Frugal Friday

 Frugal Friday 

I was truely blessed today with a warm sunny morning and some fabulous frugal finds on my first garage saling day of the season. The first sale of the day was the best. It turned out to be someone I use to babysit for 34 years ago. I could see her eyeing me and trying to figure out where she knew me from. She said "No way!!!! I thought it was you but then I thought you looked 20 years too young to be you". Well, that was it. I could have gone all morning and not bought a thing and been happy as a lark, LOL. Especially nice to hear as I turned the big five O this year. I ended up buying
an old weathered old porch post ($10) an old basket with the bottom rotted out ( .75 cents), and a crib quilt (.50 cents)from her - all for a mere $11.25. Then Pat pulled out an old bird house wind chime with the greatest rusty chimes and hardware and gave it to me so it would go to a good home.
This quilt is just appliqued and machine quilted but for .50 cents I thought it might be cute in my old cradle for a while.

Just as I was about to get to work planting my basket for pictures the thunder began to rumble. I love bottomless baskets for the garden. I just mound up some soil inside to keep the basket in place and plant some annuals into it. This basket just saved me the work of having to cut the bottom out.

The free weathered wind chime is going to hang in the lower limbs of the big pine we just limbed up by my hosta garden.

Unforetunately hubby took the trailer my post is in and covered it over with a load of cedar mulch. Men! The porch post is going to get a perfectly prim white bird house on top.

 I came up empty on the next 3 sales but then I found a great sale where all the proceeds were going to send the daughter to Haiti on a mission trip. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  

an old quilt all hand stitched and in perfect condition - $4.00. I picture this over a wicker settee' in the pool house we are about to build.

I also got a dark red pendleton wool skirt for felting for $1

and another winter white wool skirt for .50 cents at the Haiti sale. The lady wasn't thrilled to hear I was going to felt and cut her beautiful skirts into worms for rug hooking, LOL.

To top off my fabulous morning of summer like temps and great garage sale finds, I managed to squeeze in a bit of gardening. It never looks like much when the annuals are first planted does it?  But so worth the wait for the colorful show they will provide in a few short weeks. This is just a sneak peek of one tiny little corner of the garden - hot pink, lemon yellow and some accents of bright orange this year. After the cold wet spring we've had I was ready for some hot hot colors.

I hope your Friday was as fabulous as mine!

Make-Over Monday

Make-Over Monday

Been busy busy busy around here. Trying to catch up the housework and the yard work from when I was under the weather. So much to do and so little energy. This week I managed to pull out the spray paints for just a couple of quick little make-overs between spreading wheel barrels of mulch and manure.

First is a lantern I got for $1.00 at a re-sale shop this winter. It was a cheesy copper color so I hit it with 2 shades of rusty brown and a very light over spray of black. Then I hung it on a short shepards hook in the garden by my very rustic pool shed.

Next is a hand woven egg basket plus a wall pocket. I paid a whopping .49 cents for the egg basket and .25 cents for the other. The egg basket had faded peach stripe on one side and a bright peach stripe on the other. I just painted over the entire basket with a nutmeg and then a light over spray of  darker rust brown.

I'm also working on a little re-decorating in my bathroom. The fixtures and hardware are all a bright shiny chrome and brass. Dreadful!!!! To try and save a couple bucks I decided try sanding and painting the tissue holder and towel bar. I got the tissue holder done this weekend and it looks pretty promising.
Yikes!!!

After sanding it looked like brushed nickel. Already an improvement.

Perfect! Now if only I could just spray the ugly wall tile.

 Next week's makeover   -   the built in china cabinet

Make-over Monday

Make-over Monday

Ok, I take echinacea and vitamin D and I eat heaps of fruits and veggies. I never touch a grocery cart without wiping it down with an anti-bacterial wipe and I always replace my toothbrush after a cold. I am a finatic about wiping down the keyboard and mouse of the computer. But once again I have managed to get sick. So I am digging back for a make-over this round.

When we moved into our 70's ranch almost 3 years ago it had a tiny livingroom which was separated from a front hall by some waist high walls. The livingroom had navy carpet that showed every bit of shedding pomeranian and lint and the hall had stick on laminate tiles. Last year we pulled it out, 1/2 walls and all, including the baseboards. I found a great great web-site called True Hardwoods http://www.truehardwoods.com/home.html that offered hugely discounted wood floors. Without them I could never have afforded hand scraped, wide planks. The retail price of the flooring was $8.99 and Real Hardwoods price was $4.90. And get this - the cost of shipping was less than what I would have paid in MI state sales tax. What a difference!
Before

During

After

Now if only True Hardwoods sold doors, windows, and crown moulding I would have this room complete.