Top Five Posts of 2013

To wrap up the year I thought I'd do a little round up of our most viewed posts from 2013. We've learned so much in our first  year of blogging and it's fun to look back and see how much was accomplished. 

Gray Antique Dresser

 I painted my first antique dresser this past month and I can say I have learned a lot! Reading about something is totally different than when you're faced with a situation. At first I wanted to stain the top because I really like that look.

$10 Giveaway For Itsy Bitsy Seamstress

 Enter to win a $10 off Itsy Bitsy Seamstress! The giveaway ends on January 1 at 12:00 A.M.

The code is for a one time use and can not be shared.

Be sure to enter!

My etsy shop: Itsy Bitsy Seamstress

 a Rafflecopter giveaway
 

Drawers Turned Shelves

I  have a new project I've been working on lately and I've been using a lot of the stuff I have stored away in my basement. I am redoing one of my kids rooms trying to make room for our next baby that will be due in April. We had a bunk bed in this room previously. No one wanted to sleep on the top bunk, and I felt uncomfortable letting the little one up there. So we're starting from scratch and re-doing the whole room for two of the girls. I want to show each of the projects individually and then the whole room when it's complete.

15% OFF Etsy Shop!

Hello! 

I just wanted to let everyone know that I have my Christmas Sale going on right now. For all those that are shopping for Christmas gifts, you need to purchase by the 15 of December (US).  I have a 15% off a minimum of a $5 purchase (use code MERRY15). Offer ends on December 25, 2013. Also, my shop has a Buy 2 get 1 FREE sale! This offer can not be combined with the 15% coupon. Stop by and see all my new items! Merry Christmas!

Itsy Bitsy Seamstress

 

House Tour

Today I want to share some of the other rooms in my sister's house that we decorated this past summer. This house is huge and it was a big challenge to do. We started on bookshelves since they did not have any other furniture in the house for a couple months.(While still working on things around the house.)

Our First Craft Fair

 We've been busy getting ready for our first craft fair these last weeks. It was a lot of work but the girls had fun. We first set up everything in our garage so setting up for the first time went smoothly.

Boy's Vintage Car Bedroom

In the last couple of weeks I shared some rooms we have decorated this past summer. The first was a Boy's Nautical Room and then a Girl's Vintage Room. Today I have another  boy's room. This was another really fun room to put together! Emily came up with the theme and my sister gave us the go ahead, although she probably had no clue what we would come up with this time.

From Dinning Room Chairs To Bench

If you read my last post you might remember that I said I made a bench from dinning room chairs.I wonder if you were a little confused ? Well today I want to show you what I made using six really ugly chairs. I'll show you the after, so I don't scare you away with the Before. Here's one of the benches.

Girl's Vintage Room

 I want to share the next room that we decorated at my sister's house . We've been working all summer long gathering things for her house, so we've had our eyes out for anything that would go in her house. I'm so glad it was summertime so that we could  shop our favorite places (garage sales and flea markets).

Boy's Nautical Room

 This was a really fun room to decorate. I promised a while back to post some pictures of the nautical themed room and I have finally gotten around to taking the pictures.

 We shopped mostly garage sales, auctions and flea-markets. Amazingly enough we found plenty of nautical themed stuff . Hope you're ready for lots of pictures.  

DIY Nautical Wall Decor

We have been super busy this summer. My aunt and uncle asked us to decorate their new house, so we have been doing a lot of different projects. I think doing it yourself has a lot of benefits, the first one being is you get a one of a kind piece that fits the spot perfectly.
The first room we did was a nautical themed boy's room. This room was a lot of fun! We found some scrap pieces of plywood that were circles sitting around in their basement. My mom thought they had potential so we took them home and came up with an idea to make wall decor for the boy's room.

DIY Pallet Wood Shelves

 Wow I can't believe how this summer has flown by! If anyone noticed I did not post once, I have been supper busy with my kids being home and lots of projects going on. I think with the kids starting school I might be able to start blogging again. I hope to post at least once a week.
 I want to show you one project I did this summer and has been in the back of my mind for a while. Every time I walked into the laundry room I would think "I need to do something with that space. So I decided on some shelves to tie the cabinets together. I have lots of pallet wood around so that was what I decided to use.

Family Vacation

Our family took a much needed vacation to the beach the week before Memorial Day. We don't get to take vacations every year so we felt blessed to be able to get away this year! I wanted to share some pictures and hope I don't bore anyone with too many.

Spring Blooms and Gardens

 I have not been doing anything but gardening lately, so I hope you all don't get tired of my posts on gardening (or bore you with so many pictures). Even before I ever started blogging or doing DIYs I was a gardener, so in a sense gardening is my first love! We live on three acres of land and some of that is wooded so I have plenty of space to do what I want with.

   First I want to do a little update on the flower beds that I posted about a while back. If you have not seen those you can see those here. These beds look so much fuller now!

Sewing Table Repurposed To Desk

We recently became nominees for the Leibster Award! Our blog is one of eleven to be chosen. Reeves from The Weathered Door nominated us. She's a very young and talented blogger so we're honored that she would include us in the bunch!

With nice weather here I have a hard time finding time to blog because I am constantly doing things outdoors. I don't know if anyone else is like that but being indoors is really hard for me this time of year! Maybe with the hotter weather of summer I won't have that problem.                                            

Today I want to show you an old sewing table that I redid a while back. I bought it without the sewing machine in it, thinking to turn it into a desk. It was a little in rough shape, but it was well made. Here's the before.

Cabinet Door Chalkboards

I've decided to show you guys what we've been working on the last couple weeks. Our cousins are remodeling their kitchen and were getting rid of their kitchen cabinets. My mom asked if she could have the doors and they were nice enough to remove the doors before they threw the cabinets away.

Spring Flower Beds

We have been so excited for spring to get here. Only, now that it's here we totally forgot about blogging!  Actually we didn't forget, I've just been outside working. So today is a rainy day and I'm inside and decided it was a good time to show you some of the flower beds that I've mulched these past weeks.

Travel Room Decor

A few months ago we helped my 24 year old aunt re-decorate her room. We didn't have the opportunity to take pictures of the before, but we did finally get around to taking pictures of her room now. We got our inspiration from the Eiffel Tower wall art. We found it at a resale shop for $8. 

Shabby Chic Desk Makeover

I just wanted to show you what we've been up to lately. I bought this desk at a resale shop last week and I worked on it for the last few days. With just a few coats of paint we gave it a whole new look.

 

DIY Framed Chalkboard

 My mom was running errands, and couldn't resist stopping by a thrift shop. She found a 42 inch x 30 inch framed art that was kind of ugly. If it hadn't been such a dark color, she wouldn't have thought to turn it into a chalkboard.

Making a Pallet Wood Sign

I guess spring is on it's way! There have been huge flocks of robins everywhere. I have never seen so many in my life. The other day I noticed that some of our little daffodils have bloomed. Everything will soon be GREEN! Spring  is such a beautiful time of the year!

 I know it's been a little while since you guys asked us to make a tutorial on how to make a pallet wood sign. I've finally got around to it! With family, and other activities keeping us busy, we've gotten ourselves motivated again and got working on the tutorial. 

Chippy Painted End Tables

We got two end tables at a garage sale for five dollars so we could get some practice painting. They have been sitting in our basement since last fall because we didn't know what to do with them. After looking for inspiration on different blogs, we decided to try chippy paint with Vaseline.

 

Distressed Coffee Table Tutorial

This table was probably our first big furniture re do. We fixed this table up before we even contemplated starting a blog. It would have posted sooner, but since the table was done before we had the blog, I didn't take very good pictures. Well actually they were horrible. We didn't think about taking better pictures for a while because we gifted the table to some friends who needed some furniture for their new apartment. And after that I forgot about it. I finally got over there the other day, and they graciously allowed me to photograph their coffee table (which turned out pretty lovely, if I do say so myself:)

DIY Decorative Fabric Flowers

I recently got a request to do a tutorial on the decorative flowers from our post how to cover a box in fabric. So I finally got around to it. These are very simple flowers, and can liven up any simple project.

DIY Sewing Table Repurpose

 I was driving through town the other day when I spotted a table next to a dumpster. When I go to pick it up a man came out and asked if he could help me load it. Thank goodness he did, because I don't think I could have lifted this table into my truck. It weighed a ton!  When I got home, I got a screw driver and took the sewing machine out first.

Doorway Decor

We thought we would have spring flowers to show you, but we got a little surprise instead. Our temperatures went from fifty degrees to twenty eight and we got 4-5 inches of snow.

I love the Nandina Bush. I have them all the way down my driveway and in the front of the house as well. It is beautiful pretty much all year round. It has a period in spring when the leaves change and it doesn't look so nice, but it's gorgeous the rest of the year. As you can see it stays red all winter long, even in snow and cold weather.

How to Paint a Rocking Chair

On one of our trips to Goodwill, we found an old rocking chair that was really cute, but it was $35 and my mom didn't know if she wanted to spend that much. We asked about it and it just so happened to be on sale for $17.00. So of course she bought it. It has been sitting in our basement for about a month because we didn't know what to do with it. The wood was really scuffed up, so we didn't want to leave it. Then, we couldn't figure out a good color. We finally decided on a charcoal gray from Sherwin Williams called Seal Skin. The paint only cost us $6.00 because it was a sample quart.

Cork Board Re-Do

It is starting to look a lot like spring around here! We have been having 50 degree weather, and the bulbs are starting to peek out of the ground. I will most likely have some pictures of flowers as soon as they bloom.When I first started using my mom's camera, flowers were one of the first subjects that I photographed. My mom is really into gardening and we have tons of flower beds around our house. She has a lot of experience in gardening and will be doing some posts on the blog in the near future.

   My sister, Julia has been asking for a new cork board for her room for a little while, since the one she had, didn't match with her decor. We looked around and didn't end up getting anything because usually my mom doesn't just fork over money for stuff we don't really need. And what do you know she came home one day with a sad looking cork board she found on the side of the road. I'll show you the after first because afters are so much better!

Pallet Wood Sign Ideas

Lately, I've been making different pallet wood signs and chalkboards for the craft show I entered. It seems like I've already made a lot of signs, but I have a long way to go still. Just wanted to share a bit of what I have up until now.

DIY Valentine's Box

 We love to watch the birds on our porch, while we have breakfast. Lately we have had a lot of cardinals coming to our bird feeder. Yesterday one flew into the window and injured itself. We held it for a little bit until it could fly again, gave it some water since it had some blood around it's mouth and let it go when it was ready. It was a female, the males are a much brighter red.

Easy DIY wall decor

  Anyone have a hard time finding something cute to hang above your girls bed? Maybe we haven't looked  hard enough, or don't want to pay the price, but either way we decided to come up with something that we could do ourselves for one of the girls room. Two girls share this room, one of the girls is six and the other is eleven. The six year old wouldn't care too much about it but the eleven year old is definitely starting to have an opinion!

Faux Stamped Serving Tray

It's beautiful outside today! Can you believe it it's February and it's 54 degrees? Well we do live in Missouri and you never know, tomorrow it could be 8 degrees. Anyway we went outside and took a short walk . Hopefully we get an early spring,but we will enjoy every day no matter the temperature.

   In my last post I showed you my little chalkboard for the entryway that I re did . You can see that  here. Today I want to show you a tray that we bought on our same trip to Goodwill. This one was really ugly, but it was structurally sound.

Entryway Message Board

 I fixed up the blog!! For some reason for the longest time it wouldn't let me change the colors or layout, even in html codes. But thanks to all those blogs out there dedicated to helping people like me who have trouble with all this new stuff, I figured it out! Yay! Well, enough of that...we recently took a trip to Goodwill, and what do you know, my mom found some old ugly junk (surprise, surprise). She found a tray with an old angel print on the inside, a pretty okay looking cork board, and this entryway key hanger/cork/chalk board. Not too cute, right? I thought it was beyond saving because of the wheat engraving on the top, but paint works miracles.

Butternut Squash Streusel

We recently found butternut squash at our local Aldi for 99 cents a piece. Even though I've never had butternut squash, I had a sudden craving. So, we brought the squash home and I went straight to Pinterest to find some sort of cake to make. The original recipe title was Streusel Squash Dessert Recipe, which was kind of cumbersome, so I changed it (sorry whoever originally posted it!) I also changed some elements of the recipe itself, due to the fact that I didn't have enough squash. I'll give you the recipe as it was, and then tell you what I changed.

How To Cover A Box in Fabric

I talked to one of my aunts a while back and told her I would post a tutorial on how to wrap a box in fabric. It has been a while (maybe a month or two) Sorry Auntie, hope you can forgive me.

Kitchen Decor Part II

I finally made a blog button! (which is located on the side column).  I took me forever to figure it out.

 I don't think I could have done if it weren't for Google, and all the helpful blogs out there.

Well anyway I promised I would do another post with the other half of our kitchen, so here it is.

Kitchen Decor Part 1

Today I want to show you part of our kitchen and the inspiration for re-doing our kitchen decor. One of my mom's  favorite blogs is Roadkill Rescue. After she started following Beckie's blog she started paying more attention to what people had on the roadside, and what do you know she found some good stuff ! One of the first  treasures she found was an old crate from the 70s with rope handles. She was on her way to pick up some mulch, so she stopped in the middle of the road (no cars coming of course) and rescued it.

DIY Pallet Wood Shelf

Today I want to show you how we made a pallet wood shelf. I like it because it serves more than one purpose. We use it as a shelf in an entertainment center and also as a prop for taking pictures on for my Etsy shop. One other reason I like it, is it's almost free! The only supplies you need for this project are screws and stain or paint. You could even leave it the natural color.

DIY Painting Project

 My aunt bought these two panted landscapes last summer at a garage sale. They are painted onto blocks of wood. My mom went over one day and helped her organize her closet. She found these pictures and told my mom she could have them because they were ugly. So we brought them home, and decided to repaint them. We liked the sky, and the buildings, but the orange just didn't go.

                                  Before

DIY Teen Girl Room Decor

I'm so excited that my application for a craft fair that I entered, was excepted! Yay! This is my first craft fair. We will be busy getting ready for it, so the next couple of days will be a little bit hectic. I hope my pallet wood signs, chalkboard signs, and my name art sell!

 As I said in my last post, we decorated my sisters room. We kind of did a little rearranging, since we finished our basement. Everything in this room, was collected little by little from garage sales, and Craigslist (except for the rug, which was purchased at Target).  

Craft Area Organization

One day when my mom walked downstairs, she realized the basement mess had gotten out of hand. We have been using this long table for crafts but it had become a dumping ground. She started with the table but  didn't have enough space to store everything, so she organized the whole basement.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

DIY Bookshelf Upcycle

While we were cleaning up/organizing our storage rooms in our basement, we found an old shelf that was in pieces. We have been up cycling the shelf and it is now featured in my sister's room. It was a cheap laminate board thing that was wobbly and good for nothing, really. So to strengthen it we used some, you guessed it, pallet wood.