Reframing

So I got a couple of our pictures printed from our last photo shoot with a lady in our church.  She is wonderful, check out her work here! 

So I had this frame laying around and I personally HATE it lol.  Sorry to all those who like this color wood, but I can't stand it lol.  So, I thought to myself, why not paint it black and put our one BW photo in it?!  So I asked my wonderful mother if I could use some of her black  acrylic paint.  So I used a sponge brush and started painting.  The front did take 2 coats of paint.

  

But I think the finished product is perfect.  I think I shall be buying more "ugly" cheaper frames and painting them to my liking!

So for my next picture project I wanted to make some canvases of the photo session we had done a couple months back.  So I had some canvases laying around and went at it.  So here are my supplies...

So here are the steps:

1. You need some Mod Podge.  Mine was homemade - 1/2 water, 1/2 elmers glue.

2. My pictures are just printed onto paper from my printer  

3.  You cover the canvass with the mixture

4. Lay the picture onto the canvass the cover the print with the mixture

Now this takes some finesse, and it ended up drying like this.....

So then, I rewet it with the mixture and it did lay a little better... but not perfect.  But that's ok, I will explain later.

Now I did experience some smudging in this picture.  I don't  know if you can tell in this picture, but you can't see it in real life anyway so no biggy!

5.  Now paint the edges black.  This is the beauty of this project.  You can cover all your goof ups in your work!  I painted it rough so that you can't really notice the "not so perfect spots"

This is the corner that wasn't laying perfectly.  Can't even tell :)

The finished projects and all hung up on the wall :) I must say, I like it a lot.  Thank you mommy for helping with the arrangement and hanging :)

From bar to liquid

Ok, sooo I thought I would try another frugal idea I saw here.  It's taking  bar of soap and making it into liquid soap.  The direction are "simple." So here's my go at it.

First the supplies:
2Tbsp of Glycerin, found in the bandaid section
8 oz bar of favorite soap
1 gallon of water
grater
stock pot







So first things first, Shave that bar of soap!  I must say I really don't enjoy this step lol.  But hey, who said work is easy?!

Then you add your glycerin, and water to your soap shavings and heat on medium/high heat until the shavings melt.  It will look like soapy water, mine was quite clear, some are more milky.
















So that's it! Well that's supposed to be it.  Your supposed to let it cool for 10-12 hours.  Ya- mine was still water lol.  Well I wasn't willing to give up on it so I just let it sit lol.  And after two days its started to finally cloud up.  So I thought "Let's put it in the fridge and see what happens..."

 HAHAHA this is what happened!!!! A solid pot of gel soap!

Well that won't work, so the girl I got the idea from said she put hers in the mixer... Oh why not...     Well that made a mess cuz of course I put too much in lol  But it did get it more liquid like.  

So I poured it into these containers (later pouring it into 1 gallon jug) It still has some tiny gel clumps, but I think it shall work! It was an adventure but I'm hoping for the best!

Reusable Dryer Sheets

So I have been looking for ways to save money.  This was one of the ways I found to save money, and on Pinterest of course :)  So I ran out of dryer sheets and went and got my supplies.  

You need a bottle of your favorite fabric softener.














Then you need a big bucket (about 5 gallons).  I got mine at our local grocery store, Gould's.  It was a reused one from there store and I got it for a Buck! Thanks for the tip mom!
So what you do is you dump all the fabric softener in the bucket.  Then refill your bottle 2 times and dump it into the bucket.

Now find containers to store it all!!!

Next you need to get some sort of cloth to use to put in your dryer.  I used some of my husbands old A-Shirts and cut them into squares.  Here it is!  Maybe if I'm feeling especially crafty, I will make my tub look a little more Laundry like and less Cookie like hehe.


Now how to use them you ask?  Ring out the extra solution then throw in with the clothes your are looking to dry.  Then when everything is dry, you just put the cloths back into the tub of solution! Super easy and frugal!!!!

Undecorating and Redecorating

So you say, "What does undecorating and redecorating mean?"  Well we took down our Xmas decorations and I put up some new photos.  

But first, you know that feeling when you are about to string Christmas lights?

and find them tangled AGAIN!

Well as I was getting frames ready, it came to me! Im going to use the covers the frames came in and wrap the lights around them! Genius and free!

So then I finally put up our new family portrait and the twins 6 month and Bellas 2 yr portraits! YA! 

So I took the picture of the plow and lamp outside my parents house years ago.  I had it blown up and asked my mom for Christmas to get a custom frame for it.  And Viola!!! I think it fits perfectly :) Thanks Mom!

Then I saw this idea on Pinterest.  If your house is anything like mine, your steps are always cluttered with "stuff."  So, the solution? Personal baskets! I will eventually have name tags on them but I love this!

Creamer from Scratch???

So I decided to make my own creamer.  Never thought I would be using creamer enough, to think to myself, "Theres gotta be a cheaper way of doing this!"  But having twins will make you do things you thought you never would!  

So here it is, my homemade Peppermint Creamer!  I found the recipe over here and thought I would give it a try.  Only 3 ingredients and all you do is add them together and shake!  EASY!!!  And since I was able to find Fat Free sweetened condensed milk, even better.  So since I also used Fat Free milk, it not all THAT bad for you :) I reused my last Creamer bottle that I had.

 So I made my cup of coffee in my Keurig that I got as a gift!!! Bonus!  Added my Peppermint Creamer and......

Pure Bliss!!!!!!