Valentine's Day Inspiration

So I know it is only January 9th but last night I got motivated to finally clean out the last closet that had boxes in it from our move- it also had all of my photography props- alot of which I was selling. As I was cleaning out my prop stash I found tons of stuff from a Valentine mini session I had which was perfect for decorating my front entry table with for Valentine's Day- so I did!! Yep not even mid January yet and I have Valentine's Day stuff up! But hey people were pinning Valentine's ideas the week before Christmas so I figure everyone is thinking about putting up their decorations now too! It's not totally done so I haven't taken a picture yet but I thought I would share with you some of my pins from pinterest- seeing how most of my inspiration for this blog comes from there!!

Love this flower ball but not sure I have the patience to make it.
Love the shredded paper idea- think I will "borrow" it!! That is if I can find any pink or red shredded wrapping paper in the stores- target was already sold out!!

Love the free printable subway art from eighteen25

How cute would this be for a front door-

Oh and I love love love this heart wreath...Looks fairly easy to make but very time consuming...will have to see if I get around to making them - I need 2 for my front doors!!

I would have never thought to paint styrofoam balls valentine's colors- what a great idea!!

If you are on pinterest and would like to see the rest of my Valentine's pins here is a link to my boards: My Pinterest Boards

Have you already started gathering ideas and stuff to decorate for Valentine's Day? I think the Target Dollar section has a great selection of inexpensive holiday decorations- I bought 2 little mailboxes for $1 each!!

~Elizabeth

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Get out of Debt in 2012!!

Do you know who this guy is? He has probably been one of the most influential men in my life! Ha! I say that like I know him personally...well I almost met him once and I was featured in his book many years ago so for now that is as personal as I can get!

Meet Dave Ramsey- author of The Total Money Makeover(the book I was in), radio host of the Dave Ramsey Show and the founder of the Financial Peace program.

I know that as 2012 starts many of you have made new years resolutions and some of you included getting control of your finances or paying off your debt as part of yours. I am going to tell you the biggest piece of advice I can...find a Financial Peace class being offered at a local church- and sign up! You do not have to be a member of the church and trust me this program will change your life FOREVER!! Find a Class

I still remember walking into the first orientation class when I was a single mom and 25 years old and asking the coordinator if this class would teach me how to write a budget! She laughed and said DEFINITELY!! I went home and asked my mom if I could borrow the money from her to enroll and sign up- it was one of the greatest gifts she ever gave me.

12 weeks later I had paid off a huge amount of debt and my life would forever be changed as well as the lives of those in my family..I'll post about just how much Financial Peace has changed my family tree and my story soon.

So go check out Dave Ramsey's website and Find a Class

Trust me ..... It will change your life forever!

PS- if things are so bad that you can't afford the class fee check with the coordinator- often the church provides a few scholarships for families to attend their programs. The orientation class is free- so there is no harm in checking it out :)

PPS- if you still can't figure out a way to get into the class then at least go out and buy the book- it is an easy read and a great start!

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Dressing Room Closet Reveal

My daughter's closet is fairly large and from the first time I looked at this house I envisioned it to be much more then a closet for her - It had so many possibilities would I create a built in reading nook on one end? Not sure but I had the electrician pull an outlet thru just in case....would I turn it into a dressing room or a mini playroom??

This was probably the hardest part of redoing her bedroom- I could not make up my mind about what I wanted her closet to become..so I decided I would just put together her vanity (bought on clearance from target this fall for $30 and stashed in our attic for the past few months). Once I had it built and moved into her closet we both agreed it would work as a dressing room. So my mind started racing with ideas- She had one long closet rod/shelf that was in the way- but the other end of the closet was too slanted to hang 2 rods up and replace the lost space if I removed the main rod. So what was I to do....

Before:

After:
I hung a curtain rod at the very top of her closet and hung the curtain correctly- then draped the end of the fabric back over the rod and used binder clips to keep it stuck to the top fabric and exactly as long as I needed to hang over the closet shelf/rod- I tucked an empty wrapping paper roll into the bottom of the curtain to make it hang over the top like and awning!! If I knew how to sew I probably could have just sewn this together at the right dimensions but I don't know how to sew- not even a button on- so I had to get creative!! LOL

The chair is my goodwill find for $5 that my son sanded, primed, and painted to match. The chandelier was found at Hobby Lobby and was originally black but spray painted Valspar Ballet Slippers Pink to match.

This chandelier was perfect- I had looked all over for one that was more of a lamp plug in style but they all ran at least $50 and I was worried about would the chain be long enough to reach around and hiding the cords. This was perfect - well except it was black but a few coats of spray paint later and it was perfect!!

Now when she gets older and has more clothes we can just remove the curtain and she has the full length of the closet again for a hanging rod! Here you can see how the curtain is hiding the rod better.
Hoping this inspired you a bit~
Elizabeth

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Goodwill Chair Makeovers

I have always seen these great posts about people who find deals at Goodwill, I have been to Goodwill many times and never scored a deal..until now!! I had gone by a couple of weeks ago on a Friday and saw a dining room chair that may have worked - but it was $10 and I did not have $10 at that moment- so I walked away. I thought about that chair all weekend long...so Monday I quickly went back to the Goodwill on my lunch break! And SCORE! not only was the chair marked down to $5 but there was another one too for just $5!! I did the seat wiggle test (you know butt in chair, now wiggle to see if the legs are stable) and they both passed!! I quickly grabbed both and headed for the registers!!

I figured this one would be perfect to replace my rolling computer chair, but my daughter picked it for her dressing room instead- because it was prettier!!


So this would be my new office chair...maybe??

These sat in my garage for a few days, with my son asking daily if today would be the day we could start painting. Finally it was time- but first we needed some supplies. I had never repainted furniture before so I had no idea what to do- thankfully there were plenty of blogs out there with step by step instructions.

The first step was to sand the chairs and remove the finish already on them-we used the electric sander and I have to say it quickly removed the finish- a little too quickly in some spots!! LOL

Next up was to dust them off with a rag and prime them - we used Kilz2 water based because this was what we had leftover from painting a room earlier. You need to put on two very thin layers of primer- VERY THIN!!! My son started on the office chair and I started on my daughter's chair- I was done in 1/2 the time he took but I put mine on a bit thicker and in the end my chair had drip marks where his looked perfectly even. We waited and hour in between layers.

The next day we started on the paint- my son was really enjoying this and since I absolutely hate to paint (and his looked much better then mine) I decided to turn the project over to him. So he started painting the first layer on the office chair. We did not paint the underside of the chairs- because well no one sees them and it was easier for us to move them if we knew we had at least one spot that we could touch before it was completely dried.

2 layers of paint and 24 hours later we applied the Minwax Polycrylic water based sealant and then decided to wait another 24 hours before we brought them inside.

And here they are: I love them and think my son did an awesome job!

The office chair color is valspar liquid jade 5003-6B from Lowe's. It had a little more teal in it then I had hoped but I still found a perfect place for it! The back on it was too short to be my office chair but it found a great home at my front door by the entry table. Which just happens to be across from my office and now each time I look up from my computer I see it and it makes me smile. Look for this to show up in a post later this month when I show you my front entry Valentine's decorations.

My daughter's chair was painted Valspar Savvy Pink 1006-4B and it is perfect in her dressing room as you saw on yesterday's post!

Oh and a funny story about the paint- I am so use to only buying paint for bedrooms that I asked for a gallon of paint instead of a quart!! We barely even used any of it so I have plenty of these colors left over for future projects...unfortunately though it cost me at least twice what it should have in paint. So if you are going to paint furniture you can easily get by with a quart- maybe even just one of those sample jars depending on what you are painting!!

Inspiring you,

~Elizabeth

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Daughter's Bedroom Reveal

The time has finally come- to reveal my daughter's decorated bedroom. When we moved into this house we painted the walls yellow - her favorite color but not much else was done to it. I had plans especially for her large closet but wasn't able to put them all together until now. Thankfully Pinterest kept me busy the past couple months pinning some ideas and great inspiration. Now I think the room is perfect for her and I even find myself hanging out in it because it is so bright and happy!!

Before: As you can see the walls were painted and her new bed & nightstand were added but everything else was left over from when she was younger. She also has a playroom which is where most of her toys are....eventhough she never goes in there!! I should mention yellow was a pain to paint - there are 2 coats of primer and 3 coats of yellow on these walls!!






After:
I went with a pink, blue, and green color scheme to reflect the colors in her bedspread. I had thought about doing a vinyl cherry blossom tree but after reading the comments on it - it just sounded like it would be too difficult to put up on her walls- they aren't very smooth :(

As you can see her room gets full sun most of the day- so I added eclipse room darkening curtains in the raspberry color. It has helped alot!!

Since she is in kindergarten and they are learning to read, I wanted her to have a reading corner- my son is a bookworm- and I am hoping she will take after him and love reading. I debated on building something for her but in the end a big comfy chair was all she wanted. I love the paper lanterns above it- I had attempted the Martha Stewart pom poms but they were a total fail - luckily Hobby Lobby had these in our colors!!

I love this owl - I want him in my bedroom!! Yes, eventually I will fill the photo frame with photos!!

Her closet/dressing room- I will do a full post on this later this week on how I pulled this off- but I love it..she loves it....I am so excited about it. Her clothes and dresser are tucked in on the other end of the closet.



Since she never played in the playroom anyway I decided to clean out her toys {again} and bring them upstairs. Her barbies are tucked in a couple of these tubs as well as some more books- she has a bunch!!
The Barbie house also made it's way upstairs- not sure if it will get played with more but at least it matches the color scheme!! Oh and that armoire is full of her dress up princess dresses! I'll have a post later this week on that too!

Want a breakdown of where it came from and a few of my deals?
Armoire - found on craigslist and painted white for $20
Vanity- Target clearance $32
Vanity Chair- found at goodwill and painted pink $5
Dressing Room Curtains- Lowe's
Eclipse Room Curtains- Kohl's
Pink Disc Chair- Walmart
Green rug- Hobby Lobby
Pink/Blue/Green Accessories- Hobby Lobby
Pink Beaded Lamp- Target
Pink Silver Lamp- Lowe's
Black Chandelier painted pink over vanity- Hobby Lobby

All of this was purchased (except vanity) over the past couple of weeks so you should be able to find it in the stores now.

Would love to hear what you all think of her new room!
~Elizabeth

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Winter Wreath with Rosettes

I have had some DIY projects on my To Do List the past few days to keep us occupied during the last few days of our holiday break! One of those projects was a winter wreath to replace the christmas swag I had on my front doors- I did not want to go long without something up because we have glass front doors- and I felt it was too early for Valentine's day wreaths- although had I found 2 red berry wreaths on clearance I may have scratched this project altogether!

I had some old grapevine wreaths left over from my nest photography prop (so excuse their mishapen circle shape!!!) You can find these new at Michael's for around $5-$10 depending on size. I believe these were the 18" size which is $5. I knew I wanted to use those and some funky blue coloring for a winter wreath. I had actually purchased this blue spray paint for a project I thought I would use in my new office but never got around to it!! We have been so blessed to have very mild weather this past week- like in the 50's and 60's to complete this project!


First we spray painted it blue. I used Valspar Mediterranean gloss spray paint.

Then once it was dry- about 24 hours because we painted both sides and I did not want to take a chance that this might rub off on my front doors!! We started on the flower rosettes. I did take photos of making the rosette but I never realized how bad my hands looked close up- definitely not a hand model over here- so I will just link you to the tutorial I found on them at the end. Trust me it's in your best interest!!

The only thing I did different was at the end before I glued by final piece to the back I added a piece of fabric covered flower wire so I could twist them on the wreath - You could have hot glued them to the wreath but this sounded easier to me.

My original goal was to make 5 on each wreath but as you can see the first ones turned out a bit smaller then I had hoped so I had to add a 2nd layer to each one to make them fat enough for my wreath!! Now I will say making the rosettes was not as hard as I thought it was going to be- but it was very time consuming and tedious. I don't see many of these on my projects in the future!!!

Finally 6 rosettes and 3 days later the wreaths were done!! If I have time I may go back and make a few more for each one but probably not!! LOL

I am glad I made them- I love the grapevine wreath color but I may do something else to them besides the rosettes- thankfully since they are just attached with the floral wire I can remove them easily if I want to change things up a bit.

Sorry about the white coloring- I know it's had to see the detail on these from afar.

Here is the link for the Rosette Tutorial

Happy New Year!
~ Elizabeth

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