Family Tree

For 3 ½ years now, the large accent wall in our living room has been scantily decorated with our wedding picture. The wall needed something else (I’ve known that for 3 ½ years), but, until recently, I just wasn’t sure what.

I decided to put wedding photos of our parents and grandparents below ours. We couldn’t find wedding pictures for some of them, so we used what we could find. I was so pleased with the result – I love the history. It makes me smile :).

Here’s the before:

Before

Before
(I actually forgot to take a before picture, so I went digging through my computer for an old photo.)

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Deck the Halls!

Our Christmas tree has been up since just after Thanksgiving. Last year, my husband had the bright idea (seriously) of storing the tree, fully decorated and intact, in our basement. It took literally 3 minutes for us to ‘trim the tree’ this year – how convenient!

The rest of our house; however, was lacking the Christmas spirit. This weekend, my husband and I finally had time to do a little more decorating. Using sticks I spray painted from our yard, unused treasures in our basement, and some items from Wal-Mart, we decorated our mantel (all while listening to Christmas music). The hubby even helped! He’s such a wonderful husband :).

Though we enjoy Christmas lights, decorations, gifts, and time with family, this is not the TRUE reason for the season. Christmas is the celebration of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior’s birth. Let us not lose our focus – Jesus is the reason for the season!

(You’ll see a window picture frame in the pictures below. Click here to see the post about that project.)DSC00534 Continue reading »

DIY Bulletin Board #2

Today I finished the second bulletin board I began on the same day I completed this similar project.

My husband and I needed a place to put our lists – shopping lists, grocery lists, to-do lists, etc. Here was my solution:

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DIY Bulletin Board

I finally had some time to be creative today. I started a couple projects and actually finished one of them. Yay!

(UPDATE: I finished the second project as well! Check it out here.)

I recently revamped my office (see that whole process here, here, and here). I finished the accent wall, but had nothing on any of the other walls. Given this is an office, I thought a bulletin board would be practical. The ones you find at the store are usually plain and ugly, so I made my own!

Here are the supplies/before picture:

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Making Laundry More Bearable

Before I was married, doing laundry wasn’t fun, but it was bearable. However, after I was married, I began to DESPISE doing laundry! All of our clothes would be thrown in one, big, heaping pile or in the lone, much too small, laundry basket that would occasionally grace the laundry room floor. It was such a hassle and sooo time consuming to sort all the laundry before throwing it in the washing machine. I had to do something before I lost my mind! Continue reading »

Office Redo Part III-Accent Wall

Well, I’ve (almost) finished the accent wall of my office. I’ve been working on this redo project for months now. See Part I and II here and here. It’s taken me longer than I expected – finding time to complete all the finishing touches has been difficult.

All the décor on this accent wall, with the exception of the yellow leaves (which were originally white), was found at a thrift store/rummage sale, was given to me or was something I already had around the house. In other words, this project was cheap! Continue reading »

DIY Chalkboard

Picture frames are coming out of my ears, so I decided to get creative for my friend’s bridal shower. For her shower, I’m in charge of prizes! I’m so excited! 🙂 Using Pinterest as my inspiration, this is what I created:

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Spice Up Your Vases With Paint

This is the last in a series of three posts regarding our master bedroom decorations. To see the other parts of the project, click here (tricks for deciding décor placement) and here (making your own decorative canvases).

Originally, this is what the finished wall décor looked like:

It just didn’t seem quite finished. It was too boring and needed more color. Pinterest is always full of pins about painting your own vases, so I decided to give it a try.

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Office Redo – Part II

A couple weeks ago, I posted here about beginning my office redo project. Although I still have a long way to go, I have finished painting. Woohoo! (For some helpful painting tips, check out this post.)

Dark wall color (accent wall) = Sensual Jade
Light wall color = Madison Avenue
Both from Lowes

The plan is to put a small collage of frames on the accent wall. I’ve been playing around with layouts and think I have finally decided on one. Check back for the finished look!

Decorative Canvases for Little $$

It took me a couple years to decide what to put on our bedroom walls, but it was worth the wait! I love the decorations we have now. View this post to see the very beginnings of this project.

The REALLY good news is that this project only cost $25-$30 (That’s FOUR canvases for only $25-$30! Can you believe it?!). At department stores, I’ve see 12”x12” canvas prints cost $20 or more a piece! Mine were MUCH cheaper, not to mention, fun to make :).

Supplies

  • 12” x 12” canvas – I used 4 for this project
  • Mod Podge
  • Scrapbook paper of your choice – I used decorative paper for the face of the canvas and solid paper for the sides of the canvas
  • Paint, any color you wish – I used leftover paint I had from redoing the bedroom
  • Paper plate large enough to put a glob of paint on and to also dab your spouncer brush to remove the excess paint
  • Spouncer sponge brushes (see pic below) or just a really small regular sponge brush to use for painting the canvas edges
  • Watercolor paint brush, optional (I used this a little when painting the edges of the canvas, but it’s probably not necessary)
  • Small/medium sized sponge brush to use for the Mod Podge
  • Paper Trimmer Cutter, such as this

This was my inspiration and guide for the project, but the link doesn’t work anymore :/. I completed this project a while ago, but I think I can remember all the steps – we’ll see! Continue reading »