This Stop Willoughby

This is a fun, simple project you can create using supplies you likely already have (and if you don't have them, you can get everything you need inexpensively). The advent period begins on December first, so I'm a little late posting this since we're already several days into December. But unless you're an absolute purist, you can skip ahead to whatever day you get your calendar created. We'll be creating our "calendar" by making 25 tiny gift bags and labeling them with numbers, counting down from 25 to 1. You can make them with any paper you like. Christmas wrapping paper is perfect (save your scraps if you've already started wrapping gifts because you'll be using small pieces), but you can also do this with plain printer paper if it's what you have on hand. I've also used brown paper bags cut into pieces. You'll also need tape or glue and scissors. Anything else you need to complete the bags is going to be based on how you want to clo...

This spring we made a commitment to work with supplies we had before buying anything new for our house and yard.  I also wanted to keep the budget for plants and flowers in check (I tend to get carried away at the local nursery), which meant I was going to have to get pretty creative. I still went to the nursery and got a few flats of annuals, but I found some great free and inexpensive ways to fill in the empty spaces in the yard.  In no particular order, here are some of my favorites. 1. Transplant wild plants/flowers (with permission, of course).  This was easy for me because my mom's house is on a wooded lot and she told me to take anything I wanted. I had no idea wild snapdragons existed until my sister in law and I found huge clumps of them growing in a flower bed in my mom's front yard.  I dug up a half dozen plants and they transplanted beautifully. Years ago I had tried to transplant wild black raspberries without success, but t...

I'm a little behind schedule.  I had a different sweet treat that I was going to post, but I don't have all the potentially necessary step by step photos to show you exactly how to make it.  The last time we made it, I got so into the process that I completely forgot about the camera.  Too bad, because it's a delicious recipe that you would most definitely want to make.  Your friends and family would have been so impressed that you made something this awesome that they would have lavished you with praise and, maybe, large gifts of cash.  It would have changed your life.  Really. No worries, I'm still planning to share it with you.  Just not today. Instead, I'm going to share my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe.  I know you're probably thinking that there are a million chocolate chip cookie recipes, so this one can't be all that special or life changing.  But it is.  It comes from years of experimenting with different recipes, ch...

Earlier this summer, Mr. W and I used some wood leftover from another project to make some planting boxes.  I didn't like the way the bare wood looked, so for the first box, I brushed on some light walnut stain.  It's not bad, but it's not the look I was hoping for.  I wanted something that had the appearance of age.  Like it had been sitting around a potting shed for the last 50 years. This is my salad box stained with light walnut.  Those are little lettuce seedlings.   I played around with some other colors of stain we had in the garage.  I made swatches on a piece of scrap wood, but none of them were giving me the aged look, so I searched the internet for some ideas. Lots of websites had recipes for mixing different colors of stain to achieve an old, weathered look, but I didn't want to buy multiple cans of stain for just a few small projects.  The technique that appealed most to me was using vinegar.  It's super simple and you...

We're going to kick off our DIY project spree with a simple project for your kitchen and/or bathroom.  We're going to make a mason jar soap (or lotion) dispenser.  You've probably seen these all over the internet.  They're pretty popular and there are a number of ways to make them.  If you don't want to do any work at all, you can buy the precut lid with the pump insert and just pop it into a mason jar. You can use a new jar or an old jar, either way you'll get a vintage look. The method I used is pretty simple.  You will need a mason jar, an empty plastic soap bottle and a few basic tools. Begin by unscrewing the pump and setting it aside.  Next, cut the top off the plastic soap bottle.  I chose to cut just below the "shoulders" of the bottle, but you could cut just below the threaded portion of the "neck" if you prefer.  A hack saw works well for this.  Just be careful and take your time. Next, trace the opening of the bott...

Summer is so short.  You've got to make the most of it while it's here, and that's what I've been doing.  Mr. W and I have been keeping busy with all kinds of projects which doesn't leave me much time for blogging.  I started wondering, would anyone else be interested in the projects we've been working on? I'm going to take a chance and assume they would.  So for a while, I'll be posting some simple (and some not so simple), inexpensive DIY projects.  I'll post photos and info so you can do them, too, if you'd like. Tomorrow, we'll kick things off with some upcycled vintage flair.  See you then! Willoughby You can now follow me through Bloglovin .

It may not technically be summer just yet, but after the severe winter we had, it's been summer to me ever since the temperature started to stay consistently above thirty degrees.  Now that we've got that straight, let's talk about your backyard. People always tell me how lucky I am that we have a hot tub and a pool.  I suppose it's true that a little luck was involved, but it certainly doesn't have anything to do with money.  It's no secret that we got both our pool and hot tub from people who didn't want them.  We found them under the "free" listings on craigslist. It's the hot tub that I really want to talk about, today, because I have a little secret for you if you should decide that you would like one in your yard.  Unless you're buying a new one and having it delivered and set up, you're going to need a strategy for getting it out of it's current location and into your yard and that's where the secret comes into ...

Do it yourself, that is! In this house, we're all about DIY projects.  There is an immense sense of satisfaction for us in taking something and turning it into something else.  Or starting from scratch and ending up with something you've visualized. A few years ago, we found this door at our local Habitat for Humanity store.  It was dirty and beat up, but it had its original hardware (love, love, love original hardware) and it was the perfect size for our office.   We had two pieces of leaded glass that were given to us by one of Mr. W's friends, and we wanted to use one in this door.  We had a little retrofitting and some painting to do, but  here's what that door looks like now: As you can see in the picture, our office is a pretty narrow room.  There was no way we were going to be able to use pre made furniture and get a good fit, so the window seat and the bookcases were also DIY projects. For the bookcases, we pur...