The Pinterest Challenge "Winter Edition"

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Time for another Pinterest Challenge!

Well, since I've started this blog, I realized how time consuming and dedicated you have to be in order to keep this up, and since I'm almost always busy with my kids and their many activities, I can only post every once in a while. 

So this is my contribution for the challenge

This is the diy drum shade made with embroidery hoops, poster board, covered with decorator fabric and hung over a $6.00 Goodwill chandelier. 

I'm so proud of this one because you can't buy a drum shade this size for less than $50-$60...what? I can do better than that!

I got all the directions from Kristen's Hostess with the Motzes blog, but I used poster board instead of plexiglass. I probably spent less than $22.00 for all the materials.

This project is one of my favorites so try it out!

Red Beans and Ricely Yours,

Donna

Gladys Baham's 90th Birthday Party

Click here to view these pictures larger

My First Sign

I finally found a tutorial that I thought was the best to create my sign. They are all over pinterest, but this one is the best in my opinion. Aimee at aimee-weaver.blogspot.com was kind enough to share her process with us and this is my version. 

 

Now, I'm ready to create more for my house. Go over to Aimee's website, she's very talented and creative and create you own personal sign!

Red Beans and Ricely Yours,

Donna

Tissue Paper Flowers

Well, I've been away for a while. Between my son's baseball games and practices, my daughter's end of the school year activities, I haven't had a lot of time to blog. Since we were off from baseball this week, I decided to tackle a project or two. My first project was a simple one I saw on Diane's website In My Own Style.com, these beautiful flowers  are made from tissue paper.

I'm so proud of them because they came out absolutely beautiful. You can get the full tutorial from Diane here. Everything came from Dollar Tree...my favorite store (yeah!). I probably spent about $5 total to get this fabulous look.

The vase, already had but I just spray painted it a metallic gold to give it some color.

Hope you like it!

Red Beans and Ricely Yours,
Donna

My Pinterest Challenge Project

It's time for the Pinterest Challenge, Winter Edition. If you're not familiar with it, let me explain. You go to the Pinterest website and recreate any project that you've pinned (which I'm sure is many) and upload it to Sherry's website, Young House Love. That's it! This is a great way to start actually doing some if the projects we pin, instead of just looking at them everyday trying to imagine having it in our house! So I encourage you to get in the next challenge, I mean if I can do it so can you. Now on to my project. 

I actually started working on something different, but I didn't have time to finish it by today, so I have something else. This was one of my first Pinterest projects. I'm not the most patient person in the world, so even finishing this project was great for me.

The frosted privacy window.

This was the perfect solution for me because I had those temporary blinds up on each side of the door and they were torn up from the dog constantly in the windows. I also don't have full curtains up in my dinning room because I don't like to block the natural sunlight. This was a really easy and cheap project, inspired by Tricia from Making it Feel Like Home   and Greg and Ashley from Seven7h House of the Left. It gets a little time consuming, but if you're patient it'll turn out beautiful!

This is what you need:

1. A roll of clear contact paper--$5.00

2. Sissors

3. Sharpie for tracing

4. Template for tracing out on the contact paper from Greg and Ashley

All you do is trace the pattern on the contact paper ( paper side) in how ever many patterns you need, I had about 38-40 for each of my top living room windows and about 30 each for the windows by my doors, I had to make the pattern smaller for that area.  Clean your windows really good and stick on to the windows. Tricia and Ashley both give really good detailed pictures of the process. I actually did this project before I started this blog so I don't have any pictures of the "during" process.

And there you have it, frosted windows!!!

Hope to see you in the challenge.

Red Beans and Ricely Yours,

Donna

My Other Building Projects

Well, I've been pretty busy with all of my building and my son's baseball games. I guess whenever I finish everything I need in my house, I'll be a pro. Here are my other projects.

I needed these shelves so bad in my house! They are the Ten Dollars Ledges by Ana White inspired by Potter Barn. They are actually on sale now, but they were originally about $100 per ledge. Seriously????? All three cost $10 from Home Depot (yeah! yeah!). My kids' trophies were everywhere...on top of the refrigerator, on the dining room table, in the closet! I really need to build three more, but I'll get to that later. 



My next build was the Balin Console Table. I love this one. The base of the table was relatively easy, but the drawers was a BEAST! You would never think that something as easy as making a box, would be so hard...but OMG! 

Excuse the lopsided picture taking. I'll get better as I go with the blogging and the picture taking. 





Another build, the farmhouse bench I made for the foot of my bed.

Yeah, yeah, I know... my friend told me to at least make the bed and move my son's slippers before I take pictures and post them online.  I'll do it next time, I promise Stacey! 

For the top of this bench, I used the brown paper bag technique that everyone is using on their floors. 

Isn't that beautiful? The talented Rachael from Lovely Crafty Home did those stairs.  I wanted to try the technique on something small before I put it on my floors. 


Rachael has a full tutorial/guide on her website if you are interested, but this is my next big project. Check her out!
 



Well, I hope you enjoyed my projects and if you would like the plans to build your own, you can just click on the links or go to Anawhite.com.

Until next time!

Red Beans and Ricely Yours,

Donna

 

My First Building Project (courtesy of Ana White) and First Post!

For a couple of years, I had been looking for desks for my kids. They needed to be sturdy with enough space for a computer, books and other junk (see my son's desk with all his junk on it), but the ones I liked was either too expensive or way too cheap. So one day I was searching the internet for pottery barn knockoffs to create some diy decorations for my house, and I came upon Ana White's website. I was instantly hooked! All of the women (there were men too, but I was more impressed with my fellow females) on this site was building all kinds of furniture without the help of men...and they were beautiful! So, me being the do it yourself kind of person, I didn't start with a simple project, I always start big. Go big or go home, right? 

The first one went really well (see above two pictures), so I built one for each of my daughters (below). Excuse the carpet, I didn't even clean up before I took these pictures.

After I got over my fear of going to Home Depot and asking for help with something I've never done before in my life, I became hooked and started building and building and building. Now, when I look at furniture in furniture stores, I turn everything upside down to see how it's made and what type of wood and construction it has. You know, 'cause now I'm an expert novice furniture builder! I know one thing...if I can do it,  anyone can do it! 

You can check out Ana and get lots of plans and ideas from her website at www.ana-white.com.