Last minute Ah ha's

These are some of my easy, last minute, quick trash to treasure Ah ha's that metaphorphasized from a need to get something together under the gun.

Quicky #1

I bought this at a garage sale.  What it was origionally I have no clue.  My plan was to wire it for a lamp, but I never got around to it.  We had company coming and I was trying to clean  up.  I was walking through the kitchen holding this, carrying it out to to the garage, when I spied the paper towel roll sitting on the counter.  Our cheap plastic paper towel holder had broken, and not wanting to buy another cheap plastic one I hadn't found one that I liked yet.  Ah, ha stroke of genius!  Put the paper towels on the thing-a-ma-gig, but it needs some kind of top, a finial if you will.

Then I remembered I had several of these.

Woohoo, a fancy shmancy paper towel holder.  About a month later my mother-in-law told me she saw a couple of paper towel holders similar to this one for around $40.  Not bad I probably spent 6 bucks total. (not including the paper towel)

Quicky #2

This wooden queen sized headboard was free, left by the people who had lived in the house before us (3 houses ago).  We used it for a while plain.  Then one day when I was doing some decorating after a trip to the flea market I decided to put this blanket over the headboard to tie into our southwestern theme.

When we moved into our current home the queen sized headboard went into the guest room because we inherited an almost new king size bed from my parents for the master bedroom.  It needed a little make over though.  I spied this fabric in the guestroom closet at my in-laws house.  My m-i-l had ordered this from e-bay for her bed origionally.  When it came it was in pieces.  The bed skirt cut into 2 pieces and the duvet cover was cut into 2 pieces.  The color wasn't was she wanted either, so, into a closet it went, and then it found a home in my guest room.  I simply draped it over the headboard and folded the excess behind it.

Here's what she looks like with her cooshy pillows.  She's a nice backdrop for a pretty bed isn't she.

Quickie #3

About a month after we moved into our curent home we were having friends over for dinner so I wanted to get the dining room put together presentably finished.  There was a brass chandelier with 5 "candle" lights.  The wall paper in the dining room is a light blue with shells on it, and I wanted a light airy beachy look.  So, I wanted to lighten up the chandelier and make it unique.  I added the chic, white shades.  I thought about adding crystals, but our firends were coming the next day.  I didn't have time to look for crystals, and I wasn't 100% that was the look I wanted.  I looked around in my decorating stash and found I had 2 spools of 3/4' white satin ribbon.  Hmm, I thought it would add lightness and soften it.  So I tried it.  It looked good.  I added the laurel greenery to add another layer to it, and tied a metal bird ornament to the bottom to add another touch of character.  So cute, huh.  Oh, and what about the drapery behind the chandelier?

Quicky #4

Same scenario as #3.  Our friends are coming in a few hours and I was very unsatisfied with the east wall of the dining room.  An entire wall of dark cabinetry was not adding to my light, beachy feel.  My solution?  I had 10 yards of $.99 a yard white muslin fabric and white thumb tacks.  Voila, Mistreatment.  (Won't The Nester be proud.  I found a way to mistreat without windows).  My husband helped me tack the fabric up.  The woodwork was evidently hardwood.

I didn't even hem the fabric. I simply cut it into lengths that were about 4 inches longer than the floor to ceiling height so that it would drape a little at the top and pool gently on the floor.

Here's what the mistreatments are covering up. Much needed storage space, very ugly.

There's 4 of my quickie decorating escapades.  To tell you the truth that is probably how 75% of of my home gets decorated, only 25% is actually planned. 

I'm adding this to Reinvented's Trash To Treasure Tuesday

Thanks for visiting.

Amanda

Room happenings

We're up to remodeling around here. The front room in our house has been playing the role of storage room but it's being re-cast as the workout room. To get it ready we needed to do a little demo and painting. I decided to mention this to my hubby one day when we were at home together, and I also mentioned that I hoped it wouldn't too difficult to pull the paper down. The next thing I know he's in the front room effortlessly pealing the paper off. He had the room completely stripped within 10 minutes.

I didn't even get a chance to take a picture of the room before he pulled the wallpaper down so I had to take a pic of a wallpaper scrap.

Here's the room minus wall paper...and the carpet's coming up.

Bu-bye carpet.

Here's the hubs pulling up the carpet tacks.

Time to paint. Look at that yummy, creamy paint.

There it is, the painted room. We still need to do the floor and hang some window coverings (because who wants the neighbors to see you working out.)

Well, now to get the exercise out of the garage and in to the house where it might do us some good.

Amanda

One word, Cloche

I love cloches. Why? Because even the most common place objects look special under glass. When I first started collecting cloches I would watch and watch until I found one that was reasonable enough at a home discount store or a decorating boutique with a sale going on. Big ones, little ones, I ogled them all. So now I have a little collection. Notice I said "little". I'm still ogling the big ones. I'd still like to have a large cloche. Well, maybe one day, but what has really caught my eye lately is creative cloches.

So, a month or so ago I found several items on a trip to a local thrift store that I thought would make great cloches. All of the items I found were candle accessories. And super cheap about a quarter a piece.




Ok, I have really been wanting to display old class rings in a creative way. Don't they look cute under this little cloche?

I thought I would include some of my apothacary jars today also. I love changing the display in my apothacary jars with the seasons. I showed you a little bit of that in this post. The jars are still decorated for summer with sand and shells. I mean lets face it here in Texas we're still in the throws of summer, but next it'll be Halloween. Ooo, I'm excited about that.

Hope you enjoyed my cloches. I'm including these in the Cloche party at A Stroll Through Life. Check out what everyone's doing.

Amanda

I'm making cloches today

These are glass pieces I posted several weeks back that I bought for a quarter a piece at one of our local resale shops. I thought that I would get them ready to use for the cloche party at A Stroll Through Life on September 11.

Each of these 3 pieces are intended for candles.

I searched through my extra previously used hardware that I have strored in a drawer in the guest room and came up with these pretty knobs. What a shame they were in storage. I used these in my first that I lived in on my home. I loved that little house.

I simply placed the knobs on top and secured them with a little hot glue so that I could easily change them out later if I wanted to.

Or if I could ever figure out how to get the brass piece off the bottom of the door knobs. It looks ok. I'd rather have all clear glass though.

Thanks for stopping by. BTW, I'm adding this to The Shabby Chic Cottage for transformation Thursday.

Amanda

I luv me some fleur-de-lis

I am a collector. I've had to work hard over the years to not go nuts-o with a collection. I try to do this by sticking to collections of things that I really really love, and now that I have been collection those things for many year I stick to the items of those things that I find absolutely beautiful. I tend to be drawn to things that have more of a graphic quality.

The collection that I want to talk about today is my Fleur-di-lis. I can't explain what it is that draws me to them except their graphic quality, a graphic representation of of a lily. Maybe it's my memory of growing up visiting New Orleans. A city that I found sophisticated and exotic. Maybe my love of all things French influences their draw on me. What ever it is I find them hard to resist when I find them. They adorn my walls.
My fire place screen.

Electrical outlets

They are finials in my kitchen.

They stand sentinal in my garden.

They top bottles

and stand on my mantel.

One has even found it's way into a cloche.

And their simple beauty has crossed over into another one of my collections.

I love their simple beauty, romantic feel, and sculptural quality. Thanks for indulging in one of my obsessions.

Amanda

Woe is me my internet's been wack-e!

Technology is so great, but sometimes it takes the littlest thing to mess it up. We had a thunderstorm here last Friday evening. Our internet has been out ever since. Finally today we got it going again. Yeah! So what have we been doing around the black and white home this week. Well, not getting any projects done that's for sure.

We've been doing a little reading.

We've had a few fashion shows.

There's been doxie drama.

That's Toby and Marley. Marley is the red and white piebald. We adopted her at the beginning of the summer, and we have really fallen in love with her. She has definately found a home with us, and she feels like the queen. She has taken to patrolling the yard, and if she hears something whether it's in a wood plie or a bag of potting soil she goes after it.

Exhibit A: She tore the bag to shreds. Arrgh, dog.

Of course it was also back to school for the kids and back to work for me. It's gonna be an interesting year. Thank you to everyone who commented on my last post for the Rooster party. I really appreciated it. I was so excited that ya'll liked my poultry friends. I'm sorry I haven't responded to ya'll yet. I'm going to try to get to those this weekend.

Hope everyone had a good start to the school year, and I hope you have a good weekend.

Amanda