Stuck on Stickers!!!

Help!!! I am totally stuck on stickers!!! Actually, I love it! Oh, and I think I have got it all out of my system! (only time will tell!) After doing this to my baby's room, I realized that Target had safari "stickers" in the clearance aisle, so I ran over and scooped them up! Now, that blank spot over the changing table where you don't want to put something up that will fall down, looks like this...
Love it! Actually, I hated it when I was doing it. It was hard for me to get the stickers off and onto the wall without being harmed (the stickers, not me!), and I was anxious over not having a plan or diagram for where to place them, but I love it more every time I see it! And when now entering the room, it is necessary to yell "monkey" and make monkey noises! Fun!
Another item in the clearance aisle made me think of this...

I bought this plate a few weeks ago at a discount store. Love it! At $2 you can't go wrong, but I felt like it needed something. I was going to stamp it, which I had read about on other blogs, but Target had "stickers" on sale...so, $4 later and now it looks like this...

Much better! And, if that is not enough Target clearance aisle decorating for you, I also stumbled upon these...

I don't think you can tell, but it is a set of three mirrors. I could not believe the price and so I snapped them up without really thinking about where I was going to put them. (you can always return things right?) Well, my husband walked in the door and was amazed at how much bigger they make the room look, I realized that I had just the perfect spot for them, (right at the door so you can check your lipstick before leaving the house--very important!) and I love them more every time I see them too! So, welcome home mirrors! There is just one problem...see the lamp...yeah, I know. It's too big now. Yep. And, see all the darkness...ah ha...not a color in sight. You know what that means...more shopping...and more decorating! (I'm all broken up about that. =) My poor husband!!!

ps--I just realized, the candlestick is also a Target clearance item purchase! I do love Target for decorating! Big plans for that little love...big, big plans (for me anyway)...I'll let you in on it someday!

Creative Couponing!

I love coupons!!! I love couponing!!! I have to admit that I have become a coupon snob, and if I leave the store without having saved at least $30 I am very depressed! However, I hate coupon organizers. I love filing coupons, so I started with this organizer...

I use one for food items and one for 'drug' items. It is a nice holder, but a few things about it really bugged me. Small things really...you have to fold a double coupon in half in order for it to fit and when you get wide coupons they hide the category title making it hard to file coupons away. Luckily, fate--in the form of my cutie-pie eating machine called a dog--intervened and I was down an organizer. What to do? Well, dust off my sewing machine and try to put one together myself. Here's the result...

I love it! I used the one I have as a model, found fabric remnants at WalMart, put some interfacing between them to make it a bit stiffer, and sewed them together with bias tape. It was so easy and a great beginners project! This is the first completed sewing project that my machine has seen, so I am quite proud, and don't even care about the little imperfections that are there. Oh, and it only took an hour and a half!

I made the dividers from file folders by cutting them and extra half inch wide and then cutting out the tabs. I have a new favorite tool--a corner rounder--that made things all pretty, and I am in business! It is so easy to file away my coupons now, and the pride that comes from being able to use something that I made is incredible!

Sewing, it works for me!!! Well, I should be paying bills right now--or sleeping--so I leave you with one more look...

and an encouragement: if you have something boring to do and you would like a tool of procrastination go over to weareTHATfamily.com and check out this weeks "Works for Me Wednesday" there are always tons of great tips and they are worthy of a good hour or two of "productive" procrastination!!!

Progress!

As my toddler turns into a pre-schooler, I started thinking about re-decorating his room, getting a big boy bed, etc. As we are big fans of the alphabet song right now, I thought it would be fun to create a chair rail boarder with the alphabet. I was thinking of cutting the letters out of wallpaper so that they would be colorful, and have different patterns on them, but fate decided to decorate for me! I happened upon some Alphabet wall "stickers" at Kmart for $3 and could not turn it down! Here's what the room looked like before...

Boring, right? Here is the after...

I can not believe how cute it is, or how easy and fast it was to do! And my son loves it! He goes over to the wall now, pointing to the letters and singing the ABCs! Cute and educational! Love it!

Of course, you know what that means now right? There is a big, sad, empty space over the changing table....I think Target has some Safari "stickers" on clearance....I guess I'll see you later! =)

How Ya Doin'?

So, how are you doing?
I mean you. How are you doing? Do you even know?

I have been lost in blog-land. Too many blogs, not enough time. Plus, there is a tasty bit of gossip playing out in the blogs right now...if you like gossip...I read blogs (well, most of them) because I find that they energize me. The colors, the pictures, the ideas, the money saving tips. All are fabulous and I have found that they help keep the fire under me lit. I totally scored in a purchase today--it was an idea that I saw and liked on a blog. I made my own chicken stock last week--another idea I got from a blog. I am totally recovering my dinning chairs with a vinyl table cloth--at least until I no longer have toddlers! This idea came to me because my creative brain has been sparked by blogs. I love blogs! I love reading blogs! But even though I get more creative "fire" from blogs, I realized lately that there are other things that keep my fire burning that are just as important that I have been neglecting--journaling, praying, reading Scripture, walking, laughing with my family, talking with loved ones--all these things are vital to my life. My passion for my home has been awakened by the blogs, but I have a tendancy to put all my eggs in one basket, and as strong as my fire is right now, I have to say that my little voice has become very hard to hear.

So, how are you doing?

Because reading other people's words, seeing other people's homes, agreeing with other people's ideas is one thing, but your little voice is more important and I have been shutting mine out. I blame her. She is saying things I don't want to hear--that project looks fun, but save your money instead; wait, it's not time yet; go slow, focus on what you already have; your time will come but its not here yet...
Tomorrow is my birthday. It's a big one. And my little voice is using this special event to wake my brain up and remind me that she is still there and she is smarter then all the rest.
(Oh, and thanks for asking...I'm going to be 28...for a while, I think!)

Maybe you are like me. Maybe your little voice has grown distant. What can you do to reconnect? Because blog friends are great and inspiring, but your little voice is the friend that will always be there waiting for you.

Tomorrow I am going to celebrate. I am going to celebrate one more year of life. I am going to celebrate another opportunity to be alive, to make an impact, and give love away. I am going to celebrate my little voice--the person that I am--by taking some time out of the day to focus on her. After all, we capitalize the word "I" because it is important. And the next time I sit down at my computer to go into blog-land, I think I will start with my own blog first!

ps--I find gossip tastes sour after a while anyway...

Life...

Life is not filled with coincidences, but moments orchestrated by God. Grab at those moments, linger in those moments, and you will be lingering with Him.

Project Procrastination Party--The End!!!

Well, I tried to 'harvest' worms last night by laying wet pieces of cardboard on the ground. Nope, no dice. I am sure that the fact that my lawn is dead has nothing to do with it, and don't want to know what this says about my soil! =/

Anyway, a trip to the bait shop, and three dollars later and we are in business!

Then all I had to do was put it together.

The lid without holes goes on the bottom, and I put two big bricks on that to lift the composter off the ground. Then, one tub in which I put four small bricks at each corner. The other tub goes on top of that. I got my newspaper nice and wet, rung the extra water out, put that in the tub with a bunch of old leaves, some dirt, and my new friends! I buried some food for them under all the newspaper, covered it all with some wet cardboard and put the lid on.

Now, I am not a worm person, but I am fasinated by this, and wish that the sides were glass like an ant farm so that I could watch them do their thing. (but not really, cuz the bin has to be dark for them). Anyway, in about three months I should have compost so stay tuned! That is, as long as my crazy dog doesn't eat the whole thing, which might happen, we'll see!

It will be nice to go to bed tonight with a "project complete" thought running through my head.

If only I can now fix my sprinkler cover! Tomorrow....

Project Procrastination Party--The After: Part One

Well, hard to believe, but two weeks have past since I joined up with Melissa's Procrastination Party at The Inspired Room, and I have no idea where the time went! Oh, okay, maybe I do...I spent most of it here:

I found book one and two at the thrift store down the street for two dollars and am hooked! I am at the end of the second one and anxiously waiting to see how Father Tim proposes to Cynthia and am going to pay another visit to the thrift store to see if they have the third one, you never know, I may get lucky.

I have not forgotten about my projects (the sprinker cover and composter) and am happy to report that my composter is nearly finished. All I need is worms! (more on that below). My cover, however, is another story and has me learning a lot about how wood splits when you drill into it, how hard wood is very difficult to work with, and how buying a trim piece to nail on as a side was not really the best decision! We'll make a trip to the hardware store this weekend, so be on the look out for this project in the near future. In the meantime, here is all you wanted to know about an easy composter:

I got this idea from a local Parenting magizine around Earth Day, and thought that it would be fun to try. While we don't really have a lawn or a garden right now (ha!) I plan to in the future and would love to add my own compost to the mix. While getting started, I found better plans here, and those are the directions I am following to make it. I bought two 18 gallon bins from Target. To these bins, I drilled 20 holes in the bottom of each (1/4 in), about thirty holes along the sides of each bin (1/16in), and then thirty holes on one top (1/16in). I then shreaded a bunch of newspaper in preparation for my worms.

I could go to the bait shop and buy worms, but the instructions say that if you leave a wet piece of cardboard on the ground overnight, you will have worms in the morning as they come out to feast on the cardboard, so I am going to try that. I'll tell you how it works tomorrow!

Until then, I have two more chapters left and then I'm off shopping!!!


Congratulations on everyone who finished their projects, to see more and to be really inspired to create or finish a project of your own, head over to theinspiredroom.net and thanks Melissa for hosting this and encouraging us to get something done!

Update: It's finished!!!! Click here to see...