Dining Room

dining room summer decor

i made the outside hurricans with glass from the thrift store and dollar store. sand, shells, hurricans all from the dollar store. candle sticks from the thrift store. cost me about $20 total with everything on the table. candle in the middle was pricest item from partylite.

mirror hanging in the middle of the wall is from macy's outlet store. scored that thing for $39 bucks! table is from freecyle.org - FREE! i am planning to paint the table white. it's all starting to come together. if i took a picture of the other side of the room it's FAR from coming together. boxes of home decor.

Kitchen Decor

I hung up some plates in my kitchen. I need to collect some more white plates to hang on a couple other walls. I am loving it so far! I have been buying white plates on clearance or at the thrift store.

I made the chalkboard. I bought the frame and canvas at the thrift store for $3.98. I wasn't sure what I was going to use it for. I already had the chalkboard paint. I am sooo happy with how it turned out. :)

DIY Thread Holder

I have been buying frames when I find a good deal at the thrift store. Art doesn't understand why we need all these frames. I always say this is a good deal I will use it. Well here is one I used. I wanted to make a peg board to hold all my thread in my craft room. I bought the peg board and wooden dowel for about $6 at Lowe's. I picked up the frame below with the lovely painting for $1.98 at the thrift store. Look at my DIY thread holder. I LOVE it!!!! So much easier to find all my thread!

I traced the peg board out using the frame as my pattern, then we cut the peg board with the electric saw. I measured 2 inches along the entire wooden dowel and cut them with the multi-tool. I used the electric sander to smooth all the edges and ends of the dowels.

Finished result!!!

Thrift Store Finds

On Sunday's at one of the thrift stores near us everything is 30% off. I usually only go there on a Sunday. Today we had to drop off 3 boxes of junk and we left carrying 1 box of treasures to the car. Here is what we purchased for $12.00.

Lamp Shade - needs to be recovered

Vase/Planter, Decorative thingy, starter for a BBQ grill, Peace container, 2 large and 2 small curtain rod holders. We have been looking for the curtain rod holders and they are always too expensive. We found the 4 of them for about $6. Buy a can of spray paint and we can paint all these items for $1!

Garden

Here are some pictures of our garden.

Little midget man that keeps all our plants safe at night. Amber bought this for Art for Father's Day. He loves this little midget!

Art turned his old grill into a potting table. He has to finish making the boards even and securing them down, but this works great!

Cactus Garden

The photographer!

Tug, Tug, Tug

As a child I struggled with keeping my tights up! They ALWAYS fell down. I would tug on them, pull up the slouching legs, pull my skirt up to pull up my tights (mom yelling don't pull up your skirt in public!)...never would stay where they should. My mom bought every type of tights out there. The minute I get home I always took off my tights/nylons. First thing off when I walked through the door. I was super skinny as a little girl. That must be the issue!!! NOPE!

Fast forward 10+ yrs. I start wearing nylons. Same issues...falling down around my ankles. I look like I have grandma ankles. Nylons would roll down, slip down, wouldn't stay up around my waist. I HATED wearing nylons, but it was required for school. I would try to wear long skirts, so the teachers wouldn't see my legs....I would get caught in the parking lot and sent home.

I am almost 30 yrs old. I have been wearing tights and nylons now for what 30 years. I now REFUSE to wear them unless I go to ND. Luckily I have the choice here in CA. I still am having issues keeping tights, nylons and UNDERWEAR up. Underwear also has been an issue with staying in place, but not as bad as tights/nylons.

Today as I was walking to work my underwear start slipping down. Uh oh....I reach in my pocket to hold them in place. That lasts about 2.5 seconds. By the time I get to the elevator they are completely down.....I am worried if I take one more step they will be at my ankles. Empty elevator I was able to adjust them a little to make it to the bathroom.

I don't understand this issue with under garments! I buy the size that fits, too big, too small....nothing matters. They refuse to stay up. Tug Tug Tug.

Samster Mommy Tutu Drive

I have been wanting to make a tutue.....what a great cause to make one. I am going to join in on the tutu drive. Looks like I have a new project for this week. =)

Come on girls let's flood Samster's Mommy with tutu's!!!!! Just google how to make a tutu and get to work!

Parent's

aren't my parents so cute? they went to the PBR this past weekend. my dad is the tall guy in the middle. he just needs a few sponsors on his shirt and he fits right in!

Door Stop

Ballard Design is currently selling the below knotted door stop. I almost bought one about 3 weeks ago. I had a 10% off coupon and we need a door stop badly. I luckily came to my sense and didn't order it. $40+ bucks plus shipping...not in the budget!

Tonight I was shopping at Marshall's. Guess what I found......the same door stop for $5.99!!! TOTALLY in the budget and I bought TWO. We needed one for our bedroom door too.

Bedroom door

Holding the front door open.

After

Here are the afters. I still need to add drawer knobs to everything. Just haven't had the time to go buy some new ones. I will have to add some pictures of the night stands. I think everything turned out great. It wasn't that difficult either just time consuming.

Before

Remember this little cabinet we pulled out of the garbage?

2 night stands - $1.00 for both at garage sale

Dresser - Art's coworker gave this to us.

I have been piling up furniture in our garage for the past couple months. It was so bad in our apartment garage you could barely walk! Finally last weekend we decided to tackle the DIY furniture redo!

New Grill!

Look at our fabulous new grill our in laws bought us as a house warming gift!!!! Dinner is cooking as I type on the new grill! I am sooo excited to have a grill. It will be so nice to grill on hot days instead of cooking in the kitchen.

Menu for Father's Day

Cuban Pork Chops

Chipotle Lime Rice

Corn on the Cob

Brownies & ice cream

Notice anything different?

Look what my BFF Krystal in So Cal did for me...pretty cool! I have a siggy now!

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Painting Tools

Here are some painting tools that I found useful and a waste of time. I have more helpful tips than waste of time.

Corner painters didn't work very good and we felt were a waste of time.

I love this paint trim tray to paint the edges. It held the right amount of paint and wasn't too heavy to haul up and down a ladder.

Blue tape is the way to go. I have heard great reviews about the green frog tape also. We also bought some cream colored tape and it was awful!

I loved this little roller for hard to paint areas.

The edger! This was my FAVORITE painting tool! It worked AWESOME along the edges. We discovered this wonderful tool when we were almost done painting. ugh! It saved HOURS of time and worked like a charm.

I love Lowe's Vaspar paints. We painted the entire house with Vaspar.