I ♥ Giveaways!

Pin It Now! One of my favorite blogs, The Lettered Cottage is having an awesome Giveaway in celebration of their one year anniversary. Check out this awesome table runner!




Also, check out her Etsy store.

Polyvore - My new best friend!

Pin It Now! I love to come up with new ideas for decorating our home. Since we are on a shoestring budget, I like to research ideas to find the best deals. Polyvore.com is an awesome site to create these design collages so you can gather your ideas, enabling you to search for the best discounts. My kind of site! It's pretty addicting :)

Free KFC

Pin It Now! Thanks to Oprah, KFC is offering a free two-piece grilled chicken meal that includes two sides and one of their yummy biscuits! This offer only lasts until midnight May 6, so download it quickly! You know we'll be headed there - do you think they'll mind if I order my meal without chicken? ;) UnthinkKFC.com

Email Me!

Pin It Now! Is there a project you'd like to see here?  Or would you like to host a giveaway on my site?

Email Me - I'd love to hear from you!

Our new patio

Pin It Now! Neil has been working hard on our new patio this week, but it's finally completed! We got the terra cotta tiles for a steal!

Before:



After:



Close up of the tiles:

How our Garden Grows

Pin It Now! Our organic vegetable garden is thriving! We've never been successful at maintaining a garden, but this year we are doing pretty well. Here's some pictures of the of strawberry plant - with an actual strawberry growing! - and our apple tree that's about to bloom.

Gardening requires lots of water - most of it in the form of perspiration.
~Lou Erickson

Candle Decorating

Pin It Now! I had some plain white candles that needed some "sprucing up" to go with our new decor, so I decided to whip out the old hot glue gun and go to town.

They were very easy to do, I just used ribbon and a piece of black "cobblestone textured" scrap booking paper. I made mine very simple-looking for the living room.

Thanks to fellow Nestie TXsun for the awesome idea!!

Today's Great Shopping Trip

Pin It Now! Another successful shopping trip today! I shopped at Safeway and Albertson's today - both are very close to my house - and found some amazing deals as always!!

General Mills Cereal - 3 boxes at $1.20, 1 box at $1.50
Bounty Paper towels - $1
2 Liter Soda - $.87 each - I bought 6 (Husband is a soda fanatic!!)
American Greetings Cards - Buy 2 Get One Free - I bought 6 (For the upcoming holidays)
Cut Flower Bouquet Seeds - $6.99 retail, I got it FREE with purchase of 3 greeting cards
Wish Bone Salad Dressing - I bought 5 - all for FREE
English Muffins - $1 each - I bought 3

Husband went produce shopping earlier this week, so we really didn't need many groceries.

DIY No-Sew Curtains

Pin It Now! I decided to make curtains for my office window, and I wasn't going to let my inability to sew stop me! I found this gorgeous black and white damask fabric at JoAnn's for $3 per yard, and IKEA's SY no-sew tape for $1.99 for a 33 foot package. It only took me about 40 minutes for the whole project, and that includes all the times Finley tried to pull the fabric off the ironing board!

The supplies you will need for this project:

Iron
Ironing board
Fabric
No-sew or hem tape


1. Cut your fabric to size. I bought 3 yards (44" wide) to cover a 75"x 40" window.
2. Heat iron on cotton setting, or the hottest setting your fabric will allow.
3. Lay out one fabric piece along your ironing board.
4. Create a hem along the edge of your fabric about 1" wide along the entire side.

5. Insert the tape underneath your hem. Make sure to leave about 2" of tape out of the end of the fabric. You will use this to hold, to make sure you don't crease your tape to ensure the smoothest hem possible. (Also, cut the loose strings from the fabric during this step.)


6. Slowly iron along the hem starting in the middle and working out to the sides. You will want to iron over the fabric several times to ensure the tape to stick properly.
7. Do this for all sides.
8. If you want to create a loop to slide the curtain rod through the fabric, the you will need to create a fold at the top of the curtain. I used curtain clips, so I did not need to create a final loop. But this is up to you and how you prefer your curtain to hang.
9. Again, create a crease with the iron. Insert the tape along the bottom of the hem and iron.

Voila!



I decided to tie back the curtains with a green ribbon that matched the walls. I think they're pretty cute, don't you? :)

New Furniture Set

Pin It Now!

We sold our Ashley furniture set and bought this beauty! We desperately wanted a sectional, and love the matching ottoman. And we got it for a smokin deal too!!

It's dark grey micro fiber with black leather, and a black leather ottoman. Now we can seat more than two people in our house!! :)