Upholstered Headboard

We've been working on a small project with a very small budget.  Mind you, we're really not the decorate-on-a dime kinda people.  Those decorating shows that teach you how to make a volleyball net out of the plastic canholders?  Or ottoman out of empty Coke bottles?  No thanks.    However, there are ways to make your house look nice on a budget, and having a colorful, pretty headboard for your bed is one of them.  It's really pretty when you choose a striking fabric that's colorful and fun.  The headboards cost about $500-600 to make, and usually you can have a good local, upholsterer make it for you.

If you are looking for headboard models, here are some good ones from Budi.    You can go to the site and download a tearsheet (you can order from them too, but it's kinda expensive).

Bring this to your favorite upholsterer along with your favorite fabric and voila...

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Tale of a Kitchen Make-Over...Part Two!

 

Remember a few months ago when I promised to show you photos of my sister Wendy's kitchen makeover?
Well, I drove three and a half hours for the reveal (and to be served the most elegant lunch in her new kitchen), only to realize I forgot my camera! Lucky for both of us, she has a good friend with a great camera and photography skills who snapped a few so I/we could share.

You might remember the before photo I showed you:

 

Well, here is one of the after shots:

Isn't is so fresh and pretty? My sister has an unfailing eye for putting together what the rest of us might think won't work. I always liken her style to that of an artist's; because don't they always have the most fantastic spaces? Sometimes more daring, but always edited with a knowing vision.

She and her hard-working (and handy!) husband did this make-over on a conservative budget and stretched their dollars as well as Wendy's design muscles.

It involved mostly paint, new counter-tops, HARD labour, one new appliance (an over-the-range micro-wave), and a new faucet.

And a whole LOT of style!!!

Small details can mean so much:

The new kitchen faucet is from ATG Stores.com  (which I love for its one stop shopping when doing home renovation!) for her review, and you can read about it here. She is still on the hunt for her dream sink but was happy to find that a thorough buffing to her current sink was all that was needed to make it shine again. Another savings!!!

Head on over to Wendy's blog and check out all of the other photos and details of this make-over. Be sure to say hi and check out all of her other renovations at  The House She Calls Home

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Unique house

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Pumpkins and Spice...

What a busy Halloween!

For some reason I was taken over by some crazy drive to pull everything out of my Halloween bag of tricks like some kind of superwoman. Not sure where that came from or what I was "possessed" by!

This is what I took on as my way to celebrate:

1. Craft time with the girls in my family:

2. Caramel Apples: using Werther's Originals and Honey Crisp apples...yum!

3. White Chocolate Ghosts for Sophie's Halloween party: (it was supposed to be treat-free, but when her teacher told the class that, Sophie piped up that I already had all the ingredients and would be "disappointed" if I couldn't send them in. Lucky me!

4. Craft time with some of Sophie's friends (too busy to take many photos!):

We made little Halloween trees with paint and glitter!

Annual Pumpkin Carving Party:

We had my spicy chili, rolls, delicious chicken soup and apple crumble pie made by one friend, and this decadent chocolate cake made by another friend:

 And the annual stoop shot, posing with their pumpkins:

 And last but not least, Halloween itself!!

Busy, but happy...

Happy Halloween!!!

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Free Lighting...made by me!

 This year, I resolved to make many of my gifts - at least the ones I could - and this gift is my favourite yet!

My sister recently did a make-over on her kitchen and eating area but decided to wait until she found the perfect light. I know what kind of lighting she likes, so I decided I would plan a way to make or buy her what she wanted. 

 While on a walk with a friend recently, we were discussing lighting and she told me she had seen an HGTV (I think) feature on how to make your own sphere-style light. She told me it involved a beach ball, some glue and heavy string. Well, she lighted a fire under me and I vowed to make one for my sister. It took me several weeks to finally gather all of my supplies and take the time to make it but it is now complete! Remembering her brief instructions, I used an exercise ball (one I had used when in labour with Sophie), some sisal twine and fabric stiffener.

 I purchased the twine at the Dollar Store and had some fabric stiffener kicking around. So, for less than five dollars I made a replica of this beauty from here (retailing for ~ $160!):

 I also used a light kit I had from one of those paper lanterns, so the cost to me was literally next to nothing! I do wish I had bothered to Google the instructions, though, as I found out later on you should run the sisal through a dish of glue or stiffener as you wrap it around the ball. I didn't do that so I slathered the stiffener all over the ball and hung it up to dry for ~ 36 hrs. Mine isn't perfect, but I think it is pretty good for the price!

I will also assure her she doesn''t have to hang it in her kitchen if it isn't what she had in mind, but I think it will still make a fun light for another area in her home. 

Because I love my sister and LOVE making/buying her things!

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A Tiny Party...

 Sophie turns ten this Friday but we celebrated early and threw a party for her and her friends. The theme? All things tiny, which together added up to BIG fun!

The invitations: 

I topped a little gift box from the charms I collect for my Chamilia bracelet and topped them with a pretty scrapbook paper, filled the inside with some pink glitter and this tiny message:

A tiny party      

for sophie

on december one,

proving small is all

you need to have

a lot of fun!

****************

1:30 – 3:00 pm

It was so much fun to think outside of the box and imagine tiny interpretations of typical birthday decorations, games and fare:

 Clockwise from center photo:

A tiny birthday cake from the grocery store with a miniature flag bunting made from scrapbook paper; playing the memory game and writing their answers; cake pops and mini ice-cream sandwiches; teeny tiny breakfast food made from...; cheerios/doughnuts, white candy wafers and mini M&Ms/fried eggs, stick gum/bacon, cinnamon toast crunch cereal/toast; memory game items: tiny items from around the house to be memorized and recounted later; the girls; table is set; tiny canvases from the Dollar store awaiting soon to be tiny painted masterpieces.

**(miniature breakfast idea found here)**

These cake pops gave me grief. I followed the directions exactly, but lo and behold if your cake is very moist, you need to really cut back on the amount of icing added. I found the how-to here. 

I truly am not a gifted baker...

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Holiday Mantel...

Lo and behold, I got some Christmas decorating done! I conquered my mantel, which can sometimes be a challenge with  its large scale/depth, and I hung my holiday "subway" sign, a gift from Matthew Mead for my holiday photo shoot. You can order one like it (it also comes in red) here on his website. I also picked up some glittery stags to flank it on the wall. 

Who knew I'd ever have a deer's head on the wall? Hah!

Happy decorating! 

I am off to do more and will be back to share it all soon!

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Highligts home

]

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The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

Have you ever looked at a blog and wondered what it must be like to live next door to the blog author and see how things are in "real life"? Are you curious to know if their life is always as pretty as the photos on their blog? There are times that I feel like a bit of a hypocrite because while I post
The Good, as in my recent front porch makeover.

What you don't see is The Bad,
the Christmas lights still out--but not on--at the end of February (I'm happy to report that I risked frost bite fingers
to finally un-wire these and put them away).

And then there is The Ugly,
leftovers that haven't been cleaned up since
decorating for a wedding in December.
(My husband and I both laugh and cringe at this sight.)

So why did I choose to post The Bad and The Ugly? Was it to relieve the pangs of hypocrisy? Perhaps. Was it to make you feel better about your real life messes? Possibly. But I think that it was mostly to remind us both that it's okay to look passed the bad and ugly in life to be able to see the good.

Last year we had so many crazy things go wrong in our life that one day my friend asked if I were keeping track of all of our of disasters. I sat down to write a list and decided that instead of writing of the bad things happening to us, I needed to make a list of what was going right. It was that list that helped us make it through the rough waters without totally sinking. We were able to find a balance of good along with the bad. In fact, the more we focused on the good the more there was to see. There is a lot of bad and ugly in this world but there is also so much good. Maybe that's one of the reasons why we like to look at all of the pretty pictures in magazines, catalogs and blogs. They portray a beautiful lifestyle, they give us relief from the ugly around us, they inspire us, and give us hope for something better.
No one has a perfect life. Everyone's life is a combination of good, bad, and ugly. But the more we look for the good and give it the attention it deserves the more we come to see that life really is what we choose to put our focus on.

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Is Gray The New Black

Lately I seem to be having a love affair with the color gray. A few years ago it was black but now when I envision a makeover for thrifted items I see them in a shade of gray. Perhaps it's because there are so many pleasing varieties of gray----light gray, dark gray, charcoal gray, blue-gray, gray-brown, gray-green and the ever popular greige. Whatever the reason, gray has become my go-to color.

What is your go-to color lately?

***Put your name in for the M.Bellish'd giveaway here***

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Desperate Blogger

What is a blogger, who has a list of things she wants to create but no time for creating and is desperate for a new post, to do? Well that's easy! Grab the latest thrift find, in this case a garden armillary,
and give it a fresh coat of paint. Then to complete the gratuitous post she can add it to previously shown vignette.

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Colorful Closets

Simple Joys...those glimpses of life that we should take time embrace, the reminders that it's the small and simple things that make life beautiful.

The closets of our home are full of color. . . . .
even when there are no clothes hanging in them. For nearly half of my mother's life she has been making these
yarn covered hangers. (A tutorial can be found HERE)

She has literally made hundreds of them for family and to give as gifts.
I remember taking a trip with a college friend when I was in my late teens. My mom put a bundle of these homemade hangers into my suitcase for me to give as a hostess gift for my friend's relative whose home we stayed. I was proud as well as a little embarrassed (the mixed emotions of a teenager) to present the made-by-hand gift.These colorful hangers have been a part of my life for most of my life. They remind me of my mother's creative and hardworking hands, and of her giving spirit.

They are a simple joy.
Do you have a made-by-hand simple joy?

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