DIY Laundry Detergent

I can hardly believe that we could make detergent for about a year for $20. 

It just blows my mind how expensive detergent is (Tide is easily $15 for 100 loads, which never seems to actually last 100 loads.) 

You can find the recipe here from Being Creative to Keep My Sanity. My only critique is that we used a food processor to make the Fels Naptha soap into a powder form. We have a small processor so I only processed one bar at a time and made sure to break up the soap with a knife before processing it. 

We mixed all of the detergent in a double bagged garbage bag. We put the bag in a small clean bucket to add all the ingredients and then closed the bag and shook up the mix. We then put our containers in the tub and cut off the bottom tip of the bags to funnel the detergent into the containers. 

Oh and I found my glass container at Salvation Army for $5! You can also get them at Target for $8 or $9.

And thats it! Now enjoy the great way this detergent works :) I think it works better then tide!

DIY Burlap Runners

This post is loooooooong overdue! I made these runners almost a year ago for our wedding. 21 runners in all. I have to admit, it was not much fun to spend my last spring break as an undergraduate student making these lol, but they were worth it! They looked soooo great on the tables at the wedding. I cannot remember exactly what they cost me, but it was under $1 each...which beats the $6-$10 they go for after they have been used for a wedding (yep, I sold mine on ruffledblog.com in their recycle your wedding section for about $175)

Staying Organized

It amazes me how much work it is to take care of a household for my hubby, myself and our dog. With bills, grocerys, coupons, budgets, meal planning and cleaning up after us I feel as I have a full time job. So while I sit here daily and apply for jobs I can just hardly comprehend staying on top of it all when I am employed full-time. But there is always a solution to staying organized and I always like to make it "fun?", while as fun as it can be...

I had spotted a "Home Binder" on pinterest awhile back and just had to make my own. While the ones I found were helpful for ideas they just didn't match my style or what we needed them for, so to InDesign I went and here is what I came up with! Under each sample you can download the PDF so you can print them for yourself.

I also plan to make a Christmas Gift Planner, Birthday and Anniversary Reminder, Checkbook Log, Blog Idea Calendar, Monthly Master Calendar & a Fridge "need" List. But those will be added on as soon as I finish them. The ones below I have found to be very helpful!! Enjoy!

Download PDF

Read More for more home binder PDF's

Desk Organization

As much as I would love to show you the entire desk, because I LOVE our desk!! We got it off of craigslist (of course) for about $100 less then it retails for at Ikea. The whole picture is still "In Progress" (and a bit messy!). So we will just stay away from that for a bit. But while working on the whole picture we saw this awesome inspiration pic on Pinterest, Found Here.

We just loved the idea so we just had to put the pieces together! 

Pumpkin Time & Fun Fall Date Ideas!

Our "Modern" Pumpkins. Mine is the Owl and my hubby made the chevron!

I am not really sure that my husband or I really got the memo about being adults. We are all about fun during fall! We love apple picking, pumpkin carving, corn mazes and it seems the best time of the year for wine tasting! 

DIY sweater quilt!

This post has been long overdue!! I made these two blankets LAST Christmas! The red for my brother and the blue for my dad :) I think they turned out great! I found the how to on a tutorial Here!! I honestly think that her blanket turned out much better :) I would definately suggest using only wool sweaters. I used whatever I could find but I found that the 100% wool worked best. I will admit they are harder to find, but it is possible!

A Bit of Sparkle!!

I found this pretty craft on Pinterest of course!! All props go to the The Sweetest Occasion!! They are the creators of this awesome project :)

I think that my glitter was a bit larger then what they used in the above tutorial, but with two coats of ModPodge and glitter it worked just fine :) I plan on putting these away till Christmas, I think they will be just adorable with some candles glowing through the glitter! 

A Splash of Color (and a painting tip!!)

We decided our white walls were "blah." Just too much white for our vibrant personalities lol. 

Before...

DIY Tile Coasters

Another awesome pinterest project!! These coasters are so easy and can be great for a pop of color! You can find the complete tutorial HERE.

They are so cheap to make too and would make perfect gifts! I will say that the clear coat is very necessary! We did use it but I might even put an extra coat on it for extra covering. 

Craft Crate Coffee Table & Succulent Planter

Our awesome coffee table is done!!!

Let me just warn you that I swoon just a bit over this table. We ABSOLUTELY love it! Not only is it an awesome design by DIY-VIntage-Chic, but it was relatively easy to do! It is nice and big and has tons of storage for books and such :) Plus, with the empty square that is left in the middle you have so many options! Currently ours is a succulent planter, but our square dishes from crate and barrel fit perfectly in there as well! Which means a perfect place for appetizers or a plate of dessert when guests are over! Or you wan just remove the planter and such and have a table for board games! Awesome!  

DIY Antiqued/Distressed Dining Room Table

Drum roll please......

WE FINALLY FINISHED OUR TABLE!!! 

The table before the refinish...

...and After!!!

We are quite proud of this beauty, it came out just as we wanted :) While I am not going to give you an awesome tutorial (pretty much because we had no idea what we were doing and made mistakes) I will give you some tips and tricks that we learned.

Wine Bottle Sconce

This little beauty comes to you from an awesome project found on pinterest!! You can find the DIY instructions HERE. You will see that we made a few changes to the tutorial. Calvin added a piece of wood from a pallet, and the "Top plate connector/ceiling flanges" that we found at Home Depot were longer and flat unlike the ones featured in the tutorial. We found them by the ceiling rosettes.

Wedding Bathroom Baskets

Since we decided to have our reception at the Cleveland Zoo that meant having our guests use the "public" bathrooms that are available to zoo guests during the day. While the zoo did have them cleaned before our guests arrived they were still not the nicest bathrooms you have ever set your eyes on. Thus, to help our guests forget that they did not have beautiful facilities I decided to make "Bathroom Baskets."

Up-cycled Twine Vase/Decoration

This simple but adorable craft comes to you from your recycling bin! My hubby loves this larger bottle of Chocolate Stout that can be bought by the bottle at Trader Joes. I just love the size of the bottle so I had to find some way to repurpose it and this seemed like just the solution. Read more for the tutorial!! 

Bridesmaid Survival Kit

I wanted to make the girls something special as a bridesmaid gift. With the small budget I had to work with and the large number of bridesmaids I had to be savy! So I made place-mat bathroom bags (tutorial to come) and filled them with all the things we love and need as girls. Add a cute note and it came out perfect! I also just could not resist making wooden hangers with their names on them (again, tutorial to come :)

Asking the girls...

It was really important to me to find a special way to ask the girls to be in the wedding! I'm only gonna do this once so I want it to be a great experience for everyone involved. So I found some inspiration and did my best to recreate it! There are so many fun options that I had so many ideas! I actually ended up using two different types of cards because I just could not decide :) 

DIY Wine Bottle Sleeve...

...from a sweater sleeve!

          I promise this is an easy craft! If you don't have a sewing machine you could probably 

use liquid stitch (found at any local craft store). For the sake of this post I used a sewing 

machine, really because I LOVE my sewing machine and can't get enough of it! :)

Dark Chocolate Peppermint Cake Pops!!

Let them eat Cake...Pops!

Dark Chocolate Peppermint Cake Pops

One of my favorite things has to be Cake balls and even more fun then that is cake pops! So for the ladies Christmas gathering I knew what had to be the favor! Plus I I owed my cousin Paul some for his birthday! It was a win win. Since these little bugers can be a little difficult to make I figured that I would share a how to with you! I know the first time I made them I could have used a detailed how to. So here it goes!

Bottle Cap Picture Magnets

Awesome Picture Magnets

I wanted to share an awesome craft that I did quite awhile ago with ya! I made my Aunt these great magnets for her birthday...she loved them :) They really turned out great! So here is the how-to-diy!