DIY Flower Wreath

Today I'm sharing my little floral wreath I made using items from the dollar store. I absolutely love the way it turned out, and it's the perfect little wreath for spring.

It's probably no surprise that my wreath is coated in pearls, glitter, giant crystals, disco balls, and butterflies.

I saw this amazing wreath from Horchow back in December when I was brainstorming ideas for Christmas wreaths (and ultimately ended up making this). I just couldn't stop thinking about it. 

 Horchow's White Floral Wreath (seen below) is absolutely gorgeous. I remember seeing it and thinking hmmmmm...I could make that.

And I did.

But my own sassy version.

Must. Have. Sass.

All of the supplies came from dollar stores and craft stores.

 It took a little time to make, but was super easy to do.

Here are the supplies I used to make my wreath.

1. Basic wood wreath ($3 at Joann's)

2. 4 stems of assorted fake flowers ($1 each at Dollar Tree = $4)

3. 1 strand of glass pearls ($1 at Joanns)

4. Green glitter butterflies ($1 at Dollar Tree)

5. Giant Crystals ($1 bag of 'table scatter' from Dollar Tree)

6. Glue sticks and glue gun (on hand = free!)

7. Mini disco balls from my Christmas ornament stash (free!)

8. Small silver beads leftover from Christmas garland strand (free!)

9. White ribbon (50 YARDS scored for $1 last year here)

TOTAL = $10

To make this wreath, start with a basic wreath form. Since the top will be exposed, I chose a simple wooden stick wreath. Using the largest flowers, center the flower heads among the lower half of the wreath.

Once your large flowers are in place, fill in the remaining bottom half of the wreath with the smaller flowers. Try using several different sizes and shapes of smaller flowers to give the wreath a little texture.

Now, it's time to add a little bling. I just randomly chose whatever I could find at the store/my house. I finally settled on pearls, giant crystals, mini-disco balls, small silver beads, and green-glittered-butterflies.

Once you've attached all of your bling with your hotglue, cut a long piece of ribbon and wrap it around the top of your wreath. 

I attached the ribbon right to the wall with a single silver nailhead, right above my fantle. 

Jesse opens and closes the front door like a Woolly Mammoth and I don't have a mantle over the fireplace.

So, the fantle it is.

And that's all, folks! 

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

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DIY Striped Upholstered Bench

Yesterday I shared a few changes I made to our master bedroom. One of those changes was the piano bench that I made into an upholstered stool. And the best part is that I made it for just $5!

I was originally inspired by the $400 Ballard Designs Simone Bench. It's totally awesome...and totally out of my price range.

So, I decided to make my own instead.

The entire project took less than an hour, and was super easy to do. Basically, I saved about $400 (the price of the real bench) by making it myself. Not too bad for an hour with a hammer and a glue gun. 

I started with a basic piano bench that I originally found at a thrift store.

 I purchased 2 yards of fabric (a remnant I was lucky enough to find for a few bucks), 1 box of nailheads, and then used what I had on hand: hotglue, glue gun, hammer, scissors, and pillow stuffing.
You can invest in foam padding if you want, but I have tons of extra accent pillow inserts and just used the stuffing from those as a cheap alternative to foam.

The first thing you'll want to do is arrange and secure your fabric to your bench. Line up your fabric how you want it and then secure the fabric to two of the bench legs. Use two nailheads, one on each of the two legs. 

  

Once the fabric is secured, work on making the corners for both legs on this side. To make a neat corner, hotglue the fabric onto the leg and fold over the top part. 

Once it's folded neatly, and you can clearly see how much fabric you need, cut the fabric. Leave enough to fold about an inch of it under.

Next, fold it under and make it even with the part of the fabric that's already secured.

Next, secure the corner with two more nailheads, one directly on the corner, and one near the edge of the leg.

Next, add some nailheads to only ONE of the long sides, and both ends. 

You'll fill in your nailhead trim later. For now, you'll just want to add enough to secure the fabric in place. That way, if you mess up, you won't have to pry up a million nails.
At this point, your bench should be secured on 3 sides, with one side still open.
TIME TO STUFF!
I used the stuffing from two pillows for my bench cushion. You can make it as fluffy/unfluffy as you want.



I like to use pillow stuffing for my upholstery. (It's all from new pillows though. Don't use old pillow stuffing. That's just gross, and a dust-mite nightmare.)  It's really easy to push it into all of the corners and it makes the cushion really comfy. You have to work it a little bit to get it even, but I'm up for the challenge if it means saving $50 on foam. 

Once your bench is fully stuffed, pull the fabric tight and start securing with nailheads. If you're using upholstery fabric, it should be heavy enough that when it's pulled tight, your stuffing looks pretty even. If it's lumpy, rework it or pull your fabric tighter. Complete the remaining two corners just like you did with the other ones. Now fill in the rest of your nailheads. You can use as many nailheads as you'd like. I chose to space them about 1.5'' apart. To make the fabric super secure and finished looking, I also hotglued the fabric around all the edges.

It's not perfect, and as with every DIY project, it requires a little trial and error. However, for $5 and an hour's time, I think it looks great in our bedroom!

Thanks so much for stopping by today! If you want to see where this little bench ended up eventually (in one of my favorite areas of the house!) go here.

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Thrift Store Desk To Vanity Makeover

Remember my $20 thrift store desk I found last week?

 I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do with it, until I saw this Crate & Barrel LaSalle Black Vanity Desk.

My little thrift store desk was a similar size to Mr. LaSalle, and I instantly knew what I had to do.

Check out my little guy's new look!

He's so sassy now.

 And I'm smitten. When I first spotted this desk in the thrift store, a lightbulb appeared in my brain. I knew EXACTLY what I could do with a desk this size....make a bigger, better vanity than the one I was currently using. Just to jog your memory, here's the last vanity I was using. It was cute, but ultimately just too small!

Teeny weeny vanity, I RELEASE YOU!

 Now you can see how much better my upgraded version is! I made a few changes, too. I moved the whole vanity setup to a different wall (over closer to the bathroom door, which was a bigger wall) and then I also added a few other favorite ugrades.

 I found a GIANT old wooden mirror at the thrift store and painted it Sherwin Williams Sea Salt blue (same color as bathroom). I added another one of my ribbon-trimmed drum shade lamps. Then, I also decided to bring my favorite thrift store chair makeover into the mix! It's so much comfier than my little dinky stool I was using. All combined, my 8 million thrift store creations make one AWESOME vanity/dressing table!!!

I will go into great detail about how I transformed this desk in my next post (since it was a slight-debacle-that-took-3-days-but-ended-up-perfect). So, stay tuned!

Also, stay tuned for a closet update soon!

And an update on the side room!

It's really starting to come along!

That's all for today! Thanks for stopping by to check out the new vanity!

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