Monogram Wall Art

While decorating my apartment I knew I wanted a majority of the artwork to either be made by myself or to be personal. I'm not someone who really understands abstract oil paintings much, but I am the kind of person who loves pictures of all my friends and family {who doesn't?}!

A few weeks ago I printed 30 Instagram posts from a company online and created framed wall art that is going to look great on my walls {blog post coming soon} and remind me of all my friends and family while away at school.

Above my upholstered headboard I needed another piece of art that was about 20 inches by 30 inches, wasn't more photos {but still had a personal element}, and made a statement in the room. This is what I came up with: 

I found a shop on etsy that stamps out monograms of all sizes. I decided to order one from League of Letters for only $16.75. After lots of thinking I decided to order it and mount it on a canvas 20 x 30 inches. 

I am always nervous to order from somewhere like etsy but I was happy to find that they created a great product in only about 10 days. 

First we sanded the monogram to make sure there were no raw edges. Next we coated it with spray paint primer and sanded it again. I then painted the wooden monogram the color my walls will be in my apartment and mounted it onto a white canvas to create contrast. 

Here are some of the final pics! Stay tuned to see this personalize statement piece on my walls. 

Re-Purposing an Old Dresser

Hello everyone! So sorry for the lack in posts the past few weeks, its been a hectic time for us Smith girls! Paige has been busy working as a daycare teacher and doing her online summer classes. Taylor just got her first job working at American Eagle and doing the massive amount of summer homework she has. We promise to keep posting something every week from now on! So to get on with this post....

Do you have old furniture laying around the house that just doesn't "work" anymore? Maybe an old chair or dresser that just doesn't fit in anymore? Instead of ditching the piece and buying something new, try re-purposing it!

Here is a quick and easy way to re-purpose an old piece of furniture...

What You'll Need

• Old Furniture
• Painters Tape
• Newspaper
• Sandpaper/Sanding Blocks 
  
• Primer
• Paint
• New exciting drawer pulls 

Steps to Success

Our old furniture piece was a brown wooden dresser that had been around our house since we were little. Since Paige is moving into her first apartment in August {yeee! lots of excitement} we needed to find inexpensive furniture. And re-purposing an old piece was the perfect thing to do!

Prepare

1. Take all the drawers out of the dresser. Ours was kind of old and there were some rough edges and nails sticking out, so make sure to clean up any edges and remove excess nails

2. Take your sanding blocks and begin to sand the front of the drawers. It doesn't have to be a super hard task, its just to smooth and break the surface so the primer stays. Once sanded the front of the drawers should be a lighter color than the rest of the drawer.

 

 

3. Do the same for the rest of the drawers and the dresser. Since our Dad has lots of power tools we were able to use a sanding machine for the rest of the dresser so it was pretty quick. *Helpful tip: If your drawers or dresser have edges to them make sure you remember to sand that part as well! The small edges are just as important as the entire piece.

  

4. Don't forget the feet! Flip your dresser over and lightly sand the feet

Once your dresser is completely sanded... 

1. Cover  with newspaper and tape the edges of your dresser so that paint wont get all over your dresser drawers and dresser. {our dad is SUPER SUPER OCD so our drawers had to be just right before he would let us paint, you don't have to cover to the extent that we did}

2. Cover all the drawers and the inside of the dresser...

Once covered....

1. Use the primer and paint the drawers and the dresser. Make sure you are in a highly ventilated area if you are using spray paint primer. If not, make sure to use a ventilated mask like our dad did... {what a cutie}

2. Make sure the primer layer isn't too thick because if it runs you will need to lightly sand the drawers and dresser again

Once primed...

1. Paint your dresser the desired color. Again, make sure you are in a ventilated area and that the paint doesn't run.

2. Let the paint dry and add additional coats if needed.

And there it is, you just re-purposed an old dresser. It was quick and easy to do! Now that old brown wooded dresser that took up space is a fresh looking, apartment ready dresser!

To add some additional spunk to the dresser, Paige added contact paper to the inside of the drawers. This will protect the drawers and your clothes. The contact paper she found had a vanilla scent which will {hopefully} keep things smelling fresh too! Once the contact paper was added, she put some shabby chic glass drawer pulls on the drawers. Voila! 

Worked on another mason jar last night! Hannah is an ADPi and her sorority collects pop tabs for part of their philanthropy work. We made a mason jar for her future little to collect pop tabs in and of course this project gave us plenty of opportunity to catch up on each others lives over the past year :) Keep crafting.

DIY: Fabric Lined Mason Jar

I have noticed so many people experimenting with Mason Jars recently. They are everywhere and so useful. I've seen them used for smoothies and coffee, transformed into giant candles, and just used for decoration.  Soooo I decided to share with all of you a very easy and fun way to transform a Mason Jar {or any other jar} into something interesting and versitile.

DIY: Twist On The Classic Mason Jar

This DIY is quick and easy to do! The Mason Jars can be used for so many different things: desk decorations, pencil holder, candle, coin collector, etc.

So here is what you'll need!

- Mason Jar {size doesn't matter! for this project I used a pint sized}

-Scissors

-Small Paint Brush

-Ribbon

-Light Fabric {fabric quarters}

-Small Cup

-Glue

1. Take your fabric and measure {guestimate} about the length you are going to need it. Make sure the fabric will be long enough so that it reaches from the  middle of the bottom of the jar to the top {or a little out of the top}. 

{cut the fabric into strips}

2. In the small cup combine glue with water {1:2} and mix well. If needed add more glue as you start adding the strips. The mixture should be a thicker than water

3. Take a strip of fabric and submerge it in the glue-water mixture. Once the strip is covered in glue, slide your fingers down the strip to get rid of excess glue.

4. Take the glue covered strip and place it inside the jar and position it. Make sure the pattern is facing out! Use the small paint brush to get rid of any air bubbles and to push down the fabric. If needed add more glue to your paint brush.

     

{add more glue}

5. Continue submerging strips and placing them inside the jar until it is completely covered.

6. Once the jar is covered add more glue if needed and place upside down so excess glue can drip down.

     

{flip upside down}

7. Let the jar dry until the strips are not super wet and cut off the excess length at the top of the jar. Put the silver top back onto the jar and let it dry completely {over night} until use.

{finished Mason Jar}

          

And that is how you make a fabric lined mason jar!

Bookshelf Do-over

Bookshelves can easily look messy or sloppy when not organized to perfection. I was inspired by a blogger I absolutely love when she redid her office space, her son's office space, and her laundry room. Her name is Jen and she is so organized it's unbelievable. She has a mild obsession with bins, boxes, and cute printables; but when it is all put together it looks very minimalistic and it is very user-friendly. Check her out blog here. 

Because of how small my room is in my new apartment, my bookshelf needed to serve many functions. It needed to store books, hide some craft supplies and medicines, serve as a jewelry holder, and hold some documents that are yet to be filed away. 

Mum and I visited Marshalls, TJMaxx, and Homegoods to try to find some bins and boxes to serve all these functions. We were amazed with all the goodies we found! 

{drawer organizer for jewelry}

{magazine holder for loose papers}

{pretty boxes for craft supplies and medicines}

{final product}

The two pretty boxes were $5.99 each, the magazine holders were $9.99 each, the big wicker basket was $9.99, the drawer organizers were $3.99 each, the decorative flower was $11.99, and the books were previously owned. 

This bookshelf is now the perfect home to so many different necessities and it is very versatile. Can't wait till I move in and get to add this to my room!

searching for the perfect study space

Recently I have been searching for ways to make my study space in my new apartment custom. Throughout my search I have been attracted to anything that makes the space clean, geometric, and minimalistic. My mum {being the Pottery Barn addict that she is}, suggested I look at their new Daily Wall Systems. I was pleased to find that these were just the things I was looking for and they are so customizable. The only problem I was facing is that I need my TV to also be on that wall and my TV is much bigger than either of the largest pieces Pottery Barn offers. Thus, a DIY craft project was born...

{Pottery Barn Daily Wall System}

I knew I did not want a white board in my wall organizer because I think they always look messy. Plus, I write list after list on sticky notes so a white board really wasn't the thing for me. I did, however, LOVE the linen inboard {$54}. To make the Wall System look like a cohesive piece I needed to either make my TV smaller {ha!} or make my own linen pinboard that better matched the size of my TV.

So mum and I took a trip down to Joann's and {using our Joann's coupon app} found some great deals. We found that it would cost us about {$10.52} to make something very similar {and much more custom} to the Pottery Barn version.

What we needed:

~Ply Wood {Custom cut to the necessary size}

~Thin batting {to add some thickness}

~ 1/2 yard of linen or canvas fabric

~ 1 spool {about 18 feet} of white ribbon

~Staple Gun

~Scissors

Once we got home we had Dad cut the plywood into our custom size and rounded the edges just slightly-- to make it look more professionally made. 

 Then, we layed out the batting and cut it just larger than the piece of wood.

Then using the staple gun we carefully & tightly secured the batting all around the piece of wood. 

{We discovered that it was helpful to remove excess fabric so the staples could go through}

Once the batting was on, we ironed the fabric so that there we no creases. 

After ironing, we followed the same folding method that we did with the batting. We had to make sure we were extra careful with the corners so that no bumps could be seen when it was hanging.

Once the fabric was stapled to the wood, we laid out ribbon & measured how far apart each should be. After some careful measurements we tightly secured the ribbon onto the board with the staple gun.

The finished project.

When it was all said and done, this project was $46.72 cheaper and it is the exact size I will need to create this Wall System in my apartment.