DIY Bow & Scarf Holder

The other day while cleaning out Olivia’s newborn bows (and maybe tearing up over the fact that I no longer have a baby), I realized that this would be the perfect little project to share on the blog.  These are so quick and easy to make, and if you have a little girl, I promise one day you will want one to wrangle all of those bows.  They really add up quickly! 

I actually made this one before Olivia was born, and that was also before I had this little blog of mine, so unfortunately I don’t have pictures of the materials pre-project or pictures of the steps that I took along the way.  However, this project is so simple that you probably don’t even need the step by step pictures as the instructions I’m going to provide should suffice. 

What You Need 

Frame – I purchased an unfinished wooden 16x20 frame from Hobby Lobby

Paint or stain & paint brush (optional)

Ruler

Pencil

Drill

C Hooks (you can find them at Lowes, Home Depot, Hobby Lobby, Amazon)

Ribbon of your choice

Staple Gun 

Step One 

Paint or stain the frame to your liking.  I had some leftover pink paint that I used for Olivia’s bookshelf, so I used that.  Allow to dry. 

Step Two 

Decide how wide each row needs to be based on the sizes of the bows you are looking to hang.  We prefer smaller bows in our house (three inches and smaller), so I knew that each row would need to be around three inches wide.  This allowed for four rows of ribbon on my frame. 

Step Three 

Flip the frame face down.  Using your ruler, mark the top and bottom of the frame where you would like to staple the ribbon.  I wanted evenly spaced rows, so I marked my spots accordingly. 

Step Four 

Using your ruler, mark the spots evenly spaced across the bottom border of the frame where you would like to screw in your c-hooks.  

Step Five 

Grab your drill and drill small holes on the marks you made across the bottom of the frame for the c-hooks.  Or if you’re like me and you don’t like (or don’t know how) to use power tools, grab your hubby and ask him to do it.  :o) 

Step Six 

Screw the c-hooks into the holes you just drilled taking care to face all hooks out toward the front of the frame.  These will be your hooks to hang scarves (or headbands or elastics or whatever you’d like). 

Step Seven 

Cut your ribbons to size and lay them on the marks that you made in the last step. 

Step Eight 

Staple the ribbon to the back of the frames.  Be sure to face the design on the ribbon face down so it will show when the frame is hung.  Also, be sure to stretch the ribbon as tight as you can, otherwise it may sag once you load it up with bows. 

You’re done!  Now arrange all of those pretties on there and just hang it up.  Olivia’s walls were already decorated, so there wasn’t a spot in her room to hang it, so I hung it on the inside of her closet door using command strips.  Those things are the best evarrrr.

Enjoy!

*Linking up with Jessi's Design and Going the Distance for What's Hap-Pinning.

Home Tour Tuesday – Entry, Foyer, & Front Sitting Room

Hello and happy Tuesday!  I’m so excited to finally share with you guys our humble abode!  It’s something that I thought I would be sharing a lot earlier on, but in all honesty, it’s hard work preparing and photographing a house.   I’ve been working on it little by little during the last few months, and even though half of the rooms still haven’t been photographed, I thought I’d go ahead and dive right into the tour… maybe that will motivate me to finish the rest of the house.  :o) 

Brian and I started our marriage in a sweet, but tiny 1,200 square foot house in an older area of town.  The house was built in the 1950’s so the laundry room was outside off of the carport, the few closets it had were itty bitty, and there was only one (tiny) bathroom.  

That house holds such sweet memories because it was the house that Brian lived in the entire time that we dated, it was the house where I planned most of our wedding, it was the house that we first lived in together after we got married, it was the house that we always came home to from our abundant travels, and it was the house where we threw some kick-ass parties.  :o)  Even though all of our furniture was mismatched and my clothes were hanging on a rack in the middle of the office/guest bedroom/junk room, I will always treasure the time that we had there.   

Because it was so small, we knew that we had to move before even thinking about expanding our family, so back in 2009 after a year and a half of marriage, we decided to build.  We found a sweet little neighborhood on the north side of town in which we decided to put down our roots.  The building process was a blast, and in October 2009, we signed all of the paperwork and they turned over the keys.  It was all ours.  Such a thrill! 

We’ve worked hard over the last six years to decorate it and get it just the way we want it, so I hope you enjoy!  And don’t worry, it rarely looks like this… I assure you that it’s only this clean for the pictures for this tour!  If you were to stop by any given day, there would be shoes by the door, dishes in the sink, and toys everywhere.  I promise. 

Entry 

I’ve lived in a two-story house almost my entire life, so I knew when we built that I wanted another one.  They are just so sweet!  And just in case you start to wonder, these pictures were taken back at the end of the summer when the grass was still green and my ferns were still alive.  Hehe. 

Foyer 

One of my favorite parts about the house (even though it’s wasted space on the second floor) is the two-story foyer when you enter the front door.  It gives such a feeling of openness and I love how it allows for a little peek of the second floor.

Front Sitting Room 

When you walk in, the first thing that you see to your left is the front sitting room.  This room was empty for several years because we had no idea what to do with it.  We I tossed around the idea of a bar area early on since we entertained a lot, but we ultimately decided to turn it in to a sitting room for extra seating when we have a lot of people in the house.

We are not very formal people, so we knew that we didn’t want the room to have a stuffy and breakable atmosphere, so instead, we opted for bright colors and casual décor for a sort of funky and comfortable vibe.  It’s nice to know that the kids can play in there and I don’t have to worry about them breaking some expensive vase… although, they did once break the beer cap frame that I made…  #ClassyIKnow  #WeLikeBeer

As I may have mentioned before, my Daddy is an artist, and that abstract piece in the middle as well as the caricature of Dave Matthews (my fave!) are original pieces that he painted.  And see that painting on the left?  That was me trying my hand at acrylics!  Although I’m nowhere near my Daddy’s league, I was quite pleased with how it turned out.  :o)

That cabinet houses all of our adult games – Scrabble, Taboo (the best!), Pictionary, poker, etc. – because we used to have friends over for game nights constantly before we had kids.  We haven’t had one in quite some time, but we are surely about due for one! 

The picture frames on top of the cabinet are just a few of my random favorites of our family, and the rest are pictures of us meeting random famous and semi-famous people – Jarvis Jones (linebacker for the Pittsburgh Steelers and former linebacker for the University of Georgia), Paul Thorn (one of my favorite musicians), Nick Hexum (lead singer from 311), The Naked Cowboy (Lol), and my personal favorite, Boyd Tinsley (the violinist for Dave Matthews Band), plus a few others. 

The framed poster behind all of the pictures is the poster from the Dave Matthews Band show that we attended in Pelham, AL back in 2013 when I got to meet Boyd, their violinist.  He autographed it for me, so it is something that I will treasure forever.

Another thing that I love about this room is the giant collage frame that I purchased to showcase all of our favorite pictures from past travels.  Brian and I love to travel.  Love it.  Some of the places you’ll see in this frame?  New York City, Las Vegas, Maui, The Bahamas, Hawaii, Washington DC, Los Angeles, The Grand Canyon, Snowshoe, WV, and many more.  I love having all of these pictures in once place and reminiscing about all of the good times that we’ve had travelling!

Well, that about wraps up this room.  Stay tuned because next Tuesday I’ll be sharing our formal dining room. 

I hope you all have a great evening! 

Cold, Dreary Weekend

Hello lovelies, I hope you all had fantastic weekends.  We finally got the cold weather that I was wishing for all Christmas break, but ours came along with rain and no snow (boo), so there wasn’t much to do around these parts this weekend. 

We spent Saturday holed up in the house.  I think the kiddos had missed all of their new Christmas toys all week while they were at school, so they were pretty content playing inside and coloring most of the day.  We did play outside briefly in between the drizzle, and Jacob and Olivia took turns riding Jacob’s car that he received for Christmas two years ago.  The battery has been dead for the last couple of months, but we got a new one last week, so they had both been itching to get out and drive it.  I think Olivia loves that car more than Jacob ever did, and she was so hilarious when driving it.  She kept leaning waaaay back in her seat.  #RidinDirty 

I guess she gets her gangsta from me.  Hehe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We emerged late Saturday afternoon to go to church and then to Panera with my parents for dinner. 

 

Saturday night my aunt texted me and said that she was going through some old stuff, and she came across this gem.  That’s me when I was about four or five (Jacob’s age), and my aunt was around eighteen or nineteen.  It just made my night!

 

Sunday I desperately wanted to get out of the house.  There’s just something about January and February that makes me restless.  I feel like I want to travel to new places, eat new food, and try new things.  Oh, and clean out and organize all the things!   

Anyway, the weather on Sunday was even colder and very windy, so outdoor activities were definitely out, so we had to settle for pizza and Barnes and Noble to let Jacob and Olivia play.  I was just happy to get out of the house. 

 

 

 

Not the most interesting weekend, but hey, we did get to catch up on sleep, catch up on TV, and I started cleaning out my office… part of my “less” campaign for 2016. 

Tomorrow I’ll be back with a post much more interesting than today’s (hehe), and I’m so excited about it!  I’m finally going to share our home with you in the upcoming weeks in my new series, Home Tour Tuesday.  I’ll be starting with our foyer and front living room tomorrow so stay tuned.  

Happy Bachelor (and BCS National Championship) Monday, friends!  As sick as I am of Alabama, I’ll be Roll Tiding tonight so we can keep that championship in the SEC!  And just for good measure, go Dawgs!

*Linking up with B Loved Boston for Weekending.

 

Five On Friday - New Year's Roundup

Well, we made it through the first week back to work after almost two weeks off!  And let me tell you, it was loooong, but I think my body is finally adjusting to waking up at 6 AM again.  

I don’t know about you, but the last couple of weeks prior to this one were a blur.  We spent so much time with family and friends, celebrating the holidays, and just enjoying one another’s company that I got behind on all things social media – Instagram, Facebook, daily blog reading, you name it!   

I’m sure a lot of you are in the same boat, so I thought I would do a New Year’s round up (similar to my Christmas roundup) today for those of you trying to get caught up! 

O N E 

2015 AKA my first year of blogging was full of family time, tons of projects, a few trips, and miscellaneous other activities.  Our year in review and links to all of these fun projects are here.

T W O  

My word for 2016 is “less.”  Less clutter, less junk, less shopping for things that we don’t need, less time spent doing things that I don’t want to do.  The game plan to achieve this is here.

T H R E E 

We had a low-key New Year's Eve at home with family.  We had take-out, toasted with champagne, did some fireworks, and even had a little fun with sparklers and long exposure photography to get this incredible shot.

F O U R 

My top blog post of 2015 was actually the very first blog post that I ever did – Olivia Cate’s Pink & Gold First Birthday.  Thanks to Pinterest, that baby has been viewed over 11,000 times and that number is growing like crazy every single day.  Some of the other stats for the post and a look at the most popular repins on Pinterest are here and the original post is here.

F I V E  

Over Christmas break, my mom and I hosted a Winter Themed Gender Neutral Baby Shower for my brother and sister-in-law.  It was pretty easy to throw together and it turned out to be really lovely.  There was also a major surprise at the end which totally made the entire shower!  You can see all of the decorations, the menu, the pretty party pics, and read all about the surprise here.

HAPPY HAPPY, the weekend is finally here!

*Linking up with A Liz Adventures for Five On Friday and A Little Bit of Everything for Friday Favorites.