldish yellow. As I type I have a drop cloth in the dryer, a small shelf that I just spray painted drying in the back yard and 2 large shelves waiting to be assembled. My goal is to keep the coast wayyy down and use mainly repurposed items.
Craft Group: I started a little craft group with a few of my friends. I’m just tickled about it! They are coming over this Saturday for some crafty fun. I know that were going to make fancy flowers (the ones you can wear in your hair, on your shirt, or wherever) I just can’t decided which ones to make. There are soooo many great ones out there.
Did Y’all Know that I’m a Student: Yep, an older one but I’m getting it done! I’m getting my degree in development and family studies. It’s very interesting. My classes are about child development, marriage, motherhood, pretty much anything that encompass family life. After I graduate I’m going through an alternate teaching certification program and plan to teach kindergarten or 1st grade. My semester started back on Wednesday. Let me tell ya I am extremely ready to be done. I have one more year left and it can’t get here sooner :o) You may hear me talking about something I learned from time to time so I wanted to give you a little back ground as to why I may be talking about that subject. When I first started this blog I did a post that was all about me. I know, I’m not that interesting but if you would like to read it you can find it HERE.
Something has been weighing heavy on my heart and I would love your opinion: Do you remember THIS post? Well it’s been a few months and all the superficial wounds have healed but my poor baby is still limping. I’m starting to think his leg will never be the same and it breaks my heart. Every time I watch him limp around the house it makes me think back to that day and how extremely scary it was. I’m grateful that he is still here with us but I still carry a little anger.
The owner of the dog was very sweet when we talked on the phone but when I talked to her she just told me story after story about how they’ve had problems with their dog’s aggression. She never heard my side of the story or what I went through that afternoon. She doesn't know that I thought I was going to watch my little Parker die right in front of me. She doesn't know how completely helpless I felt. She doesn't know that I ran up and down the street bawling my eyes out and screaming for help. She didn’t hear the sound that Parker was making while he was being attacked. I can still hear that awful sound. She has no idea how the dog attack has changed our lives. I have yet to take Parker for a walk since. I no longer take him around other dogs. We use to go hiking on Sundays with a few friends. Parker LOVED this and due to the attack he will no longer be able to go. This breaks my heart. I hate that his quality of life is lessened because someone was not responsible enough to take care of their dog. She has no idea that I now carry a fear of dogs that was completely nonexistent before. She doesn't know that I we are still dealing with this.
Part of me wishes that she did know all of this. I want her to know just how much her irresponsibility has affected us. I’ve thought about writing her a letter. Nothing mean. I just want to share how it has changed our lives (when I say “our” I’m referring to Kent, Parker, and me). I’m sure she still remembers the attack, she may even think about it from time to time but she didn't see it and has no idea what really happened or how it’s affecting us today. I think it's important that she knows this. I want her to know that it was not just a silly happening and something she should just prush aside. I don’t want anything from her and would ask that she didn’t respond.
Here’s where you come in. Do you think I should write her a letter or should I leave it be? You can be honest but please don't be mean. I know you won’t :o)
For those of you who read through this whole post…..THANK YOU!!! I try to keep my post on the less wordy side but every now and then a girl needs to talk!

After Christmas Slump

Dose it happen to you? After I take down all the Christmas decorations I just look around my house and frown. It no longer has that same homey feel and quite honestly looks stark necked! It gets to me every year!
Another problem that happens after Christmas….funds are a little low. I want to fluff the house up a bit but don’t want to run out and spend a bunch of money. So I go shopping in my own house to see what I can find.
I pulled out this GW frame that I bought a few months back and a Key ornament.

Put the two together and came up with this.

Nothing too fancy but I think it looks cute. I believe I paid .59 for the frame and $2.00 for the key ornament. That’s $2.59, pretty cheap in my book.

Are you feeling the after Christmas slump? Try shopping in your home and see what you can come up with. I would love to see what you pull together. :o)

Something You Might Want to Checkout

Howdy!

Hope you are having a wonderful day :o) The sun is shinning bright here in Texas. I'm working on a few projects around the house and enjoing the sunshine.!

I just wanted to pop in and share a link with you. My sister-in-law Kim has joined the blog world and I'm super exited! She's a mom, she's crafty, and a good cook, among many other things. I think you're going to really like what she has to say.

Have you ever heard of a Veggie Co-op? Stop by Kim's blog , say hi and learn how to start your own Veggie Co-Op. I'm going to send out an e-mail to a few of my friends to see if I can get one started.

New Look for the Living Room Using Things I Already Have

Shhhh don’t tell the decorating police but I use to have a faux/fake (whatever same difference) tree here! I know, shame on me. I don’t usually follow the rules…….decorating rules that is. I do keep them in mind and pick and choose which ones I want to implement. This is one decor rule that I decided to follow………sort of.
I tried to find a picture of our living room with our BIG fake tree but I couldn’t find any evidence. This was the best I could do. Do you see it all the way in the back left corner?
When Christmas rolls around the fake tree goes out in the garage and the fake Christmas tree comes in. The old switcharoo, one fake tree for another. The decor Gods would have a heart attack. This year I really didn’t want to bring our “everyday” fake tree back in so I pulled some things out of a closet and came up with this…….
There are all things I already owned. I pulled the lamp from our bedroom which we really were not using. The chair was a hand me down from my Mom. The black and gold frame was an old GW purchase, black and white prints and frames were also a old GW purchase, plates you guessed it, an old GW purchase. We’ve had the little rug forever and I never want to put it down. It’s just to pretty to be stepped all over. The pillow was yet again an old GW purchase, the red blanket was a house warming gift from my cousin (5 years ago), and the basket use to be next to our couch.

I just love these photos. I knew when I saw them at GW that I would find a good use for them. I think they were $1.99 each.

I took a little black paint and dirtied up the frame. It was bright gold before. There is a funny story behind these plates but I’ll share that on a later date.

Ahhh, much better sans the BIG fake tree. It makes me smile! :0)

Before After

Remember before when I said I was sort of following the no fake plant rule? Well I still have these guys and I don’t plan on getting rid of them. Take that Décor Gods whoever you may be!

To see the post where I fancied up this oil dispenser turned soap dispenser click HERE

I'm linking up with:Blue Cricket Desgin
Tales from Bloggeritaville
Between Naps on the Porch

Valentine’s Day Décor on the Cheap

I told myself that I was NOT going to decorate for Valentine’s Day (I usually don’t so I really don’t have and V-day décor). But after seeing all the Valentine décor posts I just couldn’t help myself. I did give myself a few rules though.
1. Try to use things I already have.
2. Only do minimal décor….just a few easy things.
3. Keep it cheap, I’m talking a few bucks here!
Here’s what I did
I picked this guy up at Goodwill last week. Notice anything missing? It didn’t have a lid. I looked all over for the misplaced lid but couldn’t find it. So I had to think outside the box………

That’s when I found this guy. It’s a little ice cream dish.

I put the two together and poof and lid for my apothecary jar. It’s not perfect and the new lid is not super secure but I don’t think anyone will be able to tell.   

I made a stop at Dollar Tree and picked up these…….

  and used them to fill my jars (I just pulled the picks out of the hearts). Nothing that fancy but it adds a little Valentines love to our mantle and best of all it was cot effective.
 
We have a couple candle sticks that are always on our mantel. I thought I would fancy them up a bit with a little ribbon, a few rhinestones, and some feathers; all things I already had on had!

Tatertots and Jello did a super cute cupcake liner wreath….not just super cute, but CRAZY cute! You have to check out her blog. I loved it so much I and made one for myself! I used her tutorial but added a little red glitter at the end. It’s hanging on the mirror in our entry. It was hard to get a good picture of this little guy but let me tell ya this does not do it justice.
I used the same suction hook I used HERE and tied a bow around it so you couldn’t see it.
And that’s it! I really wish I could do more to our mantle but keeping to the rules I set for myself I need to stop! These projects cost me a total of $8.00 and took about 45min to put together. Not too bad!

Linking up with:
Nesting Place