Big Boy Tie

My little baby turned 10 this week. Boy how time flies! So I have been making all my little guys these really fun Little Guy Ties lately. But they are the ones with the little strap that velcros behind their necks.

And I was thinking that a 10 year old might want to start wearing Big Boy Ties. SO for his birthday I made him his first real manly tie. So here it is.

And here is the man wearing it on his 10th birthday!!

Isn't he SO CUTE? And SO GROWN UP!!! I LOVE this guy!!

Happy Birthday Connor!!

Hubby's Lamp Re-Do

SO--after finishing my first lamp re-do (and loving the results), I have had my eye on this beige beauty on my hubby's side of the bed. It is the only beige thing in our all white bedroom.

I began by tracing out my lamp shade pattern on to some freezer paper (you can use any paper, but the advantage of using freezer paper is that you can iron it right on to your fabric instead of pinning it on--you do take it back off after cutting out your fabric--so don't go out and buy any--but if you have some on hand, it does make handy tracing paper).

I just started at the seam and rolled the shade along the paper--marking both the top and bottom edges until I got to the seam again. Then I connected the edges--this gave me my basic shade shape. I then added about 3/4 of an inch to both sides so I would have enough to roll over the inside edge.

Then I used the pattern I just created and cut it out of my fabric. I used SPRAY ADHESIVE and sprayed the wrong side of my fabric.

Next I started at the seam and matched up my top and bottom to where I wanted it to lay (so that I would have equal amounts on both edges to fold over to make a nice finished edge). I worked my way around the shade, pressing the fabric smooth all the way around. When I got to where I started--I folded over the edge so it looks nice and then I used a little fabric glue and glued it all the way down the seam.

Then I was ready to tackle the ends. I just ran a bead of fabric glue all the way around the edge of the shade and just a touch on the inside edge of the shade. Then I folded the fabric up and over the edge.

I also used a pin to tuck in the fabric right to the edge of the shade. This gives a really finished edge.

I then spray painted the base of the lamp white. And now--NO MORE BEIGE!!

And this is my finished project. I have to admit that it is not my favorite. I just don't care for the lamp in general--but I think this re-purposing makeover saved its life for a couple more years till I decide to replace it. I definitely am glad to see the beige gone!!

And I did it all for free since I already had all the materials on hand! So that's not bad!

Quiet Penguins

Our ward is putting together several quiet books for one of their Humanitarian Projects. I was in charge of doing these little pages. The pattern was taken from my children's very own quiet book that my dear friend Sherron made for me.

This little page has a Mamma penguin and inside the zipper is a little baby penguin. (The one Sherron made for me actually is the daddy penguin--inside is the mamma and inside her is a little egg with a baby inside the egg. SUPER CUTE--but for our purposes--one inside was plenty.)

Out with the Old

So--I have had the same old frame hanging on one of the walls of my bedroom for 7 years--and the same frame hung on the wall of our old house before that. It is one of those really boring--ho-humm multi picture frames--and not a cute one--kind of old school one. And so with no further adoo... Here it is:

Ugly. I know.

ANYWAYS, I was ready for a change. SO I went to my trusty dollar store and bought some fun frames that I liked the look of--but didn't care for the color--and SPRAY PAINTED them (and then sand papered them to make them look just a little antiqued--AND ALSO this hides the imperfections in my painting job! Nice trick). Yes--I know, I am currently having a love affair with spray paint. Then I took some cute paper and ribbon and VIOLA! Cute wall for only $3!

Lamp Re-do

SO--I have wanted a new lamp for my bed side table for a while--but didn't want to spend the $$$. SO--I found this little beauty at the Goodwill for $2.99 and thought my old shade would fit it. AND IT DID!!!

So my hunny and I sanded and spray painted it--and I recovered the old shade. I LOVE how it turned out!!! AND IT WAS SO EASY!!!

Now I have my eye on my hubby's lamp--I think it needs a re-do too!

$1 Cabinet Makeover

SO--We live in a SUPER small house. We're talking 6 of us living in 1200 square feet! Lets just say it is cozy. We have our computer AND my sewing area all in our Small Master Bedroom. Up until now I have had a tiny sewing table right next to our computer desk--and my sewing stuff stashed in any small cubby space I can find. But my awesome hunny wanted me to have a nicer space to sew and suggested we move things around to give me more space, AND he wanted to buy me a cabinet to house all my sewing stuff. So the project begins!


We decided to check out our local RE-Store (Like a Good Will for home improvement stuff) and we came across and awesome find! A small two door cabinet for only $1!!! All of the other cabinets were $20--but for some reason this one was ONLY A BUCK!!! I'm sorry I don't have a before picture of it. It was brown and ugly and the sides of it were un-finished. BUT it had potential.


SO we took it home and my hunny painted it white for me and added cork (from an old cork board that we already had) to both the unfinished edges so that it became a cork board for me to hang patterns and stuff while I am working on them! Here is as close to a before picture as I have:















Then I used my 50% off coupon at Joann's and SPLURGED on this thread holder ($7.50):

















Which we then painted white and hung on the wall which is SUPER functional and REALLY pretty too!















Then I found a great blue wicker basket at Joann's that was already 50% off and it was a little damaged so they gave me an additional 10% off and so it only came to around $5.75.


THEN the dollar store came thru for me for the additional side baskets that I put on top of the cabinet. AND while I was at that same awesome dollar store--I happened upon the most awesome baskets for the INSIDE of my cabinet! FOR ONLY A DOLLAR EACH!!! AND they MATCHED EVERYTHING!!! It was meant to be!!


So adding up all the spray paint and EVERYTHING--I spent under $25 for the most AWESOME sewing area ever!!!

And Ta Da.....(drum roll please).... Here it is all together:

Let the sewing BEGIN!

Bye Bye Brass

What a busy weekend we have had!! My little hubby gets a GOLD star (or maybe it should be a white star) for all his hard work this weekend!

I am on a rampage to get rid of all the brass in our house. Our has has brass fixtures EVERYWHERE!! And I have hated them for 7 years!! Then I was inspired by the ladies over at Enchantresses3, who have transformed their homes using SPRAY PAINT. So I figured if they could do it--then SO CAN I!!

So therefore, this weekend my before mentioned AWESOME husband, took down ALL our fixtures (we're talking all the lights, towel bars, TP holders, curtain rods, etc. etc.) and spray painted them!! AND I NO LONGER HAVE BRASS FIXTURES!!! I have the look of all new fixtures for around $8 (the cost of a can of spray primer and paint). I am one happy woman!!

So here are some of the before pictures:

(And really the pictures don't do this makeover justice!)

And I was only able to get a shot of one of the towel bars because my hunny was so on the ball and took them apart faster than I could get the pictures taken--but just know that all the hand towels and TP holders looked just the same as this super attractive towel bar!

And here are the after pictures:

Let me just say again--I am ONE HAPPY WOMAN!!!

And that is not all my hubby did for me...Oh no! That is not all!

Spring Dress

So--I was looking online at all the fun crafts and sewing projects that people have done and found THIS fun idea for a pillowcase dress at one of my favorite places (Little Birdie Secrets). I liked the simpleness of the project and had some fun spring fabric--so I made it up into this cute little spring dress for my Nicole!

I love how it turned out!!

Nicole liked it too!

Ceiling Light Remodel

SO--our house has the UGLIEST lights ever!!! Actually all the fixtures in our house are really outdated. The people that lived here before us (and built the house) LOVED BRASS FIXTURES (and blue carpet--but we can't do anything about that right now--so lets stick with the fixtures shall we?) ANYWAYS, this is a picture of the ceiling lights that are found in all the bedrooms.

Isn't it attractive on SO many levels? Yes, I know--its bad. WELL, we were at our local Re-Store (which is like a Good Will for home improvement stuff) and we saw a new fixture for super cheap. Its nothing fancy but we swiped it up and spray painted it white and hung it in our room!!

AND I am so happy to be done with the ugly brass guy!!

Isn't it better?

Now we only need to go find 2 more for the other bedrooms and about 10 more for the bathrooms, hallways, and other areas in our house!!

Boy Shirt Onesie Remodel

A friend gave me a bunch of little guys shirts that had the onesie closure on the bottom. My little man is 21 months now--and kind of growing out of the onesie look on his shirts--SO I decided to chop off the bottoms and make them into regular shirts.

I was planning on hemming them up all nice--but soon found that made for very short shirts. SO instead what I did was just serge the bottom edge with a nice edging (like what you see on napkins or table cloths--you know what I mean?). I think they turned out great! They made these shirts into usable play shirts for my little man! I didn't end up doing ALL of the shirts as I found a few stains on a couple of them. But here are few of the ones that worked great!

Reversible Headbands

I saw these Headbands at the Long Thread and decided immediately that I had to make some for Me and Nicole! I love them!!

**Just a side note: If you are going to make them--use the pattern from the Long Thread--but don't follow the instructions--I thought they made it way to complicated! Just sew around the edges of the interfaced fabric pieces (with right sides together) and then turn it inside out and topstitch around it and add your elastic then) MUCH EASIER.

SO I went to the dollar store and got an 8 pack of head band elastics (for $1)--then sorted through my old scraps of fabric, added a little interfacing

and VIOLA!

Cutie Patootie Headbands that cost almost next to nothing. One elastic out of the 8 pack makes 2 headbands (You just cut them in half and sew each end into the edges of the headband--Which means you can make 16 headbands out of your old scraps for $1).

Even I wear them and LOVE THEM!!

The two smaller ones are Nicole's size and the middle one is the "adult" size--but I wear her little ones too and they look just fine!

I finished sewing them and asked Nicole if she would model so I could take this picture--but she was in the middle of playing with a friend--so she is not looking to impressed in these pictures. But you get the idea!

$1 Chair Make Over

OK--a friend of mine just opened a Dollar Thrift Store. So I went on opening day and found these little beauties for $1 a piece. Yes you heard me--ONLY A BUCK A PIECE!!!

As you can tell they were horribly stained but had really good bones! So I staple gunned some batting to them and then reupholstered them. The seats just came off and so those were easy to recover--but the seat backs were kind of tricky--I ended up sewing a slip cover for them and then securing it to the bottom side of the seat back with staples.

I am SO HAPPY with how they came out--and they look SO MUCH BETTER than the old card table chairs that sat there before.

I am Linking up to:

Re-Purposing Shirt Dress

OK--so a couple years ago--I had this awesome idea to make belly bands for ladies to wear when they were pregnant. I love those things! Well--lets just say that some of my prototypes worked--and others did not. SO out of the ones that did not, I was left with several tubes of fabric in different colors--that weren't big enough to do much with--but were too big to just throw out. SO they have been sitting in my closet for some time--UNTIL I figured out what to do with them....

The Tubes:

What to do with them:

I wanted to keep some of seams with the serged finish on the outside of the dress for a fun casual look. I think it turned out really cute. Its not quite a dress--and not quite a shirt. So its a shirt dress--to be worn with leggings underneath. Cute, Cute, Cute!

Nicole in her new outfit. It looks a lot cuter when she stands like a normal person instead of the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Dress turned Skirt

I have been SO IMPRESSED with all the Re-Purposing going on out there in blogger-ville!! I have loved all the ideas of turning that old thing into this awesome new and improved thing!!

I LOVE IT!!!

SO I have been searching my house over--trying to discover hidden gems within my own walls! And before ANYTHING gets thrown out--we are seeing if there is any old life in it left!

So here is one of my finds!

This was a little jumper dress that was getting too small for Nicole. SO I just cut the bodice part off and then sewed a casing and inserted some elastic into the bottom half--and now it is a super cute skirt! YAY!!!

Before:

After: