Upcycled entry way decor.

As soon as we signed the paperwork to start building our house 

I started looking for furniture to fill it. 

I can't help it, I'm a nester and a planner.

It also didn't help that it was rummage sale season when I started. 

Many items my parents had in their back garage or had just upgraded in their house that I claimed.

I only have one sister and we are overly vocal about what we want.

She got the huge china cabinet from our paternal grandmother,

I will receive the farm table from our maternal great, great, grandmother.

We just have to pick it up from family members who are holding it for us.

It all works out, and of course we offer each other items all the time instead of selling them

 or tossing them. 

Recently my sister has been doing more DIY projects and asking my advice.

I feel so honored!

Okay, anyway back on track here, 

Most of the furniture was garage sale finds, I really didn't want to redo too many things so I was drawn to charming items that I fell in love with instantly.

Such as this thing,

It's a "self contained aerial system", I have no clue what that means, 

but it records on wire and is basically a radio. 

It came with the original instructions and a few reels of wire.

My uncle of course needed to test out the attached microphone.

It has very beautiful dials that I love. 

I don't even care if it works, for $30 its going in my entry way.

We have a weird entry way wall that I thought this would be perfect for, and what do you know, it is.

With some polish, an old hankerchief, the green mirror that I repainted from my parents house and  some of my wedding flowers, it is a perfect drop spot.

I know that I would scratch the heck out of it so there was no reason to refinish it.

The green of the mirror is the same green as the end tables I redid from my parents.

Its restolum eden green and it coordinates with the big green wall perfectly!

This is the mirror before,

With a wooden veneered mirror that my parents had stashed in their back garage.

with a little help from my perfectionist mother,

 We turned these eyesores, 

Into this!

And this!

With the mirror back in the frame I loved it instantly!

Which of course match my end tables that went from this:

I tried doing a 'crackle' finish on these.

You live you learn right??

to this;

These end tables were one of the first things my parents purchased when they got married. 

I'm sentimental and very retro.

Thanks for stopping by!

W

Home tour.

I promised that I would post the inside of our home,

Starting with the heart, we have the kitchen,

We only got it because it came with the house!

With all joking aside I do find myself cooking and baking more, 

it helps when your stove actually works.

I picked out the colors for the rest of the house, 

My husband thought it was only fair that he gets to pick one.

Of course it's the largest wall in the house so it MUST be the focus wall.

We can always change it around in the future.

I joked with my family "Like mold, fungus and my husband, this color is starting to grow on me".

And with some furniture it looks like it was meant to be!

Moving down the hallway, there is a laundry room with my brand new washer and dryer!

I adore having a main floor laundry, well everything is main floor but thats neither here nor there.

the only thing I dislike is the chimes the washer and dryer make anytime you touch it.

Forget taking a nap if I'm doing a laundry, you can't even adjust the volume. 

Further down the hallway we have the guest bedroom.

Aka we have an extra bed and now the cats have somewhere to sleep in the sun.

You can see the two boys cuddling, 

I haven't decorated this room or even put the nice comforter on it yet, 

I haven't had a stroke of creativity for this room.

Next to the guest room will be the craft room.

There is no picture of this room for obvious reasons.

(It's a craft room, it's not set up, and it only has boxes in it.)

The guest bath is at the end of the hallway.

once again it's pretty plain. I picked up the shower curtain on clearance at Target, reused the same rugs from our rental and found two huge mirrors on craigslist.

This is also where we keep the kitty litter hidden in the bathtub behind the shower curtain.

We placed foam and a special mat on the bottom of the tub to prevent any scratches

from the cats.

Master bedroom is next to the right of the bathroom.

Of course this is where I spend a majority of my time, due to my condition.

This is why it's the only bedroom with curtains. 

For privacy sake I threw up some curtains on a tension shower curtain rod.

The house behind us in a cul-de-sac faces the back of our house, right into our bedroom.

On the floor plan the bedroom looks very small, but we have a 

king size bed, a waterfall vanity and dresser.

I don't own any small furniture.

This is the set I picked up for $50 bucks last rummage sale season!

I also used them at the rental but this is the best photo of them together.

I know that I could have refinished the furniture, the husband thinks it's tacky to have scratched and dinged furniture, I think it has charm and history. 

Opposites attract I suppose.

I simply used some furniture polish to make it look less 'pre-loved'.

The antique dresser was perfect for the TV and a bluray player.

I did get rid of the standing mirror, It just wasn't working for me anymore, I never wear jewelry so there was no sense in keeping it anymore, it has a loving new home with one of my best friends.

One of my favorite places (HA)

The master bathroom, plain, boring, and undecorated.

I'm sure I'll find something I MUST do in the future, 

that and most of my decor is still packed in storage.

I did require a magnifying mirror that I had to install. 

I know, I'm one of 'those' people.

Shower curtain is from Jcpenney, royal velvet, my favorite brand of textiles.

Surprisingly the rugs are from walmart, in the kitchen rug area.

I don't usually shop there but I needed color.

The linen closet in the master bath keeps all of my personal NEEDED items.

I need all of them.

And the stuff I don't want to keep in the other linen closets, you never know who is going to judge you based on a linen closet.

I do, because they aren't welcome here.

Of course everything is organized and labeled. I have a few million 3m command hooks throughout the house, the linen closet is no exception.

Hand towels, washcloths and hair towels (the turbans and ones for hair color)

Get rolled and put in a pan lid holder that doesn't work in our kitchen.

It keeps them neat and organized.

The bottom shelf is high enough that it can fit two large rubbermaid hampers on the floor.

Lights and darks and no clothes on the bathroom floor, for now.

Of course at least one of the cats enjoys the towels being stored in there.

Thanks to my dad, husband and Bumble, the walk in closet fits most of my clothes.

 

We had the rubbermaid track system from our rental, we just had to hang it up!

The hallway closet holds all the first aid, waxing items, air fresheners and cleaning rags.

The dusters are stored on 3m hooks off to the side, no need to photograph those.

And occasionally the linen closet hides our cat Bumble if we don't latch it all the way.

The Garage is a complete mess and so is the yard. 

As soon as I get some decor unpacked I'll post each room individually. 

Hopefully you have a basic understanding of the layout and the rooms!

Thanks for stopping by!

W

New abode!

My husband and I relocated to my hometown after his time was up with the Air force.

We had little to no luck finding a house to buy with the oil boom that is bringing in many new families. A rental was the only option we had, so with luck we rented the top unit of a duplex for about 3 years.

Here is the 1952 masterpiece with one of our cats in the window.

It was time to stretch our legs and get our own place, it's only the adult thing to do.

Plus with wanting to start a family we wanted a yard, no steps and an open concept.

After touring far too many pre owned houses we decided it was cheaper to build a small new house.

I researched local companies and there was only one builder was nice and helpful, I had either blue or purple hair at the time.

The only house that really fit our lifestyle was called "The Heartland", 

very fitting for the region we live in.

This is the design we went with. It's our first home and we don't really need all that much room.

We just wanted a big yard and all I cared about was having more than one bathroom.

Here is the floor plan. I did tweek it slightly to fit my lifestyle. 

The Darling Husband didn't really care.

A 3 bed 2 bath single level open concept.

The living room alone was the size of our rental.

The only problem with building a house is you have to wait for them to actually build it.

But it is well worth it!

I drove by our lot almost everyday because it was close to my parents, I was slowly driving myself batty by doing this, so the last few months of it being built I stayed away as much as I could.

This is the largest purchase we will make any time soon and I wanted to know it was going well.

My builder would send me weekly texts  to let me know how everything 

was going and what they had achieved.

This is the last photo I will take until our landscapers get here to remove all the construction debris.

And yes, we do have molding around our garage now!

It was worth the time and effort to build a new house,

Thanks to my husband for moving all my crap (including half finished projects)

And allowing me to decorate!

I'll post more soon about the inside!

Thanks for stopping by,

W

It's all in your head.

Do you ever go on Webmd and search your symptoms and either it turns up to be Lupus, Cancer or a Brain tumor?

 For the last 28 years I thought I was crazy because none of my symptoms made sense, okay so I've always been sick so how ever many of those years I was able to recognize the fact my health sucked.

So rewind to last october when my shrink found a tumor on my brain scan from 7 years ago that my primary failed to mention! Yes I see a shrink because I was told by almost every doctor it was all in my head, coincidently enough they were kind of right.

I was then sent to another relaxing MRI scan, where sure as heck there it was a mass on my pituitary gland. For those of you not into neurology and brain stuff, it's the gland that controls hormones etc. It is part of the endocrine system with the thyroid and pancreas and some other organs.

After many trips to Mayo I was told not to worry too much about it, a 4mm mass doesn't really affect much. So here we are in April and I'm losing vision in my left eye and I constantly feel tired.

After meeting with my shrink again we discussed the diagnosis of Cycling cushings disease (when the tumor grows and shrinks, it causes different problems). They also labeled my stow away a 'Rathke's Cleft Cyst' (I feel bad for the guy it's named after, this condition sucks).

I'm meeting with a neurologist in May once I have weaned off of the medication Mayo gave me to keep the size of my cyst down, when in fact it magnified the symptoms.

I have been on medical leave from work for far too long and I'm anxious to get back, but thanks to my stow away, I shake as if I have parkinsons disease and can't be active for more than an hour before I pass out. Yes, I fall over and blackout.
 It's the scariest thing I have ever experienced in my life.
I can't wait for the neurologist to say "time to remove it" and I can get on with my life.

I know this isn't really craft related but heck it all comes from the same brain, I just hope the tumor removal doesn't affect my craftiness, or I'll have to get different knuckle tattoos.

Thanks for stopping by!
W

Welcome home!

I haven't been around much in blog land because my life has been a great big jumble of string, pull one and it gets tighter in the center. My doctors found a cyst on my pituitary gland in my brain.
Also my Husband and I decided it would be a good idea to build a house.

It's been a wild ride but I hope I can get back to normal soon!

Do you really get it free??

I am a huge fan of getting things for free, heck who wouldn't be? Sometimes the websites that claim things that are free are way too complex or are just scams. 

I've found a couple that actually work, if you put in some effort.

Free flys is the first and it was really easy to sign up for the freebies, so not much explanation needed.

But I'm sure some of you have seen this on your newsfeed:

Seems too good to be true right?? Don't read the comments, really they haven't figured it out and thats where this tutorial comes into play, I'm going to explain exactly how to get all the freebies!

If you click on the Facebook add it will take you to their website, it looks like this:

You can either sign up and fill out a million personal questions or you can simply go to their blog, the link is at the bottom of the same page, so just scroll down.

you will see "Get samples now", Click on the "visit our blog" link.

It will take you straight to the blog where you get all the free stuff, it will look similar to this:

Up in the left hand corner choose the "Freebies" link;

It will take you to a page that looks like this:

Click on what ever freebies you want, there isn't a limit so go nuts!!

Once you click on your freebies it will allow you to "add it to your basket" it will look like this:

You can either choose to go to basket or continue browsing.

Once you are done go to your basket it will look like this:

Click on Redeem now, a new window will pop up and will look like this:

In order to get a freebie you will actually have to do something, in this case you have to fill out your info and say how many pets you have;

Fill it out and press submit;

Once you close the window you will return to the basket so you can go on to the next freebie.

The website will ask if you completed the deal.

And that's how you get your freebies!

Sometimes you just have to like a page on facebook, it's really this simple!

I've received loads of samples, stickers, hats, totes and enough k-cups to last a month!

Good luck and thanks for stopping by!

W

Vintage Vanity Organization

I am a huge fan of vanities, especially the vintage waterfall and art deco style ones, When I came across this set at a rummage sale I knew I had to have it!

 It was in great condition and knowing that we will be moving relatively soon 

I decided not to redo any of it!

The only thing I hate about the set up is that the drawers are too narrow for the drawer organizers I had so I had to come up with something.

Every time I open the top two drawers everything goes flying, so not working!

I picked up these clear divider things at Joann fabric, I think they are meant to go in those art bins, but they are thin and perfect to cut in half!

They fit perfect when cut in half!!

No more flying makeup!

With some trimming it fit perfectly in the big middle drawer!

Excuse the mess, I still have a room full of stuff to sort through!

but here she is all set up!

I stuck with my three tier dessert tray for my hair supplies, I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM.

okay maybe a small one!

The other side holds all the brushes, files, perfumes etc. on a mirrored vanity tray!

Thanks for stopping by! 

W