Off to the Lake!

Ben and I are leaving soon to spend Labor Day weekend at Tablerock Lake with his family.  It’s raining at the moment so hopefully it will stop soon so we can get plenty of sunshine out on the boat!  I hope all of you have a fun and safe holiday weekend!

Makeup Storage DIY

True story: pretty makeup storage can be expensive.  Even not so pretty, basic storage, like this clear acrylic organizer from Target, is $15.50, and it’s not even big enough to hold all my stuff.  So for a long time I just used a plastic storage container to hold my makeup, which worked, but it was not cute at all.  Then one day I came up with a brilliant idea to create my own makeup storage out of a gift box and a tea tin.  Take a look!

My makeup box started out as the gift box for this set from Philosophy

I bought this set for myself because it was a good price for sample sizes of these products.  I liked the box and saved it because I figured I cold do something useful with it.  Of course it had to be transformed a bit because, well, I didn’t want people to see it and think I had welcomed a baby.  So once I got the idea to turn it into my makeup storage box all I did was take off the lid and trace around it onto a sheet of cute scrapbook paper (sorry, I don’t have any pictures of the process because I did this about a year ago).  I then painted some Mod Podge onto the top of the lid and centered the paper onto it.  Once it dried I applied another coat of Mod Podge over the top of the paper.  To dress it up a little more I used some sticker letters I had picked up on clearance from Pier 1 to spell out “Pretty” in the middle of the lid. 



That’s it! I could have repainted or decoupaged the box but I like it as is.  Ditto for the ribbon. 
I also needed storage for my makeup brushes.  One of my friends gave me a really cute tea tin from Harrod’s London as a souvenir and I had been saving it for a long time.  I thought this could be the perfect way to make it into something useful and have it out on display.  I just removed the lid and then, to give the brushes more stability, filled the bottom with coffee beans. 


After I’ve put on my makeup I can put everything back onto a mirrored tray on my dresser.  They make a nice display along with my perfume bottles. 




The best part of this project is that I didn’t spend any money on it; I just used materials I already had.  So easy!  This would work just as well with any sturdy box you have on hand and some sort of jar or container, even a tin can that you paint or recover.  It just takes a little bit of creativity and vision! 

*linking up at Serenity Now*

On My Wish List

I have many on going wish lists, but this one is my Amazon list.  Specifically, a list for design books and others that I feel would be helpful and/or pretty to own.  Last Christmas my mother-in-law gave me two beautiful design books that I had asked for: Domino and Design*Sponge at Home.  I love both of them, and they look so pretty displayed on my console table!

I’ve been mentally bookmarking other books I would love to add to my collection and I thought I would share them with you.  Not as a request for this year’s Christmas presents or anything, just because I like them  

Another popular design book by Deborah Needleman, the former editor of Domino magazine

A lovely coffee table book filled with absolutely gorgeous photos of Paris.  You can see more of Nicole’s work on her blog, Little Brown Pen, and in her Etsy store, The Paris Print Shop 

I haven’t seen or read much about this book yet, but as I said yesterday, I love Sabrina Soto’s show The High Low Project.  I’m sure her book has just as good information and beautiful designs as the show does. 

A book about blogging!  From the creator of Oh Joy! (that second exclamation mark is part of the name, not just showing my excitement…)

Another design book that I’ve read a lot about.  I’ve flipped through it at Barnes and Noble and it has some wonderful work in it. 

This is a must have.  Young House Love is such a wonderful blog written by two very down to earth people who just love to share their experiences in making their home more lovely.  I can’t wait to see some of the secret projects they’ve been working on for the book! 

Do you have any design/coffee table/other fun books that you love or would love to own? 

High-Low Project Remake

I watch a lot of HGTV but one of my favorite shows, along with Emily Henderson’s Secrets of a Stylist, is The High-Low Project.  I love that gorgeous rooms that Sabrina Soto creates for a lot of money, and I love it even more than she can recreate those rooms for a lot less money.  This living room from “Danielle’s Dream Living Room” is one of my favorite rooms that she’s done, and this happens to be the high version which cost a whopping $29,000. 

And here’s the low version of the same room for an impressive $2,800

I like how she used the colors better in the more expensive room but the client loved this look. 

For fun I decided to try to recreate the look and here’s what I came up with.

Not bad right?  I left out all the accessories except for pillows, and I would change out the red lamp shade on the floor lamp to a white shade, but otherwise I think it’s a decent match.  The wall art should be easy to recreate with some 12”x12” frames and some pretty scrapbook paper.  Here’s the info for everything I used.

• Sofa from World Market, $599
• Side tables with marble tops from CB2, $129 each
• Table lamps from Target, $32.50 each
• Teal 7’x9’ Rug from Hayneedle.com, $430
• Acrylic coffee table from CB2, $279
• Yellow pillow from Etsy, $45
• Pink zigzag pillow from Etsy, $12
• Pink medallion pillow from Etsy, $36
• Gray pillow from Etsy, $20
• Yellow slipper chair from Amazon, $115 each
• Floor lamp from Target, $62.50
• Accent table from World Market, $80
• Blue diamond pillow from Etsy, $36
• Green and blue ikat pillow from Etsy, $36

If you add everything up it comes to a grand total of only $2189! I think that’s pretty fantastic!

Day at the Museum

A couple of weeks ago my mom was here for a visit.  The one big thing that she wanted to do while she was here was go to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art to see their World’s Fairs exhibit.  It was fantastic!  And of course we explored the rest of the museum, including the modern art building, the sculpture garden, and the Asian art.  I’ve been to some fantastic museums in Europe, including my favorite, the Musee D’Orsay, but the Nelson-Atkins ranks right up there with some of the best (in my humble opinion). 

Quote on the top of the building reads: “It is by the real that we exist. It is by the ideal that we live.”  Love that.

The next four pictures are from the World’s Fairs exhibit before a guard told me to stop

What a wonderful day at the museum with my mom!