I should be cleaning but

What fun would that be?

If it's one thing ive learned this past year it's to be myself. to be real. I have been pretty real but looking back on past posts I don't feel like ive been real enough.

Does that make sense?

Im throwing out all the stops and this next year is going to be more exciting. more fun and most importantly, more personable.

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I hope your all having a great weekend... this is what ive been up to.

sewing sewing and lots more sewing.

Although I have to take a break because the house is seriously just a wreck right now and is needing some of my attention.

But between sewing and not cleaning we also headed to the indoor flea market. Its pretty insane in there. its like a maze. just room after room, every nook, cranny and space is filled with something. but since we have a 3yr old with us we can't always take the extra time to really look through everything because every 5secs. i find myself saying 'Don't touch, stop it, put that down, you need to listen to mama!'.

I did snag this little gem up. Having some sort of coffee tree {is that what its called? I really dont know} never really crossed my mind. ever. but when I saw this it was like I just had to have it.

For $7.50, couldnt go wrong. I envision myself drinking hot chocolate around Christmas time with these little vintage mugs. {watch, that will never happen haha}.

At another goodwill type of shop I bought Jayden a tin-lunchbox for $2.00 but I didnt have 2 bucks cash on me so I needed something else to justify using my check card. I found these little mirror wooden wall hanging things. They are a dark stained wood {which matches the rest of the wood in the dining room} and they have a little ledge, i guess to put a candle holder on or something. I don't know, ill figure it out.

And see. told you my house was messy.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Don't forget, today is the last day to enter my Etsy Giveaway! 

To enter, visit this post -GIVEAWAY

Contest ends today @ 5PM CST 

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 

I have a new comment system which I installed yesterday. I wanted something to where I could reply to each individual comments within a post.

If you are having trouble with it or it's not working, please let me know! ☺

Night-stand Reveal

So I am back with a first installment of reveals. The first one was and probly is the easiest out of the bunch. You might have saw my post on Sunday where I showed you my ultimate thrifting finds? Well I decided to work on the little $15.00 nightstand I scored at the Goodwill. I am also working on re-painting the bed frame, so I have been bouncing back and fourth between the two, however the frame is being stubborn and requires multiple coats of paint, where as the little night stand is a little more laid back and only required about 2 good coats and it was done.

Here she was before. I think the thing that really did it for me was the handles on the doors. Just something about them that really stood out to me, and even now I still don't know what it is. Anyways this night stand is pretty solid and has some good junk in the trunk.

Very vintage looking. I'm really loving the whole modern vintage feel right now, so this old/brushed/gold color of the handles, along with the design really lit a fire under my butt and before I knew it the tag was swiped off and I was at that register paying for it like a mad woman.

The inside is in perfect shape. This will be great for some of Jaydens books and coloring supplies. The shelf isn't broken and surprisingly the little knobby-doobers were all still, saves me the trouble of having to rig something up for the shelf to perch on.

And for the color I went with Olympics 'South Pacific' [love the name. Makes me want to go on Vacation]......and I know.... paint on the hinges? No, that's not staying there lol.

I left the handles alone because like I mentioned earlier... Loving the vintage right now. Just gotta have the vintage and against the blue, love it. If they would talk they would say 'Hell yes I am super awesome'.

I still have to clean the paint from the hinges, but other then that this little night stand is ready for Jayden's room. I'm super excited to get it in there but im holding off until we have the bed finished, that way we can kind of just combine everything at once. I'm hoping by this weekend we will have it about 95% done. I still have some paintings to finish for his wall, and some other crafts [involving scrapbook paper.... and lots of it!], I am also thinking of doing something with his rug, but those ideas are still floating around in my head.

Not bad for $15.00 huh.

Stay tuned!

Ultimate Thrifting

...sounds like a TV show doesn't it?

Okay I can't hold out any longer. That and ive been working on projects all day that it's just time to unwind and what better way to unwind then to write a blog post, also helps pass the time especially when the wait time for pizza delivery is 95mins.

So this weekend we were on the hunt for some items. If you saw my quick post yesterday with my little 'teaser' then im pretty sure you can bet your bottom dollar that we are in fact working on Jaydens room. So with that being said, we were on the hunt for some items.

1. A twin size bed. I feel as though our little guy has done so well with his toddler bed that we feel safe with upgrading him to an actual twin size bed. Granted he is only 3.5 but I think he will enjoy the extra room, shoot, I know I would!

2. Night stand. Right now, other then his dresser and toy box, there really aren't any other permanent pieces of storage type furnture in his room. I think a night stand will fit perfectly next to his new BIG boy bed.

3. Anything else that catches my eye [I don't think I have to explain hehe].

So we found the dresser. It was $15.00 and it's just perfect for the room. It's chunky and very solid which is also perfect for a kid.Of course up until today [bought this on Friday], Jayden was using it as a 'car'. Don't ask me but whatever works right? In it's current state it is in a lovely shade of...............................

stay tuned.

We also found this solid [and can we say heavy] twin size bed frame for $23.00. The rails also came with it, which are also made of solid wood. It reminds me of camping, doesn't it? It just has that camping feel to it.... And another reason it caught my eye was because I had a bed just like this when I was a kid, only difference is that instead of the wood in the middle, mine had spindles. This is also currently drying in a lovely shade of.....

But on friday while searching for a nightstand and a bed frame I came across something that caught my eye like a hawk see's a mouse. I stopped dead in my tracks and admired it's beauty and it potential.

But where would I put it? Oh I could put it there... but no, I don't think it will look right in that spot, but jees-louise. This thing is gorgeous.

I had to have it. I just did. I didn't know [at the time] where I was going to put it, but I just had to have it. The detailing is just so lovely and real wood? Hell yes. What was even better is that this gem was only $35.00. With just a few scratches and a missing handle [in the middle part] it was definitely worth the price.

I will however not be painting it. I already know where im putting it and I just think paint will throw off the entire space, that and also because it's so vintage looking, I want to keep the wood showing... so, im going to painstakingly take the task of sanding this doober down and staining it in a nice dark, rich tone. I cannot wait.

and to add insult to injury I couldn't pass up this little lamp. Actually it's anything but little. It's quite tall. It didn't come with a shade.

But with the beautiful detailing, a nice big drum shade will do just fine seeing as how I only spent $7.00 on it - Booyah!

So that was my thrifty weekend. I really only intended to buy items for Jaydens room redo but like I said, I just could not pass up that dresser. I would have lost sleep just thinking about someone else snatching it up before me when all along it would have looked better in my house anyways ;)

So what have you been up to this weekend? Any thrifting lately? Stay tuned for some project reveals and Jayden's complete bedroom overhaul. I'm so excited to show y'all what we did!

I'm out of paper towels

Believe it or not there is a project @ work, in the making... my coworker and I decided we wanted to spruce up the ol' ladies room. Seeing as how it's just the two of us there, we took it upon ourselves to make plans for new paint and most importantly, take down the old paper-towel holder and soap dispenser. But this post isn't about our work/Bathroom project. You see after taking down the old [im thinking 80's style maybe? I'm not totally sure] paper towel holder, I got to looking at it and saw the potential it had so with my quick-whit, I grabbed it and took it home before anyone else even had a chance to... because you know everyone is just chomping at the bit to get their hands on some old metal industrial paper towel holder.

Here it is in all it's glory. It's white and made of metal. Complete with rusty accents.

After breaking the little lock {not as hard as it sounds}, I opened it up and the inside looked far better than the outside, for sure.

The best part? I adored this 'Made in USA' sticker that was on the lid. It's rare to see this kind of sight now a days ::eye roll::

First I gave it a good coat of some Valspar Spray-paint in a pretty Turquoise color. However I wanted to leave a section on the top of the lid to make some sort of design, so I taped my little section off with painters tape and got to spraying.

With a quarter-foil design in mind, I took to Photoshop and created a little section of quarter-foil with a shape tool and just filled in the spaces with a pretty color, just something so I knew where to cut. I than printed my design out on some thick card-stock paper.

After taking my exacto knife to cut out the parts with color, I had my stencil.

I just carefully laid out my stencil along the white patch I left un-sprayed and took a pencil and traced out the stencil.

Next up? The fun part. Painting the quarter-foil pattern!

And there is my Retro-Metal-Paper-Towel holder, transformed into a... Hmmm... What the heck can I use it for?

It turned out to be perfect for all of my fabric scraps! It now fits perfectly on my sewing bench and keeps my fabric scraps organized and away from all the 'bigger' pieces of fabric.

Have you ever transformed something totally off the wall? Something totally random? gave it new life? Do tell! :)

Thrifty-Victory is MINE

I have finally WON. I have beaten the 'I can never find a good deal' curse!

It all started when we decided to make a run to the 'Rescue Mission' this morning [The Rescue Mission is... well, think Goodwill... minus the zip-lock bag of Maxi-Pads]. I have been wanting a console table/sofa table/hall table... whatever it is you want to call it, for the entry way, under the mirror. I have been eying some online for quite some time now but have not committed to paying full price for something that, in the end, will be nothing but a bunch of Wal-Mart inspired pressed board. I have been on the hunt for that special piece in need of just a bit of TLC.

A hall table I sadly did not find on this mornings trip, however something else caught my eye. They had it stuffed in the back, WAY out of view from any regular shoppers [I just knew it was meant for me].

Source

Isn't there something just special about a brushed nickel lamp? It screams sophistication yet brings the room that added character and extra warmth. The lamps you see in the inspiration photo above are from Pottery Barn [because of course when you think of brushed nickel lamp you automatically think of the P to the B]. They are regular price $119.00 but are on special for $95.00. 

In my humble opinion I honestly don't see the sense in spending almost 100-buckeroo's on a simple lamp. Granted the thing is beautiful but so is that $100.00 sitting in my wallet. I am always on the look out for some similar versions or steals of my own for dollars and sometimes even hundreds less.

This may not be the exact lamp that is in the PB Photo however it was 'inspiration' and that is all that matters. When we rounded' the corner and I saw that shiny brushed nickel shine in my perifial I instantly became a 'Moth to the Flame'. I ran over and without even thinking about looking at the price I snatched that baby up before any of the 3 other customers in the store could. Then of course after my adrenaline came back down to normal level and was finally able to compose myself, I looked at the price.

DO-YOU-SEE-THAT!! My adrenaline quickly spiked up as I skipped down the isle giggling with nothing but excited glee [okay I made that part up..... a little bit]. $5.00 dollars. Cinco Dinero. 500 Pennies people!

Five Dollars and Zero cents!

Of course when we came home I did some research to find out what this Lamp really is. My findings made me even more giddy inside.

Ya... I know, RIGHT!?

Overall I don't see any major defects to the lamp. After spending only $5.00, I than tried to debunk the fact that is was only 5-bucks. I thought well 'Maybe it doesn't work', which Josh and I both knew that could be such an easy fix and in the end $5.00 was still a major steal!

Not sure if the side table will be it's permanent home but I was so stoked to score this pure awesomeness. I just HAD to showcase it somewhere, so for right now it's sitting happily and proudly on the side table by the sofa.

So, what do you think? Have you found any awesome steals lately? -So awesome you get down with the giddy-ness just as much as I do? -Oh do tell.