In the wonderful project of redoing my kids' room, I knew I wanted to put up bulletin boards. I considered magnet boards (to avoid tacks in their room) but bulletin boards were a much cheaper route.

I started with a bulletin board my friend gave me that she didn't want anymore. It was just your basic, big bulletin board. Looked like this:
I kept my eye open for another one (two kids = two boards) and mind open for what I would do with them.
I found this one at Hobby Lobby, on the clearance aisle (one of my ALL TIME FAVORITE PLACES!) , for less than $4!!!!
I LOOOOVED the nice frame around it, I loved that it was white...I just loved it!
For $3.99 I knew I had to get it! Who wouldn't right?

Can you believe it??? It was perfect! Well, it was perfect for me... it was less than $4 because it had a chipped corner. Who am I to care about a chipped corner though? I knew I was going to personalize the boards so I would probably be able to cover the broken piece. SO.... YEA! :0)
So...my next task was to find one for my son. I already had the bulletin board part (the one my friend gave me), so I just needed to figure out a nicer way to frame it.
I went to Michael's and found this:

A huge gorgeous frame on sale cheap because the glass was gone. Since I knew I didn't want glass anyway, it was perfect! :0) And only $4.99!!!

First I took the frame off of the bulletin board. It just sort of fell right off, no problem at all. (this wasn't a very expensive board) Then I cut the bulletin board (the inside part) down to the right size. I simply used a box cutter and it was super easy. (I thought I took photos of the next steps but I can't find them...??? so maybe not)

I bought some letters from the craft store...just plain letters, I think they were around $1.50 each. Then I dug out some clothes that we were going to donate, clothes that didn't fit the kiddos anymore. I found some that were the colors I wanted and then cut some strips of the fabric. I didn't measure, I didn't worry about if I was cutting straight, didn't make it super difficult...just grabbed the scissors and cut. Then I let my daughter help me wrap the letters with the fabric. :0) We put a dab of hot glue on and started wrapping, overlapping the starting/ending points with a new strip of fabric so it would hold it all in place. At the end we put another dab of hot glue to hold it down. That was it...two dabs of glue and wrapping...super easy and my daughter had fun. :0)
(Caleb's board is bigger than Georgia's so it makes his letter look smaller...)

I think they turned out perfect!
Here they are hung up...giving my kiddos a place to put the art work that they used to tape all over their walls (and bed, door, etc!) :0)
Total cost for BOTH boards: $12! :0)

thanks for stopping by!
~robin

Last Wednesday I posted our solution for stuffed animal storage (here).
The shoe organizer works PERFECTLY for smaller stuffed animals, absolutely perfect! I love it!
but
it left us with the problem of our larger ones.
I thought I was going to have to buy a hamper and rig something myself
BUT
they actually make exactly what I wanted
EXACTLY!

Adjustable so it drops lower

big enough to fit the animals
only cost $5
AND
a zipper on the bottom for access!

WOOHOO!
:0)
how do you store stuffed animals?
Find more tips for everyday life at Works for Me Wednesday!

We went to a company picnic this past weekend and they had a zip line you could go down. I knew immediately that I wanted to go on it! I was more excited though when my son said he wanted to! As the afternoon grew later we knew we better get to the zip line while we could, before it closed. Good thing we went when we did because just 10 people after us, they stopped letting people get in line! The wind picked up, the temperature dropped about 15 degrees (seriously, it did QUICKLY!) and there we stood....for over an hour and a half! And my boy did great! There was NO fussing, whining, or complaining! I was so impressed! We visited with the people around us, we shivered in the wind, and we waited. and waited. and waited.

We finally got to the bottom of the rope wall that we were to climb up.
With harness on and helmet in place, Caleb went first. He was up at the top before I even realized it! I can't believe how quickly he made it!


I went up next and when I got there Caleb was getting hooked up to go. We couldn't go at the same time (they had two zip lines parallel to each other) because a sweet girl was already hooked up on the other one...but too terrified to go. So it was Caleb's turn and he was ready to go, without a second thought!

It was like he aged 5 years and I didn't know where my little boy had gone! There was no need to convince him, reassure him, NOTHING! WOW!
This one is me...
I was so proud of Caleb, so excited for him.
He was such a big boy....
and he loved it. :0)

so did I....
I think it's going to always be one of my favorite memories to share with him.
Oh, and I liked the zipline too. :0)

I was one of THOSE Moms... back before I had kids. You know the kind, the kind that says "I will never let my kids have....". Yeah, that kind. I don't think I did it with a lot of things but I DO remember saying it about stuffed animals.
It went something like this "I won't ever let my kids have a bunch of stuffed animals. They're just pointless really and they harbor germs. YUCK!"
Ummmmm....
yeah...
Ok.

Then I had kids.
and they got older.
and they LOVE stuffed animals.
AND...
they actually PLAY WITH THEM!
:0)

So, in my dismay of WAAAY too many stuffed animals, I made my kiddos get rid of a bunch. Still left us with a WHOLE BUNCH.
We needed a way to organize them, store them, SOMETHING!
So, we went this route.
It's an over the door shoe organizer! WOOHOO! Not too expensive, easy to find at my local store, and super easy to put up. I DID have to use some fishing string to attach the organizer to the hooks and give it more length. My kids wouldn't have been able to reach if I didn't extend it lower somehow. :0)

it's not perfect...we have some animals that are too bigbut most fit
and I am lovin' it!

It doesn't take up any needed space,
it contains the animals,
it keeps them off the floor and from all over my house
(I think somehow stuffed animals reproduce...truly!)
:0)

That's what works for me today!
Check out other ideas on Works for Me Wednesday at We are That Family!

thanks for stopping by!

I'm lovin' what I can do with inexpensive canvases and "photos". I say it that way (with cute little quotation marks) because the sign I made isn't what I would normally call a photo BUT I had it printed as an 11x14 photo. SO...it's a "photo". :0)

I had picked up some 11x14 canvases a while back. These are the flat ones...not like a box style.
I typed out the lyrics to one of my favorite songs and had it printed at Costco in 11x14. (When I typed it out and created the "photo", I left space at the bottom for some embellishments.)
Then I used my wonderful ModPodge. I painted some on and put the print down, smoothing it out. Then I waited a bit and applied a coat on top. This time I used a brush because I wanted the look of the brush strokes. When I did actual photos, I rolled it out and liked that texture but for this, I wanted the lines that a brush makes.
Can you see the lines/texture from the brush?
I waited for it to dry and did another coat. :0)
Then I made some fabric rosettes out of some leftover material. I had the patterned material from the bench i did here and the black was from my diaper boxes i recovered for my laundry room here.

I knew I wanted to hang it with another frame...sort of floating in a frame...so I dug around. I bought a really cheap and big frame a while back at Goodwill. When my hubby was unloading the car he dropped it, therefore breaking the glass. I told him it wasn't a big deal, I would use it for something. It was in my pile of frames for my collage wall (STILL haven't done that project!) so I grabbed it. I had no idea what size it was because there was some sort of goofy "art" in it, it wasn't a photo frame. Turns out it was/is the PERFECT size for this project! YEA!

So I hung up the frame and then needed to figure out how to hang the canvas. I decided to hot glue thumbtacks on the back of it! Super easy and cheap....only thing I could think of too.

Here's how it turned out. I love it!

It's funny...I keep making things and then have to find places for them so I'm constantly moving things around in my house. I like the change and so far they are changes for the better (at least I think so and I'm the only one that's going to be asked! ;0)

What can you make with some canvases and "photos"?
I made another sign but haven't figure out how/where to put it yet. It's a funny one.

BTW in case you wanted to know, EVERY time I see this sign I break out in song. I sing it. I don't just sing it either, I sing it with an African accent. Good thing I'm not posting what that sounds like! ;0) I have this song on my cd of the African's Children Choir. I highly recommend that cd, it's incredible!
click on the photo of the cd cover and hopefully it will direct you to their store. If you've never heard them/seen them perform, see if they are coming someplace near you. They are INCREDIBLE!

bye for now!
(I apologize for the horrible lighting/color of the photos. I didn't have great light coming through the windows and when I used a flash it glared back at me!)

Yep, it's spring and here at our home there are two parts of that that REALLY excite us. It seems like every year we have a few families of birds that always come build their nests on our front porch. It's absolutely adorable to watch and we feel blessed to get to "care" for them in any way. (although they haven't shown up yet this year and we are getting sad/nervous!)

The second is CATERPILLARS! We love them! Last year we had A BUNCH and we had quite the stories to tell. I thought I blogged about it but I haven't found that post yet.... hmmm....
Anyway, we had lots and lots of beautiful caterpillars. We researched and found out they were ones that would grow into Black Swallowtail Butterflies. We also discovered what it was growing wild all over our yards that they love so much....dill!
So...we did our best to protect them (long story, traumatizing story, there of a yard man from next door trying to be "helpful") and watch them grow.

This year we wanted to be ready. I saw all of the dill starting to grow and knew that caterpillars may start showing up (hopefully!). So when I mowed last weekend I decided to leave a nice size patch to make into our "caterpillar nursery". My bestie Jen even came by and put up a little fence around it for us! YEA!
Sure enough.....our first caterpillar showed up today! WOOHOO! Now, it showed up on the dill in our back yard BUT we want to keep it safe so we carefully transferred it to our front yard, to the nursery. :0)
The fencing is green and a bit hard to see....
We are thrilled! We hope and pray to see many more start to show up. We also planted Butterfly bush last year and the butterflies love it...then we get to see them from caterpillar to butterfly for quite a while! :0)

Do you have some favorite God given/nature traditions for spring?

Most people love photos right? If you know me in real life...you know I REALLY love photos, I love taking them, playing with them on the computer, framing them, etc. They are all over my house.
With the kids having a "new" room, it was like a blank canvas to have fun with. SO, I decided to try putting photos on canvas! I am so glad I did. Yes, I've said many times I am going to pay to have photos put on canvas and one day I may...but for now I REALLY love how these turned out.

First I went to Michael's. They had their double packs of canvases on sale~buy one get one free. So for $5.99 I would get FOUR canvases. YEA! :0)


So I then printed some photos at Costco, 8x10 of course. I went ahead and had 8 printed. Word to the wise or inexperienced...photos aren't naturally fit for 8x10. SO, if you have a photo on your computer that you download to a developer, then order it in 8x10, it will probably need to be cropped. Which means if you don't crop it, they will...often leaving you with a photo missing a head. (I speak from experience). All that to say, play with it on your computer, cropping it or making it to 8x10, save it THAT way and then download it to the site. :0)

I got out my wonderful ModPodge and went to work. I painted a layter of modpodge on and put the photo on top. My photos were a bit bigger than the canvas but that ended up being great. I let it dry for a bit then used a box cutter to trim the edges (cutting from the back with the canvas face-down). Then I realized that I didn't want it so straight-edged. I decided to sort of run my box cutter back and forth across the edges at an angle....sort of scraping the sides of the photo. I kept doing that and liked the rough edges it was giving the photos. :0)


Then I modpodged onto the front of the photos. I painted it on loosely but then used a foam roller to go over it. I LOVE the texture a foam roller leaves behind.
(remember that it has to dry before you can see how clearly it dries and the texture it leaves)

I did that for each photo and then applied a second coat of modpodge (again rolling it out). I let them dry and VOILA! I LOOOOVE them! I'll show you all of them down the road, when I get them hung up and do a blog on the new room. :0)

Thanks for looking!
Super easy project and pretty inexpensive~ $1.50 for each canvas, $1.50 for the print. Total~$3.00 for each one. YEA! :0)
Now, my canvas photos don't wrap around the sides...maybe you can do that but since I really liked the rough-edge-look, I'm super happy with them.



:0)
~robin