Tissue Box

For about that past month and a half, I've been a little bit stressed out with a job I was applying for at work. My parents had always made the mistake when I was growing up by bribing me with a certain amount of money for every "A" I had gotten on a report card. So now, whenever I do something good or have a accomplishment, I feel like I need to be rewarded....

So I played my favorite game with Mr. Husband. It's a game I like to call "Let's make a deal". One night I said to Mr. Husband, "Mr. Husband... if I get this job, then I get to buy/make stuff to decorate my officle (office + cubicle) "D" style". After little convincing, he agreed, but I still needed to get the job...

Well................................... I got the job, and I'm beyond excited :)

Here's the plan... some Amy Butler fabric, fake Peonies in a vase, a rug, some picture frames, a wall organizer if I can find some cubicle hooks, a desk organizer, and a tissue box ...

Of all things, I opted to start with the Tissue box :)

I always want to have tissue at my desk, but I think the boxes they come in are just so ugly. I admit, they are now trying to make a effort with different designs on the boxes, but they're still just dreadful. Right now, I just use napkins from our cafeteria... can you believe that?!?

Anyways, I started with a tissue box just to make sure I had the right measurements.

I was originally going to mod podge scrapbook paper on a plastic tissue box cover (assuming I could find one), but then I thought "why don't I just sew it with some thick interfacing?". So I picked out my fabric. I had already picked out some Amy Butler and Heather Bailey fabric for my officle rug redo (next post), but wanted some coordinating fabrics too... so I picked up the big polka dot fabric (Amy Butler) and then a damask-ish fabric that I've had my eye on FOREVER from Hobby Lobby.

Then I cut three of the fabrics to a one and a half inch width, and the top fabric to a two inch width (4 of each).

Then sewed the four strips of fabric together, so I would have four sets...

Then I pressed the seams down so they wouldn't bunch up so much...

and now you have your four sets you're almost ready to sew together.

Then I measured the interfacing, and had it just a smidge bigger than the sides of the tissue box.

This part was kind of tricky... I ironed on the interfacing to the first side, and then lined all of the sides up when ironing on the interfacing just to make sure they all matched up to each other.

For the top of the box, I ironed on the interfacing and then used a template to have a decorative opening for the tissue...

Then I sewed all four sides to the top...

pinned together the sides and sewed them together...

Now here is where you hope all of your sides match up... I'm still practicing how to sew straight lines, so the mere fact that I even got to this point still amazes me. I only had one side that was just a little bit off :)

And now for the best part... flip it inside out!

I loved it, but was still wanting a pop of turquoise, so I added this turquoise trim with a few rhinestones here and there... and here's how it turned out!

How fun is the top!?!

The best part is, whenever the tissue runs out, you just switch out the box... no more ugly tissue boxes for this girl!

Linking up to CSI's Turquoise challenge!

More Patio Stuff....

After finishing the Autumn Tree for the porch, I still wasn't happy with how it was looking. I do still plan on adding some fake hay and pumpkins, and also switching out the chair covers.... but it's still missing a little something...

So I sat and thought and thought and thought.... and while sitting and thinking on the porch I just kept staring at our light pole. I'm obsessed with light poles, lamps, lanterns, the like. I was so excited when we noticed these light poles when we were first started searching for our home, because you just simply do not find these little characteristics in Arizona. (Down the street in another development, they have the "Sesame Street" light poles... obsessed with those too!)

Then I went inside and watched Sherlock Holmes with Mr. Husband (I swear if I could have any chosen any era to live in, it would have been the early 1900's... the decor and the big dresses the women wore just make me drool!)... Towards the beginning of the movie, I saw this, and the light bulb went off!

So I left Mr. Husband and went to work. I started off with this lantern which we had bought from Crate and Barrel.

and added some lettering to it, just like in Sherlock Holmes. Looked super cute, but I wanted to make it a little bit more unique...

So I took out my Cricut, and my "Summer in Paris" cartridge. This is my favorite cartridge so far... and I bought it for only $12 from Joannes during national scrapbook month! I hadn't tried this cutout before, but it is a 3d chandelier cut out.

So I used some thick cardstock and had the Cricut cut out the 3d chandelier, then spray painted it with a brushed gold color.

I then thought to myself "D, how can you waste more of your Saturday afternoon? I know, you can rhinestone it of course!!"

Then I hung the chandelier with wire at the top of the lantern... Loving it!

I originally was going to hang the lantern from a Shepherd's hook I had leftover from the wedding, but then decided it I wanted it to really look like a light pole. A few months ago I had bought one of those cabinets that has really long legs that is supposed to go over a toilet. Well, I just wanted the cabinet part, so I rigged it in a way where I didn't use the legs, and saved them because I new I could use them for a project some day...

So I filled a planter with two bricks (for stability and weight), stuck one of the legs in, and covered the rest with potting soil...

Then hot glued the lantern to the top of the leg...

Then to make it look a bit more Autumn-y, I added some twigs from Hobby Lobby, and here's the end result!

I love that the Chandelier, and the font of the lettering gives it a little bit of a haunted look. This is probably as close to Halloween decorating as I will get for the year!

One more look! I love how she turned out! I think she needs a orange bow just to finish it off :)

And here's a preview of how I wasted the rest of my weekend! Can't wait for this post!

Saturday find....

So, as part of the guest room re-do, I've been on the hunt for a side table... and look what I picked up.... for $12!! I loved the curves of the legs, and it has some pretty awesome detailing... perfect for some glazing!

I really wanted the table to match the blue I have in the bed spread, so I took the pillow cover in and had it matched up. I didn't know Home Depot does this, but you can buy a little container of test paint... but it ends up being the perfect amount for covering a small piece of furniture! I still have about half the container left over. Add on a small foam roller for about $1.50, and I spent about a total of $4.50 on paint materials.

The top of the table was pretty bad, and I was a bit scared because it has the wood going in all different directions... so I sanded carefully, making sure to go with the grain of the wood...

After I was done painting I was ready to put glaze over the top. I really wanted to have the glaze fill in all the small details, but it was much much harder than I thought. I was actually a bit surprised at how much of a problem I was having. I guess it will take some practice, but after a few touch ups, I'm pretty happy with how it came out...

I think I'll tackle the glaze over the leaf details when I've had more practice and feel confident I can make it look really good :)

Knobs are also 1/2 off at Hobby Lobby this week, so that worked out great!

Very relieved the top turned out!!

All in all, between the actual table, paint, and knobs, the total cost for this project was around $21... and I'm pretty happy with that!

p.s. Hopefully this will be the last time you see the wall that color!!

Faux Fall Tree

I'm so excited to decorate (for the first time) for fall! My house was basically made to be decorated for fall because of all of the warm colors we have:) I'll probably only be doing a couple of projects because I want my house to "barf" Christmas... so I'd rather use my craft budget for Christmas projects this year. Nevertheless, I'm still going to decorate just a bit!

This is one of my first "fall" projects. I really wanted to decorate our front porch, because I feel like that is the place that will work best for fall decorations. So that's where we'll start!

Last weekend while Mr. Husband washed our cars, I cleaned out the garage. Yes, we've only lived in this house for 4 months, and I've already had to clean out the garage! It's mostly because I've been using my half of the car for bigger craft projects instead of using it to park my car :)

These are the branches that came from the ladder project. I only used about half of them, so they kind of just hung out on the side of the garage.... wasn't working out too well!

So I stripped off all of the leaves until I had just the twigs left... I first took them and arranged them the best that I could (can't really work with twigs !)....

Then wrapped the bottom with hemp... not only to hold them together, but to somewhat resemble the trunk of a tree

then made sure it looked okay before I moved to the next step...

I thought it kind of looked a bit too bare, so out to the spray paint field it went! I wrapped the hemp with a plastic bag, and spray painted the top brown...

So glad I did it... looks so much more "fall-y"!!

While I was out in the spray paint field, I decided that the green pot just wasn't going to work... so I started spray painting it with a brushed gold color...

and I swear I didn't do this on purpose... but guess what I ended up spraying?!?! I guess this is why you're supposed to wipe down stuff before you spray paint, but who has the patience for that?

Does this just make you shiver?!?! The spray paint pretty much fossilized Mr. Spider... so I left it on there... gives it more of a Halloween look... and I hope someone touches it to "see if it's real", because guess what kids... it is :)

And no I'm not joking... it's still on there

Back to the tree! I really only spent around $10 on this entire project, and the $10 was spent on all the leaves and twigs from Michaels and Hobby lobby. All the fall stuff is pretty much on sale right now, so I totally took advantage of it.

Also... I now it's crazy (and tempting) that they've started to put out all of the Christmas stuff already, but totally use it to your advantage! If they have orange, yellow and red stuff, you can still use it for fall! For example, a cute orange bird.. I also used glittery apples and twigs that had beads and glitter on them, which were all in the Christmas section!

Then I simply clipped everything off of their wire stems, and hot glued it on to the tree.... and after what seemed like HOURS... here is what you get, for next to nothing!

Don't mind the dirt... I still hadn't picked it up :)

Here's Lola the bird....

and her boyfriend Butch :)

On a side note, I already had this pot sitting out with flowers in it, so I just replaced them with leftover foilage I had from the tree...

I still have to change out the covers for the rattan chairs, and the wall desperately needs some type of sign or something... but I'm okay with it so far!

One more close look!