Project Organized Home~Ottoman repair!

Well, here it is Friday again! I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July weekend, and I hope this weekend will be a great one for you as well! I didn't get around to those throw pillows yet this week, but I did find a use for some more of that fabric I got such a great deal on! I had an ottoman that the kids had just destroyed the top on. Not only was it ripped in several places, but since it's microfiber and virtually impossible to clean, there was a lot of stains from spills on it. I didn't want to junk it, because it's a storage ottoman, and the inside is pristine! Plus, it cost me $100 when we bought it, and I want to keep it around for as long as possible! So, this was a perfect chance to combine frugality and decorating. Now I have a new ottoman again, and it matches my curtains, so it's really tying the room together!

I should have smoothed the microfiber out before I took the picture...the bottom isn't dirty, it's just the way the fibers are laying. :) It's just so nice to have a beautiful colorful ottoman! It's much prettier than it was brand new! I just took the top off, which wasn't easy, since it has not only the hinges, but shocks, so little fingers don't get pinched when opening and shutting the top. And then I went right over the fabric that was already there. I do that whenever possible to make recovering as easy as possible! ;)

I moved all our front room furniture around, and now I have my favorite chairs in front of the window. There is a coffee table, then the burgundy couch is facing the chairs. The ottoman sits behind the couch, in the dining room space; so it ties both rooms together since it matches the curtains! I will be smiling so big when I finally get the throw pillows made! I have so many projects I am trying to finish up before we start the new homeschooling year next month! Hopefully, with God's strength and grace, I can get a good part of them done!

Project Organized Home

Well, I was recently blessed on another trip to our local Mission Center Thrift Store! I got over 7 yards of high quality interior decor fabric for only $2! I wasn't even real sure what I would use it for, I just knew it was too good of a deal to pass up. When I got home, I realized just HOW good of a deal it was. Even though it is YEARS old, the tag was still on it, and it originally sold for $24 a yard! It's got Scotchguard on it, and it's so thick and shiny. It's really nice stuff! I've really been wanting to make some new curtains for the front room, but I had been looking for some quilty looking fabric. I decided that this would work well though, because it's so bright and cheerful! I really need that in the front room with it's dismal paneling. Since my husband wasn't too thrilled about the floral pattern, and preferred to keep our burgundy curtains up, I decided to compromise and have both! :) .....It works really well too, because our couch and two swivel chairs are burgundy as well. So I am going to make throw pillows out of this same floral fabric for them. It will tie the whole room together, and brighten it up at the same time! I'm excited to have it all done! Pictures just don't do justice, but this fabric is so shiny and expensive looking!...all for $2, because I even had matching thread on hand! Thank you Lord! :0)

Now, on to throw pillows! That shouldn't cost too much either, because I have the pillows from the bench in our house in Georgia that I made still. They don't match anything here, and I contemplated giving them away. I can just open them up, and rob the clusterfill out of them!! YAY!

Project Organized Home~Inspirational Frame Art~

I wish I had gotten a better picture, but I am loving these! I found the frames at a thrift store for $2. They are solid ceramic, and so pretty! I used a simple computer program and made the artwork to go in them. It says J O Y and each has it's own meaning. To have true joy, we must have our priorities in order! J for Jesus first, O for Others second, and Y for Yourself last. I also put a scripture verse that coincides with each thought. They add so much spring color to the room, and are a great reminder of our priorities! If I keep my eyes open, there are always cheap ways to organize, decorate, and make the home a brighter happier place! :)

Project Organized Home~ Exterior Painting

Well, you may have noticed my lack of posting, but let me explain why! We have been so busy trying to make this new house a home. That's harder to do when you are renting, but we have a wonderful landlord! He and his wife, have really been giving us a lot of freedom to make changes to suit our family. He has been paying for paint (of my color choice) on the inside of the house, and just recently, he bought us a bunch of paint for the outside. He let me chose my color here too, and I am just thrilled as I see the color going up on the house! This is how bad it was looking before we started scraping and painting... You can see that it's quite the change, from looking at the bit of blue that we had done in the photo! And below is how it looks currently! Amazing transformation, isn't it?! We have only just begun too. We still have the top trim to do, some caulking to put on, and then another coat of paint. We haven't touched the east and north sides yet either. But pulling up to this, is really encouraging us to keep going! I can just imagine how beautiful it will be when we are done, and I have flowers blooming all over, in the ground and in my pots and baskets!!! YAY!

Project Organized Home~Chair Recovering

Today, I thought I'd share with you what I did this past week! So many people are afraid to tackle this project, and they shouldn't be...it's not that complicated! :) I'll show you how to do it!

For the longest time I had just plain wood dinning room chairs, but when we bought our first new set ever, when we moved to Georgia, I was so excited to get wood chairs with a fabric covered padded seat! Well guess what? I have 4 young children, and within months they were nasty looking. :( I decided to recover them with curtain fabric so that they would match the curtains in the room, and I covered the new fabric with clear vinyl so that they could be wiped down, and protect the fabric! Well, they made it almost 4 years, and the kids have finally ripped the vinyl. So, it was time to recover them again. And if you know me at all, you know that I wouldn't dare go another 4 years with the same fabric color! Hehe! So I headed to the local fabric store and picked out one I thought would go great with our rental house!

The first step is to take off the old fabric. Now if you have a new chair, there might be a nice neat covering on the bottom, don't be afraid, just cut or rip it off, and underneath will be the seat fabric stapled on, looking like this in the picture below. There should be screws holding the cushion onto the chair, you'll need to find them, and unscrew them. Now, you can decide...sometimes it's better to leave the fabric and just cover over it, while other times it needs to be taken off, so it's not to bulky. If you are using a thick fabric, plus vinyl, you'll want to start fresh with the wood and batting or foam. Since I had two layers already, I had to take one off. I just use a flat head screwdriver, and pull up the staples...

Once that fabric is removed, I am ready to put on my new fabric! Just place the cushion on the table or floor, over your fabric. Cut it with enough extra fabric to go up and around the cushion, and room to staple it in place. Now this can be done so many ways, but I would highly suggest you staple all sides first, and then tackle the corners. If you have a patterned material, make sure it is centered on the cushion before you staple it! Pull the fabric nice and tight, and staple in place. Keep it as straight as possible, so you don't have pulls or wrinkles in the fabric up the sides. With these cushions, the back is pretty curvy, so I staple the front, then the back, to hold the fabric in place, then I go to the sides.

Now for the corners. There are so many ways to do it. You may have to do trial and error to see how you like them! I just pull a little section at a time, layering it over each other to make a cute little layered corner. I start off with this...

and just keep layering and folding over, until I'm left with this, and I staple it in place...

Once I'm done stapling the corner, I cut off the extra fabric, so it's not too bulky. If the corners are too bulky, they will show space between the chair and the cushion when you try to put it back on.

Finally, when done with the fabric, you can move on to vinyl, if you wish. Same thing. Lay the cushion over the vinyl and cut it to size. Staple it all around, using the same method.

Cut off any excess material once you are done, and you should be left with this!..

Now all you have to do, is place it back on the chair, get your screwdriver, and tighten the screws back into the wood on the bottom of the cushion! I recovered 4 chairs for $30. I am also covering the top of the bench behind this chair in the same fabric, and it only cost me an extra $10. Oh, I just LOVE them! The new fabric just matches this front room so well!!!! It's amazing how such little changes can make such a big difference!

FYI-For 4 chairs, I buy 2 yards of fabric, and 2 yard of vinyl. It just depends on the size of the fabric. They are always cut by 36" yards one way, but they all vary the other way. They could be 43", 24", or any dimension. You should usually always be safe with 2 yards for 4 chairs. It's better to buy more than not enough! You can use the extra to make matching
place mats, a table runner, or other projects for the room!

Project Organized Home~Kitchen Makeover!

Well, it's been so long since I've done a Friday post, that I felt I owed you a proper one! lol! So, I thought I would share the before and after photos of the kitchen in our new rental house. God really blessed me here... it was so hard to leave the gorgeous kitchen that we had in our home in Georgia...so hard. Then, to see what this kitchen looked like, well it almost brought me to tears. But the landlord here, has been great, and had no problems with me painting whatever I wanted, to make it feel more like our home! :) You just can't beat that when you've owned your own home for so many years! So, I took full advantage of it, and really had fun in this tiny kitchen!

The before.....

The after....

It's still not done, and a little messy, but you get the idea of the transformation!

You can't see it, but I still have the other cabinet that's identical to the one on the left. It's to the right of the fridge, so when you are standing in front of it, it's all symetrical. It all fit just perfectly!

This weekend, we will be moving the microwave to above the oven, where it belongs! It's an over the range microwave, so it's taking up WAY too much of the little counter space I have available!

It's been so fun, and I love walking in there now! I will really be pleased when we move the microwave, and finish the rooster border on the stove wall. I have been searching thrift stores for more tea pots and roosters too, to finish decorating the shelves above the sink. The trick in these old houses, is finding the neat features they have hidden in them, and really exploiting them! Like the shelves, and the cove behind the fridge! Have a great weekend everyone!

Project Organized Home~Serenity Frame

Okay, so I know it's been a l-o-n-g while since I did one of these posts, and I'm sorry. But what do you post about, when you are tearing apart your home to move it?! lol! I did find something to share with you today though. Something that I will be able to enjoy at my new home!

My Grandma Sheila gave me this beautiful frame and print last year. I love it so much! However, sometimes you just want a change. I was going to pack it the other day, when I decided I should change it up a little bit before I do so. I know I won't have time to do anything with it for a while after we move, so it's kinda now or never. Well, today was my chance! My back needed another break from packing, and luckily, I hadn't put up my scrapbooking stuff yet. With a little creativity, a few supplies, a computer and printer, I came up with this...

Now I get to enjoy one of my favorite prayers, with one of my favorite gifts! I just love it, and I can't wait to unpack it and hang it on the wall in our new house! It will be like a brand new item, because it got packed 5 minutes after I finished making it. :-) I just LOVE making these types of things. This is my 7th now, and I don't think it will ever get old. You don't have to open a book to enjoy them, you can make them for all kinds of occasions and people, and they make a home feel personal, and loved!


Hopefully, when we are settled in our new home, I will be able to post more about projects that make our home more organized and beautiful! Have a great weekend everyone!

Project Organized Home~A Fall Tour

Okay, so here you are standing on my front deck, and looking into my home through the front door. Sorry, no one else is here to take pictures for me, or else I would be standing in the doorway welcoming you in! Anyway, what you see is this...a wall! I like it though, because it helps us keep our privacy!...

Then you would come in and turn to the left to enter our living room. Before we proceed though, I have to show you the entrance way from the inside view! I love it. Our wedding flowers that my mother made for us, don't match any room in the house, so I put them here in the entryway. They are still so beautiful, almost 12 years later!...

This is my view from the sofa. I love it when I finally get to sit down on the sofa and rest. So much light comes into the house through this door and the adjacent window, I just love it! The picture shows it much darker, because of how much light there is....

Okay, this is one view of the "new" living room. This used to be the dinning room before we moved things this past week. To the left of the window is the front door you just walked in! It was no small task for Mike, bringing that entertainment center in here..it's sooo heavy! Solid cherry wood! Now, I still have a few things to move around, but this is just about what it will look like all fall season. It's a little tight, but very cozy!...

Here's another view. I left the last supper in there for now, because the colors match so well with all the other decor. Mike loves this wall, and requested that I not change it right now! He's not very outspoken about the decor, so when he says something, I try to listen! This picture isn't completely up to date, because after I took it, I moved my vases over to where that orange thing is next to the lamp. The vases match much better, you can see that in the previous picture!...

I put this where my vases used to be. My Grandma gave me this metal basket when we were in Colorado, and I bought some flowers last week from Walmart to make an arrangement for it. I just love how dark and beautiful they are..I wish the picture wouldn't distort it so much. This will be a special decoration for a very long time, since I got part of it from my Grandma!...

The "new" dinning room isn't done yet, so I can't show you too many pictures, but I wanted to show you this! I got this cute set last year. It's a napkin holder and salt and pepper shaker! This will be my first year to enjoy them, because I bought them from the thrift store just before Christmas last year and had to put them right into storage. They should look really nice with some fall napkins!

Now, if I can just figure out what to do with this gorgeous fabric that I bought from JoAnns last year. I used them as curtains in the dinning room (which is now the living room) last year. I'm not sure what to make out of it this year. It's not going to match the sofa, so curtains are out! LOL!

Project Organized Home~Shiny Sink

Sorry today's post is so late....oh, let's be honest, we're lucky I'm getting a post up at all! I'm not exactly know for my faithful blogging, especially of Fridays! However, today's post is about a new goal I am setting for myself and my home. If you asked me what the one thing I'm always procrastinating on when it comes to cleaning my home, I'd have to tell you this..."There's two things I'm always procrastinating on, dishes and laundry!" I am perfectly equally bad about both. So, I have already taken baby steps to be better about getting both done. Today I am adding a new step and making a goal for myself. The worst part of my procrastination with dishes, is the sink. I leave it full of stuff that won't go into the dishwasher. I'll rinse all the dishes, and I'll even get everything I can get in the dishwasher washed on some days, but I rinse and leave pots, pans, sippy cups, water bottles, anything that won't go in the dishwasher. I don't have a drain rack, because I don't want anything else in my sink or counter, and I just despise having to wash...quit...dry...wash...quit...dry to get those items cleaned and put away. Sometimes, I'm afraid, it would be a week or more before I washed them and got them out of my sink. So, every night before I went to bed, this is what I would see....

Pretty bad huh? Those plastics on the left side...been there for days. I know, it's horrible! My bedroom just happens to be right off the kitchen. You have to walk through it in fact, to get to my room. There is no other way in or out. So, the last thing I see before I go to bed, and the first thing I see when I get up (other than IN my room) is this sink! So, my new goal is to have a shiny sink every night before I go to bed! That means, all dishes washed! I'm still not breaking down and getting a drain rack, but I will lay out my towel on the counter, and use it for my drain rack. I'll hang it up to dry when I'm done or throw it in the washer first thing in the morning. I've also found a place for storing my soap, rags and scrubbers too, so my sink will be shiny and clear of stuff every night when I go to bed, and every morning when I wake up! I am such a perfectionist, and looking at this mess all the time, really bothers me and puts me in a not-so-hot mood, so this goal should of been set a long time ago, but....baby steps! So, here's my sink now and forever more!!!...

May the Lord give me the strength and discipline to do this every night!

Project Organized Home-A Little Help For Autumn

Well, today's post is all about how I'm trying to encourage autumn to make it's way here! Now, I know full well that since we are in the south, we aren't going to enjoy true autumn for a couple more months, but it has been sooooo hot here (and most of the country) this summer. We are ready for a break in these temperatures! I do see some signs of cooler weather on the horizon...

My Kousa Dogwood has beautiful orange fruit now ripening and dropping to the ground! When we came home from our trip, most of my outdoor flowers had died since we weren't there to water them twice a day. They had to be cut down or pulled out completely, so I felt it was time to go ahead and put out the fall flowers!

Every year I put out fake fall flowers in place of where my annuals were. It adds beautiful autumn color that needs no maintenance. They usually last 3-4 years depending upon how much sun they are exposed to. A great investment, really. This year, I'm just putting them out a little early in hopes that I can encourage autumn temperatures to follow!

Every time I take a picture of this area, I realize how badly I need to clean up that brick mailbox! I have done a great job of keeping it weeded though, and it's one of my favorite parts of the yard. I didn't realize how much I missed seeing my color-changing solar lights until we came home and saw them again. They are so beautiful!

This ivy will live through the winter again...it's about 3 years old now. I think next year, I may have to transplant it, instead of just cutting it back. I love it in this pot though. I've had an amber colored solar light in it for a few months, and I just LOVE IT! Now, we have some fall color in it, instead of a spring dogeared begonia!

These sunflowers were left over, so they went at the corner of the ivy bed! It needed some color. One day, I hope to dig up all this ivy and have a nice flower bed here. This is the round brick bed next to the porch. I know it's really going to be a task though to kill all the ivy and keep it from coming back. Well, that was this weeks project for a more beautiful and organized home! Have a great weekend!