Quick Key Holder Project

The other day I was at Wal-Mart just rolling down the isles wasting time. Don't judge me it's one of my hobbies. I was not planning to get anything to DIY I just wanted to see what I could find. I found this little key holder wood sign thing, it was $3 so I figured why not. Our keys where just being thrown in the corner of a bookshelf and seriously making me itch and home with me it went!

 

 

 

This is what the little wooden key holder looks like. You can find it in the arts and crafts section of Wal-Mart and you cant beat the $3 price.

 

 

 

 

I knew that I didn't want to paint it. I wanted to keep with the natural/rustic theme we kind of have going on (who am I kidding I am a sucker for stained wood) so I stained it with some leftover stain I had laying around from Minwax in the shade Provincial. You can get these mini cans for about $5 bucks at your home improvement store.

 

I didn't take a picture of the process *worst blogger ever* but basically what I did was got an old rag, dipped in the stain and did one coat on the wood sign front and back. Since it's in cursive there is a lot of nooks and crannies in the sign and to get to those I got a q-tip, dipped it in stain and pressed it against the spaces I could not reach with my finger. I did not sand it or seal it since it was pretty smooth already and it is just basically going to stay on the wall as a permanent fixture ha!

 

 

 

Isn't it pretty! Simple and cheap, this seriously took me like 10 minutes and just left it overnight to dry. I hope you guys liked it. Come back soon.

 

Long Road Trip Tips

Hello there world wide web! Excuse my absence but the holidays are upon us and that means family time. The thing is I am on one end of the country and our families are on the other and we wanted to spend as much time with them as possible. We had not seen them in 6 months!

The Mr. and I just did a cross country trip from Ohio to Texas and back for the Thanksgiving holiday and after being stuck in a car for about 19 hours each way, I thought I would share some things that helped us keep our sanity along the way since we drove it straight.

Enjoy!

1. Probably the most important one. Always have a buddy. We could not have done a straight 19 hours alone. When we moved up to Ohio it took us 3 days to get up here since we were in different vehicles hauling all our stuff.

2. Trivia games on your mobile device are a fun way to pass time. It keeps the passenger doing something if you are not sleepy and the driver with eyes on the road and talking to stay awake. It was also a good bonding experience for us both.

3. We found that 4 hour drive times each at a time was the magic number to switch places.

4. We have a Spotify subscription, but it does not go on for 19 hours straight so carry your favorite CD's (yes we still use them) and abuse the heck out of the "seek" button in you car. I find the constant change in stations keeps me awake.

5. If you need to pull over for gas, try to go to gas stations that are on the exit side of the intestate so you can hop on and off. It can get a little confusing going to gas stations on the opposite side and then try to find your way back across (trust me).

6. If you feel your belly button gnawing at your backbone around 10 pm -ish ....STOP... do not wait until after that because believe it or not, a lot of places are not open 24 hours. We made that mistake and found ourselves desperately looking for food for 30 min straight and we finally settled for a truck stop subway. Please do no stop at a truck stop subway.

7. Always carry napkins in your car because accidents do happen.

8. You get a 5 mile leeway before you get pulled over for speeding just f.y.I.

9. Carry some vitamin C pills and hand sanitizer, trust us this one because we are both sick right now. That is a lot of states to cover and a lot of gas station restrooms and tuck stops. Keep your immune system up my dears.

10. AAAAnd finally....................Sunflower seeds! yes people that's right. These salty little things are a life saver. Pop one at a time in your mouth and welcome to wide awake land. I tested it on this trip and it totally works, you are constantly doing something and you still have your eyes and attention on the road. My mom's boyfriend is a truck driver and gave me the tip and I owe him big time.

This is what we did to help us on our trip to and from so it might not be for everyone. It was a little exhausting but it was a lot cheaper than flying and dealing with the holiday time at the airports and having to rent a car to see all our family.

Do you have any tips for long road trips? We are going back in December and would love to hear from you. Thank you for stopping by.

Grocery Bag Organization

I can be a little OCD sometimes...just sometimes.. ok maybe all the time who am I  kidding. I used to be one of those people a long time ago that shoved all of the grocery bags in one bag. Yes it's fast but I quickly realized that it's so messy in a way and it just takes up so much room in the closet or where ever it is that you store them and if that works for you then keep doing what works but if you want to know how I keep my grocery bags (any plastic bag really) organized, keep reading!

 

 

^This makes me itch                 ^This makes me happy

 

 

I've been folding my plastic bags for years now and let me tell you it makes my life a little easier. I don't have to look for the bags because I know exactly where they are and I don't have to wrestle with them trying to separate the bag I need or what ever it is they do when they are all shoved in one bag.

 

1. After I finish putting away the groceries I put the bags that I want to keep to the side. I don't keep the ones that are all wet or have holes in them and they end up looking like this.

 

MUST.FOLD.QUICKLY!

 2. Open the bag and set it flat on the counter or where ever you are going to fold them.

 

 

 

3. Start folding!

 

 

 pretend you are making a little fan!

 

 

4. Once the bag is folded- start wrapping it around your fingers like so..





 

5. After you wrapped it around your fingers you should have the handles of the bag sticking out like so..

 

 

6. To finish just tuck the handles into the space where you had your fingers and done!

 

I know this seems like a lot but it seriously took me 4-5 seconds to fold one bag. It just makes my life a little more organized and after I am done folding them I just throw them into a little basket I bought at the dollar store. When people come over and see what I do to the bags they give me a weird look but once they see how easy it is they cross over to the OCD side. Conquering the world one bag at a time ha!

How do you store your plastic bags? Hope you enjoyed and thank you for stopping by.



 

 

 

Two Tone Table

Hey ya'll! Sorry I've been M.I.A lately. This cold and rainy Ohio weather makes it very difficult to get off the couch and do anything but be  under the covers dry and warm. I never thought I would say this but Oh. My. Gosh. I miss the inappropriately hot and humid Texas weather. It snowed here on Halloween...SNOWED!!! seriously?

 

Our apartment was seriously starting to look like a thrift store furniture section with nothing but mismatched random pieces of furniture, talk about 50 shades of wood. So I had enough and decided to dust off my creative hat and get on with it.

 

Our cable box was just sitting on the carpet, making me itch and getting on my last nerves. I found this little beauty a couple of months ago and I loved it, especially because it was $9.00 and the perfect size for our itty bitty space.

 

 

I see your potential little one!!

 

 

I gave it a good cleaning and sanded the tops to the bare wood since I knew that I wanted to go the same route as the dresser and stain them. I did not. I repeat. DID.NOT. sand the bottoms because the tops kicked my butt. I will keep ya'll posted as to how well this holds up.

 

 

 

 I taped where the tops meet the poles just so I won't get paint on the tops because let's be real ya'll I have no idea what I am doing with a paintbrush.

I forgot to take pictures in my state of "oh my gosh I am so going to have to redo this because it's not going to stick" but it did. We will see how well it holds up. Live and learn.

 



I used this primer because it has always worked for me and I read all over the blogosphere that it sticks to ANTHING without sanding.



 

 

 This is what it looked like after two coats of primer and three light coats of paint.

 

 

I bought the paint at my towns version of Home Depot I suppose, it's called Menard's. I wanted a white but not super bright white. I settled for this shade called "popcorn" in satin.

 

 

 

And the ugly duckling is no more! I stained the tops with Jacobean like the dresser but I am guessing it looks darker because it's a different kind of wood. I only did one coat of stain because it was definitely dark enough for me. 

 

 

 

 Isn't she just DARLING!!!!!

 

 

 

 

The wires are just making me itch, please disregard! I sealed it with polycrylic in satin because this is about as much use as it's going to get.

 

 

 

 

Hope you enjoyed and see you soon. Thank you for stopping by.

 

 

DIY Wall Art

After my dresser triumph, I decided to make our little room a little pretty. If it was up to the boyfriend we would still be sleeping on a blow up mattress with no type of accessories anywhere. I really did feel like we needed something on the wall so I was a woman on a mission.

I wanted to get really creative and do something with some type of re-purposed window with some type of pretty quote on it. After failed efforts to finding an old window and not finding the size that I wanted for our small bedroom, I refused to give up hope. I went to where else, the land of forgotten goodies also known as the thrift store. I found this picture frame in the loveliest shade of lime green. It had a drawing of a peach so I just removed the backing and the drawing itself because I fell in love with the fame and it was the perfect size.

 

I printed out the quote that I wanted, he and I are always telling each other "love you more" I believe I used font size 160 and made it bold.

They have these really cool markers for glass at Hobby Lobby and I am sure at every other arts and crafts store. I got it for $3. Now there are two kinds: one kind that you have to put in the oven to cure it or something but I just got the regular one since I could not put my frame in the oven. With my luck I would burn the apartment down. I got some cheap little brushes and some acrylic pain in "white wash"

 

I didn't take any pictures of the process because honestly I did not think it would turn out so great. I cut up the letters and taped them to the FRONT of the frame, I wanted to keep the glossiness of the glass. After they were all taped up and in place, all I did was trace the letters carefully and filled them in with the marker. If you mess up you can wipe it off with your finger quite easily. It kind of feels like dry erase markers before it dries completely.

 

I wanted to tone down the lovely shade of lime green a bit so I started sanding it down. This paint just would not come off!!!! So I left it alone for a couple of days and it kind of grew on  me. I just went over it with white paint diluted in a little bit of water to give it a "white wash" effect. I have never done this before so I am pretty surprised.

 

 

 

Thanks for stopping by!

Dresser Re-Do

When we decided to get up and move across the country, all we did was pack up the furniture in our apartment and put it in storage since we did not know exactly where we were going to be. We packed up our cars and took off! Once we got here we lived in the shadiest hotel EVER! Let me describe that for you real quick. Imagine a dark hallway with a giant hole in the middle of the hallway that is basically just being "covered" by the carpet. You finally find your room number only to realize that its written in permanent marker on the wallpaper wall. Ah! good times.

Any who, when I finally found us an apartment all we had was a blow up mattress and a TV (priorities) so off to the thrift store I went. I found this little baby at the local thrift store for $40 bucks but it didn't fit in my little car. So I went back prepared and to my happy surprise it was on sale for 20 bucks!!!!! My lucky day for sure.

 

I was very scared about taking this on. My very first adventure of DIY/painting furniture was HORRIBLE. I bit off more than a could chew and painted a gigantic dining room table the perfect shade of dirt brown. But we have grown since then and decided to give it another try.

 

After hours of searching Pinterest (where else) I found this little number for inspiration.

 

 

I removed the drawers, hardware and gave her a good little cleaning and a quick little sanding. I focused mainly on the top and drawers because the sides where some type of particle board.

 

Now, technically you're not supposed to use white primer for black paint jobs but I had it handy and went with it. This was after two coats of primer.

 

Then the first coat of paint. I used Glidden Deep Onyx in satin.

 

For the drawers I originally wanted to go with Minwax Jacobean but I was at Ace Hardware and saw that they were having a sale on their stains and they also had Jacobean, so I decided to just get it.

 

Three coats of paint and stain TADAH!!!!!! I kept the same hardware on the top drawer and went with a similar color for these bin pulls. I sealed it with two coats of  Polycrylic in clear satin.

 

Not bad for my $20 little find.

Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did sharing. Any questions feel free to ask. Till next time.

Hello World!

So this is my first blog post!! I write this as I watch football with a beer in  my hand. I don't know if anyone will ever see this blog or read this.....but after years and years of stalking my favorite bloggers and wishing I was on the other side of the screen I finally did it. My own little spot on the world wide web.

 

I started this blog as a creative outlet. It's just my amazing boyfriend, my loving dog and myself. All of us are fellow Texans taking on a new adventure, halfway across the country in northwest Ohio. I hope you stay a while. You're in for a hell of a ride!