Make Your Own: Chalkboard Wall Calendar

I have been wanting a chalkboard SOMEWHERE in our house for the longest time ever.  I thought about covering a whole wall with chalkboard paint, I thought about buying a chalkboard, and then I stumbled upon this! I have immediate fallen in love with chalkboard wall calendar and I thought we could make it, too! 

My loving husband did all the taping.  I will admit it took a little longer than we expected.  A lot of measuring was involved.  Then all I did was applied four coats of Valspar chalkboard paint that I've bought from Lowe's.  After a day of drying I covered the whole calendar with chalk and it erased well with a damp paper towel.  The fun part was the decorating and personalizing my calendar! :)  

The only thing I wish I did differently, was paint the whole wall first and THEN do the calendar.  I had to repaint the wall and it took me a while to go around the calendar... Oops! But now I have a fresh wall with a fresh piece of art! ;) I love it! Are you into chalkboard as much as I am?! 

Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to stop by Jen Loves Ken to get more inspiration for home decor projects! :) I am off to work on a shed! (WHAT?) :)  Yup,  last Saturday we started working on it and I can't wait to share our progress with you! Happy Friday! xox, m.

Rustic Coasters

I've talked about how much I love rustic home decor.  What I love more than rustic is handmade.  My husband and I've combined our love for rustic and handmade and started to decorate our home. It's kind of the theme around our whole house.  My hubby build a beautiful coffee table from old pallets for me and it is one of my favorite pieces in our home.  Little by little we've been adding more handcrafted items to our home. Like this ladder shelf  along with this necklace holder. After living in our house for a little over a year, we learned that our favorite furniture is handmade.  Our favorite thing to do in our "free time" is design, build and create!  We are loving every minute of it!  When I look around our house, the items that we've worked hard on make me smile big. They bring back memories of the time my husband and I spent bonding, while working on a certain project together.  We have so much fun doing this! I would choose working on projects together over many other things!  I really do feel like it's a great way for us to spend our time.
Anyway, this blog post is about coasters... somehow I got carried away talking about my husband and our love for working together...  It's hard for me to write a blog post and not to mention my husband, if you haven't picked up on that little detail yet.  He is simply the greatest, he is my life.  (Oh, and he helps with almost all of my DIY projects...) :-}

I blogged about my camping trip in the beginning of June, if you haven't read it yet, check it out!  Camping is SO.MUCH.FUN! While we were camping, we picked up a few tree logs... For coasters! I've been seeing coasters made out of tree stumps ALL over the internet.  Of course being a fan of rustic home decor, I really wanted to add some to our home.  They were really easy to make.  Says me, because I didn't even make them... :( My husband used a saw to cut them out and all I did was smooth them out with a sander. I've been using them a lot, hot tea lover I am! We made a ton, these will make great gifts! I hope next time you're in the woods, you will find yourself a fun little project as well! If you already have wooden coasters, (I feel like everyone has them) please share the link in the comments below, I would love to see! :) Thank you for stopping by! I'm off to drink some tea! Happy Wednesday! M.

Succulents + Vintage Tin Cans

You might remember when I shared my DIY ladder shelf and also how I've obsessed about my vintage tin cans.  I'm in love with vintage things. I was giddy when I stumbled upon some vintage cans while treasure hunting at our local Goodwill. 

My tin cans started out with Marigolds.  I loved it, but I had to water them almost daily and to admit, I am not so good with keeping indoor plants alive.  I decided to move them outside and fill the tin cans with succulents!  Best decision ever!  (I wanted to plant succulents in them from the start, but it was flower season and I couldn't pass up on colorful flowers!) I added some rocks to my succulents from Lowe's to cover up the soil.  My ladder couldn't look any prettier, in my opinion! ;) 

Happy Tuesday! M.

Paint The Front Door

My husband and I love to take walks around neighborhoods and look at the different houses and yards people have.  Front doors say a lot about a person's personality. Front door is the first impression you receive about the homeowner and the house. Today, I want to share a few tips and tricks on how I painted our front door.

Some of these tips will probably be very obvious and others might be more helpful, I have learned a lot while painting our door.

1. Pick out a color that speaks YOU. My husband suggested red, since he knows I love red. I have a lot of things that are red in/around our house already and also I've seen a ton of red front doors. I wanted something different, yet a color that I love. I picked out mint! Mint is a lovely color, it's right there with red for me.  The type of paint that we used was exterior satin enamel.

2. You want to pick a nice day. Duh. You don't want rain and you don't want it to be super cold. The door will have to stay open the whole time you're painting and after while it's drying.

3. You want to use a brush. The effect is so much prettier than a roller. 

4. You want to tape up everything you don't want paint on. Another obvious, but so important!!! My husband was kind to prep everything for me. He also laid out plastic for my work surface. You could use cardboard or big trash bags. Whatever you have handy. I also suggest keeping paper towels with a little bit of water near by, just in case! ;) Also, if you want to hang something on the doors to keep the flies and bugs away, you may. I didn't, because I didn't want to block out the light.

5. A friend of ours, an experienced painter, suggested to add two teaspoons of water to our paint so it will be a little thinner and easier to apply. Now I don't know if that works for all the paint out there, but it worked for us and it was helpful. 

6. Start painting!!! :) After you're done, make sure to let the paint dry before you start peeling the tape off. Very important step! We let our doors dry for about 3 hours before my husband started to take the tape off. The doors stayed open all day. We didn't want to risk closing them while the paint might not be dry all the way.

Before

After

It's a subtle change but we love it and it makes us happy! By now, you should be in the mood to change up your front door! :)  Thank you for letting me share a few tips with you! 

Happy Tuesday! M. 

DIY: Shiny Red Shoes

I recently thrifted a comfortable pair of leather sandals. Immediately when I tried them on and they fit, I knew I wanted to give them a fun little face lift. They had some years of wear on them, for certain, but they were also super cute! I love DIY projects that involve shoes! Growing up, along with million other dreams, I had a dream of becoming a shoe designer. Buying a pair of shoes and making them my own is sort of like being a shoe designer. No? Let's pretend it is. Let me live my dreams!

So here is what I did. For this little make over I used a thin paint brush and red acrylic paint along with a little bit of water. I diluted a little bit of paint with the same amount of water and started to paint my sandals. I didn't tape around the shoes, so I painted carefully not to get the sides. When an accident occurred, I just wiped the paint off with a damp paper towel. No biggie! Also, I used a big trash bag for my work surface! After the first round of paint diluted in water, I gave about three coats of just paint on the shoes with no drying in between! Then after they dried, I gave two more coats!

When hubs saw the shoes, his exact words were "Wow they are hot! I am so proud of you."  Nothing makes me happier than making my husby proud! ;) It is the most rewarding feeling ever! Yes, this project is no big deal, easy peasy, but in my husband's eyes I'm the world's best shoe designer. Heehee. 

I'll cut myself some slack and let you all know that I put in my best effort and worked on these babies for a couple of days! There! 

Oh and I even water-proofed them with triple thick glaze after I made sure the paint was dry, because you just never know when lets-jump-in-a-puddle-moment would come! ;)

The glaze made them shiny. Shiny shoes bring back memories of me being five years old. I don't remember this but my mom told me a story of a time when her friend took me shopping for a pair of shoes and we came back home after a long day of searching, empty handed!  Apparently my five old self was not satisfied with any of the choices.  Today when I am not satisfied with a shoe 100% I turn it into a project! ;) So these shiny red shoes cost me $4! I thrifted them for $3 and the paint was just a buck.  I had triple thick glaze left over from sandals makeover project. I had so much fun creating these cheerful sandals.  I will be wearing them a lot this summer!  Red is my favorite color and anything that's comfortable is always a win in my book! ;)  What is your favorite DIY project?  Thank you for reading!  Happy weekend!  xo, m.

Lots of Green!

It has been awhile since I've done a garden update.  Well here it is, folks!  It's all green and beautiful!  Loving every second of gardening!  I love taking peeks at my garden each morning, afternoon and evening!  This evening I just got done watering my plants! 

Cannot wait till these little guys will be ready :)

 Plenty of radishes!  Yumm!  Spring salad anyone? 

This will be a sugar snap pea... soon!

My tomatoes that I've planted around May 10th, froze over night on May 13th.  Why is there frost in May? Why? We were in DC that day and didn't have a chance to cover them... :( So sad!  I do have the best dad in the whole wide world though, and he planted new ones for me!  Surprise!  We were away celebrating our anniversary and I thought as soon as we get back I will buy new plants and wait until June to plant them! But my daddy beat me to it, we came home to beautiful tomato plants standing strong.  Ahhh... the stories of gardening.  Hopefully no more frost, but more of this...

How is your garden doing this spring?? :) Thanks for stopping by! xo, m.

"Young And Beautiful"

I have the sweetest husband on earth. No doubt. I've been wanting to watch The Great Gatsby ever since I heard it's coming out. I love the 1920s. I've read the book and knew this movie will be just magical. Knowing that Leonardo DiCaprio will be starring in it was just the silver lining! :) Anyway, my hubby took me to watch it!!! I was so excited! I thought I'd be going with my girlfriends to see it, but he suggested we go see it together! I love my girlfriends, but this was amazing news to me!!! We went to see the 9:40 show on our anniversary!!! My heart was happy! We typically don't go out to watch movies, so this was special! (Don't worry, we have date nights often, but they don't involve a movie theater, more like ice cream and park... and exploring... and ice cream... and adventures... and road trips.) Did I say ice cream twice?! ;) Sometimes it's smoothies!

Why am I talking about The Great Gatsby today? Well, you see, the song by Lana Del Rey "Young And Beautiful" is on repeat in my head all.day.long!!! My husband and I both LOVE Lana's voice and her music.  When we sat in the theatre holding hands and our full attention on the movie and heard Lana singing we both were smitten! (I expected great music in this film, but didn't know whose music it would be!) We grinned at each other and did a little hand squeeze from excitement. Are we dorky or what?! 

The whole movie was magical and the music was AMAZEBALLS! Both hubby and I LOVED this movie and couldn't stop talking about it for the next couple of days! ;) 

After the movie we left for our trip to Wilmington. We loved spending our 3 year anniversary at our home with a home cooked meal. One of our favorite things to do is having a homemade dinner together! So we decided we will leave town after our anniversary is over. Best decision ever! :) 

If you haven't watched the movie yet, go see it, you will love it! And listen to Lana more often if you haven't been doing so yet! ;)

I have to leave you all with the lyrics... Just 'cause. 

Btw, the song is still in my head!! (I don't mind it one bit!) :) 

"Young And Beautiful"

I've seen the world

Done it all

Had my cake now

Diamonds, brilliant

In Bel Air now

Hot summer nights, mid July

When you and I were forever wild

The crazy days, city lights

The way you'd play with me like a child

Will you still love me

When I'm no longer young and beautiful?

Will you still love me

When I got nothing but my aching soul?

I know you will, I know you will

I know that you will

Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?

I've seen the world, lit it up

As my stage now

Channeling angels in a new age now

Hot summer days, rock n roll

The way you play for me at your show

And all the ways I got to know

Your pretty face and electric soul

Will you still love me

When I'm no longer young and beautiful?

Will you still love me

When I got nothing but my aching soul?

I know you will, I know you will

I know that you will

Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?

Dear lord, when I get to heaven

Please let me bring my man

When he comes tell me that you'll let him in

Father tell me if you can

All that grace, all that body

All that face makes me wanna party

He's my sun, he makes me shine like diamonds

And will you still love me

When I'm no longer young and beautiful?

Will you still love me

When I got nothing but my aching soul?

I know you will, I know you will

I know that you will

Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?

Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?

Will you still love me when I'm not young and beautiful?

So what movie have you seen lately that you just LOVE?! What kind of music do you love to listen to? I would love to hear from you! Thank you for stopping by! Have a lovely day! Hugs, M. 

Our Gallery Wall

It was time to fill one of the walls in our living room.  I've been collecting picture frames, clocks and DIY picture art.  I spray painted most of the picture frames the colors that would fit our style.  I chose red and brown.  It would be boring to stay with just two colors, so I mixed in silver along with other shades of red and brown.  My Instagram canvases have a lot of shades of red in them as well, so I thought they would be a perfect fit in our gallery wall!  Don't be afraid to mix things up a bit! ;)  Throw different shapes and sizes in the mix as well!  You'll appreciate it later, promise!  

First I laid everything down on the floor to see how I wanted them to be hung.  We tried to get the spacing as even as possible and mixed bigger frames with smaller ones.  I really wanted to create a square or a rectangle with the frames on the wall. I took a picture of my layout and my kind husband offered to hang everything up.  Things don't always go as planned.  Right?  Good thing we love being spontaneous.

I think we changed the order of our pictures 22135795 times and added and took away frames before we were actually happy with the final result!  This wall will always be a work in progress.  I can see us adding more pretty things as we go...
What items do you love to collect?  Thank you for taking a peek at our living room wall! Happy day!  xo. m. 

Bottles and Twigs-Photo Display

 

Today I am going to share another way to display photos around your home.

I printed my Instagram pictures from Foxgram  and they arrived super quickly right to my doorstep!  I am extremely pleased with the quality.  I bought pretty clothes pins at Michael's.  I can never leave that store with just one item.  I am sure most of my DIYer friends would agree with me on this one.  We saved curly willow twigs from our brother's wedding last October.  We had similar twigs at our wedding, too, but unfortunately we did not save them then.  I like twigs in general, but these are extra special since they remind me of a fun time we had at our brother's wedding!  Oh and the bottles... let me tell you about bottles... I pick my wine by the prettiest wine bottles! ;)  I have quite a collection of different glass bottles.  

It was pretty simple and easy to do, but I really do love the look!  The bottles are standing on a dresser in our bedroom.  I shared a simple necklace holder DIY project that goes well with my twigs and bottles.  I shared an Instagram canvas  back in April and I can't wait to think of other fun ideas to display our memories around the home, other than just in picture frames!
Thank you for reading!  Have a lovely day!  xox, M.
P.S. If you shared ideas of displaying photos, please leave a link in the comments and I will head over to take a peek!  ;) 

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy, happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there and of course to my wonderful, loving, caring mommy.  She is the world's best mom, please spare the argument! ;) 

 

 Proverbs 31:26-31 "She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue. She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all." Charm is deceptive , and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her the reward she has earned, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate."  

This is so true about my mom.  She is my role model  and I pray to be more like her!  I was blessed with an incredible mom!  I hope you all are having an amazing day and giving hugs and kisses to your mommas!

 xo. m. 

 

Etsy Love: Tea + Foxes

I am back for another round of Etsy love! :) I hope you all, lovelies, are having a wonderful start to the weekend!  I am SO glad it's here!
How cute is  this print?!  Tea lover over here.

 


This ring  is adorbs!  I kind of need it!  :)

 

Along with these pretties!  I'm in love with pretty rings.  Rings are my favorite.

 

I am head over heels in love with collars.  Yes.  Every new dress that I buy has.to.have.a.collar! ;)  Or I guess I could just get this pretty thing and wear it with a simple dress or shirt.  Hmmm... that's an idea!

 

 What are you in love with these days?

Oksana shared her therapy  and this is mine... a little bit of window shopping is always a good idea!  I had a lovely date night with my mister tonight and I am thankful for it.  Tomorrow will be a busy day for us doing house work and maybe a few projects?  Thanks for stopping by, and have an awesome weekend! Blessings, M. 

Weekends are for...

We had another wonderful weekend  filled with lots of project dreaming and planning! The highlight of my weekend was when my husband sat down next to me in our cozy living room putting his arm around my shoulders and said, "Let's look through your Pinterest board."  He wanted to see my pinned ideas and dream with me about future projects.  It became one of our favorite things to do.  We love to work on our house together making it our home.  It's so special!
Here is a little run down of our weekend. My garden is loving all the rain! / Snuggling with our cuddle bug while it's pouring outside! / Working on a Bible lesson with my little helper.  / Eating Mexican food with our friends after helping them move to their new place. Friends + Mexican food = the best!
How was your weekend?  Any special highlights? Happy Monday! xox, m. 
P.S. It's been so cold here and rain is on the forecast for most of the week!  Fireplace is on.  Perfect weather for crafty messes!  O and I have something up our sleeves  for tomorrow evening.  Can't wait! :)

Old Book Smell + Vintage Schwinns

I've been in love with Etsy for quite some time now... Who isn't?  If you love handmade or vintage things I am sure you're just like me,  always checking in with your favorite shops!  Am I right?  I've been meaning to do a post dedicated to Etsy for quite some time now...
This evening I want to share a little bit (more) about myself. (Okay, I lied, a LOT more about myself...it's my blog, I can do whatever I want... is that how it works?)  I am a lover of vintage bikes (and tons of other vintage pretties like cameras, typewriters, locks, keys and the list goes on!  I lovelovelove the smell of old books... and new books, too! I am always sniffing notebooks or freshly printed papers.... mmmm... If you're passing out papers straight from the printer, I will sniff them first. ;) I can go on and on about my love of different smells... like right after it rains.  I love the smell of that.  I also love the smell of freshly cut grass.  That's why I enjoy mowing, plus it's a great exercise with a push mower, so it's a win-win!
Which brings me back to my point.  Etsy.  I found this shop today and it's pretty great. I am in LOVE with these amazeballs pencils. I kind of need them.  After having a conversation with my husband, turns out I don't.  Well... what does my husband know about cool pencils?  Apparently nothing!  I'm keeping them on my wish list! ;)



 I am always looking for an iPhone case.  I drop mine a gazillion times a day and after having a rough life, it gets replaced by another pretty case.  I dig this one.  I have a thing for bikes.  Oh yeah, and for biking!  It's fun.  (Confession: I haven't been biking as much as I would like to, but I am waiting for warmer weather - lame excuse?)

 

Oh yeah and a thing for vintage cameras, but I already told you all of that!!! :)

 

What I haven't told you yet is that I love foxes, cats, summer dresses, mountains, ocean, evening walks with my man, birdies, picnics, hot tea, dates, asparagus, swallows, pretty prints, red vintage cars, sunshine, Subarus, adventures, polka dots - okay, you knew that! (Not to overwhelm you or anything...) And speaking of birds...  My hubby got me this stinkin' cute necklace from this shop.  He is a keeper!



This was fun! I love sharing my favorite things from Etsy.  I plan on doing this again sometime! ;)  If you have a favorite Etsy shop, let me know in the comments, and I will definitely check it out!  Thanks! :) Happy Friday and have a blessed weekend, friends! xo. m.