Label Maker Spice Jars

I needed to organize my most used spices in a more uniform way and they needed to be cute, because they sit on the shelf out for everyone to see.    So, I emailed this etsy seller and asked her to make me some.  I saw some of her cute Halloween labels and a light bulb went off.  Originally, I was going to buy a label maker and make them myself, but this was cheaper and I didn't have to do it!  Plus, she was lovely to work with!  She made them and shipped them to me super fast, all for $4! :)

the tall spice jars are from target, they are Archer Farms Spices in the grocery area.  I just refill them with cheaper spices.  The jars are from ikea, but I picked them up in the package for $2 at Goodwill! :)


xoxo

Obsession=This Bathroom

This bathroom makes my brain explode with excitement!

Photo via Desire To Inspire. 

the girls over at a beautiful mess posted it today.  i die.  i am already planning to redo our bathroom with a little inspiration from this bathroom.....what's that you say "you're in the middle of a kitchen reno" "didn't you just finish that damn bathroom"  Shut your dirty mouth, hooker.  Bite your tongue and be supportive.

xoxo

New Year and Goals for January

Resolutions suck balls.  I, every year since I can remember, have vowed to lose weight.  I hate this resolution.  I sit down and figure out what I am going to do.  I do it.  I lose x amount of pounds.  Then I plan out if I keep up that weight loss each week then I should be to my goal by______fill in whatever date it is.  Then, I vow to keep track of it in my planner.  I mark what my weight should be by that date and what it should be each previous week to maintain the goal.  January passes and I'm over it.  It was boring. The kids didn't want to eat the food I was pressuring myself into sticking to.  I would try to make myself food and a different more delicious meal for my family.  Sometimes, I would eat both.  Kind of counter productive.

Then the guilt would set in.  I mean seriously.  Then each month that would follow I would re-plan my weight loss.  Black scratch marks over all the "suppose to be" weights in my planner.  Instead of hitting my goal by say July, I could do it by Thanksgiving....Christmas.....might as well just wait until the New Year and start then.  I mean seriously...October: Halloween candy, November: Thanksgiving dinner, December: Christmas Dinner.........what's the damn point at that time in the year.  Snowball effect.

This year is different.  I started the Whole 30 program.  It is awesome.  I am not going to lie.  It is a lot of prep work.  Like I wash all the damn pots and pans like 2 times per day at least.  Blah.  I have figured if I do most of the prep on Sunday, then I won't have so much work all week.  Plus, the kids go back to school tomorrow, so I don't have as much food to make during the day.

I am almost done with the first week.  I'm down 8 lbs.  I am ecstatic. But, that's not the point.  I am tired of feeling tired and sluggish.  I want to finish things I start.  I am tired of sitting on the computer pinning shit, when I could be living my damn life.  Seriously.  Giant suck whole of time.  I need to figure out a process to do this.  Like a timer for myself for Pinterest. Anywho, this has given me more energy and when I feel like it, I will share the meals I am making.


Another goal of mine for the year is to think about things before I buy them.  Too much money is being wasted on crap I see in other people's pictures or on pinterest and I really have no use for them.  I am re-donating too much stuff.  Plus, I just have a lot of things I don't need.  Flushing those out this year too!
I want to focus on quality and not quantity.  Like we need new shower curtain liners, instead of buying plastic shit from WalMart, I plan to buy cloth one's that I can wash, bleach, and will last longer...etc.


Now on to the house stuff for the month:

January: 

 kitchen
1. build the countertop for the island.
2. paint the island
3. put on all the hardware

living room:
1. rearrange some art
2. fix the desk area
3. build some boxes or crates for the entertainment center

dining room:
1. get the everyday mantle done
2. do something for a centerpiece for everyday use
3. hang the other light fixtures (we've already done this, but I like to add it because I need to blog it)


sorry no pics and it's all words.  I'll get you something to look at later this week.  That means I'll have to clean somewhere and take pictures, but whatever.




xoxo

Home Tour: Christmas Tree, Table, Mantle...sneak peek of new floor and kitchen

It's Christmas time in these parts and I hope to clean show you the rest of the Christmas decorations over the next week or so.  Plus, Mr. TSL and I (mainly me while he was at work) laid the floor in the kitchen and dining room over 3 days!  Pics of that in a sec.  We are hosting Christmas this year and I am super excited.  I almost alwasy do Thanksgiving and my sister in law does Christmas.  This year we switched!

I don't do "theme" stuff for Christmas.  Mainly because it would take entirely way too much planning on my part.  I often only buy Christmas stuff after Christmas, so I would essentially have to plan a year in advance. Not happening.  Plus, all the ornaments on our tree were mine and the mr's from childhood, or our kids picked them out.  We rock white and colored lights...I want white, mr and kids want colored lights. We hang both.  I am proud to say that other than picking up the brass candlesticks for the table ($10 for all of them on CL) I didn't buy anything for decorations!  I am planning to buy some napkins for dinner and maybe 3 disco balls to replace the silver ornaments on the table, but haven't done any of that yet.

As for now, here is our Christmas Dining Room tour.

Because we have so many stockings, we use a gold painted dowel rod hung with some Merry Christmas stocking holders.  This WILL NOT hold full stockings.  So, when Christmas comes Santa leaves the stockings filled on the floor!

I had been looking for a wool plaid blanket for a while to use as a tablecloth and had all but given up on finding one for cheap.  Then, I was helping my mom clean out some boxes and this was in one of them.  She told me to throw it away...I kept it.  

and that completes our Chistmas dining room tour....now on to some kitchen progress, new chairs, and new rugs.....

The pics are taken in really low light and the cabinets are more of an inky dark gray.  The pics are spot on for the fingerprints on the dishwasher though!

Pic of the newi-sh (I've had it for a while and not blogged about it) runner on the stairs.

 My new 8x10 Kilim Rug my friend was not diggin anymore, so we traded for a mirror I had from Hobby Lobby and a cake stand I hadn't used in forever!  I freakin' love it!  Thanks Erin! Plus, aren't those stools amazing....trash that Mr. TSL brought home for me.  He brought home 7 of them!  The Island is getting a makeover this weekend!

My new chairs I scored on Craigslist for $35 each.  The black one was originally bright yellow.  Couple coats of paint and the black is much better!  I originally thought they were Eames Chairs, but they are in fact vintage Krueger chairs and were advertised as "Fucky Little Chairs"  She meant funky, but now they are called fucky chairs.

xoxo

Linking to:

inspired by charm

SUNDAY: The DIY Showoff 

 MONDAY: Thrifty Decor Chick, Dittle Dattle,Between Naps On the Porch, Homemaker on a Dime
TUESDAY: Tip Junkie, Today's Creative Blog, Strictly Homemade
WEDNESDAY: Not Just A Housewife Sugar and Dots The Mommy Club  
THURSDAY:My Repurposed Life. House of Hepworths, Beyond The Picket Fence, The Shabby Chic Cottage, Somewhat Simple 
FRIDAY: Fingerprints on the Fridge, Miss Mustard Seed, Remodelaholic, Chic on a Shoestring,  Shabby Nest
SATURDAY: Funky Junk Interiors, Tatertots and Jello 

kitchen progress: laying new flooring

Laying new floor........

old painted sub-floor got a coat of flooring primer

real life mess people.  keepin it real. 

It's actually all done and I can't wait to show you it when it's all put back together!

xoxo

Girls' Collage Wall Mock-Up

I have been known to put quite a few holes in walls and later re-patch them.  That's what I have to do after I put the window headboards and mirror up.  That, ultimately, was more for Crafting with the Stars than what the girls really wanted. Their bedroom is very large and the are getting bunkbeds soon, so I will have this huge blank wall to do something with.

I had 2 packs of ugly wall dots, one pack I transformed to be gold dots with a little spray paint.  The girls looked at them on the paper still and told me they didn't like gold.  I was shocked.  Then when they went with me to Jess's house and saw how awesome they looked they loved them!

So, the other pack is getting sprayed gold soon and put up on their wall. (they wanted them to go on their ceiling, but alas we have disgusting popcorn ceilings that I am not removing due to the fact that we live here and I am not freaking cleaning that crap up!)  see what I plan to do with the popcorn ceilings here.

I mocked up a little wall example in Paint (I don't have photo shop, hell I've never even used it!)  

the sources for the mock art on the pic above can be found here

Now to patch the previous holes, prime and paint them. UGH.

xoxo

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H&M Purchases

A while ago, I decided I needed to start dressing better.  Being dressed cute always makes you feel better.  I often can be found in yoga pants and a crappy shlubby t-shirt with paint all over it.  Most days I wasn't doing my hair or putting on make-up.  I use to get ready and look cute for work, but when I had Audrey I stayed home, then Oliver came and it was even harder to get ready.  Now, I take care of 2 other kids to help with money.  This makes 4 kids under 4. ALL DAY.  I was getting lucky to even get in a shower.  Gross, I know.  Or you are going, oh my God me too.  Either way I was getting sick of it.  I have a fat butt and not so big boobies.  Both of which I am fine with.

Yes, some weight loss would be nice, but I found myself saying "I'll buy new clothes when I lose x amount of pounds....  I don't want to waste money buying cute jeans at this size, I'll just wear the crappy one's I have.....and so on."  Well, eventually I hope to be a healthier weight I still need to feel fabulous now.

I was on a mission to get some pieces of clothing to make up some cute outfits for fall/winter that I would look cute, feel comfortable in, and not constantly be adjusting/tugging at my clothes.

A few outfits I wanted to piece together:

Also, I decided after staring at this pic forever that I most certainly needed to cut my hair.  It was looking ratty and blah.  My hair is very fine and looks stringy when it's grown out.  It was also almost always in a weird wad of a bun on my head.  Not a cute bun, but more like just out of my face bun. Shlubby again.  So, I had my friend Tammy cut my hair.  I love it.  Like super love it.  

Back to the clothes and the H&M Purchases.  I was looking for some sweater/tunic shirts to wear with skinnies/leggings.  I found some, they were like $50 each.  Yikes.  Then I was searching H&M's home stuff again. {I would rather buy stuff for my house over clothes always} I found some of their new fabulous pillows that totally tie my bedroom together, more on that another day.  So, I decided to peruse the clothes.  Fabulous and affordable.  

Then I found this tunic sweatshirt.  I order all three colors. These were $18 each.

And this sweater.  I ordered, black, white and stripes.  These were buy 2 get 1 free.  Which made them $13.30 each.

This sweater will need a tank underneath, but I can totally make a few of the super cute outfits from Pinterest with these!  

I cannot even explain to you how much I hate trying on clothes.  Mostly because I usually look like crap when shopping and that just makes it worse.  Plus, it's a pain in the ass trying to pull your 3 year old back into your dressing room while you baby screams in the cart you pushed into the too small dressing room and your older kids sit outside the dressing room and say "are you done yet?"  Mr. TSL tries to help by taking them, but usually by the time he does that I am done. Like super done.  Like "I don't care if I ever go out of our house I don't want to stare at my muffin top want to crawl into a hole" done.

I should get all dolled up, then try on clothes after I have had a few margaritas.  

I buy clothes online a lot, because nothing is more stressful than trying to find cute clothes that fit your big butt, but aren't too big for your smaller waist and bust.  These are the problems that plague me.  Anywho, I freaking love all of these tops and the purse I ordered (first new purse in forever-usually it's goodwill stuff that's okay) and the pillows for my bed.  I have never been 100% satisfied with an online purchase.  There's always tha tinge of "the quality is not what I thought it would be."  Not these I freaking love them and can't wait to get dressed!  Seriously.  That is a huge feat for me.  I can see all kinds of kitchy house crap or furniture and see it's potential and can make it look amazing. Getting dressed has always been a chore, but I am actually excited to wear these.  

 via

xoxo


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