Fresh Flowers

I picked these lilacs at my parents house. I’ve been loving the smell all day! I hope the neighbors won’t mind me stealing some lilacs off their bush too!

Faux Mudroom

Once again my house is small so I have to do without a lot of the "luxuries" that many of you have. I'm very jealous of all of you that have a mudroom! Alas, I had to make do with what I have and created a "faux mudroom"

The idea started when I bought this buckboard bench at AC Moore. I got a really good deal on it. At the time I bought it they had a 50% off 2 items coupon. The way the coupon worked was that they took 50% off the highest priced item and then 50% off the next highest priced item. They took the discount off the bench and then it was still the highest priced item so their register took the discount off the bench again, so I got a $100 bench for $25!

Then I found this coat rack at an unfinished wood store for $80 and used a 20% off coupon.

One step of this process was to finally get rid of the bead board to nowhere. I have no idea why it just stopped but it has been driving me crazy. I've tried many things to cover it up but nothing seemed to work in that space. So I started by cutting into the railing where I wanted it to stop and prying it off. Then I covered it all up with the venetian plaster that I had originally put on the walls (I don't know why I didn't think about doing this when I had worked on the walls in the first place).

Then I added beadboard and some moulding and gave everything a coat of my leftover black cabinet paint.

I got the bins at Ikea this past weekend. (the camera is crooked not the shelf)

 

I’m looking for locker baskets for these three spots.

We’re eventually getting new countertops and they are going to extend a little longer than they do now so I left a little of the railing up to stop where the new countertop will stop which will be even with the upper cabinet.

Head over to Between Naps On The Porch for some more before/after projects.

A 5 Min. Makeover

My sister has one of those machines that makes the wall decals…I am sooo jealous. It would probably be a really bad thing if I had my own though (walls covered with decals from floor to ceiling.) So for now I’ll just give her my list…

(notice the ugly wallpaper that has yet to be taken care of!)

This is my headboard. I’ve had it for over 10 years and got it free when I saw it sitting in the basement of the house my father-in-law moved into. It’s been painted many times and many colors but I’ve settled on black for awhile now and I think the black is going to stay. It has a raised medallion in the center and since I love monograms and decals I had my sister make me a “B” for the center.

Instant Project

I love when things are easy! I found a bag of old wooden spools at a consignment store for $10 and these two were perfect for candle holders. No need to do anything!

Check out Thift Store Thursday over at Homebody Holly for more ideas.

 And Thifty Thursday at Bloggeritaville.

Back To Business

I guess I’ve taken a long enough break from home projects and should get back to it…

I’m in the process of making new curtains for my dining room so I ran to Wal-Mart today to get some cheap fabric to line them. Well, it ended up being cheaper than I thought. As the woman was cutting it she told me that all the by the yard fabrics and trims were 50% off because all Wal-Marts are closing their fabric departments. By the middle of June they hope to be closed so go through your project lists and stock up now!

I picked up this burlap to make a cheaper version of those grain sack memo boards. It’s $1.23 a yard now.

I also got the webbing that I think I’m going to put on the memo board  or make one of those french memory boards with it. It was only $.32 a yard. I think I’m going to pick up some more. I think it would also look neat as trim on some of those drop cloth drapes.