DIY

03.28.

Fun Shared Girls Room (Reveal)

I have been literally obsessed with finishing the girls’ new room, and honestly it isn’t really finished yet. There are a few things to tweak here and there and paint. There are also a few DIY projects that still need to be done, but don’t worry! I will definitely share them once they have been completed.

The girls’ new room is our old bonus/playroom that never got played in! Doesn’t that irritate you? Well, it DID irritate me! LOL!

What to do?

Answer: MOVE THE GIRLS UP THERE!

I need to back track a little though and let you know why I decided to move the girls upstairs. First, like I said, the room never got used even though we had tons of toys to play with up there. Our home’s lay out is to where the downstairs is our main living space and everything upstairs was considered (for us) bonus. One big bonus room, a bathroom, and another bedroom.

The girls shared one of the downstairs bedrooms and a king bed and were still fighting ALLLLLLLL the time! “She touched me! She looked at me! She FARTED on me! ” You know, the usual stuff.

Then, one day, I just looked at my husband with those ” I have an idea” looks. After I chased him down into the other room and made him listen to me, I told him I thought we should move the girls to the bonus room and maybe their own space would make things better.

So far, so good! I am really happy with how it turned out. A friend of mine said that it reminded her of a cool dorm room.

I knew that if I wanted to make this happen, it was going to have to be on a tight budget. Other than the beds, I didn’t want to have to spend much. I kind of had no way around purchasing the beds. I did, however, go to Walmart to buy the twin beds/box springs which I felt would be the cheapest alternative.(*around $300/each bed) The metal frames were universal ones that I picked up at Sam’s Club. ($38 each)

The hilarious thing is that they are happier with smaller beds. They went from sharing a King, down to a twin bed. I think something can definitely be said though for having your own space……. and not being farted on….. right? Sorry!

I wanted to visually divide the room to allow them to have their “own sides”. I already had these toy shelves in the room and decided to arrange them in a way that they both could have their own things stored on each side. It is basically 4 of the units that I picked up at Walmart for $17 each with fabric containers picked up at Target a while back.

This is one of the projects that still needs tweaking. My idea is to attach them with screws and put molding around the creases with maybe a top to match their desk tops. This way, the piece will look more like one piece, instead of 4.

Next off, the DESKS! I am extremely proud of these desks and I’ll tell you why. They cost me a total of $ 4 . 00 !!!! No, that wasn’t a typo!

Let me explain:

I actually took an old dining table that I had on my back porch (that I wanted to move) and cut it down (since it was a pub table), along with the chairs and attached it to the wall to make their desks. The only thing I had to pay for were the roller casters on the back legs, which I scored at Ollies for $ 4.00.

I had looked and looked on Pinterest for all sorts of ideas. I found some great ones, but they all were going to cost around $300 to $400 to complete, which definitely would have had to wait a while. *Remember the tight budget?

If you look closely, you can see that one end looks like it is coming out of the wall and only has 2 legs.

That is because of this:

I thought I was going to have to buy wood from the store to do this, but instead, we were able to reuse pieces from the original table! SCORE!

To let the girls personalize their own space, I generously gave up a few of my bulletin boards from my office I bought at Homegoods a while back.

This is my youngest daughter’s side.

This is her older sister’s side. I think you can guess which one has “HOARDING” tendencies……. LOL!

Here is a view of the chairs. When we initially cut them down, we didn’t allow for the fact that they all naturally leaned back, so we added the roller casters to the back to level it off. We didn’t want to have to cut two more of the four chairs that were left, in case I come up with more projects…… for my husband to do……. 😉 * He would have preferred to cut them all up and use them for a bonfire, I’m sure. Love you honey!

By now, you have probably noticed in a previous photo that the girls have LOCKERS in their room! This is all because of their cool daddy! While doing a painting project for the local Sheraton hotel in our city, they were getting rid of them!!!!!! There were 6 in total!!!! So, you know what that means…………. they were FREEEEEEE , aside from the paint that we purchased to paint them. They were originally a stale tan color like most lockers are.

You may not be able to tell so well in the pic, but the one in the picture above is a light blue since that is my youngest daughter’s favorite color.

The one in the previous photo further above is a light purple for, you guessed it, our oldest’s favorite color.

The girls and I did a really cool Pinterest DIY project for them. I bought one sheet of mosaic tile backsplash. Then, we pulled individual tiles off and attached peel n stick magnets to them.

Now, the girls can stick things on the lockers since they are magnetic! Lots of fun! They love it!

I love how they are able to express their own style and keep it on their own sides of the room.

There are so many things I love about this room, but one of my favorite things are their headboards.

I was really nervous that what I had envisioned would not come out right, but I am SOOOO happy with it!

Again, I had looked and looked on Pinterest for all kinds of ideas. I found so many great ideas. However, they all involved using a thick plywood for the base, which would have been fine, except I was determined to not have to ask for my husband’s help on this one. He was projected out by this time and I was wanting to do this one on my own.

I would have had to have him cut it and that just wasn’t going to work for me.

I decided instead to buy a very large canvas at AC Moore, which was on sale and went from there. Mom and Dad were visiting the weekend I decided to do it, so I sweet talked Mom into helping me. She was a trooper! I asked her because while I might have wanted to go it alone, it is definitely easier when you have two people tugging and stapling. Thanks MOM!

I will be posting a DIY post on it later.

The one above is my youngest’s. The stripes were actually a result of things not going exactly like I had planned, but then again, they say that some of the best things come from that and I think this turned out better because of it. It also allowed their headboards to be slightly different.

Here is a closer view of it.

Here is a close view of my oldest’s. I kept hers plain without stripes so that she could have, what I considered an older look. By the way, that is a painter’s drop cloth that is on the headboard. 😉 More on that in the DIY post.

AND this is the BEAST that I will be taking on next. The plan is to paint it a dark gray and add a long mirror above it. For this, I will definitely be needing my “painter husband” ‘s help. Once it is done, I will add a tutorial! *Maybe my first video tutorial? What do you think? 😉

Well, there you have it. This is the girl’s room ……… for now.

Anytime I add anything, I will make sure to let you know!

Until next time……

XOXO,

Esther

Sidebar: The bedding was bought at Target.

Turquoise comforter : $27.99 (comforter/sham),

Purple Comforter: $ 24.99 (comforter/sham)

Both Sheet sets: $ 17.99 (flat/fitted/pillow case)

Quilt on purple bedding: Gift from Nana for birthday

Tags: AC Moore, Bonus Room, Bulletin Boards, Canvas, Comforters, Daughters, Decorating, Decorating with Lockers, DIY, DIY Desks, DIY Headboards, DIY Magnets, Dorm Room Look, Free, Girl's Room, Homegoods, Lockers, Mosaic Tile Backsplash, Paint, Pinterest, Playroom, Room Divider, Shared Girls Room, Storage, Target, Toy Shelves, Tween Bedroom, Twin Beds, Walmart

03.01.

DIY Spice Holder

It’s widely understood around these parts that I like Mason Jars. Ok, maybe more like LOVE them.

I even make layered cakes in them. If you missed that post, you can see it here.

Well, the other day, while going into my pantry to pull out things for dinner, I noticed my stash was overflowing. I can never bring myself to part with a mason jar, so I thought of something I could use them for. Then it dawned on me! I have been trying to clean out my lazy susan in the kitchen.

Since I didn’t want to spend any money doing that, I decided to make my own version of a “spice rack”/holder thingamajig.

SO! This is what I did:

First, I took the mason jar…

Then, I hopped online and searched free circular printables and found these. They were perfect size for the seals on the small jars I was using. My computer allowed me to size them this size and also slightly bigger.

If you notice, I chose to put them on a slightly yellow tinted paper compared to white because I wanted the labels to have a vintage appearance on them. You could use any color you like though.

After cutting out the labels for the seals, I took my label maker and made each spice name I wanted to use. I decided to cut the ends in a banner like point to give it some flair.

This was the end result.

But then, I needed something to put them in…….

I had this metal thing I bought from Homegoods a while back and was planning on trying to sell it in a yard sale. I say thing because while I thought it was a good idea to buy it at the time, I just couldn’t find a permanent home for it. It held a few papers once, then was a shoe holder for my little man, and then just went into the yard sale pile.

So, I decided to give it one more try. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t a contender in it’s original state.

So, I laid it down and deconstructed it, a bit.

Ending up with this. I call it RUSTIC FLAIR! LOL!

So, in the spices went.

Now, there are a few spices I use more of, so I thought it would be good to make their jars a little bit larger. Unfortunately, the labels in the original size were too small for their lids, so I doubled them up.

This was the end result.

Now, I realize that one side of the basket, basically being the bottom of the holder, is a different color than the rest of the holder. Then you have the opening on the side of the holder that was originally the top, but I had a solution for that. Hee! Hee!

The opened side went up against the fridge (so you can’t see it, unless I point it out), and the other end just looks brown.

Yup! I’m just lazy like that. Of course, I could paint the brown side, but I kinda like it. If I end up not liking it in the future, I’ll probably paint it.

So there you have it. It really has been a nice addition to my kitchen. I thought about using the piece I cut off and piecing it on the opened side. However, you DO remember I said the word lazy, right?

Happy Weekend, Everyone!

XOXO,

Esther

Tags: Deconstruct, DIY, Homegoods, Kitchen, Label Maker, Labels, Layered Cakes, Mason Jars, Metal Holder, Spice Rack, Spices

04.11.

Raised Vegetable Garden

Eeeeeek! Spring has Sprung and I am just tickled about it!

You know you are too! How could you not be?

The air is warming up and once in a while you get that perfect day that allows you to dream of those beautiful flowers and veggies you have wanted to plant and grow forever.

Then you grab your car keys……….. run out the door without hesitation………… and then RUN back in once you realize you have forgotten your children (don’t judge me) …………..

then you RUN back out the door and drive to your nearest Home Improvement Store and go WILD!

Right?

NO?

Well, I didn’t do that exactly, but I WANTED TO SOOOOOOOO BAD!

Instead, I was very patient ( which is completely UNLIKE me) and I waited and planned and built a Raised Vegetable Garden Bed with the hubster.

We did it without a plan and SO CAN YOU! Very easy. We were first time DIYers with this and it turned out great!

I have to say I am very Proud of us.

Here is what we did:

We knew that we wanted the garden bed to be 4ft. x 12ft., so we bought 12 ft. pieces of cedar. We figured for the sides, we could just cut them to 4 ft.

We also bought short 4 ft. pieces of wood that would act as support boards and also an area that the screws could adhere to, in order to stack the boards. We had a few pieces of cedar siding that we improvised with and used so that we wouldn’t have to buy as much cedar.

Don’t mind the ladder. It’s just there for moral support. 😉

We attached the first 12 ft. piece of cedar to the sticks. This top piece split a little on the car ride home, but it wasn’t a concern.

This is what it looked like afterwards.

Then we attached the second piece using the same method. We just lined it up under the top one.

Now, we had (2) 12 ft. pieces of cedar attached to the 2 wood sticks at each end.

We had 4 screws on each side.

We knew we would need more support, so we added an additional board in the middle and attached the boards to it.

Afterwards, we trimmed the length on the support sticks.

This is what they looked like after being trimmed.

We repeated those steps with the boards for the other side. Then, instead of doing it again for the shorter 4ft. pieces, we decided to just attach them to the ends.

This is the 4ft end piece. We attached the two screws for it to the support stick that we had also attached the adjoining side to .

Z even let me get in on the action. Then, he went behind me, removed the crooked screw I attached, and reattached it correctly. Oh well….

Here is a shot of the bed after one board.

Now the finished side.

Then, to keep burrowing pests out, we attached a heavy duty plastic chicken net to the bottom with “U” shaped nails. We didn’t use wire netting b/c I have before and it toar up our hands during the process. I know you could just use gloves, but I’m lazy and I looked it up and the pests shouldn’t be able to chew through the heavy plastic. I might be updating this later if I find that not to be true.

We made sure that it was secure by nailing every ft. or so along the wood.

Since the netting wasn’t wide enough, we had to overlap some of it and then we just trimmed it off at the end with a razor blade.

Buster kept a watchful eye out just in case any rabbits tried to eat our veggies. How do I know I have rabbits? By the piles of “unpleasantries” I found left for me in my yard. (Is that a word?)

The great thing about gardening in general is it seems to awaken something within children. All 3 of my kids love to go out with their Nana and help her with the garden.

Heck! They will even help her pick up Doggie Poopoo at her house. I haven’t mastered that art here yet, but I’m working on it.

My oldest was beggin me to let her plant the veggies. I wanted to make sure they were done correctly the first time, so instead, I let her plant the marigolds around them.

I CANNOT wait to see how these turn out. I have wanted to plant Heirloom Tomatoes for a while. Z asked me if I thought we would get our money back out of the beds? As soon as I went to the grocery store and saw that tomatoes were $1.99 / lb. , I quickly answered , “Ummmmmm Errrrrrrrrrr Yup! ”

We planted 3 Crookneck Squash , 1 Zucchini, 2 Cherry Tomatoes, 4 Homestead Heirloom Tomatoe, 4 Marion Tomatoes, 2 Cayenne Peppers, and we will be making a seperate 4 x 4 ft. bed for our Cucumbers.

We also planted the Marigolds throughout the bed and will be doing the same thing with the Cucumber bed. Marigolds help keep the bugs off the plants. That is why we plant them. Plus, they look Purrrrrrrrty in there!

I should add that we used to have a garden back where we are from. We were so excited the first year we did it. We had a pretty big backyard, so we planted just about a 1/4 acre of it with all sorts of things. Well, I really had no idea how much it was going to yield and let me tell you , when it started ……….. it didn’t stop!

I couldn’t give it away fast enough before it started to go bad. I think this smaller modest raised bed is much better for us, though my friends might wish we had the larger garden so that we can share. 🙂