Necessity is the Mother of Invention


Two days ago I wrote about Clean Freak on HGTV, and instead of just letting the days go by and considering ways to improve my overall organisation, I decided to start with some small stuff that would be very impactful for me in trying to create a more organized and clean environment. Today I went to The Container Store (my favourite store) to get lipstick holders originally. I ended up getting a few more things but they turned out to be major in my closet re-organization. I’m going to jump right into it! 🙂 (the first picture is what I bought).

Lipstick

I’m going to start with this because it’s what I went there for in the first place lol. I was eyeing a lipstick holder on Amazon but it was for 60 pieces. I thought no way! I don’t need that many and I went and started counting every single one of my lipsticks/lip glosses/lip balms and sure enough I had over 30 but I still didn’t want to buy the one for 60. So I checked online and The Container Store had one to hold 24 so I bought two after a friend suggested I do that with the possibility of stacking them. I can’t stack now because of the type I bought and the different heights of the products but at least now they’re neatly stored!

Belts/Scarves

As I said before I wanted to move my scarves to the accessory belt and get proper belt hanger for my belts. I bought two belt hangers today – one for my belts and one for my necklaces. I sorted my belts first as there are a few to get rid of that I never wore or liked. I also have a few belts that do not have anything for me to hook them with so I closed them up and put them on one of the rings with the scarves.

Jewellery

The lipstick holders were practically next to the jewellery stuff, and since I’ve been saying for years I need something to store my jewellery properly, I decided to have a little look at what was available. I bought a spinning bracelet holder, an earring rack and as I said before, a hanger for the necklaces. I haven’t transferred all of my necklaces as yet because I have a few that I no longer wear and I really want to sort through them. I still need to find something for my bangles but I just may end up getting one of these considering their shape. I wanted to go to Michaels to see if I could get creative and make up something on my own but laziness may get the better part of me. Below you will see a round mason jar with earrings on it and stuff on the inside. As I was taking pics today, I realised that before Pinterest, I was coming up with my own uses for mason jars outside of the kitchen! (This is what gave me the idea for the title of this post :)) Anyway I needed something else for the earrings as I had more than when i first started doing this and obviously all couldn’t fit. I cleaned out most of my kitchen cupboards Saturday and that’s when I’d placed this lovely vase on the dinning table with some other stuff to go somewhere else. I decided to use it because the earring holder I bought wasn’t able to accommodate all of my long earrings and store all of my costume rings on the inside (2 for 1 ;)). I was about to return it when I realised I still needed something for my studs so I decided to keep it (I know it looks scanty but I prefer long earrings and don’t want my studs laying around anymore).

These strips here are another piece of what this title is all about. I had bought a piece of this plastic (I never  remember the name of it) to hook my long earrings on just to keep them together. What I also did was cut smaller pieces to attach all of my earrings to when travelling. This way I know they’re all together and I don’t have to worry about the being scattered all over a bag.

I hope you enjoyed this little post as much as I enjoyed putting it together. 🙂

xx

DIY Attempt #1


Just over a week ago I made my first attempt at dressing my mason jars. I didn’t have everything that the blog post I used as a reference had but I had other things that I wanted to use. The idea actually came to me while my husband and I were out. Luckily he was driving and I whipped out my phone and made a note of the idea. I’d bought these two drawings/paintings from Ikea – basically black thick squiggly lines on a white background – and I bought two thick black frames to put them in, they were my inspiration along with this black and white print material that had several prints on it. Just like that, while in the car, this idea popped into my head – dress the mason jar in the material, add a bow and voilà! I felt so fussy with myself and even more importantly – inspired. I didn’t have doilies but this was a rather good substitute. I think I’ll be using this as either as a vase with some white flowers or to hold potpourri.

I’ve got my craft bag there and I’ll be jotting down ideas as they come but I’m very excited to keep up with these little projects. I got back into my cleaning mode today and did a killer job cleaning our guest bedroom today and I’m working really hard to get the dining room done as soon as possible – hopefully by the end of the week.

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I hope you enjoyed this little post and I look forward to sharing more DIY projects with you 🙂

xx

Interest/Pinterest


I can’t even tell you why I haven’t been blogging… I don’t know myself. I think I wasn’t very inspired recently. Nothing came to mind and as I have said before, I don’t like to blog just for the sake of it. I have been rather pensive recently and again, I don’t know about what. It’s like I went into a shell and everything that was floating around my head just wasn’t making sense either. This may sound very much like a ramble to you as it is sounding to me. A lot of noise but nothing is really being said. Don’t you have those days where you feel frazzled and when you take a minute you realize you don’t even know why you feel frazzled? Maybe it was one little thing that set you off or what you were anticipating was going to be stressful, wasn’t stressful, and you just held on to that emotion? I think I had a few of those, while enjoying the company of my husband. He’s been sick recently with this nasty bug that’s going around, coughing a lot and annoying me.. you know how men are when they get sick..

Yea… So I just enjoyed a quiet weekend with him and it was nice and relaxing. We went on two dates and Saturday’s included a movie (Safe House with Denzel Washington is a must see) :). I’ve also been extremely obsessed with Pinterest. I mean OBSESSED. Thankfully, it’s also awaken my deep love for all things craft and today I finally made it to Michael’s and got some stuff to start doing something! Lol. My prized purchase is my glue gun, and it looks so feminine and cute!

I can’t wait to start getting messy!! This website (also found on Pinterest) gave me plenty of ideas for mason jar decor ideas (I have plenty and I have found uses for them outside of the kitchen) but the one project I’m dying to start working on is using doilies on the jars to create candle votives.

Here is the tutorial for these Doily/burlap candle votives.

Craft is something I consider my true passion. Whenever we buy a home, I know I will have my little nook for all things art and craft. I find it to be very relaxing and it’s as therapeutic for me as writing. It also brings out the perfectionist in me and it can get quite frustrating but I’m always mostly please with the final product. I’m very thankful for that push to join Pinterest and I hope you guys join and enjoy as well! Look for me (symonef) and let’s get sharing!