Crazy Pillows

I might have pillow ADD... but it's the easiest way to add instant personality & vibe to a room. I'm constantly changing the pillow cases and replicating designer threads for way cheap. I get my fabric from Walmart ($4 yard) and recycle the inserts... total cost is about $2 per pillow. Here are 4 new pillow cases I made yesterday:

Green chevron stripe: I measured and sewed the case up, cut 5" pieces of painter's tape, measured out the zig zags and then painted with fabric paint ($1.50 Michael's). Peel off the tape and the outcome is very crisp... totally machine washable (a MUST in a puppy friendly house).


Here's a blue chevron stripe pillow case using 6" pieces of tape for a slightly bigger stripe.


The linen reverse side gives them a cleaner look and is very soft for actually using the pillows. (The painted side has a slight textured feel.)


Combined with the Moroccan print pillows I made last spring...




The yellow Otomi inspired pillow was made by sewing an 18" embroidered fabric panel I brought home from Mexico onto a plain white pillow. Really, it couldn't have been easier. I did this while the paint was drying on the pillows. It reminds me of this Jonathan Adler pillow shown below (no longer available).


($98 jonathanadler.com)



I think it was a fun/easy/cheap project to add a little summery latin vibe to the casa.

Home Goods

I just discovered the cheap thrills of Home Goods~ a best-of-the-best collection of Marshall's and TJMaxx stuff times 100! I spent about an hour in there and miraculously made it out in under $25 :)

Here's what I scored:


A fun and bright "foo dog" statue... I just really like color and personality ($5) Besides, I think it looks like Bandit a little bit :)



And a keepsake box
for $16 (check out the orange one in Tory's dressing room here.)

Good times...

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Tory's Dressing Room Inspiration

What's not to love about Tory Burch's fun, punchy orange & mango dressing room?

DIY Chandelier

I've been obsessing over the beachy "Hollywood Regency" inspired bamboo chandeliers for awhile now such as this one (which costs thousands, btw):



I like the white one, but I really preferred a black wrought-iron looking one... So I here goes a fun & very inexpensive experiment.

I bought a standard Ikea chandelier for $39 to install in the guest room. The installation really couldn't have been easier-I love ikea! The chandelier looks pretty fantastic all on its own and works well with the dimmer switch for a cool effect.

The bamboo twist would be the experimentation... I wanted to create an ocean front Italian villa look... evoking palm trees but with out being too tropical. Such as:




I went out & bought nontoxic crayola "model magic" clay in black from michael's for $2.99.



One bag was more than enough for 5 palm pieces. I started rolling out "t" shaped peices of clay to cut the leaves out of:


Which ended up looking like ninja stars :) I cut the airy/ spongy clay with scissors since it was so easy to work with, hand pinched the leaves to create an organic texture, and cut holes large enough to lay over the entire light source in each cup of the chandelier.



After that I placed and hand molded each ninja star into the bases of each light bulb. I made each leaf turn downward and then out again as to not look too droopy.




The clay air dried fairly quickly which made it easy to work with. The clay pieces dried in about an hour and are totally removable (incase the hubs thinks I'm crazy and doesn't like it) and easy to rotate/ adjust.

Ta da!




***Just a safety note, do not use the clay near open flames/candelabra chandeliers***

Turn Keepsakes into Art

A little souvenier from our honeymoon in '07 to Bermuda ~ our golf cart key. The reverse side has our names, house no., etc. I love looking at this and remembering what a beautiful trip we took. Now it's in a girly white frame (Marshall's $5) with a beachy print behind it (which exactly matches the print of my closet makeover- Papyrus $7 for a roll). Cute & sentimental :)





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