16 Easy Halloween Tutorials

How to Build a Rain Barrel Drainage Pad

Late summer/early fall is a great time to do garden landscaping projects. The weather isn’t as blazing hot as it is in the middle of summer and most of the materials are now on clearance to make room for fall and winter merchandise.

  

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Or in our case, you end up with a bunch of extra bricks from repairing your vintage brick garden border and want to do something with the lovely, worn, and free reclaimed bricks.

Thanks to two months of never ending rain and me replacing the broken spigot on the rain barrel (read the tutorial here) before the rains came, Husband and I have plenty of water to use for watering our new plantings. Eco Dork that I am, I get positively giddy watering my plants with rain water but I’m not happy with stepping in the mud that sometimes surrounds the rain barrel spigot.

100 Homemade Halloween Costumes!

 
My absolute favorite, favorite thing about Halloween is costumes! It is the only day of the year you can dress up as weird as you like and no one will think you are a weirdo.

Unless your costume is a Weirdo.

Husband and I as Raving Rabbid Weirdos. Bwaaaaaaaaaaa!

How to Make a Brick Tree Ring on Uneven Ground

After I repaired our crumbling brick garden border (read the tutorial here) it was time to turn our attention to the brick tree ring.

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Yep. The brick wall around the tree in the front yard is falling over too.

Why?

Fabulous Fall Craft Roundup

Stop.

Did you smell that?

The hint of cinnamon?

The whiff of drying leaves?

The just about ripe pumpkin on the vine?

Fall is almost here!

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Whimsical and Recycled DIY Flamingo Garden Decor

I have a weird love hate relationship with outdoor garden décor and yard art. I’d love to add a few whimsical pieces to my garden for color that doesn’t die (like our landscaping always does.) The problem is I hate for my garden tchotchkes to be the same as everyone else.

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I’ve been looking on and off for unusual garden decorations all summer. I found a few to poke fun at like the free range garden Yeti we found in Amish country but nothing we really wanted in our yard full time. Or in the case of Sasquatch and lawn gnomes, something which is commonly stolen because it is ridiculous.

How to Repair a Crumbling Dry Stack Garden Border

Husband and I finally got several days without rain in a row to repair and landscape the front yard – again. I think this is Landscape 4.0 of our promised “easy to care for landscaping’ that keeps dying and makes us sing the condo blues.

But at least I got the name of this blog out of the deal. So there’s that.

We were so sad when the harsh winter killed our lavender bushes.We spent many cool summer evenings chilling on the porch and watching the biggest bees you’ve ever seen flit and play amongst the flowers. The on demand organic lavender is something I miss too.

We tilled the soil in the front flower beds and planted lavender instead of traditional evergreen bushes. Next I turned my attention to the crumbling brick garden border.

Why Your Dry Stack Brick or Stone Garden Border is Falling Over and How to Fix It

Quick Craft: Make a Portable Phone Charger Case

I  love photography. My phone has a good camera and I’m not shy about whipping it out to document the beautiful, fun, or surprising things that cross my path in any given monument. Unfortunately, using the camera so often kills my phone battery. I started carrying a portable phone charger or two in my bag or backpack when Husband and I go on one of our adventures.

My quick phone charger holder makes a great gift. 

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I quickly realized I need some sort of phone charger holder or case to store the charger and the cord together.  Why are the things you need to grab quickly always in the deepest darkest corners of your bag or purse and take ages of rooting around to find? It’s some sort of purse conspiracy I tell ya.

Why You Should Never Center a Design on a DIY Project

t is amazing how a few brushstrokes of paint can totally transform a piece of old furniture. By merely changing the color, you can make what started as junk in the trash into a whimsical piece people fight over in an artist’s shop. Even more so if you are talented enough to add decorative paint elements to the piece.

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20 DIY Earphone Cases

I’m more likely to listen to music on my phone if I have earphones with me. Unfortunately most of my earphones sit all by themselves in a drawer. Even the cute painted earphones I made over (read the tutorial here.)

  These earphone case ideas make great gifts too!

My earphone cases are long gone. I need replacements. Yes, replacements.

20 Clever Earphone Holders for Music on the Go

DIY: How to Decorate and Paint Earphones

Back to School season is a great time to buy office supplies.  It is also a tempting a time. Sometimes the logical The Greenest Thing is What You Already Own side of my brain and the computer IT geek I Don’t Care This One is So Much Cooler Than What I Have side of my brain do battle. Well, not  exactly battle but more like I end up buying something cute that’s not on my shopping list just because it is a cuter version of what I already have.

Now in the case of something small like earphones, the purchase won’t break the bank or anything like that but it will clutter up my house. Especially when I found several pairs of very good ear buds while cleaning and organizing my desk. It was a good surprise because I can keep a pair in my gym and dance bag, in my purse, my desk, etc.

 Keep reading for my step by step painted earphone tutorial!

So why am I tempted in the store while staring at a rack of cheapola 5 dollar ear buds that probably sound worse than the good ones I love and use?

I’ll tell you why. The cheapie headphones are in pretty and cute colors. The spendy and great sounding earphones are plain Jane black.

How to Make Cute Earphones

Landscaping Budget Hack: Use a Tool Lending Libarary

It seems strange to start a landscaping project in late July instead of May but Mother Nature isn't giving us much choice. Ohio has the opposite water problem California has - too much rain.

The number of days in a row Columbus has not had any precipitation this year?

Four.

This we're lucky if we get a 24 hour period without rain once every couple of weeks. If the sun decides to visit us after a 15 to 19 day rainy stretch we learned to drop everything to do outside chores just in case it rains later in the day.

 

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7 Back to School Craft Projects

I always think of Back to School season as an unofficial New Year's Day. It is full of new possibilities and new school clothes, shoes, and supplies. My parents bought me new consumable school supplies like pens, pencils, and notebooks but for the big stuff like lunchboxes, binders, and backpacks they had a One and Done policy. I had to take care of it because I wasn't going to get another for the following school year if I trashed it that year.

Looking back, it was a great green lesson about taking care of what you have so it will last. It was also a lesson in creativity. Sometimes I jazzed up last year's school supplies makes them feel bright, shiny, and new for the new school year with a craft project like my washi tape USB Flash drive.

 Them: "Hey, where did you get that cool Flash drive?!" Me: "Oh, I made it."

When you want to be crafty for Back to School season it helps to start early. Especially if you have a student going back to college since most college start before summer officially ends.

How to Repair a Quad Camp Chair

One of Husband’s coworkers has a HUGE Fourth of July parade party and cookout.

Food was made. Watermelon cut and cubed. Coolers were washed and ready. The one thing we didn’t double check were our first generation armless folding quad lawn (camp) chairs. (aff link)

We discovered one of rivets holding the chair legs to the seat broke after we set up the chairs at our parade viewing encampment. Whoops!

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Replacing a broken rivet on a folding quad lawn chair is a super simple fix. It takes barely any time at all. If you have a jar of odd nuts and bolts laying around, it could be a zero dollar repair. What’s not to love about that?

How to Fix a Folding Lawn Chair

12 Favorite Summer Craft Projects

Summer is in full swing. I am loving it! Warm summer days are excellent DIY and craft project weather. Here are a few of my favorite summer craft projects that are not only clever but useful too!

 

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DIY Personalized Insulated Wine Glass Tumblers –  Fun and reusable!

CREATE: Vintage Jewelry and Burlap Letters

I have a big, fat, crazy love for vintage jewelry. I always surf the jewelry section when I’m in a consignment or thrift store just to drool over what I call Grandma Jewelry- the glitz rhinestone stuff.


When Husband and I played nobles at our local renaissance fictional I finally had a reason to buy some. Renaissance rich people love to wear their jewels but as two real life people acting in a 10 acre field, I didn’t want to spend much on it. Why? The pile of orphan earrings in our costume jewelry box from losing them while performing is the answer to that question.

I hung onto them to either make over into a prop or for crafting. From time to time, I cleaned out my everyday costume jewelry box and added pieces to the Some Day My Project Will Come Pile.

How to Replace a Rain Barrel Spigot

My rain barrel has been harvesting water for the last three years. I couldn’t be happier with it. Even better my rain barrel keeps a soggy side of my house dry.

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The only downside to my 40 gallon bundle of joy is after three years of faithful service the shut off valve on the attached hose broke. I can’t unscrew it and use a regular garden hose with my rain barrel rock because it has a hose instead of a spigot. 

25 of the Best Ways to Reuse Old Pill Bottles

Husband and I are relatively healthy people but every once and awhile we get sick enough to require prescription medicine. More often than not the medicine comes comes in a plastic bottle that aren’t always recyclable.

I really hate tossing something like that into the trash and sending it to a landfill to sit on a mountain of garbage for a thousand years.

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How to Cut a Glass Bottle with Hot Water

The most difficult part of when reusing a wine bottle for a DIY recycling project is cutting the bottle. I tried several methods and had varying levels of success with each one.

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Cutting a bottle by lighting string dipped in acetone on fire method doesn't work for me. I can’t get a clean break and I  am afraid I’m going to burn down my house because acetone burns scary hot.

How to Make Extra Money Flipping Furniture

I bypass a lot of cast off furniture that would look stunning with a little DIY love. If I don't, my small condo would quickly look like an episode of Hoarders.

If I had the room to store the pieces AND work on them (for me its an either/or not both situation) I could make some cash on the side fixing up old furniture and flipping it - selling it for a profit.

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