Trash to Treasure

I enjoy reading home decor blogs. So many people saying they find furniture on the side of the road and take it home to refinish it.

I don't know about you but until the other day I NEVER see nice furniture or chairs out for the garbage.

We put stuff out like our blue plastic pool and it's gone in an hour, but not anything nice worth more than a few bucks.

So Monday after swim lessons we're driving home and we see 2 pieces of furniture out. This dresser, which I'm going to repaint for the girls room. Then this....... OMG I start freaking out in the car. You know why?

Because it matches this bed I bought off craigslist last year for Madeline.



My husband told me I'd never find another bed to match... ha!



Now the girls will have matching beds. Since we just cleaned out the garage I'm moving the bed with a new mattress to her room early. We now have an extra bed.



I think the two beds are going to look great together in the room. They aren't exactly the same but they're from the same collection. Now I'm off to order another bedding set.

Next week I plan to tackle the dresser, we just need some warm weather. Yippee!

Journey of a Living Room

I'm pleased to introduce my new living room! Thanks to Cheap Thrills Decor our custom built ins are complete and beautiful!

We've been brainstorming and trying to figure this room out for 3 years. Remember my inspiration photo. Finally I feel at home.

Let's take a journey of the phases...

This is the living room when we first purchased the house.

Bright sunshine yellow and a gold ceiling fan. Not for me. Off balance and weird. Although Madeline enjoyed her extersaucer play spot.

Don't you love the storage space for the pack and play? Notice a theme... baby accessories. Not exactly a relaxing living room with some sort of style.

This phase I was going for an accent wall. It looked good but the dark color made the room seem really dark.

Here is the finished product again. Light and bright! I cannot believe how much different the room looks. I love sitting in this room. I spent many days frustrated on what to do with it. Finally it's done! Well except I need a new rug and coffee table :)

Our huge flat screen is now up away from little hands and has a special place of it's own.

This unit is the corner. Let me tell you.... we have storage galore!

We even have room for our rock band guitar. All the DVD's and old VCR tapes have a place.

The other side is complete with bookshelves accented with bead board. I just loooove it! So much functional storage space. My husband is an avid book collector. We moved an heirloom collection to the living room.


If you live in the DFW area and are looking for a design firm or carpenter for some custom furniture check out Cheap Thrills Decor. They are incredible, professional, and high quality. Thank you Jami and Bob!!

Repurposed Cabinet Door

One of my many finds in Canton was this unfinished cabinet door. (I've got 2 more for other projects)

I've wanted a chalk board at the end of my cabinet for a while. I just needed to find the right shape.

I found one that had the same arch as our kitchen cabinets. I scored this for $5!I sprayed the whole thing with chalk board paint. Then I did some distressing and applied a natural color stain to the edge and trim. I left the middle un-coated so I could use it as a chalk board.

With some little wooden accent pieces I was done! I plan to use this as our menu board. The kids are always asking what's for dinner.

Master Bedroom Update

This beautiful piece of furniture has caused a lot of drama in our home.

We bought the furniture set because of this 5 foot by 5 foot piece. After 4 failed attempts to get it upstairs we sadly sad good bye. We even considered tearing out the banister and having it replaced it get it up.

But then if we move we couldn't get it back down. Here's the way our bedroom looks right now.

We got a new ceiling fan, window arch, furniture and bedding.

I'm still on the hunt for drapes, chunky lamps, accent pillows and wall decor.

See my iron work it will go above the bed. I got it in Canton for $30. We're not sure how to hang it up. It's really.... really heavy. Not exactly something you want to fall on your head in the middle of the night.

This is the way our room looked before with our old furniture. We sold it on Craig's list in 1 day!

My husband got this furniture when he was in high school about 15 years ago.
It was still in great shape but we desperately needed a king size bed.
Plus we were just plain tired of it.

Getting Professional Help

Now that Caroline is getting into a routine I'm able to get some home projects done. I've had some serious nesting since I spent the last 3 months of my pregnancy on bed rest. I'm going to clean up the house and share some photos tomorrow.

But today.... I have a real life interior designer coming to the house. She was even on HGTV's Design Star!!! Her name is Jamie and her company is Cheap Thrills Decor. Why you ask? Well our living room built in's aren't going as planned.

We've had 3 carpenters out and none of them will paint or do the electrical work. When I have contractors do all three separate jobs surprisingly it's more expensive then just going with a designer to handle it all. I had a painter quote me $1,500 just to paint the built ins. CRAZY! No thank you! I can't wait to see what they come up with. Plus I will get the whole living room finally put together.

Check out their blog!

It's Almost Time.. Baby Room Is Ready

I am proud of say the baby's room is finally done! Let me share. Remember we don't know if it's a boy or girl. Can you tell what we think we are having?

My good friend Misti made this amazing and beautiful wreath. It will adorn the hospital door when we have baby.

Announcing our official baby names: We have an initial for "C" for Caroline

and an "A" for Alexander.

I was able to paint a special mural for baby. We're going with a nautical theme. The bedding I found at a garage sale for $20. It's pottery barn! This was the starting point for the room.

Yes, mom I still need someone to iron the bed skirt.

This bed was my crib as a child, all 3 of my children have slept peacefully on it. A few of my cousins and family friends have also used it. Don't worry it was never recalled and it's safe. I'm paranoid like that... I even remove the decorative end knobs once baby stands up.

I had a mismatched set of shelves so I painted them all red to match. This changing table has seen 3 coats of paint and 3 baby bottoms.

Love my glider... I've been known to sit in this spot and daydream about baby.

I painted a whimsical ocean scene to match the bedding.

The red stars are just waiting cute little outfits.

Baby's already got a ton of toys thanks to hand me downs.

I redid the mobile by adding satin trim, adding some nautical accessories and ribbon.

This is the way the mobile used to look.

A new car seat was in order. I did my research and chose the Graco that holds baby's up to 32 pounds in this wonderful paisley pattern.

Now for a pregnancy update:

I am 33 weeks and 5 days.

Still having contractions.. last night we almost made another trip to L&D but my meds finally did their job.

Still on modified bedrest. I go back to the Dr tomorrow.

I had Madeline at 35 weeks and the other two at 36 weeks. We think baby will arrive on or around July 27th.

That is only a couple weeks away!!!

Princess Table

My Little Miss loves dress up. With the addition of baby #4 we lost the playroom. So when we moved her to a big girl room I made little play areas for her.

This is her make up table. She actually uses this table... especially when she's supposed to be napping. I find her sitting here with her pretend blow dryer and straightener.

This is an easy and affordable little dress up table to mimic for your little princess. It just takes a few little pieces.

Chair: Ross $30 (couldn't pass it up)

Mirror: Bombay Kids about 5 years ago this is a hand me down from big sister. You could use any mirror.

Lamp: $5 garage sale find with one of her FABULOUS glamRbaby bows adorning the shade. This is a great way to display outgrown baby bows.

Table: Craigslist find for $10. After baby comes I am going to repaint and put tulle around the bottom. Similar to this one.

Accessories: Wallyworld (Wal-mart) has a great princess hair set with a bag, pretend straightener, blow dryer, brush and hair things.

More Painting Projects

I finished up the 2nd set of wooden crosses for the kids room. My mom picked up unfinished wooden crosses at her last trip to Canton.

Remember how I painted the girls crosses?

Oh how I love to paint! I finished up a cross for the baby's room and Will's room.

The baby's room is nautical theme. I am using Pottery Barn Casey Bedding. Did you know I found the bedding for $20? Gotta love garage sales. I am still working on the nursery I will share next week. I love how Will's cross turned out.
After this baby comes I'm looking forward to my next big project.... painting the master bathroom cabinets.

I am linking up with:

Shanty2Chic

Thrifty Decor Chick

Chic on a Shoe String

Finishing Home Projects

I start projects and have big ideas but then I get distracted and never finish. This garage sale find is no exception. I bought it for $5 and spray painted it ORB.

I've had this iron thing on the wall for a year empty. It's right in the entry way so people actually see it. I've had many comments "What are you going to do with that?"

Well I finally did something. I did it all "Texas" with fake flowers and feathers.

For those of you who don't live in the south. Most of us just love feathers and fake flowers. Yes it goes against everything they teach you on HGTV. You know what? It makes me happy!

I do have some friends who are also fellow Texans and they hate fake flowers and have more of a modern style. Not me I love the statement "Everything's bigger in Texas".

Just fun and it welcomes my guests into my home.

Painting Wooden Crosses

I am back to some frugal home decorating... my fun hobby.

Oh how I love to paint! I can do this while I am on bed rest. I pull up my comfy chair to the kitchen table and go paint crazy.

My mom picked up these unfinished wooden crosses on her last trip to Canton, TX. We LOVE Canton First Monday Trade Days. If you live close and haven't been, go!

She scored all these crosses for $19! I got busy immediately, this is the one I did for Katelyn's room.

She's 13 and a full fledged teenager.

These types of crosses sell for $50 + at boutiques and online. It cost me roughly $4 to make myself.

I use the little acrylic bottles for paint. My favorite is the folk art brand.

Their paint is nice and thick, it covers great.

I did this one for Madeline my 3 year old. Can you tell the difference in my girls personalities?

I have 2 more to finish. One for Will and another one for the nursery.

Painting makes me feel so happy!

Brought a little "normal" back to me.

I am linking up to:

Southern Hospitality Thrifty Treasures Party

Domestically Speaking Paint Party

DIY Showoff Project Parade

Bedrest = New Bedroom!

The benefit of bed rest has included a brand new king size bed!!! My wonderful husband went out shopping and found this amazing set. He took pictures and brought them home for me and I loved it. My only complaint was he bought it full price... no discount... not frugal. Oh well it was splurge well worth the price!

However I did get some deails online.

JcPenney Bedding with 20% off coupon from www.retailmenot.com

We also got a new ceiling fan at 50% off at a swanky light shop, Lee Lighting.

Long gone is our temporary shade for our arch. We finally after 3 years in our home decided to order a shutter to fit. Scored 30% by buying in online instead of at Lowe's.

We even got a new flat screen TV. My favorite part is my new dresser. I've got a ton of storage. We've got one more piece on order. It's a huge master chest for my husband's stuff.

After the baby arrives I can't wait to get out and shop for accessories and decorate this room.
This is our old queen bed. It was way to small and too firm for us. Besides it was my husband's furniture he got in high school..... 15 years ago. It was time for us to focus on our room.

I listed our old furniture on craigslist and sold it in 1 day! Our oldest daughter got the queen mattress and she also got new bedding. I will show that in another post.


This is the room before we moved in. So glad that old gold ceiling fan is gone.

Once Again Inspired

During my little bloggy break I've been spending time with the kids and relaxing. I've even read a book. I finally jumped on the Twilight bandwagon and let me tell you.... LOVE IT!

I decided I would read it before Kate (12) was allowed to read it. I'm the type of parent that wants to know what my kid is up to. It was completely appropriate for a 7th grader. The love was very mild and well written. It also gives us something to talk about together.

I am now reading New Moon. I am so addicted!

I've been thinking more about Madelines new room and the baby nursery. I stumbled accross this photo on a blog. Sorry not sure which one (remember I have prego head right now), I am using their photo it looks great!

This inspired my theme for Madeline's big girl room. I am going to use this paint technique and we already have this exact chandalier in her nursery.

I am going to do white furniture. Of course at a garage sale hopefully next month. I want a scrolly headboard if that makes sense.

The next big decision.... bedding? I've been looking everywhere and nothing seems perfect. Anyone have any ideas or have you seen any bedding that would go with this look?

Painting Project

I did a painting project for my photographer friend Brandi right before Christmas. This is for one of her daughters. I've already painted the other 2 girls rooms.

I've seen this idea around and was excited to give it a try. I love the way it turned out.

Here is closer look. You can bling it up by gluing crystals to flat push pins.

I think I'm going to paint one for Madeline's big girl room in a couple months. I am picturing one above her bed between a curtain rod and drapery's pulled back.

I am linking up with Do It Yourself Day http://asoftplace.net/

Rust Paint Effect

My friend Nicole gave me this beautiful "R" as a gift. I've had an itch to try a new paint technique. Rust. Here is the final product. Here it is displayed on the mantle next to the family picture.
I started with a brown. The R started out as gold.
I did lots of layers of acrylic colors. I would dry brush on and wipe off with paper towels. Sometimes blotting the towel to create a weathered look.
Here are all the colors I used.
See the shiny gold R in the right bottom corner. That is the before.
I am going to be trying this technique out on a wall at my friend Brandi's photography studio.
I can't wait!

I am participating in Metamorphosis Monday http://www.betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/