Craft Room.

Craft Room- AKA: My Office, Where I get my "craft" on, Where my mojo flows, My Design Studio, My Spa, My Getaway Space, My Sanity Saving Spot, My Creative Space, My FAVORITE Room in the House!

I am not going to lie. . .I am a messy crafter.  When my mojo starts flowing, I just want to create.  I don't want to clean up until my project is complete.  SO, unfortunately, that means that my creative space eventually ends up looking like this:

Before

Before

Before

Before

SEE I TOLD YOU I AM MESSY!!!  Sometimes it gets so bad that I can't even go in there.  Then I end up doing my creations out on my kitchen table.  When this happens, I know my hubby is thinking, "Why, oh why, does she have a craft room, if she is just going to sit out here and do her crafts?"  Haha!

Last week I decided to get back into my craft room and get organized.  Sometime soon I plan on painting and pulling out the carpet and putting in laminate floors.  That hasn't happened as of yet, but you can still see what my space looks like. . .at least for now :)

Ahhh, so nice and clean!  Wonder how long it will stay that way?

Wanna go on a tour of my creative space?  (WARNING!  MANY PICTURES TO FOLLOW!)

Wall of cabinets

Closet Wall

Behind My Desk

Button Shelf

Inside of Closet Door

Inside my Closet

Labeled Drawers (Inside My Closet)

Labeled Alpha Drawers (Inside My Closet)

More Labeled Drawers

Cardstock Stash

Pegboard

Flower Shelf

Paint Storage

Window Seat

A view from the doorway

You can click on any of the pictures for a larger view.  I just didn't want to put them all in this post really large, or it would have taken up pages and pages on my blog :)

I actually found some REALLY SUPER DUPER UBER CUTE paisley print black and white material that I will be recovering my bench seat with.  So, watch for that in an upcoming post!

I hope you enjoyed my space!  Where do you get creative???

I will be linking up to some of THESE FABULOUS PARTIES this week. 

Hope you can stop by here at Paisley Passions on 

Wednesday for Wandering Wednesday Blog Hop,

Thursday for Thrilling Thursday Linky Party, and on

Friday for Fun w/Food Friday Linky Party :)

March Wreath.

Welcome to another Made By Me for Monday! Before I share what I made this weekend, have YOU entered for a FREE 3 Month Ad Space on Paisley Passions??? YOU SHOULD! CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS! Good Luck!!!

Made By Me for Monday!!!

This year I decided that I am going to make a new wreath for every month of the year.  In January, I made my WINTER WREATH.  In February I made my BLACK AND WHITE POLKA DOT WREATH.  Today, I am going to share my March wreath :)

Since March is when we celebrate St. Patty's Day, I knew I wanted a wreath that reflected the "feeling" of St. Patty's Day, without all the well, er, how do I say it?  Um, without all the tackiness of it.  Sorry, I don't want to offend anyone!   It's just that sometimes St. Patty's decor can get a little bit gaudy.  Which can be super fun for a party, just not what I wanted on my front door!  :)


So here is what I came up with for my version of a March wreath:

Supplies I started with: foam wreath, zippers, ric rac, material

I tore the material into strips and wrapped it around the wreath leaving the torn edges exposed.

Next, I took the zippers and made them into rosettes using my glue gun.  I didn't do a tutorial on the flowers because it seems like EVERYONE is making them.  They are pretty easy to make :)  I added the flowers to the wreath with my glue gun and then looped a piece of zipper around the top of the wreath to give me something to hang it with.

There you have it!  My version of a wreath for March.  What do you think???

After hanging it on my front door, I just kept thinking that it didn't look quite big enough.  I have a really tall door and the wreath was being swallowed up by it!  Then I remembered that I had a frame in my storage closet that I kept meaning to do something with! :)  Oh HAPPY day!!!

Frame from my storage closet :)

I glued some felt strips on the back of the frame with my glue gun so that it won't scratch my door.

Then I took some more strips of fabric and used them to hang the wreath in the center.  I added a bow on the top and hung it on the door.  VOILA!  No more wreath being swallowed up by the size of my door.  Now it looks just right :)

I will be joining in some of these wonderful LINKY PARTIES HERE this week!  

I hope you come back and join in my parties too!   

Wandering Wednesday Blog Hop

Thrilling Thursday Linky Party 

Fun w/Food Friday Linky Party. 

Winter Wreath

Made by Me For Monday :)

January is always a fun time to hang a new wreath. The Christmas wreath has come down, and it is too soon to hang a Valentine wreath. So, I decided on making a Winter Wreath for January.

It has been hanging on my door since I took down my Christmas decor, but I haven't had a chance to share it yet :)

The BEST part about this wreath. . .it didn't cost me anything!!!  I made it from a bunch of leftover & mismatched Christmas decor that I was going to throw away.  YAY FOR FREE!

I had this wreath and I had previously added the ribbon to it, but I just didn't love it.  It seemed kind of boring.  Like it needed a little sprucing up. . .

Here it is BEFORE

AFTER

AFTER

 I will be linking up at some of THESE fantastic LINKY PARTIES this week.

I will be BLOG HOPPING at some of THESE fun BLOG HOPS this week.

Don't forget about my parties:  Wandering Wednesday Blog Hop, Thrilling Thursday Linky Party, and Fun w/Food Friday Linky.  See YOU there :)

Christmas Tree

I know a lot of people have been saying this, but really, don't you feel like this year has FLOWN by??? I really can't believe that it is December and that Christmas is almost here! Wow!

Not a whole lot of crafting has been going on here. I have started putting up my Christmas decorations, but I haven't even done much with those. I have six comprehensive finals coming up next week, and so really all my focus has been on finishing up all my papers, case studies, and lesson plans, and focusing on FINALS WEEK! I will be SO glad to have another semester of school behind me in two weeks :) YAY for that!!!

Next Christmas will be a SUPER CELEBRATION for me because I will have just finished up my LAST SEMESTER for my bachelors degree!!!!  I can hardly wait!

Anyway, I thought I would at least share the progress I have made on my tree so far since I don't have any crafts to share :)  My tree is 11ft tall, and so it takes a while to decorate it, especially since it is old and I still have to string all the lights, no pre-lite tree for me :(

I am going to try and LINK UP HERE and BLOG HOP HERE this week, if I get time in-between studying for finals :)

Come by on Thursday and LINK UP to THRILLING THURSDAY.  If you didn't have a chance to stop by last week, CLICK HERE to view all the thrilling projects that were linked up!  There is some AMAZING inspiration over there :)

Thanks for stopping by! 

Child's Chair Makeover :)

Happy Monday everyone!  I am late getting this post up today.  I have been super busy spoiling my daughter on her birthday today.  I even went and stole her from school this afternoon to take her to lunch and do a bit of shopping before I returned her to finish up her classes for the day :)  It was a great afternoon!

First off THANK YOU to all who joined in on Paisley Passions Thrilling Thursday last week.  There is some amazing stuff linked up.  If you haven't checked it out, you really should scroll on down and check out the talent.  I am going to try hard to leave comments for all of you who linked up.  If I don't leave a comment, just know that I visited each one of you and your wonderful blogs!  :)

This week I have a cute little chair that I did.  It is a cute little thing.  The perfect size for a kid.  It was an unfinished chair that was given to me and I decided that I needed to spruce it up a bit.

A little paint, a little scrap paper, some mod podge, some vinyl lettering and there you have it.  A chair fit for a little princess!  :)

I am LINKING UP TO THESE PARTIES this week.
I am BLOG HOPPING W/THESE PARTIES this week.

PS- Hope to see YOU back on Wednesday for my first Blog Hop, Wandering Wednesday, that I am co-hosting with Jessica @ Inspiring You to Save and Thursday for Paisley Passions Thrilling Thursday!  Can't wait to see what gets linked up this week!!!

Shelf Top Ribbon Organizer

**(HAVE YOU ENTERED MY GIVEAWAY FOR A FREE 180 Piece MemoryWorks Kit???  CLICK HERE TO ENTER!) ***

I spent last month reorganizing and cleaning out my craft room.  It was quite the process and took me much longer than I ever expected that it would!  (On a side note, I have had SEVERAL people asking me to post pictures of my craft room and I PROMISE they will be posted soon)  :)

While I was cleaning out my craft room, I came to the conclusion that I have a problem.  Hello, my name is Lori and I am a ribbon hoarder.  I don't know how it happened.  I don't know when it happened.  Somehow it happened, and I have a TON of ribbon.  Ribbon on rolls, ribbon on cards, loose ribbon, ribbon pieces, ribbon, ribbon, ribbon.

I wanted to come up with a way to store my ribbon that is on the rolls.  Somewhere out in plain sight where I can see what I have and actually use it instead of just storing it.

So, here is what I came up with.  I took my little shelf that sits on top of my storage boxes.

When I first got the shelf, I mod podged the paisley paper and added the flower.  That is how it has looked for the past year or so.

I took my drill (yes, MY drill.  Hubby and I have agreed it is MUCH easier to have our own tools) and I measured and drilled holes in the top of the shelf.

Then I took some wood dowels and pushed them into the holes.  I used some E6000 in the holes before I put the dowels in.  You could also go to the reverse side of the shelf and put a small nail or screw in.  My dowels were really tight, so I didn't see the need to do that.  I can always do that later if I need to.

I slid a washer down each dowel and glued them in place with some E6000.  Not for any other reason then because I thought it looked nice :)  Then I painted each dowel black.

After everything was dry, I put the shelf back in its place and slid my ribbon spools on them.  Of course they are coordinated by color.  At first I thought I could just put them all willie-nilly like.  I tried that.  It drove me crazy.  I had to remove them and color coordinate.  Haha.  A little OCD, I guess.

I also organized my ribbon strands and ribbon on cards nice and neatly in some of my drawers.  Ahhh, organized ribbon.  Now hopefully I will USE it instead of HOARDING it!  :)

I will link up at some of  these parties FOUND HERE and blog hop at some of these blog hops FOUND HERE this week :)

PS- DON'T FORGET my Thrilling Thursday Linky Party.  Every Thursday-Sunday hosted by me on my blog.  Come join in on the fun!!!  :)  Hope to see you there!

Flash Back Friday~Lap Tray

This was a fun little project.  I took an ordinary frame that I got on clearance for a couple of dollars (sorry I don't have a before picture of the frame!).  It was deeper than a normal frame, not quite as deep as a shadow box, but deep enough that I was able to add some material and some buttons underneath the glass.

Then I took two extra large unfinished wood letters.  I used W's, but I think you could get M's to work depending on the font of the wooden letter.

I covered the letter with scrapbook paper using Mod Podge.  LOVE the stuff! :)  Then I inked the edges of the letter and applied a couple of coats of mod podge on top of the letters and paper.

I attached the letters to the bottom of the frame using E6000 and then I screwed small screws from the inside back of the frame down into the tops of the wooden letters.

I took a dowel and attached it with screws along the backside of the W's and then covered the screws with buttons.

I painted the dowels and the backside of the letters a cream color to match my frame.  Then I ended up with this handy dandy lap tray.  It works great for the kids to have a snack on or to draw on while watching tv or in bed or even in the car.  Or maybe even for hubby to bring you breakfast in bed?  Haha!  One can dream ;)

I LINK UP HERE & BLOG HOP HERE.
Go check them out :)  You will be glad you did!

The Box.

Once upon a time there was a box.  This isn't any old box.  This particular box has a story.  If you care to read the entire story, CLICK HERE.  So, after bringing the box home for a second time, we decided that it needed a little revamping and a special spot in our home so that the same story never repeated itself.

Here is what the box looked like before:

I wanted the box to look like it had a carved piece of wood on the side.  I went to my local hardware store and the cheapest wood piece they had was $6.  That isn't too bad, but I knew I could figure something out that was less expensive.  Hooray for my Cricut!

I cut out several pieces of the same shape onto cardstock and mod podged them on top of each other and then mod podged them onto the box.

Then I got out my paint, scrapbook paper, etc. out,  ready to spruce up the box.

After I painted the box black, I dry brushed a linen color to give it a weathered, distressed look.  Then I added scrapbook paper on the sides with mod podge and did a crackle finish on the handle.  I also added two jewels to cover up two of the nails.

Voila!  An old box transformed into a beautiful box!

Now it has a new home, proudly displayed on the back of the toilet, holding extra rolls of toilet paper.  It went from thrift store "re-find", to useful home decor.  I guess the fact that I had to buy it back from the thrift store wasn't so bad after all.

This week I will be LINKING UP HERE and BLOG HOPPING HERE.  Go hop on over and check them out :)