Tag Archives: DIY

NewlyWife Likes #37

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You’ll find just one post about St. Patrick’s Day in this round up of links. Do I not like the holiday? Eh, I don’t mind wearing green or having an Irish coffee. But beer I find to be just so-so. Also, I’m a little upset that the Irish and English genes are more prevalent than my Portuguese ones. So as I dream of tans and boozy coffee, please peruse some Internet tidbits.

  • Feeling Thirsty? A Champagne cooler is probably one of the best ideas I’ve seen in a long time. Right? (Via Wine Harlots, who has a source list that reads like a chapter in the Old Testament where so and so begat so and so and it was apparently created on a random Tumblr…)
  • Funfetti: I was realizing that my table cloths were kinda ho-hum. I know, #firstworldproblems. I think that this DIY Confetti Table Cloth by Oh Happy Day will solve my boring table cloth issue, and possibly could kickoff world peace. It’s just that cute.
  • Banana-Pana-Rama: No, this isn’t about a wide-angled view of bananas. Tina of Carrots n Cake recently posted a pancake recipe that I’m dying to try. It’s ingredients? Bananas, eggs, almond butter, almond flour, baking powder and vanilla extract. Sounds a lot healthier than what I’m used to making!
  • Say Goodbye to Pesky Pinchers: You’ll avoid a pinch on St. Patrick’s Day on Saturday with these cute outfits: emerald blouse, soft green cropped skinnies, pleated dress, bright blazer.
  • Bringing It Full Circle: Someone needs to invite me to a party where there’s a mimosa bar. Sure, I could host it, but where’s the fun in that? :)

Happy Tuesday!

NewlyWife Likes #36

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Does it seem like spring has sprung where you live? This past weekend was absolutely gorgeous with unseasonably warm weather. Sometimes I think I’m part lizard because I can just bake in the sun all day. Instead, however, it was more like spring cleaning was going on in our house. While working on a “quick” DIY project, we hit a wall, a bowed wall to be exact. Trying to even this out led to the second coming of the dust bowl in our house. Every inch of our house has a fine dust on it, despite our best efforts to control it. Remember how I cleaned the bathroom last weekend? Yeah, that room was hit the worst and I was literally washing the walls. It even got inside the closed cabinets!

Anyway… I’ll share more of that story with you next week (I hope!) but in the meantime let’s focus on fun things like spring and not dust, shall we?

  • The Perfect Life: Do you find yourself wishing for a more perfect life? I think Natalie from Nat the Fat Rat has found it. Perfection is loving the life that you have created, enjoying the chaos, unpredictability and stains. We can all take a cue from this sweet post to appreciate how blessed we are.
  • Because Dr. Seuss Says So: Leading off of the above, I thought this Dr. Seuss print by Den 10 Studio is perfect. Maybe for a nursery today. (Mom, there’s no news to announce! Just thinking ahead…)
  • Sheep, My Girl Says: I’m always tempted to snag a few sheepskins from Ikea, but I stop myself because I think I’m not cool enough to casually throw one over a chair. Maybe I also get caught up in how else I could use one. Well, Karen from The Art of Doing Stuff to the rescue with Five Ways to Use a Sheepskin.
  • Insert Drool Here: My friend Andrea made a killer flatbread with prosciutto, gruyere, arugula and carmelized onions and a stop motion video of making the flatbread, too! I can’t wait to make this. You should too!
  • Hurry Up Summer: That’s the name of this outfit mood board, and I couldn’t agree more. I’ve always felt that I couldn’t pull off the maxi dress trend, but this outfit may have changed my mind. This makes me dream of going to a tropical locale, sipping tropical drinks and enjoying tropical sights. Can you tell I’ve been dreaming of a vacation?

Happy surfing and spring cleaning, everyone!

NewlyWife Likes: Being Organized

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We’re switching up the usual NewlyWife Likes posts this week. If you’re anything like us, you’re all geared up for a great new year. Megan and I have already shared our resolutions this week and are making headway. How about you? Well, if you have been wanting to get more organized, we wanted to share some tips and inspiration with you from past posts. Some are a work in progress, as I’m sure you can understand. If you’re like us, we need all the help we can get!

I actually spent this New Year’s Day reorganizing/cleaning my pantry. It took 2.5 hours, but it was well worth it.

Food

Storage

Favorite Organizing Resources

I hope some of these links might be helpful. Happy organizing!

 

Simple Home Updates

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Over the last few months I’ve done a few home updates. They’re small, but overall our place is feeling more homey. Some spaces still need some sprucing, but right now it’s all about little changes bit by bit.

First was just a simple task of restyling my husband’s dresser top. While I’m OK with showing you the “before” pictures of my messes, I decided that he probably didn’t want it for the world to see. So, just imagine it not being organized.

Basically, I used a vase (that I got for free!) because I figured it wasn’t uber feminine and added some nice height. Then I collected his colognes on a dish, put his loose change in a jar, neatly stacked his books and put some of his fun novelty stuff on display. It now looks like an intentional collection of things as opposed to piles of stuff collecting dust.

I should also say that usually I am not the person to invade his space without him knowing. I figured I didn’t throw anything away without his permission and I was just making it look better. Thankfully, he agreed and was OK with it. Your guy might not be as easy going about organizing his stuff… Just an FYI. :)

The other change was adding some shelves to highlight some of my favorite cookbooks. We finally also put up our shadowbox frames with souvenirs from our dinner at Bouchon in Yountville. One is a menu and the other, hard to tell, has a collection of business cards that you could hand stamp at the restaurant. Yes, I took four.

Have you all done any simple things lately to spruce up your space?

Semi DIY Glam Christmas Wreath

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While I do miss my (now broken) easy DIY ribbon Christmas wreath that I made a couple years back, I was excited at the idea of making a new one. One of my favorite inspirations from Pinterest was this wreath:

I love to decorate with Christmas colors, but in non-traditional hues, so this candy apple/lime green was up my alley. Plus, those feathers are so fun and unexpected. In creating my wreath this year, as always, there’s a bit of a back story as to how it came to be.

Armed with the above photo on my phone, I headed to Joann’s and began the hunt. Originally, I wanted to copy the wreath closely. Yet, I was really disappointed with their wreath selection. The plain ones were so fake yet they wanted $20 for them. I found a good ribbon, but the feather selection that I liked most were greenish and kept blending into the greenery of the wreath. I ended up buying ribbon and feathers, but skipping the wreath.

I should note at this point Matt, who was nice enough to accompany me to the store after much begging on my part, asked why didn’t I just choose a premade wreath. My reply? “But there’s no DRAMA in any of these!” He suggested then that we could try the wreath store — huh? — or Target.

Bless his heart, Target had the perfect wreath for me. It practically called me by name and begged me to take it home. This is usually how I know which direction to go — the other wreaths didn’t “speak” to me, but this one was practically glowing. In the end, I’m glad I put my own spin on it.

The assembly was very easy, plus it’s totally removable, meaning I can switch it up over the years as I please.

What you’ll need:

  • 1 wreath
  • 3-4 yards of wire ribbon, about 2-3 inches wide
  • a few plumes of feathers, I used three
  • wire cutters

First, I trimmed the wire on the feather plumes down to about six inches. Using Katie Bower’s big fluffy bow tutorial, attach the ribbon bow to the wreath. Then, visualize where you’d like the ribbons to go and carefully jam them into the wreath below. (The base of my wreath was branches bound together, so it was easy to stick the wires in there.) Just like that, you’re done!

Happy wreath making!

 

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