Making use of your unused space

I don't know if it is a case of spring fever, or nesting before my upcoming knee surgery, maybe a little of both, but today I was just doing some plain old house cleaning, and started cleaning out Zach closet & got rid of the clothes that he has out grown and that turned into all of the upstairs closets, and laundry room. We got rid of a ton of junk! Then I thought today would be a great day to get that window seat done that I have been thinking about! This is where our old front door was, and when we put on the addition to our house it became this little nook, ok, now it's a nook, before it was a bit of a junk room with no real purpose!
Mike built the seat for me, I just give him "my vision" and he gets to work! We used an old door, just cut it to fit in the space that was already there. he used the edge that he cut off as the front. I made the cushion & pillows with some fabric that I had in my little "stash". My first attempt at a square edged cushion, and it didn't turn out too bad! I then decided that the cabinet in there needed a fresh coat of paint and glaze! I sprayed the hardware with some paint, and then painted all the accents in the room to match. Most of what I had in there was oak, and that is just not the look I am really going for. I love spray paint!
I made this sweet little bird, added some pinecones from around the house and this shelf finally looks cute!

This is the back side of my french doors I re-did last month! As you can see my boys are enjoying them!


All the frames are from the dollar store, I bought them a while ago. I just gave the a coat of paint and glaze!

Now take a good look at these cabinets and just think of an entire kitchen like this...It's gonna happen, soon! :)

No more Block Envy

I have had a serious case of "block envy" for the last few months ever since we went to the Cranberry fest and my SIL picked up this really cute set of calendar blocks. But today I finally am over it because I made a set of my own! Here is how I made them! You will need 2 blocks of unfinished wood 3 1/2 x 3 1/2 x 3 1/2. You will also need 3 blocks that are 7 inches long x 1 1/2 high.

*Paint *Glaze and brushes *Sandpaper *Cardstock *Removable spray adhesive

I used my Cricut machine and card stock to make the letter and number stencils. Had to play around to find the font that I liked the best, I ended up using Base Camp. I cut out each month, and numbers 0-9.
Paint the blocks, I used Rustoleum 2x coverage to paint all sides and ends of the blocks. Let dry. I cut out my months while the paint was drying. Then once the paint is dry, sand all edges with sandpaper or a palm sander.Spray the back of the cardstock with removable spray tack, don't use a permanent bond! Use an acrylic paint and a stencil brush to paint on your months on the 7 inch blocks 1st block is Jan, feb, march, april, and so one to the other 2 blocks! and numbers on the blocks that are square. Block 1 you will need numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 5 & 6 Block 2 needs to be 0, 1, 2, 4, 7, & 8 Make sure you choose a font that the 6 & 9 are interchangeable! Let paint dry.
Once they are dry to the touch, I added a coat of Ralph Lauren smoke glaze, brush on, wipe off. And you are done!

The best thing about this style of calendar blocks is that they can be used forever! No year, so the never "expire"!




You can even stand them upright for an entirely different look!

Enjoy! I know my kids are going to love playing with these! Great for math projects too! I may just post a few of these in my store!

Natures Beauty

I woke up to the most beautiful snow today! It has been right around 30 out, so the snow is thick and heavy and the trees were just covered, I couldn't help but grab my camera and head out! I haven't gone out take many lately and I am glad I finally did today! It is a perfect winter day!
Happy Sunday!

The accidental Bedroom remodel

I swear I had no intention of completely re-decorating my bedroom. I had this dresser (isn't that the way it always starts?) It was old, ugly and I hated looking at it every day. So after diner I decided to re-paint it. It would be an hour long project, no big deal right? Zach was eager to help me with my project!Well as I was painting I also started thinking...that's when it started. I was thinking that not one piece of my bedroom furniture matched, and that was because none of it was from the same place. My big dresser was my mom's, the headboard was old and very out dated, the other dresser came from the side of the road, and so on. The majority of it was white or cream. So I started with the ugly dresser, and made a shade of cream from three different shades I had around the house. The next step was to sand, and then glaze with my new favorite Ralph Lauren glaze! Then I decided to sand and glaze EVERYTHING!The dresser of my mom's was already cream and had silver hardware that I just replaced a few years ago, so I was not about to go get new hardware, in fact I was not going to spend a penny on this re-do. I just used some spray paint, and voila! They were now a nice shade of espresso! I found an old door in the garage that I painted with the same cream from the dresser, sanded and glazed as well. Why quite while I was ahead, I also sanded and glazed the nightstands, the picture frames and a couple of old windows I also had in the garage.It has now been almost 24 hours since I started to paint this dresser, I did sleep for about 7 hours, but otherwise I have been working non-stop! Now keep in mind, my room was not even in bad shape, in fact I just posted about it not so long ago HERE, but take a look at my before and see if you can notice all of the things I found a way to re-use! Here is the finished project! I must say I love it even more! I was able to re-purpose a ton of stuff, use what I already had, and give my room a brand new look for, yup you guessed it $0!!!!

Try to ignore the white patches on the walls, just waiting for the Spackle to dry from where we had to fill all the old nail holes! Then I can do a little touch up painting!
I love how this head board turned out! And the photos above it, were 11 x 14 photos that I wasn't really happy with, so I did some editing, printed them out on my own computer 81/2 x 11, and made mats out of scrapbook paper.

The numbers are from my cricut, just use vinyl and that's it! More cricut vinyl on the wondow below too! SO after I did the words for this I realized that I spelled fairytale wrong, but I am out of white vinyl! LOL!
Do you recognize the mirror from the old post?? What about these candles...
I must say, Thank you road side dresser, I have now transformed my entire room thanks to you! Take note - that Scentsy pot on the dresser, currently melting cinnamon vanilla, my room also smells heavenly!