Your friend, Spray Paint.

So, this blog will be somewhat short and sweet! I just wanted to do a quick blog about the beauty of Spray Paint! I think we often see things at Thrift Stores and think to ourselves, “I like that, but not in that color, and it would be a pain to paint.” and we forget HOW SIMPLE SPRAY PAINT IS! So, I just wanted to show you a few things that I’ve done to remind you that spray paint is simple, easy, and relatively cheap!

This first “Simple Spray Paint Upgrade” was crazy cheap! The two picture frames were .45¢ each and the sconces were .75¢ each from my local Salvation Army Thrift Store. HOWEVER, they were super chincy, the off white looked dated and cheap, but I KNEW they had potential! Two layers of metallic gold paint later and they look like this! The picture frames will soon hold ultrasound photos of my little one 🙂

“Simple Spray Paint Upgrade” number two was just as simple as number one! I was given these drawer pulls for my dresser (For Free!) they are a beautiful French Provincial style, but they didn’t look good AT ALL with the dresser. The dresser is pure white and grey, and these pulls were a kind of strange off-white color that just looked completely off with the dresser. SO, just like the above project, I sprayed those puppies gold (since it’s the accent color in my nursery, anyways!) and now they look awesome!

AND on top of the fact that I spray painted the drawer pulls, I also spray painted these drawers grey! The whole dresser used to be white, and I wanted to throw in some grey to make it match my crib, which I ALSO SPRAY PAINTED! So, if you’re keeping up, that’s now number 3 & 4 for “Simple Spray Paint Upgrades.”

I could probably go on for a really long time, but y’all probably wouldn’t actually appreciate that. So I’ll leave you with these simple thoughts:

1. Spray Paint is your friend.
2. If you see something that you’re not in love with the color, remember that changing it is relatively simple.
3. Don’t ever let a color get you down!
4. Spray Paint isn’t just for color, it’s for texture and style too! So don’t forget that you can make something look like stone or metal!

Are Your Boots a Slouchy Mess?

Ya’ll. I have a LOT of boots. I moved to Illinois right before this winter started and boots are kind of a necessity in the Midwest (even though it’s been a mild winter.) So I acquired quite a few pairs this season (thanks to my awesome Sister-in-law who found me a bunch of really nice ones at some consignment stores in Georgia!!)

However, my boots were all slouchy. And I don’t mean “I got these super cute slouch boots” I mean, my boots were slouching when I wasn’t wearing them because I didn’t have boot shapers. I know I’ve read that you can cut a pool noodle down and use that to keep your boots standing, HOWEVER, newsflash –No one in the Midwest carries pool noodles in January and February (nor did I want to pay for any.)

So, when you buy new boots, but there are no pool noodles, what do you do? Buy the fancy boot shapers? (Which, my local Target has to the tune of like $20.00!) They have a variety of them on Amazon from $6-$30, however, then you add shipping and in general, Why spend money if you don’t have to?? So, this is my solution!

Do you use canned goods? Do you have fabric? Do you have a hot glue gun and hot glue? Then you are SET for this DIY!

So, here we go. You’ll need four cans, the cans that are the standard size are best (The big Progresso soup cans are too big, and a lot of the smaller “Cream of” soups are too small depending on the brand. So I used four of the standard size cans that had veggies in them.

You’ll start with your can, and put hot glue around the ridge of the can so you can stack the second can on top of the first one. I originally used Krazy glue, but when I made a second set, I realized that hot glue was easier. When you’re done with this step you’ll have two stacks of two cans each. These are your Boot Shapers. But they’re obviously not very “pretty.” They’re just silver cans.

This is where the fabric comes in. I had an old plaid skirt that was in my fabric drawer that I decided to use for this. I cut the fabric so that it was about an inch longer than the two cans, and wide enough to wrap around the cans with a little extra fabric.Put a line of hot glue across the length of your cans and set the cans on the fabric. Glue your fabric to your cans line by line so you can make sure the fabric is smooth and well attached to the cans. Once you’ve got your entire cans covered, use glue to attach folded over fabric to the inside of the top of the can. And fold carefully to attach the extra fabric to the bottom of the can.

Once you’ve finished this step, you’re done! Put those puppies inside your boots and you’ve got boots that can stand proud!

I’ve made two sets so far! But I only need one more can and I can make set three. But I’ve got pictures of my first two sets for now!

So, what do you think? Did you try it? Do you have another easy way to keep your boots standing that doesn’t require you to spend money? I’d love to hear about it in the comments section!

Bridesmaids dress…no, Pillow.

Have you ever had a dress/sweater/shirt that you liked, but you couldn’t wear anymore? That was the case for this DIY. My brother got married in December and I was a “Groomsmaid.” (Basically a bridesmaid, but on my brother’s side of the attendants.) And I had to buy a dress for the wedding. Well, since I’m pregnant, I knew I wasn’t gonna be able to wear this dress again, and I couldn’t imagine spending money on something I’d only wear once. SO, what does a thrifty person do when they can only wear a dress once and that dress just happens to be the color that you’re using in your nursery? You make an accent pillow for your nursery!

I dug around in my fabric drawer to find an accent fabric for my pillow since I didn’t want to make a simple grey pillow. I wanted something else with it. I’ve seen lots of pillows that have designs on the front out of a second fabric with exposed stitching, so I decided to make something like that.

I started by cutting out “Flower Petals” for my floral design. I just free-handed the shape. So they weren’t at all perfect, but I kind of liked that. I cut the dress in half, and set the top aside. Once I had the skirt prepped to become a pillow I pinned my first petal to the skirt so that I could start sewing. Once you’ve got one petal on you can start sewing others on. Again, it might look a little messy, but I kind of liked that it wasn’t perfect. It just seemed a little more realistic.

Once I had all my petals attached, I wanted to add something in the center for the center of the flower. I cut a circle out of a pink fabric that I had scraps of in my spare fabric. Once I cut the first circle, I continued to cut circles out of it until it got smaller and smaller until I had a sort of swirled circle for the center.

So, once this part was done, I’d actually finished the “hard part” of the pillow. Now I needed to actually make it look like a pillow rather than an unfinished skirt with a flower on it!

Turn your skirt inside out and pin it along the top edge. You’ll sew the top of the pillow here.

Turn your “skirt” back to the right side and now you can put a pillow into it. I used a pillow that I got at a local thrift store here in town for $2.00. Buying pillow forms can be expensive, and just stuffing a pillow sometimes means that you can end up with it being uneven or uncomfortable. Once you’ve got your pillow inserted into your “skirt” you need to be able to seal up the unsewn end. There are a number of ways to do this; you can insert a zipper, you can do buttons and button holes, or you can stitch it, amongst other things. I decided that my best option was to permanently seal the pillow. I chose to fold the end sort of the way that you tape up the end of a wrapped gift. But rather than tape, I sewed it shut with buttons. I had plenty of matching buttons, but I decided it would be more fun to use a bunch of similarly shaped but different colored buttons.

So, there you have it! A relatively simple way to make a pillow from an old dress! Once I have our glider all put together, this pillow will sit in the glider. For right now, it’s sitting in the crib.

 

 

Deer Antler DIY –With a little help from my brother…

So, I recently saw this picture on Pinterest:

(Click here to see the original website it was published on and here to see the etsy shop where you can purchase it, TheShabbyShak. Her stuff is really awesome!)

Awesome right? I’m working on our nursery for our soon to come daughter (Less than 12 weeks to baby! Crazy, right?) I’ve decided to go with a grey and pink nursery with hints of Gold and when I saw this I KNEW I wanted something like this in Violet’s nursery. HOWEVER, this one was a little over my price range. At $40.00, I knew I just couldn’t swing spending that amount and feel okay about it. But I was completely in love with the concept of these antlers.

I started brainstorming on how I could get something like this, but on my “Thrifty, only wanna spend a dime” kind of budget. I knew I didn’t have any antlers, and I wasn’t even sure how to go about beginning to make this. So, when all else fails? CALL YOUR BROTHER! I texted him a picture of this beauty and said “Umm…can you make something like this?” and of course he said yes. (I swear y’all, my brother could construct nearly anything.)

So, my brother, Stan, worked on this beauty and mailed it to me!

I already had gold spray paint from another project so I took the antlers to my basement and sprayed those puppies down.

And here we go! I just put some jewelry on it so y’all could see what it looks like, but I definitely want to hang headbands and bows and stuff on it like they did in the original photo. So, this cost me a total of $0.00 because my brother had all his supplies already, he did pay to ship the antlers to me from South Carolina, but since I already had the spray paint, the only money spent was on shipping! Not too bad, huh?

 

Once I actually have this set up in the nursery (and once the nursery looks good, right now, it’s all a big huge mess! But it’s getting there!) I’ll take new pictures. And those won’t be cell phone pictures I promise! Sometime soon there should be a nursery post coming! Trust me, it’s nearly all thrifted or upcycled!

 

My .99¢ Goodwill Chair Makeover

So, I’ve been a little MIA with the whole pregnancy, moving across the country, and the fact that there is NO GOODWILL where I live now!!!! So, I’ve been frequenting the smaller thrift stores in my area, but their hours are shorter, they don’t have as much product, and furniture is definitely at a minimum. There are some great little stores, but chairs and tables seem to be a very real struggle. Which is exactly what I needed! Before we moved, we donated our dining room table and chairs to our local goodwill because they weren’t in great condition and they just didn’t seem worth moving. I figured I’d just get new stuff here at Goodwill. But y’all. Seriously. Tables and chairs are REALLY hard to find here unless you’re willing to shell out some serious cash. Of which I am not…like, ever.

Anyways, a few weeks ago my husband and I drove 45 minutes to go to a larger town because we wanted to got to Barnes & Noble (because, no, we don’t have that either. I know. It’s very sad.) While we were there we popped over to Goodwill because it was just up the road. As I was in the front looking at picture frames, my husband had disappeared to the back. He comes up and tells me “Honey, come look at these chairs they have!) I walk to the back to see these chairs. They weren’t anything special. I’d call them typical “church chairs.” The kind they pull out at church when they need extras.

Not perfect, but, wait until you hear how much. Take a guess. 99¢!!!! Yep. Not even a buck each! So we grabbed those babies up and I figured that I could recover them.

(Yes, that’s my husband with our prize chairs.) The chairs needed some serious love, they were torn, and the metal was a little rusted in places. So we went to the local hobby lobby and grabbed some fabric at TWO DOLLARS a YARD! (Clearance Shelf!) And then I bought some grey spray paint (which I had a 40% off coupon for! Brought the chairs home and used my drill to remove the screws so I could take the cushions off the chairs.

Once the cushions were removed from the chairs, I took the frames outside and spray painted them. The paint was nearly the same color as they were originally, so it only took one layer of spray paint. After that, I had to pull that ugly maroon vinyl off of those cushions. This part was not the easiest thing I’ve ever done. I don’t know how people usually do this (I’m a total rookie) but I used a screwdriver to kind of work the staples out of the wood and then I used needle-nose pliers to pull the staples out. Some of the cushions were really easy, but one had rusted which led to serious issues. Staples breaking in half, sticking in the wood, and my growing frustration. Eventually, I got them all out!

I cut my fabric so I had about 3 inches on all 4 sides of the seat. I laid the cushion down, then put the seat over the cushion so that the soft side is completely covered in fabric. Pull the fabric tight on one of the “straight” sides and staple it down using a heavy duty stapler. (I was using a Stanley T-50.) I am so mad t myself, but I totally forgot to take pictures while I was doing this, but I know there are tutorials online!

The chair backs were more difficult to cover because they were smaller on the top than the bottom and I had to work to keep the fabric from wrinkling. For the back cushion I took the fabric and folded it over the top so that the top was completely smooth. The biggest goal is to keep the staples where they wont be seen, so for the back cushion, that was on the sides and the bottom, but not on the front, back, or top.

I reattached the cushions to the chairs, using the screws that were with the chairs when I got them.

And here we go! Here are my Goodwill chairs! Here’s the breakdown of what I spent:

Chairs: .99¢ each (x3)= $3.00, Fabric: $2.00 a yard (2 yards)=$4.00, Spray paint: 1 can (40% off coupon)=$4.00. TOTAL: $11.00!!!

 

So, I got creative with my front door…

So, I’ve been trying to think of something for my front door for the Holiday season, something kind of Christmas-y, but also just something different for the new season. (I’ve had my Cork Wreath up on my door since we …

Upcycled Nail Polish Rack

Hello, Hello!

I’ve been feeling a little under the weather lately so I haven’t done much DIY-ing (No, that’s not a word, yes, I used it as one. Oh well). However, I’ve finally got something for you! My DIY Nail Polish Rack!

I’ve been keeping my nail polish in a glass jar

which, looks kinda cool but isn’t necessarily the best. It’s not always easy to find the color you’re looking for, and it’s loud. Glass bottles, inside a glass jar, clinking clanking (possibly waking my husband, since I usually do my nails in the morning before he’s awake). It’s just not practical. I’ve been waiting to find a spice rack at a thrift store for awhile and Ta-da! I finally found one! For $2.92!! You literally CAN’T beat that!!

        

I brought it home and sanded it down. It had a shellac of some sort on it that was pretty thick so I was really just trying to get that off rather than really sanding it down really far.

After I sanded it, I wiped it down with a rag to get all the sawdust off, and then spray painted it. I already had silver spray paint from another project that I worked on awhile ago, and I knew that silver would go well with our bathroom colors. I sprayed two layers of paint and it was done! As simple as that! Brand new Nail Polish Shelf!

DIY Cork Wreath!

So, I’ve been wanting to make a new wreath for our apartment for awhile, and my original plan was to make a cool wreath that had our apartment number on it, but we want to buy a house soon, and since I’m going to have a new address (whenever we do move) I didn’t want to do one with our current address.

So I decided to revamp.

I found this cool weaved wreath at Goodwill for .49 cents and I figured it could be a good base wreath for what I wanted.

I decided I wanted to work with things I already had, without spending a lot of money. So I used the weaved wreath I found, fabric that I already had, corks that were left over from my wedding, and I purchased a wooden “Y” (For our last name) which I only spent $1.00 on.

I started by using Hot Glue to attach the corks to the wreath. I didn’t attach them in any particular design, or manner, I just attached them. Be careful when attaching the corks if you are using a wrapped wreath like I did, because the Glue can drip through and burn you if you’re not careful.

       

I then made flowers out of fabric that I have had for awhile but I didn’t have enough to make anything significant, so I knew it would have to be something small. I started by cutting out the petals into four different sizes; Small, Medium, and Large and Extra Large. The Small are about half an inch wide at the base, and an inch tall, the medium are about three fourths of an inch wide at the base and an inch and half tall, and the large ones are about an inch wide at the base and two inches tall, the extra large are about an inch and a half at the base and two and one third inches tall.

To make the flowers, I took a “petal” and used a needle to make tiny stitches in and out of it so that it would “sinch” tight like a ruffle. I did this until I had enough petals to form a flower. Once I had enough petals to make a flower, I would stitch is shut so it was tight and begin on the next flower. Make as many flowers as you want in the four sizes.

    

      

Once I was done with my flowers I attached them to the wreath with hot glue. I started with a large flower, then attached a medium flower on top of it, and a small on top of that so that it would look like one very large flower. Then I added some gold beads to the center of the flower for a little more pizzazz.

I also took the “Y” and painted it Orange because my flowers were Orange and White. I then attached the Letter to the wreath with, yes, Hot Glue. (Seriously, Hot Glue is one of my favorite things!)

I weaved some ribbon through the wreath for hanging and then,

Voila! All done! Very simple, but really pretty wreath!

Coffee Filter Canvas!

So, I am famous for seeing things on the side of the road and thinking to myself “Oooooh, a dresser/table/canvas on the side of the road! I know I can make something out of that!” Which tends to be a problem, because my husband and I live in a one bedroom apartment that is good sized but not necessarily huge and not necessarily the best for my upcycling habits. However, I just can’t resist when I see something awesome on the side of the road! Which is where this project came in!

Recently a lot of the people in my sister-in-law’s neighborhood have been moving, which means they’ve been putting a LOT of things on the side of the road because they don’t want to deal with moving it, or they don’t have time to take it to a thrift store because of an open house. From one house I got two huge 3×5 canvases, and a broken (but easily fixed!) bedside table. The bedside table we’ll get to later, but for today, I wanna show you what I did with one of the canvases!

First off, I need to tell you, this can be done with ANY canvas. The canvases I found had painted handprints and signatures. It was clearly decorated for someone’s birthday. You could literally pick up a $2.00 canvas at a thrift store and upcycle it into this project!

What you’ll need:

• Canvas (Any size! Mine was just large because it was FREE!)
• Coffee Filters (Large work best if your canvas is large, however, I bought the small ones because it was what they had at the dollar tree.)
• Washable Markers
• Spray Bottle with Water
• Hot Glue Gun & Hot Glue

So, I came up with this idea when I was doing crafts with the 2 year olds at church. They were making coffee filter flowers for their mom’s on Mother’s day and I thought to myself, “I could totally make an entire art piece based on this craft!” Which means, YES, this can be a “Mommy & Me” craft that you can do with your kids!

Start by “coloring” on your coffee filters. Since this is simple, your kids can help with this part. Be sure to use  washable markers because when you spray the filters later the color needs to be able to spread and permanent markers won’t spread as well. Also, be sure to put newspaper or magazines under the coffee filters when you’re coloring on them because they will “bleed”.        

Once you’ve colored a few of the coffee filters, it will be time to spray them. Again, lay your filters onto newspaper or magazines because the color will bleed. Take your spray bottle and spray down the filters so that the color begins to spread throughout the filters.
        

Let the filters lay out  until they are dry.

To form the filters into a “flower” type shape, you’ll want to find the center of the filter,pinch it,

and twist it

so that it begins to take the shape of the flower.

Once you’ve made a lot of flowers, begin to hot glue the flowers to the canvas.        

How you arrange your flowers is completely up to you! I chose to do a random pattern simply because it was my first time experimenting with this. But I think it could look really awesome if it was done in only two colors, or in a ombre effect.

 

So, there you have it! My new statement art that I only spent $2.00 on! ($1.00 for hot glue sticks from the dollar tree, and $1.00 for the coffee filters!) For now, this piece is sitting in my craft room, but I have high hopes of it being a statement piece in my living room!

I’d love to hear from you! Did you try this? Any ideas of how to make it more interesting? Did you try it? I’d love to see!

Always Thrifty,

Emily 

DIY Picture Frame Pin Cushion!

I LOVE vintage picture frames, always have, always will. And when I found this beauty at a yard sale for .50¢, I knew I had to make something awesome from it! It sat in my craft space for awhile while …