Fire Pit Refresh

Good Monday morning everyone!


I hope that everyone had a great weekend. I have been a busy bee this past weekend. We got a few projects done and a few more started. One project in particular jumped at me as I was browsing Pinterest. 

Pinterest

We have a fire pit with a bowl that looks something like this.

Via

The problem with this is that the base is not steady so it wobbles. I can fix it but it doesn't stay for long. 


We already had the same kind of brick that was used in my inspiration picture (above) out back. These are the bricks that we took out of our flower bed.

I loaded my wheel barrel with a few bricks to try them out.
I put a few down and kept measuring my fire pit bowl. After a few minor adjustments, I had what I wanted. 

 I didn't want the bricks to be too clean as I was going for the weathered look. I put the fire pit bowl on. PERFECT!

 I just love when I can do a project for FREE!  

This project was done just in time for my daughter's birthday party. She wants to roast marsh mellows with her friends.


One more item checked off of my birthday party list.  

Have a great day everyone :) 

A Dolphin Birthday

Happy Thursday everyone! 

I have been crazy busy these last few weeks. I have been trying to plan for a baby shower, birthday party and fall decorations at the same time.



First up is my daughter's 9th birthday party. She is into anything "animal". As we just went to see the newest Winter movie, she has decided that she wants a dolphin party. 

Winter

 For those that do not know who Winter is, she is a dolphin that got caught in a net and beached herself in Florida. The Clearwater Marine Aquarium rescued her and saved her life. She had to have her tail removed because it was badly damaged. I don't want to give away too much for those that have not seen the movies. Winter still lives at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. We took our daughter to Clearwater to see her and she is just beautiful. The Clearwater Marine Aquarium was struggling to make ends meet and to maintain the aquarium. After the movies were made, they had the money they needed so badly for repairs and to help save more animals. One of the workers at the aquarium also told us that they were just overwhelmed with the people that came to see Winter. They had so many people come that the aquarium had to get portable units to sell tickets. What a wonderful story.  I would encourage you to go online to learn more about Winter. The link is bellow Winter's picture located above.

 Anyway back to my daughter's party. She wants a dolphin cake and dolphin games. Her birthday is in November. I know that is over a month away but time flies when you are doing so many things at the same time. I have some great ideas that I will post as I complete each one. 

I have finished the goodie bags.  Here are the items that I used.

• blue paper bag

• glue stick

• silver glitter glue

• wave made from blue card stock

• dolphin cut from a coloring page 

First, I made a wave from blue card stock. Next, I found a coloring page with a dolphin. I made copies of the dolphin on light blue paper and cut them out. I glued the wave on the paper bag first and then the dolphin.

The final step was to go along the outside of the dolphin and wave with the silver glitter and let dry.   

I still have to put the kid's names on the bags but I don't have all of the guests' names yet. The birthday girl has a limit of 12 guests.


Next on the list, invitations.


 

Hide the Electric Meter

Happy Monday! I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend.

I finished up a project that I  have been working on for a few weeks now. I have been trying to come up with a way to cover our ugly electric meter. As soon as I put my bench over the sprinkler system, I realized that I wanted to cover that ugly electric box.  Our electric company just switched our box to digital so they don't have to come out every month to read it. They can read it from their office.  Yea! 

A picture of my cool bench.

So I did what I always do, I went to Pinterest.  I found a few things, but did not get excited about any one thing. I took  the ideas that I liked from each picture and  put them all together.   Here are my inspirations.    

    

Via

Via

I found some old fencing out back and cut it to size. Then I got all of the materials that I thought that I might need. I started out with strong glue but I decided to use nails instead. Just in case I didn't like how it turned out.  

I sanded the fence just a bit to give it a fresh look. Then I traced the star fish and the relax template. I decided to do something different with the relax template after I already traced it.

Then I took a piece of rope and nailed it around my star fish. After that, I dusted the front with some white paint and a dry paint brush.

I went back to the shed and got a single piece of fence panel for my relax template. I also got two pieces of scrap wood to attached it to my main piece.  Next, I screwed the two scrap pieces to the back of my piece of fence panel and flipped it back over.  I then traced the relax template and painted the letters white. Then I got some rope and made two square knots (with my husband's help of course!). I put the square knots on my panel using the hot glue gun. The finished panel with attached to the main piece with screws. Here is the front view.

This is what it looked like from the back.

I had to figure out how to put my new creation up without making contact with the electric meter. I needed something that would keep it in place when the wind blows. I sure didn't want it to damage the meter. 

I went back out to the shed to make some braces to attach to the wall. I found some metal things that I got from the Dollar Tree to attach the braces to my creation. I think the metal things were supposed to hold things in the shed or something.  Here is a side view of the braces. There are two at the top and one at the bottom for support.

Here she is from the front.

At last, I can sit on my swing and I don't have to see the electric meter. 

Oh Happy Day!

Garage Sale

Happy Tuesday everyone!

 I managed to get everything out of my attic that I wanted to sell this past week so we had a little yard sale at our house on Saturday. Considering all of the stuff that I brought down from the attic, there really wasn't that much  after I got it outside.   I think my daughter had more to sell than me. She also had a lemonade stand.

I know that my daughter's head is not there. We do not put our children's pictures on the internet. Check out her pretty painted toes on her DIY foot stool!

 It wasn't too hot but the people stopped coming just after noon so we packed up the leftover items in my van to donate and had some pizza. My daughter made about $10 between her toys and lemonade. I brought in $35 for all of my small stuff. 


It was a productive day but I would much rather be going to the yard sales instead of having one myself. I have been going to yard sales since I was a kid. It is one of my favorite things to do.

Time To Clear The Attic

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday weekend!

Our family is finally feeling better and I have been in the mood for a good project. Knowing that I had an extra day off, I set my sights on our attic. 

Each time I declutter a room, I store things that I want to sell in the attic.  Last week as I opened the attic door to put something else in, a previously stored item fell on my head. I am very thankful it was a comforter.

 Time To Clear The Attic!

 Here are some before pictures of our attic.

I unloaded all of the items that I had been storing to sell. Here is a picture of the mountain of stored stuff from the front of my attic. 

I cleaned our attic last winter but I need to down size my holiday decorations and purge a few more things up there. I will do my best to do it this week. I can only stay up there for a short time because it is so hot in the afternoon when I get home. 

If I get everything done by Friday, I am going to have a garage sale. I was planning to have it later when it is cooler but I am tired of looking at all of that stuff. 

Lets see if I can do it! 

Does anyone have ideas on how to make labels stick to plastic boxes in the attic? 

I have tried packing tape, scotch tape, and duct tape with no luck. The heat just makes the labels fall right off.