You Tube Tuesday: Take Seven

This definitely gets me into the Christmas spirit! Words can't describe just how much I love this A.ma.zing Gap commercial!!! Not only does the video feature Flo Rida and Trey Songz with an amazing rap performance, but there are also appearances from the Dixie Chicks, Selma Blair, Rainn Wilson, and Jason Biggs!! Oh, and please pay particularly close attention to the very end....love it!!!

Thankful!

Happy Thanksgiving Eve Everyone! I am leaving for a whirlwind weekend visiting with the hubs family here in Florida, my dad's family in south Georgia, and my mom's family in north Georgia, so needless to say, I will be out of commission until next week. In honor of this scrumptious holiday, I wanted to take a minute and list off my top 10 things I am most thankful for. There are obviously so many more things I feel blessed to have in my life, but here is just a snip-it in no particular order...

#1. A-mazing friends who bless me with their loving support, challenge me with their candidness, and bring me unending amounts of joy. You girls have changed my lives in ways that I will never fully comprehend. All I can say is 13 bridesmaids...I am so blessed!!

 #2. Chocolate. No words necessary.

#3. The hubs. I was one of those girls who never thought they would ever be married, and there are still moments when I have a mini freak out at the reality that I actually have a ring on my finger. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect guy for me! He is loving, generous, selfless, compassionate, and adorable! How did I get so lucky?

#4. Family, both biological and "adopted". I am thankful for each and every person whom has shaped me into the woman I am today. I feel lucky to have such a big family complete with drama, lots of estrogen (we're all girls), lots of love and tears.

#5. My relationship with Jesus. I don't mean to sound sappy, "religious", or corny. Its a simple and life-transforming truth for me.   I am confident that I have a saving relationship with the one true God. A relationship that has sustained me through the most difficult times in my life, challenged me in my complacency, and blessed me beyond words.

#6. Music. I am a music lover! I love to sing, I love to discover new artists, I sing in the shower, I sing around the house, I just love to sing. My favorite song of the moment is Jason Aldean and Kelly Clarkson, "Don't you wanna stay". They were amazing on the CMA awards!!

#7. Macy. All though she is the bane of my existence at times with her snoring, her latest obsession with climbing into a laundry basket full of clean clothes, her amazing stubbornness, her allergic skin, her always-infected ears, and her refusal to obey anyone but Adam; I am very thankful for the company she provides me and her rare moments of affection when the love of her life (hubs) is not around. She also brings unending amounts of joy to Adam, which is precious to watch. He's gonna be a great dad to some human children one day!

#8. Television and a DVR. Yes, I know, this is a little bit superficial, but it's true, I am thankful for my evening line-up. It helps me to unwind after a long day of teaching, crafting, cleaning, cooking, etc. I am currently obsessed with Glee, Grey's Anatomy, and Oprah.


#9. Teaching. I don't say it often enough, but I am truly blessed to be a teacher, especially a High School teacher. I am thankful that God has placed me in a career that allows me to directly impact the lives of impressionable teenagers each and every day. There are days (though few and far between) when I know that I was THE person that a child needed that day. It's the most amazing feeling in the world.


#10. Neighbors. We have the world's greatest neighbors! I am reminded every day that God has us in this neighborhood, around these people for a very specific reason. I get so much joy from spending time with the 4 kiddos down the street. It's amazing practice for future parenthood, and there is just nothing like a child running up to greet you screaming "Ms. Taylor!!! Where's Mr. Adam?" Ha ha!


Happy Turkey Day Everyone!!

DIY Birthday Calendar

Alternate post titles include: "How to stay sane in a Ginormous family" & "How to not feel guilty anymore..."

As a newlywed I find it incredibly difficult to keep up with everyone's birthday, both my peeps and his. (If I am really honest with myself, it was difficult before the nuptials. ) It seemed that no matter how hard I tried to keep all the days of birth straight in my head, I managed to miss 1 or 2 each month (or have an ridiculously unpredictable phone which keeps me from getting in touch with a certain birthday girl), leaving me dramatically apologetic and frustrated. Thus arrived the birthday calendar...

No, this is not an earth shatteringly ingenious creation of mine, but it also wasn't just as simply as buying a wall calendar either. It had to meet certain criteria...

1. Reusable. As is I didn't want to have to re-write everyone's birthday every time the calendar year changed.
2. Attractive. No offense to any of you animal, flower, landscape, loving calendar people out there, but I just couldn't see spending money on something I didn't even like and I knew I would want to keep out of plain site (which actually defeats the point of a reminder calendar in the first place).
3. Easily Alterable. I needed to be able to add (and subtract, i guess?) birthdays each year as we acquired more little ones into the fam/ new friends

So here's what I came up with...

I made it on the computer just using Microsoft Office, a cute font, and some ivory card stock. I did it month by month, so that I will be able to re-use it every year. (Reusable: Check) It's also as simply as opening up the word document to add new birthdays. (Easily Alterable: Check).

I wanted to display it in a cute way, so I took a standard white picture album and removed all the guts. I then wrapped the existing cardboard in some inexpensive burlap fabric and put it back together. Using a nail, I poked a hole through the 2 places where I wanted it to hang, all the way through the back of the frame. I then was able to easily screw in to coffee cup hangers and attach the calendar.

I still didn't think it was finished, so I added a few rosettes made of ribbon and some linen like fabric. (Attractive: check).

You are welcome to use my template and altar it to fit your own birthdays. Just email me at taylorkizziah@gmail.com, and I will send it to you!!

The Headboard Tutorial

So I ran out of time to post the tutorial for our headboard yesterday, so without further ado, the painstaking tale of really how not to create a headboard/learn as you go building! We made lots of mistakes which I will highlight for you as to avoid our pain troubles. 

Supply List:

• 1 piece of 1/2 inch plywood cut to your desired length. For a king we did 78 inches
• 3, 4 foot boards (for the legs)
• Enough foam to cover the plywood (can be pieced together)
• 1 sheet of batting long enough and wide enough to cover your board
• Fabric of your choosing (with about 6 inches to spare on each side)
• Nail head trim if you choose
• 3, 1x4 boards (1/2 thick) if you choose to do trim
• Staple Gun
• Screws and Drill
• Hammer

Process:

{1} Attach your legs (4 inch boards) to your plywood using screws. We screwed through the front of the board so if there was any excess we could hammer them flat to the back and the front surface would remain flat. We attached ours right at the edge of the board to line up with our bed frame, and also because we were not worried about seeing the legs as we have 2 night side tables on either side of our bed that will be there permanently to hoard our junk and the hubby's fighter pilot mask.

{2} Cover your plywood with foam. I used cheap 1 inch foam from Wal-mart. Trust me, this stuff can get expensive, so you wanna try to use a coupon. Don't worry if you can't find foam wide enough (most likely you won't be able too), it can be pieced together and never seen. Using spray adhesive, just work in pieces until your entire piece is covered. You can also use hot glue on the edges if they won't stay down.

{3} Attempt to hammer in 1 decorative nail head to see if it will stay.
{4} Find out that it will not stay, and devise plan B.
{5} Cut out approximately 4 inches of the foam around the top and sides and drill in 1/4 boards to create a "border" that will allow the nail head trim to be hammered into.

Here it is with the "cut outs"

Here it is with the attached boards.

{6} Cover the whole thing with high rise batting by simply stapling to the back side of the board. Make sure you actually read the package and buy a piece that is wide enough to fit your enormous headboard. Otherwise you will become very frustrated, have a minor breakdown to your husband, and then devise a plan to piece it together and hot glue the seam together. It actually turned out not to matter at all, but I was very worried you would see the seam down the middle.

 

{7}Yell at your dog for constantly sleeping, drooling, stepping on your headboard project. 

 

{8} Cover your headboard with the fabric of your choosing. We chose a velvety gray fabric that was on sale at JoAnne's, but anything will work. Just make sure it's "sturdy" enough to be able to pull tight. I recommend stapling the very center of each side first, then continue pulling tight and go around the edges. Since we opted to attach our headboard directly to our bed frame instead of the wall (which would be impossible as our bed is front of a window, but we also didn't want to leave huge holes in the wall) you will have to sort of cut slits in the bottom of the fabric to go around the legs. Don't worry, this doesn't have to be perfect...No one will ever see it, it's behind your mattress. 

{9} Start nailing individual nail heads to your "raised" wood border in a pattern you like. Get about 1 foot done and realize that it will be absolutely impossible to keep them in a straight line even with precise measuring. Pitch another fit because "you went through all this work and it won't even work now", pout, etc. Then devise plan C. 

{10} Get online and order a roll of nail head trim that only requires nailing every 5th hole and wait patiently for it to arrive. 

{11} Decide on a pattern and begin nailing into the wood. You will want to use a mallet (a regular hammer covered in a sock) so as to not damage your nail head trim.

{12} Slice your fingers open multiple times by stupidly not wearing work gloves while dealing with a roll of METAL!!

{13} Apply work gloves and finish your project. 

{14} Admire your hard work! After it all it did take sweat, tears, and even blood!!

I chose a double row of nail head trim spaced exactly 3 inches apart

{15} Wait for your husband to get home to bolt your head board through the holes in the bed frame. We simply pre-drilled holes into the legs, stuck a long screw through it and tightened a nut from the other side. It is incredibly sturdy.

{16} Fall in love with your new head board and enjoy many nights without neck cramping while trying to enjoy your evening t.v. line-up!

Please let me know if you have any questions and send pics if you attempt this yourself! It's so worth all the work, and really I have walked before you, so should be easy breezy!!

Have a happy weekend!! Up next a Birthday calendar, a Craigslist score, and some hair beutification!!

The Crowning Glory...

I have been slaving away for the past 2 weeks (yes literally two weeks) to create a headboard for our master bedroom. (It didn't actually take that long, but I was waiting on supplies, being lazy, and well just tired after work)

We recently re decorated our bedroom. Not sure if you can actually call it re-decorating if its previous decor consisted of John Deere signs and mix-matched bedding, more like overhauling. You can read about our bedroom redo here. Oh how I love the combination of colors, and the funky and eclectic feel to the room, but something was definitely missing. Can you see what it is...

Okay, take an even closer look....

Oh yes, definitely missing a crucial part of our bedroom...a Headboard. You can see just how big of a problem our lack of a head board posed with the new bed in front of the window configuration. Smooshed up curtains and lots of pillow propping to be able to watch t.v. and I was officially fed-up. I perused many of my favorite home sites only to be amazed at just how expensive a king sized upholstered head board really is. After a brief moment of discouragement I decided that I (well really my hubs) could create our own. So we did!

I couldn't be happier with the results...

Sorry...not a great picture by any means. I was a teeny bit tired by this point (read: don't care about blog pics at the moment)

It's a gray velvety fabric with nail head trim. I'll post a full how-to tomorrow, as this was not the easiest project I have tackled and hopefully I can spare you some of my pain frustration if you want to attempt your own. 

One last photo opt of my brand spankin new head board! Clearly I am in love...

What do you think?

You Tube Tuesday: Take Six

Once again, an oldy but a goody!!! I absolutely love this mostly because it is so true and I can so easily relate. How many girls out there have wondered if the nail ladies were talking about them and their calloused feet, or wondered why the name of the salon was missing just one crucial letter, or why exactly they feel like they must fill you up with all the sugary compliments you can stand? Don't they know they are getting paid regardless?!? Don't get me wrong, one of my most favorite things to do on earth is get a pedicure. So here's to all you lovely technicians who help my little piggies look so "niiiiice""!

She's Got The Look...

There is so much to be said about a certain furry female in our home, and no, I am not referring to my un-shaved legs :) But really no words are necessary. Only photos could possibly describe our bulldog, Macy. Take a look at a typical day in the life of May, as we affectionately call her...

Approximately 90% of her day is spent doing this...

Yes, Those are Adam's clothes. She LOVES to be on our clothes. I absolutely cannot leave clean clothes laying around or they will be ruined with the lovely smell of pooch. 

And the close-up shot!

The rest of her day is spent doing one of the following things...

1. Staring aimlessly into nothingness. Looking Regal Though!!

Notice the Crossed Legs!! What a lady!!

 2.  Begging For Food/ Following me around the kitchen...

3. Begging to Get on the Couch (she's been recently banned!!!)

4. Snarling because I have upset her in some way. She can be very temperamental.

She doesn't like that I just cleaned her ear

5. Basking in the sunlight

As you can see, It's rough to be Macy :) Hope you enjoyed a Day in the Life of our pampered pooch!!

Mystery Solved...

While perusing my all-things-knowledgeable information source, formally known as Facebook, I stumbled across this link on a friends page leading to a very informative and eye-opening article. I'll spare you the complete synopsis and allows you to read this earth-shattering guide to the male psyche for yourself, but I'll just give you the cliff note's version for your laughing reading pleasure...

Article Title: "5 Ways to Understand Him Better"
                   (this should be interesting)

Basic Concept: there are medical reasons for why your man acts in inferior impossible to understand ways to us women. Basically the "functionings" of the male brain should cause us to be more sympathetic to the following scenarios...

1. His memory, or lack thereof
2. His lack of ability to pick up on obvious subtle hints
3. His out of nowhere silence in the middle of earth-shatteringly important conversation
4. His incredibly ADD upbeat energy
5. His "apparently you've been part of a different relationship than I have" memory of your past together.

And let me just put the icing on the cake for ya ladies...this article was written by a WOMAN!! 

I in no way mean to attack the male gender. I am the happy wife of a very loving and adorable husband who just so happens to to have some medical issues I was unaware of :0 Good luck out there ladies!

 Love you honey!!

You Tube Tuesday: Take Five

This is seriously one of my all time favorite You Tube Finds. Yes, I know, it's certainly not new to video land, but it's definitely a sign of delicious video goodness if it still makes me laugh every single time I watch it. Hope you enjoy and look out for those monsters! 

The Pile

Really this title should be the "pile of crap". That is the pile of mildly important papers and small items that seem to expand at an exponential rate on my kitchen island. Without fail, every single day, there will be a pile. Most of the time said pile originates with me toting in all the junk important things from my car when I arrive home from work. The pile then grows further when the hubs brings in the mail and his pile of stuff from his car resulting in a very junky and majorly disruptive to my OCD self kitchen island.

I was determined to find a solution. Nothing fancy. Just practical. I needed some system to organize this pile into meaningful other piles (sounds redundant huh?) that could be sorted at a more convenient time (read, when I actually feel like doing such boring stuff). My solution, yet another craft!

Doesn't it just blow your mind??!! Ha. Simple, I know, but works for me!

I took a square basket that we got as a wedding gift that unfortunately wouldn't fit in my craft cubby organizer, cut down some file folders, attached some scrap book paper to half sized index cards, wrote a label and voila...a junk pile organizer on a dime. Here's a close-up of my ever so clever filing system he he!

Total Cost = $0.00
Mental Sanity Gained = priceless!!


So do you have a pile too??

Cutifying your outfit/ The headband tutorial...

Anyone who knows me is fully aware of my headband obsession. I have headbands in every shape and size, and every color of the rainbow. Though I do find them incredibly adorable, I must admit my real reason for wearing them is to tame my afro mess of a head of curly hair or to hide the rapidly forming greasy roots. To be honest about 5 of the 7 days of the week my hair is in a pony tail (sorry hubs!) and the majority of those days I will also be wearing a head band. I guess it helps to "style up" the outfit a little bit and helps me feel not so guilty about NEVER doing my hair.

For this past weekend's festivities, I decided to create a little red floral number to cheer on my bull dogs and show some team spirit. I couldn't decide what I wanted, so I did what any girl would do, I made two so I could have options. I love having options.

The Rose Headband:

Materials:

• 3, 1 X 12 inch pieces of felt fabric
• hot glue gun
• head band of your choosing

Steps:

1. Cut your fabric. You will need 3 strips of felt that are approximately 1 inch wide and 12 inches long.  

you need 3 of these

 2. Fold your fabric in half and roll up the end a few rolls to start your rosette.

3. Begin rolling the fabric around the center, twisting/flipping the fabric towards the center on every turn. You will have to smooth the "tail" of the fabric after you twist. 

4. When you come to the end of your fabric, simply flip your rosette over and hot glue the remaining fabric to the back. You then may need to tack down some of the "petals" to make sure they don't separate.

 5. Repeat 3 times for a total of 3 rosettes. Don't they really look like roses?

6. Hot glue to the head band of your choice and Voila...a rose inspired head band! 

Are you on headband overload yet? I love how it turned out, and it really is super easy!!

Here comes tutorial number two! How did you get so lucky to have two in 1 post??

The Flat Flower Head Band:

**This idea came from one of my favorite blogs, Joy is at Home. 

You can see Suzy's in detail tutorial here**

Materials:

• About  a 12 X 12 square of felt fabric
• beads
• a needle and thread
• hot glue gun
• thin rubber band
• something to trace to make your circles
• lighter

Steps:

1. Trace circles of 3 different sizes onto your felt and cut them out. I used a spool of thread for the smallest size, a bottle of craft paint for the medium size, and then simply guessed about 1 centimeter larger than the craft paint bottle to form the largest size. They DO NOT need to be perfect at all. 

2. Take your lighter and burn the edges slightly of each "petal" circle to give it a little bit of an antique feel. To me they look too crafty without the edges burned. It's hard to tell with the grey fabric, but makes a HUGE difference with the lighter fabrics (see the red one at the end of this post).

Left: not burned/ Right: burned

3. Stack your petals up biggest to littlest on top and sew them together with 2-3 stitches.

4. Sew 1 or more bead(s) into the center to create the middle of the flower. 

**Note, use the same color thread as your beads so it will not be seen. I made this mistake with my first headband**

5. Here's where I differed a little bit from the original tutorial. I wanted my flowers to be removable in case I ever wanted to wear the head band plain again. Also, I can't wear those stretchy head bands for some reason. Is my head funny shaped? Wait. Don't answer that. So, I decided on a regular thin head band.  I cut a strip of felt and glued it to the back of the flowers.

6. Then I cut a regular rubber band into about 1 inch pieces. You could definitely use the baby rubber bands (the clear ones) for this, but I didn't have any.

7. Tie each rubber band into a double knot around a pencil. It's important to still have a "loop" at the bottom. 

 8.Then hot glue your rubber band "loop", knot side down, to each end of your fabric strip on the back of the flowers.

9. Now just slide your headband in through the rubber bands, and Ta Da, a removable flower headband!!

 

Here's the one I made for Saturday...

 

You can really see the burnt edges on this one. Makes a HUGE difference!

Hope you all enjoy! Let me know if you try one yourself!!