Our little patio is nothing special. Until recently, we only had a couple of cheap, second hand patio chairs, a sand box for the kids, and our grill, which totally met our needs. However, with the warmer weather we’ve been having, I’ve been feeling the need to spruce things up. The only problem is that we don’t have a huge amount of money to throw into a patio makeover. We are currently saving for a few other big projects inside of the house, so I had to do a patio update on a tiny budget.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a before photo, but you really aren’t missing out on much. These chairs were super cheap to buy and after a couple of years of use, the seats had started to fade and look weird.

So, I grabbed a few cans of Rust-oleum Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint and went over all parts of each chair. I was a tiny bit worried that the paint would effect the feel of the seats, but they are exactly the same to the touch as they were before painting. Plus, changing up the color really makes the outdoor space feel so much different and saved us from having to buy new chairs. Woohoo!

Here they are still drying, but I think they turned out pretty nice.

I also found some cool indoor/outdoor globe string lights at Target that I thought could be fun for the patio. (Dollar Spot for the win!) I wasn’t crazy about the blue color, so I grabbed some ping pong balls from the dollar store and changed them out for a more neutral look.

To add the ping pong balls, I used a craft knife to cut an X into each ball and then inserted a bulb into each. Easy peasy.

The striped lumbar pillows were a last minute idea. The fabric is from Ikea and I was hoping to cover some existing placemat pillows. Sadly, I measured everything incorrectly, so I had to wing it and sacrifice a couple of old throw pillows to stuff these. They turned out cute though, right?

As for accessories, I grabbed our pegboard luminary and added a few other items from around the house. I love this pretty, yet simple, vignette.

In all, I think we spent about $30 total on this update, with the cost of paint and the little bulb lights. Not bad, huh? Although this is not the patio makeover of our dreams, I think it will totally make our time outdoors a bit more enjoyable. What do you think?

With all of the horrible things happening daily in the news, every now and then, we can all use a reminder that there are still good people in this world. This is my story about a very wonderful stranger I had the pleasure of meeting.

Last summer while shopping a garage sale, I purchased an awesome vintage crate. I had no real plan for it, but couldn’t just leave it sitting there. As I was walking to my car, a very nice lady who was just walking up asked if I knew if there were more of the same at the garage sale. She was looking for a few crates to use for her daughter’s vintage themed 1st B-day party. I told her I didn’t think there were, but if she wanted to buy the one I had just purchased off of me for the same price I paid, I would be more than happy to sell it to her. (As I really didn’t need it in the first place and wasn’t quite sure how I was going to explain bringing another crate in our home to my husband.) She took my offer and the crate went to a good home with an actual purpose in mind for it. As I was helping her load her car, she showed me a beautiful old bassinet she had just snagged at another sale. She was planning on using it for the b-day party as a place to put the gifts. I told her how much I loved it. We chatted for a few minutes about the b-day party plans and I shared with her that Erin and I have a blog together. She ask if I would be interested in the bassinet once she was done with it. Of course, I told her YES!

Several months later I received this email from her:

Hi Emily-
This might sound strange, but I met you at a garage sale this summer. (You let me buy from you the crate that you just purchased.)
As we were leaving I showed you an antique pink bassinet. You gave me your website and said you might be interested in this item.
Now, months later, it’s sitting in my garage and taking up space. It is free to you if you can come pick it up.
Let me know if interested, thanks!

I had completely forgotten about the bassinet until I had heard from her. I was so excited! I made arrangements with her immediately and picked up my new bassinet.

Once I got it home, I realized the pink was pretty and all, but it didn’t exactly match the decor in my home. So, it was makeover time.

First, I mixed up a white-wash of equal parts white paint and water. It took three coats of this concoction to rid this entire piece of pink. Honestly, I chose to white-wash it vs. painting it because I was also white-washing another project simultaneously and laziness kicked in.

Finally, I let it dry and it was done. Ah, a neutral color to decorate with. Yay!

This basket has already had a few purposes in our home.

We used it to keep Christmas gift out of the reach of little hands. You may have seen this in our Christmas Home Tour.

After that, it became storage for Christmas tissue paper, bows, and embellishments.

Currently we are using it as a planter for a few extra veggies that didn’t fit in our garden.

I am not sure what the future will hold for this antique bassinet, but I will always hold this sweet gesture from a complete stranger close to my heart.

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This month it is my turn to share a project for The Home Depot Gift Challenge. As you may remember, a group of bloggers, including us, purchase a selected item from The Home Depot and then use it to create a gift (which is also wrapped with a product from THD.) A few of our past projects were an Industrial Book Rack, a Wood Box Caddy, and a Pegboard Luminary. I found this month’s item extremely inspiring. So, I decided to take a plain wood board to a new level with this 2×4 artwork.

First, I cut slices off of this month’s chosen item, a 2×4, with a miter saw. Ah, power tools! Gotta love them.

Next, I used my mouse sander to smooth out the edges of every single wood piece.

I arranged each slice on the backing of an Ikea Ribba picture frame, measured and marked the outline of where the framing would land with a pencil. This way I knew where to make additional cuts so my design would fit in the frame.

Then, each slice was attached to the backing with Loctite 375 Pro Line Heavy Duty Adhesive.

After that, getting the color just right was a bit more work than anticipated. I stained the wood, sanded it, sanded it some more, gray washed it, sanded it, sanded it again and rubbed stain on it one more time. A lot, right?

But, it was all worth it in the end.

Finally, I printed out a mirror image of the word “hello” on white card stock and used an x-acto knife to carefully cut it out. I attached the letters with tape to the wood slice design. This way it can be easily changed is desired.

I love how this turned out. Who knew you could make such fun artwork from a 2×4?

Be sure to check out the other wonderful projects a part of The Home Depot Gift Challenge this month!