Yard Improvments

Before:

 This is our "Kidney Bean" planter in the front corner of our yard.  It's seen better days. It's kind of out of the way so I don't pay much attention to it or how over grown it has become.

 I trimmed the tops of the green bushes in the Spring and I also cut the bushes back off the rock.  They had completely grown over the rock.
After:

 Two hours outside today with my ipod and a pair of shears (and 2 "pickup boys" and a husband to use the sledgehammer to push clippings into the garbage can) and here are the fruits of my labors......3 separate bushes...and is that a tree I see back there?

Two nicely trimmed bushes, and a big ol' rock. :)

A few side-by-side shots to I can tell that I really DID make a difference!

 

The ground in the planter is covered with faded bark chips. Rather then buy some now and let them fade over the winter, I'll wait till Spring and buy some more bark to cover it and it will look great!

Virtual Paint Preview site FREE (repost)

As I stated over the weekend, I have a few makeover ideas in mind for my house.  I thought now might be a good time to remind everyone of this cool "Virtual Paint" website.

When I was trying to convince my husband to let me two-tone our house, he was afraid painting the walls tan would darken the rooms in our house. He couldn't see my vision. I found this AMAZING site. Bher has a FREE online virtual paint preview called Paint Your Space.

I LOVE this site because you can choose any color and accent colors if you want and then you UPLOAD YOUR OWN PHOTOS to virtually paint!

I took photos of our kitchen, uploaded them to Bher's Paint Your Space, chose my color and began virtual painting. You can change the color at any time, and even save your projects. The program works a lot like Paint Brush on your computer. Click on an area, and it turns the color you chose.

After virtually two-toning my kitchen, I showed my husband and he said "That looks really good!" I TOLD YOU IT WOULD!!!! (...is what I wanted to say) ;)

And the really cool thing is, after we painted the house, we were amazed that it looked EXACTLY like the photo! I then went crazy and started taking photos of every room to upload and "paint". Paint Your Space also helped me decide NOT to paint a room the way I was thinking of painting it.

**Be sure to NOT get the flat paint. Flat paint does NOT hide fingerprints. And it's hard to wipe clean. Semigloss is the most common type of basic paint because it cleans up well.

Utah Readers: Estrada Farms $9.99 for a $25 gift card!

WOO HOO!!

Are you landscaping your yard this summer? If so, you might want to head over to City Deals and grab THIS Estrada Farms Nursery gift card. It's only $9.99 and worth $25!

Here's the DL:

1. Click HERE and add the Estrada $25 gift card to your cart. It will say $12.50....just wait...
2. Head to checkout
3. Use promo code SHRUB to get the deal for $9
   

Estrada Farms (formally Olson's Nursery) is located at 1133 West 3200 North Lehi UT, 84043

(Thanks, Barbara!)

Home Depot Light Trade In for up to $5 Discount

And at Home Depot now through Friday Nov. 11th, you can take in a broken strand of Christmas lights and exchange them when you get to the register with THIS COUPON, 1 per strand you are recycling. You can use the coupons to get these discounts:

• $3 Off Home Accents Holiday LED Lights

• $4 Off Martha Stewart Living or GE Holiday LED Lights

• $5 Off EcoSmart or Light Show Holiday LED Lights

Last year we traded in 2 strands and bought 2 C6 LED sets for $7.96 each, which came to $5 each after the $3 credit.

BOGO FREE Paint Samples at Lowes

Lowes has their Paint Sample cans on sale BOGO FREE online.  This is a great chance to grab some high quality paint for your craft projects, or a cheap way to test out colors you might want to use in your home.

1. Head on over HERE and select your color.
2. Add it to your cart.
3. Add a second can of the same OR DIFFERENT color
4. Price will automatically be adjusted to get the second one FREE
5. Shipping will also be free

I just gave this a test run and my total for 2 cans was $2.94 with the free shipping.



Offer Ends 5/16/11.

$10 off Lowe's $50 purchase

Lowes has a nice printable card online right now you can get $10 off a $50 purchase.

Spring/Summer is right around the corner (It's suppose to be 70 here on Saturday!!!) so get your yard in shape, buy gardening tools, fertilizer, plants.....anything you can think of and get $10 off.

Thrifty home decor, Master Bedroom beach retreat

Sometimes in order to be Thrifty with your re decorating, you have to piece everything together over time. 

A while back, my husband and I decided we wanted to re decorate our room.  The before was all white walls.  Being the beach-going people that we are (trapped inland) we decided to do a beach/resort type theme.  We started with this bedding we got on clearance at Sears.  It was a LONG time ago, but I think we paid $60 for everything:

I purchased the pillow new from a garage sale for $2.00.
We then painted our room 2 shades of tan.  We matched the tan on the palm trees on the bed sheet.  I had this idea to use bamboo as a chair rail.  

We kept our eyes open and found some some discounted bamboo at a consignment store.  We of course bought it, took it home and used a box cutter to cut it vertically in half.  We then used our table saw to cut the angles we needed.  To attach it to the wall we pre-drilled the nail holes because I was afraid the nails would split the bamboo.

We found this poster (I believe it was at Walmart or Target) that reminded us of when we went to Green Island on the Great Barrier Reef, Australia.  We also framed it in a smaller size bamboo (also found on clearance):

To use the smaller bamboo as a frame, we again used the box cutter to slice the bamboo vertically, but only on one side.  We then slid the photo and the thin cardboard into the cut in the bamboo.  As you can see, the edges didn't line up perfectly, but that's okay by me.  I think it looks native. :)

I picked up 3 of these palm tree canvas pictures at a garage sale.  I paid $1.50 for all 3.

And here is the 3rd canvas art. I found the shower curtain on clearance at K-Mart as well as the matching wallpaper boarder.  I installed an arced shower curtain (from Bed Bath and Beyond with a 50% off coupon) in the master bath this past fall.  I LOVE it.

We used more bamboo to frame the mirror in the master bathroom.  The light fixture was brass....I blogged about my thrifty light fixture update HERE. (yay for spray paint!)



This is a souvenir from our recent trip to Fiji.




I found these woven place mats at Thrift store for .25 each. 










The process of finding all the room decor at the right prices has taken a long time.  It's been fun waiting to see what I come across that would fit into our room.  By being patient and waiting for the right thing, at the right price we were able to spend much less then if we would have purchased all the items at once.

Fireplace Make Over (repost)

So now that we are all motivated for the new year and thinking "warm thoughts", I thought I would repost my fireplace makeover to motivate you to change things you have been meaning to. (Originally posted Oct. 2010)

So, the weather here in Utah has taken a turn for the worse. The heater kicks on multiple times a day and rain is in the forecast all week. I figured it's the perfect time to share my fireplace makeover! :)

So, here is the before:I had already started sanding the mantel at this point, so there was some dust in the air for the photo. See how orange the wood looks? And the pink bricks? I felt it was dated, and I wanted to stain the wood on the mantel darker. (The wall was maroon when we moved in.  It kind of grew on us, so we left it)

So first I sanded the mantel:I thought even THIS looked better then the orange wood. We debated putting a clear coat on this and leaving it light.
Ultimately we decided to stain it dark:I LOVE the color that the wood ended up. But now I didn't like the pink bricks. Truth be told, I HATE pink, but now with the mantel dark I felt they really stood out...and had to go. I didn't get any photos of the process, I wish I would have. :( My husband and I took a chisel and hammer to the brick fasad on the mantel. They were 1/2 inch thick with grout in between. The ones on the wall were stuck on with Tough as Nails. It was much easier then I thought to get them off.

I then picked out a tile color to replace the brick. We have a neighbor that does tile work, so we hired him to do it. BEST DECISION EVER!!! There are some things you can do yourself, and there are others you should know you limits and let the pros handle it. So we paid him $80 to tile the fireplace. (This led to all 3 bathrooms and my laundry room being tiled also! :)

Here is the final result:













And a side by side comparison:
BEFORE AFTER
 

Planting Tulips

My life long dream has been to go to Holland to see the Tulips
in bloom. A few years ago, my husband and I did a Europe trip during April and we made it to Amsterdam and went to Kukhenoff Gardens. It was AMAZING. I've added a few photos to this post. Google Kukhenoff photos to see some more amazing photos.

For us in the US, now is the time of year to plant Tulip bulbs or any Spring blooming bulbs.

I live near a botanical garden that every year imports bulbs from Holland plants them in the fall, they bloom in the Spring, and they dig them up and sell them to the public for cheap and order more from Holland for the next year. (I know, waste of money right? But GREAT deal for us! :)

I bought bulbs from this garden (Thanksgiving Point) for $3 a dozen. AND because I got there before the gardeners "cleaned them" the cashier told me that every "cluster" of bulbs counts as one.

To better understand Tulips, here is a run down:
On the left is a "cluster" of 3 bulbs. Each bulb sprouts 1 flower.
You can break the clusters up and plant each bulb individually. >>

The middle is a bulb with the skin on and the bulb to the right has the skin removed.

To plant a bulb, dig a hole 3-4" deep and place the bulb with the tip up. **"Tip up" is a good rule of thumb, but when farmers in Holland plant Tulip bulbs, they push them off the back of a truck, they don't worry about "tips up" so if your bulb falls over, don't sweat it. (Below)

You can cluster bulbs in groups in the same hole 3" apart or plant individually. Usually the first year you plant a bulb you will get one flower. The second year you will get two because the Tulip grows another bulb. (1 flower per bulb) **For this reason some people "thin" their Tulips at the end of the season and re plant them in the fall. "Thin" meaning they dig up the bulbs and break them into individual bulbs again.

Clip flowers after bloom to prevent seed production. Leave the green foliage on until it's fully dry. The bulb "sucks" nutrients back from the leaves to "feed" the bulb for next season.

**If you dig up your bulbs to thin them, you must leave them spread out in a cool dry place to dry until they are dry. Then you can re plant them again in the fall.**

Tulips are my favorite flowers ever. They are so easy to care for. You drop them is some dirt Sept-Oct. and forget about them until Spring comes around and you have beautiful flowers!

My latest project

I am starting to decorate my office/craft room with a NYC/travel decor.
I have wanted a magnet board to go over my craft table for a while now. I've been looking and the size I wanted are quite expensive! I had an idea in my head of what I was going to do, I just needed to find a magnet board for the right price.

Well, after searching and searching, I decided to make my own. I had a piece of metal that we used for my sons preschool "Alphabet Town" that was blank on the back. He doesn't use it anymore, and this way I didn't have to buy a new magnet board.

I went to Home Depot and bought some wood to make a frame. I came home and cut it to size, and made the 45° angle cuts in the corners with my Miter Saw. I attached the corners with Joint Fasteners.
I then strengthened it with wood glue and filled any gaps with wood putty. (mind you, this was the best corner I used for the photo. ☺) Then I sanded it all smooth, and if there were any uneven joints I sanded them flush.

I then used the same black high gloss paint I used on my kitchen table makeover and painted the whole thing black.
I then attached the metal to the frame using large head screws. I positioned the screws so the heads caught the metal and pressed it into the wood. Hardware was attached to hang it with.

I really liked it painted black. It had a nice crisp clean feel to it.
But my vision was to Modge Podge a pack of "Landscape" flash cards I picked up in the Target $1 bin all over it. Because the black turned out so well, I thought I might want to have a solid black frame later on, so I used hot glue, sticky dots and double sided tape to attach my Landscapes so I could take them off later if I wanted to.
I really like the way it turned out. I started off wanting to bend and cut the flash cards so they were molded to the frame, but I kind of like how they look like post cards now. And I like how they are temporary so I can move the magnet board to another place, take the flash cards off and have a nice black frame around it.

Cost:
Magnet board-Free (I originally paid $7 for it from my sons preschool)
Wood for frame-$1.67 each. I used 2.
Joint fasteners-$1.40 for a box of 30. I kept bending them, I was grateful they came with 30 pieces!
Wood glue and putty-Free, I already had them. They are about $2 a bottle
Paint-Free, left over from another project. I could have used spray paint, that would have been cheap
Hardware-$3.00 I bought a packet of 20 different pieces for future use.
Landmark Flash Cards- $1.00

So total cost for me was about $7.00. From scratch, this would have cost about $20.00.

I have a ton of joint fasteners left if anyone wants to do a project! :)

Laundry Room decor

I wanted to add some color to my laundry room, but nothing permanent. I went to Home Depot and bought a scrap piece of "puzzle board" that happened to be the exact size I wanted. I don't know the technical term for it, but it's smooth on one side and has an unfinished soft back side....like in the old wooden puzzles we use to play with.

Here's what I did:
I painted the entire board white.
Using different size dining plates and lids I traced circles on my board. (make sure some go off the edge)
Then I used 3 different colors of tole paint from Walmart and filled in my circles.
I debated on hanging it vertical or horizontal...horizontal won. :) I used Mirror hangers to attach it to the wall. I love the way it turned out, and that it's not painted on the wall. I can take it down whenever I want.

If you wanted to you could use embroidery hoops to give it some depth, or you could even make a frame to hold it in. A finished project with the hoops can be seen here.

I also added some vinyl:













I loved both of these vinyl signs. I thought the laundry logos were so unique and I fell in love with the Laundry Room sign. My friend Lexi at www.ramblingsvinyl.blogspot.com made them for me. She's amazing, she can do anything.

New Living Room Revealed

Before:
After:

I am SO in love with my new front room! So here's the break down of what I did:

1. Got rid of the ugly green couches and dark coffee and end tables that were a hand me down gift when we got married 12 years ago.
2. Got rid of old area rug and shampooed the carpet
3. Added NEW Ashley Furniture couch set we got at an AMAZING price at the new store opening Manager's Specials over Labor Day.
4. I got the accent rug at Shopko on sale for 40% off
5. I wanted a "dark chunky table" to put photos on where the 2 couches meet in the corner. But I didn't want it to show very much. The measurements had to be 36" X 36" and 24" high. I was so excited to find the exact table I wanted at Target on clearance!
   

(the photo is of the picture on the box)
The box said "36 X 36 X 30. We thought "close enough". 6" isn't that much, and it will be in a corner.
We took it home, put it together and set it up where we wanted it and......it was too tall. (you could have used it for a dining room table it was so tall) I loved the table and loved the price....So this is what we did to it:
:)
Now it's the PERFECT table that we wanted and at less then 1/2 the price we were willing to spend!
Now......it's time for new carpet through out the house......hummmm! ha ha!

As I posted before, I have realized that, for me, "less is more" when it comes to a clutter-free home. We were looking for a new coffee table, I'm SO glad we waited till we put the room together. I like it without a coffee table in the middle of the room to be a catch-all....and we saved the $100 we would have spent on it. I think that's pretty thrifty!