What is it about January....

Every year after I take down all the Christmas decorations the house feels so bare. Although I am glad to not have the tree up anymore, it took up so much space, but it makes the room feel so full and welcoming. Once it is gone it feels to naked. To fill the empty space that the tree left I decided to make a couple of these...

With the help of my sisters and the quick sawing skills of my husband we made these...

 (from this tutorial)

I didn't want the corbels to stick out as much as the ones in the original picture and I wanted much thicker decorative molding. So with a few tweaks, figuring out how to use a miter box, a nail gun and the wonderful forgiveness of wood filler, I think they came out beautifully. After buying all the supplies for the shelves, about $60, there wasn't much  left over for the decorating of the shelves. A quick trip to Beals Outlet and a bit of digging through their clearance bin, I found all the frames, the key, bike, and family blocks all for a whooping $22.00. Plus just an fyi it is an extra 15% off for 49 and younger on Fridays. That store is pretty hit or miss but if you look hard enough you can find some fun stuff.

After putting up the shelves on one side, the opposite side of the wall looked pretty bare. So I repainted this shelf I already had and added some decor. I still think it needs some color and a bit of tweaking but for now it works.

For Christmas my older sister Jill made me this shelf. It is beautiful. I had seen the tutorial online and had wanted to attempt to make it myself. But I was too chicken to try it. It is perfect for my entryway. I love it!

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The whole view of the room. I love the look on both sides of the window but, you knew that was coming right, now the window is huge bare and needs a window treatment. I think I have just enough material left over from the kitchen windows to make these roman blinds. My projects never end...

*gold star to whoever can guess what movie I am watching :)

Gathering...

Gathering is what I do when I am planning to decorate. I like to walk around my house and look for things that are ready to be placed somewhere new, old frames and accessories that didn't have a home. I recently got a piano (yeah!) and needed to decorate the top and the space on the wall above the piano. So on my hunt I found a few fun things I had tucked away...

This huge frame was my Grandma's.

She was painter.

In her house she had a whole room full of oil paints, paint brushes,

 canvas's of all sizes and frames.

Her home always had the faint smell of turpentine and oil paints.

My Pottery Barn knockoff Hurricane jar came in handy :)

My Goodwill owl found a home.

The only thing that will get changed is the lamp

The one there right now is functional, but not pretty.

This is what I am thinking about getting from Target.

But that will have to wait for another day.

I really love the way the wall collage came together. Have you every heard of Real Deals? It is a fun little store. I went there on Saturday hoping to get a little inspiration and I did not leave empty handed. I got the keys, frame and mirror for $15.00. Oh how I love a good deal!

 The picture in the lower right is my Grandpa.

 I love this picture!!

He was a great sportsman.

He had many mounted animals and fish in his house.

Sometimes I get an idea in my head...

and I get nothing else done until I do it.

This time it was this...

My mom found this frame and print at a yard sale last year and gave it to me.

I love the primitives,

but I could never find a home for this one.

(I have a plan for the print though)

The frame was just the perfect size.

These little frames I bought back in December at Target for 50 cents apiece.

Don't you love the little orange clearance tags at Target?

You can find the best stuff sometimes :)

After many coats of paint and a little bead board wallpaper

... oh how I love that stuff...

this is what I came up with.

*update-

Getting the little frames to attach to the board took a little more thought than I expected. I couldn't glue them because then I could never change the picture.

So here is what I did:

The back of the frame is cardboard covered in bead board wallpaper.

I measured where I wanted the frame to sit, then punched 2 holes about a 1/2 inch part.

Then I threaded some ribbon through the hook on the back of the little frames, pushed the ribbon through the holes and tied them in the back. So easy and I can change out the picture whenever I want.

I hope that makes sense :)

Hobby Lobby has this neat long frame with little frames in it. I always look at it when I go. I pick it up every time look at the price, put it back down and walk away. It is a bit pricey for me, so why not make a smaller, cheaper version?

I have had the hardest time figuring out what to put on this hutch. It is red so I feel like the things I place on here need to be light colored. I am loving the white. I don't normally decorate with white, but I love the crisp feeling white has.

This box sits on one of the hutch shelves.

It has always been green. A nice mossy green.

Once I put my new frame up it looked so muddy and well not looking so good.

So what do I do...
Paint it of course!

I wanted it to look old and weather.

It has little compartments in the back half of it that

I wanted to have glass vases filled with flowers.

But after looking at the prices of cute little glass vases I decided not spent that kind of cash.

But good old Goodwill never lets me down.

If you ever look at those lightly green tinted glass "vases" please ignore the Coke-a-Cola logo.

Now I just need to find an old set of gardening tools and maybe some gardening gloves for the front compartment.

With a few other nice crisp pieces,

I think it has come together quite nicely.

I love this little bowl!

A nice $1.00 find at Goodwill.

I found all these little birdies at Michael's. I paid $1.50 apiece for the first 3.

But today I bought one more for 99 cents. They are on sale.

And it is done! {until I get another idea in my head} I love it. The only neglected spot is the space underneath. And that won't get any attention until I have no more babies at my house. Seeing as it is the absolute best place to eat snacks, race cars, and hide shoes and socks.

Oh yes... can't forget this guy.

Found him at Goodwill this morning for 50 cents.

"Whoo-whooo" knows what I'll do with him?

I just fell in love...

with this place!

They have a ton of unique reusable wall stencils. My favorite is the damask! I have never been a big fan of wallpaper, to overwhelming for me. But the damask stencil in just a shade lighter than the base would be beautiful. Oh how I need a house that is mine so I can paint the walls.

Knock off part 2...

I put up my ABC canvas today.

It did not look right.

See look how boring. Just a bunch of beige shapes.

So I tried to add some color to the mix.

Now there was just a bunch of beige shapes with a red circle.

I decided to paint the frames.

I absolutely love these frames.

They have a fun paisley pattern on them.

First they were green.

Then linen with a brown wash. (like the picture above)

Then finally they ended up a robins egg blue color with a brown wash.

I added fabric ties at the top to finish them.

In the end I decided that the canvas looked unfinished without a frame.

Lucky I had a big one out in the garage.

It is too big, so there is about an inch boarder between it and the canvas.

I painted it red.

I am loving the red and the blue.

To bad my camera is taking horrible pictures.

It looks much better in person.

Pottery Barn Knock off...

Remember this post?

Well this past week I was at my sister's and finally attempted to make this.

Here is mine.

I was a bit worried (and I think everyone else was too) that is wouldn't turn out.

I had a hard time getting the vinyl to stick to the canvas.

Then I was worried that the stencil wouldn't seal and the paint would bleed.

But it worked.

I wish I had the time to put a frame around it.

When I was buying the canvas I couldn't remember if the original was square or rectangle.

I went with the rectangle so my circles are a little oval.

I also did mine brown instead of black

I still like it though.

I made this for about a tenth of the price of the original.

Not bad. Quite good actually :)

Now I need to find a spot for it.

The decorating is my favorite part.