A room to grow in...

If you don't already know this, my kids share a room. Yes, we have enough rooms in the house that they could have their own. Yes, they are different genders. Yes, my son is almost 8. But also..... yes, they have grown much closer in their relationship since they share a room. Yes, I think sharing a space is a great thing for kids to do and to learn from. Yes, I will continue to have them share a room for at least a couple more years.
All that said, their room needed to "grow up" a bit. It was done in a "wheat" color on top and a dark brown on the bottom...in between was a jungle animal wall-paper border. It was cute. Their room was ok. The colors all went together, there was a theme, it worked.
But now we are changing it all! (and I am lovin' it!)

First I knew the wall paper border had to come down.

I was worried it wouldn't be easy to do. My worrying was pointless because it was a BREEZE! Georgia and I first sprayed the border (we used a mixture of warm water and Palmolive dish soap).

Then we peeled off what we could...mainly the top layer.

Then we sprayed what was left, the bottom layer.

We let that sit for MAYBE 3 minutes (we would play I Spy or sing a couple of songs) and then we scraped it off! We used my Pampered Chef pan scraper and it worked like a charm!

The stuff literally just came right off! Big easy pieces, in no time at all. It was wonderful! We did the entire room in less than 50 minutes!

Next I decided to go from bunk beds to twin beds.
I didn't want to spend the money on twin beds. I thought about just buying the basic metal frames...but then I would have to buy box springs. I went back and forth for a couple of days (which is a LONG time for me to decide something...I am usually a very quick decision maker) and then decided to go for it! How hard could it be?

First Georgia and I took the parts off of the bunk bed that I knew we wouldn't need anymore. These were pieces like the steps for the ladder, side beams, etc.

Then I measured and marked where all of the cuts would need to be. I marked all the way around the post (a friend of mine suggested that).

Then it was time to do the cutting. I was again worried that this would be hard.
Well, turns out...it wasn't hard at all!
Of course I actually didn't have to do the cutting, a friend of mine offered to come do it for me. (don't ya' just love gentlemen!)
First we tried a circular saw. It wouldn't hold a charge.

So then he decided to just try a hand saw~worked great!

He got the whole thing done in about 15 minutes! YEA YEA YEA!

Then I grabbed the hand sander and sanded the newly cut tops. It made a huge difference!

So now we have two twin beds that I am purchasing new bedding for. Then the walls will get painted and then bead board will go up! After that comes even more fun~decorating! WOOHOO!

Stay tuned for further updates as this project continues.
:0)

Read More 0 comments | Posted by cajungal01

I am SOOO excited about this project!

Hi!
Ok, so I'm pretty new to the world of crafting. Really new to crafting and blogging. I am completely addicted though and check out a variety (a LOT) of crafting blogs DAILY to inspire me.

This project is the first one that I didn't get from anywhere else. I have never seen it done (ok, if it's "out there" somewhere, please don't show me or tell me!) and was so excited that I came up with it AND actually did it!

So, here it goes...

my one-of-a-kind SIGN MADE FROM A FAN!

Once you get into crafting nothing, i mean NOTHING, in your house is trash again! I WAS the queen of just giving things away when I was finished with them...well, I may never be "finished" with something again!

We took down an inexpensive fan that was in our guest room that we didn't care for anymore and were finally upgrading.

Normally my prior-to-crafting-addiction self would have put it out to the curb free for someone to take or saved for my next garage sale and tried to get a couple bucks for.
But NOW I saw potential.
That's WOOD (well, really just particle board I think...I did say it was an INexpensive fan) that could be used for SOMETHING!

an idea came to mind...
and I did it!

Here we go (for real this time)

I took the fan blades completely off the fan.
Gave them a light sanding. Just enough to rough it up to make painting more efficient.

Then I knew I'd have to do something about the holes. I thought about using them as part of the decoration...maybe running ribbons through them...decided not to. So I filled them with spackling.

(this is just the spackling I already had on hand..you can probably use a variety of things for this step!)
Let that dry really well.

Then I painted them black with a mini-roller. (sorry no photos of this part..I'm new to this!) :0)
After painting them I knew I'd have to figure out how to get them to stick all together.... dum dum dum dum (trumpet blaring tune...maybe even a drum roll...!)... paint sticks! I am ALL about trying to use as many materials that I can get for FREE that I can. So I got a few paint stirrer sticks and glued them to the backs of the blades. (again, no photo BUT I can take one soon!) I used 4 sticks.
Once that dried (I used bricks to weigh them down and make sure they were stuck-fast!)
I set out to use my Silhouette to make the letters.

Here it is with the words all on it:

Don't you love what I decided to "write" on it?! I LOOOOOVE sweet tea and since this is for my guest room, I wanted to incorporate "family" and "friends" into the sign. :0) And what I "wrote" is TRUE for me too!

Here are close ups of some of the papers... the colors are really hard to tell...

then I knew it needed more so I made my first attempt at fabric rosettes. I've been seeing them all over blogworld so I gave them a try and they really were as easy as everyone says they are! YEA! I cut up some of my daughter's shirts and a pair of pants that she has outgrown (they were actually already bagged up in the garage to take to GoodWill!) . :0)

Then I needed a way to hang it. I used the little ruffle from the bottom of the same pair of my daughter's old pants! Just cut it off and hot glued it to the back of the top blade! WOOHOO!

The last step was to distress it a little to just rough it up a bit...so I lightly sanded the edges of everything. (please forgive my horrible photos...I had no idea how blurry these were until now!)

And here it is again:

BEFORE:

and AFTER:

Thanks for looking!

I posted this on:

Read More 18 comments | Posted by cajungal01

Like it....LOVE it!

I've always wanted to make some terrariums to have around my house. I absolutely LOVE having live plants. The problem is...I'm not so good at maintaining them. I do OK...I've had some for MANY years (seriously, I had a peace lily and some ivy for 9 years so that's not too bad!) but usually they have to be extremely resilient (such as previously mentioned types).

I wanted to give it a try though...so I did.
Here they are!
I used two containers that I already had in my house and then the third is a votive from the Wal Mart and a base from the dollar store that I glued together! What do you think?

This photo shows them done simply and cute. I really liked them!

But then I decided to use my handy Silhouette SD, some paper, and some ribbon I already had in my craft stash to make some labels.
NOW...I LOVE them!

fun huh?

I posted this on:

Read More 2 comments | Posted by cajungal01

A better way to tell time!

This is my first time posting a craft that I've done and I KNOW there will be many more to follow! I am super excited about all that I have been working on and have on my project lists! YEA!

This one is not my own idea, I saw it here and loved it! (BTW, ALL of her ideas are amazing and I am constantly getting ideas from her! She's fabulous!) I have a clock much like hers that I just wasn't thrilled with. I have been trying to incorporate some more color into my kitchen and decided this was a perfect way to do that! SO...here we go...

This is the original clock. I think it's fine but I mainly bought it because it was red and round. Two things I wanted to incorporate into my decor on top of my kitchen cabinets.

I grabbed a BUNCH of paint chips from WalMart. These paint chips are the large ones of one color (obviously...but on the site I referred you to,she uses the strips with various shades...either way works great!) These are the colors in my home. My kitchen has been mostly red, tan, and black, so I am looking for ways to incorporate some blue and green. :0) YEA for FREE craft supplies, I love me some paint chips!

Ok, I don't have photos of the process BUT the blog where I got this idea DOES! (I'm new to crafting so I promise to get better about photos).
Here are my steps:
1~take apart the clock. I removed it from the frame and took off the hands.
2~ Started cutting all of my paint chips. I made them 1.5 in x 1.5 in AND/OR 1.5 in x 2 in. Here is what I learned...make sure you do good measuring, they ALL have to have the same WIDTH measurement in order to line them up right!
3~Decided to start at the top center. I painted (sponge brush) a little ModPodge down, enough for a few cards. I did NOT sand it first. It seemed to work just fine without sanding.
4~Started placing the cards down, in random order. This is where I learned the lesson of them all needing to be the same width. :0) I painted on some ModPodge, placed some cards...over and over. I did NOT do this ahead of time like Amanda did (on the other site)...I just put down some ModPodge and stuck on another strip...
5~When it was covered, I painted a layer of ModPodge over the top of all of it. Then let it dry.
6~ Once dry, I turned the clock over and used an exacto knife to cut off the excess.
7~At this point I knew that I didn't want it too look quite as "bright" as it was... So I grabbed my Distressing Ink stamp pad and rubbed it across the front. I would rub it onto a few cards then use my finger to rub it around a bit. I did that all over until I was happy with the results. :0) I know that doesn't sound super professional but well.. there ya' have it!
8~While all of that dried a bit, I used my Silhouette SD to cut out numbers from an off-white cardstock I had on hand.
8~I used ModPodge to apply the numbers to the clock. When I did this, a bit of the ink came off onto my numbers...I loved it! It helped everything blend a bit.
9~Let it dry and reapply the frame and hands. That's it! It was super easy and quick!

Here are the finished results