Tuesday, February 18, 2014

DIY Steal

As I mentioned before I have a love for home decor. It is more like an obsession, it should be illegal. I am always checking out people's decor from pictures they randomly take at their house.

So one day, I was casually scrolling through my Instagram feed and I came across a picture from Jefferson Bethke's profile. I noticed this on their end table:

(Isn't his wife beautiful?) Any who, you see that tiny picture frame with the initial B? I fell in love. I wanted to recreate it with our initial, R. (Is it weird that I spotted the tiniest thing in the picture?)

I began my search for a frame at thrift stores and I found this one at Goodwill a few weeks ago.

I really didn't care for the picture inside. I was looking at the perfect square shape of the frame plus the frame was previously painted a gold color. At first the paint job looked good but once I further inspected it at home, it was a sloppy job. I am leaving the paint for now but I plan to try out gold leaf on it in the future. I will post about that once I actually get to it.

UPDATE: You can read about my experience with liquid leaf here.

Back to the inspiration picture.

I wanted to recreate the picture with burlap but didn't have any on hand so I went through the craft paper I had. I found a textured brown paper from my Thanksgiving banner I made and figured it would work. While I scrambled through my craft stuff, guess what I found? BURLAP!!

I gathered everything together and started to get to work on it.

This project cost me two dollars total (only the frame). I had all other supplies on hand from previous projects. Once I buy gold leaf, the project price will go up by a few dollars but that is nothing. I feel like I practically stole this for how beautiful it turned out with such a cheap overall price.

Do you find inspiration from social media? Am I the only creeper who notices the littlest of things? Do you love a good DIY steal?

I am linking up with A Wise Woman Builds Her Home.

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stormieariel

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Monday, February 17, 2014

Home

Home Sweet Home

Posted by stormieariel

About a year and a half ago, we bought our first home. It wasn't new but it wasn't a fixer upper either. It was built in the 1980's and the previous owners did the very minimum in keeping up with it so it was move in ready when we bought it.

I was so excited about the new house that I forced my husband to throw our queen pillow top mattress on the roof of my car so we can start sleeping at the house. (We still had a month left in our apartment lease but I just couldn't wait any longer).

Almost immediately, we had my father-in-law and my husband's uncle assist my husband in painting the master bedroom and our living/dining area. It wasn't perfect but it made the place feel more homey. (Is that a word?)

Anyways.

After painting, we began moving our furniture into the house which included our bedroom set and a breakfast table. We bought a new sectional and added family pieces such as a coffee table, buffet table, end table, entry table, and a silver chest all handed down from my grandmother.

A year passed and I still felt something was missing. I hadn't hung much on the walls since I wasn't sure what I wanted to do exactly so I started to play around with ideas in my head and would often search Pinterest for inspiration.

This is where my new passion began.

Over the past few months, I have been adding little things here and there to make our home feel more like us.

The rooms that get my attention the most is the living and dining area and occasionally our master bedroom.

The guest room has only seen paint and complete closet renovation but still needs work. The mini entry way only has a nice rug and my silver chest but it needs some loving. The side and back yard also needs attention and I want to give the laundry nook some TLC.

Here are a few pictures of what our house looked like before moving in.

These pictures are of our living room,

dining room and the entry way before moving in.

The beige walls were painted yellow.

The kitchen wall color is the same but I have dreams of painting it grey.

I have only decorated above the cabinets. Maybe I will do a short post on it in the future.

Archway leading to the bedrooms and restroom (the wall colors are now yellow here as well).

The shower wall now has new tile but I have so much more changes to make in here.

Picture angle sucks but this is our master bedroom.

We painted the walls a dark red, the ceiling and window seat remained white.

We also created a custom closet in here (I don't have a before picture).

The guest bedroom is still a work in progress.

We just painted the walls beige a few weeks ago and redid the entire closet

but haven't made anymore progress.

I will start posting more on these rooms individually while I make progress in them. Stay tuned!!

Where do you begin when it comes to decor? How do you pull a room together to give it a finished look? What are your favorite decor items?

I am sharing this post with A Wise Woman Builds Her Home.

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stormieariel

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Saturday, February 15, 2014

Smell the Roses

Posted by stormieariel

A few days before Valentine’s Day, Anthony and I sat down to look at our finances. We have started seriously budgeting and wanted to be sure to stick with it even with this holiday approaching.

After bills were paid and savings set aside, we did not want this holiday to leave us broke for an entire week so we gave ourselves a tinsy budget. I told Anthony I didn’t need the expensive things to make me happy. I just wanted a nice dinner with him, roses and to have fun. I would rather collect memories with him than things.

Don’t get me wrong, things are nice to have but aren’t an essential. By finally getting serious about budgeting and reading some amazing blogs about thriftiness, I have a new take on things. I don’t want to worry about obtaining the newest thing.

I want to enjoy the time I have with my husband.

I want to create memories with him (sometimes that is hitting the thrift stores or the golf course or just staying home watching netflix).

I’m not perfect and sometimes I (ahem) whine when I don’t get what I want. Having stopped to smell the roses, I realize grass isn’t always greener on the other side (haha I used two cliché phrases in one sentence). This new time set aside for budgeting each week has created a stronger bond in our marriage. It is quality time well spent where we talk about our dreams and goals. I look forward to more of these moments of budgeting, laughing, and dreaming together.

Have you smelled the roses lately? Do you budget? What is your take on budgeting?

I am linking up with A Wise Woman Builds Her Home and Yes, They Are All Ours.

P.S. I am making progress on one of my many projects, here is a sneak peak.