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Today I thought I would share how I used savvy savings to decorate the Superstars' rooms. I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that some of it was decorated with thrift store finds. Since this post turned out to be pretty long I thought I would break it into Part I and Part II. Today's half will focus on Superstar #1's room which we did for about $600 total.
SUPERSTAR #1's Bedroom
We decorated Superstar #1's room when she turned 2 and we had to transition her out of the crib to make room for Superstar #2. She turns 7 in a couple months and outside of a change in the dresser (from a free one to a bought one) it's lasted almost 5 years now. I like the fact that you really can't tell how old/young the child is that lives here. A few changes and we could make this a guest room very easily.
Furniture Breakdown - $483
The bed was the most expensive item in this room, but we bought it through a buying club we belong to called Direct Buy and ended up with a $1200 day bed for $450. IKEA has a comparable bed that we considered (not quite as sturdy, but looks very similar for $400) but the IKEA version has pull-out drawers whereas the one we bought has a pull out bed which is perfect for both sleepovers or if we have lots of guests in the house and the Superstars have to bunk together. I don't see us replacing it any time soon.
The chest of drawers was a purchase from the thrift store last year. It was $15 and brown. I brought it home and painted it with white semi-gloss, put the old knobs back on and voila! The bedside wicker table was $8 at the thrift store. The matching trash can was from...a trash pile left on the side of the road. I sanitized it and sprayed it with another coat of spray paint ($1 a can at Walmart) and it's perfect. The toy chest was from IKEA, bare wood, for $10. I painted it and that's where all the extra stuffed animals are stored.
Bedding & Curtain Breakdown - $70
($85 for the option to change out when she wants)
All that cute kid's bedding can be EXPENSIVE! We found that IKEA was the cheapest, well made items that looked really good. We timed our trips to IKEA as part of a family vacation to visit the family in California or St. Louis (then drove up to Chicago). I envy all you out there who have an IKEA nearby.
The duvet cover & pillow case was a set and cost $20. Each European pillow with sham was less than $10 a piece. The duvet itself was around $20 (hypo-allergenic). The sheer cotton window panels were $20 ($10 a set and I needed 2 sets for the 3 panels). The matching fabric fringe at the top of each panel was the pillow case from the duvet set taken apart and sewn on by me. The hardware to hang the curtains was $10 at IKEA.
The red standard pillowcase was bought during our 2007 Christmas trip to California to see my folks. We bought both girls a matching duvet/pillow set on sale for $15 a set. Superstar #1 had been wanting to update her room and so we bought one for her so she could switch back and forth as she wanted. It's as easy as pulling it out of the linen closet when we pull the dirty ones off. Isn't it amazing what a change it is, just for $15? When everything else is pretty basic, you can change the whole look of a room for very little money. I think blue, greens & reds would be another great color combination in this room, so that if we had a boy, it would work just as well without painting.
Art, Accessories & Lighting - $42
Last but not least the art and accessories. We bought the "M" & "B" letters at TJMaxx for $4 a piece. The butterfly was from my mom but I have seen them for less than $5 a piece at various places from Target to Party City. They're seasonal so you can't always find them but they sure are cute.
The rug was $16 at IKEA, a little surprise that my husband brought home from a work trip to California. I LOVE the pop of color it brings to the room and how it keeps the room from becoming too girly/fru-fru. It also hides the permanent ink spot that was there when we bought the house.
The wicker mirror over the drawers is actually mine from when I was a child. It was one of the things my Mom & Dad let me have as I went to college (it was brown back then, $1 can of spray paint changed that). There's a good chance that one of the girls will take it with them to college someday. The tall mirror behind her door was a curbside find. Actually a friend of mine was leaving town and had a pile on the front porch she was throwing away. It was dark brown and now it's white.
My husband and I bought the hanging star lamp with a gift card we received for our wedding over 10 years ago. It was originally bronze, a reminder of the huge star lanterns that hung up in the restaurant in Playa del Carmen where we had a wonderful dinner one night during our honeymoon and hung up in the living room for a long time. When Superstar #1 was born we painted it white and it has been hers ever since. It was a great "night light" back then for her as a baby and she still uses it now. The main light in her room was a horrible builder's grade see-through glass globe (BLECH!). I found a nondescript white flushlamp for $12 at Lowe's.
The ballerina picture over the night stand was a $5 buy at TJMaxx. The lamp, was another friend's "we're throwing all this out if you want any of it", and the fairy hook that she can hang her bathrobe & pajamas on was .99 new at the thrift store. I wanted to put it behind the door, but she wouldn't have that. Thank goodness the robe matches her room. You laugh, but it would catch my eye and bug me every time I entered the room!
One Last Word...
So that's it for Superstar #1's room. I hope you all know that as I share these things it's not to say "this is how you should decorate your room" because I know that we all have different tastes and styles. I definitely don't share it with you because I feel like I am on the cutting edge of decorating.
I just wanted to share that with a little time, creativity and patience, you can have a room that looks pulled together without a lot of cost. I have friends that LOVE Pottery Barn and surf Craigslist and eBay looking for the set they want and save a ton of money doing it, but I've never been beholden to any particular look so I'm fine mixing and matching. It's more eclectic and more organic in the sense that it's not so "matchy-matchy". It's also more forgiving with experiments where you can add and take away pieces as the children grow, without changing or throwing off the whole room's look.
I don't have any examples of it here, but garage sales are also GREAT places to find accessories and sometimes incredible deals on furniture. I remember my girlfriend buying a gorgeous hand painted Bassett armoire for her daughter's room for just $75. Another girlfriend bought a boy's car bed for $50. The deals are there it's just a seasonal thing around here. We don't have as many of them around when the weather is freezing.
Tomorrow's post - Superstar #2's room. It's kind of in transition at this point, having been thrown together rather haphazardly over the last 2 years. It's the second child thing. I was too busy to put as much thought into it and without another child on the way, it was easier to let some things slide. Bless her heart, we just got rid of her changing table/dresser this summer.
What is it with Holiday vacations? Why can't I be content to sit on my butt and enjoy a cup of good cheer? Why is my idea of a "relaxing" vacation seem to entail tools and/or noxious chemicals? And WHY on earth do I have such a willing accomplice in my Beloved? Isn't it his job to keep me from going nuts with the cleaning and organizing as is inherent in my German/Japanese DNA?
So, what did I do? I helped my husband put shelves in our attic. Well, they're not technically shelves, but large 4'x8' pieces of OSB (oriented strand board) we had the fine fellows at Lowe's cut in half to fit on the cross beams of the attic. I confess, this was definitely not one of my most favorite projects Being doubled over in the attic is never fun, and NEVER for hours at a time, but this project sure was one of the most practical, and the end result speaks for itself. 
You see, before we just stacked things on the studs of the floor of the attic, which in turn flattened all the lovely insulation that is suppose to help keep the house warm/cool. This method of storage also made walking along the center aisle and trying to get to items while not hitting your head on the studs extremely frustrating.
My Beloved was the one who realized that all we needed to do was lay down a board where the crossbeams "crossed" so to speak, and voila, instant shelf! Though the project was relatively easy and could be done alone by a strong man or woman, it is much easier with two people given the size of the boards you end up using. As for tools, we could have done the whole thing with just a tape measure but we decided to increase the storage space by nailing a 2x4 across a couple studs to create another shelf on another part of the attic that didn't have the crossbeams that we could just set boards down upon.
See how we basically just laid down the piece of wood where the cross beams crossed? And because we had an extra small piece from somewhere in the garage, we did a double tier on one side, which although narrow, is perfect for the suitcases of which we have an enormous selection apparently!
Voila! I think what amazes me is that we spent about $25 and about 2 hours on this project (getting the boards, moving stuff, etc.) and just look at the final result. It's beautiful...sniff, sniff...who knew a clean attic would move me so?Project Breakdown
Three 7/16" x 4' x 8' OSB Boards ($17), box of nails ($3), One 2' x 4' ($3). Grand Total: $23 End Result: PRICELESS!
My husband said it would have actually cost less than $20 for the whole project if we hadn't needed to replace the floor boards going down the middle of the attic. They were started to give way and since neither one of us wanted to go through the second story dry wall ceiling, we decided to spend the extra $6 for another piece of OSB which pushed it over $20.
A few extra notes on this project. You don't have to use OSB, you can use any sort of plywood providing that it's sturdy enough to bear the weight you intend to load on to it. I'm sure the MDF (medium density fiberboard) would work but it's more expensive and it would weigh a TON.
Also, make sure you get the folks at Lowe's or Home Depot to cut the boards: it makes it easier to carry home (we have one of the smaller vans, an MPV and it was easy to bring home) and unless you have a table saw, it is a pain in the behind to cut yourself. And really why do it when there's no charge to have someone else do it for you?
What if you don't have the same cross beam set up we do because of the architectural style of your home? You can always do what we did for the Christmas tree area on the other side of the attic. This is where the extra 2'x4' we nailed to the vertical pieces studs in the attic and then used that to rest another piece of OSB upon. I think we added a nail here and there for extra stability.
Remember I told you we had two big Christmas trees now? Since we actually use our garage for the cars and we have no outside shed of any sort, into the attic they went. In addition to the tree shelf we pounded in a few long nails into the boards and it's the perfect place to hang all my wreaths for next year where they don't bend out of shape.
This is a VERY easy project that not only helps organizationally and spatially, but it also helps to improve resale value. First because it makes things look more organized, and second, lessens the appearance of cramming SO much stuff in the attic that the potential buyers think "There must not be enough storage in the house!" You laugh, but I hear it time and again on Designed to Sell a great show to watch because it will give you tons ideas of how to make your home look great for a fraction of the cost.
Now all we have to do is get some more insulation to fill up the mushed down insulation from my previous storage methods. I want to make it as nice & puffy and energy saving as possible. Luckily we have a neighbor who specializes in that kind of stuff so you know I will be savvy in that too!
It's such a simple thing, but making the most out of what you have is the savviest way to save. Thanks to my husband's ingenuity our attic is now a source of pride rather than frustration.
Ah, Thanksgiving; the preparation of the feast, the tidying of the house for guests, the smell of deadly cleaners wafting through the house...
I'm not sure why exactly this weekend turned into a cleaning-fest, maybe it was because I had a willing accomplice in my Beloved or maybe because there's a certain element in my life that feels out of control so I scurry around to make sure at least my home is order so I have some measure of sanity (can anyone out there relate?). Who knows, but for whatever reason we spent Thursday morning cleaning out the refrigerator, the pantry and the rest of the kitchen cabinets, Friday steam-cleaning the stairs and upstairs carpet and "rejuvenating" the wood floors in our foyer and steam-cleaning the second set of stairs on Saturday.
May I remind you that this was AFTER we had a house full of guests. No, we couldn't have done that BEFORE we had guests because, uh, we would have impressed our friends and family so much they would have felt uncomfortable at the blinding beauty of the stairs & wood floors. Yeah. That's it. I will say one thing, regardless of arguments of whether Saturday or Sunday is technically the Sabbath, we will be RESTING on Sunday!
As much as I jest, I have to say that the end result has been quite amazing. As I walk around our clean-floor home I am reminded again that a little savvyness (is that even a word?) applied to home maintenance can go a long way.
Carpet steam cleaner.
On this front we were lucky that our neighbor bought one from Costco recently for $189. With three kids, two dogs, two cats and two adults in their home, it has become a huge money saver for them. Before buying this gem I would estimate that she had her carpets cleaned about 3-4 times a year at about $200 a pop using a coupon. Now for the price of one cleaning she (and the rest of us neighbors) can steam clean anytime she wants!
Admittedly I don't know how using a steam cleaner can wear a carpet over time or if it destroys any warranties, but for those of us who live in homes with builder's grade carpet over 10 years old and have young children, the idea of spending just $189 for a carpet cleaner sure beats out spending THOUSANDS on new carpet. We moved into this house 5 years ago as the second owners and had always assumed we would get new carpet after the youngest Superstar was finished potty training. Now almost two years after that glorious occasion with the economy (and our budget) looking the way it does, it doesn't look like it's going to happen anytime soon. For you renters out there, it's also a great way to keep apartment/rental grade carpet looking good too!
The steam cleaner of today is a far cry from the ones you rent from the grocery store and they are so easy to use. Pull off the tank, fill with hot water and a bit of cleaning solution and voila, clean carpets. When finished, the carpet is still a little damp and takes about 1-2 hours to fully dry. We sent the Superstars to a neighbors house to play and everyone was happy. The stairs were the worst and as you can see, they cleaned up pretty well!
Remember, this is 10 year old carpet and the owners before us had 4 kids and a dog, but I think it will last us another 2-3 years if we're savvy!
Rejuvenating the Floor
You've seen the commercial on TV. Just apply this product and your floors will look brand new! I admit even as I was skeptical about the product there was a part of me that really just wanted to try it. When my friend said he used it in a house they were selling I knew that I had to give it a shot. Remember the builder's grade carpet? Well, we have builder's grade engineered plank wood floors in the foyer. Soon after moving in we ripped out all the carpet downstairs and replaced it with wood floors matching what was in the foyer.
Even though it was the same floor, there were obvious wear-and-tear differences. In an attempt to off-set those difference we added some floor rugs to help hide the wear and to keep it from wearing even more. All-in-all it's worked pretty well, but as of late, it has looked pretty sorry.
So we went and bought a bottle of Rejuvenate at the home improvement store. I would tell you which one, but I can't remember since we bought it TWO YEARS AGO. I mean, c'mon, you have a free hour or two and you want to...Rejuvenate the floors? Yeah, right. I don't know if I am the only one who does this, but sometimes I make things a whole lot more complicated and difficult in my mind and then just psyche myself up NOT to do a task. This was one of those times. Turns out it was totally easy - from start to finish it took about 1 hour.
First I used Bruce's Clean 'n' Strip which says it helps clean up wax build-up. I don't use wax on my floors, but I figured it would cut through any junk on them. Unfortunately the stuff was TOXIC. I used latex gloves and a dust mask and opened up the windows and it was still heady stuff. In fact, when I was finished, I rinsed out the cloth only to find that the cleaner dissolved the latex glove! EEK!
Then because of said glove-melting I was afraid that some chemical in the Bruce's would combine with the Rejuvenate and cause a noxious gas that would kill me so I washed the floors again with Murphy's Wood Soap. Thankfully that seemed to cut down the smell as well.
After the floor was dry I put a microfiber cloth on my Swiffer, poured a little bit of Rejuvenate on the floor and slowly spread it across like painting (once you cover the surface, move on, don't rub it in). It was the fastest and easiest part of the job. The best part is that the floors look AWESOME. If I remember right the Rejuvenate was maybe $15, the Bruce's floor cleaner $5 and the Murphy's was $1.50 so for less than $20 my floors look almost as good as the newer ones. You can see in the before picture some of the scratches on the wood, and it seems the wood looks darker in the second. And can you see the reflection of the front door in the floor????
So there you have it, what I did during my Thanksgiving vacation, because nothing says Thanksgiving like updating wood floors and steam-cleaning carpets! Can't imagine what we'll be able to accomplish during Christmas vacation...
So far I've focused more on the clothing side of savvy shopping. Today I will do a post on one of our recent savvy home improvement projects. Homeschooling means LOTS of books, combine that with the Superstars' need to keep all their leisure reading books on the floor of their bedrooms, in their bed, under their bed and in their closets (regardless of having had bookshelves in their respsective rooms) we figured we could kill two birds with one stone with a wall of built-ins in the bonus room.
With a few ready-made MDF bookshelves from Big Lots (2 for $50) we were able to built this bookshelf in one weekend...well, uh, two weekends if you count the trim work we still have to do to finish it off!
AS A NOTE: this project is great for both a homeowner seeking to improve their home's value or for someone who leases or rents and needs the storage but A) doesn't want to spend a lot and B) can't make permanent changes to the house. No carpet was ripped out, and besides a few holes in the wall for securing the shelves, it will be easy to take out when it's time to move on and made to look "normal" again with just a little spackle and paint. If you can't paint because of the renter rules, you can always use the backboard pieces that come with this kind of shelf. We opted not to because we felt it looked more "built-in" with paint.BEFORE
This was the empty space at the back of our bonus room where we had put a little play area for the girls. The cabinet and the kitchen set were thrift store finds that I paid less than $20 for...for both! I'll do a segment on that on a later blog.
Usually $29.99 each, they were on sale 2 for $50. As a bonus, we got the 5th bookshelf for $25 too, which isn't always a gimme. Sometimes they will only give you the discount if you buy the amount specified.
I loaded all 5 bookshelves in my van and drove home. They were easy to assemble and I was able to finish it all off in about an hour. All it took was my mini battery powered screwdriver.
The bookshelf came unassembled in a long, heavy thin boxes (top left of picture). Don't pay extra to get them assembled. Besides the obvious pain of trying to get them all home, it's so easy to do that even my 3 year old was able to help.
The girls fought over the screwdriver were happy to help.
And in no time we had all five bookshelves propped up against the wall for show!
I painted the back wall with some white semi-gloss paint we had in the garage.
My husband fastened the bookshelves to the wall with L-brackets (so the girls couldn't pull them down should they decide to use the shelves as a ladder to get to books higher up).And Viola...built-book shelves for a fraction of the cost of custom made. Now all we have to do is add the trim at the top and bottom to make them look more finished.AFTER
This was a relatively easy project that I probably could've done without my husband's help, but it made it go much faster with his help...and of course my Superstars' help.
