White Ironstone Style Animal Hooks

Hello everyone! 

Today I thought I would share my cute collection of iron stone style animal hooks. 

I am not sure when they were made. 

I found them at the thrift store for .69 each! 

TOTAL STEAL! 

I knew I wanted to use them to hang my potholders and or tea towels in the kitchen, and I settled on hanging them on the side of the kitchen island. 

I think they look adorable! I have a little thing for ironstone, and I have displayed some of my collection in a glass fronted cabinet on my pantry wall. 

This cabinet also holds my animal creamers I have brought back one at a time from my visits to Paris. My sweet animal hooks fit right in, holding oven mits here in the kitchen!

Here they are on the side of my island holding the cute potholders I found at Target. 

 Here's the whole gang!

 See? They just make me smile!

The photos above were taken when I brought them home. They needed a little cleaning, but now they are gleaming, hanging up on the kitchen island! 

 I brought these two pot holders home, and ran right back to Target to buy another two.  I wish I would have bought a whole extra set of four. I love them and will be sad if they get worn out, but everything is made to be used, so we use them everyday!

 Can you see why I love them?!

 I didn't even want to wait to finish screwing them in before taking a pic! I am so weird. 

I will share about my animal creamer collection and my large ironstone stash, coming soon! 

Have a fantastic week! 

 xo-Lisa

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New Wreaths for the Front Entry

Happy Monday everyone!

I hope you had a lovely weekend. 

I was able to sleep past 8 am for the second time this summer, so it was a good one for me! 

Today I thought I'd show you the new wreaths that I put up on my front doors a couple of weeks ago. 

I was at JoAnn Fabrics, and I noticed the wreaths were 60% off, and they still had the ones I had been thinking about getting. 

For 60%off I could not get them in my cart fast enough!

I know that there are a ton of super talented crafting genius types that change out their wreaths almost as often as they change their shoes, but I am waaayyy to lazy er, um, I mean, I like to keep it simple. ;-)

I try to do a mostly green wreath, with a bit of white in it for spring and summer. When fall rolls around I will change them to something fitting, and then of course in the winter, I like to decorate the front doors with fresh evergreens for the holidays, and that stays for a while in the winter, minus the christmas ribbon, and then back to the standard green and white. 

Here are the wreaths I found on clearance...I decided to buy a few stems of white and green faux flowers to make them a little more full.

 Here's the way they came. They look pretty, but I wanted them a little more full. 

So, while I was at JoAnn's, I picked up a few faux stems on sale.

 I cut them down, and saved the leaves for latter in my craft stash. ...You never know, right?

 I broke out the glue gun, and in a few minutes, wound up with a pretty nice couple of wreaths for my double doors.

 I like that the white and green shows up nicely from the street, and looks fresh and clean.

Not bad! 

Have a great week! 

Thanks for stopping by!

xo-Lisa


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Book Page Wreath Tutorial

Hello friends! 

Can I ask you something? 

Do you ever walk through your house, stop dead in your tracks and see something that's been bugging you, (in my case the area over my mantel) and suddenly know EXCATLY what you need to do about it? 

I mean something that you've been trying to figure out like For-eva?! --But you want it to be just right, and set you back an arm and a leg?!

Well, a few weeks ago, I was standing at my kitchen sink, and my little guy was sitting quietly in his chair reading a book. (Quiet is non-existent rare with MY 6 year old boy...there are usually siren noises, or explosions being imitated, or legos being tossed about while he builds some new creation,  all while carrying on an animated conversation with himself, in his own little world.)  Sorry. Back to my point, I was standing at my sink, and I turned to face the family room, and my sweet boy, and I looked up and saw the space above the mantel that I had been wanting to change. 

Suddenly, as if the skies had parted, as if being hit by a lightning bolt, I had an idea! 

 I needed to make a book page wreath to hang over my mantel!! 

Halle-lu-jah!!! Halle-lu-jah!!!

(That's the angels singing) :-)

So, I went to gather my supplies, and while I cut my circle out of

 cardboard, and started rolling paper cones from the pages I pulled out of an old dictionary, I was singing along with Alicia Keys to the song in my head...This Girl is on Fi-i-i-i-r-e!

...And I was! I think I nearly burned my finger prints OFF with the hot glue! But what fun it was to create something spontaneously!

If you want to make one, here's what you will need...

A glue gun, glue sticks, and old book, cardboard or foam core, some ribbon or twine to make the hanging loop, and something cool to make the center medallion. For me it was a combination of an old clock face, scrap paper, and cork contact paper.

First you cut a circle out of your cardboard or foam core.

 Then, just roll some cones out of your pages in whatever way looks good to you. I did a longer set by rolling the pages length wise, and then a shorter set by rolling them sideways. 

It's kind of hard to explain, and I didn't take pics, but I would tell you just play with it, and see what you like. There are no rules. 

This girl is on f-i-i-i-r-r-e!!!

OUCH!

Lots of hot glue incidents...

 I bought a few of these old clock faces at my friend's antique store.

 So I just kept making rows, and when it started to get poof-y, I kind of smoothed them down by almost creasing them, but not too much!

Just keep gluing around until you achieve the fullness you want. I believe that I did 3 rows. 

Then you make something for the center. I cut out a circle on cork contact paper, then a smaller one out of extra scrapbook paper, then I got a wild hair and sprayed it with chalkboard spray paint, then I hot glued the old clock face on top, glued all layers together, and used a piece of chalk to make some marks around the clock.

 To hang it, make a small loop with some ribbon, and hot glue it onto the back of your cardboard. I also cut out a small circle from scrap paper, and glued that on top of the ends of the ribbon to secure it further, leaving only the loop portion exposed on the cardboard.

It only took me an hour from start to finish, and I had everything I needed for it already! 

I love it when that happens! 

I also made one for the guest room...

See it over the lamp? I did a little fun medallion with 4 different types of scrapbook paper, and a circle of cork contact paper for the center of this one. Sorry, I can't seem to find the close up I shot of it! 

Darn it!

So that's the story of how a quiet moment, a bolt of lightning, and some angels singing, resulted in this wreath, in one hour. While singing with Alicia to This Girl Is On Fire!

Should you choose to try it, 

Happy wreath making to you!! 

Have a fantastic weekend!!

xo-Lisa

I will be linking to the following...

  

First Day Back Blogging...

I'm still up late here tonight.

I am up contemplating my future posts. 

The house is quiet, and everyone is already fast asleep. 

But not me! I can't sleep because I am still flying high with the excitement of a GREAT first day back at the blog! 

I can not tell you how thrilled I am that so many of you stopped in to check out my Post Reno Home Tour! 

I am over. the. moon! (And the moon is actually very beautiful tonight, by the way!)

Anyhow, I just wanted to say Thank You! 

What a great surprise to feel the love from all of you today!

I will be back tomorrow to show you how I made the paper wreath (from an old dictionary) that is hanging over my family room mantel. 

See it, way across the room?

 I have a little tutorial, and it's the easiest thing ever to make! I think it took an hour from start to finish. 

I did almost burn off my fingerprints with the hot glue, but that's just because I'm a dork, and not very careful!

Until then, I am going to try and get the gerbil of it's wheel up there in my nogin! He's going like a hundred miles an hour! I think he's got that song Good Feeling by Florida CRANKED, 'cause I can hear it loud and clear! That's his feel good song, and it helps him run faster. Just like it does for me! ;-) He's sure been giving my brain a work out tonight. 

I think it's time to wind down. The gerbil needs a rest, and so do I! 

Thanks again for the warm welcome back! 

xo-Lisa

Post Reno House Tour

Hi Friends! 

I am so excited to be back with you after a longer than anticipated absence! 

I took a lot of time off, but I am back, and ready to share the BIG changes that have been happening in  our home in the last 12 months. 

Some of you may have noticed that I've decided to change the name of the blog from Budget Design Girl, to the new name, Nothing But Blue Skies...

I was never fully satisfied with the original name, and though I am a thrifty girl, I just wanted something that made me SMILE, and didn't pigeon hole me quite as much. 

One day, not too long ago, it just hit me that my new blog name should be Nothing But Blue Skies, so here we go...new name, new inspiration, and a whole lotta new things to show you in our home!

As you may recall, we had a little leak in our kitchen wall that turned out to be a bigger deal than we originally thought. As a result, we wound up replacing our flooring throughout the entire first floor. We also put in new appliances, new kitchen sink and faucet, and repainted the cabinets. This led to the need to repaint the walls and ceiling in the better part of the first floor as well.

I am so happy with the results! There are just some tiny things that need to be tweaked, but it really is 99% finished.

Enough yammering on, lets take a look...

Our Living Room, and Dining Room. 

We decided on engineered hard wood throughout the entire first floor, and honestly, I really love how it warmed everything up. Prior to this, we had a combination of very large (I think it was 24") travertine tile, in the entry, kitchen, family room, bath, laundry and hall. The living room and dining room were carpeted. I always knew I wanted to ditch the carpet and have continuous flow through the whole first floor. I think it's such a nice improvement!

 This is standing in the dining room, facing the living room and entry.

 This is the view of our staircase looking up to the second floor. I recently got a wild hair, and decided to paint the banister and newel posts the same grey brown as the kitchen island. (Um...this still needs to be completed, but it's hopefully not showing too much in the pics!) ;-) Shhh... don't tell anyone.

 This is looking back toward the entry, and into the living room. (Ahem... I still need to get the sofa and ottoman re upholstered. The sofa was stripped of it's slip cover quite some time ago, and I intend to use a very neutral creamy fabric, much like the current muslin underpinning she is currently sporting. The poor ottoman has just been covered with an unused faux fur throw. I do think I like the color, but I will not be choosing faux fur for it's final upholstery.)

In the dining room I used a sisal rug under the table, and I am loving it!

 The family room and kitchen are where we spend most of our time, and I am thrilled with how this area came out. 

(P.S. I am standing right beside/in front of my son's train table-turned Lego table. Please don't get the idea that this room doesn't get messy! I'm just not showing you!) 

 I also bought a new kitchen table at a local antique store, that a friend of mine owns. I still need to get new chairs. (-So much harder than I thought to find exactly what I want. The hunt continues!)

The walls actually look lighter, and more taupe/greige in person. I am happy to be rid of our former carmel-y tan.

Looking into the kitchen, Just peeking into the photo on the right is my new granite composite sink, which I LOVE! It would have been fantastic to have it under mounted, but that was not possible, since I elected to keep the old granite countertops. I would have loved to change them out for something lighter, like carera, but that was simply not in the budget.

We had the pantry wall on the right custom built, as this was the location of the leak, and the former pantry and cabinets had to go. Although it was unfortunately not built to my original specifications, I decided to pick my battles, and let it be. It seems to be working out fine for us. I will do a post on the inside coming soon!

I still have a little custom trim coming for around the microwave. The trim kit that arrived for it when it was installed was just awful! I made them take it off right after they drilled the holes to put it up.
It reminded me of the sides of a chicken truck! (You know those aluminum clad, slatted semi truck- trailers that haul chickens?! Um, yeah,...farm to table never held less appeal! All I saw when I looked at my shiny new microwave with it's icky trim kit, was a CHICKEN TRUCK!) So, we will finish it off with a little idea I had.

View of the kitchen and family room from the entrance to the dining room.

Our downstairs guest room. It's still a work in progress. I would like to find an upholstered headboard in a cream linen, and replace the current dresser with a vintage chest or small dresser. Look for more changes to come.

The laundry room wallpaper was stripped and repainted (by me to save more money). This was quite a big job, and I regret not letting someone else do it for me!

I am still looking for knobs for the laundry room cabinets, but I think I may have found some that will work. Stay tuned!

This is the downstairs bath, and the last room that still needs some updating. It's on the list, people!

I have tried to work with the green marble and polished brass fixtures, but I think the time has come to get rid of them. We are planning to get to that very soon.

On the way up the stairs is this little reading nook it the living room. It is a work in progress. I am planning to upholster the chair in a brown and cream buffalo check, and I am still looking for the right piece of furniture for against the wall. Then the wall hangings that are what I had, will be changed out to suit whatever I find.

This is the master bedroom. It has an adjacent sitting room that is currently being used as my office. The hubby's man cave is down the hall, and I will be sharing pics at a later date.

The dog wants to sneak into my pics! See him in the hall?

I am working on an idea for the wall behind the bed...and I would love a button tufted headboard in here someday soon.

 Looking into my office.

 I decided to have a little fun, and display some of my evening bags and shoes in the corner.

Looking back towards the bedroom and bath to the left.

 Master ensuite bath.

 I painted the old oak cabinets about 6 years ago, and then recently changed the wall color to a deep brown, and doors to black. It is such a big space, and gets so much light during the day that it doesn't feel dark. These pics were taken at night.

This is the little guy's room, and I think we are getting ready to change it slightly.

Well, I can't seem to find the photos of the upstairs hall bathroom, and I need to also share photos of the hubby's man cave. I am going to save that for another day. I am pooped from all the work! 

...And so is the dog! This is our one year old German Shepard/Yellow Lab rescue, Romeo. He's a great addition to the family, and a total love!

That's it for now! Stay tuned, things are always changing around here! 

So glad to have you back, and plan on seeing me blogging regularly now!

I hope you like the new name, and my new look!

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

xo

-Lisa

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