Thrifty Decor Chick

January in review!

2012-01-31T22:29:00.001-05:00

Hey hey! I can hardly believe the first month of the year is DONE. I know I say that every month, but for real. It’s crazy.

I’m back with another month in review for January! I kinda skipped over December, just because I was a little tired of looking at Christmas decor by the 31st. (Remind me of that come September when I’m chomping at the bit for Christmas to come.)

I started off the month with the first Before and After Party of the year, and I recapped some of the before and afters that I accomplished last year. The black interior doors in the kitchen were a favorite:

Go check out 441 before and after projects linked up here!

Next up I shared my anticipation for a few projects I’d like to accomplish this year. I’m super excited about all of them – I just hope I can find the funds, time and resources to get them done.

I’m really hoping to install built ins in the loft:

Wouldn’t they be perfect right there?

I did a little bloggy series with a few friends of mine and my topic was making moola:

I really appreciated all of your comments on that one! Check out more of the Growing Your Blog posts here.

One day earlier this month I went shopping at Target and couldn’t believe all the awesome decor stuff they had. I shared a few of my favorites here.

I mean, who doesn’t love Target?!

Next up, I showed you the step by step process to make your own printables using Picnik:

Yes. I’ve heard the news that Picnik is closing down. No, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m still in mourning. :)

I know of a few different other options and will let you know what I end up using instead.

Grumbles.
Scuffs feet.
Pouts.

Anyway, next up I shared a big project I’ve had rolling around in my brain for awhile…I’d like to change our completely unused dining room and turn it into a library:

And you all totally convinced me to do it. ;) Yes, we already have a family room and a living room. But I’d much rather have a space I know we’ll use and enjoy, instead of a pretty room that no one ever uses. Unused spaces give me hives.

Up next, I shared what I have in store for TDC in 2012, including a switch from Blogger to WordPress:

I’m sceered. :)

Don’t forget the February Before and After Party will be February 6, and the Show Us Your House party will be the 20th, where we’ll be sharing closets of all shapes and sizes!

I FINALLY revealed my finished office! It took five years or something, but it’s done and I LOVE IT:

I shared all of the details of the office (paint colors, sources and how-to’s) in the next post:

And you all showed off 144 craft and office spaces of your own!

We spent much of our Christmas vacation in the least decorated space in our house – our unfinished basement “family room”:

I shared a little more about our plans to finish that space too. So exciting! No idea when it will happen, but so exciting!

I had been looking for the perfect piece for between our living room windows, and I finally found it on a trip to HomeGoods. I showed you how I accessorized it here:

Next up, I shared a deep dark part of myself – the fact that I am (and always have been) a night owl:

WOW, there was a big response to that post! So many of you are JUST like me! It was a relief, I gotta tell you. I’m on a mission to become a morning person, and I’m doing pretty well with it. (You may notice my posts are going up a tad earlier.)

I mentioned the other day that I’ve started using the Sleep Cycle app on my phone, and it. is. amazing. Have any of you tried it?

I showed off some of the amazing craft and office spaces that were linked up this month:

And finished up the month by bragging on the city that I love, Indianapolis:

It’s such an exciting time here in Indy right now! So fun!

So there you go! Just in case you missed a post – we can’t have that now can we?

I’m knee deep in a pantry redo (seriously, knee deep in piles of food) that I was hoping to show you this week, but a nasty cold has taken hold and knocked me on my butt. I’m hoping to get more done tomorrow and finish it up this week!

You know, so we can find the food. :)

Holla!!

P.S. I think I said “shared” 67 times.

If you visit

2012-01-30T21:12:00.001-05:00

Helloooo there! Hope you had a wonderful weekend!

Today I’m going to brag on my hometown a bit…cause this is the biggest week of the year for us here in Indianapolis. You may have heard of a little thing called the Super Bowl? ;)

I’m a born and bred Hoosier and I SO love this state. I think the general thought when people think of Indy is that it’s may not have much to offer, but oh ho ho, you’d be so wrong.

I’ve traveled a lot in my 36 years and there is still no place I’d rather call home than in central Indiana. We’ve got the best of everything – although this time of year you won’t see much of the natural scenery. ;) (Visit southern Indiana during the fall for an especially spectacular show courtesy of Mother Nature.)

Indy knows how to party, and how to party with large crowds – we host the largest sporting event in the country every May. The Indy 500 attracts about 300,000 – the Super Bowl doesn’t even touch it.

I wanted to share some of the highlights of our city, the shops and restaurants and spots that we love then most. So if you are planning on visiting this week, consider this a possible itinerary. If you aren’t, this will help you to plan a trip. ;)

First up, the shopping. I don’t know what I like best – the food or the shopping. But I’m a girl so we’ll start with shopping.

If you fly in, you may want to skip these first two, just cause if you go, then you’ll find something and then you’ll be mad cause you won’t be able to take it home. I’m just thinking about you. (Not that it would be left for me or anything…)

I’ve declared my love for Midland Arts and Antiques a few times:

It’s HUGE and it’s got plenty of every style – vintage to midcentury modern to industrial. You can see more of my Midland finds here and here.

Docs Architectural Salvage is another one of my favorite spots:

This place doesn’t look like much from the outside, but it’s a feast for the eyes inside. It is a true salvage experience – they have some of the most spectacular chandeliers I’ve ever seen. (I talked about one of my favorite finds from Docs in this post.)

Silver in the City is another fun spot downtown, with all kinds of unique jewelry, funky gifts and cool home decor items:

And Mass Ave Toys is the coolest toy store I’ve ever visited:

It is just fantastic!

If you venture north a few miles, you’ll reach Broad Ripple Village:

It’s an eclectic mix of nightlife, eateries, shops and art. It’s also where we partied in college. ;) It’s fun at night or during the day – tons to look at and do! I grew up visiting this area as a kid, since I had so much family nearby.

Of course there’s a huge mall downtown, but if you head even further north, you’ll get to what I like to call the fancy mall, with stores like Anthropologie, Restoration Hardware, Urban Outfitters and Saks.

If you have the kids, you MUST visit our Children’s Museum (consistently voted as the best in the nation). And if you have a little sports fan, you’ll want to check out the NCAA Hall of Champions along the downtown canal.

Now, let’s talk FOOD. Oh, the food.

Downtown Indy is home to the best steak I’ve ever eaten, at St. Elmo Steak House:

I warn you –- it’s pricey. But fantastic. And I’m not a shrimp cocktail fan, but St. Elmo’s is known for it’s shrimp cocktail – make sure you have a pitcher of water nearby. ;)

One of our very favorite downtown spots is Bourbon Street Distillery:

The food leans toward Cajun, but everything there is amazing. And if you go, make sure you go upstairs to eat -- it’s just a super cool atmosphere. (At night a little jazz trio or band may show up to play for you.) We love this place so much, we had one of our wedding receptions there. :)

A few of my other favorite downtown restaurants are along Massachusetts Avenue – if you love pizza, you MUST go to Bazbeauz Pizza (the quatro is my fave), Yats is another yummy Cajun restaurant (I love the jambalaya), and finally, MacNivens is great for pub food with a Scottish flair (try the scotch eggs!).

And no one plans a party like Indy – if you are visiting this week, you’ll want to check out the festivities downtown. One of my BFFs and I were able to get away to check it all out Sunday night:

If you have the kids, you can’t miss the NFL Experience:

And if you are brave enough, try the zip lining outside. I was SO ready to do it but we didn’t want to wait. It looked SO FUN!

Georgia Street is completely blocked off for the Super Bowl Village:

There’s tons of heat lamps, plenty of heated tents (serving drinks – from hot chocolate to beer inside), and bunches of restaurants and bars line the street. An empty spot in the mall is opened up for a spot to warm up, eat, and shop for all kinds of football gear. (The Huddle – and you can leave your cell to charge for free – they babysit it!)

At the end of the Georgia Street, in front of Conseco Fieldhouse, there’s the biggest of two stages:

The concerts have been going since last Friday, and Fuel will be there Tuesday night, Darius Rucker and Edwin McCain on Thursday night, and LMFAO will be there Friday. (We may try to make it down again for that one – it will be a (crazy) blast!)

And of course, Madonna herself will be performing at the big game. :)

So there’s Indy in a nutshell – a few of my favorite shops and eateries if you visit this week, or anytime. And if you come to town, give me a holla!!

So, the big question is…who will you be cheering for?

Are you surprised that this Indy girl will be rooting on the Manning team? I don’t think I’m allowed to cheer any other way. I’d get kicked out of the state or something. ;)

Which team will it be for you? Do you watch football? Have a Super Bowl party every year? Our city is buzzing – what a great experience!

Pretty work spaces

2012-01-27T17:32:00.001-05:00

Well happy Friday and weekend to YOU!!

I gotta say, your responses to my last post made me feel SO MUCH better. I certainly do not feel alone, especially since so many of you feel the way I do.

There were SO many great suggestions (yes, I read every comment) and a couple of you mentioned the Sleep Cycle app on the iphone. I had heard of it before and decided to give it a try.

You see, I don’t usually have a problem falling asleep – it’s getting my booty up that’s hard. I LOVE the sleep part. ;)

It’s totally freaky, but this thing works. I’ve only used it two mornings but it’s kind of blowing my mind. It somehow keeps track of your sleep patterns and wakes you during your lightest sleep phase. So if I set it between 7 and 7:30, it goes off when I’m sleeping the lightest during that time.

The first morning it went off and I felt fantastic. I didn’t even hit snooze! Today it went off and I snoozed it, but then realized right away I felt fine. So I got up within seconds of it going off both mornings. That’s happened…uhhh. Never?

It’s freaky. I can’t believe that a little dollar app would make that big of a difference, but so far it has. I’m going to keep using it to see if it keeps up, but I thought I’d mention to my fellow owls so you can try it out. :)

Anyhoo, today I wanted to share some of the amazing spaces that were linked up at the first Show Us Your House party here at TDC! This month’s room was the office or craft space. Since I shared my office redo this month, I thought it would be appropriate.

There were so many awesome ideas I just had to share!

Andrea’s space is so serene and pretty, and the cutting table in the middle of the room is ingenious:

Willow Wisp Cottage

She used two dressers and two dresser tops from IKEA – for less than $150! I LOVE that! And what great storage. I am SO doing this someday. If only IKEA would move closer, darn it.

Brook’s hubby made this a table for her craft space:

Being Brook

And again, only $150 to build it! If you’re handy, it’s a great option. I could see doing something similar with two short bookcases and a butcher block countertop – now my wheels are really turning!! ;)

Janel uses chicken wire all along one wall as a larger than life inspiration board:

Hating Martha

What a fun idea!

I love Bec’s wall of beautiful organization:

Little Lucy Lu

The shelves, brackets and buckets were all from IKEA (I guess it’s a good thing it’s two hours away) but you could totally recreate this with supplies from the hardware store!

There were some perfectly organized spaces throughout the links, but I wanted to share a few using pegboard. It’s is supa cheap – and I think it’s a brilliant way to organize!

Kellie makes it look easy with her pretty blue pegboard:

Nest of Posies

And Hayley uses it all over her walls in her basement craft room:

Mouse House Creations

You won’t even believe this space is unfinished! Bravo!

I love how Liz changed up a beat up dresser into a shelving system:

Liz Marie

The beadboard covering the top of the dresser was brillz. And this is a great option for when you want to store TV components in a dresser as well!

Carrie has one of the most organized spaces I’ve ever seen!:

Saving for Six

The girl makes plastic baskets and wire shelving look so good, for real!!

I love seeing how people make the most of awkward spaces! Jen had an unused spot in her dining room and you won’t believe everything she fits behind that wall!:

Jennifer Rizzo

This side looks pretty amazing too! ;)

Joanne used an unused closet and made a (pretty darn spacious) office out of it:

Double Wide in the Sky

Love it!!

Let’s end the officepalooza with a couple of pretties, eh?

I loved Julie’s bright craft room with the graphic black and white striped curtains:

Less Than Perfect

And all of the beautiful colors in Kammy’s craft space:

Kammy’s Korner

Love the ceiling and how she mixed all those colors!

So there you go! Some organization ideas and pretty pictures to inspire you! This week I moved my craft space to a different spot in our basement and I LOVE how it’s turning out. These links are making me even more excited for a finished room to decorate someday!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend! Holla!

Morning bird/Night owl

2012-01-25T21:32:00.001-05:00

I’m at a crossroads in my life people. I’ve been a certain someone most of of my 36 years, and I desperately want to become another. It’s time. It needs to happen. Change is good. (I keep telling myself that.)

You see, I’m a night owl.

(source)

That’s me…usually wide awake at midnight. (But I don’t need coffee -- I don’t even drink it.)

I’m making a conscious effort to try to become the opposite:

Again, without the coffee. I mean, is this a necessity? Please tell me non-coffee drinkers can be the bird.

Just look how happy he is. All alert and peppy and early. The owl just looks freaked out. I want to be the bird.

But…deep in my heart, in my soul, in my being, I just want to do this every morning:

It’s a struggle, to say the least.

I’ve always leaned toward being a later kind of person, but in my adult years it’s gotten worse and worse. When I worked full time and had to be in at 8 a.m., it was absolute torture.

I seemed to always push that 8 a.m. to 8:30, and then I’d stay till 5:30. That was just more comfortable for me.

Blogging doesn’t help. Or at least I use it as an excuse. As a blogger, my days have started and ended later every year. It’s gotten progressively worse. Initially it was because I’ve always blogged and done computer business while my son is asleep. (Which is just a personal decision for us.)

But now, I must come up with a better solution. I’m determined to make a change and I need help and reassurance that it can happen!

Help. me.

Because my kiddo goes to pre-K so few hours a week, it’s hard for me to blog while he’s gone. That’s a time for me to get stuff done, you know what I mean? And it’s just not in me to be functional (in that way) in the morning when he’s gone.

I’m also a procrastinator to a T – always have been. I was a huddle in the library and cram for an exam kind of person, and that always served me well.

Once I wrote a paper well ahead of time, to see if I could do it. It was the worst grade I got on a paper in my four year college career.

My mind just functions better when I have pressure, (that’s why I don’t schedule posts for the week – I have to come up with content by the day and write it as it comes) and it’s the same thing with working earlier in the day. I get in a zone when I write at night, there’s just something about it.

I can’t get in that zone during the day.

It’s weird.

But I’m determined to change my life where this is concerned. Why? Many reasons. One, I just feel out of touch with the world. It’s a yucky feeling waking up later than 90 percent of the world, (at least it feels like that) and knowing so much productivity has been happening while I slept.

I want to fall asleep when my husband does – I’m tired of being the only person awake in our home for hours on end at night. (Sometimes it’s nice, but lately it feels more and more lonely!)

My kiddo goes to school next year, and like it or not, I need to figure this out. I want to be awake and present for him and have plenty of time in the mornings for him to get prepared for the days too. Right now he would much rather go to bed later and sleep in (and that he does – it rocks). He’s turning into me. :)

The world is not a night owl world. Plan and simple. I mean, no one is on Facebook at 2 a.m. ;) And have you seen the television at that time? Thank goodness for the DVR. (And I ask you, where was the DVR for the 3 a.m. feedings five years ago??)

And finally, I’m working out (pretty intensely) again, and I find I feel SO much better when I start out my day with exercise. I feel more productive, more alert…just better. No, not just better, TONS better. It feels GREAT.

But my body fights me. It hates me. ;) I can easily stay up till 2 a.m. – if I had my own clock, that would be my bedtime. If I’m engrossed in a good book, I can stay up till 3 or 3:30 no problem.

I feel more comfortable working out late at night – it is totally not unusual for me to work out at 11 p.m. I know, I see some of your mouths gaping open. Close that, you’ll catch flies. ;)

Thing is, I’m OK once I’m UP. It’s just the getting there that’s the problem. I’ll hit snooze five or six times some mornings. And it doesn’t seem to matter how much sleep I get – my body just struggles no matter what time I went to bed.

I’ve actually done some research in my quest to become a morning lark. It’s quite fascinating too. Turns out whether you are a morning or evening kind of person is largely genetic (which I figured, since my mom is the exact same way). It also is kind of ingrained in you – your body clock (circadian rhythm) is just set a certain way and your body fights to follow it.

What I found most interesting is the consistent traits for each type of person. Studies have shown that night owls have higher intelligence/I.Q. (I don’t believe that personally), and tend to be more creative (that I totally believe.)

If you’re an early birdy and are offended by that, don’t be, because owls also score lower on tests than morning folks (isn’t that odd, considering the intelligence thing?) and are more likely to suffer from depression and/or addictions.

And you lucky morning folks seem to test much better and get better grades than people like me. And you catch the worm. I mean…who doesn’t want to catch the stinkin’ worm?!

I do. I really, really do.

Overall, I just know it needs to change. I want to eat breakfast in the morning (night owls rarely do), I want to not feel rushed and frantic in the mornings (night owls usually do).

The best part of all this research is that I have hope – it most definitely can happen.

So, I’m trying. Lately, I’ve been forcing myself to go bed earlier. I now recognize that watching just one more TV show or reading one more blog at 1 a.m. isn’t going to change my life for the better. Eight hours of sleep will. I realize that working out first thing in the morning makes me feel so. much. better. than when I exercise at night.

I want to help my kiddos lean toward a morning bird life too. My stepdaughter is at college and is already on the dark side with me…and when she gets a full time job, it’s gonna hurt. And I don’t want the Bub sleeping away his summer mornings when his friends are already out playing at 9 a.m.

It’s time for a change. And I’m working on it. :)

So, tell me. Are you are a lark or an owl? Do you like what you are, or do you struggle like me? Have any of you owls-at-heart changed to a morning person? Do you get up without an alarm clock? I’d love to hear your tips and anything that’s worked for you!

Thanks in advance! I’m off to get ready for bed. We’ll see how this goes. Cheer me on!!! ;)

Styling the new bookcase

2012-01-23T22:29:00.001-05:00

Hey heyyyy! Hope you had a GREAT weekend and Monday! I spent a bit of time styling a new bookshelf – which I find just plain fun. If I’ve got time and the resources (aka STUFF from the basement), I find it oddly relaxing.

I totally get in a ZONE.

It usually takes me some time though, so I go through a process. A lot of placing something, stepping back, moving something, stepping back, switching something, stepping back. Lots of hokey pokey. And turn yourself around.

You last saw our living room after our new floors were put down last fall:

Pretty much immediately I started making changes. :)

I installed wainscoting around the room a couple years ago and it’s always bugged me that you couldn’t see any of it the way the room was set up.

I did some rearranging, which I liked, and then a few weeks ago came across a PERFECT addition for the space between the windows. It was a tall bookcase from HomeGoods:

I LOVED the detail on the sides and that it was open on the back. (So you can see some of my hard work.)

I’m kind of obsessed with the colors that are in the drapery fabric in this room:

(You can see more about that fabric on my FAQ page.)

That deep peacock blue is my favorite. (And to think I never had an ounce of blue in this house only a couple years ago!) I’m trying to pull that and more of the green into the space.

I styled the shelves (or decorated them, but “styling” seems to be the word nowadays) over the weekend and wanted to share how I made it happen. The only challenge was that I wanted to use what I had – no shopping allowed. Although some of it I had gotten recently, it just happened to work perfectly. :)

One thing I do as I’m working on a space like this is to take pictures – it really gives me a different perspective to see it on the camera screen. I don’t know why, but it does.

The top shelf holds some of the more recent finds, and they were from a local antique shop. I just discovered it and I can’t believe it’s been under my nose all this time! I can’t wait to go back. :)

I found the most adorable brass owl, and had to add him to the shelves somewhere. The vintage books were just beautiful and worked with the colors in this space perfectly:

I had to add something to the back to cover the meeeellions of holes on that wall. I can patch them but don’t have the wall paint anymore, and it’s not made anymore either (and I know from experience it wouldn’t color match perfectly.) Soooo…I have holes. (I have an plan to rectify this though…it’s number 464 on my list.)

The little pot was from Goodwill, isn’t it cute?:

The faux plant is from IKEA – it is the most realistic fake plant I’ve ever seen!

The next shelf is pretty self explanatory:

Ack. Darn HOLES!

The wood dough bowl was a Wuslu.com find – I LOVE it. I just filled it with my rattan balls and dollar store mossy rocks that I had.

I was going to add something to the back, but it got too busy.

Moving on down, I tried to pull more of that beautiful blue, and the green from the drapes in with the next shelf:

The ceramic candle holder was a clearance find at Cost Plus a few months ago, and the green jar was a Goodwill find years ago. (It was covered in old rattan and I took it off.)

That photo is a good example of how I like to use accessories that make your eye move up and down. I use that little rule often and it always works.

The bottom shelf had one more Cost Plus item – a storage box I picked up a few weeks ago, a couple more books I already had in those lovely colors:

That pedestal was horribly tarnished when I found it, but this stuff always does the trick:

With a little elbow grease it made it shine!:

After much hokey pokeying, I finally came up with a display I liked:

I’m pretty happy with it, considering I was using stuff from my stash.

And ignore the missing drapery panel – those are getting a little redo too. ;)

I LOVE how the bookcase fills in the this space between the windows:

It fits perfectly, and it’s got tons of character too, so unique!

I love looking back to see how this space has transformed over the years – first the red and black days:

You can see how to knock off those Ballard Design shelves here.

Here it is last year with showing the difference new drapes and some color can make:

And here it is now, sans a couple drapes:

Before and afters are my very favorite things. :) Other than fried chicken. And reality TV.

Believe it or not, I don’t have a lot of spaces I can decorate with accessories in our house, so I love having a new spot!

I hope to change up a few more things in here in the next few months. Me saying that out loud means it will probably happen next year. Whatever. I can hope.

So, do you struggle with accessorizing? Styling? Whatever? ;) Do you have tricks that work for you? Anymore I head straight to Pinterest for ideas too, or even catalogs. They have some GREAT inspiration! (I even have a “vignette” board on Pinterest!)

Giveaway Weekend

2012-01-20T23:30:00.000-05:00

Hey hey! I’m so excited about this weekend’s giveaway and I know you all will be too. Cause I know you all LOVE TO CLEAN!!
Whoohoo!!
Am I right?
I said, Am I right??
Crickets.

OK, I’m really excited about this giveaway because I really love this stuff. And I love giving away stuff I use and love. The love affair started a couple of years ago when I did my first Shaklee giveaway.

I was Hooked. (With a capital “H.”)

Other than an occasional cleaning wipe and toilet bowl cleaner, Shaklee is ALL I use anymore. I donated all of my other cleaning supplies a long time ago and haven’t missed them since.

I have a few Shaklee favorites, but the one I love to show off the most is the Scour Off:

This stuff ROCKS!
And it looks pretty (it’s PINK!) and smells amazing. I’ve told you before you’ll want to lick it. For real.
Just don’t.
(I think one of the main ingredients is cherry pits – hence the smell.)
Here’s where I show you how much I like you all, cause I’m going to show you my dirty oven:

That glass is the hardest spot to clean in my house, I swear. Am I right? I mean, am I right? ;)
Can I get a holla?
If you’ve been around for awhile, you’ve seen my dirty oven before. My apologies.
Every time we cook lately, the smoke alarm goes off, cause there’s so much junk in there:

I’m getting tired of waving the paper at the alarm every night, (or…every other night. Like I cook every night.) so I figured it was time to clean it.
Once I tried the self cleaning option on our oven and I thought the house was going to blow up. I didn’t feel comfortable staying with the fumes, and I didn’t feel comfortable leaving with the oven that dang hot. So I turned it off about 20 minutes in.
So now, I do it myself. Thankfully this stuff works darn good. :)
This stuff has a paste consistency, so I take a sponge (I just use dollar store sponges) and get a glob and start spreading:

Scrub it in good. It takes some muscle depending on what you’re cleaning. The oven = muscle.
A few minutes later, and you can tell the difference. The dirty is on the left, and the right is cleaned with Scour Off:

I love it!!
I used it on the inside as well, and didn’t get to the whole thing (we had to leave), but you can see the difference already:

You know I’m all about before and afters, so here you go:

I used to use stinky, caustic stuff, and never felt quite right about using it where I cook our FOOD. The Scour Off is nontoxic and contains no phosphates or harsh chemicals.
I’ve tried almost every Shaklee cleaning product and love them all. I use the dish soap, hand soap and laundry detergent daily.
But these three are my faves:

The Scour Off of course, the dish wash detergent and the Basic H cleaning solution.
You just need SO little of that concentrate for cleaning:

I’ve had the same bottle of Basic H concentrate for two years. It would appear that I don’t clean because I have so much left, but I DO. I swear. You just need so little it lasts forever.
One bottle is 16 ounces and it’s $12. I figure I’ve saved at least $100 on cleaning products because of it. I still have a bit left, but even two years in that’s $6 a year to clean all of our windows, counters, appliances, bathrooms, stainless steel…everything.
It’s hard to beat. ;)
And I love the dish wash detergent too. It takes a couple little scoops and the dishes come out clean and spot-free every time.
I keep the powder in a little bowl on the sink:
Gotta make it pretty you know. ;)
Shaklee has been around foreva – 50 years now. They also sell nutrition, weight management and beauty items. I’m trying out their face cream and so far I love it!
My friend Bonnie is my distributor and she has an AWESOME blog with all kinds of cleaning tips and tutes. She shows how to mix the Basic H and talks more about what a GREAT deal they are here. (She is so dang cute!!)
There are a whole buncha deals going on right now, and you can see more about those here and here.
This weekend, my girl Bonnie is giving away 20 Basic H samples! That is 2-0! One sample mixed with water makes a whole all-purpose cleaner bottle and a window cleaner bottle.
Did I mention they’ll probably last you all year? Well, if you’re a better cleaner than me, maybe not that long. Let’s not talk about that.
Here’s how to enter to win one of 20 Shaklee samples:
1. Leave a comment here.
2. Visit Bonnie’s Shaklee site here. Check out the products and let us know what you’d like to try out!
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This giveaway is only open to US residents! It will be open till this Monday, January 23rd at noon EST.
Have a lovely, WARM weekend! :)

Underground family room

2012-01-19T23:33:00.001-05:00

Well thank you for the lovely comments about our sweet, sweet kitty. You all always make me feel like I have a few hundred extra friends around the world. :)

This post is about a space I’m kind of obsessed with –- the basement. I freakin’ LOVE basements. Something about them – they are just super cool spaces to me. I may have mentioned one or 800 times how excited I am about finishing ours…someday. It’s been eight years of saying “It’s going to happen this year!” and it never happens.

It’s certainly the biggest project we’ll ever do to this house. At first I thought it would be fairly straightforward – frame it up, add a few extra outlets, put up some walls and be done. Easy peasy – pushaw.

As we’ve used the space more over the years, we realize more and more that we’d like to do. (Read: stuff that costs more money.) Like is the key word. If they will happen or not, I have no idea.

Our basement is obviously still unfinished, but as I've mentioned before, we USE it. It’s just too much extra space not to! And although it’s not particularly pretty to look at, I love seeing seldom seen areas in other bloggers’ homes, so I like to share how we use this one. And how we see it working in the future.

I guess I’m saying, you probably won’t be pinning any of these photos. :) But I like to show how we use this typically unusable space.

The layout in our “family room” down there has changed more than any other rooms in our house put together. Because of our very open floor plan, I don’t move furniture around in our rooms…like, ever. They’re set up the way they work. And stay that way. Forever.

So the basement is my fix for when I want to change something up. ;)

Over Christmas break, we made a few changes to the basement family room space to make it even more usable:

This space used to be set up like this:

But we had a whole lotta shifting of furniture that happened when we got our new family room sectional. The old sofa went upstairs to the loft and the two recliners that were there came down here.

We got those recliners about six years ago, and I don’t care for the look of them anymore, but oh man, they are SO COMFY. Dang.

I’ve found three keys to making an unfinished space comfy – warmth (blankets and a space heater if needed), something soft for the tush (loveseat and recliners) and keeping the feet warm (lots and lots of rugs).

Oh, and no spiders. Spiders kind of ruin everything.

(Side note – I once had a serviceman tell me ours was the cleanest unfinished basement he’s ever seen. He couldn’t even find a spider web. I don’t know why we don’t get bugs down here, but we just don’t. Knock. on. wood.)

The TV cabinet is the old one from our family room, the side tables we’ve had for years and the Pottery Barn coffee table was a Craigslist find early last year. It was supposed to go upstairs but it didn’t work.

The rugs are mostly the really cheapy utility rugs you can find at most hardware stores. We also have a huge one down there that was a remnant and I got it for a steal.

Now that it’s so warm and cozy down there, we find ourselves using this space ALL the time. We don’t really need an extra family room, but it’s there and we want to use it. Eventually it will be a movie room/family room space, and who says you need to have drywall to make it that way?

Not us!

I have a confession…every single night of Christmas break (two weeks people!), we sat our butts on these chairs and had movie nights:

The dog and the Bub usually cuddle up with one of us, or lay on the couch.

It was/is SO FUN.

Nothing matches, nothing is prettied up, but it has been one of our very favorite spots over the past few weeks. Isn’t that crazy?

I like to call it industrial chic:

Ha! That’s totally in, right? ;)

Although we like the way it’s set up now, it’s going to change, AGAIN.

I’ve been doing my workouts down here, (I put sliders on the bottom of the coffee table so I can move it easily – that thing is heavy!) and I keep banging into the chairs and table:

And when we DO finish the basement, we envision an electric fireplace in that alcove where the TV is. (I envision it built into that space so it looks like it’s always been there.)

So the room needs to be oriented the other way, facing the long wall.

That got my wheels turning. Because we are closer than we’ve ever been to actually moving forward with the framing, I want to set up the basement like we want it when it’s finished.

That means my craft space behind those chairs:

Will need to be moved to the back corner by our storage space, where the Bub’s toys are:

And his toys will go into that corner where my stuff currently resides. Got it? :)

My craft area really houses more than just that – it’s all the wrapping supplies, home decor stuff I can’t let go of, extra pantry items and all the seasonal serving dishes and baking stuff.

It will be great because the kiddo has WAY less toys than I do. ;) So there will be a lot less STUFF as soon as you walk down the stairs. My craft room will eventually be part of the storage/work out/laundry room.

That room will have to serve a TON of functions so I want to move everything around to see if my ideas will even work.

I put a little digital layout a few months ago, while daydreaming. :) Even though we haven’t started the work yet, I bide my time by planning. And planning. It helps me hold my horses and it’s something that needs to be done anyway.

Here’s an idea of the way I hope to make it work:

Just as a side note, this is the only part of our home you’ll see a floor plan for. :) I don’t feel comfortable sharing the layout for the other parts of the house, just for security reasons. (Crazy maybe, but I’d rather be crazier than the crazies. You know what I’m sayin’?)

But I know you’ll all be coming along for this ride with us, so this part I will share, because it’s below ground level. :)

Anyhoo, in this layout I still have my craft table off to the side of the family room space, and I now know I don’t want it there. So that space where the blue rug is will get smaller, as that wall will need to come out even further. I was trying to avoid that, but I want to be able to shut the door on all that STUFF.

And you eagle eyes will see where I’m planning on putting the washer and dryer. That’s a whole other post. (Yes, I’ve already done a ton of planning and thinking about that and it’s going to happen if I have anything to do with it. And I do.) ;)

So…there’s our underground family room in all it’s glory. And the start of the beginning of the initial kind of maybe finishing our basement. It has to start somewhere, right?

Do you love moving furniture around? Does you house let you? ;) Do you use floor plans for spaces like me, or do you get a work out and shove everything around till it works? Do you love basements like I do? And most importantly, are you as PYSCHED as I am for it to (maybe?) start soon??

Wahooo!

(And do not hold me to this, I may be saying this exact same thing next year.)

Office deets and show off yours!

2012-01-17T21:50:00.001-05:00

Hello all! Welcome to the first Show Us Your House party! I can’t wait to see the rooms for this month – your craft spaces and offices!

I had intentions of getting this first house party up last night, but we had a bit of a family crisis that was my priority. Around ten last night we noticed one of our kitties was looking just…not right. Her sweet face didn’t look like her and right away I knew something was wrong. I picked her up and took her to her food and water and tried to get her to eat something, and that’s when I noticed she could barely stand up. She couldn’t eat, drink, or walk without struggling.

I kept an eye on her for a few minutes, then noticed blood around her mouth and we knew immediately that the night was not going to end well. We took her to the ER doc at midnight and as the minutes ticked by she got considerably worse – I’ve never seen anything like it. I still can’t believe how fast it happened.

We found out she was suffering from kidney failure and it was taking her incredibly fast. The night before she was her old self…cuddling up with my on our bed (the fact that she could still jump up on our tall bed at 18 years old was crazy), “talking” to me before bed like she always does.

She went from her old self to horrible health in 24 hours. We only had about an hour to wrap our heads around it and then there we were saying goodbye to her. When they brought her back into the room so we could hold her, she was pretty much comatose. Her beautiful bright eyes just were not there anymore.

We held her and said goodbye and cried and cried. It was heart wrenching. I’ve had this baby girl since the day she was born…our kitty gave birth to a litter and she was one of them.

I haven’t had time to find recent pics of her, but you can see she was a stunner. :)

I love this one because you can see her “smile”:

She was the sweetest, best girl in the world. I miss her terribly. We’ve been moping around the house all day today…still kind of in shock. This is the second cat in about six months that we’ve lost. We’ve gone from four animals to two in a very short time. Our last cat is so sad today…it’s just awful. My heart hurts. I’ve had that sweet girl for half of my life.

So, it’s been a sucky few days…hubby has been sick with pneumonia and now this. (He’s doing much better but still feeling yucky.)

Anyway, that’s my very long story for the reason I didn’t get this up last night. I couldn’t help but show off our sweet kitty to you all before we got going with the post. :) Thanks for letting me share her with you.

Sooo…it’s time to move on to some details on my office reveal from earlier this week. First of all, I just want to say THANK you for all of the wonderful comments. I truly appreciate them and appreciate that you take the time to comment. It makes my day!

There’s a lot I want to share, so bear with me!

First, more about the layout. This room was tough for me because it’s like every other room on our main floor…very few full walls. The space is only about 11 by 11 feet, two walls have windows (which I LOVE), and two are cut off a bit by the angled doorway.

You might remember that for a long time, I had the desk and light on the left side of the room. First it was facing the doorway, then I changed it to face the wall.

It just felt weird to me though…awkward. So in the end, it was moved over by the windows:

For a while I had it angled in the corner facing out, but that was awkward too. In order to get around it to sit down, the table had to be too far out into the room.

One day recently I was cleaning the floors and moved the desk over a bit. I realized it worked great!:

I love it! And it only took forever to figure it out. :)

This way if I ever want a different view, I can just turn it the other way, and I’ve still got all that natural light!

Speaking of the desk, this was my third option for the room. It was EXACTLY what I wanted – a “real” vintage farmhouse table. I totally lucked out when a friend of a friend was selling it.

Unfortunately it was covered with lead paint. :) I had it professionally stripped down and then I painted it a very light blue. (Paint colors coming at the end of the post!):

I also changed the orientation of the desk so the legs went with the width. It is a HUGE surface and perfect for crafting or sorting mail.

Speaking of mail, I showed you how I figured out a process for controlling the paper that comes in the house here. All of my office supplies are organized in the Craigslist dresser (that I LOVE).

The mail and stuff that I need to go through goes in the box on top, then the papers that need to be filed in the basement go in the top drawer:

The binders hold everyday stuff I want close at hand – house stuff, inspiration files and manuals for games and toys. This way I don’t have to run to the basement for every day things I need.

The other drawers hold lots ‘o stuff. Before I put a drop of paint on the walls a long long time ago, I did a serious purge of my office supplies. Did I really need four rolls of tape? Did I need ten packs of post its? Did I have to have 45 random pens and pencils?

No. :)

One drawer holds what office supplies I do use in pretty holders from HomeGoods:

The drawers are REALLY wide but very shallow, so these work great! I can fit a ton of stuff in there!

The next drawer holds my Silhouette machine, and all the fun stuff that I use with that, as well as my “junk drawer in a drawer” – it holds my go-to stuff like address labels, stamps, envelopes, my label maker and just STUFF:

When I sit down and go through mail, I pull this out and put it on the desk so I have stuff at hand.

The bottom drawer is dedicated to the kiddo – three more bins corral all of his goodies:

But most of his stuff is in the caddy to the left of the dresser:

And his sticker books, magazines, coloring books and Lego magazines have a spot in the book bin:

It was a Goodwill find years ago and used to sit in his nursery:

I put some castors on the bottom ($4 for four at Lowe’s) because it’s SUPER heavy and this makes it easier to move around the room.

The basket to the right of the cabinet used to house our little shredder and the cords:

We’ve since moved the shredder out to the garage, so now this holds bulky stuff like my tripod, camera case and laptop case:

Everything I need on a daily basis is organized in this room and I love it! I mentioned that I moved some of the bulky stuff to the basement (like the filing cabinet) and I’m so thrilled! (We already had one down filing cabinet down there so this way everything is in one spot.)

The printer/scanner is also in hubby’s basement office. This works great for us because he uses it WAY more than I do. It’s also wireless, so I can print from anywhere in the house, then file items right away.

At first I hid the modem and router under the dresser (you couldn’t even see them – YAHOO!), but when I moved the dresser I didn’t have access to the cable jack. So instead, I moved them to a spot in the house that has a free cable jack -- the guest room. :)

That room is hardly used, so it’s worked perfectly! (We have no problems accessing internet from anywhere in the house.)

OK, onto some pretties. :) The gallery walls around the room are probably my favorite part of the room, but they also took the longest. OH EM GEE.

If you can believe it, I already had every frame, but that’s because I had been collecting them at Goodwill for about a year. They were all different colored frames, which I liked initially, but it got to be too busy. And I wanted the art to shine!

So I sprayed them all white, which took FOREVER. I had to take the art/photos/glass out of each one, clean them off, prime them twice and then spray them satin white twice.

FOR.EV.ER.

And hate me, but I didn’t cut out paper the size of each frame (like I’ve seen in mags) to figure out where I wanted each one on the walls. I just piled the frames in the room, started at one end of each wall, then picked different sizes that worked here and there.

Yes, I had to move a few along the way, but it’s just holes people. Itty bitty holes. You can’t even see them, can you?:

;)

Most of the art is the Bub’s or my photos. Here’s the lowdown on the art and other stuff on this wall, left to right:

Art by stepdaughter (of the Bub)
Angel by Bub
Circle art by Bub
Statue of Liberty shot
”S” from old sign – Midland Antiques Indy
Blue/yellow art by Bub
Bub by me
Bouquet art by Bub

Left to right:

Hubby and I photo
DIY printable
Photo of Bub and Daddy
Photo of Hubs and I on the first flight he took me on.
Sweet stepdaughter
Art by Bub (Christmas tree but it’s staying up – I love it)
Poster I cut up to fit into frame (You can see more of that art here.)
Target mirror I spray painted metallic color

(Still looking for something tall and skinny to put over to the left!)

Left to right:

My little pirate at Halloween (arrrgh)
Vintage sign from late father-in-laws business
Art from this post (LOVE)
Cherry blossom photography
Family photo
Photo of Skyscraper Lunch sculpture from Ground Zero, January 2002
School photo of my late brother-in-law (beautiful frame was from fil’s house)

Left to right:

Clock from Garden Ridge
Goodwill oval frame
DIY silhouette in GW frame
Sunflower photo that used to be here
Photography from here (Gorgeous! Matches the room PERFECTLY.)
Butterfly photo
Photo of the kids in NYC
Flower photo

I wanted to have something on each wall that wasn’t art and wasn’t white, so that’s where the clock, industrial “S,” mirror and the Modern Bird art (absolutely LOVE it) come in.

I couldn’t be more thrilled with how it all came together. :)

That cutie little aqua table above started out as a table I found at my late father-in-law’s house. It was rickety and in bad shape – I took it apart, cleaned it up, tightened it up:

Because it was round, it stuck out into the room quite a bit:

So I used my jigsaw to cut it down, then reattached that piece with “L” brackets so it looks like a drop leaf table:

It saves us about six inches of space right there, and I’m all about that!

Whew!! Almost done!! :)

The drapes are a Waverly fabric I found from Joann’s forever ago. It is still there though. :) The striped fabric on the DIY memo board goes with it perfectly, and they were the very first picks for this room. The whole space was designed around them!

I made the drapes myself – lined and everything. ;) They aren’t sewn perfectly, but you can’t tell, right?:

Now I wish I would have picked a different fabric for the pendant light, but that was one of the first projects I finished, and I had planned on it hanging on the other side of the room away from the drapes. Oh well…I’m not touching anything in here for awhile, so it’s good. ;)

Here’s a rundown of a ~~few~~ ton more details…

Paint colors

Desk: True Value, Soft Hearted
Kid table: Valspar, Pond
Memo board frame: Dutch Boy, Purify
Walls: Ralph Lauren, Sisal, lightened 25 percent
Ceiling: Dutch Boy, Purify

Sources:

Lamps, large basket: Target
Organizational items on and in dresser, chair and pillow: HomeGoods
Binders: Nakedbinder.com
Fabrics: Joann's
Dresser: Craigslist
Knobs on dresser: Hobby Lobby
Frames: Goodwill
Rug on chair back: IKEA

And here are links to the long list of projects that made this room happen!

Desk redo
Priming the formerly dark room
Painting the walls
Installing crown (I later chunked it up a bit by adding a piece of molding two inches down, then painting in between.)
DIY memo board (made from insulation board and a GW frame)
Board and batten how-to
Organizing the paper
Desk chair redo (from a pleather parson’s chair to a no-sew covered chair)
Spraying the board and batten
Pottery Barn art caddy redo
How to make your own printables tutorial

(Live Writer is hating me again, so those links are not highlighted right.)

And if you missed it, the full reveal is here!!

Dang, I’m tired!!!

So let’s see YOUR spaces! I still don’t have a button for this shindig, but I would appreciate it if you would link back here in your post! Thanks so much!

Well, finally. The office reveal!

2012-01-15T22:42:00.001-05:00

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away (OK, it was middle America) there was a beautiful (it’s my story, OK?!) blogger named Thrifty.

Thrifty decided it would be fun to redecorate her office. She thought she would slap some paint up on the wall, move some furniture around, and it would be done! A new office, easy peasy.

It only took a few months. And she lived happily ever after. The end.

If only. :)

Instead, I think it took two years? Almost. No, about 18 months. Whatever, it was a long. dang. time.

It seems like it was stuck at half way for about a year:

The only good part about it taking so long? (Besides the fact that I have an office that I LOVE) is that we got some new floors installed along the way, so now the room is just completely new. The floors are the perfect finishing touch.

I am SO HAPPY.

For this post, I’m not going to talk much. Cause I’m just tired people.

I’ll do a follow up post this week with all the details and a recap of how it all came together. For now, here’s allllll the afters. Sorry, I went a little overboard. I figure with an 18 month wait it’s allowed. :)

I am pretty sure this is the most dramatic room redo I’ve ever done. You can decide for yourself at the bottom – I’ll share before and afters next to each other.

Here’s a little tour around the room. Bear with me peeps, I’m a little in love…

Because of the light, the wall color looks a bit different in some of the pics. That one above is pretty true to the color.

You may notice I was able to get rid of the typical, bulky office-type stuff by putting it all in the hubby’s basement office. (I know, I’m mean.) The printer, modem, file cabinets -- all that stuff is outta here.

And we got rid of our old monster computer, so the only things I have up here are a few crafty items, a few office supplies and some filing.

It rocks. :)

Here’s a few more shots of the details:

This room has morphed into a crafty space for the Bub as well, and I’ve tried to figure out cute ways to keep that all corralled.

The little table in the room was my sister-in-laws when she was little and I made it over for this room. It was supposed to be for coloring and crafting, but it’s also used for LOTS of Lego building:

I could squish him. ;)

I can’t wait to share more about the room this week! For now I’ll end with some before and afters, my VERY favorite part!!

I can hardly believe it’s the same room, can you?:

Pretty dramatic, yes? I am seriously in love with this space. Dare I say, it was definitely worth the wait!

I’ll fill you in on sources, layout, how-to’s, colors and pricing this week. If you have any questions about anything specific, please let me know in the comments!

Thanks so much for your patience with this redo! I do (pretty much everything) by myself, and this one was WAY more labor intensive then I ever imagined. It was a labor of love though – I am SO THRILLED!

OK, I’m done. For now. :)

Holla!

New at TDC

2012-01-12T21:11:00.000-05:00

Hello hello! I was so hoping to share the office redo with you today, but the last project is taking the longest. (Why is that how it ALWAYS is with me?!) And because this part being such a bugger, I came up with a new idea for it anyway. In my head it’s pretty darn cool, but we’ll see how it turns out.

So I will finish it it up this weekend and share it with you first thing next week!! I’m ITCHING to get it done because I’ve forced myself to hold off on anything other projects till it’s done…so it must. be. done.

I’ve shared a few of my house goals with you over the past couple of weeks. There’s a bunch of them here, and then a BIG project idea in my last post.

I tell you WHAT. Y’all are a bunch of enablers and I LOVE IT. I’m SOOOOO changing up the dining room. I just have to get the final OK from hubby first. I start introducing my big ideas slowly with a lot of “I was thinking” and “Wouldn’t it be nice if…” or “SO, I have this idea…”

After all these years, he knows it (usually) ends up well…so he trusts me. I just have to remind him of that. ;)

(Check out my Facebook page to see a photo a reader sent me with the exact chair set up I was thinking of! Love it!)

Sooo…I’m pretty excited about some new stuff going on on the old blog this year and wanted to share some of it with you!

The popular Before and After Parties will continue every month:

Those go up the first Monday of the month and I love before and after photos too much to give them up! ;)

But from now on, I won’t be sharing my own projects during that post, but instead will highlight some of my favorites from the previous month’s party. I figure this way I can show some of you off even more. I’m super excited about that!!

I love seeing individual projects every month, but I thought it would be fun to do another party too…this one sharing whole rooms. It’ll be a Pinterest frenzy!! ;)

I don’t have a button for this one yet, but the Show Us Your House linkies will go up the third Tuesday of every month – the first one this coming Tuesday, January 17. I’m SO excited about this one!!

Every month we’ll highlight a different room. Here’s the plan for the year:

January:
Office/craft spaces

February:
Closets

March:
Kitchens

April:
Dining rooms

May:
Nursery/Kids rooms

June:
Outdoor spaces

July:
Bathrooms

August:
Family rooms

September:
Basements/rec rooms

October:
Bedrooms (guest or master)

November:
Foyers

December:
We’ll play it by ear ;)

FUN eh? I can’t wait to see so many awesome rooms all in one post!! I think this is an awesome way to find new blogs too – it’s easy to get an idea of someone’s style when you can see a whole room.

Next up are some changes in the works for the blog. (Super excited about this too – this is just an all around exciting post for me.)

I’ve been working with a designer for about five years now to redo my site. OK, I think it’s been about six months, but I take forever to do anything, so it feels like five years.

It’s a totally new look and I really love it. There are still a LOT things left to do, so it won’t be revealed for a while yet. Here’s a little peak:

I know, not much. I suck. ;)

The change I’m quivering my boots about is this one:

YES. I’m doing the switch from Blogger to WordPress. I’ve fought it for years. I hate change. Changing up my blog look, I’m OK with. Changing up rooms, I’m great with. Changing how I work? Notsogood.

I’ll explain why I’m switching in a future post (it’s nothing earth shattering), but what I want you to know now is that the look of the posts will not change – they will not be truncated, or shortened. I’m trying to set it up in a way that’s familiar and comfortable for me and you. :)

And as far as posts go, I plan to keep up all the DIY of course, but hope to show and share more of ME along the way.

Not sharing more of me in that way…dirty birds.

I find myself looking at blogs and liking when I see photos of the actual blogger. I realized the other day that all you really see of me is this:

My left hand. ;)

I’m not really all excited about sharing my mug on here, but it is my blog and I am the one writing it, so maybe I’ll include some action shots here and there? You know…like crafting, sawing, watching paint dry. The exciting ones.

So we’ll see how that goes. I’d also like to share more of my life with you guys…just a bit more. I always struggle with how much to share because I feel like I spew out enough of my life on here, but I like when other bloggers share personal stories here and there. Nothing drastic, like my son’s birth story. (Although it was AMAZING, really, you should hear about it.) :)

But just a few more things about me here and there. So we can get to know each other better. Cause I’ll be asking you to share some info too.

And you thought you were just going to get to sit back and read boring stuff about me.

SO…that’s the plan for this year on Thrifty Decor Chick! I’m so excited, are YOU? Can you barely contain yourself at the thought of seeing photos of me painting walls?? It’s gonna be AWESOME.

I have one question I need your help with – I’ve been wondering this for a while and would love your feedback. When I’ve done room redos, I typically share the redo along the way and then show the final result. Do you like it that way or would you rather see it finished first and then the how to’s after?

I like both ways so I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do you like to see it in pieces or in one big reveal?

Thanks in advance!!

Dining room turned…

2012-01-10T22:43:00.001-05:00

Hey all! I shared some of my home plans for 2012 with you here, but there’s one I held off on mentioning. It’s one I’m kind of sort of really excited nervous anxious about. :)

There’s actually two drastic changes for the house I have going on in my noggin – both are HUGE projects. One I’m still hashing out in my head. This one I’m more ready to move forward on. It’s a bit of an usual makeover idea though and I’m wondering if I’m losin’ it. ;)

If you’ve been around for a while, you saw how I changed up our dining room a few years ago by painting, hanging a new fixture, adding new drapes and recovering the chairs.

Here’s what it looked like before:

I went DARK with the walls and the ceiling (I love a dramatic look in a dining room), but wow, the new floors certainly changed the look even more.

Here’s what it looks like now:

(Ignore the one white chair…more on that in a bit.)

WAY too dark for my taste. I am loving brighter looks now anyway, but if we had had these floors years ago, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have gone this dark with the paint.

Now every surface in the room is the same dark color, and me no likey:

I know painting the ceiling would help, and so would a light rug, but I’ve been itching to rework this room over the past few months anyway, so I’ve held off on those (not easy or cheap) projects.

(Not sure I want a light rug in the dining room anyway!)

There’s a few things I know I want to change, and one is the molding on the wall. I just want something more elaborate and different, but I put this up a LONG time ago, way before I had a compound miter saw or a nail gun. Here’s the reason I always tell you to use nails to install molding – cause you can remove it if you want down the line.

Guess what I used on this stuff, pre-nail gun? Liquid Nails baby. That stuff is going NOWHERE.

Sooo…I’ve been considering my options. One is to rip it down and have the drywall fixed. Honestly I don’t know if it could be patched. I mean, it could, but it would take an incredible drywaller for that to not be noticeable.

The other option is to just cover them. And that’s when I came up with my slightly unorthodox idea. (That I’m one really excited/nervous about.)

Here’s the deal…we never, I repeat, NEVER use this room. Ever, ever, ever. I think in the almost eight years we’ve lived here, we have used it maybe five times. Probably more like four.

The last time we used it was the Christmas dinner of 2009.

And I still remember how completely uncomfortable I was sitting on those awful chairs. They were the hardest upholstered chairs my tooshy has ever graced.

So about a year ago (YES. A YEAR.), I found a set of chairs at Goodwill that I planned to recover and paint. They were way more comfortable, and I liked that the open backs opened up the space a bit.

You can see one white chair in the pics that I spray painted:

I stalled out though, and usually when I stall out on something like this it’s because I know there’s something deep down making me hesitate.

And now I think I like my new idea way better than recovering the chairs.

I want to get rid of the “dining room” and make it a useable space. This room is open to our living room, and we spend quite a bit of time out there. I know most don’t use the more formal area like that, but because our house is so open, it just lends itself to hanging and playing. Thing is, the living and dining rooms are bigger and more open then our kitchen/family room space.

At least they feel like they are, I’ve never taken measurements. :)

So because we use our living room so often and it’s open to this space that we never use, I’m toying around with not having a dining room table at all.

Instead, I’m envisioning a library-type space. One day…some day…I’d love to make the living room a music room, complete with a Baby Grand Piano for my musician hubby.

That’s a LONG way off, but the library idea in here could be a reality.

I’m thinking floor to ceiling bookcases on this wall:

Like in my friend Emily’s office:

Isn’t that fantastic?

In our room, I’d make the bottom level of the whole thing cabinets, so I could use it for storage of all of our serving dishes. (And loads of other stuff!)

Are you starting to see it? :)

And then, I would do away with the table and chairs, and go with a different type of table and chairs, like this:

(source)

Or this:

(source)

Or this:

One of my girlfriends has this set up in their sunroom, and every time I’ve been there, that’s where we end up. I love that idea!

That last photo with the low table is more of what I’m thinking. Or maybe a long, narrow coffee table, with two chairs on either side, facing each other over the table. (Instead of in a circle, it would be more like a square shape.)

I’m also thinking very comfy chairs for lounging. Reading. Visiting. Talking. Whatever.

I think it could be amazing!!

Here are my hesitations and my own rebuttal to those. ;)

1. The furniture. The current stuff wasn’t cheap, but we’ve had it for seven years now. I’m not in love with it though, and wouldn’t mind selling it. I could even take the leaf out of the dining table and move it to the basement in my craft area instead. (I can see it painted out in a fun color! It’s just a veneer, not solid wood, so don’t hate on me.)

New furniture and built ins certainly wouldn’t be cheap. But the built ins I could DIY, and four new chairs wouldn’t be awful if I really took my time looking for a great deal. Otherwise the only expense is a table and a rug, and the rug was coming anyway.

2. The light fixture. I LOVE our dining room light. LOVE. I don’t know if I would try to lower it a bit and keep it in the room or not. It may be too fancy for the look I’m thinking up. I love it so much though and can’t think of where else I would put it.

Wait a minute…hot DANG, I could put it in our bedroom!! Just thought of that just now. Well…now that one doesn’t bother me as much. (See how I talk myself into things?)

3. The whole losing a dining room thing. Uhh…why is it I’m worrying about this even though we NEVER EVER use it? And we’ve thrown a sit down dinner party uh, NEVER. I doubt we’ll start any time soon. (Our parties are more stand around the island mowing on food.) And if we do finish the basement this year, the chance of anyone sitting in the dining room lessens even more.

Party in the basement! Whoo HOO!

I’ve already come up with a possible solution if we need a huge table for an event, and that would be just to have folding tables that I could cover with tablecloths. I think that would do the trick.

4. Resale. Well, we’re not moving. No plan to. Don’t wanna. And when we do, I think the built ins would only enhance the look of the room, not take away from it. We could take out the chairs and throw a table in the room when selling it to make sure potential buyers knew what the space was supposed to be. It’s not anything crazy permanent that couldn’t be changed around in the future.

Soooo…what do you think? Have you ever changed up a room so drastically? Made it something it wasn’t supposed to be? I’d love to hear! I’m really anxious about this potential change, but it’s a FUN, I-think-I-really-want-to-do-this anxious.

I’m linking this up to my girl Nester’s Home Goals Party…cause it’s a goal I think I’m going to try to meet. If I can get up the courage. ;)

How to make your own printables

2012-01-08T23:45:00.001-05:00

Hey hey! Hope you had a lovely weekend! Our temps here are unusually high for this time of year – today we took a long walk and even played at the playground. Crazy! It’s supposed to be in the 50’s again this week!

I still say we’ll be paying for this soon enough. I have no doubt we’ll be under five feet of snow in a few weeks. We shall see. :)

So if you have looked at oh…a few blogs lately, or surfed Pinterest for ohhhh…a few seconds, you’ll see a TON of fun printables. They’re fun graphics or sayings and they are all the rage to print out and frame right now.

I think they are too fun and I pin pretty much any free one I see anymore. ;) So I was psyched the other day to see someone pin a post on how to make your own printables:

(source)

In my old life I did a lot of graphics work – I worked in marketing and whenever possible, I created the advertising, annual reports, brochures – all that good stuff. When I had time and could really concentrate on it, I really enjoyed that part of my job. (I used Quark – is that ancient now or do people still use it?) So when I realized I could make something fun with only Picnik.com (which I use to edit my photos anyway) – I was hooked!

I made a super easy, basic printable for my office today and then recreated my steps to show you how to do it! Did I mention this is totally, completely FREE? Booyah!!

I’m sure this has been shared a meeeellion times in blogland, but that was the first I had seen it, so I wanted to share it with you too. First, open the Paint program on your computer. I had to search mine out because I never use it. Just open it, then save the blank screen as a document:

Open up Picnik and download the blank page into it:

To pick a background color, go to the Effects tab and then pick the Duo-Tone option:

I just pick the same color for both since it asks for two colors (this would typically be used for a photo, hence the need for two colors).

Then, because I wanted this one to run vertically, I went to the Basic Edits and rotated the image:

And then it’s time to have some fun! You can add graphics by going to the Stickers tab and pasting them in. I just wanted text for this one, so I chose the Text tab (duh) and then picked the fonts I wanted:

You can send the text back or forward (to layer) by right clicking on the text box. I didn’t do anything fancy schmancy on this one so it wasn’t needed.

Because I knew I wanted to print this out in an 8 by 10 size, I finished it up by going back to Basic Edits and cropping off the bottom:

Save the file to your computer, then open it in MS Word (or whatever program you’d like) to resize it and print it out.

I ended up printing mine at home and it came out beautifully. I used a ton of ink in the process I’m sure, but I really didn’t want to make a run to the printer today. ;)

I used the lyrics from the song My Life by Robin Thicke – I love that song and it’s used in the movie Dispicable Me (light. bulb.), which is one of our family favorites.

The lyrics are totally hokey but they say how I feel:

I wanted to print it out on some pretty cardstock but didn’t have any. So I cut a paper-size piece of the stuff I use for my fake photo mats and stuck it in the printer. It worked great!

I use these large pieces of poster cardstock all the time to do “mats” for my art and photos. I just laid the paper that came in the frame on the paper and cut around it to get the size I needed:

Then used double stick tape to stick the printable on the paper. I just eyeball it but you can measure if you really want. :)

I picked random fonts that I thought were fun – they have no rhyme or reason to them. The whole thing makes me smile. :)

I LOVE how it turned out:

Aaaand it’s impossible to take a good photo of a glass surface. For real. If you look close you can see my not washed hair and glasses and pj’s still on. Scratch that -- don’t look close.

;)

It’s hanging in the office, which I will share this week. I will. Even if it kills me. :)

I just have to do a TON of spray painting and then it. is. done. GoodNESS.

I love that aqua color and how it ties in with the lovely lady lamps:

Fun, eh? You can SO do this, even if you have zero experience with graphics or computers or whatever. I pay to get a few extras with Picnik, but you can do all of this with their free options – they offer a ton of free images and fonts.

The link I shared above shares how to add images and shapes to your project too! It’s super easy to follow – check it out here!

If you’d like to use my printable, you are welcome to it! You should be able to click on this image to get the full size. Then you can save it to your own computer:

I looks like butt on my screen for some reason, but hopefully this will work!

And yes, I know there is a grammatical error error (its) but that font wouldn’t accept an apostrophe for some reason. I choose to overlook it, but I know some of you may not be able to. ;)

It took me a total of about 30 minutes to create this one, but I could have been sucked in for hours if I had more time. I find this kind of stuff fun cause it’s cool to play around with different images and fonts.

Hopefully this will work for you and you can create your own! The possibilities are endless! Create your own holiday cards, invites, birthday stuff like cupcake toppers, fun stuff for holidays…I could go on and on!

So have you tried to DIY your own printable yet? I’m feeling pretty behind, but now that I know I can do this fun stuff with Picnik, the world is my oyster! I may even create my very own blog button!! WHOOO!

Target Luv

2012-01-05T22:49:00.001-05:00

OK, if there’s a go-to place that always makes me happy, it’s Target. (Or Tarjay, as we’ve always called it. That started cause sometime back in high school someone told us Target was a French company. It’s not. But we still say it.)

Fun little fact: Target was my very first job. Even at 15 I had good taste. Either that or I REALLY loved the red shirt and khakis combo. (Not.)

Anyhoo, my love of the Jay has been deep and it’s been long. This Pinterest find from the other day made me giggle:

(source)

We did it high school when we had $2 to spend and we do it now when we have $2 to spend. (Dang you, dollar spot!! Curses!)

Anyway, my little man and I were there today for some, errrrr…uh. I don’t remember. Steak knives I think? No – it was socks. Both? I walked away with neither.

I was too distracted with all of the pretties they have out right now. I gotta say, Target has some design-forward peeps working there. I love their clothes and I love their home goodies. I snapped a few pics of some of my favorites from today.

This $70 table could be a gorgeous little accent:

It reminded me of my World Market table:

But the Target version is $70 and it would look fabulous spray painted in a metallic color. Satin nickel, gold – even a bright color would look fantastic!

Everything equine is hip right now – this guy would be a great accent to a dresser or bookcases (with the backs painted out so it pops!):

It’s big too – worth the $25 price tag!

I loved this graphic lampshade:

I’m just nuts over that aqua color right now – I’m working on some changes in our living room and I’m trying to bring in more of that color.

It goes perfectly with the glass beauty on the left, and I love the shape and color of the one on the right too:

(I think those were both $40?)

Many of you missed out on the glass aqua lamps I found for the office at Target last year:

And the color of that one on the left above is identical to these. So there you go!

They had a few of these little throw rugs with different designs:

I loved this one, but this material never works well for me as a rug. It’s not sturdy enough and gets messed up too easy. I wonder if these could be made into floor pillows or something? Or maybe cover an ottoman with one?

Speaking of ottomans, I thought this little gold round one was totally hip:

And the blue benches would be lovely at the end of a bed, or even a couple lined up in front of a sofa.

They had some fun vintagey kitchen pieces too –- I loved these bright breadboxes:

I was thisclose to picking this one up – I even had it in my cart. My plan was to break out the Silhouette and put “Bread” across the front. ;) But I was trying to be good, so I put it back. Boooo.

They had some fun storage options too – I LOVED these wood milk crates and wire baskets:

Don’t they look like something you’d find at the antique store?

And I loved this beauty as well:

It was lined with a beautiful gold fabric, and I had visions of filling it with throws or magazines. I didn’t walk away with it just because I was afraid it was a little too fancy for our house. I kind of can’t stop thinking about it though…so if you live near me, stay AWAY till I decide if I’m going back, umkay??

I’ll let you know when it’s safe to go pick one up. ;)

Do you love Target as much as I do? Can you spend hours in there with your girlfriends like me? I miss their World Market line (or whatever it was called) they used to carry every year around now. It was SUPER fun and unique. Ah well…they still have me coming back, I think they’re doing OK. :)

P.S. I was not compensated to drool over all this stuff. Target has no clue who I am. But they should, since I’m there so dang much.

P.P.S. My friend Melissa posted about some great deals at Target today – I didn’t even make it over to the clearance stuff though. I was there for socks, remember?

Now I may have to go back. Drats.

Making Money Blogging

2012-01-03T23:50:00.001-05:00

Hey hey! How about that title eh? Just putting it all out there. I just couldn’t think of anything more appropriate, so there you go.

I’m joining a few of my favorite lovely blogging ladies today for the next post in the Growing Your Blog series my pal Kate dreamed up:

Yesterday Nester shared her thoughts on authenticity in blogging and her post and the comments were a great read – check it out here.

Today I’m sharing more on a topic I know bloggers and non-bloggers alike are curious about – making money on a blog.

First, let’s hear what the other four ladies had to say, then I’ll share my advice:

The time I get to spend at Nesting Place is directly related to how much money I earn, that's just the cold, harsh truth. My husband and I are hoping to be debt free early this year and it's been great to help contribute to that. The best advice I've ever heard about monetization and blogging is to diversify where your money is coming in from. I have private ads, corporate sponsors, ebook affiliates, my own ebook, network ads and from time to time 3rd party sponsors. Relying on any one of these methods alone is risky, but as a whole, I can usually count on an average income per month. I go into more detail at this guest post at Funky Junk Interiors about how I've made a business out of Nesting Place if you are wondering more about each of those methods.

My best money managing tip is something I heard from Simple Mom :: Open an ING account. I opened one three years ago and have an ING checking account where my Network Ad income is automatically deposited. That account is linked to my PayPal and our regular joint bank account. I also have SEVEN ING savings accounts {emergency fund, taxes, Nesting Place expenses, accounts for my boys, braces...stuff like that} ING lets you have up to 25 savings accounts for free. I like ING because it's all online, you get a debit card and checks and you can set up automatic payments into your savings accounts. For my private ads {etsy shops} I have an assistant who does all of the billing because I've figured out, I always forget to bill everyone so basically, I make more money when I have an assistant because she actually bills people.

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I started my blog without any intention of making money but as a hobby and creative outlet, and mostly to document the continuing progress on our home remodel. I didn’t have any sponsors for an entire year, only Google Ads which made next to nothing. I remember getting my first Google Ads check for $13 and being so excited! As traffic grew due to a growing readership, I started getting sponsors for the sidebar, mostly small businesses, and they all found me. In 2010, I signed on with Haven Home Media (HHM) as my ad network. Google Ads and HHM both account for 60% of my income, the rest comes from sponsors and writing gigs. I don’t make much from affiliates, I suppose I should be better about that, and I have yet to write an eBook (all that extra time ya know…). I’ve read all sorts of good things about SocialSpark (have yet to try it) and do get approached a lot to do paid sponsored posts for companies large and small, but I turn 90% of them down, unless it’s a brand I trust and would be comfortable promoting to my readers (and of course there is always the requirement of full disclosure for those arrangements).

The cool but unexpected thing is that through consistent content over three years, the blog has grown into an actual business where I made an income in 2011. But with that growth comes the cost of maintenance (server, accountant, costs for projects, travel expenses, etc.) and taxes that must always be filed. To keep track of it all, I use PayPal for billing and Quickbooks to document income, receipts, and other expenses.

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When I first started blogging, I thought I would never have ads on my blog. Almost a year in, though, I realized this was a full time job and I needed some income for it. I am now a part of an ad network and I use Google Ads. Both are awesome, because they require almost no maintenance. I also accept private sponsors. That form of monetization requires a lot of upkeep, but it’s fun to spotlight small businesses or products I really love. And, since I’m sure everyone is curious… Yes, you can make a good full-time income off of a blog. It’s worth all of the work to grow your blog.

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I started my blog as a family blog – and didn’t even know you could make money from your blog back then. I’ve learned a lot over the last few years. If you are thinking of monetizing, making an advertiser/sponsor section on your sidebar is a great way to start. (WordPress, for example, has some wonderful plugins that automatically rotate your ads, schedule ads and track clicks.) Also, be sure to create a media kit that includes facts about your blog, who reads your blog, your latest blog stats (use Google Analytics to track and update your stats). But keep in mind also, sponsors care about more than just numbers – if you have a specific niche and an engaged readership, that relationship you have with your audience can be more important than numbers.

An ad network is a way to make money from your blog without having to manage the overhead of sponsors and advertisers. Google AdSense is an easy way to start, and your revenue will increase over time. Whether you like Google ads or not, you may want to try a few different networks and see what works best for you. (I use a few networks and rotate them around.) Many of these networks don’t restrict you to using just one network. Finally, there are companies that match bloggers with advertising campaigns. If you’re interested, they will present you with the brand’s campaign and you can decide whether or not to participate. Examples are: CleverGirls Collective and SocialSpark. This can be a good way to start working with major brands.

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And now my two cents. Har. Get it? Two cents…post about money? OK, I’ll move on.

Anyhoo, I first blogged about making money as a blogger in this post a couple years ago. I started my blog in May of 2008 and didn’t accept my first ad until January of the following year.

If there is one piece of advice I have about making money blogging, it’s to not expect to make money blogging. ;) Meaning, don’t start a blog with the goal of making it your “career.” I’m 100 percent positive the most successful bloggers I know (that make the most money) did NOT start their blog thinking, I’m going to make meeeeellions!! Buwhahahahaha!!!

OK, I have two pieces of advice. The other is to take the advice of your financial advisor and like Nester said above -- diversify! Change it up, take on different types of ads, look into different ways to make some moolah.

Let me start by saying something important. I don’t get the notion that a blogger is “selling out” because they make money doing what they do. Obviously I don’t agree with that. Blogging takes more time than you ever think it will and takes effort and work. Therefore, if you can get paid, by all means…get paid.

Sure, I see ads that annoy me. I see sponsored posts I’m not interested in…but I still say all the power to them. That blogger is trying to make the most of what they are putting out there and I think that’s a good thing (although, yes, there’s always a point of going a little overboard.)

Personal ads are the first and only advertising I had on TDC for a long time. That January years ago, I put up a post letting the world (or the 50 people who read my blog at the time) know that I was accepting ads.

I felt like this:

I was SO uncomfortable about the whole thing. Still am. UGH.

At the time, I had just over 2,000 page views a day. My ad space was $10 a month.

Here’s another nugget of advice from a “seasoned” blogger (can we call almost four years seasoned?) – I highly recommend you wait till you’ve been blogging at LEAST six months to take on ads.

Actually, a year if you can. I was only nine months in to it, but I had a surge of new visitors the fall before I took on my first advertisers. Honestly, if I could go back in time I would have held off and waited a bit longer.

Why? Just because you need time to figure out where your blog is going to go. You may be able to post five times a week at the start because of the rush, and then realize the time it takes and slow down. Advertisers like consistency.

Or you may start off with one focus for your blog and find a new interest takes it in a different direction later. Businesses are looking for a site that matches their audience.

After I took on some private ads, I started with Google:

These are SO crazy easy to put up and use! Go to Adsense to set up an account (if you blog on Blogger you’ll probably already have one). Just pick out the size you want, grab the code and put it on your page. It really is easy and they guide you through the process.

You get paid through Google based on impressions and clicks on your ads. Some days and months you’ll make more than others, but it’s great, consistent income. Even if “income” is just $4.36 – the amount I made my first month. ;)

Next up I moved on to network-type advertising. It’s similar to Google, but instead it’s a private company that works with advertisers for you. You put their code on your blog and it kind of does it’s own thing. The ads will change based on key words they pick up in your content.

These are my favorite. :)

In my experience, they pay the most. They are easiest to work with because you don’t do much and you know what to expect. Sometimes Google will put up an ad I’m not particularly thrilled with, and then I have to go in and block ads from that site.

For a while, I worked with a network called Juice in the City and it went great for a while. They changed their format and it no longer worked with my audience, so I was thrilled when I was contacted by a new network called Haven Home Media. These guys are fantastic and I’m thrilled to partner with them.

I’ve also worked with Rivit Media and they do a great job too – many of the Michael’s campaigns you see in blogland are through them. I have not worked with BlogHer but have heard great things. Another reputable company for these types of ads is Federated Media.

Sometimes you have to sign a contract for this type of ad, or they may have some guidelines you have to follow in order to keep your ads up. (Mine do not.) Just ask as many questions as you need and find out all the details before signing on the dotted line!

Finally, a couple of weekends of the month (sometimes less, sometimes more during the holidays), I do giveaways. Businesses pay me to blog about their product and then they give away something to one (or more!) of you.

I know some bloggers don’t charge for giveaways and I say all the power to them! I think starting out you should test the waters and try a few without payment. But I (and my advertisers) believe I’m providing a service – sending hundreds if not thousands of new visitors to their site, not to mention exposing their products and brand to tens of thousands.

I still struggle with TDC being a business. Sometimes it’s hard for me to treat it as such because I LOVE WHAT I DO SO. But doing giveaways for a fee is one of those business decisions. I believe you undervalue your blog as a business (if that is what it turns into, which happens often) if you do too much for free.

These are all my personal experiences and thoughts – take them or leave them. :) All that being said, I’m picky. If I don’t like the products a company sells for a giveaway, I politely decline. If an advertiser isn’t a right fit, I let them know. I don’t take on any types of ads that would annoy me if I saw them on another site. I get approached daily with offers, and I decline most of them. I try to be deliberate and consider my readers as much as possible.

The million dollar question that I always want to know is how much a particular blogger makes doing what they do. Without going into too much detail, I will say you can absolutely do “well” as a blogger.

I now make much more than I did working full time – and that feels kind of weird and icky for me to say, because I don’t want to sound like I’m all oooowheee, check me out, I rule.

I say that because I want to encourage anyone who wants to blog or is blogging that you can make money doing this. You can help support your family, you can make some extra spending money. My income allowed us to become debt free much faster and allows me to keep doing fun things to our home that I hope continues to inspire you.

And that inspiring part is my very favorite part. :) Blogging (can be) a job, and if you’ve been at it long enough, I believe it’s one you should make money doing. If you want to.

But I still find it hard to consider this work, especially when it’s this fun. Probably the best job ever.

I hope that answers some questions about the elephant in the blogland room. ;) If you blog and have any other advice to add, please do so! If you’re a reader and want to share what you like to see when it comes to ads, I know we’d love to hear from you too! (Constructively, of course.)

And if you have any other questions, please let me know and I’ll address them soon! Be sure to check out Jen’s advice on utilizing social media on Wednesday, Marian’s photography tips on Thursday, and Kate’s thoughts on finding balance on Friday.

P.S. I think I said “blog” 847 times in this post. Annnd that is all. :)

Anticipation

2012-01-02T23:59:00.000-05:00

Welcome to the second most wonderful time of the year people. At least I think it is. Next to the Christmas season, the beginning of the year is absolutely my favorite time. I just get plain giddy about all the possibilities…mostly for my house. ;)

Beyond just that new year feeling, it’s the first time in months that I can focus on more DIY again, instead of holiday decor. And that holiday decor is all down (except for outside – it’s been too dang cold!) so the house feels fresh and new and bigger and brighter and…SIGH.

I just love the new start the new year brings. It’s this time of year that I can’t turn off my brain – I laid in bed last night with visions of sugarplums…err, built ins, new paint colors and board and batten dancing in my head. ;)

I have some big plans for the blog and the house this year, but let’s start with the house, shall we?

I won’t bore you with more pics of undone projects again, but the one of the biggies is to get that office finished (for real, planning to have that post up next week).

The chocolate powder room (that I showed you in my last post) is getting a complete redo. I’ve already put a first coat of a bluish grey on the walls and the ceiling, and for awhile now (it’s been torn apart for MONTHS) I have been planning on doing tall beadboard around the room, like our laundry room.

But then I saw this the horizontal look instead, and am kind of smitten with it:

(source)

I’m thinking all white though, with the blue walls above.

We currently have a pedestal sink in there, but because it’s a pretty big powder room, we have the space to add something like a small dresser with a sink instead:

(source)

I LOVE that!

I’m already scoping out Craigslist and have my measurements ready in case I find something that works at Goodwill or Habitat Restore.

My plan is to move the light from above the mirror down to one on either side of the mirror – something like this:

Can you see it? The new bathroom in my head? ;)

I have big build plans in mind for a few rooms in the house. I’m calling this year The Year of the Built In. Dun dun dun...

I have thoughts roaming around in my head (told you it’s keeping me up at night!) for some in the living room, maybe the dining room (I have a whole idea in mind for the dining room that is a bit out there), and for sure in the playroom:

This space is more a game room space now, because most of the toys are down in the basement. The problem is I know we’ll need a bit more game storage space as the Bub gets older. Right now we only have a few board games that he plays, but my hope is that he’ll enjoy a rousing game of Clue as much as I did someday. (Without the fierce competitiveness and sulking when someone beats me.)

I’ve had plans to build something like this:

(source)

Along this wall:

Isn’t it perfect for those? I’ve actually been planning them for years and my Dad and I have it mostly figured out. It’s just a matter of DOING it. :)

One of the biggest projects I’d like to complete this year is to move the washer and dryer and make the laundry/mud room a true mud room. Cause it drives me total bonkers to have the piles of laundry in there.

When my lovely, evil plan is all done – this space:

Will look something like this:

(source)

Ohhh yeah.

This wouldn’t suck either:

You know. Just saying.

You have NO idea how happy it would make me to see this every time I walked in. I know it will be covered with shoes and coats and dog leashes but I so. don’t. care. Anything is better than what we’ve got going now. It ain’t workin’.

There are SO many other projects running through my noggin – I’m loving the look of bright spaces with neutral pieces but lots of pops of color:

(This designer does some beautiful work!)

Because I couldn’t sleep last night, I pulled out my phone and made a list a mile long, just get to get the ideas out of my brain. Do you ever need to do that?

So, there’s the very short list for the coming year – I’ll share what I have planned for the blog soon as well!

I can’t wait to get started on the first project though – and it’s none of the above. It involves the pantry and making it work a little more efficiently (and a tiny bit prettier maybe). I think I have it all figured out – it’s just going to take a TON of work.

So do you love this time of year too? Have you taken all your Christmas decor down yet? Do you think your home feels new and fresh right now or drab and boring? Any fun projects planned for your house this year?

Before and After Party: Updates

2012-01-01T22:33:00.001-05:00

Hey all! Happy New Year to you! And YOU. :)

It’s time to kick off the first Before and After Party of the year! Whoohoo!! This time I’m doing a little update on my 2011 plans – I’ll show you what I had on my to do list last January and show you the latest photos I have of each space.

Let’s just say I didn’t get most of what I wanted to to do done. I think I should just stop saying things out loud. Or writing them down. Whatever.

First up, I wanted to complete the never-ending kitchen redo I started 15 years ago. OK…just a couple years ago. I still haven’t done a complete post on all the updates I’ve made, but here’s a pic of the bay window area late 2010 (left), and late 2011 (right):

What I didn’t do in the kitchen:

- Install glass fronts on a few of the cabinets
- touch up paint (everywhere)
- a light fixture over the island

I did get a couple projects done that were on the list:
- install crown
- finish up some accessory projects (mostly above the cabinets)

Aaaaaaaand. That’s it. ;)

No wait! I did change out the light over the kitchen table. That’s something.

In my defense, in August we had the fridge leak, so the kitchen was out of commission till October. Then the holidays hit and it was all over for the year. ;)

Up next, I had big plans for the master bedroom, mostly involving the installation of molding throughout the room.

That didn’t happen.

But I did change up the room a bit, by hanging mirrors over our nightstands and redoing the space above the bed:

I didn’t get our dresser painted or get the wall behind the bed painted either.

Total slacker.

I have some new ideas in my for our bedroom, which will involve A TON of work. Which means it will be completed in 2015.

The office has come a loooong way! It started with painted walls, then molding, then new floors and a little rearranging:

I take it back – the kitchen isn’t the longest project ever. The office is. But I’ll show you the final room in the next two weeks. I LOVE it!!

The chocolate brown powder room looks a little different. I showed you the update (which consisted of pulling off the molding and painting the ceiling) late in the summer:

I did slap a coat of the new paint up there before a party back in October, but it’s rough. :) First coat, no cutting in kind of rough. A little scary.

I’ve since figured out exactly what I want to do in here so I’m excited to get moving! (More on that this week!)

And finally, the poor, poor guest room. Or maybe I should say our poor, poor guests that sleep in this room. ;)

The only thing that’s changed in this space is a little rearranging and some new bedding:

The new bedding was HUGE though – I didn’t want to move forward with anything major in there till I got that figured out.

So there you go! A little update on all of the fabulousness I marked off my to do list for 2011. I’m sharing the goals for 2012 this week but I’m a little scared I’ll jinx them. ;)

It’s time to share your projects! Link up a recent fave or your favorite before and after from 2011! Or both! :)

I’d appreciate it if you’d link back to TDC or this post and use this pretty button if you’d like:

Another one of my 2012 goals is to figure out how to add code to that button. ;)

Party hardy folks!!

Tops of 2011

2011-12-29T22:47:00.001-05:00

Hey hey! How is your last week of the year coming along? I’m still not doing much. Other than eating. And sitting. And sleeping. ;)

Yesterday I posted about the top ten posts in 2011 (based on your comments), and I couldn’t resist sharing some other tops of the year! Google Analytics is chock full of awesome little details about blog traffic (if you don’t have it set up on your blog, you should!).

I gathered a few of my favorites to share with you today! And then I swear…onto the new for 2012! ;)

I love to check out the posts that get the most traffic every year. It’s a great reminder because it truly shows the benefit of titling your posts right. Eight of the top ten posts that were “hit” on my blog this year were NOT from this year. Some were actually from years ago. Isn’t that crazy?

There is great power in titling your posts according to how they will be searched! Here are the top ten:

1. How to Decorate Your Mantel

2. How to Make a Headboard

3. Dollar Store Fall Wreath

4. Comfort Foods

5. A Santa Craft

6. DIY Drum Shade Chandelier

7. Closet Turned Book Nook

8. Family Room Redone

9. Warm and Cozy Family Room

10. New Dining Room Centerpiece

It was also fun to look back at the linky parties I hosted this year. I checked back on them to see which ones had the most links. I gathered the top five to share – if you have nothing to do this weekend I think they’ll keep you occupied. ;)

5. Home May’d Spray Paint Party (493)

4. Before and After: February (499)

3. Before and After Party: March (505)

2. Before and After Party: November (507)

1. Christmas Tree Party (573)

Of course I have to give a shout out to all the bloggers who sent me visitors this year! I consider them all friends and am lucky to know them!

1. Centsational Girl
2. Hooked on Houses
3. Bower Power
4. Nesting Place
5. 320 Sycamore
6. All Things Thrifty
7. The Inspired Room
8. Miss Mustard Seed
9. The Lettered Cottage
10. Better After

Live Writer wouldn’t let me link to the full blog names for some reason. Highly annoying. So just click on the grey parts to get to these lovely ladies. :)

Numbers one and two are actually Facebook and Pinterest respectively. It is blowing my mind how Pinterest is affecting blogging – in a mostly really good way! If you have a blog and don’t have an account, I encourage you get one!

And just for fun, I checked out where all you Squeezies come from. :) Of course the majority is the good old US of A, but it was kind of cool to see the top five:

1. Canada
2. Australia
3. UK
4. Germany
5. Brazil

Sooo…if any of you (especially those Australia or Brazil) would like me to come stay for a week or so, that would be awesome. Just let me know. ;)

There you go! Aren’t recaps fun?? No? Maybe just for me? Whatevs. Did you find Thrifty Decor Chick in 2011? If so was it from one of the posts I linked to? I’d love to hear!

I hope to be back before the new year, but if not I hope you have a wonderful end of 2011 and even better start to 2012!! Loves ya!

Top Ten of Eleven

2011-12-28T00:21:00.001-05:00

Well hey there! Remember me? :) I’ve had such a lovely, totally lazy week…it has been absolutely wonderful. I’m still in low key mode but sure do miss you all.

The end of 2011 is here…can you even believe it? Only a few days left of the year, and that means it’s time to recap the biggest projects of 2011 here on TDC.

I figure these out based on comments. I love ‘em. I do. :)

So here. we. go. – the top ten projects based on you!

Up first, the most recent redo – our awkward corner fireplace that used to look like this:

Was changed (with a bit of handy men help) into this:

I am SO so happy with it still. One of the best changes I’ve ever made to our house! (You can go here to see more about the process.)

I’m dreaming up ideas for a treatment above the mantel, but I love it as is for now. I don’t want to do anything till I’m totally sure about it.

Up next was a project from this summer – a little redo of our family room based around our first debt free purchase – the new sofa:

I finished up that room during my No-Spend July, and I was able to get creative with some accessories and art that didn’t take any cash at all. My favorite kind!!

Next up was another big purchase, but this one wasn’t planned and it was one we didn’t have to pay for (well, most of it). Our fridge meltdown meant we had to replace our laminate floors in the family room and kitchen, and we decided to continue them throughout the bottom floor.

At first we were planning on going with prefinished floors:

But after reading all of your comments on this post, I changed my mind. We went with finished on site, and I’m SO glad we did. I can’t get over how much I love our hardwoods:

Because our laundry room was laminate previously, and we weren’t replacing it with hardwoods, we were able to apply that insurance credit toward the office, then we paid extra for the dining and living rooms.

Best. decision. ever.

Up next, I shared how I tackled the pile of papers I had ignored for YEARS. That was a very fun week around here.

NOT:

I used to go through the files at the start of every year, but I had avoided it for awhile and it came back to bite me. :)

That reminds me…I need to go through the files. (Shudder.)

The next big post was when I blogged about how we are NOT moving any time soon:

We got some bad news about the value of our house this year, along with the rest of the human race, and had some major thinking to do. It only took about a day to figure out we didn’t want to move and aren’t moving. You can read why here.

Next was yet another family room post. It certainly was the year of the family room around here. ;) This one was from the start of the year, before the new sofa or the redo. (Confused? Me too.)

I was so tired of the room feeling so cramped that I broke all the couch rules and removed one:

It made a HUGE difference in this space! It was less seating for awhile, but it was worth it. It also helped me to figure out a new set up for the room which is what we ultimately ended up with.

The lesson here…do whatever the heck you want. It’s YOUR home.

You all were so helpful when it came to the sofa search for that family room. I shared all the things I hated about our sofa set we had had for years:

I loved those comments because I was originally set against microfiber, but my mind was changed. I saw the microfiber light people!! We ended up with a smaller sectional from Arhaus and it’s made of micro denier – a bunny’s butt soft version of microfiber.

It is incredible. LOVE. Love love love.

The next biggest post was not about the family room. I know, shocking! It was about me being a total doofus and causing a big gaping hole in our house for a few days:

Ugh. I still can’t believe I did that. You can see how that happened and the end result (which I love) here.

Number 9 was one of my very favorite projects I’ve done in our home – the closet turned book nook:

With some purging and reorganizing, I realized we didn’t need the small closet in our loft space. Using almost all scrap wood that I had in the garage, I transformed it into a lovely little book nook for me the Bub.

It’s the smallest “room” in our house and one of my favorites. :)

And finally – the biggest response was to a project that didn’t include many pretty pictures, but instead pictures of my piles:

Yep. I’m a piler. A stacker. A bagger. I try to fight it and I can’t. Many of you are right there with me. (Thank you.)

And just like every year, my most popular posts were more personal ones that weren’t about DIY at all. :) The top five of those were…

When I introduced you to the dog I saw, picked up, and fell instantly in love with:

These cat folks are now totally head over heels in love with that little bugger. :) We can’t imagine our lives without Peanut Butter.

I shared how I don’t do it all in this post.

The (mostly) pretty pictures can be highly misleading. I try to share our “real” life with you as much as I can.

Early this year I got news that a (very young) family member of mine had breast cancer. It kind of rocked my world. I shared how I was determined to take better care of myself here.

That’s when this woman came back into my life:

I’ve fallen off the wagon a bit…but I’m determined to get back on. I recently found out that a former student of my husband’s is facing cancer. He just graduated a few years ago. What a cruel reminder.

I celebrated three years of blogging by sharing how I try not to let the wonderful world of blogging get me down:

Blogging is 90 percent amazing, ten percent yucky jealousy and insecurity. That post was my reminder to remember that all the houses and blogs that appear perfect are not really perfect after all. And that’s OK. :)

And finally, the biggie. The one that changed our lives:

The one where we paid off $125,000 in debt. Everything but the house. And our lives have been (unbelievably) better for it since.

I hope that I have inspired you to take on something in your homes this year – whether it be personal or just using a hammer for the first time. ;) I love your comments and emails telling me just that – they fill me with JOY!

Next up I’ll share what I’ve got planned for 2012. It’s going to be a great year! :)

Did your favorite post at TDC this year make the cut?

Merry Christmas to you & yours

2011-12-25T20:51:00.001-05:00

From ours. :)

Do you know how hard it is to get a family photo when one kiddo is in college? Nearly impossible. I cherish them big time when we get one. Especially when we’re all smiling and actually looking at the camera. :)

Of course I couldn’t resist playing around on Picnik a bit:

My stepdaughter is gonna kill me. I think I’ll put this on Facebook and tag her.

Of course I couldn't forget the Nutter Butter:

I had to fake that Santa hat cause there was no way he was going to let me put one on him. He is not a dress-me-up kind of dog. :)

I hope you had an absolutely lovely day. We did and I’m feeling especially blessed this evening.

I wanted to send out a huge THANK YOU to you all as well. I cannot express how much I love doing what I do, and you are all a BIG reason I’m able to do it. I am so thankful for your friendship – whether we’ve met or not. :)

Merry, MERRY Christmas!!

And now, I’m off to have ~~thirds~~ seconds of the apple dumplings. The treadmill and I have a date…starting tomorrow.

Head start

2011-12-21T23:45:00.001-05:00

Well…I’ve caught the bug. Just a bit early this season. The clutter is driving me MAD and I had to do something about it. I’m still enjoying the magic of the season, believe me. (Sitting by the Christmas lights and eating my second cookie of the day right now.)

I’m just overwhelmed by the stuff already.

Not the Christmas stuff, just the STUFF. Usually I wait till all the holiday decor is put away before I start the new year decrapification process, but this year I just couldn’t wait.

There was a pile that was growing in the basement that was a ~~little~~ ~~big~~ HUGE reason why I didn’t want to wait any longer.

Be prepared. I’m showing you my bad side. Again.

I’ll preface this photo with a “it looks much worse than it is.” ;)

Told you I was a piler. :)

The pile started in early October –- I moved a bunch of the little odds and ends down there when they installed our new floors.

When we got things back together, some of the stuff just kind of conveniently stayed down there. I was tired of going up and down the stairs. Something like that.

OK, for real, the pile looks way worst than it is. It’s long. And wide. But low.

OK, I give up. It was bad.

I started attacking in yesterday and got it all down to one little bag of stuff I just don’t have a stinkin’ clue what to do with. You know that stuff? The stuff that hurts my head when I try to figure out where it belongs.

It’s a small bag. I can deal with it. (And I will.)

Now the space is cleaned up:

And I’m totally PUMPED to keep going. The basement is always our dumping ground. By the end of the year it’s a junk-magnet.

Every year I purge like I’ve never purged before. This year, I’m FOR REAL gonna purge (like never before) cause we’re hoping this will finally be the year we start finishing the basement.

We have said that every year for almost eight years now, but I think it may actually happen this time. :)

Even unfinished, I’ve shown you how we use this space a ton:

Who needs ceilings? Or drywall? Flooring? Flooring schmooring. :)

We’ve moved some furniture down there and turned what will be a movie room space into an actual comfortable, cozy movie room until-a-movie-room. We’ve been down there enjoying it every night this week.

I’ll show you how that space looks soon, and share our plan for finishing this space – I’ll need your advice if you’ve finished a basement!

So, has the decrapification bug bitten you yet? What’s the one space you’re itching to get to?

I hope to post again before Christmas, but I’m just kind of enjoying our home and family, so I won’t make any promises. :)

If I don’t talk to you before, I want to wish you and yours a very lovely, warm, beautiful, MERRY CHRISTMAS!! I’m so blessed to have you all in my life. :)

Secret Santa (and a few things)

2011-12-19T23:15:00.001-05:00

Hello there! How the heck are ya?!

First of all…AHHHHHH!!!:

Are you freakin’ out yet?

Just a friendly reminder, that’s all. ;)

I had to tell you about a FUN idea my friend Stefanie over at Brooklyn Limestone came up with. She coordinated a bunch of bloggers and we’re doing a blogland Secret Santa:

How great is that? (I’m in good company, eh?) I love it cause it’s the same kind of fun I used to have in the office setting (in my old life), but this time it’s via the good old US Postal Service. ;)

I’m dying to know who has me – I got these lovely coasters the other day:

I think I know who they came from…but I’m not guessing out loud quite yet. ;) I’ll let you know who it is when I find out! I hope my gal likes her treats as well!

I wanted to share a fun linky party as well -- my friend Melissa is hosting a favorite things party, and I love sharing mine, especially this time of year:

Go check out my favorites here and see how I created the snowflake bokeh-like photo of our tree:

By the way, there are nearly 550 gorgeous trees linked up at the Christmas tree party – it’s a feast for the eyes! Go here to link up you’re own! (It will be open till Wednesday this week.)

And finally, the winners of the Antique Farm House giveaway are:

Beth at The Rhamy Roost
Amy at Wine Country Mama

Congrats ladies! Please email me at thriftydecorchick (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll get you connected!

Hope you’re having a lovely week! Any guesses who my Santa is? ;)

Spreading Christmas CHEER!

2011-12-18T21:56:00.001-05:00

Hello all! I hope you had a lovely weekend! I got absolutely ZERO done – Saturday we quite literally laid around all day, and only got our butts up to go see a movie. Today was spent visiting my grandparents who live about three hours away. It was a lot of driving time but it was SO wonderful to see them!

So the Christmas list hasn’t gotten any shorter, but whatev. I’ll be all supersonic this week and power through.

Today I wanted to share some Christmas craft and decor ideas that have caught my eye over the past few weeks. I’ve seen SO MUCH goodness out there, these don’t even scratch the surface.

If you are completely awesome, maybe you can throw some of these together this week? If not, we’ve all got next year. ;)

When I saw Michelle’s spray painted nutcrackers, it was one of those why-didn’t-I-think-of-that moments:

Decor and the Dog

She found them for super cheap at Hobby Lobby and just sprayed them in glossy red. I was all psyched cause I had the glossy red, just not the nutcrackers. High-tailed it to Hob Lob and NOTHIN. Goodwill…nothin.

Next year fo sho. ;)

If you are giving away some scrumptious sweets this week, Mique has you covered with some adorable printables:

Thirty Handmade Days

Almost makes me want to bake. Or something. ;)

Check out Hannah’s cutie candy cane tree skirt:

Young and Crafty

Can you believe it was made with hot glue? No sewing people!

I think Lakeitha’s Christmas table is just beautiful:

Ramblings of a mother, decorator…

I love the little Christmas trees on the table! And check out that GOODWILL chandelier! And those velvety chairs (what is that, velvet?). I LOVE.

Absolutely LOVE all the great handmade boy gifts Charlie compiled:

Attempting Aloha

My favorite is the super hero fort kit. Hello, I would have loved that as a kid!

I love love LOVE Laura’s rustic Christmas mantel:

Finding Home

Seriously. Isn’t it gorgeous? Magazine-worthy, for sure.

If you’re looking for some bling, you’ll love Cassie’s sparkly tree craft!:

Hi Sugarplum!

They’re just sequins and stick pins but they make a major statement!

Finally, I thought Debbie’s Pottery Barn pillow was just too sweet:

Confessions of a Plate Addict

So pretty! And brilliant -- she used sleeves from a Goodwill sweater to make the stockings!

I love blogland!! :)

There you go – plenty of goodies to keep you busy this week. Cause I know you’ll all be sitting around twiddling your thumbs. ;)

I have my kiddo and hubby home for the next two weeks and I’m in heaven. I’ll still be posting but probably not quite as much – gotta spend some time with my loves.

In the next few weeks, I hope to recap this year’s big projects and share what I have planned for the year – can’t wait!

Have a great start to the holiday week!

Right Now

2011-12-16T16:30:00.001-05:00

Right now I’m in knee-deep in holiday STUFF. Every year I swear I’m going to have everything perfectly planned and decorated and non-stressed by now and every year about this time I laugh manically at myself.

It just doesn’t happen. :)

And I’m OK with that.

Right now the basement looks like a Christmas bomb went off. Every year I say I’m going to keep it organized as I go:

And you know…then the crazy person laughing ensues.

I blame Halloween. You can see from the five foot wide spider legs sticking out in the back that once I don’t get that all away it turns into “Awwww, I’ll just do it all in January.”

Right now I’m wondering WHY FOR ALL THAT IS GOOD it is I can’t keep the kitchen island cleaned off:

I read once online that someone thought I staged these photos. It made me laugh.

It made my husband fall out of his chair. He wishes.

Right now I’m trying to get creative with our Happy Elf (named by the Bub) every day, but I’m failing miserably. Last night it looks like he had some fun though:

And all I can think of is this:

Love that movie. Did you know it’s coming out in 3D next year? SO. THERE.

Right now I’m struggling because I was up till 2:30 a.m. reading this:

It’s good. Obviously, so good I can’t GO TO BED.

This is why I don’t read books as much anymore, which I hate. The only time I have is late at night and then I get completely sucked in.

Right now I’m getting ready for a Christmas party with the girls tonight. I’m making these (ohhhh yeah) and I sent out the call on Twitter yesterday for a festive, bubbly drink idea.

Becky’s suggestion was the easiest (I already had one of the ingredients) so I went with that:

It’s a Poinsettia Cocktail and it’s cranberry juice, triple sec and champagne. It’s yummy! I just mixed everything together till it tasted right. I may know this because I may have sampled it last night. ;)

I had about 25 things on my list today and I’m feeling pretty awesome because I got four done. Like every year, it will all get done. All the presents will get wrapped, all the food will be yummy, and if I don’t get it all done, I’m totally OK with that. All that matters is we’re happy and healthy and together. Nothing else.

Are you sampling any festive drinks, reading any good books, watching any great movies or just trying to get your house under control right now? I’d love to hear!

Have a GREAT weekend!!

A Christmas Tree Party!

2011-12-14T17:53:00.001-05:00

Well, the time is here! It’s time to share all the magic – there is very little more magical than a tree lit up at Christmas, don’t you agree?

There’s something mesmerizing about the glow from a Christmas tree. It calms me, makes me pause and give thanks, and makes me feel all gooey inside. :)

I’m sharing the three trees we have up at our house with you today. Starting with the Bub’s FUN tree. You know…the one with the colored lights. ;)

Of course, it has all the fun stuff on it, like tinsel and garland and fat Santas. We also hang the Hallmark ornaments the Bub picks out every year on this tree:

Anyone else notice the train theme in most of these? The boy is obsessed. ;)

The Bub and I stalk Hallmark starting early October to check out the new ornaments every year. Yes, we are the ones who love seeing Christmas out that early. Sue us.

I still can’t embrace the white LED Christmas lights, but I LOVE the big fat colored lights:

I told my hubby next year I’m doing all the exterior lights in color – they are just too fun and the Bub will only be this age for so long.

We used to have a family room tree every year, but because of some changes I’ve made to that space, we haven't had room for one in a while. I missed having all those pretty ornaments up, so last year I picked up a skinny tree at Lowe’s for a killer deal – only $12!

I LOVE love love the ornaments on this tree – they’re mostly silver and white and glass. Lots of shimmer! They are just gorgeous:

The beautiful baby boy pictures sure don’t hurt either. :) My boy has a December birthday and was and continues to be the BEST Christmas gift I’ve ever received.

Because I knew I’d put this tree in my office, I picked up some blue and green ornaments at Walmart on clearance last year. They go perfectly in the new office! (Which I will show you first thing in January…it’s OH so close!):

I adore this skinny tree – it looks SO real.

Finally, we come to the Big Mama. ;)

I think every year of my life I’ve had a real tree at Christmas – we were just a real tree family growing up and I continued that tradition.

But new hardwood floors kind of changed that. ;) I wasn’t set on it till the guys pulled up the carpet in the front room before the install. There was a HUGE water ring on the plywood, and I stood there for about five minutes trying to figure out what in the heck it was from.

It finally hit me – the Christmas tree. Seven holidays in this house, plus cats who wouldn’t leave the water alone, plus a tree that wouldn’t stand up one year equaled lots of water seepage. Although I’m finding the floors hold up great to spills, we just couldn’t chance a real tree.

Soooo…after much research over the past few months, we ended up with a BEAST from Lowe’s. I wanted a ten foot tree, like we got in a live tree. Hubby wanted to go MONSTER size. So we went with the 12-footer from Lowes.

It was SO easy to put together. The lights are already on it (and don’t go out if one dies) so that saved me hours of work.

But the extra couple of feet meant more ornaments, and next year I think we’ll need a new (taller) ladder to safely decorate the whole thing. ;)

This one is mostly decked out in red and gold, with a few of our most meaningful ornaments mixed in:

About half of the ornaments are from Walmart – I love their selection! There’s a bunch more from Big Lots and the rest we’ve had for years. It seems our tree has gotten bigger every year, so every year after the holidays I get more. (I like our tree dripping with ornaments.) But this is the tallest it gets people. No. more.

Like always, I use a few yards of faux silk as my tree skirt. I just throw it under there and fluff:

It always works great and with a coupon the fabric was WAY cheaper than a real skirt!

Here she is in all her glory – it’s not easy getting a picture of all of her. ;)

I miss a real tree so much (I found something to help with that I hope to show you soon!), but I gotta say, this is SO much less stress!! A tall real tree is SO heavy and was always hard to get just right in the stand, so I was always worried about it falling. (Since the tree debacle a few years ago I started tying it to wall.)

And not having to water (and not worrying about the animals getting in the water) is the GREATEST!!

Of course…I couldn’t have a Christmas tree post without some night shots. My favorite. :)

So here you go…

See? Magic. ;)

I LOVE CHRISTMAS!!!

Now let’s see yours! :)

I’d appreciate it if you could link back to TDC in your post and use this pretty button as well:

Have fun!

Thank you Pinterest!

2011-12-13T23:22:00.001-05:00

OK peeps…I had a whole other post planned for this evening. But then fate stepped in, in the form of our old buddy Pinterest.

A few days ago I pinned a simple little recipe for easy apple dumplings:

Source: oneshetwoshe.com via Thrifty Decor Chick on Pinterest

Tonight I made them. And my life has been changed forever.

OK, I may be going a little overboard here. But for the love of all that is good -- how can something so simple and easy taste so good?

SO. GOOD.

It takes about five minutes to prepare, 30 to cook. Bake? Cook. Whatever.

I’ll share the recipe as I found it first, and then let you know how I changed it up.

You’ll need:

2 Granny Smith apples
1 tsp vanilla
cinnamon
2 packages crescent rolls
1 1/2 cups sugar (see below for more on this)
2 sticks butter (just do it)
12 ounces Mountain Dew

To start, peel and slice your apple(s). I have one like this that makes the slicing super easy:

I halved this recipe, so I used exactly half of everything. (Duh.) One apple, one stick butter, 6 oz of the Dew, 3/4 cup sugar, on package of crescent rolls and a dash of vanilla.

Just wrap your apple slices with the crescent rolls and place them in a baking dish:

Again, nighttime pics so they stink. :)

Then you mix up the sugar, (melted) butter and vanilla in a separate bowl. This part is where I think I made these even more spectacular, on accident. ;) I went to get my sugar and realized we only had a bit left – about half of the 3/4 that I needed. I figured brown sugar might work, so I actually used half brown sugar/half sugar to make up the 3/4 cup.

I think that made these extra AMAZING. ;)

Anyway, you mix all that up and then pour that mixture all over the “dumplings,” then take the Mountain Dew and pour that over everything too:

It will look kinda grody, but oh JUST YOU WAIT.

Sprinkle some cinnamon over the top and put them in a 350 degree oven for 30 to 40 minutes. I took ours out at 36 minutes in.

I doubted them when I first saw them – they looked like they would be total mush all the way through. But I persevered people. I pushed on.

And I added some ice cream:

They were SO GOOD. I cannot express how good. Like, how did I make something so good, GOOD.

The bottom is mushy, the apple is tender, the top is crispy and flaky and scrumptious!

Yes. That good. I’m sorry, do I need to say it again?

Go get some apples and brown sugar and make them immediately. You can thank me by making some more and sending them to me. Cause ours may be (almost) gone already.

Have I mentioned how much I love Pinterest?

Have you tried these easy apple dumplings yet? Any other easy peasy recipes I can’t live one more day without?

Christmas Craftastic!

2011-12-12T23:06:00.001-05:00

Well HEY! Hope you had a great weekend! I determined I was totally joking about being done with the Christmas decorating. :) I put up another tree and have at least one more spot I want to deck out.

I think this is the latest I’ve been working on decor in a long time, but I’m having fun with it so I’m not worrying about it. I’ve used VERY little of what I’ve used in the past. It’s been fun to change things up a bit!

Today I worked on a couple crafts I’ve been itchin’ to do for a while now. Kate’s Holiday Home craft party is the perfect reason to get them DONE!

OK, the first craft I was alllllll excited about – I was able to visit a spectacular Anthropology store over Thanksgiving (I still plan to tell you about that trip. It just may be Easter by the time I get to it.) and my girlfriend and I saw these and fell in love with them:

Their prices on the other hand, were INSANE. I think the big ones were $25 or maybe $30-something?

So of course, I think, OH, I could SO do those myself! The day after we got home, I went out and got the supplies to make them.

And the next day I started seeing them pop up ALL. OVER. blogland. They are that easy. And cute. :)

I wanted to do them anyway, and I changed them up just a tad, so bear with me if you’ve seen this eleventy billion times.

I started with cheapy little trees from Michael’s:

You get a package of various sizes for $1.99. They were already “snow” covered, but I wanted them to glisten with CHRISTMAS.

I used my Aleene’s clear glue and just brushed it on the sides:

Excuse the leftover pirate party plates. ;)

I used three different types of glitter to pretty them up – a silver, white, and one that is teeny tiny little glittery balls. It is beautiful!

I just dipped each tree with glue into the good stuff:

And let them dry. That’s it!

I have bajillions of Ball jars but ZERO lids for said jars. I was going to rig up something so they could sit upside down like the Anthro version, but then thought – WHY? – and just filled each jar with my faux snow and then the little trees.

I got some little pinecones and jingle bells from Hob Lob for half off and dropped a few in each jar as well:

The end result isn’t the exact Anthro version, but just as cute. (I think.):

I mean…really? I already had everything but the trees and the little fillers, so each jar was about a buck for me. But even if you started from scratch, you’d be able to do each one for less than $5.

Really Anthro? Reheheheally?

The pics don’t show how much the little trees glitter, but they are so pretty!:

If you want the fine snow look like they have, just use Epsom Salts. I have some but it was up in the bathroom and this was SO EASY, I was that lazy and didn’t want to go get it. :)

I found a little sled at a barn sale years ago, and I just laid it on the living room coffee table and placed all these goodies on it:

The trees are a little bluish green for my taste – I would rather have a true green. But when I got them in place, I realized they work perfectly with the blues in the living room:

So pretty and so easy! And CHEAP! Ohhhhh so cheap.

The next crafty project is one I had going in my noggin for months – and I couldn’t believe how easily it all came together. I started with the glass pieces I had on the dining room centerpiece till just recently:

I got most of mine from Goodwill, but you can find them for cheap at Hobby Lobby as well.

A few weeks ago Michael’s had all their Martha Stewarts paper punch thingies on sale, so I picked up a couple for this project. The first was one that punches out a line of the design out of the paper:

I found this paper at Hobby Lobby – it’s in their “special” paper area – the $1.99 a sheet stuff. (I got it half off.) This one is a grey linen-like paper that looks JUST like fabric. It’s kind of shimmery and so pretty!:

I just used spray adhesive on the back, then wrapped it around the glass candleholder.

For my next version, I used the big snowflake cut out on my sparkly white paper (also half off):

I used a strip of the paper and then the punches on some other glass pieces:

Again, I just sprayed the back of the paper with spray adhesive. If I want it to stay on there it will, but if I want to reuse these I can just take it off and wash off the adhesive.

For the final version, I used this beautiful scrapbook paper I found in the fancy papers as well:

Again, half off. :) I got each sheet for a buck and only used two sheets. For this one I just simply wrapped a few candleholders with the paper. It’s SO pretty on it’s own!

At first I was going to line them up along the stairs:

But then I realized how beautiful they’d look all together! So they ended up on the foyer table:

I added a couple mercury votive holders I had from Pottery Barn (I think they were $3 each?) and finished off the little candlescape.

Of course, it looks ahhhhmazing all lit up:

Isn’t that beautiful?

One of them is a real candle I wrapped, but for the others I’ll use my little LED candles.

I can’t get over how pretty they are – and it’s just PAPER!!

The entry table is very low key – just some greenery from the back yard in an urn, some decorative trees and now the candles:

And I figure all of them can stay out through the winter months.

LOVE them!!

This project cost me about $6 in paper and I think the paper punches were about $15 total on sale. Considering I’ll easily be able to use most of these throughout the year (not the snowflakes of course), I’m thinking that’s money well spent!

Check out Goodwill for these glass pieces – I found most of mine for a dollar or two a couple years ago!

I’m thinking about adding some of the faux snow to the top of the buffet for some fun, but I’m afraid “fun” will become “MESS” real quick. ;) I may try it out to see what happens.

So there. you. go. – my latest Christmas crafty goodness! I tell you what…when it goes well, crafting is so cathartic and relaxing. I enjoyed it so much, I have a few more projects I’m hoping to get to before the end of the season!

I can’t wait to check out what you’ve all got up your sleeves at the party! And don’t forget our Holiday Home link ups will finish up this Wednesday with my annual Christmas Tree Party!:

I can’t wait to see your gorgeous trees!

Have you been getting crafty lately? Were they successes or fails? I never know till I start if it's going to work or not!

Last giveaway weekend of 2011!

2011-12-09T20:59:00.002-05:00

Heya hey! OK, so I almost forgot we have one more giveaway for the month! I'm not sure how I could have forgotten about this one cause it rawks. ;)

You’re gonna love this site! The lovely folks at Wuslu.com have had such a great response to their deals, they’ve added a new site called Antique Farm House:

And whooeee, they’ve got some beauties in store for you! Antique Farm House is sales event kind of store (flash sales similar to One King's lane, etc.) with a BIG difference – they’re keeping the items at the same great prices as Wuslu.com.

AFH will have three events at once, and every few days a new event will launch and the oldest of the three events will expire.

I couldn’t wait to show you some of the goodies they have in their store!

These vintagey industrial numbers are awesome:

Each of these tin signs are 10 by 14 inches and are only $10 each! Aren’t they fantastic? You could hang a few in a mud room with hooks, or spread them across a whole wall – it would make a HUGE impact!

These antiqued critter boxes are so unique:

This is what I love about blogging – we find out about all of these great online resources!

Farmhouse/industrial lighting is all the rage right now – check out this fixture:

And this petite cage light sells for less than $50:

Wouldn’t that be awesome in a powder room or over a kitchen sink?

Antique Farm House also sells small furniture pieces like these vintage-looking carts:

They also have a bunch of beautiful accessories, like this lab glass vase:

It looks like something you’d find at an antique shop! And without the driving and digging through the not-so-cute stuff.

Pretty awesome eh? Love it!

To start Antique Farm House off with a bang, they are offering TWO of you $50 at the site to spend as you wish! WHOO! I’ve already found three or four things you’ll want to get. ;)

Here’s how to enter to win one of two $50 gift cards to AFH:

1. Leave a comment here. Are you done with your holiday decorating? I’m close…I’m trying to decide if I want to put up one more tree. Hmmm…

2. Visit the Antique Farm House site here. Take a look at the three current sales events going on now and come back to tell us which item you like the most.

3. Like AFH on Facebook here.

Subscribe to their email list here. (You’ll know when the new sales will start!) Come back and leave another comment letting us know which one you did.

**You can enter using one method of entry or all three – it’s up to you!

Remember if you comment anonymously or you have a private blog, please include your email address in each entry, and spell it out with “at” and “dot” to avoid any spammy emails coming your way.

This giveaway is only open to US residents! It will be open till this Monday, December 12th at noon EST.

Have a lovely weekend – I’m hoping for SNOW! :)

My (New) Christmas Mantel

2011-12-07T23:24:00.001-05:00

Well HEY! I’m so excited to share my Christmas mantel with you today! You know this year was especially fun for me because of the redo our corner fireplace recently went through. If you haven’t seen it yet, go ahead and click over. We’ll wait.

OK, so here’s a quick stroll down memory lane – the big bad annoying corner decorated for Christmas:

I tried my best to work with it…and I thought it always turned out pretty this time of year.

But now…NOW. I am giddy!

I have a REAL fireplace (OK, it was always real, whatever) and a REAL, thick, chunky mantel. WHOO!

My plan was the same as always – I beef up my garland in layers. I started with some pine greenery from Big Lots:

I’ve mentioned this stuff a few times and I swear this is the most realistic, beautiful greenery I’ve seen anywhere. At least for $10. ;)

I made an investment this year by purchasing a few really thick 9 foot lengths of faux greenery at a local florist. They had thick, thicker and thickest and I got the thickest version. I got them during a great sale, so they were still a steal compared to the prices I kept finding online.

I used a section of it and just placed it right on top of the pine:

It’s SO FLUFFY!!!! (I try to resist, I do.)

Then I added the must have – lights:

I just pushed them in here and there.

Then I fluffed and fluffed and fluffed, and then started adding more pieces of the pine from Big Lots. Because I love this stuff so much, I got some on clearance last year:

Then came the sparkle in the form of cheap ornaments:

And the pine cones (they actually come attached to the BL garland – told you it was awesomesauce). I found some of the new Glitter Blast Krylon spray paint at True Value (they have every. spray. paint. ever.) and I couldn’t resist spraying the cones:

This stuff is SO fun!

I got the red version too, but I have yet to find something to spray red glitter. I WILL find something.

The garland was ready to go and was FLUFFY beyond my wildest dreams, but the wall above the fireplace seemed empty on the sides. Enter a trip to IKEA and their perfect red lanterns. I hung a few on each side with cup hooks and fishing line:

Aren’t the lanterns insanely festive?

I just love them and their bright Christmas red and stars etched into the glass!

I hung the wreath that usually hangs on our door over the mirror:

It’s a wreath from Target (clearance years ago) layered over a simple pine wreath I’ve had foreva. It’s nice and chunkaaay.

And the result? Well. I LOVE.

It’s a large and in charge mantel and I love it!

I’ve mentioned once or 20 times that I’m a little obsessed with red this time of year. This space is no different.

Obviously. :)

A few of you had asked for a shot from further back in the room, so here’s a view of the new wall:

I swear, it looks like it was always that way!

The little Polar Express Santa on the chair was a Goodwill find a few years ago and he was in PERFECT condition. The countdown pillow was from Stein Mart:

Did you see my cutie candy cane by the fireplace?

It’s a knit cover over the cane and it is adorable! I found it at a local shop.

The stockings are all from Pottery Barn – I got them all for $15 each (including embroidery!) last fall:

I think we need to get another one for this guy:

Yes. We will get our dog a stocking. Welcome to our world.

Because I am so excited about having this mantel (did I mention that?) I took way too many pictures. Speaking of pictures, ignore the IKEA backing still in those frames. ;)

You know nighttime is my favorite time at Christmas! The little candles in the lanterns are all LED, so I just flip the switch on them and it’s all dreamy and glowy:

Here’s my view from the sofa:

Usually my feet are up there on that table but I’ll spare you the foot pic this time. ;)

(And the candy cane doesn’t stay there when the fireplace is lit – I just left it for a bit while I took pics.)

Because I can’t resist a before and after session, here’s the family room after it’s redo earlier this year:

Here is is with the new fireplace and all Christmastastic!

The view from the kitchen before:

And now, with new floors too!:

These show how very little space the new mantel takes up – I swear it looks more spacious! And I like how the angled wall mimics the angled wall that goes to my office.

Couldn’t be happier!!

If you haven’t linked up your holiday mantel at Rhoda’s yet, get on over! And check out the 300+ gorgeous mantels! I’m late, like always. ;)

And if you’re looking for more mantel ideas, check out my JOY version in our master bedroom:

More red. Shocking. :)

Happy decorating to you!

December Before and After: Poinsettias!

2011-12-05T22:09:00.001-05:00

Hello! Can you believe it? The final Before and After Party of the year? It’s blowing my mind how fast the year went. As I get older they just go faster and faster. Not sure I’m happy about that. :)

This month I’m sharing some simple before and afters of a lovely little holiday plant you may have heard of…the poinsettia.

I have long loved this holiday plant, but have NEVER purchased one for our home. I have a friend who gets a few every year, and I have always been jealous of her bright red beautiful flowers.

You see, we’ve had cats as long as I’ve lived, and I had always heard poinsettias were toxic for animals. And then…35 years into life, I found out earlier this year that it’s a myth. I gotta say, I felt a bit cheated for all those years I didn’t get any for fear my cats would keel over.

When I found that out, I knew I would have to get some this holiday season, and then the stars aligned when the dear Tamara contacted me and and a few other bloggers.

Tamara and her husband own a greenhouse in Vancouver, BC, Canada and grow 180,000 poinsettias yearly. Wowza!!

How awesome is that? Needless to say, she’s an expert on the subject of poinsettias.

I was thrilled when the folks at Ball Horticulture in Chicago provided me with a few poinsettias to use this holiday season:

I got two Polar Bear Whites, one Mars Pink and one Christmas Season Red. They were hand delivered to my door and I was giddy when they arrived!

I had grand plans to incorporate them into some vignettes, but to tell you the truth, they’re too big and beautiful to fit well into the spaces I have to work with. I ended up just using them alone here and there and I gotta tell you, I think that does them justice. :)

I’m not really a pink girl, but the Mars Pink plant is SO pretty. I put her (yes, her) in a simple white pot near the Christmas tree:

That white pot used to have a fern in it – the ferns were doing fine, but the cats would NOT STOP eating them. It was driving me mad, so I only have one left and it’s where they can’t get to it. Grrr…

I wanted to house each one in something a bit different, but use what I already had around the house. I found an awesome ceramic container at Goodwill a few months ago and thought the Polar Bear White would look fab in it…and it does:

It looks like it was meant to be in my office! LOVE the white leaves with the blue ceramic! This is one that will stay up all year (if I can keep them alive!!).

The Christmas Red one is my absolute fave though – I am all about the contrast of the deep red leaves with a white pot from IKEA:

I LOVE the look of the traditional poinsettia mixed with the modern white container.

I loved the pop of red in the kitchen so much, I decided to use it on the table too. I wanted to cut the flowers to use in the centerpiece, but when I did the first one, it wilted like crazy. Then my friend Beth mentioned that you have to sear them with a candle flame. I had no idea!

She said:

“Searing will stop the milk sap from leaking out of the plant while still allowing the stems to absorb water. When you break off a poinsettia leaf or stem hold the area excreting sap over a candle flame until it bubbles and sears the area. It will turn black in the areas where you do this, but it won’t detract from your decorating. You will know if you seared the stems correctly based on their post perk or droop. If your poinsettias begin to wilt in your vase, try searing the stem once again and return them to water. Also, you shouldn’t see a milky stream in the water. The water should remain clear.”

Did you know that? I had no idea! I did it just how she described and so far so good! I placed a couple cuts in each little bottle I keep in the kitchen centerpiece:

I love how full and pretty these are – you don’t need many to make a BIG statement. Now my little caddy that holds our sugar and syrup is all business in the front:

Party in the back:

;) I couldn’t resist.

The pops of red on the counter and table look so great with my little wreaths that I hang from the backs of the chairs:

I used to go hog wild with the Christmas decor in the kitchen. I’ve been toning it down a little every year, but it looks just as festive:

Little pops of Christmas are just as powerful, believe me! :)

I can’t get enough of red this time of year. Love it!!

So there’s my before and after for this month – the beautiful poinsettias in their plain Jane containers before:

And the afters!:

I didn’t even replant them by the way, just dropped them in. Easy peasy SQUEEZY.

Fun little facts about poinsettias:

* Did you know they HATE cold? I found that so interesting, considering we mainly see them in the winter.

* You can keep them all year round. Check out this article for a bunch of great tips. One of the ladies I used to work with would tend to the poinsettias we got every season and keep them alive all year!

* I know I already mentioned it, but I think it’s worth reminding that they are NOT toxic. (See this article for more info.) Our cat has already nibbled a few times (even though they are supposed to taste AWFUL, he’s so weird), and he’s just fine. I hear the taste deters any animal (or human) from trying them more than once. ;) If you have any hesitation about it, just keep them up high away from your animals and kiddos.

I for one, am THRILLED that we get to welcome these pretties into our home every Christmas season now!

Do you buy a poinsettia every year? Any luck keeping them going all year?

Now I can’t wait to see what you’ve been up to! Link up your posts below, and If you could, I’d love it if you would link back to this post and/or use this pretty button:

Disclosure: I was given four poinsettia plants for this post. All photos and opinions expressed are my own.

Metallic Christmas Table

2011-12-04T23:26:00.001-05:00

Hello hello! Hope you had a lovely weekend!

I finished up our Christmas dining room today and I am smitten! Layla is kicking off our Holiday Home link ups tomorrow morning, so I had to share what I’ve been up to!

I’ve wanted to change up the centerpiece in the dining room for some time now – I love those glass candleholders in the framed out mirror, but it’s been a couple years now and I was craving something different!

I tried a few different ideas, none which were it. And then finally…it came to me.

I swear anymore I have to sit on a space mentally for about six months before the final idea comes into my noggin. But once I’ve figured it out in my head, I usually love the result. This time is no different. (Thank goodness. Whew.) ;)

I started with a few trips to a few different Goodwill stores. I was on a mission – a mission for brass candlesticks:

You know – the ones you see gracing the shelves on every trip into Goodwill? And of course when I decided to do this project, they were harder than heck to find. Sheesh. It’s like brass is coming back or something. ;)

I have a confession to make…I actually kind of liked these as they were. Kind of. Kind of more that I’d like to admit. They were more antiqued brass than shiny brass. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

But I had a vision in mind, and that vision included spray paint:

I started by spreading them all out in the garage:

Then sprayed them all with a primer:

Then I put them into three groups and sprayed each one in a different metallic color. One group was Krylon Caramel Latte, one was Krylon Nickel, and one was Valspar Gold.

Let me tell you – that gold color was BEAUTIFUL. It is really awesome – although I hated the new nozzle. It was SO hard to spray with.

When they were dry, I just mixed the different colors in the mirror centerpiece, then filled it with bits of greenery and green and brown ornaments:

I tried to vary the heights as much as I could, but otherwise they are just on there, no rhyme or reason:

The place settings are pretty standard – white dinnerware I got from HomeGoods a while back (I wanted to brighten up the table so I sold the dishes and place mats that we used for years), my goblets from Goodwill and the sparkly brown bulbs that sit in the bowls were from Hob Lob years ago.

When I got it all together, I wanted to add the napkins to the table but didn’t have any napkin rings that worked.

I was standing in the garage when I saw my solution -- I grabbed a cardboard roll that some fabric came on, cut it down on my saw and got these:

After sanding down the edges and then spraying them in the gold Valspar spray paint, I got some very quick, very free DIY napkin rings:

And I gotta say, I really like how they turned out!

I love how the candlesticks give some height to the table, but you can still see through them:

The metallic colors are so pretty and I figure they’ll work all year round – it looks beautiful without the Christmas filler too!:

I wanted to keep the green and brown theme in this space to go with my Walmart ornament vignette I put together last year:

All of the ornaments were a buck and all of them are SO FUN!:

I was totally bummed to see that Walmart doesn’t have all of these ornaments again this year! They still have a bunch of pretty sparkly ornaments for cheap, but not quite as cute as these were.

Of course, just like any Christmas decor – the table looks most magical at night:

Wowza! I love it!!

Candlelight – I don’t think you can beat it! It’s just beautiful.

Makes you want to cook a four course meal at 10 p.m. on a Sunday for your husband and eat by candlelight beautiful:

Of course I don’t keep the candles lit if we’re not in here, which is OK, cause I love it when they’re not lit too.

But there’s some definite magic when the only light comes from the candles and the tree:

LOVE!!

The total cost was probably around $30? The candlesticks ranged from $1 to $3 each and I had all of the spray paint colors but the gold color. I think that one was $5. It took me about an hour to spray paint all of the candlesticks.

Not too shabby for a new look in the dining room – and one I’m a little giddy over:

Do you see those chairs? Yeah…that’s another project I’ve been sitting on (HA! Sitting on…get it?) for the past six months or so. ;) Can’t finish those till I finish the drapes, and I don’t want to finish the drapes till I decide if I’m going to repaint the room.

So…yeah. :)

Can’t wait to see all of your beautiful tablescapes at Layla’s tomorrow!

*You can see how I created the original centerpiece here.

**The December Before and After Party will go up Monday evening!

Linking this up to Julia’s party!

Month in review and winners!

2011-12-02T22:36:00.001-05:00

Helloooo! Are you ready for some weekend?! I am – and it’s going to be a busy one. Today was hubby’s birthday and we have the Bub’s birthday party and a holiday show tomorrow.

Have I mentioned our family has seven major events in December? My step-brother’s birthday, my hubby’s birthday, my son’s birthday, my nephew’s birthday, our anniversary, Christmas and then New Years.

Whew. We are not the best planners. ;)

I’m back today to share the month of November in review, but first I need to share all of the winners of the Thanksgiving week giveaways!

$50 to Kirkland's: Jenny at cjy5787 (at) gmail (dot) com
$100 to Dimples and Dandelions: Lisalulu at The Davis Dialogues
Free ticket to the Haven Conference next year: Becky at Organizing Made Fun
$50 to Old Time Pottery: Angela at Decorating Cents
$150 to MirrorMate: Elizabeth with Keeping up with the Joneses
$50 to Target from Hometalk: scg00387 (at) yahoo (dot) com
$50 to Back 40 Life: Jennibell at Jenni’s Seasons
$50 to Wuslu.com: Cathy at cathysimpson100 (at) yahoo (dot) com
$50 to Wuslu.com: Joyce at joycehackley (at) msn (dot) com

Whew! (Again.) Winners, please email me at thriftydecorchick (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll get you connected!

Now, the November in review. Cause I know you are just on PINS AND NEEDLES!! Or something like that.

First up, I shared how I’ve been cleaning our new floors – this steam mop is rocking my world!:

A few of you asked about using the steam mop on the floors. I did a bunch of research before I decided to use this one – because it uses so little steam on the wood option, I feel comfortable using it. Our floors were also finished on site and have a good seal.

Annnnd…if you know how often I clean the floors, you’d know there’s little worry about damaging them. That’s all I gotta say about that. :)

If you have wood or laminate floors I encourage you to do your own research and decide if it’s right for you!

Next up, we announced our upcoming holiday shindig!:

My pals Kate, Layla and Rhoda and I are joining up again to celebrate the season! I have my mantel ready (OMG…I love it.) but I need to get moving on the table setting. Hope the weather cooperates this weekend cause I need to spray paint a TON.

At the November before and after party, I showed you how I transformed the Craigslist dresser in the office with some half off knobs from Hob Lob:

I still can’t believe the difference they made! Love the pops of white on the black dresser:

Be sure to check out the more than 500 posts that folks linked up! So much talent out there, it’s astounding!!

Then I shared my design confusion – our house is a mix of farmhouse, traditional, modern, industrial and a bunch of other styles:

No matter what my style is, it’s warm and cozy and we love it!

Next up I shared an update on our debt free story and paid it forward a little:

Pretty awesome. :)

I showed you here how I changed up a clearanced out Pottery Barn bath caddy and made it work for the art supplies:

Many of you asked how I can keep this stuff out where the Bub can get to it so easily. Well, he’s almost five, so there’s not much danger of drawing on the walls anymore. And his entire life, he’s never gotten into stuff like this. I never have to worry about him – and YES I know how awesome (and crazy!) that is. :)

I shared how I installed the peel and stick tile in our laundry room next:

It’s still going strong! And it still looks JUST like real tile. And I still big fat love it!

After the holiday, I shared what I had been up to for a couple weeks:

With some help, we were able to enclose our formerly SO ANNOYING corner fireplace and make into a real fireplace:

And yes, I still stare at it every time I walk in the room. I think this is one of my top three changes I’ve made to this house.

This week I also shared horrible pictures of my hands:

OK, you should be looking at the nails, not the hands. ;) This polish is still going strong! My Sis and I put up our tree today and that did take a bit of a toll on them – they’re definitely more scratched up. But overall they still look fantastic, considering it’s been two weeks since I had them painted.

I ended the month by sharing how I use our year-round accessories to decorate for Christmas:

I feel so behind this year with the holiday decor, but I’m staring at the beautiful tree right now as I type, and I can’t help feeling totally chill about the whole thing. I’m certainly enjoying the process. :)

So there you go! Hope one of these posts helped or inspired you in some way!

I’ll let you all know when the Before and After Party will be next week – I’m thinking Monday evening, but with Layla’s party I need to figure out the timing. Be back soon!

Hollaaaa!

My Go-To Christmas Decor

2011-11-30T23:05:00.001-05:00

Well…it’s finally starting to look like CHRISTMAS up in here! I had forgotten how much I love turning off all the lights and letting just the Christmas lights twinkle. Magic. :)

As I was pulling decor out today, it occurred to me that I use the same formula every year for most of my holiday decorating. I’ve mentioned it before, but I think it’s worth repeating.

I think any home can look Christmas-tastic with three things:

1. Garland/greenery
2. Ornaments/sparkle
3. Natural elements

I used to decorate with mostly holiday-specific things – so that meant I had to take down all the current accessories and replace them with new. Let me tell you, it gets exhausting. :) All the lugging stuff down to the basement, lugging the bins up, lugging them back down, lugging the year-round accessories back UP after the holidays.

Whew. Lots of lugging.

Now I do my best to use what I already have up and Christmasfy it.

Like taking the lemons and limes out of a basket and replacing them with pinecones and ornaments:

Score one for ornaments and natural. ;)

Remember my DIY trough thingy I made for the family room? I used all of the above to make it work for the holidays and I love how it turned out!

My favorite tool this time of year is my wire cutter:

I cut my garland all apart using this baby. I leave some in one piece as a base, then cut individual pieces off different types of greenery to stick in here and there. It makes the end result full and more interesting. (I think.)

Then I add the lights (OK, there should be a No. 4 on that list – lights are a must for sure) and fill in any empty spots with ornaments, sparkly beady stuff and pinecones:

I drilled a hole into the back of the trough so I could put the lights right through it.

NO CORDS ALLOWED.

OK really, not kidding.

I added a sparkly dollar store ornament to the mirror above the TV and called it done:

LOVE. :)

Today I worked on the Goodwill shelves in our kitchen -- again, using what we already have. I stuffed some sparkly red pics in my little pitcher and then some real greenery as well:

Is it sad that one of my very favorite parts of our new backyard is the fact that we had arborvitaes planted, so now I have access to REAL green in our house this time of year?

It makes me positively giddy. I felt like Heidi frolicking around the evergreens out there.

I used little snips of it to fill in some spots, and bigger swags that I just laid on the shelves, along with some sparkly faux greenery (that I cut off of it’s stem).

Sparkly, yes. Natural, yes. Greenery, yes. I tell ya – it works!

Add some ornaments to the mix and I really don’t think you can go wrong:

I LOVE the pop of green of this vintage pedestal from my late father-in-law’s house. The added bonus is I think of him every time I walk by this little vignette. :)

I wanted to keep some fun in the display, so I added a couple dollar tree trees (huh?) from a few years ago:

I love love love how this little mix turned out:

Best part is I already had everything. Boo.yah.

I don’t think you can get more classic than red, green and white. As much as I try to get into different colors for the season, I ALWAYS gravitate back to the classics for most of our decor.

I went the same direction with our (new) mantel – here’s a sneak peek, just cause I’m so giddy about it:

This is why it takes me longer than I hope to decorate for the holidays – it’s not always just pulling an item out of the bins and setting it up. It’s taking different parts of a recipe and making something visually yummy. :)

Trying to use what I have and making it work for holiday decor is a challenge, but I eat it up. It’s WAY more fun to me – it totally gets my decorating mojo going and I love watching it all come together. It’s my thang.

By the way. This is behind the scenes of it all coming together:

I firmly believe there has to be a bit of madness in order to get to the good stuff. :)

So what are your go to’s for decorating for the season? Do we have the same list? What colors do you use in your holiday decor? I’d love to hear!

* Spell check does not recognize “Christmasfy” and “Christmas-tastic.” What is this world coming to?

** I believe I said “sparkly” 58 times.

Nails for the DIYer

2011-11-29T22:12:00.001-05:00

Hey hey! How are ya? I’ve FINALLY been pulling out the Christmas decor around here. Being away for Thanksgiving made me feel totally behind – especially since (like every year) I have delusions that I’ll be able to get it ALL out before December 1st.

Ummm…like every year, it’s just not happening. ;)

But I’m taking my time and thoroughly enjoying it. I’ve pulled out a few things here and there, and one of my favorites is ready to go -- the cutie Santa hats are baaaack!:

With Rudolph on the TV in the background – could it be more perfect? :)

You can see how I made them here. It’s been two years and they’ve held up GREAT! The Bub was so excited to see them too – it’s like Christmas officially starts when they come out.

I also finished up the Christmas decor on the new mantel tonight and I am in luuuuurve. Can’t wait to show you it when our holiday parties start next week!:

Thanks so much for the sweet comments on the new fireplace set up by the way. It tickles me pink that some of you felt my pain all these years and are just as excited as I am with the change. ;)

So tonight I’m sharing a little something different – you know I like to share when I find a product that I love, and I just had to do a post about this one. This will probably be the one and only fashion-related post ever at TDC, but I couldn’t resist it!

I’ve mentioned before that I never get my nails done – mostly because it’s just not worth the money for me. I get them painted (I never do the “fill” – is that what it’s called? Just painted.) and then within days (sometimes less than 24 hours), they are destroyed.

Manicures are not the DIYer’s best friend. :)

Until now. Whoo HOO!!

I read about shellac nails at Emily’s site – I think it was a few months ago. I thought they sounded awesome but since I never have mine done, I didn’t try it out till a few weeks ago.

Let. me. tell. you. This stuff is incredible!!

I got my nails done with it and then loved it so much, I did it again before our vacation last week – nine days ago. (Usually I have them done two times in a year – so that tells you how happy I am with this!)

They still look like this:

(I’ve decided my hands just don’t photograph pretty, no matter what.)

I’m not kidding you – this stuff is impossible to mess up. CRAZY awesome.

I’ve sawed, cleaned, bathed (duh), painted, drilled, scrubbed, scraped…ev.er.y.thing.

They still look brand new.

The only thing that has slightly done anything to them is a few wires sticking out of the garland – they got minor scratches. You honestly can’t even tell though.

As far as I can tell, the only reason to have them redone is because they grow out:

Isn’t that AWESOME?? They price isn’t bad either – just a few bucks more than a standard manicure. (At least at the salon I go to.)

I’m going to wait another week and then have it taken off for a while (they have to soak your nails and then scrape it off, so you I think you have to go into the salon to have it removed).

I’ve heard that the shellac can damage your nails, but with it on, my nails are SUPER strong, especially for the winter. Usually I have issues with them breaking easily in the cold months.

Of course I say that and tonight look what happened:

GAH!! You gotta be kidding me! Funny though – the polish is still perfect. ;) It’s not flaking off at all.

So there you go – if you love pretty nails but love power tools even more (like me) – you finally have a solution! I get to feel like a girl every once in a while now and I’m pretty stoked about that. And they are WAY more economical – at least I figure, considering the polish lasts so much longer.

Have you tried the shellac? Love it, hate it? Did it damage your nails? I’d love to hear!